By Joe Walker
People can be so unfaithful and so unreliable. You put your trust in them, you allow them access to your heart, and they smear black paint on it.
Some people try to get the paint off with alcohol, but that just poisons their system. Some might even try to eat it away, but that just makes them heavier and unhealthier.
Keyshia Cole uses pencil and paper, a microphone and an audience.
Keyshia Cole, a singer/songwriter from Oakland, CA has had her share of the unfaithful and unreliable. After catching her boyfriend red handed in the cookie jar, Keyshia went on a sugar free, fat free diet. She vowed to feed her blossoming music career instead of an untrustworthy Venus fly jock.
On her debut album "The Way It Is", Keyshia touches on several relationship subjects from various perspectives and creative outlooks. Her life has been a bevy of emotional tales that she plans to showcase in song.
TNCP – Why does it seem like situations such as the one you went through appear to be happening more and more? And do you think that the current state of music content and videos has anything to do with it?
Keyshia – Honestly … that’s just life. Sadly, that is the reason that some of us are here. We’re here to make money and do our thing, but if IT doesn’t happen with you it will with somebody else.
TNCP – Why do people want to deal with that pain? Some people just accept it. Then we have to hear it in our music. Why?
Keyshia – I don’t know. Sometimes that feels like that’s all we’ve got. You know? So we have to put it in our music because that’s what people feel and go through everyday. That’s why I had to sacrifice that situation because I had to do my thing with my music and my business.
TNCP – So once that was over you went straight to the recording booth?
Keyshia – Actually when I broke up with him I came down here to try to go to school or do something else. It just so happened that I met the right people.
TNCP – What were you going to school for?
Keyshia – To be a veterinarian.
TNCP – Is that something you think you will ever go back to?
Keyshia – Yeah. I’m going to go back and do that. One day I want to open up a chain of stores and veterinarian hospitals. But it takes like five years to become a veterinarian.
TNCP – Since you have knowledge of animals, compare the average man to an animal. And what type of animal would a man be?
Keyshia – A turtle …because men are slow. [Starts laughing] You guys are slow …
TNCP – A turtle? Slow … C’mon, Keyshia … not all men are slow.
Keyshia – [Still laughing] … y’all slow …
TNCP – Do you have any pets of your own?
Keyshia – Yep! He’s right here. He’s a Maltese – a doggy.
TNCP – Where did you draw inspiration for the songs on your album?
Keyshia – Just from me, from my heart. I drew them from my situation. There are like three songs on the album that I didn’t write, but they are from someone else who went through a situation like me. I normally don’t take songs from other people because I write from my heart about what I’ve experienced. I can’t write about someone else and their life.
TNCP – What is something that happens in your life that makes you get really emotional?
Keyshia – Men make me emotional. My business makes me emotional. And my doggy makes me emotional when I have to leave and be gone for two months and I can’t see him.
TNCP – What is something or a situation in your life that gave you an emotional high or low?
Keyshia – When I left my first boyfriend, I left him because I was mad that he was cheating on me. It was better for me to leave, you know? It was a very positive thing, even though it was a painful thing. There are different levels of love that you go through. That level was the end. That was the LAST level, like, I’m cool. You know? I’m through with it, then life goes on and you meet new people. No situation is really different than the next situation, UNLESS – and I haven’t met the ‘UNLESS’ yet.
The situation with the guy I’m kinda talking to now, we’re not really together. It’s a different situation because I have to handle my business now. I don’t really have time for a relationship because I can’t cater to that person’s needs or emotions right now. But at the same time … you don’t want to be alone. That is the most up and down, emotional rollercoaster I have ever experienced. I don’t even know what to do about it.
TNCP – Does that make you feel confused or sad?
Keyshia – Both, because it’s sad not knowing what to do.
TNCP – What do you do to pick your spirits up in that situation? Is there somewhere that you go? Is there a certain person you talk to?
Keyshia – Honestly, I’ve been trying to train myself to be like ‘whatever’ – to get over it just that quick. I don’t want to send myself through that … because … you can’t depend on nobody. As soon as you get to doing that you get let down. My mom is there for me, my music is there for me, and my dog is there for me.
