“Back in Detroit is Different studios—my grandma’s house—where the organ once sat and the stories still breathe.” Episode 500 turns the mic on founder Khary Frazier, with Kahn Santori guiding a deep dive into why this platform became the safe space for stories of contemporary Legacy Black Detroit. Khary maps his roots—“Rosa Parks, Linwood, Davison, Dexter”—and how a choir-director grandmother and entrepreneurial parents, shaped a curiosity that became a catalog. In 2014 at Le Petit Zinc: “I wanted to introduce people to the Detroit I know,” from Malik Yakini and D-Town Farms to The New Dance Show’s Henry Tyler, Rev. Ortheia Barnes, Sharon McPhail, and even Slow’s BBQ Owner Phil Cooley. “Detroit is clickish, but I had connections across the cliques”—into subcultures (car clubs, Hamtramck’s Eastern European community, the North End’s legendary Aknartoons) and the fractures of the 96 freeway. Khary rejects clickbait—“this ain’t the place for that”—and builds community instead: pandemic roundtables, a garden, and the Collard Green Cook-off born from a CashApp Crowdfunding campaign. He’s candid about platform attacks—“with success comes attention you don’t want”—and future films on the Detroit Phoenix Black firefighters and the New Bethel incident, linking elders’ truth to tomorrow’s archive. The heart lands where it began: “Opening this space with my Mom was my proudest moment,” a living memorial that keeps the past pulsing into Detroit’s future.

“Council is empowered — they’re not using their power.” Brenda Faye Butler from Birmingham to Detroit—walks us through a life that links the Civil Rights South to the Eastside today: a coal miner’s daughter who landed here after the 1967 uprising, trained at 14 by Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth to knock doors and teach neighbors the civics needed to pass voter tests, and later inside the Wayne County’s first executive administration of Bill Lucas “setting up how government would run.” Brenda unpacks why council-by-district matters, how ARPA and CDBG dollars should “follow the people,” and why CRIO must truly monitor deals “If a developer says they met with the community—who?”. Brenda Butler is a community voice that represents the Eastside residents where politics and business connect. She’s real about development math, tax abatements, and the difference between promises and delivery: “Stop saying jobs; people want careers.” We trace her organizing arc—from Chandler Park meetings during the housing crisis to tracking Stellantis benefits and flood relief gaps—tying it all to Legacy Black Detroit’s past (migration, unions, church-led civics) and future (youth seats on CACs, manufacturing training, climate resilience). And as a write-in for District 4’s Community Advisory Council, she makes it plain: “Bring everyone to the table. That’s equity.” By the time she spells the ballot line—“Write in B-R-E-N-D-A F-A-Y-E B-U-T-L-E-R—coal miner’s daughter working for us”—you’ll hear why her voice maps where Detroit has been and where we’re going.

“My father used to say, ‘If you’re gonna deliver mail, own the block you walk on.’ That stuck with me.” Joe Drew-Hundley, Deputy Director of the Michigan Roundtable for Just Communities, sat down with Detroit is Different to trace his family’s Detroit roots from Waynesboro, Mississippi to the east side post routes that built Black stability and ownership. In this powerful and personal conversation, Joe shares how his family’s migration story mirrors Detroit’s — the grind, the grief, and the genius of making something out of what others overlook. He breaks down the journey from Ford Motor Company to the military to the post office, the lessons of growing up in Detroit then navigating suburban schools, and how those experiences shaped his work building just and beloved communities today. “My mom worked to finance small Black businesses, my dad bought homes on his mail route — community work was our inheritance.” From the Great Migration to today’s movement for racial and economic justice, Joe’s story bridges the past and future of Legacy Black Detroit: how we moved, how we built, and how we keep giving back.

“You speak life—I try to speak life every time I open my mouth,” says One Single Love Rose, and from there this episode blooms into a living archive of Legacy Black Detroit: four generations from Black Bottom to the East Side, Creole kitchens to jazz guitars, a mother born a “call bearer” whose veil marked prophetic gifts, and a daughter who learned in second grade that “words have power—to hurt or heal.” Rose traces family roots from Shreveport red clay to McClellan Street porches, then walks us into Detroit’s spoken-word renaissance, where she evolved from page to stage—touring Europe, mentoring “great-mentees,” and crafting sets that move “from the bedroom to the boardroom.” She breaks down playful, sensual erotics done “with love,” the discipline of listening for spirit at 3 a.m., and why young writers must “write for everybody so you can go everywhere.” It’s an irresistible, funny, soulful ride that ties Black Bottom’s vanished jazz bars to the future of Detroit’s cultural power—proof that when Detroit women speak life, the city’s ancestors answer back, and tomorrow’s artists find their cue.