Divinity Roxx Takes Listeners on Her ‘World Wide Playdate’

17 Sep Divinity Roxx Takes Listeners on Her ‘World Wide Playdate’

Divinity Roxx creates the kind of catchy, funky, songs that make me want jump into my day.

In fact, her 2021 family music anthem “Ready Set Go” is STILL stuck in my head, three years after its release (as evidenced by my personal back-to-school Instagram reels). Needless to say, I was thrilled when I heard the bass-playing superstar — who used to tour with Beyoncé! — unleashed a follow-up: World Wide Playdate.

Spoiler alert: It’s SO good! The record includes lots of fun tunes, including collaborations with her mentor Victor Wooten, as well as Mumu Fresh, Tarriona “Tank” BallfromTank And The Bangas, Malcolm Jamal Warnerand the Atlanta based Genesis Innovation Academy Cheer Team. The music videos are also off the hook.

We recently caught up with Divinity Roxx to learn more about her latest Divi Roxx Kids endeavor.

[SEE RELATED: Superstar Bassist Divinity Roxx — Who’s Toured with Beyoncé — Drops Uplifting Back-to-School Jam (and Practice Tips)]

Rockmommy: I can’t believe it’s been three years since “Ready Set Go!” It’s still stuck in my head! How did that first single in family music change the trajectory of your career? 

Divinity Roxx: Ready Set Go! expanded the possibilities for me in terms of who I was making music for. It aligned with my desire to make music that truly inspires and impacts people’s lives in positive and affirming ways and allowed me to do that for the most vulnerable amongst us, kids.

Rockmommy: How did you approach this new album — did you have a specific theme in mind? 

Divinity Roxx: I wanted this album to be fun, and playful. I wanted it to feel like the 90’s, colorful, and larger than life, to represent hip-hop when it was fun and light with beats and chants that are easy to dance and sing along to. I also wanted it to feel like a Playdate. I mean, who doesn’t love a good playdate?

Rockmommy: You’ve got this awesome new single “Celebrate” — what inspired this one? 

Divinity Roxx: Celebrations are universal. Every culture commemorates milestones that may include birthdays, religious holidays, graduations, and the like so I wanted to create a song that can be played in those times of gathering and memorializing unforgettable moments that bring people together.

Rockmommy: That video with the Barbie dolls is amazing (I used to play with Barbie & The Rockers): How did that video come together? I can only imagine it took a dozen hours to create the set! 

Divinity Roxx: My nieces were visiting us in NJ and they spent a lot of time watching videos of kids playing with dolls. All of my nieces and God daughters have gone through that phase at one time or another and it intrigued me because we played with dolls (they do too), but we never sat around watching other people play with dolls.

It gave me the idea to create a video starring the doll I was gifted by Toni from Haus of Swag a year earlier. She took on this project to honor Black women in music and recognized me with a doll made in my image. The little girl in me lit up. My cousin had an extensive collection of Barbie dolls and we played with them all the time when we were kids so to have a doll made in my image was incredible.

But the doll sat on a shelf in a box. We looked at her but we never played with her for anything and I wouldn’t allow my nieces to play with her though they were very excited that Tia Divi had a “Barbie Doll”.

So after watching them play with dolls and deciding I wanted to make a doll video, I hit up my cousins, my sister, and my niece to help me create this video. They were excited about this video. We jumped on a few production calls and I watched a bunch of YouTube videos and we came together on a Saturday morning while I was in Atlanta recording for the album, and got to work.

We had so much fun making the video, but yes, it was a LOT of work. From building sets to setting up the lights and the scenes, dressing the dolls, and filming it all on my Samsung, it took about 15 hours to create the video from start to finish. We laughed a lot and had a great time playing together again. It brought us all closer together. My family is always up for my creative shenanigans, and they are all so creative and smart, it was just great working with them on this. 

Rockmommy: Last year you wrote and performed your very first musical! How did that experience go? What did you learn from this experience? 

Divinity Roxx: Yes! Boy was that a blast, and a LOT of work. I’d always wanted to perform a one-woman show and I did it! I learned that I am an actor and that I can do really hard things, with very little time. I learned that my deeply personal story is universal and that this story is one I should continue developing and telling because the impact is profound. I was deeply affected by its impact on those who experienced it. I’m continuing to develop the story and hopefully will put it up again in NY in the coming years.  I can’t wait to do it again.

Rockmommy: You’ve also got some cool new projects in the works! What can you tell us about those? 

Divinity Roxx: I’m always creating, always conjuring, always developing something. But I’m focused on getting the word out about this new album. It’s hard for us Independents. We don’t have unlimited resources to buy ads and to spend money to bring awareness to our projects so I’m doing everything I can to get people to take a moment to simply press play.

There are some magical pieces of music on this project, along with some great collaborations, I’m especially proud of the kids from the Genesis Innovation Academy Cheer Squad who brought these songs to life with their voices, and their hearts.

There’s so much music out there that does not uplift and empower girls and to have these young girls appear on an album that was made to inspire and uplift them and to watch them internalize this music and message — to believe in the words that were written and to stand a little taller because of their contribution to this project is everything to me. It’s why I’m here. How do I share that? That’s what I’m working on.

Rockmommy: Any plans for concerts in the NYC Tristate area, for your fans of all ages? 

Divinity Roxx: I will be playing at Lincoln Center in the David Rubenstein Atrium on September 28th at 11am. It’s a World Wide Playdate!

Rockmommy: You are a bass-playing superstar. Who are your musical inspirations?

Divinity Roxx: I have several musical inspirations, from Betty Davis to Sade, of course, my mentor and friend Victor Wooten, Living Colour, and Outkast, but some of my inspirations are independent artists like JOI, poet-laureate of Detroit, Jessica Care Moore, Nik West, SATE, and the list goes on and on and on.

Marisa Torrieri Bloom is the editor and founder of Rockmommy.