James ‘StickNasty’ Small: ‘I Need You and Water’

The Sunday Music Drop is a weekly radio series hosted by the KQED weekend news team. In each segment, we feature a song from a local musician or band with an upcoming show and hear about what inspires their music.

“I Need You and Water” is a song from James “StickNasty” Small’s debut album A Universal Love Language.

Small, a drummer, actor, educator and producer, who grew up in Berkeley and now lives in Oakland, said he played drums with his dad in church and acted throughout elementary to high school.

“I grew up listening to smooth jazz gospel and pop from Radio Disney,” he said. “You can definitely hear that sound in my album. There’s rock, there’s funk, there’s pop electronic music. It’s a wide spectrum.”

Small describes his music as “very funky,” adding that usually when he produces songs, each one might be 20 minutes long because he has so many ideas, “then I have to scale down, scale back,” he said.

He also aims to tell a story with his songs. “I want my songs to take you on a journey. I don’t just want the same groove throughout the whole song,” he said.

His influences for his music are also varied, “I am just a vessel for what I am exposed to. And I put it into my music — and life is crazy. So my music is gonna be crazy,” he added.

Though he didn’t initially picture himself releasing his own music, “because of the fear of it not being received well,” during the pandemic he dove into creating his own album.

Small said creating music is like a form of meditation, “fear, uncertainty … a loss of hope was pouring into this music, but then it was being shaped with optimism.”

At the time he was working on the album, he had also just met his now fiance, “that new love was pouring into the music and it all just transformed into this beautiful album that became uplifting and inspiring and full of love.”

Small said the album has been a collaboration among friends. He produced the music and the title, but friends contributed lyrics. “It just really molded into something so incredibly beautiful that’s rooted in community,” he said.

“I Need You and Water” features his friend and former Berkeley High classmate, Courtney Knott.

The band’s members also include Jonah Levine, Courtney Knott, Arenetta Johnson, Uriah Duffy and Ben Misterka. The song was mixed and mastered by Julian Le. Hear Small live at Minna Gallery in San Francisco on Sept. 29. Tickets are available on his website.