More photography of Usher and his son Cinco (Usher Raymond V) were posted up on USHERWEB.NET. (Earlier this week the father and son's cover shot made its rounds onto the urban blogosphere. Sandra Martin and Timothy White really outdid themselves with the photography!) Hill Harper interviewed the R&B singer who explained how fatherhood and marriage changed him for the better.

HILL HARPER: In the last year, you got married and you've had a baby. Which has changed you more?
USHER: They're both linked—I can't have one without the other. But the one thing that changed me the most is having a wife. Our child is an extension of that union.

HARPER: Why?
USHER: Because now I represent what he is to become. He's gonna admire me, he's gonna look up to me. He's gonna say, "I wanna be"—or he should say—"I wanna be like my father. I wanna be a man of valor. I wanna possess what my father has as a man." To get married was a choice. To have a child is a responsibility.

HARPER: Does that new responsibility challenge you to make music that is more responsible?
USHER: I started making Here I Stand before I had my son and before I was married. It was a deliberate choice to make music with substance, not just about the things that we're accustomed to—music about being the celebrity, the player, or having the car, the girl and the bling.

Erika also posted a new behind the scenes clip taken at the Essence August 2008 photo session in New York's Bedford Corner back in May. Usher later admitted he had Cinco in mind when he wrote "Prayer for You" which you can hear in the background.




Photo credits: Sandra Martin & Timothy White for ESSENCE.

Labels: Bundle of Joy, Newsstand Snapshots, Usher