Lenny Kravitz never saw himself as a frontman.
The ‘Let Love Rule’ hitmaker has opened up on his early career ambitions and admitted despite his time in the California Boys Choir, he didn’t necessarily see a future as a featured singer.
Appearing on ‘The Jess Cagle Podcast with Julia Cunningham’, he said: “Even though I’d gone through the choir, I didn’t really wanna do that.
“I didn’t seen myself as the front person. But then when I started doing that, I started taking my music around and the different labels didn’t think I fit in with what was going on.
“It was either too black or too white, whatever that meant. They said, ‘Look, we’ll sign you if you do what we say.’ “
However, he didn’t like the idea of giving away control despite some big money offers from various companies.
He added: “I was offered some very big deals but it just really comes down to my spirit wouldn’t allow me to do it.”
Lenny moved from Manhattan to Santa Monica with his family in 1974 when his mother Roxie Roker landed her role in ‘The Jeffersons’.
Here, he discovered a whole new world of music and found himself embracing other style and influences.
He explained: “That’s when I really got into electric guitar and got into rock and roll music, because my friends’ parents were hippies. “We were listening to all this really great music that I wasn’t so familiar with ’cause in New York, in my surroundings, it was more about jazz and soul and funk and R’n’B and gospel and blues and all that. It was a new world.”
Meanwhile, Lenny opened up on his musical beginnings and how seeeing The Jacksons as a seven-year-old changed everything.
He said: “[My father] taking me to my first concert at Madison Square Garden to see the Jackson 5, which completely blew my head open and showed me where I could go, what that road looked like.
“And then later, yes, believing in me when I was in this group. He thought I had something and thought it was worth exploring, and that was pretty great.”