When You've Done Everything Else
Wicked Wisdom is clearly climbing the ladder of success

BY AMY ATKINS

At 34 years old, Jada Pinkett Smith has seen her share of success.
She's starred on both the small and the big screen (most notably the
Matrix series), is happily married to someone equally successful
(musician/actor Will Smith) and is the mother of three (two of her
own and step-mother to one child she lovingly refers to as
her "bonus son"). What more could there really be? Apparently,
Pinkett Smith asked herself that same question and came up with an
answer that must have been something like: "I'd like to front a
metal band." Enter Wicked Wisdom.

Wicked Wisdom is Jada Koren (a.k.a. Jada Pinkett Smith) on lead
vocals, Pocket Honore on lead guitar, Phillip "Fish" Fisher on
drums, Rio Lawrence on bass and Cameron Graves on guitar and keys. I
got the opportunity to speak with both Pinkett Smith and Graves
about their freshman self-titled release and their current tour.

Through her PR company, Pinkett Smith called me from Cleveland. I
really wanted to be cool, but have to admit I was starstruck. After
a stammering introduction and a, "May I please call you Jada?"
(sheesh), I asked her how the tour was going. Now, I have a gravelly
voice, but Pinkett Smith sounded a little like Richard Nixon. She
said the tour was going very well and Wicked Wisdom was getting
great response from every audience. As to my Richard Nixon comment
(yes, embarrassingly enough, I actually told her she sounded like
Tricky Dick), she said she was giving her voice a much-needed rest.
The music Wicked Wisdom produces is heavy and Pinkett Smith's fist-
pumping vocals can be as hard and raw as the guitar riffs. She'll
need the downtime while she can get it as Wicked Wisdom has a flurry
of tour dates with Sevendust (and Nonpoint, Socialburn and One)
ahead of them. As for the audience response, she said the
interaction with people has been amazing--something she just doesn't
get on TVs or movies. And the relationship with her band has also
been something special. That's great, but how does the rest of the
band deal with having a famous movie star as their lead singer?
According to guitarist Cameron Graves, just fine.

Graves, 24, studied briefly at UCLA. He said he took myriad classes
like psychology and astronomy. "I just wasn't feelin' it, though.
All I wanted to do was play music." Graves had known Pocket Honore
for a few years and said he, his brother and his father (musical
artists in their own rights) all agreed that working with Honore
would be amazing. "One day, a homegirl gave me his [Honore's] number
and I just called him," Graves said, with wonder in his voice. If
the chance to work with Honore is such a, well, honor, I wondered
what it was like to work with someone as famous as Pinkett Smith.

"It's really nothing, to tell you straight. The reason me, Pocket
and Jada get along so well is we don't treat Jada [differently]. We
aren't starstruck. She's just [our] homegirl. We're all from
the 'hood. In terms of everyday life, [we're all] just tryin' to buy
gas, tryin' to make sure we got money for food, tryin' to chill
out 'cause it's too stressful--just regular everyday things. Jada's
the same regular person, so, it's really nothin'. We get up there,
all five of us, just tryin' to kick ass."

Kickin' ass is just what they're doing. Pinkett Smith spent six
weeks touring with Ozzfest, so she's no stranger to life on the
road. However, she didn't want to become a stranger to her family so
they come along. Family includes her spouse and kids, a goddaughter,
nephews, friends and even, sometimes, her mother: "We have the band
and crew bus, and then we have the Smith family bus. We couldn't all
fit on one bus if we tried!" Smith said laughing. Her mother?
Certainly Pinkett Smith's family is proud of her successes up to
this point, but how does her mother feel about her music? The lyrics
of some of Wicked Wisdom's songs are not exactly Hallmark card
material, such as the hook in "Something Inside Of Me": "Something
inside of me is poised/Something inside of me could throw/A 10,000-
pound fist/Something inside of me is so incensed/Something inside of
me could break/That muthafucka's neck." According to Pinkett Smith,
her mother not only loves the CD, but it's her mother who helped
give her the freedom to do the kind of music she does.

"My mother was one of the first people to introduce me to rock and
roll," Pinkett Smith said. "She's a big Who fan. My uncle got me
into heavy music: Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, Queen, Ozzy Osbourne,
Santana. I come from a very musically eclectic background."

From her background right into the foreground, Pinkett Smith credits
Honore with much of the band's vision and direction. With only a few
tour dates behind them and a CD release before them (Wicked Widsom
hits shelves on February 21), there's no telling what direction the
band will go. Whether Pinkett Smith's fame will be a burden or a
blessing also remains to be seen, but based on the music and the way
the members of Wicked Wisdom seem to feel about it and each other,
it's a pretty safe bet that this project is just another in a long
list of successes.



For more info on Jada Koren Pinkett Smith, visit
www.thejadapages.com