Lachi/Ian: The Art of Two Entertainers in the Music Industry

Welcome to Disability Matters with your host Joyce Bender. All comments, views, and opinions expressed on the show are solely those of the host, guest, and callers. Now the host of Disability Matters, here's Joyce Bender.

And hello everyone, welcome to the show to everyone in the United States, North America, all around the world. We have listeners in 17 countries. And you know what's amazing? It's always 17, but they keep changing countries. I don't know, this must be the magic number for listeners in countries from Australia to Mongolia. How about that? China and Russia. I mean, we have just Great listeners. And I just want to thank you, everyone around the world. Even if there's only one of you in Saudi Arabia, which I saw that one of you can make a difference in so many lives. Just one of you. One. So thank you. I mean it. I love all of you and everyone in the United States. And here I go. Special shout out to Yoshiko Dart. Yoshiko, you know I love you. I love you, and I think about you every time I do a show. I do have to thank Highmark because they are the lead sponsor of this show and have been, uh, just such a great, such a great company, uh, so wonderful and so exciting today. Because guess what? I have a famous star. Oh yeah, hopefully she'll still talk to me when she's had so many Grammys and is just flying so high. I'll be in the audience saying, Lachi, do you remember me? Lachi, remember who I am? That's what is going to happen, uh, and she is an award-winning international touring creative artist and personality. She is the president of the United States recognized RAMP.org. I turned on the TV one day, I'm not kidding you, and there's this movie and I look, I said, oh my God, that's Lachi. Lachi's in that. And then I turn on Good Morning America.

Oh my God.

That's Lachi. So like, when I tell you, you're lucky because you're getting to hear her before she becomes so famous, famous, famous that, as I said, I'll just be a little peon. I'll be out there saying, I still love you, Lachi. Remember me when you were on my radio show? Not to mention, we have James Ian Singer. Songwriter, instrumentalist, poet, and writer, both as guests on the show today. And I want to welcome both of you. Lachi, how are you?

Lachi, I am so good, and I am just so humbled by that intro. You know I'll always take your call, Joyce Bender.

It's true, but I'm doing—

I'm doing well.

You know, I'm telling you, I turned on the TV and there you were in a movie. I thought, holy cow, I better get her autograph before she forgets about me.

Oh, stop, stop it, Joyce.

But now listen, I'm telling you, not only is she absolutely stunning, she's beautiful, uh, and has a lot of bling going on with her cane and everything else. Not only is she beautiful and intelligent, but she is a disability rights fighter with that fighting spirit, and that's what I love so much about her. So, Lachi, we're going to start with you. Um, I know the last time you were on, it was one of the most listened to shows, and people are still asking me questions about you. So how about if we hear your story from when you got going, why you got going, to the stardom that you're in right now?

Well, I'll keep this— first of all, I want to thank you so much for having me on this show again. It's always a pleasure speaking with you, and I really enjoyed, uh, the Judy tribute, the Judy Heumann tribute show you did a while back, and I was really honored to be a guest on that as well. Um, So, really quickly, my history is, you know, I'm Lachi, she/her. I'm a Black woman with cornrows. I identify as blind. And when I was younger, I remember being 8 years old and pointing at the TV and going, "Mommy, Mommy, I want to be that." But, you know, there weren't folks that looked like me or had my story or anything of that nature. And so, myself, my parents, my teachers, my friends, but honestly, more importantly, myself, couldn't to see how I would be able to get there. There was no one to put on my vision board to say, like, "I want to be that." While folks were trying to be Michael Jordan and other folks were trying to be other celebrities or athletes or, you know, famous broadcasters or anything, I didn't really have anybody to point to. And so, as I navigated through life, I decided, "You know what? I want to live my truth. I want to be able to succeed in this world." And I did a lot of hiding of my disability. I did a lot of trying to navigate the world legally blind and not using my cane, not advocating for myself. And what it really did was it really dampened my soul, my light, and my spirit. And so, as I started finding success in the music industry and started getting into bigger and better rooms, folks knew something was off but didn't know what it was. And I was tripping over wires, or I would miss late night, at the club, I would miss the big handshakes or the waves that I would need that could make or break a deal. And so, honestly, for my career and really for my own mental health and social health, I decided to step in front of my disability. And what that ended up doing— I mean, at first, it was just a fun factoid, and I was like, "Oh, I'm legally blind," and people were like, "Oh, okay." It helped me start getting accommodations. In the recording rooms that I was in. But more importantly, it helped me just be more confident. It helped me love myself more and want to stand up for myself more. And that energy became super duper infectious. And interestingly enough, as I was finding success in music, I started finding success in other areas because of the infectious energy and spirit I had for being so accepting just of who I am and being as authentic as one can be when they accept all parts of themselves, including that part that society tries to tell you you shouldn't accept. And that really blew up my career. I really have my acceptance of my disability to thank for getting me on this next level. I mean, I get these TV roles and these movie roles because of my authenticity with my disability. I get on these morning shows talking about my authenticity of my disability. And I get to work in these amazing studios with other names that I would have never dreamed of. But it's because I accepted my disability, stand in front of it, claim it as my identity, and I'm proud of it. And now that I do that for that 8-year-old girl that's sitting in front of the TV that says, I want to be that. I want to be this for her. That's me in a nutshell.

Wow. Wow. Wow. Yeah. You know what? Isn't it all about that authenticity and pride in who you are? No hiding. Just proud of who you are. I wanted to ask you, like, though, what gave you the courage to do that? Like, what made you decide, that's it, I'm gonna do this?

Well, it wasn't really like— it wasn't a defining moment, right? It was more of a growth, um, and it was a combination of— through— honestly, it was during COVID And during COVID we spent a lot of time with ourselves and getting to know ourselves. And I remember going through a phase of thinking, you know, I'm actually like a really dope chick, like I'm a cool person. Why am I hiding this from the world? Uh, my manager at the time, and I remember this very clearly, this is when I was still kind of hiding behind myself, he had said to me, he said, Lachi, I am a rich Jewish white guy with not a problem in the world, but I wake up in the morning and I'm 100% inspired by you and what you do. So if I'm frickin' inspired, you gotta get out there and let other people know how much fire and fight you have, because that's such an amazing story. Granted, I'm pretty sure he was just trying to get me to like up my, you know, ability to get booked for things, but it really hit me that what I have to say matters beyond just what I have to sing. And when I started doing it here and started doing it there and started speaking up about it in small places, it was a ripple effect of everybody wanting to know more. And so, again, it was just this spooling out of authenticity and this need for other people to want to be around it.

Well, I, I will tell you what, Lachi, you not only did it, I mean, you have an absolutely Beautiful voice, beautiful voice. Um, okay, James, I'm happy to have you on the show also. Um, what about you? What's your story? What's your story, James?

Thank you so much for having me, first of all. Um, so really appreciate that. And, uh, my story is I have a, um, physical disability. It's called spinal muscular atrophy. They are classified into various types. I am a Type 3, and I— my disability is progressive. And so, I was not diagnosed. I have had it my whole life. I was not diagnosed until I was like almost 15, kind of during like adolescence and puberty. It is typical for the disability to kind of show more symptoms. And so, I, you know, loved music from a really, really young age. I took piano starting at the age of 5 and really, really loved music. I was a big fan of like Prince and Whitney Houston and Janet Jackson and folks like that. And so that is kind of what made me want to be a musician. And so I took piano, practiced the craft for a while, and then when I was around 11 or 12, I really wanted to play basketball. And so I kind of stopped doing the piano thing for a bit and started doing sports. And with sports, you know, I was disabled, but I could, you know, do many of the things that my non-disabled peers could do, but I still, you know, showed signs of the SMA. And so I definitely had difficulty kind of like keeping up and performing, you know, very well on the basketball court. And so, you know, did that. And then around the age of 15, started to show more signs. I got my diagnosis and, you know, like Lachi, I, you know, I really wanted to, you know, be an athlete and then also a musician. And with a disability, I was like, well, the athlete thing is not happening, but would love to be a musician. And I didn't see anyone that was disabled, you know, that was a musician really doing what I wanted to do because the media had terrible portrayals of disability. And so, I got the message that I couldn't do it. And so, you know, I just kind of shut myself off from the world and really just did not really want to engage. And then I ended up going to college. And I really, really got really, really heavily into music as kind of like a therapeutic thing. It really just helped me express my feelings about being disabled. And, you know, it kind of helped me kind of navigate the world. And so I joined a band. I joined a band as a drummer, actually. I sang my whole life, but joined a band as a drummer. Then I joined a different band as a singer and a keyboardist. And then that is kind of, kind of just kind of what kind of really, really solidified my kind of role as a musician. And then when I was in law school, I was in the band and we were doing some touring. And so that really, really just made me really, really want to be a musician even more. And so I actually started to talk about my disability from the stage. I fell down on stage a couple of times and used that to kind of talk to people about my experience, and it just really, really resonated with the crowds. And so I was like, oh, this is, this is the sign that I am on the right path. And so that is what, that is what kind of, you know, drove me to where I am today.

Joyce Bender Well, you know what? I have an employee, uh, with the same disability. Oh wow. So yeah, when it's— so that when he grew up, like same age, around, I don't know, 12 or 13 is when he started seeing, uh, the, the degenerative changes. And of course then he was in a wheelchair, uh, in a few years later. But, um, I love your story. I do. I love your story. And I wanted you to share with our listeners about your song Spaces. You know, when I was reading about it, it was saying it's a first of a kind recording. What does that mean?

Yes. So thank you, Joyce Bender. Spaces actually was a song that was from start to finish. It was first of its kind in that it was created with all— by people that all have SMA, various types of SMA. And so, I was the, you know, the songwriter on that and was lucky enough to be tapped to sing that. But essentially, we came up with the song in a group brainstorm. It was sponsored by the company Genentech. They brought all of us together. We had like this really cool brainstorming session where We talked about what we wanted to say in the song. It was me and I think about 12 other folks who have SMA. And so then I kind of took the notes from that brainstorm. I boiled it into a song. I worked with 2 other recording industry professionals. And so we kind of took my song, you know, made some tweaks and edits to kind of get it to a radio-friendly place. And then re-recorded it one day at a very, very well-known historic studio in Hollywood. And the next day we shot the video. And the video was actually directed and conceptualized by a person with SMA named Dominick Evans. Dominick Evans is a very, very brilliant writer and director. And so Dominick actually was on an iPad directing from his home in Michigan while we shot the video in LA. So I think Dominick actually set a record for being the first person to direct a video remotely. But the video stars people with SMA. And so, it's first of a kind in that start to finish, it was all, you know, it's by the SMA community, which is really, really, really, really cool. The video and the song have had lots of success. So, just very proud to have been a part of that.

Nothing about us without us, right?

Yes, exactly.

Amen.

So, how did you meet Lachi?

So, Lachi and I, I believe Lachi and I met on like a research project either in 2020 or 2021. And it was like a virtual thing. And we just kind of connected. I remember Lachi was like, "Jaden, you have a really great voice." Like, and so that is kind of how we connected. And Lachi, I always thought was brilliant just from, you know, I had been seeing, you know, posts and things from Lachi, you know, for a little bit before then. And I was like, oh, man, like very, very honored for you to say that. Love your work, Lachi. And so Lachi actually asked me to become a RAMP member when she was first forming RAMP. And that is how we connected.

Wow, what a great thing and what a great way to meet because that is such an exciting, such an exciting project. And you know, Lachi, before we move on, I was going to ask you over the past year and a half what, what you think happened to catapult your career as much. And I would have to say one of the people was Judy Heumann.

Mm-hmm. Are you kidding? So absolutely. So, I mean, I know we're going to talk a bit later about the song Lift Me Up. I was just listening to it before we got on this call, and I was just so energized. I mean, you know, the song is in tribute to Judy Heumann. I, in 20— about, I believe it was 2018, I watched Drunken History right around the time when I was sort of struggling with my disability identity. I had recently got a diagnosis that while I always had low vision, I would go from low vision to no vision over the course of several years. And so I was struggling with my disability identity, and I saw the Drunken History episode about Judy Heumann, and that was the first I'd heard of Judy Heumann and how she was this badass and everything like that. And I was like, I was like, whoa, wait a minute, rewind. I watched it like 5 times. And I drank along with it. And so it was an interactive good time. And so at the end of the day, and it was, you know, I had this thing in my head like this Judy person, this Judy person. But I hadn't really taken the leaps and the bounds. But one day I got a tweet from Judy, actually. She like DM tweeted me. And back when it was called Twitter, right, as opposed to whatever it is now. And she, she said, "I love your music. You are really, you know, great, and I'd love for your music to be part of my podcast." And I was like, "Oh my gosh, this is the lady from the thing that I just saw!" And it was so great. And she, you know, we finally met, and she was just such a badass. She was— I've been all my life, I'd been looking for a role model for a badass woman who is a leader, who is proud of their disability, and I had finally freaking found it. And I was like, I remember telling her, I was like, "Judy, you messed up, 'cause I'm gonna be bugging you all the time for advice and la la la." And she was like, "You have no idea who I am." And I didn't. I didn't realize how much she would actually just call me. And she called me all the time, like at any hour of the day, it didn't really matter. A lot of times she'd make me sing to her, and sometimes she made me sing to James a lot, which was— we were her singer friends. So she'd call us up, put us on speaker, and make us sing or whatever. It was great. But we would also talk about— she was the first person I asked. She was the first person in the disability community that I asked about Ramped, saying, I want to start this thing. What do I do? She immediately gave me some advice. She hooked me up with a bunch of folks that she said that I needed to know. She actually hooked me up with Day Al-Mohamed, who actually directed our music video. She had hooked me up with Jim LeBrecq, right, the creator of Crip Camp, who, um, he and I right now are working on a remix to the song, which is going to come out in just a bit. And she just— she's a connectrovert. And I have, like you said earlier, you know, I've had music talent, and, you know, I'm congenial, and there's a lot of things, um, that I already kind of have. But one thing that Judy really, really gave me was this idea of connecting people, was this idea of not fearing connecting people and seeing that as a strength and a power. In the disability community, there are a lot of silos. There are a lot of folks that want to protect their, you know, "Ooh, I can't believe I just got into this room and I just met this person. I want to protect my status." Judy saw things the opposite. If she saw that Person A and Person B could benefit from knowing each each other, she would immediately hook them together. And I was like, I want that. That's what I want. And it has propelled— that is that thing. That is what has propelled my career. Because if you come to Lachi, you already know Lachi knows a lot of folks. So if you go, hey, Lachi, I'm working on this, you know, can you help me out with something? You know that I know someone that can help you. And that's power. That's very powerful, especially in the music industry. So here I am giving away all my secrets, but honestly, the secret is not only to be authentic, but honestly to connect folks and to lift folks up, because then you'll find your— as soon as someone gets something, they want to take you with them, especially if that getting something is very genuine, honest, and true. And that is what I learned from Judy. And so I will say that it really is Judy that has helped shape my disability journey, um, which helped in my meteoric rise in on the music side of things as well.

Yeah, uh, you know what, uh, Lachi, I have— I knew Judy since like 1998, and okay, uh, and, and I immediately we became friends. And when she passed away, I was devastated, as I know you were, because she's Judy.

I mean, yeah, right, right.

She's Judy. And, and, and she, as you said, was the great connector. She really was. She was just a phenomenal, uh, person. And her spirit will live on always, no doubt about that. I, I taught a class— spoke, actually at an event today and talked about IDEA, and I talked about Judy. And that movie, if you haven't seen Crip Camp, you are really missing out. I mean, that is such a great movie. So that's awesome that you have Jim LeBrecht working with you, you know, on that video. That is really, really tremendous. But Judy helped you. I'll tell you one Judy story. In 1999, I received the President's Award at the White House from President Clinton. Yeah, for the work I was doing, because the people I placed when I first started the company, because I only place people with disabilities, and when I started They were all in IT, the first group of people, which is why I won the award. Because back then, people with disabilities were only working in like factories, bagger at a grocery store, those type of jobs. I even remember, Lachi, I remember someone telling me, oh, you think you've done a lot. Well, I have. 400 people working for me in this facility. I said, wow, yeah, they're blind and they're making coat hangers.

Oh God.

Yeah, so you see what I see.

And, and so, yeah, and like, and reckons that, and you know, they would see something like that as some sort of feat, as some sort of positive thing, like, oh well, at least I'm helping.

And it's like, uh, it's like slavery. And it's like, not— yeah, it's terrible. But anyway, Judy was there. So I would speak someplace and I would say, oh my God, Judy Newman's here. And I go through this big thing if she was in the audience and I would go on and on. And then she would say, oh, but she's the queen because she got the President's Award. I know what Judy was— what Judy was like is she was always trying to like uplift other people. Do you know what I mean? She was always like that when she on her own was a living legend. I mean, she, you know, I just can't say enough about Judy. She was just absolutely awesome. And I'm so happy that she helped you with R.A.M.P.T. So what does it mean? How does it help musicians with disabilities? And then I want to know, how it felt to walk down that red carpet at the Grammys.

Hahaha. Well, you know, firstly, the whole thing about Ramped is, well, people like James Ian, people like Galen Lee, people like just so many amazing artists and music professionals have been out here really making a name for themselves, but in an isolated way. Right, just because of the stigmas and folks not being accommodating. And of course, in the music industry, a lot of it is about machismo and/or who you know, which, as you've mentioned, is kind of anathema to the disability community because it's so hard to get access to spaces to get to have that network. And it's so difficult to— there is a lot of self-acceptance that you have to have internally, and that's just really difficult in a machismo-driven industry. So because I was just doing so much within the Grammys and the Recording Academy— I am a board member now. At that time, I was an advocacy committee leader, so they saw my leadership and they were giving me power. And I said, okay, this is great, but what are we doing about disability and accessibility? And they were just like, "Well, you know, what would you like us to do?" Because they didn't have anything in place yet. And they were good and welcome. It was 2020, so it was post-COVID. It was like during COVID and they were ready to, you know, have the discussion. And so I had them have it. And what that ended up leading to is me going, "We actually are going to have to have an entity that can speak to folks like the Recording Academy as an entity, like an entity-to-entity talk." so that we're not just a bunch of artists or a bunch of folks who work in different various places in the corporate structure of the music industry just trying to come together. We need to officiate this. And that's how RAMPT was born. And RAMPT stands for Recording Artists and Music Professionals with Disabilities. I mean, it is the— one of the things I'm proudest about with RAMPT is the acronym. I mean, it's just too good. Really what we are is we're a network of music professionals who have disabilities, neurodiversities, chronic conditions, mental health conditions, are deaf, have rare diseases, who work in any shape or form in the music industry. You can be an artist, you can be an engineer, you could be like a stage manager, but you could also be a booking agent or an artist manager, or you could be an administrator or an executive at a music firm. Really, If music runs through your blood as a career, then you are welcomed at Ramped. And the beauty of Ramped is that we are disabled-led, so our leadership has disabilities. The majority of our staff have disabilities. We prioritize that our leadership are women and BIPOC, LGBTQ, etc., so that we can really stay in line with disability justice. The reason we do that is because when we look at music, a lot of times people look at music and they're like, "Oh, a poor guitarist that's a starving artist." When they look at disability, they see the same thing. They're like, "Oh, bless their heart. They made it across the street." Inspiration porn, etc. Musicians or music professionals with disabilities have that dual double crosshair of pity. This is why we make sure that we're disabled-led. That we're amplifying disability culture in a very competitive way. Because when we think about disabled musicians, a lot of times it's the parents going like, "Oh, I want my child to have like an instrument." So we're like, "You know what? No, we're not coming at it from that angle. We're coming at it as professionals who are a professional affinity network, and that affinity is disability. But we are competitive. We are your colleagues, your peers, and you need to watch out for us because we are out here and what we have that you do not have is that we have built-in leadership because we know how to navigate a world that was not built for us. We have built-in out-of-the-box thinking, creativity, problem-solving. We are able to win at life on hard. That is what we have. That is the story we share in our minds and bodies and spirits when we put those through force in our art and in our music and in our words and our perspective. Perspectives, and it deserves to be celebrated. I mean, as you can see, I get really emotional here because I just, I so believe in our mission and that it's going to be culture and music that really honestly infiltrates at a granular level sort of the popular culture mindset as it pertains to disability narratives. And it so shines through in our song Lift Me Up that I did with the amazing, talented, beautiful, wonderful singer James Ian. I can't believe that you remember me, James, that I said that. That's so beautiful.

Thank you a lot. Yeah, my memory is, uh, it's very good. It scares people sometimes.

So, love you.

Well, James, what do you think about Ramped?

Oh, I think, I think RAMP is incredible. It is just, it is so cool to see the amount of success the organization has had in such a short period of time. I mean, it was 2 years ago, you know, I remember being on like one of the first RAMP meetings, summer of 2021. And I remember Lachi telling me about like, hey, I am going to start this thing. Would you want to be a part of it? So, it is just I am blown away by the success. I am blown away by How Lachi is a connector like Judy, you know, like she really, really wants to bring people together. She wants to bring opportunities to people and she wants to work with other disabled artists. And so I think there is— it is a very, very unique organization. There is nothing like it. I am very, very proud to be a part of it. And it is just— I am just so happy for Lachi and the founders and the folks who are involved because it is really, really cool. It has become something that like I said, in a very short period of time, a lot of people want to be a part of. You know, it's like the cool kids club is what RAMP is to me for disabled musicians. And so I'm just really, really blown away by it and what they've been able to accomplish. And the future is very, very bright for RAMP. So happy to be a part of it.

Well, that is awesome. And I have a few more questions about that, but right now We're going to break, and if you just joined us, we— oh, you're, you're gonna love it because we're talking to Lachi, recording artist, superstar, and James Ian, new singer-songwriter, instrumentalist, poet, and writer. As Lachi said, with a beautiful voice coming from her, that is a compliment. This is Joyce Bender, America's Voice, where disability matters, at voiceamerica.com. Don't go away, we'll be right back with Lachi and James Ian.

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You're listening to Disability Matters. If you have a question or comment, Call in toll-free at 1-866-472-5788. That's 1-866-472-5788. Now please welcome back the host of Disability Matters. Here's Joyce Bender.

Welcome back, everyone. And if you just joined us, oh, you're gonna say, oh my gosh, I have to go listen to that full show on demand because we have Lachi. I love just saying that name. Lachi. We have Lachi and James Ian, singer-songwriter, instrumentalist. Lachi, recording superstar. She's still talking to me. She hasn't become so famous yet that like I'm a little peon out there. She's receiving a Grammy. I'll be saying, remember me, remember me, you were on my radio show. But I'll have to get around all the paparazzi. In order to do that. Hey, James and Lachi, you were talking about RAMPED, which is so exciting. I wanted to ask you, Lachi, what would you say, in your opinion, are some of the biggest achievements that have happened because of RAMPED?

Sure. Yeah. Well, So, RAMPed was, you know, RAMPed has been fortunate enough to win several awards and be recognized for our work. We've been recognized by the United Nations Zero Project. We've been recognized by the Music Business Association. We received an award, which I'm also really proud of because they see us as a music industry organization, right, and not a disability organization. And that's a very powerful thing. But I want to— I mean, obviously, our partnership with the Recording Academy is probably one of our biggest and most visible things. We're able to partner with the Recording Academy to make the Grammys more accessible, and we were able to get ASL, American Sign Language, on the red carpet. We were able to advocate for audio description, captioning,, and a ramped accessible stage. So if you watch the Grammys, there's this little circular dais in the front. That's actually a ramp accessible stage that we advocated for. Um, it was the stage that Kim Petras used in her big Fire Dance show. Um, but frankly, you know, it's there so that a wheelchair user or anyone who would need a ramp can see themselves potentially winning a Grammy. It's a cultural statement. We also— we've also partnered with Netflix to be able to provide some development programming for composers and songwriters. So that was another really big get. Obviously everybody knows about Netflix, but what was really important about that is we were able to get a lot of our songwriters and composers to speak to Netflix leadership, and that was through Ramped as well. We were able to put together Ramped Ramped Records, which is a record label that releases collaborations from ramped professionals. So we were able to release Lift Me Up because Lift Me Up is a collaboration of artists with disabilities. We released it through Ramped Records. Ramped Records right now is distributed through United Masters, which is a really great release platform, releases tons of major artists. And we have some really great numbers. We have upwards of— are we at 800 yet? I believe we have around 800 community members right now. And you yourself can become a community member. You don't actually have to be a musician to be a part of the community. And you can just sign up, make a profile, join the newsletter, start engaging on some of our internal network. But we are growing. We're growing really fast. So that's nothing to sneeze at. And I think the last thing now is that, I mean, we have— now that we have staff and some things in place, and now that we have like a great executive committee and leadership board, we are able to start building out our own advisory board, which is what we're going to start doing. And then the last thing I will say is that we did receive Ford support. So we received support from the Ford Foundation, which we're really proud of, and we received it from their arts and culture grant. And I just, to me, I'm always just so excited when we are seen for our arts and our creativity and our impact on culture. So those are a lot of the really cool things that RAMP's been up to and some of the really great recognitions we've been receiving.

Oh, that is awesome. Awesome. Well, this takes me to something When I heard you sing Lift Me Up, oh, that just really got, really got to me. That is so beautiful. Um, everyone has to download this. Actually, you should download anything and everything Lachi has out there. And I want you to do me a favor. I want you to tell everyone you know about this show, because as you know, You can hear it on Spotify, Amazon, Apple, VoiceAmerica.com, BenderConsult.com, and really almost all the other social media. You've got to share this, tell everyone about it. We want to support Lachi and James. So Lachi, let's hear about Lift Me Up.

Sure. Yeah. And I want to firstly give a huge shout-out to James for a lot of the music that you have been putting out as well, and a lot of the work that you have been doing, really blending your advocacy with your music. James was also a Judy favorite. Was he? Yeah. Yeah, of course. James was also a Judy favorite. And Judy would make me sing happy birthday to James on speaker on James's birthday, and vice versa. I truly believe we were her singer friends and she was just kind of pitting us against each other on speakerphone so that she could have her own personal American Idol competition. I don't know. But it was only natural that, you know, when Judy passed away and, you know, the only way I could find some kind of solace was at the piano, and I started writing. And it was only natural for James and I to come together and write a song together for Judy. And thank goodness for that, because it's such a beautiful duet. Gaylen Lee, who had also known Judy, wanted to be a part of the project as well. As, you know, she heard of it and she was just like, "I want to get involved." She's also a Ramps member, touring artist.— and then we— and she's a wheelchair user. Then we got the call from April Rose, also another Ramped artist who has a chronic condition, calls in and says, "I want to help you guys songwrite because you guys are just writing about your feelings, but we got to make sure this is a pop song." So she's actually signed to BMG, so we were like, "Okay, well, she knows what she's talking about." And as this project kept growing, Kulick, who is a half-deaf mastering engineer who's worked with like Sony and this and that, again, also a Ramps member, said, "I'm here to master and mix your project. Let's do this." So this song started kind of getting out of hand with how much, you know, the community was getting involved in creating it. And then it was like, well, now that this song is larger than all of us, let's have a music visual. The minute someone said, "Let's have a music video," my first thought went to Deh El-Mohamed, who, again, Judy had introduced me to, who's a blind film director. She was working at the White House, and she was just leaving her term at the White House. As soon as the White House door was closing behind her, I jump in front of her and go, "Boy, have I got the project for you." She jumps on board. We bring in— so that she could direct. We bring in Kat Rubines Stevens, who has done a bunch of the Disability Film Challenges and won a ton of them. So we brought her on to co-direct. So they directed the video together. And we thought that it would be an amazing visual if we actually had sign language front and center so that we could really nod to disability and deaf culture. So instead of having disability instead of having an ASL interpreter in a box in the corner, we wanted to have it front and center. And so we ended up having Nell Russell and Otis Jones, who are both TikTok stars in the deaf community, as well as Amber Galloway, who is also a viral hard-of-hearing artist. The three of them performed ASL while James Galen and I— James Galen and I were projected on screens behind them. And it ended up turning out so beautiful. But we wanted to go even further. While this is great for deaf viewers, what about blind viewers? So we ended up adding a stint of audio description at the beginning of the video. And we were like, who should we get to do it? And we ended up getting Tony Award-winning singer, Ali Stroker. And Ali and I are friends. Yeah, she's great. I mean, we're friends and everything, but the beauty of it is that the first time I ever heard about Judy was through Drunken History, and Ali Stroker was playing her. So she was cast as her, and it was just so full circle and beautiful. And everyone just kept saying yes to this idea. Uh, MTV was like, we are going to premiere this on MTV.com. Google said, "We want to help support this in any way," and they put it on all of their channels. We released it in July, which is Disability Pride Month. And this is a particularly beautiful year because it's 50 years of the Rehabilitation Act, which was passed in 1973, heavily resultant from her work with her sit-ins and her crawls and everything that she put together. So we're celebrating 50 years of the Rehab Act. We're celebrating Disability Pride. And so BET Soul started playing the song. We got the song to kind of go have a nice little viral moment. It got support from Coldplay and other big artists. It ended up getting 2 million— what are the numbers, James? There's like 2 million on TikTok, you know, 160,000 on YouTube, and just so many big numbers that we couldn't have imagined.— because, and we're getting radio play. We're, I believe, number 44 right now, as of the taping of this show, or as of the discussion of this show. We are number 44 on the adult contemporary charts on radio. And then, apparently, we're also being picked up by Christian radio.

Oh my gosh, that is awesome!

That is awesome!

Yeah, I mean, the song is blowing up, and it's just—

it started out with just the two of us wanting to write a song to celebrate our beautiful friend.

Wow, wow. Now, okay, so our listeners, if they go to Spotify, they can download— what, do you have an album there, or what do you have? CD search list on Spotify?

It's a single.

Download your music, right?

Yes, if you go to Spotify and you just search Lift Me Up or you search Lachi, it's right there. It's a single, it's not a full album, it's just a single, uh, but it is a larger-than-life song. You can find it on Spotify, YouTube, SoundCloud, like wherever you get your music, it's there.

Okay everyone, you know what you have to do, right? You've got to go download Lift Me Up. You will not be disappointed. Lachi, I have a song for you to work on.

Ready? Uh-oh.

Here's what it's going to be, okay? I'm not handicappable. I'm not handicapped. I'm not diverse ability. I'm not differently able. I'm not special needs. I am a woman with a disability.

Yeah, I've been on, I've been on this crusade, uh, about specifically about differently abled. I don't know, I just can't stand it because it's like, what? Why is it that only people with disabilities are differently abled? Are people without Disabilities, normal-abled, right?

You know who was adamant about this was Judy. Judy hated when people— she would say, I am a woman with a disability. It is not the Americans with Differently Abled Act. And why, you know, and why are you relabeling us? You know, because basically what it means is it's a bad word. We don't want to say that word. And then when they say, oh, that's what the employees with disabilities want— no, it isn't. It's what you want. It's what you want. You need to stop doing that. And I know I've heard you talk about that also, Lachi, and I'm always so proud when I hear you or read about you talking about that. That is awesome.

So, well, I think— yeah, yeah, thank you, thank you. I'll work on that song. James, you wanna, you wanna, if you wanna join me on working on that song, we'll do it. You heard it here, folks.

Yeah, you can make that, uh, really rappy-oriented there, James and LaChee. But you know what, that would be the biggest hit How many people with disabilities are there? Wait, 43 million. That would be the biggest hit with at least 1 million because, you know, I would have to advertise that everywhere. I get so mad when I go somewhere and they say, yes, this is our abilities ERG, and I'll say, why don't you say disabilities? And as you said, I hate that differently Abled. Oh, I hate that so much, but you wait, we've got a hit song coming out here. You wait, everyone. So, James, I have a question for you. Who is your role model?

Definitely Judy was one for sure. I met Judy probably 4 years ago. I went to Georgetown. For undergrad and law school. And I did an event at Georgetown about disability representation in media. I am also an actor as well. And I was a child actor. I was on a TV show as a lead in a BET series. So having Lift Me Up premiere on BET Soul or be aired on BET Soul was kind of like a full circle moment with my, with my BET involvement. Since a kid. But I met Judy at that event and we became really, really good friends. I performed, talked about disability representation. And so she and I just stayed connected every time I would go back to D.C. I am from the DMV originally. I would always meet up with Judy and just kind of hang out. And so, you know, I learned a lot from her as a role model, but she was just also a very, very, very good friend. To me and my family. And so Judy for sure is a big role model. I am a really big James Baldwin fan. I love, I have a James Baldwin shirt with one of his quotes on it that is one of my favorite quotes. So, like James Baldwin, I would say anyone who was doing the social justice work. Sam Cooke, Nina Simone, folks like that. And just in terms of From like a musical, just like a musical perspective, I am a big fan of like Prince, Toni Braxton, Whitney Houston, Stevie Wonder, like singers like that. So I think those are the folks I looked up to in terms of like musical aspirations. But just from like the social change perspective, those folks that I previously mentioned. And I will say, too, I think that Lachi had touched on this earlier. I think that art plays a really, really big, big role in bringing about social change. If you look at a lot of the movements throughout our history, art was at the forefront driving those movements. And so I kind of, kind of associate art with, you know, that social change as well. And so I really look up to people like that. So.

Joyce Bender: You know, you mentioned some of my absolute favorites, but you forgot Miss Patti LaBelle and Aretha. How could you forget them?

Sorry about that.

I do—

I love Patti. I love Patti. I love Anita Baker also. So, uh, you know, it's hard to list them all, but—

Well, Lachi is my favorite. And, uh, we have come to the end of the show. We have come to the end of the show. But I want you, L-A-C-H-I, yeah, go out, download Lift Me Up, download that song, and follow my new friend James Ian. Wow, what two stars today, folks. You got to follow them. We end every show with a quote, and here it comes. Wait for it. If I have to thank you for an accessible bathroom, when am I ever going to be equal in the community? Said Miss Judy.

Judy Human.

Oh yeah, it's all about Judy. All about Judy. So listen everyone, I will look forward to talking to you next week. Make sure you share this show. Wherever you are in the world, share it. And in the words of Mary Brooker, when you leave today, remember, choose joy.

Voice America would like to thank you for tuning in. Please join us next Tuesday at 11 AM Pacific time and 2 PM Eastern time for another installment of Disability Matters. Right here on the Voice America Variety Channel. We are the leader in live internet talk radio. VoiceAmerica.com.