The second interview

McKinley and I are sitting in his apartment in Detroit. Although trying to get the interview done is proving a little difficult as he keeps getting phone calls from Eddie and Brian Holland, with whom he is working on some arrangements.

But also it is a joy to sit and watch him work; the phone goes, his wife Carol calls from the other room, 'it's Brian for you, McKinley'. A conversation then starts about the tune and McKinley says 'Well I thought it could go some thing like this'; then he lays the phone next to a small keyboard and plays a small passage of music.

At this point the conversation gets excited, as both Brian and McKinley start to share ideas. The conversation then ends with him saying 'OK I'll keeping working on that'.

He then turns back to me, with a big smile on his face and say's 'where were we, you know you're making me think about things I haven't thought about in years'.

I ask him about the ESP album he did with Popcorn.

I tell him, that this is one of my personal favourites and with a little coaching he starts to reel off the track titles, a little like someone looking at a childhood family photo and, bit by bit, naming everyone in the picture.

'Going out to the west coast was so much fun and working on that project with my friend Popcorn, but you know I haven't seen that much of him since he left and came back to Detroit'.

I tell him that I'm off to see Richard later and he asks if he can tag along. He also asks if I can let him have a cd with the album on it, as he has hardly any of the music he worked on back then and in many cases hasn't heard them since they were recorded.

music: "Speak On It" - The Politicians (Hot Wax album track)

Continued