Tank gave an interview to AllHipHop.com and he explains how he got to link up with LeToya…

AllHipHop.com: Thank you for giving me inside perspective on those tracks. I really appreciate it. You have also contributed several tracks to LeToya Luckett’s latest album, Lady Love, in addition to co-starring with her in the film Preacher’s Kid. What kind of special bond do the two of you share behind-the-scenes, because the chemistry on Lady Love was incredible? Besides, “Regret” and “Good to Me,” which were singles, I fell madly in love with “Over”.

Tank: You know what’s crazy? It all started with “Over,” while we were on the set of Preacher’s Kid. She and I had run into each other a few times, but nothing really sparked off, as far as us getting anything done. And so, one day I said:

We’ve gotta work together.” And she said: “Okay, well, let’s work together, because we really can’t avoid each other!” [laughing] So she wanted to hear something, and I started playing records for her, including that record. When she heard it, she told me to play it again. And we played the record like three or four times in a row, and she’s said: “That’s it! That’s it!” I mean, she was just going crazy about the “Over” record. And then there was another record, too, that she was going crazy about that we didn’t actually get around to. That started the process and – from there – she just started listening to more records. I was listening to the stuff she had, and she would come to the house or whatever, and we’d just hang out – all of us. There was a nice bunch of us that would just hang out. And then once it came time to come back to L.A. and get the record done, it was almost towards the end of the record. They were looking at it, and trying to figure it out over the holidays, and I was like, “Hell, no, let’s work.” And we ended up creating like three super, super great records that came at the end of the album, at the end of the budget, and all of that stuff. But we just figured out a way to work it out and we ended up with some of the biggest records on the album.

AllHipHop.com: I am surprised to hear that it all started on the set for Preacher’s Kid. But that’s the way fate works sometimes. As one of R&B’s leading men, you have written a great deal for yourself, in addition to the genre’s leading ladies as well. Since you are capable of writing from both the male perspective and the female perspective so well, do you tackle the songwriting process differently with each approach?

Tank: I just pay attention to the artist. When I work with a certain artist, I get into that artist’s mode, because I’m not really a fan of making people sound like me, or just handing them a bunch of my records that are sitting around waiting to be sold. I would rather me do what I do, and they do what they do. But when it comes to other artists, I want to give them their own individual thing. So I think that’s why it’s easy for me to write for a male and female, because I’m not stuck in a particular pattern or a particular way to do it. With female artists, in particular, I ask myself: “How does she sing, and what does her voice sound like? What is her range, and what have her songs sounded like in the past? What can she pull off? What can’t she pull off?” You have to get into the science of it all, before you actually just start making a record. So I think that’s what makes the process unique and that’s what also gives me the versatility to be able to go back and forth like that.