Robin Thicke is a platinum-selling singer, a Grammy-winning songwriter, a budding sex symbol and goes home at night to a gorgeous wife, actress Paula Patton. Yet while he seems to be living a life most men would envy, the R&B crooner says he still struggles with moments of self-doubt.
Thicke’s internal struggles come from trying to meet his own high expectations. It’s understandable why the 31-year-old might have lofty goals for himself: He’s the son of two actors, Alan Thicke of “Growing Pains” fame and Gloria Loring. And he’s had to deal with disappointment. His first CD, 2003’s “A Beautiful World,” was a commercial flop despite plenty of prerelease buzz.
But with the success of 2006’s breakthrough CD “The Evolution of Robin Thicke,” and the excitement surrounding the release of his third CD, “Something Else,” Thicke may finally gain that confidence that he says he lacks. He’s on a tour with Mary J. Blige, the CD’s first single “Magic” is hit, and at a party to celebrate the album’s release, none other than Jay-Z and Diddy showed up to pay their respects.
AP: The past two years have been really successful for you, do you wish you did anything different?
Thicke: I just wish I wouldn’t have worried so much or doubted myself so much; I think I would have made a lot more music. Stanley Kubrick, who is my favorite filmmaker, once said his only regret in his career was that he didn’t make more movies. It’s not that he didn’t love the movies he made, but he wishes he could have made more. I have a feeling I’ll end up like that, where I’m always going to enjoy the music that I made but I’ll always wish I made more.
AP: You’ve mentioned a lot that you want to be loved and that you need love. What’s the love you’ve been missing?
Thicke: Self-love, that’s what I been missing, sometimes I still miss it; there’s nothing more powerful than self-love. Because when we doubt ourselves and doubt each other, it really just comes from I don’t have enough confidence in myself to be good or be kind, so I have to be mean or be rude and hold other people down and say, “You’re not good enough because you’re this and that.” But if you have self-love and self-confidence you normally give it out more.
AP: On the song “Dreamworld,” you talk about racism. How did that come about?
Thicke: “Dreamworld” came about because my wife and I were talking about the situation she faces being an African- American woman in society and in Hollywood and the opportunities and the playing fields not being leveled. In that conversation, we just started talking about what our dream world would be — that includes me and her walking in Mississippi without anybody looking at us.
AP: Do you feel like there’s a disadvantage for you in music because you’re a white R&B singer?
Thicke: Anytime you’re sticking out like a sore thumb, you can get one of two things: Maybe you get coverage because you stick out like a sore thumb and maybe because you’re the sore thumb no one wants to touch it. So I do find that doors are closed because the color of my skin, but doors are also open because of the color of my skin. And doors are closed on a lot of other people, and I’m definitely not the victim in this society, that’s for sure.
AP: How do you and Paula deal with the disadvantages in your careers?
Thicke: She being African-American gets one script out of every 10 that a white girl would get because they just aren’t the roles, they’re just not looking for a black actress in this role. It’s not like for every role they say, “We want the best,” (it’s more like), “No, we want a white girl. We’re sure of that.” So she has to deal with that a lot. And when you live with somebody you see that world in a different way than I would have ever seen.
AP: Do you think there will be a time when race won’t effect people’s careers?
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}AP: The song “Magic” is very upbeat. How did you decide to put that together?
Thicke: Well “Magic” came about of just the celebration of having that feeling when “Lost Without U” finally became a hit, and there was a little release for me, a monkey off my back. You go out there and see all the people who’ve given up on their own dreams and given up on themselves, so I just wanted to write a song that said I got the magic, you got the magic, we all got the magic and we can all bend metal with our minds if we try hard enough.