ThereвЂ™s way too many people on the sideline and thatвЂ™s what makes me sad and it pushes me in that studio everyday and if it takes me putting out 100 songs til they hear it, IвЂ™m gonna do it. And thanks to people like you who do push it to the forefront and acknowledging these people. ItвЂ™s too many talented people who are just sitting on the sideline because what they do no one hears, so we gotta figure out a way. I wanted the proceeds and sales from that song to go to to help the victims of the hurricane so thatвЂ™s how that came about.Д¬ASSANDRA LUCAS: Where is it? Like you said, itвЂ™s out there but we just canвЂ™t find it. I was like, you know what? This needs to come out now and then the Hurricanes were happening and it was just so much and I was like, well how can I give back? And вЂњGive Love a ChanceвЂќ was a great opportunity to lend my voice to help in any way I can. If I feel like this then I know there are a million other people who feel this exact way and that inspired me to finish that song because remember I only had the hook and by the time I finished thatвЂ™s what it was.

Everyday IвЂ™m thinking if IвЂ™m feeling like this and IвЂ™ve never been that type of political person and so caught up on that because I know the man upstairs is God so I really donвЂ™t put my life in nobody elseвЂ™s hands but when you put one bad apple in and itвЂ™s just shaking up everybody. But while working on the project, you know you get up everyday and say your prayers and then youвЂ™re looking for the remote or youвЂ™re going through your feed because youвЂ™re kind of living on the edge now because of the new President. Very awesome.Д¬ASSANDRA LUCAS: Well, oddly enough when I decided to start a new project I had the hook for that song done already. It was the greatest gainer for that week and we didnвЂ™t have the internet so you couldnвЂ™t put a face to who these people are so all Prince was looking at is who the heck is Changing Faces? ThatвЂ™s when the light bulb went off like what you did was kind of special because if you have Prince calling your label trying to find out who the hell you are then thatвЂ™s awesome. We went from some crazy number like #89 and from there we jumped from #10 to #3. We were all on the charts I guess to get this greatest gainer or whatever. And I was like Prince? Why did Prince call the office? Because he wanted to find out who was this Changing Faces (laughs). I think one time what made me think about it was when we went in for a meeting with the record label and Craig Kallman was like, you know who called the office? And we were like who? He was like Prince. I donвЂ™t think we ever kind of grasp on how big it was. We werenвЂ™t even paying attention to the magnitude of what could happen and when we heard that song on the radio, we were like the Five Heartbeats.

A lot of stuff from back then is still a blur because we were just so excited to be doing what we were doing. I was a little girl from East Harlem and Charisse was from South Bronx. And with вЂњStroke You UpвЂќ he said yes and it went from there thank God.Д¬ASSANDRA LUCAS: Right. We were like just send our demo and if he say no he say no and if he say yes then he say yes. We were like we want to work with him and they were like well you guys arenвЂ™t out yet so IвЂ™m not sure if thatвЂ™s going to be possible. Kelly he does the writing and producing for that group. What happened was when we did get the deal, Craig Kallman and Kenny Smoove were asking who did we want to work with and at that time Public Announcement were really hot and they were like, oh thatвЂ™s R. And just to clarify this part, a lot of people thought we were R. Then we got a call a couple days later that they wanted to work with us and we were ecstatic and the rest is history. A friend turned manager Charnise Carter set up for us to meet with Kenny Smoove who was the President of Spoiled Rotten and he was doing a joint venture with Big Beat/Atlantic and we sang. It ended up just being two of us and it was a little bit of a challenge because you had En Vogue, TLC and all of these girl groups and with two girls a lot of times people would say thatвЂ™s not going to work because they want to emulate whatвЂ™s out there already and not touch anything new or different.

We would do little gigs on the side and go on auditions for background singing and then we landed a gig with the singer Sybil and from there we decided to create a group after going on the road and seeing that side of it. It is quote, unquote, the same school for the movie. CASSANDRA LUCAS: We both met in La Guardia High School of Performing Arts.

Family reunion noel gourdin