In the cosmos of the Black Eyed Peas, Stacy "Fergie" Ferguson is the group's glamour queen, William "Will.i.am" Adams is the quirky pop visionary and Jaime "Taboo" Gomez is... well, that's not entirely clear. Several seasons ago, "Saturday Night Live" evoked the murkiness of his role with a skit that called him "that scary weird guy" in the Peas.
Nevertheless, Gomez has been a key member of one of the most successful groups of the past decade (along with the fourth Pea, Allan"apl.de.ap" Pineda Lindo.) At a time when true mass-scale popularity is harder than ever to achieve, the Peas remain proudly lowest-common-denominator pop stars of the most massive order.
Fresh off another high-profile star turn at last month's Grammy Awards, the group is back on the road with a tour that comes to Raleigh's RBC Center tonight. We caught up with Gomez by phone from his home in Los Angeles.
Q: So what is your role in the Peas? What do you bring to the table?
We're all great performers, but what I bring is the entertainment factor. If people are sitting down, I'm always the guy who will get them jumping up and down - even if I have to go into the audience to do it. I take the performance to the next level. I don't have the gift of being a superstar like Fergie or a genius likeWill.i.am, but I do have the performing gift. I'm like Dennis Rodman of the Bulls.
Q: What's it like being on the road?
It's great. Since '93, we had the dream to be able to travel the world and perform in different places. And to have our fifth album be our most successful - on "Oprah," 26 weeks at No. 1, three Grammys - it's like a dream feeling.
For me, I'm grateful to be able to share such great experiences with my best friends. We live on the bus and in hotels, and we've adjusted since we've been touring since 1998.
The hard part is leaving my family. I got married in 2008, and I have two sons - a 16-year-old and a 6-month-old - and leaving is hard for me. But we have a mission, and Daddy's gotta make the money.
What the future holds
Q: Was last year's "The E.N.D." the final Black Eyed Peas album?
When Fergie did her solo album, there was a lot of speculation that Black Eyed Peas would break up because of her success. We'd read these articles about, "The end of the Black Eyed Peas, the beginning of the Dutchess." So we'd make fun of that, and we decided to poke fun at it.
It's also an acronym for "Energy Never Dies." Because no matter what you think, it never dies. Fergie or Will.i.am doing their own things will always represent the Black Eyed Peas brand, even though each individual is also popping off their own individual brand. We're always looking at it as part of the mothership vehicle.
Q: What about your solo album?
What happened was that everybody at the label was really wanting a new Black Eyed Peas album. So everybody's solo projects were put on hold. I want the machine to work for my individual project. I could've been rebellious and said no, I want it out right away. Then it might have been attacked or put on the shelf, not getting the same push as Black Eyed Peas. So I opted to wait until after "The E.N.D."
I know that the momentum of Black Eyed Peas will allow us to do our individual projects, so that's OK. My first solo single will probably be out next year. But I'm so focused on Black Eyed Peas right now, because it's such a big monster. The solo project seems so far from me because it's so much fun doing the Black Eyed Peas.
Q: How do you guys come up with these chants that become just inescapable?
That's part of how we do it. We came up with that style from listening to Bob Marley, Leaders of the New School, Busta Rhymes, Tribe Called Quest and Michael Jackson, all their chants. They have major precursors, or hooks. So we try to write big hooks and that's our thing, to make it as infectious and monotonous as possible so it sticks in your head.
Q: That sounds like the Village People.
[laughing] I'd rather say Queen. "We Will Rock You." We will, too.
