Phoenix musician Raheem Jarbo, aka Mega Ran, can be described in a lot of ways. In fact, the adjectives listed on his website include teacher, rapper, father and author.

He’s out with his second album of children’s music, called “Buddy’s Magic Tree House;” it’s a follow-up to his debut kids’ album, called “Buddy’s Magic Toy Box.”

The music is inspired by his son. Jarbo spoke more about it with The Show.

And, if you’d like to see Mega Ran perform live and in person, get your tickets to see him at The Show live on stage at Crescent Ballroom.

Full conversation

RAHEEM JARBO: Well, I thought if the toy box was just exploring all the different things you can play with and the different ways you can enjoy play, the tree house is as you grow up a little more and you may want a little bit of maybe alone time or representing a safe space.

And me, growing up in Philadelphia, we didn’t have a tree house. But the treehouse represented a bit of safety, like a bit of a getaway where you can get up there and you’re by yourself and you can get into your own imagination and have fun. And so that’s what I kind of wanted to reminisce on.

As this kid grows up, I ultimately want these albums to grow up with him. I’m like, “Well, let’s just talk about now, like how to make good friends, like taking your healthy habits and bringing them to the next level and things like that.”

MARK BRODIE: Did you find that you drew from your own childhood despite your lack of an actual tree house growing up? Did you take from your experience, and are you taking from your son’s experience that you’ve observed so far? 

JARBO: A lot of both. Most of the songs are. We are inspired by conversations that we’ve had for sure. We’ll talk about a thing, or let’s say I have a song about brushing your teeth because he doesn’t like to brush his teeth.

[“BRUSH THEM TEETH” AUDIO]

JARBO: I’m like, “Well, maybe if I put it to some catchy beat, you know this will make him get excited about it.”

BRODIE: Does that help? 

JARBO: A little bit. Not much. It’s a 50/50. You know, I say, “Do you need me to put the song on?” And he’s like, “Yes, put the song on.” And so then I’ll put it on and it makes it a little easier.

BRODIE: I want to ask you about the song called “Dino Stomp On The Playground.”

[“DINO STOMP ON THE PLAYGROUND” AUDIO]

BRODIE: I’m curious both about sort of the music and the lyrics here because musically this seems like a little bit of a departure for you in terms of genre. It’s got some horns in it, more of a guitar beat than what we’re used to hearing from your music. 

Are you consciously trying to maybe experiment with different genres of music? 

JARBO: Yes, absolutely. Even with the first album we did a little bit of experimentation with some ska, some rock, you know, live instrumentation. There’s horns on probably 70% of the first album. I wanted to continue that, the live instrumentation stuff and playing so many shows and playing with bands and playing with live musicians just really gives these songs a whole new life.

I just thought, “man, if I could just capture a little bit of that feeling on a recording.” So basically I built a makeshift band for a “Dino Stomp On The Playground” and that just basically came from taking all the things that my kid loves. You know, he loves going to the playground and he loves dinosaurs. And so I was like, “Well, how many of his favorite dinos can I mention? And imagine if they were all on our playground as we were going to play.”

So it’s a wild song. It’s probably my favorite on the record and it’s really what inspired the rest of the album. I can remember maybe nine, 10 months ago where I didn’t have a lot of ideas and I was like, “what am I going to do? What am I going to do?” And then this song came first.

[“DINO STOMP ON THE PLAYGROUND” AUDIO]

BRODIE: Let me ask you about another song on this album called “Love That Guy (feat. 123 Andrés)” and this kind of goes back to what you’re talking about in terms of understanding sort of who you are and sort of being comfortable in your own skin. This seemed more like a message almost to your son and probably to other kids and other adults as well that the message seems to be, “look, you are who you are and that’s fine.”

[“LOVE THAT GUY(FEAT. 123 ANDRÉS)” AUDIO]

JARBO: “Love That Guy (feat. 123 Andrés)” is one of my favorites. I got to thank 123 Andrés who helped me out with that. They’re an amazing duo, a bilingual duo that won a Grammy last year for Best Children’s Music Album.

We just wanted to talk about self-love and just appreciating who you are. I think I’ve read a quote somewhere where someone said, “just be you and they’ll adjust.” And that’s something I’m like, “Wow, if 7-year-old me could have heard and understood that, I might be in a different place right now.” This was something that was mostly autobiographical. It was me telling my own story and talking about the idea of building a representative because you’re just maybe ashamed of who you are or what people might say about you, so you try to pretend to be a little cooler than you actually are. And then you realize like, “wow,” later on in life, you’re like, “Well, I wasn’t being my true self and this isn’t fun. You know it’s so much more fun to be yourself. You know, like fitting in isn’t fun at all. Why not just stand out?”

And that’s always been kind of a Mega Ran message throughout my music, but I wanted to make sure that this was one that kids could relate to and understand. And what better way than just, “Hey, you look in the mirror and realize that I love that guy, or I love that girl.” Like you’re OK, you know.

BRODIE: Do you consciously try to balance sort of the fun songs with the message songs when you’re writing kids’ music? 

JARBO: No, it just kind of happens that way, I think. I want them to be fun, but I try to do both, you know.

BRODIE: Oh sure, even the message songs are fun. 

JARBO: Oh, yeah I try to make sure.

BRODIE: But some seem like pure fun, whereas others are more like thinkers maybe.

JARBO: That’s a good point. I think maybe it’s not really a fully conscious thing, but when I made the first album “Buddy’s Magic Toy Box,” I remember my only goal was if the song made me smile. Then it was a keeper.

This time I expanded a little bit where, yes, I probably was thinking like, “All right, well this song is going to maybe be about some positive values, but this song is going to be complete silliness and foolishness.” And I think balance is important. I think just trying to combine the medicine with the candy, as they say, is probably the teacher in me. So it’s probably subconsciously happening.

BRODIE: Well, it’s interesting because you talk about how you want the albums as they come out to sort of grow with your son. This one, it seems like it kind of does that because of course, when kids are really, really little, it’s all play, right? Like “eat, sleep and play” is basically what you do. 

But as you start to get older, you know, there’s school that comes up, there are more, you know, lessons, social interactions that come up. It seems like even if it was subconscious, like this is really growing with your son. 

JARBO: Even almost track to track. I feel like you know as we get to the end, it starts to feel like it grows up. There’s a song on there that’s probably the most touching song I’ve ever done when it comes to family music is “Why Do People Go?” Where myself and Kimya Dawson, we talk about loss and how maybe how to deal with it and how it affects you.

[“WHY DO PEOPLE GO (FEAT. KIMYA DAWSON)” AUDIO]

JARBO: It was a song that I was a little afraid to put out because it’s not the normal jovial Mega Ran song, but it is something that people have to deal with, whether it’s friends leaving, moving away. I can still recall one of my best friends moved away when I was in second grade and it crushed me. You know what I mean?

And even to the point where we had some kids on there singing. And when I asked the parent of the kids to do this, she’s like, “Yes, I can get them to sing on this. But I have to know, Mega Ran, like, what’s the resolution? My kids are asking me, ‘What is the resolution that we need to get at from this?’” And so I had to explain to them the concept of the song is that yes, people do grow, people move on, people are in our lives for a moment, but it’s important to cherish those friendships and those moments and make the most of them.

KJZZ’s The Show transcripts are created on deadline. This text is edited for length and clarity, and may not be in its final form. The authoritative record of KJZZ’s programming is the audio record.

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