WEBVTT - Don Was 0:00:08.640 --> 0:00:12.440 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Lefts That's podcast. 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:17.560 My guest today is the one and only Don was Don, 0:00:17.880 --> 0:00:20.279 what did your parents say when you dropped out of college? 0:00:22.640 --> 0:00:26.280 You know something? They were remarkably cool. They were. They 0:00:26.280 --> 0:00:31.280 were incredibly supportive, both of them. And I didn't just 0:00:31.360 --> 0:00:35.879 drop out to uh, you know, to to go to 0:00:35.920 --> 0:00:39.239 the beach. I knew what I wanted to do, and 0:00:39.960 --> 0:00:45.400 they supported me both in spirit and uh uh from 0:00:45.440 --> 0:00:48.120 their wallet. And it took a while to get on 0:00:48.200 --> 0:00:51.760 my feet. And my dad was always there to loane 0:00:51.800 --> 0:00:53.880 me some bread if I needed it. They were great. 0:00:54.400 --> 0:00:56.920 Okay, how many kids in the family? 0:00:57.560 --> 0:01:00.840 Is my sister and myself and your sister older, younger 0:01:01.240 --> 0:01:06.440 younger sister. When she retired, she was a chief Statistician 0:01:06.520 --> 0:01:08.679 of the United States of America. 0:01:08.959 --> 0:01:11.520 And that sounds very impressive, but I have no idea 0:01:11.560 --> 0:01:12.080 what that is. 0:01:12.120 --> 0:01:15.360 It's extremely well, she ran the Census Bureau, Okay for 0:01:15.640 --> 0:01:17.520 a number of years. Well how did she get there? 0:01:18.640 --> 0:01:25.040 She understood management, She had a degree in management, and 0:01:25.080 --> 0:01:27.959 I think she had like fifty thousand people reporting to 0:01:28.000 --> 0:01:29.720 her at the Census. 0:01:30.319 --> 0:01:33.480 Well, I guess I'm more interested you and your sister 0:01:33.520 --> 0:01:36.520 are both very successful. What was in the water, what 0:01:36.640 --> 0:01:39.320 was going in your house that you're both successful? 0:01:41.680 --> 0:01:46.280 Well, it probably goes back to my parents just understanding 0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:53.000 that you can you can do just as well doing 0:01:53.080 --> 0:01:57.520 something you love something you don't love to do, and 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:02.560 so they encourage us to, you know, follow our hearts 0:02:02.720 --> 0:02:06.640 and back to sup And Yeah, I went to my 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.160 fifty second high school reunion bah way Way just because 0:02:11.480 --> 0:02:13.440 to cousin Covid, I. 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:15.640 Got roped in to go to my college region. That 0:02:15.760 --> 0:02:19.359 was the first reunion I ever went to. How did 0:02:19.400 --> 0:02:21.679 you decide? How'd you been to previous reunion? 0:02:22.320 --> 0:02:26.680 The Okay, what motivates you to go? There's nothing like 0:02:27.160 --> 0:02:29.840 you know, touch and base with these people that you've 0:02:30.160 --> 0:02:38.079 known for sixty years, seventy years, You can't. You only 0:02:38.120 --> 0:02:42.040 get that opportunity once to build relationships that last that long. 0:02:42.280 --> 0:02:44.320 Yeah, But in the old days when we grew up, 0:02:44.880 --> 0:02:47.320 if you left your hometown moved to the West coast, 0:02:47.880 --> 0:02:51.200 unless you made a big effort, you lost touch. Whereas 0:02:51.200 --> 0:02:53.760 today today's kids will never lose touch with anybody. 0:02:53.760 --> 0:02:54.600 It's all available. 0:02:55.200 --> 0:02:58.480 So when you go back, if you maintain relationships with 0:02:58.520 --> 0:03:00.720 these people or you just check it in on the reunion. 0:03:01.440 --> 0:03:03.160 It depends, you know, that a lot of people. There's 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:08.360 three hundred people in my class, and some are still 0:03:08.400 --> 0:03:12.440 my closest friends. I see, I got a place in 0:03:12.480 --> 0:03:14.000 Detroit on Mairland. 0:03:14.840 --> 0:03:17.760 Okay, so I interrupted. You just came back from your 0:03:17.800 --> 0:03:19.840 fifty second What was that like? 0:03:22.000 --> 0:03:24.800 It was beautiful, man, you know, it's a wonderful experience, 0:03:24.840 --> 0:03:27.640 and I love going to them. But one thing I 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:33.520 did notice was that, you know, everybody was seventy and 0:03:33.560 --> 0:03:36.600 some of them looked ninety, and some of them are 0:03:36.600 --> 0:03:38.560 pretty much the same as they were when they were 0:03:38.600 --> 0:03:42.000 in their forties and fifties. And the difference seemed to 0:03:42.080 --> 0:03:49.880 be that people who pursued a line of work that 0:03:50.360 --> 0:03:54.800 they loved looked much better, you know, and that people 0:03:54.840 --> 0:03:58.080 who found meaning in their work in and then it's 0:03:58.120 --> 0:04:02.400 got nothing to do with fame, right or really or revenue. 0:04:02.600 --> 0:04:06.440 It's got to do with you. You can pump gas 0:04:06.480 --> 0:04:09.800 and think, man, I'm keeping America moving. There's a point 0:04:09.840 --> 0:04:14.040 to this. People who found meaning and did something they 0:04:14.120 --> 0:04:19.039 loved looked a lot healthier and happier. You know. 0:04:19.120 --> 0:04:22.200 There's the famous story of Jani's Joblin going back to 0:04:22.240 --> 0:04:26.080 Port Arthur to her reunion. It's sort of a victory lap. 0:04:26.600 --> 0:04:28.839 The whole thing didn't work out well and she was 0:04:28.880 --> 0:04:32.240 derided in high school. Where was your role amongst the 0:04:32.279 --> 0:04:34.280 three hundred and when you went to one of these 0:04:34.400 --> 0:04:37.120 reunions after having success, how did people treat you? 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.920 People have been really nice. They're supportive. I think when 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:45.080 you come from a little village and you go out 0:04:45.080 --> 0:04:47.320 in the world and you do well, you do well 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:52.919 on behalf of everybody else. I think they feel some 0:04:53.240 --> 0:04:56.960 ownership of the success of people from our high school class. 0:04:57.720 --> 0:05:00.440 So if there were three hundred in the class, were 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:03.640 you the art guy known as the musician? We're a 0:05:03.680 --> 0:05:07.680 good student in class? Did you play sports? Were you unknown? 0:05:08.000 --> 0:05:09.520 Where were you in the landscape? 0:05:12.480 --> 0:05:16.479 David wasn't I We were hippie kids, you know, and 0:05:19.920 --> 0:05:24.080 we well, I'll be honest with you, man, It's why 0:05:24.320 --> 0:05:27.360 I relate to what you do so well, because we 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:32.719 were provocateurs. Oh yeah, and game recognized game. 0:05:34.320 --> 0:05:37.280 That's something that's totally lost his day. You know, this 0:05:37.320 --> 0:05:39.040 is about you. I can tell you things we did 0:05:39.040 --> 0:05:42.159 in high school, pranks, et cetera, just try to get people. 0:05:42.440 --> 0:05:46.480 It wasn't purely for fun. You wanted to make them think, yeah. 0:05:46.279 --> 0:05:53.760 Exactly, you're trying to stimulate a real discussion, and it's 0:05:53.839 --> 0:05:59.120 actually the provocateur. It's a Youngian art type, you know. 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:04.400 And the people like us, we were valued. Kings would 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:06.919 invite us to dinners and see us at a table 0:06:06.960 --> 0:06:09.800 with people who didn't know each other to get conversation going. 0:06:10.200 --> 0:06:14.400 Just say something that's provocative and you get a lively discussion. 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:18.000 And when you have that, people have a good time. 0:06:18.120 --> 0:06:19.680 They walk away feeling refreshed. 0:06:19.760 --> 0:06:22.000 Well, since we're having a conversation as opposed to just 0:06:22.080 --> 0:06:26.600 making it about you. I find in today's group think 0:06:26.720 --> 0:06:30.920 world a lot of times if you don't say and 0:06:31.160 --> 0:06:34.880 follow the accepted norm or whatever, there's trouble. 0:06:39.360 --> 0:06:40.159 What kind of trouble? 0:06:40.640 --> 0:06:44.400 Okay, you know, I'm inter interacting with people. When I 0:06:44.440 --> 0:06:46.880 write something, people responding, which is you know, there's a 0:06:46.920 --> 0:06:51.000 direct communication, which is different. But let's say there's a 0:06:51.040 --> 0:06:54.680 political issue, okay, and I go to somewhere. Everybody's got 0:06:54.720 --> 0:06:57.719 an opinion. Most of the people are getting their opinion 0:06:57.760 --> 0:07:02.120 from television. Who are our demo? And you say, well, no, 0:07:02.279 --> 0:07:03.600 that's not true. 0:07:03.800 --> 0:07:05.920 Blah blah blah. 0:07:06.279 --> 0:07:08.240 They say, you know who the fuck is this guy? 0:07:08.279 --> 0:07:11.280 What the fuck does he know? So just to stay 0:07:11.680 --> 0:07:13.600 on the same topic. One thing I've noticed in the 0:07:13.680 --> 0:07:18.320 music business the very top person at all these enterprises, 0:07:18.400 --> 0:07:22.960 the labels ag live nation, they can hear something contrary. 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:27.960 They're open, whereas the people below have drunk the kool aid. 0:07:28.960 --> 0:07:33.080 And it's very weird for me in the environment because 0:07:33.120 --> 0:07:35.960 I like to be stimulated, which is the flip side 0:07:36.000 --> 0:07:41.120 of being a profocateur. And we grew up when there 0:07:41.160 --> 0:07:44.200 was a huge middle class. No one ever wanted their 0:07:44.280 --> 0:07:46.720 kid to be a musician, but there were always the 0:07:46.800 --> 0:07:49.760 kids in school were artists, musicians. Who knows what would 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:54.480 happen to them in life? Where today money trumps everything 0:07:54.920 --> 0:07:59.720 and that is the answer to everything. And it makes 0:07:59.760 --> 0:08:03.600 me be alone a lot of time, because when I 0:08:03.640 --> 0:08:07.640 interact with people, it's like, no, you know, that person 0:08:07.680 --> 0:08:12.440 makes money, they're good, just be with the program. 0:08:12.480 --> 0:08:18.160 Well, I'll look at it from a slightly different skew. 0:08:19.800 --> 0:08:23.920 I think every one of us has got Trump and them, 0:08:24.080 --> 0:08:27.240 and every one of us has got mother Teresa, you know, 0:08:27.480 --> 0:08:31.800 And that's the that's the great human conflict, is altruism 0:08:31.920 --> 0:08:32.640 versus greed. 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:39.280 It's probably going to be the undoing species. But that 0:08:39.640 --> 0:08:48.080 conflict is it's just part of life. So when people 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:53.000 are reacting emotionally to things that they see, whether whether 0:08:53.040 --> 0:08:57.800 it's AOC or Trump, you know, it's because they see 0:08:58.000 --> 0:09:02.640 part of themselves in that, and it's reprehensible. They don't 0:09:02.640 --> 0:09:05.360 want that to be whichever side you're on the argument, 0:09:05.559 --> 0:09:08.200 they don't want that to be part of it. I 0:09:08.240 --> 0:09:12.040 think we all it's in our DNA man, you know, 0:09:12.160 --> 0:09:21.000 like altruism and community action. DNA knows that that's better 0:09:21.040 --> 0:09:24.959 for survival. And you can find if you should go 0:09:25.400 --> 0:09:30.040 through all there like seventeen eighteen species that have been 0:09:30.080 --> 0:09:37.400 identified as being altruistic and they survive. They do well. 0:09:37.960 --> 0:09:41.840 But a certain amount of self interest is necessary for 0:09:41.920 --> 0:09:49.559 survival too. It's a constant battle. I think It's what 0:09:50.160 --> 0:09:52.960 I think that's what's really making people crazy, is that 0:09:54.440 --> 0:09:58.000 the conflict you see in the society is really an 0:09:58.040 --> 0:10:01.960 inner conflict all of us. That's why that's why these 0:10:01.960 --> 0:10:05.640 times which are really polarized, driving us nuts. 0:10:06.200 --> 0:10:10.120 Okay, let's compare them to fifty five years ago. So 0:10:10.160 --> 0:10:15.760 the late sixties, huge anti Vietnam movement. I went to 0:10:16.080 --> 0:10:18.520 unlike University of Michigan, I went to a small college. 0:10:18.679 --> 0:10:22.600 You could literally pick out the Republicans on campus. 0:10:23.480 --> 0:10:24.040 Same thing. 0:10:24.120 --> 0:10:27.640 The music was identified with left wing causes, etc. 0:10:28.720 --> 0:10:29.640 So how do you. 0:10:29.760 --> 0:10:32.960 Compare what was going on then to what's going on now? 0:10:34.000 --> 0:10:40.720 But i's see happening right now. Yesterday they basically passed 0:10:40.880 --> 0:10:44.160 a tax package that gave breaks to the very wealthy 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:48.520 at the expense of the medical care of the average people. 0:10:49.480 --> 0:10:59.880 I see. I see altruism and empathy being cast in 0:10:59.840 --> 0:11:06.080 a negative light, and that that's that's the big difference. 0:11:06.520 --> 0:11:09.760 Altruism wasn't held in the negative. It was a virtue. 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:14.760 And now I still think it is a virtue, and 0:11:14.760 --> 0:11:16.840 a lot of people think it's still We've yet to 0:11:16.880 --> 0:11:19.679 see what the reaction to everything that's going on in 0:11:19.760 --> 0:11:23.679 the last few months is going to be. But I 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:27.720 think I think we all have it in us to 0:11:27.760 --> 0:11:28.559 be altruistic. 0:11:29.480 --> 0:11:33.600 Now, you have children, I don't have children, so we're 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:39.559 both in our seventies. Do you detach and say there's 0:11:39.679 --> 0:11:42.640 just too much I'm gonna do what I'm doing or 0:11:42.679 --> 0:11:46.120 do you get involved? 0:11:46.880 --> 0:11:53.360 Well that's the million dollar question man there, And also 0:11:53.440 --> 0:11:57.800 how you what you consider to be involved. I believe 0:11:57.960 --> 0:12:02.760 making music that helps helps you deal with this conflict 0:12:03.120 --> 0:12:11.400 is vital and I see that as activism, And honestly, 0:12:13.800 --> 0:12:15.480 that was the thing that made me want to get 0:12:15.480 --> 0:12:19.360 into music. Seriously, it was to it was to make 0:12:19.520 --> 0:12:24.760 music that would help people deal with the chaos and 0:12:24.800 --> 0:12:29.520 confusion and uncertainty of being a human being. It's rough, 0:12:29.880 --> 0:12:32.240 It's really rough. Man. We don't know. We don't know 0:12:32.280 --> 0:12:34.319 if we're going to die in the next ten seconds, 0:12:34.360 --> 0:12:36.200 if our loved ones are going to drop in the 0:12:36.240 --> 0:12:40.800 next ten seconds. Everybody gets fired, everybody gets divorced. What 0:12:40.840 --> 0:12:42.720 do you hang your hat on? Man? You know, it's 0:12:42.760 --> 0:12:48.720 it's it's tough, and music can really help you deal 0:12:48.760 --> 0:12:55.800 with that and bring great comfort and open and openness to, 0:12:55.880 --> 0:13:00.000 you know, to the situation. So I see making music 0:13:01.600 --> 0:13:07.679 being a form of activism and it transcends individual issues, 0:13:07.920 --> 0:13:13.360 you know that that people argue about. You know, it's it, 0:13:13.360 --> 0:13:16.400 It goes beyond that. There is a there's a human politic. 0:13:16.520 --> 0:13:21.880 That's that's more ah, more soulful. 0:13:23.360 --> 0:13:26.760 Okay, So, when done right, what does it look like? 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:39.240 Well, when done right, it looks a little bit like 0:13:39.240 --> 0:13:42.240 the Rolling Stones. If you want to know my feeling 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:51.400 about it, I spent thirty years working with them, and 0:13:51.480 --> 0:13:58.240 in that band you have really different different mindsets, you know, 0:13:59.000 --> 0:14:03.760 sometimes one hundred eighty degree opposite mindset, which is where 0:14:03.760 --> 0:14:06.160 the beauty in that band comes from. Because when they 0:14:06.200 --> 0:14:13.839 find a place in the middle where all sides are represented, 0:14:15.280 --> 0:14:18.160 the whole becomes greater than the sum of the parts. 0:14:18.720 --> 0:14:21.840 And that's a just by going out and being that, 0:14:21.960 --> 0:14:27.000 having having their own personal conflicts public, and having the 0:14:27.440 --> 0:14:30.080 having people come to a stadium, one hundred thousand of 0:14:30.080 --> 0:14:35.080 them at night. Looking at these guys not only coexisting 0:14:35.600 --> 0:14:40.080 on stage, despite you know, any differences they may have artistically, 0:14:40.720 --> 0:14:48.000 but actually being great together. That's inspirational. But there's one point. Well, 0:14:48.280 --> 0:14:51.400 We're working on an album called A Bigger Bang around 0:14:51.440 --> 0:14:56.760 two thousand and four, and I was reading Phil Jackson's 0:14:56.800 --> 0:15:04.120 book Sacred Hoops, and I caught the parallels between a 0:15:04.200 --> 0:15:08.400 rock and roll band and a five man basketball team. 0:15:08.560 --> 0:15:13.400 And this was, you know, maybe a couple of years 0:15:13.400 --> 0:15:16.840 after seeing Kobe score eighty points and the Lakers lose 0:15:16.920 --> 0:15:23.200 the game, I started quoting from the book about passing 0:15:23.240 --> 0:15:26.320 and teamwork and being aware of where the other people 0:15:26.360 --> 0:15:29.280 are on the court at all times. I started reading 0:15:29.360 --> 0:15:33.400 passages during dinner to Mick and Keith, who like they 0:15:33.520 --> 0:15:39.720 fucking hated it, but they hated it because they knew it. 0:15:40.200 --> 0:15:43.480 They're aware of it already. They know that when they 0:15:43.520 --> 0:15:47.640 passed the ball musically to each other and when they 0:15:48.000 --> 0:15:52.120 work together as a unit, did the greatest band in 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:54.880 the history of the world, and that it means something 0:15:55.280 --> 0:15:58.200 to everybody who listens to the music and sees them 0:15:58.280 --> 0:16:01.360 play together. They understand that, and they understand that they 0:16:01.440 --> 0:16:09.320 got a responsibility that comes with that, and to me, 0:16:09.480 --> 0:16:18.040 that's activism. 0:16:18.240 --> 0:16:20.320 Let's just go back one step before we go back 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:23.680 to the stones. You talked about, Hey, a society, we 0:16:23.680 --> 0:16:25.840 don't know if we're going to die in ten seconds whatever. 0:16:25.880 --> 0:16:27.960 You don't know if you're going to get divorced. How 0:16:28.000 --> 0:16:29.160 many times you been married? 0:16:29.480 --> 0:16:30.360 They're married twice. 0:16:31.160 --> 0:16:33.000 How old were you when you were married the first time. 0:16:34.240 --> 0:16:36.640 I'm not sure if i'd actually marriaged, but we moved 0:16:36.640 --> 0:16:41.040 in together when I was nineteen, lasted eleven years, probably 0:16:41.040 --> 0:16:45.960 should have lasted, you know, eleven minutes, but a lot 0:16:45.960 --> 0:16:49.600 of good things came from that. And my second wife 0:16:50.040 --> 0:16:52.400 been with her now forty some years. 0:16:52.520 --> 0:16:54.200 And your kids are with your second wife. 0:16:54.240 --> 0:16:56.680 My oldest kid is with my first wife? Is with 0:16:56.760 --> 0:17:01.480 the younger the first wife, Yeah, the the oldest one, Tony. 0:17:01.800 --> 0:17:06.560 Okay, I know about the second wife. I don't know 0:17:06.600 --> 0:17:09.919 about the first wife. You moved in together when you 0:17:09.920 --> 0:17:11.880 were nineteen. How did you know her? 0:17:12.640 --> 0:17:19.960 She's my neighbor. Yeah, I was going to University of Michigan. 0:17:20.080 --> 0:17:21.159 She lived downstairs from me. 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:26.080 You know, at a state university. Of all these socioeconomic classes, 0:17:26.119 --> 0:17:28.280 what was her background relative to yours? 0:17:31.760 --> 0:17:39.480 There wasn't a whole lot in common except where we're 0:17:39.480 --> 0:17:44.679 horny kids. Oh okay, so, which is a pretty good 0:17:44.760 --> 0:17:45.399 common ground. 0:17:46.560 --> 0:17:50.480 We've all lived in it whatever, at least in our generation. Okay, 0:17:51.000 --> 0:17:54.200 so you drop out to play music. Does she stay 0:17:54.240 --> 0:17:55.879 in school or does she go with you? What does 0:17:55.920 --> 0:17:59.040 she do? She? 0:17:58.160 --> 0:18:02.720 Uh, she was a month she's older than me. She 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:05.760 was like a month from graduating. Oh really yeah, but 0:18:05.840 --> 0:18:08.399 then she's in nursing school. Didn't want to be a nurse, 0:18:09.480 --> 0:18:14.239 so so we moved to Detroit from an arbor. But 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:17.320 she did graduate. No, I she strapped out. 0:18:19.000 --> 0:18:25.639 Okay, where's she todaym Skeig in Michigan. Okay, if we 0:18:25.720 --> 0:18:28.840 go to the end the eleven years, how did you 0:18:28.880 --> 0:18:30.000 finally blow the whistle. 0:18:36.400 --> 0:18:45.000 Well, you know, the details are kind of personal and 0:18:45.760 --> 0:18:47.560 I wouldn't go into them other than to just say, 0:18:47.800 --> 0:18:51.399 eventually you have enough, then there's enough. And when you 0:18:51.480 --> 0:18:57.520 have kids in the picture, you you gotta do what's 0:18:57.600 --> 0:19:01.679 maybe best for them, best for them meetings split up 0:19:02.320 --> 0:19:07.440 in this case. Yes, okay, So going back to the Stones, 0:19:08.200 --> 0:19:12.240 how'd you get to work with Stones in the first place. Well, 0:19:12.280 --> 0:19:16.880 I'm not exactly sure. You know, I started. I went 0:19:16.880 --> 0:19:21.919 from being a bum to having hits and we wait. 0:19:22.480 --> 0:19:27.600 You're a bomb. There was not was walk the Dinosaur. 0:19:27.720 --> 0:19:30.280 You have success, you expand it. Actually, I want to 0:19:30.280 --> 0:19:32.760 get into that a little bit. You have the big 0:19:33.119 --> 0:19:37.080 breakthrough with Bonnie Raid was the Stones thing. As a 0:19:37.119 --> 0:19:39.880 result of your success, they were looking around. 0:19:43.080 --> 0:19:47.280 I think actually the record company was looking around. My 0:19:47.440 --> 0:19:52.560 first meeting with them was I'll tell you a story, man. 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:56.040 I went to meet them at essay hour because they 0:19:56.080 --> 0:20:00.679 were auditioning bass players to replace Bill Want So I 0:20:00.760 --> 0:20:02.359 got to sit there and watch a set of The 0:20:02.440 --> 0:20:05.520 Rolling Stones with a different bass player, like from two 0:20:05.560 --> 0:20:09.199 feet away. And it was mind blown because, as a 0:20:09.320 --> 0:20:13.200 lifelong fan Sam for the first time in nineteen sixty four, 0:20:13.480 --> 0:20:17.959 went to every show about every album. Now I'm in 0:20:17.960 --> 0:20:21.200 a room watching him play on my mind. Then Mick 0:20:21.240 --> 0:20:23.760 and Keith come and sit down on the sofa next 0:20:23.800 --> 0:20:26.720 to me, at their face and me. They're on either 0:20:26.760 --> 0:20:29.879 side of me, and they both start talking at the 0:20:29.920 --> 0:20:33.880 same time, and Keith was, from what I could get, 0:20:34.080 --> 0:20:36.119 very hard to follow. I was going back and forth, 0:20:36.240 --> 0:20:40.240 like you know, like watching a tennis stern. Keith was 0:20:40.240 --> 0:20:42.960 telling me all the reasons that they didn't need a producer, 0:20:43.440 --> 0:20:46.560 and Mick was suggesting reasons why they did need a producer. 0:20:46.640 --> 0:20:50.600 But they weren't yielding to the other guy. For about 0:20:50.600 --> 0:20:54.439 two minutes, which is an excruciatingly long time to be 0:20:54.520 --> 0:20:58.000 sitting there. In the middle of that, they both kept talking, 0:20:58.840 --> 0:21:02.000 trying to talk over the other guy, and then they paused, 0:21:02.320 --> 0:21:05.400 and then Keith said, you sure you won't be the 0:21:05.440 --> 0:21:12.520 meat sandwich. I walked out of there, thinking, well, I 0:21:12.600 --> 0:21:15.439 got a good story from my grandchildren, but I'm never 0:21:15.480 --> 0:21:23.000 going to hear from them again. And and then I've 0:21:23.000 --> 0:21:24.840 been trying to think of what actually happened, you know. 0:21:24.880 --> 0:21:26.879 Then then Keith called me up about a week later 0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:29.240 and he said, maybe I was a little rough on 0:21:29.280 --> 0:21:32.199 the idea of a producer. He said, I got an 0:21:32.240 --> 0:21:35.919 issue here. He said, I'd like to use Don Smith 0:21:36.119 --> 0:21:41.119 as the engineer. And I'd been working with Don Smith. 0:21:41.480 --> 0:21:44.240 But Don did the new Barbarians records. 0:21:43.880 --> 0:21:49.000 That the expensive Winos records, the Solo records, which I 0:21:49.040 --> 0:21:52.920 thought was a really good sonic template for a rolling 0:21:52.920 --> 0:21:57.600 Stone celt And I thought Don was just a wonderful engineer. Man. 0:21:58.240 --> 0:22:04.560 He's gone now, but he had a real gift, so 0:22:04.840 --> 0:22:07.080 he said, but he said, doesn't want me to use 0:22:07.119 --> 0:22:10.680 them because he doesn't he wants an impartial guy. And 0:22:10.680 --> 0:22:13.280 I said, wow, he's he's my guy too, you know. 0:22:14.400 --> 0:22:16.760 I said, I'll call Mick, and I said, and Mix said, 0:22:16.760 --> 0:22:19.199 all right, if you're saying he's your guy and that 0:22:19.320 --> 0:22:23.359 he'll be impartial, I'll go with it. So I call him. 0:22:23.480 --> 0:22:26.920 Keith Backer said, all right, we got Don Smith and 0:22:26.960 --> 0:22:29.359 he said, all right, your name's not was it's his 0:22:29.800 --> 0:22:31.640 or some Well. 0:22:31.520 --> 0:22:34.640 Let's go back to the original meeting. During the audition, 0:22:36.040 --> 0:22:41.720 they have their conflicting stories. You had to sell yourself 0:22:41.760 --> 0:22:42.280 a little bit. 0:22:42.320 --> 0:22:49.000 What did you say? I don't remember, well, do you 0:22:49.160 --> 0:22:56.879 honestly do you remember selling yourself? My memory of it 0:22:56.960 --> 0:22:59.560 is seeing them play and like not being able to 0:22:59.720 --> 0:23:01.879 believes in a room with them and then having the 0:23:01.880 --> 0:23:04.000 two of them talking at me. Okay, same time. 0:23:04.920 --> 0:23:07.520 Most people don't realize that what most people say is 0:23:07.560 --> 0:23:10.640 complete horseshit. Things don't happen by accident. 0:23:11.680 --> 0:23:13.040 In that you have to have. 0:23:13.000 --> 0:23:15.159 The right personality. You have to put yourself in the 0:23:15.200 --> 0:23:19.720 right situations, and frequently you have to ask, Okay, what 0:23:19.800 --> 0:23:20.720 do I know you're in? 0:23:21.280 --> 0:23:22.119 Was not? Was? 0:23:22.240 --> 0:23:26.040 I go to the VMA sometimes in the nineties you're 0:23:26.119 --> 0:23:29.160 running the house band. I remember you played that song 0:23:29.240 --> 0:23:34.919 from Extreme Wholehearted, which crack me up. Okay, that doesn't 0:23:35.000 --> 0:23:40.000 happen by accident. Okay, you don't sit at home, especially 0:23:40.000 --> 0:23:43.159 someone like where you were at the time and the 0:23:43.160 --> 0:23:46.080 phone rings. You have to work it a little bit. 0:23:46.880 --> 0:23:54.040 So what's your style of working? Well, I'll probably stems 0:23:54.080 --> 0:23:57.200 from my dad, you know, who is a guidance counselor 0:23:58.240 --> 0:24:05.080 counselor and very cool headed guy, didn't get worked up, 0:24:05.600 --> 0:24:08.760 and he listened to people, and he was empathetic and 0:24:10.720 --> 0:24:15.440 a diplomat. I guess that's my style. I don't really, 0:24:15.800 --> 0:24:18.720 it's really hard for me to identify that kind of thing. 0:24:18.840 --> 0:24:21.359 I can tell you this to get to the point 0:24:21.359 --> 0:24:25.000 where I was in a meeting with the Rolling Stones. 0:24:25.240 --> 0:24:29.720 That took some doing for a number of years, and 0:24:30.160 --> 0:24:33.560 it wasn't easy getting over. There was a point in 0:24:33.600 --> 0:24:43.000 the somewhere around in nineteen seventy nine, bad inflation, remember 0:24:43.000 --> 0:24:46.840 whipping plation. Now it was tough. I was playing five 0:24:46.920 --> 0:24:49.120 nights a week in a bar and Detroit. I loved 0:24:49.160 --> 0:24:51.159 the gig, but I was taking home one hundred and 0:24:51.160 --> 0:24:53.600 twenty five bucks a week and I had a wife 0:24:53.640 --> 0:24:57.960 and a kid. Couldn't get by on that. My goal 0:24:58.040 --> 0:25:00.600 in life had been to be able to play music 0:25:00.640 --> 0:25:03.800 and never have a job that was just a job 0:25:04.200 --> 0:25:08.359 that I didn't care about. But it became pretty clear 0:25:08.440 --> 0:25:10.760 that I was going to have to do something. I 0:25:10.880 --> 0:25:15.120 was falling deeper in debt every month. I was making 0:25:15.200 --> 0:25:17.720 up fake resumes and still couldn't get a call back 0:25:17.800 --> 0:25:22.320 for anything. And I was unqualified for anything except really 0:25:22.400 --> 0:25:24.479 playing bass and bars, and I knew a little bit 0:25:24.480 --> 0:25:28.720 about making records. So I had to get a job, 0:25:28.840 --> 0:25:33.520 and finally I found one where there was a I 0:25:33.520 --> 0:25:35.280 can't think what the program is called now, but it 0:25:35.320 --> 0:25:38.600 was like a domestic peace corps where the government Vista 0:25:38.800 --> 0:25:42.160 the Vista Vistorship and the government would pay half your 0:25:42.160 --> 0:25:45.000 salary for six months if an employer would teach you 0:25:45.000 --> 0:25:46.720 a trade. So I was able to get a job 0:25:46.960 --> 0:25:51.600 preparing copy machines. But after about two days in the 0:25:51.640 --> 0:25:55.440 gig and by the way man, I thought my life 0:25:55.520 --> 0:25:58.600 was over. I was so depressed. I used to drive 0:25:58.680 --> 0:26:05.680 to work mad Maverick without a passenger door. A cassette 0:26:06.280 --> 0:26:10.720 like a realistic is a radiosop that I had to 0:26:10.800 --> 0:26:13.119 duct tape to the seat because I couldn't afford to 0:26:13.160 --> 0:26:16.679 put one in the dashboard right. I didn't want to 0:26:16.680 --> 0:26:20.040 slide on and I made a cassette that I'm front 0:26:20.040 --> 0:26:23.280 and back, just had the song satisfaction. I can't get 0:26:23.320 --> 0:26:26.280 no sense, and I drove to work Mad. I can't 0:26:26.280 --> 0:26:30.639 get no thing. My life was over. Two days in 0:26:30.720 --> 0:26:34.400 it got worse. The boss said, you know, when you're 0:26:34.440 --> 0:26:37.760 out there repairing copy machines, we want you to also 0:26:37.800 --> 0:26:40.119 sell some paper and toner to the clients. And we 0:26:40.119 --> 0:26:43.240 don't think you know anything about selling, so we've enrolled 0:26:43.280 --> 0:26:47.080 you in the Dale Carnegie sales course. And I was like, 0:26:47.160 --> 0:26:50.720 oh God, the thing I had to go to at night. 0:26:51.400 --> 0:26:55.320 I walked in. You've read Death of a Salesman. It's 0:26:55.480 --> 0:26:59.760 me and five Willie Lowman's right, like older guys trying 0:26:59.760 --> 0:27:06.879 to onto their gigs and refresh their sales technique. Oh man, 0:27:07.320 --> 0:27:10.800 I thought i'd hit rock bottom. The first assignment you 0:27:10.840 --> 0:27:14.679 had to write down where in your wildest dreams you 0:27:14.720 --> 0:27:17.880 wanted to be in one year, five years, and ten years. 0:27:17.920 --> 0:27:19.439 Then you had to get up and read it to 0:27:19.480 --> 0:27:23.720 the read your list to the room. And man, that's 0:27:23.720 --> 0:27:26.120 a hard thing to do, to admit what your wildest 0:27:26.160 --> 0:27:28.840 dreams are and then tell a bunch of strangers. You know. 0:27:28.880 --> 0:27:33.480 One of the things you know Bob doing obfuscates all 0:27:33.520 --> 0:27:35.800 the time, but he also does a little bit of 0:27:35.840 --> 0:27:39.280 hypher his records. One time on sixty minutes sometime the 0:27:39.359 --> 0:27:42.680 last twenty five years ago, he goes, I won't tell 0:27:42.680 --> 0:27:45.679 my hopes in dreams because people just laugh at me 0:27:45.720 --> 0:27:47.239 and give me a hard time. You got to keep 0:27:47.280 --> 0:27:47.960 them interior. 0:27:48.040 --> 0:27:50.720 Yeah that's interesting. Well that's that's I think that's a 0:27:50.840 --> 0:27:53.919 very human response. It was really hard for me to 0:27:53.960 --> 0:28:01.480 do this. But if you've bottomed out right far ago, right, 0:28:02.119 --> 0:28:04.760 So I did it. I really thought about it, and 0:28:05.080 --> 0:28:07.000 I wrote this down a little piece of paper and 0:28:07.080 --> 0:28:10.280 I got up. I was the first guy, and in 0:28:10.280 --> 0:28:12.199 one year I said I want to be out of 0:28:12.240 --> 0:28:14.840 this fucking job. And I got the big laugh of 0:28:14.880 --> 0:28:16.880 the night for that, because everyone was there to try 0:28:16.880 --> 0:28:19.639 to keep their job. In five years, i'd like to 0:28:19.640 --> 0:28:22.600 produce a record that comes out, and ten years, i'd 0:28:22.640 --> 0:28:28.199 like to produce an artist who some big artist. And 0:28:28.280 --> 0:28:30.680 after I said it to everybody, I looked at the 0:28:31.400 --> 0:28:37.760 piece of paper, How hard can this be? Man, here's 0:28:37.800 --> 0:28:41.479 an orderly list. Man. So within a month I had 0:28:41.480 --> 0:28:45.440 a record deal for it was and I was We 0:28:45.480 --> 0:28:47.720 got our first deal, and I used by the way, 0:28:47.720 --> 0:28:49.880 I used the techniques that I learned in the Dale 0:28:49.880 --> 0:28:57.760 Carnegie course to get the deal, you know. And within 0:28:57.760 --> 0:29:00.240 a year and a half Carly I was producing Harley 0:29:00.360 --> 0:29:01.560 Simon and that was my poy. 0:29:01.640 --> 0:29:04.520 We went a little bit slower. What were the lessons 0:29:04.520 --> 0:29:05.080 they taught you? 0:29:05.360 --> 0:29:10.640 Oh, it's just like, uh, you know, don't just if 0:29:10.640 --> 0:29:14.320 you're if you're doing a sales pitch, you got to 0:29:14.400 --> 0:29:17.240 keep people saying yes. So if you're if you're the 0:29:17.240 --> 0:29:20.280 fuller brush man going door to door, if I could 0:29:20.320 --> 0:29:23.520 show you away that you wouldn't have to work so hard, 0:29:23.560 --> 0:29:27.320 scrub and your sink you'd want to know about it, right, Yeah, sure, 0:29:28.040 --> 0:29:30.920 and you just keep saying yes and then you go 0:29:31.040 --> 0:29:35.640 for the kill after about twenty yeses. So I'll say 0:29:35.720 --> 0:29:39.200 I used that technique, David wasn't. I. We knew we 0:29:39.240 --> 0:29:41.680 wanted to be on a label named Z called Z 0:29:41.960 --> 0:29:48.400 Record Ze, which was doing They were doing really cool 0:29:48.560 --> 0:29:53.800 dance music, subversive dance music at that at that point 0:29:53.800 --> 0:29:56.840 in time that people were still doing these remixes that 0:29:56.880 --> 0:29:59.200 had all the strings and it was a very studio 0:29:59.240 --> 0:30:03.640 fifty four the worst things you can imagine when you 0:30:03.640 --> 0:30:06.840 say the word disco, which does that doesn't bring up 0:30:07.320 --> 0:30:10.360 bad feelings for me. I love dance music and I 0:30:10.440 --> 0:30:14.520 love those records. Some of them were cheesy in formulated, 0:30:14.840 --> 0:30:17.959 so there was something in the in the zeitgeist at 0:30:17.960 --> 0:30:23.000 the time. The remixes like franzoisk of Orkian, they were 0:30:23.040 --> 0:30:29.240 adopting like dub techniques basically Lee Scratch Perry techniques and 0:30:29.280 --> 0:30:31.960 applying it to dance music and not just doing an 0:30:32.040 --> 0:30:34.800 instrumental verse and sticking and that in the middle and 0:30:34.880 --> 0:30:38.560 bringing the bass drama. So we started messing with that 0:30:38.880 --> 0:30:44.120 and we thought, how can we Trojan Horse a meaningful 0:30:44.480 --> 0:30:49.040 message on top of a dance beat that was that 0:30:49.120 --> 0:30:53.120 was kind of the goal and uh and it seemed 0:30:53.160 --> 0:30:55.320 like Sea Records was doing that. It was headed by 0:30:55.320 --> 0:30:59.000 a guy named Michael Zilka. Very bright guy, cool guy, 0:30:59.400 --> 0:31:03.360 and I'm grateful for life to this cat. 0:31:03.560 --> 0:31:08.720 Okay, way a little bit slower. While you're working in 0:31:08.800 --> 0:31:12.640 the copy or repair of business, is there a band 0:31:13.040 --> 0:31:15.080 or just you and David with a fantasy? 0:31:15.920 --> 0:31:18.200 Me and David with a fantasy and a couple of songs. 0:31:18.360 --> 0:31:20.680 And I knew a lot of musicians because I and 0:31:22.120 --> 0:31:25.000 I'd been i'd been working in studios. I would go 0:31:25.080 --> 0:31:27.440 to the studio. I'd play in the bar till two 0:31:27.480 --> 0:31:31.520 o'clock in the morning. Then from two to like eight, 0:31:32.920 --> 0:31:35.240 I'd go to the studio. And there's a there's a 0:31:35.280 --> 0:31:38.360 great studio in Detroit called Sound Sweet Studios. And they 0:31:38.360 --> 0:31:42.280 were just extremely kind to me and generous. They gave 0:31:42.320 --> 0:31:44.200 me the key and if no one was in there 0:31:44.520 --> 0:31:46.880 after midnight, I could go in and work till someone 0:31:46.880 --> 0:31:51.800 else came in. So we started cutting two songs, and 0:31:52.080 --> 0:31:54.000 you know, and I was playing all the time, So 0:31:54.040 --> 0:31:59.640 I knew great studio musicians. And we had Marcus bell 0:31:59.680 --> 0:32:02.800 Grave come in we had Mark S. Belgrave was a 0:32:02.840 --> 0:32:06.920 great jazz trumpeter, kind of the dean of Detroit jazz musicians, 0:32:07.240 --> 0:32:10.520 played with Charles Minger's toured for years with Ray Charles, 0:32:10.600 --> 0:32:14.760 but chose to stay in Detroit and play and teach WAYN. 0:32:14.840 --> 0:32:17.400 Kramer from the MC five, who I didn't know at 0:32:17.400 --> 0:32:20.080 that time. He became one of my dearest friends. But 0:32:21.080 --> 0:32:23.360 we just called him cold and asked him to come 0:32:23.400 --> 0:32:25.320 in and play. He ended up going on tour with 0:32:25.400 --> 0:32:30.040 us on our first version, and Sweet p Atkinson and 0:32:30.080 --> 0:32:33.640 Harry Bowenes, who I just knew from hanging around the studio, 0:32:34.040 --> 0:32:38.880 so I knew the players, and we started. We made 0:32:38.920 --> 0:32:44.440 these records on a shoe string, and then I had 0:32:44.480 --> 0:32:47.600 to sort of abandon it to take this job. 0:32:47.720 --> 0:32:50.080 Well a little bit slower, a little bit so, so 0:32:50.160 --> 0:32:53.520 you have X number of tracks and you personally go 0:32:53.560 --> 0:32:56.200 to the record company get the deal. There's no manager, 0:32:56.320 --> 0:32:57.520 no lawyer, no anybody. 0:32:57.560 --> 0:32:59.360 We didn't have a manager or lawyer. But here's what 0:32:59.440 --> 0:33:04.040 we did to David was it was the jazz critic 0:33:04.120 --> 0:33:08.720 for the now defunct La Herald Examiner. So we concocted 0:33:08.840 --> 0:33:13.680 the scheme where David called Michael Silka under the guys 0:33:13.720 --> 0:33:16.120 of doing an interview, but I don't even think he 0:33:16.200 --> 0:33:20.320 was rolling tape. He got forty five minutes into the 0:33:20.320 --> 0:33:23.640 interview and then he said, you know, as I'm thinking 0:33:23.640 --> 0:33:25.800 about it and talking to you, there's this band in 0:33:25.880 --> 0:33:28.160 Detroit that you got to hear. He said, Okay, if 0:33:28.200 --> 0:33:31.320 I have the guy call you after we do the interview, Michaels, Yeah, 0:33:31.440 --> 0:33:38.960 of course, I'm cute a fed Ex cassette but wheel 0:33:39.040 --> 0:33:43.080 me out and Hello Operator on our first two songs. 0:33:43.760 --> 0:33:46.040 Sent it to Michael and he happened to play it 0:33:46.360 --> 0:33:49.880 while August Darnell from Kid Krill and the coconutsu was 0:33:49.920 --> 0:33:53.480 a big artist. He was in the office and August 0:33:53.600 --> 0:33:57.760 just loved the record and reinforced the thing a Michael 0:33:57.800 --> 0:34:00.240 that it was great and they signed us. 0:34:01.720 --> 0:34:05.280 Okay, a little clean up work. If David is the 0:34:05.880 --> 0:34:08.759 jazz critic for the Herald Examiners, he living in l A. Yeah, 0:34:08.760 --> 0:34:13.960 he's living living okay. And how long did you actually 0:34:14.000 --> 0:34:16.280 work in the copy repair of business? 0:34:17.120 --> 0:34:20.760 Six weeks? Okay. 0:34:20.800 --> 0:34:23.120 I can't imagine there was a ton of money in 0:34:23.160 --> 0:34:24.799 this record deal, was there? 0:34:25.040 --> 0:34:27.920 No? But I learned a lesson previously we'd cut a 0:34:28.040 --> 0:34:32.040 twelve inch on Sweetpea, a dance record of him covering 0:34:32.080 --> 0:34:35.680 Bob Seekers heavy music. Okay, it was good man, and 0:34:35.760 --> 0:34:39.680 Sweetpea was like the voice I always wished I had, 0:34:40.040 --> 0:34:43.160 you know, he was, he was my vocal hero. I 0:34:43.239 --> 0:34:45.879 was just thrilled to meet him and know him. Such 0:34:45.920 --> 0:34:50.720 a character, such a you know, an intimidating character at first, 0:34:50.760 --> 0:34:56.600 but huge heart of gold underneath. Tough guy. You know, 0:34:58.880 --> 0:35:00.960 no one, no one ever wants to mess with sweepy. 0:35:03.239 --> 0:35:06.560 But we got this record and we sent it off 0:35:06.640 --> 0:35:12.759 to Oh it was an offshoot label that Epic Records had, 0:35:13.120 --> 0:35:16.279 Lenny Pets Portrait Portrait Records. Yeah, Lenny Pezzi was the 0:35:16.320 --> 0:35:20.520 head and he and he loved it. So then we 0:35:20.600 --> 0:35:27.200 got an attorney, big guy in New York. Oh, simple, 0:35:27.360 --> 0:35:31.040 simple deal man, you know. So twelve inches the deal 0:35:31.080 --> 0:35:33.840 from nobody's man. Just we should have paid them to 0:35:33.880 --> 0:35:37.280 put it at. But this guy negotiated for six months, 0:35:37.320 --> 0:35:39.399 ran his bill up to where we couldn't afford it, 0:35:39.640 --> 0:35:43.799 and then they closed Portrait Records. We took so long 0:35:43.880 --> 0:35:46.600 to make the deal. Well, I'm never going to do 0:35:46.640 --> 0:35:53.040 that again, right right, right, So there's no lawyer I called, 0:35:53.520 --> 0:35:56.279 you know, I talked to Michael Silka. I said, just 0:35:56.320 --> 0:35:58.719 take it, take the record, put it out. I guarantee 0:35:58.760 --> 0:36:02.040 you if you put it out, you'll come back to 0:36:02.120 --> 0:36:06.279 us and we'll do an album deal. I guarantee you 0:36:06.280 --> 0:36:09.520 get I'm confident enough that you get a response. Just 0:36:09.640 --> 0:36:13.840 take it, you own it. We want nothing. Put whatever 0:36:13.880 --> 0:36:17.719 you want in the contract. So we did that and 0:36:18.120 --> 0:36:20.359 he put it right out and turned into an album deal. 0:36:21.440 --> 0:36:25.520 We actually had a plan. I got the list of 0:36:26.200 --> 0:36:29.920 stores that reported to the Billboard Dance Charts his presound 0:36:30.000 --> 0:36:35.680 scam right, So I knew the R and B DJs 0:36:35.719 --> 0:36:40.080 in Detroit, and I knew the promo guys, independent guys, 0:36:40.719 --> 0:36:46.920 and I knew to hire them and get us some airplay. 0:36:47.120 --> 0:36:50.120 And then I knew the stores that reported, and so 0:36:50.160 --> 0:36:52.960 if they ordered six records, I just went in and 0:36:52.960 --> 0:36:57.279 bought up to six. And all anybody saw was reorders. 0:36:57.800 --> 0:37:00.200 And that's what stood out. It's getting on the on 0:37:00.360 --> 0:37:06.280 radio somehow and people are reordering it. That probably wouldn't 0:37:06.320 --> 0:37:10.080 have been enough, but as it happened in England, people 0:37:10.160 --> 0:37:14.880 just dug it. It was. It was alternative dance music, 0:37:15.120 --> 0:37:19.600 alternative club music, which was a cool thing at that moment. 0:37:19.640 --> 0:37:24.640 In time and Z Records was highly respected. So based 0:37:24.680 --> 0:37:29.640 really on the reaction we got in England, Chris Blackwell 0:37:29.960 --> 0:37:33.160 was into it and Michael was distributing his records through Chris, 0:37:33.360 --> 0:37:35.560 so he signed us to our first album deal. 0:37:40.920 --> 0:37:47.800 Okay, you're nobody in Detroit, you get a little buzz, 0:37:47.840 --> 0:37:51.280 you end up on the island. When does it start 0:37:51.360 --> 0:37:54.600 to coalesce that you're on the landscape and you're outside 0:37:54.600 --> 0:37:56.320 of Detroit and you get to know people. 0:37:58.000 --> 0:37:59.799 It's hard to say. It seems like it seems like 0:37:59.800 --> 0:38:01.920 a there was a lot of struggle, is the way 0:38:01.960 --> 0:38:04.880 I feel. But really it's just a couple of years 0:38:04.920 --> 0:38:10.320 between between putting that first record out and working with Bonnie. 0:38:11.160 --> 0:38:16.319 Okay, it's like friends of mine managed one direction. They 0:38:16.360 --> 0:38:18.720 have no people have no idea how hard they worked. 0:38:19.440 --> 0:38:22.240 You know, they're working all day long. You're just seeing 0:38:22.280 --> 0:38:26.520 the end results now. You know, there were the day, 0:38:26.640 --> 0:38:30.000 the heyday, the pre internet days. Yeah, the label supported you, 0:38:30.080 --> 0:38:34.360 But when you were struggling, how much were you on 0:38:34.400 --> 0:38:37.520 the road. How much were you trying to make something 0:38:37.520 --> 0:38:39.600 great in the studio? What were you doing when you 0:38:39.600 --> 0:38:40.320 were struggling. 0:38:41.360 --> 0:38:43.480 It's trying to figure out how to make great records. 0:38:45.280 --> 0:38:47.400 I could hear what other people were doing. I'll listened 0:38:47.440 --> 0:38:51.680 to everything. I had the advantage of someone just before. 0:38:51.760 --> 0:38:54.040 You couldn't make records in your laptops, right, there were 0:38:54.040 --> 0:38:57.239 no laptops, right, There was no pro tools and none 0:38:57.320 --> 0:39:00.200 of that. So you had someone had to invest in 0:39:00.680 --> 0:39:04.560 at least half a million dollars you know worth of stuff, 0:39:05.480 --> 0:39:09.360 and more than that. Usually I had the advantage of 0:39:09.400 --> 0:39:13.920 someone letting us use the studio. The hard part about 0:39:13.920 --> 0:39:17.960 doing it and the provinces like that was that there 0:39:17.960 --> 0:39:20.400 were a couple of great engineers in Detroit, and they 0:39:20.440 --> 0:39:23.320 were very guarded with the knowledge. There wasn't this culture 0:39:23.600 --> 0:39:26.160 that there was with the musicians, like with guys like 0:39:26.200 --> 0:39:29.160 Marcus Belgrave who were there to pass the knowledge on. 0:39:30.000 --> 0:39:34.640 No one wanted to lose the work. We just had 0:39:34.640 --> 0:39:36.759 to figure out how to do it on our own, 0:39:36.880 --> 0:39:40.200 which I think is what makes our first record probably 0:39:40.280 --> 0:39:42.360 our best record, because we had no idea what the 0:39:42.360 --> 0:39:46.720 fuck we were doing, and we had no money really, 0:39:47.160 --> 0:39:51.960 so you know, you know, now, if I'm working on 0:39:52.000 --> 0:39:54.520 a record and we need something to build the bridge 0:39:54.520 --> 0:39:58.759 of the song up, yeah, called David Campbell. Have them 0:39:58.760 --> 0:40:01.319 write some strings. Have people come in. But we didn't 0:40:01.360 --> 0:40:04.320 have that kind of bread or know those kind of people. 0:40:04.400 --> 0:40:06.360 So we had to go out in the room and figure, 0:40:06.360 --> 0:40:08.400 all right, if we slowed the tape down a little 0:40:08.400 --> 0:40:12.680 bit so that this anvil is when you bang on it, 0:40:12.680 --> 0:40:15.719 it hits a note that rings that's in tune with 0:40:15.800 --> 0:40:17.759 the song. We'd bso it down so we were in 0:40:17.800 --> 0:40:20.360 tune with the anvil and then bam, hit it with 0:40:20.400 --> 0:40:25.239 a hammer and that note would be the sound. That 0:40:26.239 --> 0:40:30.600 was basically the orchestra and the bridge. Much cooler way 0:40:30.600 --> 0:40:37.320 to make records, so, uh, you know, necessity is the 0:40:37.400 --> 0:40:39.880 mother of invention. We made. We made some cool records 0:40:39.880 --> 0:40:42.360 because we because we couldn't afford to do it the 0:40:42.360 --> 0:40:44.880 standard way and we had no knowledge about how to 0:40:44.920 --> 0:40:45.919 do it the standard way. 0:40:47.040 --> 0:40:50.000 Let's go back, where exactly do you grow up in Michigan? 0:40:50.400 --> 0:40:52.600 I grew up in Oak Park, Michigan, which is just 0:40:52.640 --> 0:40:57.240 across eight mile from the Detroit city limits. 0:40:57.320 --> 0:41:02.759 Okay, Detroit was no own is its own scene very 0:41:02.800 --> 0:41:07.480 early there was New York, LA, eventually San Francisco. You're 0:41:07.560 --> 0:41:11.600 growing up, are you aware of Motown? Are you ware 0:41:11.680 --> 0:41:15.560 there's a house you drive by? Do you feel some ownership, 0:41:15.680 --> 0:41:16.879 or it could be in Timbuctoo. 0:41:17.200 --> 0:41:21.160 It's the samely we felt about the Detroit Tigers winning 0:41:21.200 --> 0:41:23.759 the World Series in nineteen sixty That's how we felt 0:41:23.800 --> 0:41:28.080 about Motown. That was victory for all of us. And 0:41:28.120 --> 0:41:31.759 there's a lot of local pride and even for yeah 0:41:31.840 --> 0:41:35.800 whatever in seventh eighth grade when those records started coming out, 0:41:36.480 --> 0:41:40.600 but I still felt tremendous pride it was coming from 0:41:40.600 --> 0:41:46.439 our town. And also there is a Detroit sound. There's 0:41:46.480 --> 0:41:48.719 a thing to the music that comes out of there. 0:41:50.920 --> 0:41:52.880 It has to do with a couple of factors. I 0:41:52.880 --> 0:41:56.479 think one is that, you know, post World War Two, 0:41:57.000 --> 0:41:59.520 people came from all over the world to work in 0:41:59.560 --> 0:42:01.799 the factory, and they all brought their cultures with them. 0:42:01.840 --> 0:42:05.080 So we grew up in the middle of this incredible 0:42:05.160 --> 0:42:09.840 cultural John Balaya, you know, it's just beautiful. And eventually 0:42:10.840 --> 0:42:13.839 the generation goes by and the lines start to blur 0:42:14.880 --> 0:42:21.560 and there's a regional sound that starts to starts to form. 0:42:22.120 --> 0:42:27.600 Another characteristic of Detroit music, which is probably best personified 0:42:27.640 --> 0:42:34.759 by John Lee Hooker, is incredible, honest rawness. I think 0:42:34.760 --> 0:42:38.759 that's because in a one industry town like that, everybody's 0:42:38.760 --> 0:42:44.040 in the same boat. You. You know, everyone's fate was 0:42:44.080 --> 0:42:47.400 tied to the success of the Big three automakers or 0:42:47.680 --> 0:42:50.600 success or failure, and if they were failing, they'd lay 0:42:50.600 --> 0:42:54.640 off workers, workers would move away. My parents are both 0:42:54.880 --> 0:42:57.920 in teachers, so if kids moved out of the district, 0:42:57.960 --> 0:43:01.200 they'd lay off teachers, they'd lay off barbers, waitresses, a 0:43:01.280 --> 0:43:04.480 get laid up. So everybody in town was in the 0:43:04.520 --> 0:43:07.760 same boat, and there really wasn't much point in putting 0:43:07.760 --> 0:43:11.120 on any errors because you weren't fooling everybody. I didn't 0:43:11.120 --> 0:43:14.920 know one person who liked least a Mercedes to impress 0:43:14.960 --> 0:43:20.480 their friends. They just call you on your bullshit immediately 0:43:20.520 --> 0:43:24.279 with backfire. So you get a really honest population there, 0:43:24.320 --> 0:43:28.000 and the music reflects that. It's raw and honest. John 0:43:28.040 --> 0:43:35.840 Lee Hooker, Mitch Ryder, Stooges, Empty Five, George Clinton, White Stripes, 0:43:35.880 --> 0:43:39.600 all the same thing. Really raw, edged, but very real 0:43:39.800 --> 0:43:45.239 and very and deeply emotional. So I forgot why we 0:43:45.239 --> 0:43:47.680 started talking about Believe. It's a great but I'm going 0:43:47.760 --> 0:43:49.120 to ask more questions. Do feel him? 0:43:49.480 --> 0:43:52.320 So when do you first play a musical instrument? 0:43:54.080 --> 0:43:56.400 Oh? Yeah, I think I started playing piano when I 0:43:56.440 --> 0:43:58.239 was eight seminary eight. 0:43:58.840 --> 0:44:04.280 Okay, your seven or eight when you're eleven twelve when 0:44:04.760 --> 0:44:08.480 the Beatles hit, was that the transitional moment in You're 0:44:08.480 --> 0:44:10.879 getting deeper or it was something before. 0:44:11.000 --> 0:44:15.439 I was into it, and then folk music was actually right, 0:44:15.560 --> 0:44:18.000 Like there was a summer when Peter Palm and Mary 0:44:18.120 --> 0:44:24.280 was alternative rock and roll and so and hoot Nanny. 0:44:24.840 --> 0:44:26.600 It was a big show. 0:44:26.680 --> 0:44:28.360 Well that's what I told you that you have no 0:44:28.480 --> 0:44:31.320 idea even had its own TV show. 0:44:31.480 --> 0:44:33.279 Yeah, yeah, no, there was. 0:44:33.800 --> 0:44:36.840 Everybody had a nylon string guitar. You when everybody was 0:44:36.840 --> 0:44:37.760 singing the songs. 0:44:38.080 --> 0:44:40.000 So I was in sixth grade and we had a 0:44:40.040 --> 0:44:43.480 band called the Saturns and we did basically Peter Palm, 0:44:43.480 --> 0:44:46.920 Mary's first album, and then Tom Dooley, some Kingston trio 0:44:48.440 --> 0:44:51.480 and the first gig, actually my first gig sixth grade, 0:44:51.520 --> 0:44:55.440 hoot Nanny. The headliner was a guy named moish Last 0:44:55.800 --> 0:44:59.759 who talked guitar at the Jewish Center. The second on 0:44:59.840 --> 0:45:02.960 the and somewhere I got I still have the mimeograph. 0:45:03.040 --> 0:45:07.839 Flyer is Chuck Mitchell and wife. That's hysterical. 0:45:08.040 --> 0:45:09.000 That's Joni Mitchell. 0:45:11.719 --> 0:45:15.320 And then my band, our band. 0:45:14.400 --> 0:45:20.120 Okay, you're playing the piano. Does a piano migrate to 0:45:20.160 --> 0:45:20.640 the bass? 0:45:20.640 --> 0:45:24.520 What is thing? No, what happened was my dad went 0:45:24.560 --> 0:45:26.680 to I don't know, he was someplace, but there was 0:45:26.680 --> 0:45:29.480 a rock and roll band and he came back with 0:45:29.719 --> 0:45:32.120 a guitar that he bought for five bucks, which I 0:45:32.160 --> 0:45:37.480 still have, the old Harmony acoustic guitar. So he tried 0:45:37.560 --> 0:45:42.040 to he took some lessons and it didn't click for him, 0:45:42.080 --> 0:45:43.640 so he gave me the guitar and gave me all 0:45:43.680 --> 0:45:47.160 the chord charts and I started just learning on my own. 0:45:48.600 --> 0:45:52.440 But there was a turning point in February in nineteen 0:45:52.520 --> 0:45:58.120 sixty four. That's that's a life changing moment and up 0:45:58.200 --> 0:46:01.920 for a lot of guys age born in nineteen fifty two. 0:46:02.480 --> 0:46:06.040 I know an inordinate number of musicians born that year 0:46:06.680 --> 0:46:10.080 because we were tuned into Ed Sullivan. We saw the Beatles, 0:46:10.320 --> 0:46:13.080 we saw the girls screaming, we saw them having fun, 0:46:13.320 --> 0:46:16.520 we saw them making great music. And at twelve years old, 0:46:16.560 --> 0:46:20.080 you're just dumb enough to think I'm going to do that. Right. 0:46:20.239 --> 0:46:23.640 If you're older, I'd like to do that. But maybe 0:46:23.680 --> 0:46:27.000 I should get that teaching certification just to have something 0:46:27.000 --> 0:46:29.760 to fall back on. I think it must be the phrase, 0:46:30.239 --> 0:46:34.680 and if you're eight, it didn't register. So seeing that, 0:46:34.719 --> 0:46:37.879 we went out the next day and the guys my man, 0:46:37.920 --> 0:46:41.400 we all put pickups on our acoustic guitars and about amplifiers, 0:46:41.400 --> 0:46:46.640 and we got a drummer and there's no turning back 0:46:46.640 --> 0:46:46.920 from that. 0:46:47.360 --> 0:46:52.320 Okay, you talk about being on that bill with Mitchell 0:46:52.400 --> 0:46:56.400 and wife. Was that an anomaly or were you guys 0:46:56.440 --> 0:46:57.200 doing gigs? 0:46:57.320 --> 0:46:59.240 No, it's our It was our elementary school. 0:47:00.000 --> 0:47:04.200 It's a funas so once you once the beatles and 0:47:04.280 --> 0:47:07.440 you get motivated, and you know, we all live through that. 0:47:07.920 --> 0:47:12.359 Everybody's playing, everybody's forming bands, although we're certain people were 0:47:12.360 --> 0:47:15.400 more serious than others. At what point do you have 0:47:15.480 --> 0:47:17.160 a band and they play a gig? 0:47:18.280 --> 0:47:21.439 That band played gigs. We used to work in fact, 0:47:21.480 --> 0:47:28.400 where was that someplace? And I ran into like the 0:47:28.680 --> 0:47:31.640 grandson or the grand nephew of a guy who used 0:47:31.640 --> 0:47:35.120 to be a band. What used to happen was the 0:47:36.040 --> 0:47:39.680 adult bands that would play weddings and bar mitzvahs. They'd 0:47:39.760 --> 0:47:41.799 hire us to play in their breaks because we could 0:47:41.800 --> 0:47:45.719 play the kids stuff, especially at thirteen year olds. Want 0:47:46.080 --> 0:47:49.320 they didn't want to hear hovin ne Guila. So we 0:47:49.520 --> 0:47:53.040 play Beatles songs. So we were twelve thirteen and we'd 0:47:53.040 --> 0:47:54.879 have forty bucks in our pocket every week. 0:47:55.000 --> 0:47:59.239 You were rich, right, What were you playing guitar in 0:47:59.320 --> 0:47:59.960 those bands? 0:48:00.200 --> 0:48:03.200 Yeah? Well the first band we didn't know about bass. 0:48:03.360 --> 0:48:06.680 I didn't know what bass was, and then we so 0:48:06.760 --> 0:48:09.319 we didn't have a bass player. One day we're looking 0:48:09.360 --> 0:48:12.239 at some pictures the Beatles studying it and we see 0:48:12.320 --> 0:48:21.840 McCartney's only got four strings. Fck that. I auditioned. I 0:48:21.840 --> 0:48:24.400 think I was in sixth grade, seventh grade. I auditioned 0:48:24.680 --> 0:48:27.160 for a band some guys who were older than us 0:48:27.440 --> 0:48:29.719 actually went out called the Shy Guys. They actually had 0:48:29.719 --> 0:48:33.400 a big hit, regional hit in Detroit, We Gotta Go. 0:48:33.800 --> 0:48:37.239 It was the number one record in Detroit, and they 0:48:37.280 --> 0:48:40.160 needed a bass player. So the leader of the group 0:48:40.200 --> 0:48:42.480 came over, came up to my bedroom and he said, 0:48:42.480 --> 0:48:45.280 all right, let's play something. So I grabbed my regular 0:48:45.320 --> 0:48:49.040 guitar and he said, let's do walk, don't run. So 0:48:49.080 --> 0:48:51.319 I play play the chords, but I'm very careful to 0:48:51.400 --> 0:48:54.239 only play on the lower four strings, thinking that's what 0:48:54.440 --> 0:48:58.439 bass guitar. He said, oh cool, He said, now play 0:48:58.440 --> 0:49:01.480 the bass part, and I said, well, I was Yeah, 0:49:01.719 --> 0:49:07.799 you see, I didn't play the be er these ron leftko. 0:49:07.840 --> 0:49:12.279 Guess he was kind enough to explain what bass was. Now, No, 0:49:12.320 --> 0:49:16.959 it's an octave blow, and so then I learned about 0:49:16.960 --> 0:49:20.880 it and they were There are four or five guitar 0:49:20.920 --> 0:49:24.200 players in my high school class who are better than me, 0:49:24.440 --> 0:49:27.080 and a couple of keyboard players who were better, and 0:49:27.120 --> 0:49:28.200 there were no bass players. 0:49:30.160 --> 0:49:36.080 Bingo, Okay, I don't understand the bass. I played guitar, guitar, 0:49:36.239 --> 0:49:39.040 Still have a guitar or whatever. The bass seems to 0:49:39.080 --> 0:49:41.640 be a calling. Okay, you know you have a guitar 0:49:41.719 --> 0:49:43.920 to play the rhythm, you can play the lead. There 0:49:43.920 --> 0:49:47.800 are people like McCarty plays very melodic notes, but historically 0:49:47.840 --> 0:49:50.759 most of the rock players do not. So is it 0:49:50.960 --> 0:49:54.759 something that you just it resonates go, oh, I know 0:49:54.800 --> 0:49:56.640 where this is in the record, I know how to 0:49:56.680 --> 0:49:58.960 do this? Or was it more of a chore? 0:50:01.600 --> 0:50:05.480 Oh, it's not a chore, man, I was wonderful. The 0:50:05.520 --> 0:50:08.799 beautiful thing about the bass is that if you wanted to, 0:50:09.480 --> 0:50:11.439 if you really wanted to play the bass, I could 0:50:11.480 --> 0:50:15.719 sit here with you for ten minutes and show you 0:50:15.880 --> 0:50:20.080 enough of the geometry of the neck to play any 0:50:20.320 --> 0:50:22.840 four chord rock and roll song you ever heard in 0:50:22.880 --> 0:50:28.920 your life. It's the easiest instrument to get by on, 0:50:29.600 --> 0:50:34.080 but if you want to really get deep and dig 0:50:34.160 --> 0:50:39.160 into it, it's beautiful. Look I'm seventy three and I'm 0:50:39.280 --> 0:50:42.840 just feeling like I'm getting the hang of it. And 0:50:42.880 --> 0:50:46.000 I had some lessons from Ron Carter in the last 0:50:46.000 --> 0:50:48.239 couple of years, and he showed me some things that 0:50:48.280 --> 0:50:53.200 blew my mind. Just Michelle and Daviocello, who's a artist 0:50:53.239 --> 0:50:56.319 sheet we talked about some stuff that Ron had showed me, 0:50:56.520 --> 0:51:01.120 and she showed me another approach to it. And it's 0:51:01.840 --> 0:51:09.960 the nuance. Something that seems tiny, the change of just 0:51:10.320 --> 0:51:14.800 the angle of a one millimeter with your fingers opens 0:51:14.880 --> 0:51:18.600 up a whole universe. I know that that sounds hyperbolic, 0:51:18.640 --> 0:51:22.279 but it's actually not. Well, here, I can actually tell 0:51:22.280 --> 0:51:24.919 you the story Ron Carter. I was playing with Bob 0:51:24.960 --> 0:51:28.560 Weir and we played a radio city musical. Ron Carter, 0:51:28.600 --> 0:51:32.719 who's my hero for life, the greatest bass player around ever. Right, 0:51:34.000 --> 0:51:36.000 he came and sat in with us and he played 0:51:36.040 --> 0:51:38.959 my bass, which I always wondered, what would this sound 0:51:39.000 --> 0:51:41.600 like if Ron Carter was playing this thing? So I 0:51:41.600 --> 0:51:43.840 got to find he played through my rig. The only 0:51:43.920 --> 0:51:50.680 difference was our fingers right, and Bobby records everything. So 0:51:50.719 --> 0:51:52.760 the next day I say, will get the tape, isolate 0:51:52.840 --> 0:51:55.640 the tracks for ron Carter playing a song, and then 0:51:55.680 --> 0:51:59.919 me playing the next song. Called ron Carter up, I said, 0:52:00.000 --> 0:52:02.680 all right, So, how come when I hear you play 0:52:02.680 --> 0:52:06.799 in the space it's the note It's just round and 0:52:06.840 --> 0:52:12.120 warm and perfectly symmetrical. And by comparison, my note sounds 0:52:12.160 --> 0:52:14.600 like it's made out of Swiss cheese with like holes 0:52:14.640 --> 0:52:19.640 in the note. And Ron Carter, who really doesn't suffer fools, 0:52:19.840 --> 0:52:22.239 you know, he said, well, you know, I can tell 0:52:22.239 --> 0:52:24.520 you what you're doing wrong if you want me to. Yeah, 0:52:24.840 --> 0:52:28.720 tell me. He said, you're not releasing the previous note 0:52:28.760 --> 0:52:32.279 before you play the next note. And he gave me 0:52:32.320 --> 0:52:35.920 some exercises to practice for releasing notes, and he was 0:52:36.000 --> 0:52:39.520 one hundred percent right. Something I just I'd have stayed 0:52:39.560 --> 0:52:42.680 in college I had learned it. That was probably a 0:52:42.760 --> 0:52:44.400 dumb move, that dropping out. 0:52:44.280 --> 0:52:47.040 Business you were studying music and going. 0:52:47.320 --> 0:52:49.920 I snuck in. Yeah, I couldn't get into the music college, 0:52:49.960 --> 0:52:52.240 but but no one wanted to be in the school 0:52:52.239 --> 0:52:56.239 in natural resources. Ecology was yet the word was yet 0:52:56.280 --> 0:52:58.839 to be coined. I think. So it's easy to get 0:52:58.880 --> 0:53:00.759 in there. And once I was in then I could 0:53:00.800 --> 0:53:02.760 start taking music classes and transfer. 0:53:03.080 --> 0:53:07.160 Okay, let's go back to bass players. You know, even 0:53:07.200 --> 0:53:11.560 at this laid date, people Rivera Jocko Pastorio, Are you 0:53:11.600 --> 0:53:16.759 one of those people's. 0:53:15.200 --> 0:53:18.680 He's not my favorite bass player, but I'm in awe 0:53:18.880 --> 0:53:19.440 of what he does. 0:53:19.440 --> 0:53:21.719 He's Oh, okay, so your favorite would be Ron Carter 0:53:22.480 --> 0:53:25.920 my favorite? Yeah, anybody else in his league? 0:53:26.360 --> 0:53:29.319 Sure? I mean there are people today who who are 0:53:29.800 --> 0:53:32.360 blow my mind. You may not know their names, like 0:53:32.400 --> 0:53:38.200 Larry Grenadier is just an incredible bassis. Willie Dixon was 0:53:38.239 --> 0:53:40.799 a big hero of mine. I thought he I like 0:53:40.880 --> 0:53:43.880 the guys who don't play a million notes right, but 0:53:44.160 --> 0:53:47.840 hold the thing down and keep it swinging and choose 0:53:48.120 --> 0:53:53.360 interesting notes, but can groove like crazy and keep swinging 0:53:53.480 --> 0:53:59.680 and propel this thing forward. So Willie Dixon, James Jamison is, 0:54:00.400 --> 0:54:03.880 you know, for a myriad of reasons, just he's I 0:54:03.920 --> 0:54:06.960 think he's the greatest genius pick for the instrument up. 0:54:07.000 --> 0:54:11.879 He'd what Robert Johnson did on the guitar, he did 0:54:11.920 --> 0:54:15.319 on the bass. He it takes a whole band to 0:54:15.640 --> 0:54:18.920 cover all the turf that Jamison covered. He was melodic, 0:54:19.000 --> 0:54:23.319 he was playing counterpoint. It's like a percussionist, and he 0:54:23.400 --> 0:54:26.720 was holding down the low end all at once. People 0:54:26.760 --> 0:54:34.799 weren't really doing that. I like the ego free, supportive 0:54:35.000 --> 0:54:39.799 bass players who play minimal amount of notes, but they 0:54:39.840 --> 0:54:42.759 all mean something. The choice of notes. You don't have 0:54:42.840 --> 0:54:45.360 to play if you're in C. You don't have to 0:54:45.400 --> 0:54:49.480 play a C in the bass, play a G in 0:54:49.520 --> 0:54:54.480 the bass. A whole other emotional palette. It's opened up, 0:54:55.120 --> 0:54:59.959 So choosing the right notes to play is a big deal. 0:55:00.360 --> 0:55:03.440 Ron cardigtal tell I think that's the title of his biography. 0:55:03.960 --> 0:55:07.400 It's something to do with searching for the right notes. 0:55:07.520 --> 0:55:11.560 Okay, the obvious dumb question, you place the end up bass. 0:55:11.960 --> 0:55:16.080 There are bass electric bassed guitars with no frets. Is 0:55:16.120 --> 0:55:20.360 it feel or do you sort of memorize where the 0:55:20.360 --> 0:55:21.880 threts would be. What's the trick? 0:55:26.080 --> 0:55:30.279 Yes, it's feel. You can actually even if you don't 0:55:30.280 --> 0:55:33.319 hear it yourself, because especially you know when you have 0:55:33.600 --> 0:55:37.479 a really good bass that resonates as one piece of wood, 0:55:37.520 --> 0:55:40.560 even though it's a couple pieces of wood put together, 0:55:41.840 --> 0:55:44.160 you feel it on your body. It's very physical on 0:55:44.239 --> 0:55:47.720 the bass, and you can tell from the vibration whether 0:55:47.760 --> 0:55:53.719 you're in tune and you're just and you don't necessarily 0:55:53.760 --> 0:55:57.280 want to be perfectly in tune, you know. Brian Wilson 0:55:57.280 --> 0:56:01.959 once told me, he said, when when studio musicians when 0:56:02.239 --> 0:56:05.919 they started buying these personal tuners, when that came out 0:56:06.040 --> 0:56:08.760 and you didn't tune by ear right, he said, record's 0:56:08.760 --> 0:56:11.239 got all thin. He said, it doesn't sound good when 0:56:11.280 --> 0:56:14.880 everybody's perfectly in tune. And if you think about an orchestra, 0:56:15.640 --> 0:56:18.600 that's why an eighty piece orchestra is so huge sound 0:56:18.800 --> 0:56:22.920 because everybody's a little bit out, but among the eighty people, 0:56:22.960 --> 0:56:25.600 they fill in the gap and it turns into one note. 0:56:25.600 --> 0:56:36.919 But it's a warmer, fuller sound when you're not perfectly into. 0:56:37.800 --> 0:56:42.080 Okay, let's set the stage. It's sixty four. You hear 0:56:42.239 --> 0:56:45.920 the Beatles. In terms of what comes out of Detroit, 0:56:46.040 --> 0:56:49.160 we have Motown breaks around the same time where did 0:56:49.160 --> 0:56:53.520 Our Love go goes top forty goes big? Then in 0:56:53.560 --> 0:56:56.520 terms of what comes out of Detroit, it's big, is 0:56:56.560 --> 0:57:02.240 pretty much Mitch Ryder Okay, Stugents sixty nine seventy, same 0:57:02.320 --> 0:57:07.440 thing with the MC five. They don't make big commercial impacts. 0:57:07.960 --> 0:57:11.839 Bob Seekers on independent labels. You keep hearing about them. 0:57:12.480 --> 0:57:16.320 Was this something we live in Los Angeles, a giant 0:57:16.360 --> 0:57:19.400 suburban city. There's shit going on all the time that 0:57:19.480 --> 0:57:24.000 we have no access about we might hear about. Was 0:57:24.040 --> 0:57:28.160 it like that you're young or was there any pollination, 0:57:28.360 --> 0:57:31.920 any cross pollination intersection with that bigger scene. 0:57:35.080 --> 0:57:36.680 You mean a cross between like. 0:57:36.880 --> 0:57:41.200 You, Oh me, yeah, little DoD Well. You know it's like, oh, 0:57:41.280 --> 0:57:43.600 Bob Seeker his bass player lives down the street. I 0:57:43.680 --> 0:57:45.919 go to somebody's house, I listen. Oh yeah, I sat 0:57:45.960 --> 0:57:48.400 in on the studio or as they could have been 0:57:48.400 --> 0:57:50.959 in you know, Seattle for all you knew. 0:57:52.040 --> 0:57:58.440 Well, there's a there's a local consciousness that permeates that music, 0:57:58.520 --> 0:58:04.520 that makes it feel more personal, I think. But to me, 0:58:05.600 --> 0:58:09.800 there was effectively no difference in Detroit between Bob Seeger 0:58:10.080 --> 0:58:14.360 or the Beatles, or really John Sinclair, who was quite 0:58:14.400 --> 0:58:16.400 a heroic figure to me. 0:58:17.240 --> 0:58:19.480 Okay, John Sinclair, what do we know? You bought the 0:58:19.520 --> 0:58:24.400 original MC five record that wasn't uncentried. You open it up, 0:58:24.440 --> 0:58:28.200 you had a whole squeed. What we knew was John 0:58:28.240 --> 0:58:32.800 Sinclair was the manager with Air quotes and they arrested 0:58:32.840 --> 0:58:35.520 him for two joints. You know, this is not like 0:58:35.560 --> 0:58:38.600 today we could go deep into somebody. So what did 0:58:38.680 --> 0:58:40.920 John Sinclair represent for you? 0:58:41.120 --> 0:58:47.000 John Sinclair was the leader of the alternative culture in Detroit. 0:58:47.440 --> 0:58:51.160 He was a political activist. His role with the MC 0:58:51.360 --> 0:58:56.320 five was really in grasping the idea that you could 0:58:56.360 --> 0:59:00.320 have a guitar army, which is a phrase that he pined, 0:59:01.280 --> 0:59:03.240 and that you could change the hearts and minds of 0:59:03.320 --> 0:59:06.919 young people and open them up to bigger ideas through 0:59:07.040 --> 0:59:12.040 rock and roll. But he was a beat poet and 0:59:12.920 --> 0:59:22.400 an advocate for jazz, and he was just everywhere I knew, 0:59:22.480 --> 0:59:25.480 more as an anti war activist than as the manager 0:59:25.480 --> 0:59:27.960 of the MC five. And that was a minor part 0:59:28.040 --> 0:59:32.320 of his life, I would say, But he was He 0:59:32.440 --> 0:59:36.760 was local, but what he had to say was as 0:59:36.880 --> 0:59:40.840 influential as maybe John Lennon would have said, or what 0:59:40.880 --> 0:59:44.280 Bob Dylan would say. He was so that that was 0:59:44.640 --> 0:59:47.520 part of the beauty of having local cultures. It's something 0:59:47.880 --> 0:59:51.280 that's kind of gone now because everything's so global. You'd 0:59:51.320 --> 0:59:54.160 have regional hit records. You don't have regional hit you 0:59:54.200 --> 0:59:56.640 don't even have you know, you put a record up 0:59:56.640 --> 0:59:58.520 to stream. It's all over the world. Now you know 0:59:58.560 --> 1:00:01.640 that you can't I have a regional hit. It just 1:00:01.680 --> 1:00:09.920 doesn't work like that. But there you to answer your 1:00:09.960 --> 1:00:13.480 bigger question. I think when things were local, you could 1:00:13.520 --> 1:00:16.439 feel more a part of it. I felt a part 1:00:16.480 --> 1:00:20.480 of that culture in Detroit. I had friends who were 1:00:20.640 --> 1:00:23.400 more deeply enmeshed in it. There's a guy named Joel 1:00:23.520 --> 1:00:28.640 Landy who became quite an activist in Detroit. Body of mine. 1:00:28.680 --> 1:00:31.680 He ran the print shop for the alternative paper, the 1:00:32.640 --> 1:00:37.360 Fifth of State, which was next to Sinclair's Enterprises, right, 1:00:38.120 --> 1:00:40.560 And I remember he called me up and said, you 1:00:40.560 --> 1:00:43.560 got to come down here, man, And I got my car, 1:00:43.680 --> 1:00:47.360 drove downtown and the members of the MC five were 1:00:47.440 --> 1:00:55.160 jamming with members of Pharaoh Saunders band. Fuck man. I 1:00:55.320 --> 1:00:57.880 never heard anything like that in my life, and I 1:00:57.920 --> 1:01:02.240 actually I've never heard anything like it. Subsequent that became 1:01:02.440 --> 1:01:04.760 like a virtue, you know, that was something that could 1:01:04.800 --> 1:01:11.400 only happen in Detroit, and uh, it felt. It awakened 1:01:11.400 --> 1:01:13.560 a part of me, I felt, but I felt connected 1:01:13.560 --> 1:01:21.560 to it because because it just spoke to me as 1:01:21.600 --> 1:01:27.280 a as someone who lived in that familiar you know, Okay, 1:01:27.560 --> 1:01:32.400 you gained success. Eventually, John Sinclair comes out of jail. 1:01:32.960 --> 1:01:36.400 Did you have any personal contact with him later in life? 1:01:36.400 --> 1:01:38.360 We became really good friends. He's on a couple of 1:01:38.400 --> 1:01:41.600 us and I was records and I played on his albums, 1:01:41.640 --> 1:01:43.400 you know. And I played gigs with him too when 1:01:43.400 --> 1:01:43.760 I could. 1:01:44.560 --> 1:01:48.440 But did you know the times it changed he was 1:01:48.480 --> 1:01:50.640 in jail. I should know that he worked with you, 1:01:50.800 --> 1:01:53.920 but obviously I didn't. Was he the same guy with 1:01:54.040 --> 1:01:55.240 the same charisma? 1:01:55.600 --> 1:02:01.640 He never faltered man, you know, he passed man, but 1:02:02.720 --> 1:02:08.080 to this last breath. Man he was rebellious and a 1:02:08.120 --> 1:02:11.080 little crotchety about it, you know, but he did. He 1:02:11.240 --> 1:02:14.439 never surrendered when everybody else did, when everyone else said, 1:02:15.320 --> 1:02:18.920 he never gave up the fight. And it was it 1:02:19.000 --> 1:02:22.760 was an admirable quality. It represented real conviction. Most people 1:02:23.680 --> 1:02:25.760 he could have cashed out. It was several junctions. 1:02:25.760 --> 1:02:29.840 That's the story of our generation. You know, we protested 1:02:29.840 --> 1:02:32.680 in the sixties seventies, back to the Land movement. We're 1:02:32.680 --> 1:02:36.919 licking the wounds. Reagan legitimized greed. All of a sudden, 1:02:36.920 --> 1:02:40.040 everybody's values flipped. Yeah, you know, they wanted to make money. 1:02:40.800 --> 1:02:44.400 It was really very strange. You get some success with 1:02:44.800 --> 1:02:52.680 was Not was so Bonnie Rate he loses her record deal. Ultimately, 1:02:52.720 --> 1:02:56.080 the guy worked at Warners, working at Capital, they sign her. 1:02:56.560 --> 1:02:58.720 Where do you come in in that process? 1:02:59.520 --> 1:03:04.720 Before they signed her, what happened was there's a guy 1:03:04.760 --> 1:03:08.480 named Hal Wilner who was a very dear friend aside 1:03:08.520 --> 1:03:13.760 from COVID. From COVID early on, you know, the first 1:03:13.760 --> 1:03:17.320 couple of weeks of it. I think beautiful Cat just 1:03:17.400 --> 1:03:21.680 loved music. Earned a living by being the the music 1:03:22.760 --> 1:03:25.640 supervisor maybe of Saturday Night Live. I'm not sure what 1:03:25.640 --> 1:03:28.080 the title was, but any kind of music you heard 1:03:28.080 --> 1:03:30.240 in the things. He was responsible for that. But he 1:03:30.360 --> 1:03:36.240 invented the tribute record, and as opposed to getting all 1:03:36.280 --> 1:03:39.280 the superstars together, he put he would put together the 1:03:39.400 --> 1:03:45.320 most eclectic lens of people and and encourage you to 1:03:45.360 --> 1:03:48.320 stretch out, so he called us. Was Not was when 1:03:48.680 --> 1:03:51.440 we were still not No one knew who he were, 1:03:51.720 --> 1:03:53.880 and came to Detroit and had us cut something for 1:03:53.920 --> 1:03:58.320 a flneous a Monk tribute record. We had Sheila Jordan's 1:03:58.360 --> 1:04:02.200 singing with us, and we thought, great, freed from the 1:04:02.280 --> 1:04:05.080 constraints of making pop records, we can get out here 1:04:05.200 --> 1:04:11.680 and well, you know, it's like Carla Blaye was on 1:04:11.720 --> 1:04:15.240 the record. You can't out Carlo Blade right right right. 1:04:15.600 --> 1:04:18.680 So we just got lost in the shuffle because everyone 1:04:18.800 --> 1:04:20.280 was trying to stretch out. So I said, all right, 1:04:20.360 --> 1:04:24.440 next time, we're going to stand out by going inside 1:04:24.880 --> 1:04:28.360 and touching people's hearts. So the next album he had 1:04:28.880 --> 1:04:34.240 was a Disney tribute album. So we did an arrangement 1:04:34.360 --> 1:04:37.280 of baby Mine, which a very sad song in the 1:04:37.360 --> 1:04:41.200 movie Mother Elephant gets, you know, locked up in the 1:04:41.200 --> 1:04:44.280 cage and the baby comes and they touched trunks through 1:04:44.320 --> 1:04:47.400 the bars. If you don't cry in the scene, there's 1:04:48.440 --> 1:04:53.560 you need help. So we did like a real nice 1:04:54.080 --> 1:04:58.320 three four maybe six eight feel, but it was like 1:04:58.360 --> 1:05:00.360 an R and B kind of thing. And and from 1:05:00.400 --> 1:05:03.360 the arrangement, I just heard Bonnie singing because I've been 1:05:03.360 --> 1:05:07.000 a fan of hers since since she can't I bought, 1:05:07.040 --> 1:05:09.680 I got her first record, and so I played live 1:05:09.720 --> 1:05:13.040 at the ann Arbert Blues and Jazz Festival. So I 1:05:13.120 --> 1:05:17.960 always loved her, and Hell put us together. So we 1:05:18.320 --> 1:05:22.240 worked on that song and we clicked. We clicked musically 1:05:22.880 --> 1:05:27.520 and personally. She felt like a like a long lost 1:05:27.560 --> 1:05:32.040 sister to me. You know, I could just well, you 1:05:32.080 --> 1:05:34.120 can't help but love her, man, She's just one of 1:05:34.160 --> 1:05:38.480 the best people, biggest heart. H you did a wonderful 1:05:38.560 --> 1:05:43.600 moview with her, Oh thank you, and uh so we 1:05:43.840 --> 1:05:46.400 just clicked and it was like, well, let's do more stuff. 1:05:46.440 --> 1:05:49.360 Well I don't have a record deal, that's okay, just 1:05:49.400 --> 1:05:50.919 come on. I got a little I had a little 1:05:50.920 --> 1:05:53.840 eight track things set up in my house and we 1:05:54.080 --> 1:05:59.960 we started. We started doing demos for what would become 1:06:00.200 --> 1:06:05.680 Nicked Time. And it took some time to make that 1:06:05.720 --> 1:06:08.360 deal happen. She was managed by Danny Goldberg and Ron 1:06:08.440 --> 1:06:12.160 Stone at gold Ma and she'd been dropped by Warners 1:06:12.160 --> 1:06:18.280 and there was a stigma attached to that and took it. 1:06:18.280 --> 1:06:23.080 It took a minute to overcome that and find it 1:06:23.120 --> 1:06:26.040 is Joe Smith, who was part of letting her go 1:06:26.080 --> 1:06:29.360 at Warner Brothers and not happy about it, who gave 1:06:29.360 --> 1:06:33.800 her the shot that capitol. So you know, we made 1:06:33.920 --> 1:06:39.000 Nicked Time. We made it real fast, but we were prepared. 1:06:39.560 --> 1:06:43.560 We did something before we started the record. She came 1:06:43.600 --> 1:06:45.760 over to my place a number of times and we 1:06:45.840 --> 1:06:49.400 cut just demos with her either playing guitar alone or 1:06:49.440 --> 1:06:54.040 playing piano and singing, and we figured you know, if 1:06:55.000 --> 1:06:58.880 the song doesn't work with you playing it alone, whatever 1:06:58.960 --> 1:07:01.480 other layers stuff we put on, it's not going to 1:07:01.680 --> 1:07:05.040 make it work. So let's find you know, ten that 1:07:07.960 --> 1:07:10.560 and and so we're ready. 1:07:11.480 --> 1:07:14.160 Okay, So all the stuff you cut before the deal, 1:07:14.440 --> 1:07:16.840 none of those were masters. It was after the deal 1:07:16.880 --> 1:07:17.880 you recut everything. 1:07:19.560 --> 1:07:22.520 We recut everything, and we cut it pretty quickly. We 1:07:22.520 --> 1:07:23.840 didn't have a lot of bread. We had one hundred 1:07:23.880 --> 1:07:26.920 and fifty thousand dollars, which now actually seems like a 1:07:26.920 --> 1:07:30.920 big boat, right, but that was like that was minimal 1:07:31.080 --> 1:07:32.680 kind of budget in those days. 1:07:32.720 --> 1:07:35.120 Did you bring any of the songs or did she 1:07:35.240 --> 1:07:36.200 bring all the songs? 1:07:36.480 --> 1:07:42.800 I'm sure she brought all the songs. She's a great musicologist. 1:07:44.440 --> 1:07:48.760 People would send She always had boxes cassettes of demos. 1:07:49.120 --> 1:07:53.120 In fact, on the second album, Luck of the Draw, 1:07:54.960 --> 1:07:57.120 we'd cut most of the album. We were ready, but 1:07:57.160 --> 1:08:00.240 we didn't have the up tempost single that we thought 1:08:00.280 --> 1:08:03.720 it was gonna require. And she was going through every 1:08:03.880 --> 1:08:08.080 box and way at the bottom of like the last box, 1:08:08.880 --> 1:08:13.440 she found Shirty Elkhart's song something to Talk About Me. 1:08:13.560 --> 1:08:17.280 She said, I found it. But the thing about Bonnie 1:08:18.040 --> 1:08:21.320 is that she won't sing anything that she couldn't have 1:08:21.320 --> 1:08:24.759 written herself. That she didn't want to have to act. 1:08:25.720 --> 1:08:30.760 She wanted to draw from personal experience. So everything that 1:08:30.840 --> 1:08:32.960 we cut, if she wasn't a writer, it was something 1:08:32.960 --> 1:08:36.559 that she felt and was experiencing and was experiencing at 1:08:36.560 --> 1:08:39.080 that moment, which is the one reason her vocals are 1:08:39.120 --> 1:08:40.439 so great, because she means it. 1:08:41.920 --> 1:08:46.120 Okay, niked, time is done. You know, it has success 1:08:46.200 --> 1:08:50.759 that no one could foresee. But when it was done, 1:08:51.800 --> 1:08:52.760 how do you feel about it? 1:08:52.760 --> 1:08:54.160 I mean she'd been up and down. 1:08:54.280 --> 1:08:57.640 She cut, you know, records on FOD track at a 1:08:57.720 --> 1:09:01.000 summer camp she worked with Paul Roth, a Jerry raggvoy. 1:09:01.160 --> 1:09:05.400 Everything had been tried and nothing really worked. So you're there, 1:09:05.960 --> 1:09:08.479 I mean the record is done. You say, wait a second, 1:09:08.479 --> 1:09:10.439 there's something specially. He said, Well, you know, we gave 1:09:10.479 --> 1:09:10.960 it our all. 1:09:11.000 --> 1:09:18.240 We'll see what happens. We never considered that kind of success, 1:09:18.880 --> 1:09:21.599 the kind of success we enjoyed, never considered that to 1:09:21.640 --> 1:09:24.320 be in the cards. We just were trying to make 1:09:24.360 --> 1:09:26.720 something we'd be proud of in twenty five years. That 1:09:26.800 --> 1:09:29.960 was something that we have actually said, let's not compromise 1:09:30.040 --> 1:09:34.840 for the marketplace, don't imitate what's out now, because what 1:09:35.000 --> 1:09:37.960 was out then was like flock of seagulls, and you know, 1:09:38.000 --> 1:09:41.000 it was just the opposite, the antithesis of what she 1:09:41.160 --> 1:09:45.080 was about. Don't try to be eighteen. I mean that 1:09:45.200 --> 1:09:47.679 was another thing too. You know, it was such such 1:09:47.720 --> 1:09:50.000 a brave thing to write and record a song like 1:09:50.120 --> 1:09:55.200 nick of Time, because at that point, the conventional wisdom 1:09:55.320 --> 1:09:57.679 was that, even if you were closing it I'm forty, 1:09:57.800 --> 1:10:01.519 you had to pretend to be eighteen, right, And she 1:10:01.720 --> 1:10:06.200 just dropped that pretense, and she wrote to her age 1:10:07.200 --> 1:10:11.840 and not everyone thought that was a great idea, but 1:10:12.600 --> 1:10:16.200 no one considered that her audience was going through that 1:10:16.360 --> 1:10:19.840 exact same thing. Plus, I mean, plus it's time, it's 1:10:19.920 --> 1:10:23.680 nick of time? Is it that happened? That song is 1:10:23.760 --> 1:10:27.599 relevant to every generation somewhere in their forties, right, So 1:10:27.640 --> 1:10:32.040 it's a timeless song. But she was gutsy about it, 1:10:32.080 --> 1:10:36.439 and we hoped we'd get to the next record and 1:10:36.960 --> 1:10:39.840 make something that we'd be proud of. At one point 1:10:40.320 --> 1:10:43.680 someone came back to us and said, you know, we 1:10:43.720 --> 1:10:45.800 need a Motown cover, We need a single for this, 1:10:47.120 --> 1:10:50.559 And thankfully we were both on tour and couldn't get 1:10:50.560 --> 1:10:53.200 back together to do it me, because if we'd have 1:10:53.240 --> 1:10:55.960 done that, it would have ruined the album, I think, 1:10:56.000 --> 1:10:59.519 and everything that it stood for. So we just had 1:10:59.520 --> 1:11:00.960 to put it out the way it was. I remember 1:11:01.000 --> 1:11:04.559 Tim Divine was the anarch guy, and Tim came to 1:11:04.600 --> 1:11:07.559 the studio. We played it for him and he said 1:11:07.600 --> 1:11:11.200 to me, he said, you got a tux. No, I 1:11:11.240 --> 1:11:13.080 don't have a tux. He said, we'll get when you're 1:11:13.120 --> 1:11:16.200 going to the Grammys. My first instinct was to punch 1:11:16.240 --> 1:11:18.720 him right now, you know you like it, to just 1:11:18.720 --> 1:11:20.040 say you like that. You don't have to come in 1:11:20.080 --> 1:11:23.320 here and be all hyperbolic. But he was right, he 1:11:23.439 --> 1:11:23.800 heard it. 1:11:24.960 --> 1:11:28.559 Okay, it's a very interesting thing with Bonnie. For a 1:11:28.680 --> 1:11:32.120 long time. My favorite record was the second record give 1:11:32.160 --> 1:11:35.639 it Up. Then she works with you. After a little 1:11:35.640 --> 1:11:37.880 bit of hiatus, having no label deal, you put on 1:11:37.960 --> 1:11:43.600 Nick of Time, very successful. Luck of the Draw is 1:11:43.640 --> 1:11:47.480 a peak that's actually for me and I told everybody 1:11:47.520 --> 1:11:51.519 involved except maybe you, that better than give it Up. 1:11:52.360 --> 1:11:56.360 So now you have the pressure of having had success. 1:11:56.720 --> 1:11:58.840 So what was the mental state of going in to 1:11:58.920 --> 1:11:59.960 record Luck of the Draw? 1:12:04.479 --> 1:12:10.400 Uh? I think we were remarkably cool about it, to 1:12:10.479 --> 1:12:13.599 be I think we were uh. I think it gave 1:12:13.680 --> 1:12:18.000 us confidence to follow our instincts. And by the way, 1:12:18.000 --> 1:12:20.400 when I talk about us, I can't talk about us. 1:12:25.080 --> 1:12:28.120 Yeah, you are you going to break down? You're going 1:12:28.200 --> 1:12:31.200 to mention the engineer here, very sad story. 1:12:32.720 --> 1:12:40.240 Ah, I can't talk about us without mentioning Ed Shirney 1:12:44.920 --> 1:12:46.479 Ship Bobby. 1:12:46.520 --> 1:12:49.120 Well, you know, I became close. I mean I knew 1:12:49.280 --> 1:12:51.800 Ed Brobab probably ten or fifteen years before. Body became 1:12:51.880 --> 1:12:56.200 close just before he died. And I didn't really think 1:12:56.240 --> 1:12:57.040 he was going to die. 1:12:57.920 --> 1:12:58.120 You know. 1:12:58.520 --> 1:13:01.479 I guess I spoke with him, you know, one time, 1:13:01.720 --> 1:13:04.160 just before you because he used to talk to Al 1:13:04.240 --> 1:13:07.000 Schmidt every day they used to wake up. And then 1:13:07.040 --> 1:13:07.840 they both died. 1:13:08.560 --> 1:13:10.599 But you know, I. 1:13:10.520 --> 1:13:14.800 Guess he died before his time. And it's not like 1:13:14.840 --> 1:13:17.400 he died in his twenties. It's and he was such 1:13:17.400 --> 1:13:20.040 a you know, upbeat, fun guy. Not that he didn't 1:13:20.080 --> 1:13:23.040 have his darkness whatever, It's just not the type of 1:13:23.080 --> 1:13:25.640 guy you expect not to be here. It's hard to 1:13:25.640 --> 1:13:26.800 explain if you didn't know him. 1:13:26.880 --> 1:13:29.760 Yeah. No, He's a wonderful guy and just had this 1:13:29.960 --> 1:13:35.719 great spirit about him and he he changed the energy 1:13:36.000 --> 1:13:38.960 of the sessions. So much. He made it such a 1:13:39.000 --> 1:13:44.960 positive thing and relaxed people. And but in addition to 1:13:45.360 --> 1:13:49.679 all his human characteristics, he uh, he was a genius 1:13:49.720 --> 1:13:53.640 engineer and nick ad time and lucky to draw on. 1:13:53.680 --> 1:13:58.639 Those records are as much his design. Because we were torn. 1:13:58.880 --> 1:14:02.040 We didn't know how this record should sound. I wanted 1:14:02.080 --> 1:14:06.479 it to sound like Joshua Tree. I wanted dark and dry, 1:14:08.400 --> 1:14:13.160 and Bonnie wanted it natural like her other records have been. 1:14:13.520 --> 1:14:16.439 And Ed was coming from working with Quincy Jones on 1:14:16.479 --> 1:14:20.680 something and was putting long echoes on things. Long you know, 1:14:20.760 --> 1:14:27.240 long delays, long reverbs, and somehow we had to find 1:14:27.760 --> 1:14:30.479 a middle ground, and Ed came up with a way 1:14:31.000 --> 1:14:34.600 to use really short delays and really short reverbs that 1:14:34.840 --> 1:14:42.880 are imperceptible. You don't hear it as reverb. They sound 1:14:43.000 --> 1:14:45.840 very natural. They sound very dry, like you could have 1:14:45.840 --> 1:14:48.439 put one really great mic up in the room and 1:14:49.479 --> 1:14:52.720 balanced it in the room. Sounds very natural, but it's 1:14:52.760 --> 1:14:55.679 actually there's a lot of work that went into that sound. 1:14:56.560 --> 1:15:00.559 And people started imitating him. After that, everything got away 1:15:00.560 --> 1:15:02.920 from the long reverbs and people were going for some 1:15:03.000 --> 1:15:07.280 kind of intimacy again, and Ed was the architect of 1:15:07.360 --> 1:15:10.280 that thing. That's why I think of engineers and mixers. 1:15:10.320 --> 1:15:13.639 I think of them as architects because when you put 1:15:13.680 --> 1:15:17.519 on headphones, put your head right between the speakers, you 1:15:17.560 --> 1:15:20.920 can hear the you can picture a room. You can 1:15:20.960 --> 1:15:25.960 hear reflections off of walls, but those walls don't actually exist. 1:15:26.160 --> 1:15:29.000 It's not actually a photograph of the room it was 1:15:29.040 --> 1:15:33.400 recorded in. You create the illusion of a wall by 1:15:33.400 --> 1:15:36.960 putting a delay in there, and then a signal is 1:15:37.080 --> 1:15:39.240 bouncing off of this thing the same way you perceive 1:15:39.479 --> 1:15:43.879 like sonar, the same way sonar works, so you perceive walls. 1:15:44.360 --> 1:15:47.639 And the great mixers are beautiful architects. They build these 1:15:47.640 --> 1:15:53.000 imaginary rooms that compliment the music, don't overshadow the music. 1:15:53.479 --> 1:15:57.920 They compliment the thing and help the storytelling. And Ed 1:15:58.200 --> 1:16:03.920 built this beautiful space for Bonnie to sing these songs, 1:16:03.520 --> 1:16:10.400 and the intimacy of those records allowed her to communicate 1:16:10.400 --> 1:16:13.759 directly with people. Our goal is to make it feel 1:16:13.800 --> 1:16:17.519 like like you were driving your car and Bonnie was 1:16:17.520 --> 1:16:20.160 in the in the passenger seat next to you, leaning 1:16:20.240 --> 1:16:23.800 in and singing to you in your ear. That was 1:16:24.320 --> 1:16:26.439 when we when we talked about it at the beginning. 1:16:26.479 --> 1:16:29.360 That's what we're going for. And I think we achieved 1:16:29.360 --> 1:16:33.439 that and that's in you know, large part due to Dad. 1:16:34.360 --> 1:16:37.959 So how did you meet Ed and start working with him. 1:16:38.000 --> 1:16:41.160 Over that record? I didn't know him before that, and. 1:16:41.280 --> 1:16:43.080 So how did you end up with him? 1:16:43.680 --> 1:16:47.360 He had done Right Cooter's It is a bop to 1:16:47.400 --> 1:16:49.000 your draft. I'm trying to remember. 1:16:48.800 --> 1:16:53.479 Which I was earlier. Well, he did a Right Cooder record. 1:16:53.560 --> 1:16:55.360 He did a Right Cooter record right around the time. 1:16:55.439 --> 1:16:58.360 Bonnie liked the sound of it, so she said, let's 1:16:58.439 --> 1:17:00.320 let's get together with that. We went to move Sewing 1:17:00.400 --> 1:17:04.439 Franks and it was like it is like the three 1:17:04.439 --> 1:17:06.320 of us had known each other forever. 1:17:14.479 --> 1:17:19.559 Okay, Bonnie, after a number of records you no longer 1:17:19.640 --> 1:17:25.320 work with. This has happened with other acts. Why does 1:17:25.360 --> 1:17:27.680 it run out? And how do you feel about it? 1:17:38.880 --> 1:17:39.719 I don't know the answer. 1:17:40.439 --> 1:17:42.680 Well, you got to know the answer to how it 1:17:42.840 --> 1:17:44.559 feels when they don't call you. 1:17:45.520 --> 1:17:53.439 Well, we talked about making the next record, and she liked, ah, 1:17:55.400 --> 1:17:59.360 what's the the Lost Lobos record? How well the worst 1:17:59.400 --> 1:18:03.040 will survive? That one after that? The one that's very experimental, 1:18:03.120 --> 1:18:07.680 that that Mitchell Prum did, Mitchell Fruman, Chad Blake. She 1:18:08.439 --> 1:18:10.040 I just can't think of the name of the alright, 1:18:10.920 --> 1:18:14.160 but it's a great, incredible record. She wanted to go 1:18:14.240 --> 1:18:18.599 for more of those kind of sounds, and it wasn't 1:18:18.640 --> 1:18:23.160 really what Ed and I did, and there's no no 1:18:23.320 --> 1:18:26.360 value judgment on it. I said, well, yeah, you know, 1:18:27.280 --> 1:18:29.640 maybe you should go with Mitchell if you want, if 1:18:29.680 --> 1:18:32.080 you want that thing to do that. It was never 1:18:34.680 --> 1:18:37.599 We talked about it, and it wasn't. It was most 1:18:37.640 --> 1:18:44.519 amicable and and she made some great records too. So people, 1:18:44.800 --> 1:18:46.920 you can't keep you doing the same things, and you 1:18:47.000 --> 1:18:52.280 got to shake things up. I think that's just part 1:18:52.320 --> 1:18:55.719 of the nature of making records. We couldn't keep going 1:18:55.840 --> 1:18:58.240 with that sound. We did three records with that sound, 1:18:58.479 --> 1:19:01.840 and a live album that covered all the material and 1:19:02.439 --> 1:19:07.200 brought it together. And you want artists want to grow. 1:19:08.040 --> 1:19:10.920 I didn't take it personally. I hope. I don't think 1:19:10.960 --> 1:19:14.240 she took it personally. If we you know, we we're 1:19:14.280 --> 1:19:21.040 still wonderful friends to this day. That's just how it goes. 1:19:21.640 --> 1:19:26.280 Okay, you mentioned Pharaoh, Saunders and all these other people. 1:19:27.400 --> 1:19:34.160 Where does this jazz influence come from. 1:19:31.840 --> 1:19:36.639 Well, tell your story. I was I was fourteen years 1:19:36.680 --> 1:19:39.800 old in Detroit, my mom was making me drive around 1:19:39.800 --> 1:19:44.519 with her on Sunday running errands, right, and I just 1:19:44.520 --> 1:19:47.000 wanted to be at Northland Mall with my friends and 1:19:47.360 --> 1:19:50.320 to hang out with my mom. So it was a 1:19:50.320 --> 1:19:54.400 pretty crabby, obnoxious kid that afternoon. She was disgusted. She 1:19:54.479 --> 1:19:57.320 left me in the car, gave me the keys. He said, 1:19:57.360 --> 1:19:59.640 just play with the radio. I'll be right back. I 1:19:59.640 --> 1:20:03.679 remember were sitting outside of the Park Library. I'm messing 1:20:03.720 --> 1:20:07.680 with the tile, and I just randomly landed on a 1:20:07.760 --> 1:20:10.080 station that I didn't know it existed, because we didn't 1:20:10.080 --> 1:20:13.400 have FM radio in the house, right, And it was WHD, 1:20:13.840 --> 1:20:18.439 which was the jazz station. It was a very highly 1:20:18.439 --> 1:20:21.280 regarded DJ who's still on the air in Detroit in 1:20:21.320 --> 1:20:23.240 his nineties, by the way, a guy named ed Love 1:20:23.360 --> 1:20:26.400 who used to back announce records and was a jazz 1:20:26.720 --> 1:20:31.000 dis job. I came in on the station just as 1:20:31.040 --> 1:20:34.000 a song, which I later learned was Mode for Joe 1:20:34.160 --> 1:20:37.600 by Joe Henderson, which is a Blue Note record. And 1:20:37.640 --> 1:20:39.840 I didn't know anything about jazz. I'd probably heard it 1:20:39.880 --> 1:20:42.920 in the background and movies and stuff, but I didn't 1:20:43.120 --> 1:20:47.920 think about it ever. And right where I hit is 1:20:47.960 --> 1:20:50.680 where he starts as solo and you can check it. 1:20:50.520 --> 1:20:53.880 It happens about forty six seconds in the song. He's 1:20:53.920 --> 1:20:56.840 making these kind of anguish cries with the sacks. I'd 1:20:56.880 --> 1:21:06.719 never heard of saxophone and grabbed my attention because whatever 1:21:06.920 --> 1:21:09.600 Joe Henderson was going through that the sound he was 1:21:09.680 --> 1:21:13.120 making sounded like exactly how I felt being stuck driving 1:21:13.160 --> 1:21:16.599 around with my mom all day, so that it got 1:21:16.640 --> 1:21:20.599 my ears. And then I don't know ten fifteen seconds 1:21:20.600 --> 1:21:23.880 in the drummer, guy named Joe Chambers starts swinging on 1:21:23.920 --> 1:21:31.360 his ride symbol. And Joe Chambers stops howling and starts grooving, 1:21:32.360 --> 1:21:34.479 and I thought he was talking to me. I picked 1:21:34.520 --> 1:21:37.840 up a nonverbal message from there. I thought he was saying, 1:21:37.960 --> 1:21:43.280 don you got to groove in the face of adversity. 1:21:43.320 --> 1:21:46.839 And I thought about it, and he had just showed 1:21:46.840 --> 1:21:50.400 me how to do that. He started, no matter how 1:21:50.880 --> 1:21:54.600 how much angst he was experiencing, he couldn't resist the 1:21:54.720 --> 1:22:01.240 ride symbol and he started swinging. And I took the 1:22:01.280 --> 1:22:03.200 message to heart, and by the time my mom got 1:22:03.280 --> 1:22:05.760 back in the car, I was relaxed and a nice 1:22:05.800 --> 1:22:09.760 kid again, and I understood that there was something about 1:22:09.800 --> 1:22:14.519 this music that was highly communicative on another level than 1:22:15.000 --> 1:22:19.840 what I was experiencing with, you know, the Cherrell's or 1:22:19.880 --> 1:22:23.960 whatever at the same time. So I got an FM 1:22:24.080 --> 1:22:28.479 radio and started listening to this jazz station and just 1:22:28.680 --> 1:22:32.679 totally became enamored of this one company that was putting 1:22:32.680 --> 1:22:36.360 out all these great records. And then I saw the artwork. 1:22:37.320 --> 1:22:40.800 There was Blue Note Records, the little independent company out 1:22:40.840 --> 1:22:45.080 of New York. The covers were incredible, photography was amazing. 1:22:45.080 --> 1:22:48.720 It's black and white photography with these guys and cigarettes, 1:22:48.760 --> 1:22:53.519 smoke and saxophones and cool clothes and whatever. It was 1:22:53.600 --> 1:22:57.000 about that familiar I wanted to be part of it. 1:22:57.600 --> 1:23:01.800 I knew then wherever I can't figure out what room 1:23:01.800 --> 1:23:04.479 they're in the walls are black, I couldn't duck and 1:23:04.600 --> 1:23:10.799 dump it. This is the coolest stuff. Subsequently, I learned 1:23:11.040 --> 1:23:14.679 the roots of this music, which is that it comes 1:23:14.680 --> 1:23:21.000 from extreme oppression from the African the aspora, people who 1:23:21.040 --> 1:23:23.360 are here against their will and being forced to give 1:23:23.439 --> 1:23:26.120 up their culture or at least hide their culture. And 1:23:26.120 --> 1:23:29.240 they were able to hide it musically keep it alive. 1:23:30.080 --> 1:23:36.719 And that's where this music comes from. So it's popular 1:23:36.840 --> 1:23:40.760 all over the world because anyone who's oppressed, and there's 1:23:40.800 --> 1:23:43.880 oppression all over the world with all different kinds of people. 1:23:46.000 --> 1:23:53.800 This is the music that you should comfort and understanding 1:23:53.880 --> 1:24:00.160 of the situation. So I just became like a huge man. 1:24:00.600 --> 1:24:05.360 This music really spoke to me, and I collected the records. 1:24:05.120 --> 1:24:08.880 We used to get on a bus man we'd call 1:24:08.920 --> 1:24:10.960 around it. This goes back to the days before there 1:24:10.960 --> 1:24:13.800 were chain record stores. Every record store was a mom 1:24:13.800 --> 1:24:16.280 and pop store and reflected the taste of the owner 1:24:16.320 --> 1:24:19.519 a little bit too, So we'd have to call ten 1:24:19.640 --> 1:24:22.920 stores to find out, oh, you've got a copulary, young Unity. 1:24:23.120 --> 1:24:25.400 We'd get on the bus ride forty five minutes to 1:24:25.439 --> 1:24:27.840 the east side of Detroit just to hold the thing. 1:24:28.320 --> 1:24:30.519 It was four ninety eight or three ninety eight for 1:24:30.600 --> 1:24:33.160 the two ninety eight for the mono, right, three ninety 1:24:33.160 --> 1:24:36.519 eight for the stereo. Couldn't afford either one. But I 1:24:36.640 --> 1:24:38.719 could hold it and look at it, look at the pictures, 1:24:38.760 --> 1:24:41.120 and read the liner notes, and maybe you could con 1:24:41.200 --> 1:24:43.920 the store owner into breaking the seal and playing some 1:24:44.000 --> 1:24:47.880 of the record for you. I started collecting them. Never 1:24:48.200 --> 1:24:50.960 gone to me that fifty some years later, I didn't 1:24:51.280 --> 1:24:53.880 being president that label. 1:24:54.760 --> 1:24:59.599 Okay, A couple of questions, jazz had a peek conventional wisdom. 1:25:00.040 --> 1:25:02.320 Don't argue with me. I'm just putting it out. Pejorative 1:25:02.400 --> 1:25:05.800 jazz is dead, just like rock and roll is dead. 1:25:05.880 --> 1:25:09.599 Now now, there have been so many iterations of jazz, 1:25:09.640 --> 1:25:16.280 there's been smooth jazz, et cetera. How does someone who 1:25:16.400 --> 1:25:20.759 is not a jazz fan, where is the entry point? 1:25:21.800 --> 1:25:28.360 Yeah, but that's a that's a very good question to me. 1:25:28.520 --> 1:25:33.320 The essence of jazz or even improvisational music. I extend 1:25:33.320 --> 1:25:37.080 that to like The Grateful Dead and Goose and bands 1:25:37.160 --> 1:25:44.880 like that. They're conversations. They're there are people listening to 1:25:44.920 --> 1:25:48.400 each other and reacting. The best musicians are the ones 1:25:48.439 --> 1:25:52.240 who listen to what everyone else is playing and not 1:25:52.280 --> 1:25:57.040 only react, but suggests something new that advances the conversation further. 1:25:59.160 --> 1:26:01.679 Not every if you go to a party, not every 1:26:01.680 --> 1:26:05.840 conversation is for you. Right, you stand with some group 1:26:05.880 --> 1:26:09.240 of people and they're talking about some bullshit. You sort 1:26:09.280 --> 1:26:11.880 of back up quietly and find some other people to 1:26:11.960 --> 1:26:15.000 talk to. But you can always find something to sink 1:26:15.040 --> 1:26:18.400 your teeth into. And it's very much the same with jazz. 1:26:19.560 --> 1:26:23.880 I recommend going Easy kind of Blue by Miles Davis 1:26:24.000 --> 1:26:27.040 is a pretty safe entry point for people. Blue Trained 1:26:27.200 --> 1:26:32.360 by John Coltrane, which is the most popular catalog album 1:26:32.400 --> 1:26:37.120 that Blue Note's got. That's just it makes you feel good. 1:26:37.520 --> 1:26:42.160 You put those records on, you feel good. And the 1:26:42.280 --> 1:26:46.519 greatest misconception about jazz is that you have to study, 1:26:46.720 --> 1:26:49.280 you know, two years of music theory at the university 1:26:49.360 --> 1:26:54.200 level to qualify it to listen to it. And that's 1:26:54.320 --> 1:26:58.000 just not true. You shouldn't even be aware of the seams. 1:26:58.040 --> 1:27:01.840 You shouldn't know what these guys study to play like that. 1:27:02.439 --> 1:27:06.080 You should. It either speaks to you or it doesn't. 1:27:06.439 --> 1:27:13.240 And I don't love all jazz. You know that A 1:27:13.280 --> 1:27:15.000 lot of it doesn't speak to me. I don't like 1:27:15.040 --> 1:27:18.040 it when it gets too cerebral, when people are sometimes 1:27:18.040 --> 1:27:22.200 you can hear people. It reads almost like an application 1:27:22.360 --> 1:27:27.719 for a grant from a foundation. It's all in the head. 1:27:27.880 --> 1:27:29.960 I like it when it comes from the heart. It 1:27:30.040 --> 1:27:34.599 doesn't matter jazz or blues or anything. You know, any 1:27:34.640 --> 1:27:37.880 kind of music you want some well, at least I 1:27:38.200 --> 1:27:44.880 favor the non acrobatic, soulful, oh types of expression. 1:27:46.200 --> 1:27:50.720 Okay, what do we say to the people who know 1:27:50.880 --> 1:27:54.920 nothing but say jazz is discordant? 1:27:55.600 --> 1:27:59.000 When you're playing something else. When I first started Blue Notte, 1:27:59.000 --> 1:28:03.679 we started, we did some some research. We have focus 1:28:03.720 --> 1:28:06.559 groups come in of people, just every type of person. 1:28:07.000 --> 1:28:09.599 And what do you think of jazz? I hate jazz man, 1:28:09.640 --> 1:28:13.400 it's all discord It's terrible, all right, I understand that. 1:28:13.600 --> 1:28:18.240 Then we put on a Sidewinder by Lee Morgan. I say, oh, 1:28:18.280 --> 1:28:22.720 I love that. What do you call that music? If 1:28:22.720 --> 1:28:26.720 someone says it's all discordant, I don't dig it. I said, well, 1:28:26.760 --> 1:28:29.840 you're not listening to the right stuff. You know, it's understandable. 1:28:30.160 --> 1:28:31.800 How do you find it's hard to find your way in? 1:28:31.840 --> 1:28:35.080 That's that's That's one of the biggest things we've tried 1:28:35.080 --> 1:28:38.920 to do that Blue Note is to provide a nice 1:28:38.960 --> 1:28:42.320 pathway in, you know, to put out a welcome matt 1:28:42.640 --> 1:28:46.599 and let people come in. And of course it changes too, 1:28:46.720 --> 1:28:50.080 you know, the times change. When I when I started, 1:28:50.080 --> 1:28:52.679 the first meeting I had with an artist was with 1:28:53.120 --> 1:28:57.839 Robert Glasper, who played a very early version, rough mixes 1:28:58.479 --> 1:29:03.439 of Black Radio. I could tell them already, you know, 1:29:03.560 --> 1:29:06.559 I'd heard other people. Roy Hargrove was experimenting with hip 1:29:06.600 --> 1:29:10.479 hop ten years before that, but no one had quite 1:29:10.479 --> 1:29:17.120 put it together the way Robert did, and I was transfixed. 1:29:17.760 --> 1:29:21.240 I never heard anything like it, but I knew it 1:29:21.240 --> 1:29:25.519 would speak to a whole other generation of people, because 1:29:26.520 --> 1:29:32.920 the best jazz musicians take everything that they've absorbed and 1:29:32.920 --> 1:29:38.639 and incorporate that into the flow of their music. So Robert, 1:29:39.439 --> 1:29:41.840 you know, certainly that he grew up, you know, when 1:29:41.920 --> 1:29:44.720 hip hop music was popular, so that that's part of 1:29:44.760 --> 1:29:49.000 his thing. But here, I've heard him quote McDonald's commercials. 1:29:49.200 --> 1:29:53.439 I've heard him quote Bonnie Rait records. I've heard him 1:29:53.600 --> 1:29:57.839 quote Bruce Hornsby. Uh, you know, he's we're all musicians. 1:29:57.920 --> 1:30:00.800 You're you're you are the sum total of what you 1:30:01.240 --> 1:30:05.639 absorb in life and what you've listened to, and if 1:30:05.640 --> 1:30:09.240 you don't keep updating what you do to reflect who 1:30:09.280 --> 1:30:13.839 you are in that moment, then you're just basically a museum. 1:30:14.680 --> 1:30:16.160 You don't want to be a museum. That was one 1:30:16.200 --> 1:30:18.519 of the things when I first started a Blue Note. 1:30:19.800 --> 1:30:22.280 I wanted to know, why is it music that was 1:30:22.320 --> 1:30:26.479 recorded fifty sixty years ago relevant today? You know, why 1:30:26.479 --> 1:30:30.240 does it sound fresh and vibrant today? And what I 1:30:30.280 --> 1:30:34.000 found was that in every period of the company's existence, 1:30:34.560 --> 1:30:39.720 they always signed artist who had absorbed the fundamentals of 1:30:39.760 --> 1:30:42.519 everything that came before him, but then use that knowledge 1:30:42.560 --> 1:30:45.120 to create something brand new, whether that was The Loneliest 1:30:45.200 --> 1:30:48.360 Monk in the forties, or Art Blakey and Horace silver 1:30:48.439 --> 1:30:51.320 Invent and Hard Bob in the fifties, or Wayne Shorter, 1:30:51.560 --> 1:30:55.360 Herbie Hancock or Ntte Coleman, Eric Dolphie in the sixties, 1:30:55.520 --> 1:31:01.960 or glassper in two thousand and eleven. You have to 1:31:03.080 --> 1:31:07.200 it's got to be self expression, not you just copying 1:31:07.920 --> 1:31:09.440 someone else's self expression. 1:31:11.520 --> 1:31:15.719 Okay, let's just stay on that topic for a minute, people, 1:31:15.800 --> 1:31:19.160 Let's just talk rock music for a minutes. Yesha, very rare, 1:31:19.640 --> 1:31:23.519 extremely rare for someone to create something unlest we're talking 1:31:23.520 --> 1:31:27.320 about Bonnie Raid of the quality of their initial period 1:31:27.680 --> 1:31:32.960 decades later, especially today with recording revenues for most of 1:31:33.000 --> 1:31:36.439 these acts small. They make the money on the road, 1:31:36.439 --> 1:31:38.720 and the people want to wear, they hear, they hits. 1:31:38.720 --> 1:31:41.120 There's an occasional being like the Doobie Brothers puts out 1:31:41.120 --> 1:31:45.000 a record every couple of years, but most acts have stopped. Okay, 1:31:46.560 --> 1:31:50.639 do you think you're a record producer, Do you think 1:31:50.680 --> 1:31:53.200 it's a state of mind that you got them in 1:31:53.240 --> 1:31:56.040 the studio and you get two hundred thousand dollars, you 1:31:56.040 --> 1:31:59.280 can make something as good as they made in their 1:31:59.400 --> 1:32:03.479 legendary era. Is something in that quality or is it 1:32:03.720 --> 1:32:07.840 spent whatever headspace they were in, whatever that ship sailed. 1:32:08.760 --> 1:32:12.360 I don't think that there's like a singular cutoff point 1:32:12.600 --> 1:32:15.880 at which point you're doomed to just repeat what you 1:32:15.920 --> 1:32:21.759 did in your glory years. The artists that I admire 1:32:21.840 --> 1:32:28.479 most have it's it's cicular, you know, cyclical that you 1:32:28.640 --> 1:32:33.120 ride these waves of you're inspired. You ride a wave 1:32:33.240 --> 1:32:39.240 of an inspired time, and then then the trough of 1:32:39.240 --> 1:32:42.040 the waves when you're not inspired, and if you stay 1:32:42.040 --> 1:32:45.360 in it for forty fifty years, you get a couple 1:32:45.360 --> 1:32:46.360 of crests. 1:32:47.479 --> 1:32:49.200 Well, well, let's put it out differently. 1:32:49.240 --> 1:32:49.519 Okay. 1:32:49.640 --> 1:32:52.040 Certainly, if you were a rock fan and you're buying 1:32:52.120 --> 1:32:55.320 records in the sixties, the interest leaves would have pictures 1:32:55.320 --> 1:32:59.160 of every album that whatever you bought Atlantic records, there 1:32:59.160 --> 1:33:02.240 were a lot of jobs, less McCann whatever. What do 1:33:02.320 --> 1:33:06.280 we know? Those records were never million sellers. This was 1:33:06.320 --> 1:33:09.599 a business. We like your music, we're making a record. 1:33:09.640 --> 1:33:11.840 We're not going to lose money because then we're going 1:33:11.920 --> 1:33:15.479 to stop. So when you're making records at Blue Note today, 1:33:15.640 --> 1:33:19.719 is that pretty much the goal we're documenting. These people 1:33:19.760 --> 1:33:23.960 are artists. We are not even looking at you know, 1:33:24.000 --> 1:33:27.640 the Spotify top fifty whatever in that. This is the 1:33:27.680 --> 1:33:28.400 modern world. 1:33:33.600 --> 1:33:37.599 I see albums. I still make albums, still believe in 1:33:38.280 --> 1:33:41.040 the album is a statement, but I see it I 1:33:41.160 --> 1:33:47.519 seem as postcards. You know, hey, Bo'm in Minnesota today. Man, 1:33:47.600 --> 1:33:50.880 it's great here heading to you know, we'll be in 1:33:50.880 --> 1:33:55.800 Saint Louis tomorrow night. Just dropping the mailbox picture. You're 1:33:55.800 --> 1:34:00.679 standing by the Paul Bunyan statue, right right right. That's 1:34:00.720 --> 1:34:02.479 what the albums are. This is where I am at 1:34:02.520 --> 1:34:07.440 this moment in my life. 1:34:11.800 --> 1:34:15.439 Well, this is very different from the pre Internet era, 1:34:16.520 --> 1:34:19.639 where the goal was to sell tonnage on every record 1:34:19.640 --> 1:34:20.519 on a major label. 1:34:20.520 --> 1:34:26.640 Ony. Yeah, well, I believe the best business plan is 1:34:26.680 --> 1:34:31.000 to make great records. If you make great records, you'll 1:34:32.880 --> 1:34:35.240 the revenue will find you. 1:34:35.600 --> 1:34:37.880 Okay, Blue Note, how many records you put out a year? 1:34:38.840 --> 1:34:44.519 We do around twenty Frontline albums, and last year we 1:34:44.600 --> 1:34:50.760 did fifty high quality audio, file quality vinyl reissues of. 1:34:50.680 --> 1:34:54.439 The catalog Frontline product. What's the budget for one of 1:34:54.439 --> 1:34:55.200 those records. 1:34:55.200 --> 1:34:57.640 It depends, could be Norah Jones, or it could be 1:34:57.680 --> 1:35:00.400 if it's a new jazz artist, it might be fifteen 1:35:00.400 --> 1:35:04.320 thousand dollars. Okay, how'd you get this gig? 1:35:07.760 --> 1:35:08.439 Good question. 1:35:08.920 --> 1:35:11.040 I was in New York City. I was producing a 1:35:11.120 --> 1:35:16.320 John Mayer record. Born and Raised twenty eleven, were recording 1:35:16.439 --> 1:35:20.240 an Electric Lady, and we took a night off. So 1:35:21.320 --> 1:35:23.599 I looked in the village voice just thought, oh God, 1:35:23.680 --> 1:35:26.280 and here's some music clear my head. And I saw 1:35:26.320 --> 1:35:29.360 that an artist named Gregory Porter was appearing at a 1:35:29.360 --> 1:35:33.800 little club called Smoke Up near Harlem. And I'd heard 1:35:33.840 --> 1:35:39.040 Gregory on the local jazz station, and I was blown away. 1:35:39.040 --> 1:35:40.920 I didn't know anything about him, but I heard a 1:35:40.960 --> 1:35:43.559 song called Illusion that he put out on a little 1:35:43.560 --> 1:35:49.120 independent label called Motima. I thought, man, you wrote this song, 1:35:49.600 --> 1:35:53.240 and he just sings it so beautifully, which is great poetry. 1:35:53.240 --> 1:35:56.479 And listen to his voice. Man. So I was thrilled 1:35:56.479 --> 1:35:57.840 to see that he was there. I didn't know anything 1:35:57.840 --> 1:35:59.639 about him, so I went up to catch a show 1:36:00.080 --> 1:36:03.880 there for three sets. Wasn't there on business. I just 1:36:03.960 --> 1:36:08.040 drank coffee, ate ribs and enjoyed all three sets. The 1:36:08.080 --> 1:36:11.519 next morning, I had breakfast with an old buddy of mine, 1:36:11.560 --> 1:36:14.800 guy named Dan McCarroll. I knew Dan when he was 1:36:14.840 --> 1:36:18.320 a Sheryl Crow's drummer, played Lloyd Cole Emotions, and he 1:36:18.400 --> 1:36:21.519 was married to Jane Oppenheimer, who was my assistant in 1:36:21.560 --> 1:36:24.360 the nineties, and that's when Dan came into the picture. 1:36:24.400 --> 1:36:30.519 I met him then, but over the years, his savvy 1:36:30.640 --> 1:36:36.479 as a musician of taste had gotten him to the 1:36:36.520 --> 1:36:40.000 point where he'd become the president of Capitol Records. And 1:36:40.400 --> 1:36:44.200 we weren't even talking about the music business, records or anything. 1:36:44.240 --> 1:36:47.320 But at the end of the breakfast, I said to him, 1:36:47.960 --> 1:36:51.439 Blue Not it's still a part of Capitol, right, you 1:36:51.640 --> 1:36:54.879 really should sign this guy. I saw last night Greg Reporter. 1:36:56.479 --> 1:37:00.280 He's quiet for about ten seconds. He said, now you 1:37:00.320 --> 1:37:04.000 should sign him. And completely unbeknownst to me, I don't 1:37:04.000 --> 1:37:06.479 know anything about the inner workings of Blue Note at 1:37:06.479 --> 1:37:09.599 that point. But Bruce Lonval, who'd run the company for 1:37:09.680 --> 1:37:13.400 thirty years, one of the great recordmen of all time, 1:37:13.680 --> 1:37:18.680 maybe one of maybe the most beloved executive among musicians. 1:37:18.680 --> 1:37:23.840 Even Bruce was ill. He had Parkinson's and he wasn't 1:37:23.840 --> 1:37:26.559 going to be able to continue, and they were looking 1:37:26.640 --> 1:37:32.000 for someone who could, who had an understanding of the 1:37:32.040 --> 1:37:37.160 ethos of Blue Note Records, but would continue to move 1:37:37.200 --> 1:37:42.040 it forward, not just remake the old nineteen sixties records. 1:37:42.560 --> 1:37:46.360 So he offered me the gig. And and my goal 1:37:46.560 --> 1:37:49.640 in life had been to not have a job or 1:37:49.800 --> 1:37:51.519 something that I considered to be a job. I never 1:37:51.560 --> 1:37:54.720 thought a guitar player or being in a band or 1:37:54.760 --> 1:37:59.400 making records as work. You know, it was fun. This 1:38:00.120 --> 1:38:03.880 is going to be something. Plus, I also knew that 1:38:03.960 --> 1:38:06.200 I was going to have to learn to understand a 1:38:06.240 --> 1:38:10.200 profit and loss statement. I never used excel. 1:38:12.000 --> 1:38:13.799 I haven't used it to this day, okay. 1:38:14.320 --> 1:38:18.200 And so I also know that you have a finite 1:38:18.320 --> 1:38:23.040 number of synoptic pathways that you can keep open at 1:38:23.040 --> 1:38:26.599 any given time, and when you don't use them, you 1:38:26.640 --> 1:38:28.920 shut them down to make room for the things you're 1:38:28.960 --> 1:38:32.679 currently using. So I thought, well, I'm gonna I'm gonna. 1:38:32.800 --> 1:38:35.240 I may learn how to do this, but I may 1:38:35.280 --> 1:38:43.280 never write a song. I can live with that. It 1:38:43.360 --> 1:38:45.960 seemed like a high high adventure to try to learn, 1:38:46.160 --> 1:38:48.680 but I was woefully unprepared. I don't know anything. 1:38:48.439 --> 1:38:50.760 About okay, but you know, it's not like the old 1:38:50.880 --> 1:38:55.360 days where it labels. Every five years, it would be turnover, 1:38:55.600 --> 1:38:58.880 get a new president. They wipe everybody out. You've had 1:38:58.920 --> 1:39:03.240 this gig for a long time. I would assume you 1:39:03.280 --> 1:39:06.200 don't listen. Everyone likes to get paid. But I assume 1:39:06.240 --> 1:39:07.200 you don't need the money. 1:39:08.080 --> 1:39:08.840 I don't need the Braain. 1:39:10.640 --> 1:39:14.240 Do you actually have an office? Do you actually go in? 1:39:14.880 --> 1:39:16.240 Yeah? 1:39:16.280 --> 1:39:19.479 Well, all I know is you're always out on the 1:39:19.560 --> 1:39:20.560 road with somebody. 1:39:20.680 --> 1:39:26.160 Well I learned, Well, here's the deal. OK. It took 1:39:26.240 --> 1:39:32.360 about five years to figure out how to do the 1:39:32.479 --> 1:39:36.200 job as myself. I couldn't be Bruce Man. Bruce was 1:39:36.240 --> 1:39:39.080 so good. If you wrote him an email, if you 1:39:39.120 --> 1:39:42.120 send him an email, he'd answer you within like thirty seconds. 1:39:42.160 --> 1:39:45.120 You'd get a reply. He always returned calls. He could 1:39:45.120 --> 1:39:50.760 do all these things. Now we have a living refutation 1:39:50.920 --> 1:39:54.200 of astrology, Bruce and myself, because we have the same birthday, 1:39:54.240 --> 1:39:55.360 September thirteenth. 1:39:55.760 --> 1:39:59.560 He was a time out timeout you believe in astrology. 1:40:00.400 --> 1:40:07.920 No, we refuted astrology because we are so different. But 1:40:08.120 --> 1:40:13.200 we were really different. And they were huge footprints, you know, 1:40:13.240 --> 1:40:23.200 to walk in possible to fill the shoes. But I 1:40:23.240 --> 1:40:26.439 couldn't be him, he couldn't be me. So how can 1:40:26.479 --> 1:40:29.360 I be myself and do this? And that may not 1:40:29.439 --> 1:40:34.800 be going into an office and sitting there and you know, 1:40:35.360 --> 1:40:37.320 just sitting there on the phone punching in and out 1:40:37.439 --> 1:40:40.760 from eight in the morning to five or whatever. That 1:40:40.439 --> 1:40:44.080 that wasn't my style. I found a style, do it? 1:40:44.880 --> 1:40:47.720 So what is the style? Get out in the world, man, 1:40:47.880 --> 1:40:56.880 and and and keep making music because someone's got to understand. 1:40:57.640 --> 1:41:02.400 But the artists are really going through someone's got to 1:41:02.479 --> 1:41:05.439 understand it. It's a it's a different mentality. You start 1:41:05.439 --> 1:41:08.599 talking to an artist about a deadline. We need we need, 1:41:08.680 --> 1:41:10.960 we need the credits handed in by October twenty eighth 1:41:11.000 --> 1:41:14.559 and the photos done by the November two. That just 1:41:14.560 --> 1:41:16.680 goes in one ear and out the other. Especially if 1:41:16.720 --> 1:41:22.559 someone's trying to portray life in the recording studio at 1:41:22.560 --> 1:41:24.040 the same time that you got to be in a 1:41:24.080 --> 1:41:28.560 completely different headspace. Someone's got to understand that that headspace. 1:41:28.920 --> 1:41:33.640 Someone's got to understand the relationship with the audience. You know, 1:41:33.640 --> 1:41:36.880 you're if you're running a business of getting music to 1:41:36.920 --> 1:41:40.640 an audience, you got to understand what the relationship is 1:41:40.680 --> 1:41:45.280 between musicians and the audience. Going out and tour with 1:41:45.400 --> 1:41:49.439 Bob We're was the best thing I ever did for 1:41:49.520 --> 1:41:53.880 Blue Note Records, because that's that you go in there 1:41:53.960 --> 1:41:59.479 night after night, the grateful that audience is such a 1:41:59.600 --> 1:42:04.800 great audience. Man, they're so tuned in man, sometimes with 1:42:04.880 --> 1:42:11.160 a little help, sometimes just on their own. But there's 1:42:11.200 --> 1:42:16.280 a real psychic connection between everybody in the room and 1:42:17.320 --> 1:42:24.120 between the band and the audience. We never play anything 1:42:24.120 --> 1:42:27.479 the same way twice. That's the wond room or whatever 1:42:27.479 --> 1:42:29.400 you played last night, don't do it because it's not 1:42:29.400 --> 1:42:31.000 going to work tonight. Everyone else is going to be 1:42:31.040 --> 1:42:33.439 in a different place. So just start fresh every night. 1:42:34.439 --> 1:42:37.639 And there will be some failures. There'll be some real 1:42:37.880 --> 1:42:40.599 train wrecks in the band. A song may fall apart. 1:42:41.680 --> 1:42:45.200 Audience doesn't mind that as long as you were doing 1:42:45.200 --> 1:42:47.880 it in the service of trying to achieve something great. 1:42:48.040 --> 1:42:52.439 And a couple times a night we will connect with 1:42:52.560 --> 1:42:55.439 the audience and you get this energy. You can feel 1:42:55.439 --> 1:42:59.439 it flowing from the stage into the audience and you 1:42:59.800 --> 1:43:02.680 can feel and see them responding to it, and it 1:43:02.680 --> 1:43:05.480 comes back to you and it becomes cyclical. It elevates 1:43:05.520 --> 1:43:07.960 the game and you can blow the rough off the 1:43:07.960 --> 1:43:11.519 motherfucker like that, you know, And and I don't know 1:43:11.800 --> 1:43:15.519 anything that's more exhilarating than that feeling when it's happening. 1:43:17.400 --> 1:43:21.679 And record companies need to understand that and that and 1:43:21.760 --> 1:43:24.640 that that's the kind of relationship you're They're not just 1:43:25.600 --> 1:43:29.919 you know, it's not like you're selling horn flakes to somebody. 1:43:29.960 --> 1:43:33.080 You know, this is you're dealing with high levels of 1:43:33.240 --> 1:43:40.760 consciousness and and and you're impacting people on uh, some 1:43:40.920 --> 1:43:45.120 really deep levels. And you got to understand that. 1:43:45.880 --> 1:43:50.280 Okay, how much administrative work do you do. 1:43:52.439 --> 1:43:52.719 Enough? 1:43:53.520 --> 1:43:56.120 Okay, you're on the you're on the road with Bob Weird. 1:43:56.920 --> 1:44:00.280 You know you're only on stage a very small portion 1:44:00.439 --> 1:44:03.840 of the day. Are you working on Blue Note every day? 1:44:03.960 --> 1:44:06.280 Absolutely? Man? You know I'm up at eight o'clock in 1:44:06.360 --> 1:44:11.160 the morning on calls. And also you know, if you 1:44:11.160 --> 1:44:13.280 you know how people you put the names on the 1:44:13.360 --> 1:44:19.439 dressing rooms right mine's they's a Blue Note World headquarters. 1:44:19.040 --> 1:44:22.000 We're just a full time gig. Man. I go to 1:44:22.040 --> 1:44:25.559 bed thinking about it. I'm talking to the musicians. I 1:44:25.600 --> 1:44:28.400 can have better conversations with the musicians because I'm playing 1:44:28.400 --> 1:44:29.639 improvisational music. 1:44:31.040 --> 1:44:34.920 I'm not like, Okay, you're out with Bob Weir, but 1:44:34.960 --> 1:44:38.240 you're out all the fucking time. You're out with a band, 1:44:38.600 --> 1:44:41.519 you Last Waltz Tour, it seems like you're working all 1:44:41.560 --> 1:44:41.960 the time. 1:44:42.120 --> 1:44:45.200 It just seems that way. You don't see every day 1:44:46.760 --> 1:44:47.200 I'm there. 1:44:47.640 --> 1:44:52.559 Well, no, I'm not justifying your work, and I'm more 1:44:52.760 --> 1:44:56.400 interested in what is driving you to go on the road. 1:44:57.720 --> 1:45:00.439 It's got to be more than you know. Gives me 1:45:00.520 --> 1:45:05.040 insight and not every and you know, the electricity talk 1:45:05.080 --> 1:45:08.280 about a moment with the dead is different from a 1:45:08.360 --> 1:45:12.400 regular concert that is not improvisational. Not that the audience 1:45:12.439 --> 1:45:15.799 can't connect to a certain degree. There must be somebody, 1:45:16.200 --> 1:45:20.400 you know, is this type of thing where okay a month, okay, okay, 1:45:20.400 --> 1:45:22.559 I'll do it, or you really want to go on 1:45:22.600 --> 1:45:22.960 the road. 1:45:23.280 --> 1:45:26.680 I love I love play. But here I'll give you 1:45:26.720 --> 1:45:30.040 an example this because this isn't like a grateful dead 1:45:30.040 --> 1:45:33.400 improvisational thing. When you mentioned the Last Waltz Tour, which 1:45:33.439 --> 1:45:36.280 we do heavy so often with Warren Haynes and Jamie 1:45:36.360 --> 1:45:41.479 Johnson and John Medeski and a rotating cast to other 1:45:41.680 --> 1:45:49.599 characters too. One year I was positioned behind Warren Samp 1:45:50.280 --> 1:45:53.040 clocked it in at about one hundred and thirteen decibels. 1:45:53.040 --> 1:45:55.719 The sound coming out of it had the back cover off, 1:45:56.000 --> 1:46:02.080 and it was just hurt in my ears and I 1:46:02.080 --> 1:46:04.800 don't like to use in yours. I want to be 1:46:05.120 --> 1:46:09.240 in the thing. But it was really loud. We got 1:46:09.240 --> 1:46:12.479 to I should be Released, which was like kind of 1:46:12.479 --> 1:46:16.479 a climactic moment in the show, and I look at 1:46:16.479 --> 1:46:20.240 this audience. We're playing theaters twenty five hundred, three thousand 1:46:20.240 --> 1:46:23.880 people every night, and we light it up a little 1:46:23.880 --> 1:46:26.120 bit in it. You see everybody standing up, you see 1:46:26.160 --> 1:46:30.400 people crying, hugging each other. That song means so much 1:46:30.439 --> 1:46:32.799 to him. It's such a great song. I should be released. 1:46:32.800 --> 1:46:36.439 I mean something different to everybody. Everybody, but everybody's got 1:46:36.439 --> 1:46:42.040 something that they need to be released from. And I thought, 1:46:42.080 --> 1:46:44.400 all right, man, if I got to damage my hearing, 1:46:44.600 --> 1:46:46.800 I can't think of a better way to do it 1:46:46.880 --> 1:46:50.599 than bringing this kind of feeling to three thousand people tonight. 1:46:50.800 --> 1:46:55.639 If I'm I'm willing to lose my hearing this, how 1:46:55.800 --> 1:46:57.000 is your hearing? It's good? 1:46:59.360 --> 1:47:05.240 Get older? Yeah, okay, I'm gonna jump. What was going 1:47:05.280 --> 1:47:07.240 through your mind? And how did you make cap in 1:47:07.400 --> 1:47:08.799 the Brian Wilson movie. 1:47:10.640 --> 1:47:14.640 I was producing my old school buddy Doug Figer in 1:47:14.680 --> 1:47:17.599 his group The Knack right around the corner from here. 1:47:17.680 --> 1:47:26.639 In fact, and Doug and Burton Averar the guitar player, 1:47:27.080 --> 1:47:31.639 had laid the Smile bootlegs on me. I was unaware 1:47:31.800 --> 1:47:33.840 of I knew about it, but I didn't really know 1:47:33.920 --> 1:47:38.120 the story. Holy cow, man, I got so deep into 1:47:38.160 --> 1:47:41.760 listening to these things it just blew me away. And 1:47:41.760 --> 1:47:45.720 then the mystique about them being unfinished and fragmented like that, 1:47:47.840 --> 1:47:50.200 probably to the detriment of the Knack record. That's all 1:47:50.240 --> 1:47:54.240 I was listening to. And sometime we were still making 1:47:54.240 --> 1:47:57.760 the record, I got invited to remember it was Red 1:47:57.800 --> 1:47:59.920 Hot and Blue. Was that with this album? Are Gone 1:48:00.400 --> 1:48:04.599 Pediatric Aids or AIDS benefit? Yeah? Yeah, So Elizabeth Taylor 1:48:04.760 --> 1:48:12.760 was hosting a party. I thought, well to Jim, and 1:48:12.760 --> 1:48:18.840 I went and I get into theffet line. There is 1:48:18.880 --> 1:48:21.720 Brian Wilson and doctor Landy standing right next to me, 1:48:22.800 --> 1:48:26.200 so I couldn't contain myself. I was so steeped in 1:48:26.320 --> 1:48:28.880 all of his music at that point, and I was 1:48:29.000 --> 1:48:36.200 just rantic about how brilliant it was, and I think 1:48:36.240 --> 1:48:37.400 he appreciated it. The invite. 1:48:37.400 --> 1:48:42.120 Wait wait, wait, I've had my interactions with Brian from 1:48:42.160 --> 1:48:45.240 going back forty years to more recent stuff on the 1:48:45.280 --> 1:48:49.480 bus whatever. It's not a regular conversation. 1:48:49.880 --> 1:48:50.479 No, it's not. 1:48:50.600 --> 1:48:56.280 So you testify. When you testify to the average household 1:48:56.360 --> 1:48:59.000 name musician, yeah, most of them just say thank you. 1:49:00.560 --> 1:49:02.760 That's not the way to connect with people and say 1:49:02.760 --> 1:49:04.720 you know that's not you. But you can't hold back 1:49:05.000 --> 1:49:07.960 at certain points. But occasionally get someone and. 1:49:07.880 --> 1:49:09.680 Said oh yeah, blah blah blah. 1:49:09.720 --> 1:49:15.000 So normally Brian most of the time blank, other times 1:49:15.040 --> 1:49:18.760 sort of enthusiastic, over amped. I mean, what was his 1:49:18.840 --> 1:49:21.440 reaction to you testify? 1:49:22.520 --> 1:49:26.800 I think it meant something to him that someone had 1:49:26.840 --> 1:49:29.640 listened that closely and heard what he was trying to do. 1:49:29.920 --> 1:49:31.960 So you were talking about the smile, that's. 1:49:31.760 --> 1:49:35.800 How much smile stuff and being very specific in my references, 1:49:35.800 --> 1:49:38.759 more specific than I could be today. I was steeped 1:49:38.760 --> 1:49:45.519 in it, and I guess I heard what he was 1:49:46.080 --> 1:49:54.040 going for and it meant something to him, and just 1:49:55.560 --> 1:49:58.439 you know, finish your shrimp and you come come to 1:49:58.439 --> 1:50:03.559 the studios. So they invited me to the studio. I 1:50:03.640 --> 1:50:06.360 went over there and we became pretty friendly. 1:50:06.600 --> 1:50:08.240 Do you have any idea who you were when he 1:50:08.320 --> 1:50:08.560 met you? 1:50:08.920 --> 1:50:17.879 I don't know, but yeah, he knew I was a producer. 1:50:17.880 --> 1:50:20.960 I guess yeah. But we became friendly and then I 1:50:21.200 --> 1:50:24.960 played some gigs with him, would just be me and him. 1:50:25.200 --> 1:50:28.160 He played piano and sing. I played bass. It just 1:50:28.200 --> 1:50:32.840 one off charity things. One Sunday we played something. It 1:50:32.920 --> 1:50:35.759 was something for the Elizabeth Glazer Foundation. She was still alive. 1:50:35.800 --> 1:50:40.320 Then it was somehouse up in Benedic Canyon in place, big, 1:50:40.479 --> 1:50:45.040 big place for a huge backyard. Ronald Reagan was there, 1:50:46.800 --> 1:50:52.080 Paul Buls, a bunch of people there, and Brian and 1:50:52.160 --> 1:50:55.360 Jackson Brown were the entertainment. His families in the afternoon. 1:50:56.960 --> 1:51:02.200 So Jackson was brilliant. And then then we played and 1:51:03.080 --> 1:51:05.680 we just made a mess out of California girls. It 1:51:05.760 --> 1:51:08.080 was terrible, and Brian said to them like, oh man, 1:51:08.120 --> 1:51:10.320 we really fucked that one up. And then everyone came 1:51:10.400 --> 1:51:14.799 and got their kids, and then we did some damage 1:51:14.800 --> 1:51:18.479 to another song, and then we got to Love Mercy, 1:51:18.520 --> 1:51:21.040 and the sun was going down on the mountain in 1:51:21.080 --> 1:51:23.280 front of us, so it was just a beautiful scene. 1:51:24.000 --> 1:51:27.720 And he connected on such a profound level to that 1:51:27.760 --> 1:51:31.080 song that I think I stopped playing at one point. WHOA, 1:51:32.120 --> 1:51:36.560 I didn't know he still had that in him, and 1:51:36.600 --> 1:51:40.160 it was just sublime. Man. It was just a beautiful 1:51:40.280 --> 1:51:44.640 version of that beautiful song and a beautiful message. And 1:51:44.680 --> 1:51:48.160 I thought, oh man, people could only see this part 1:51:48.160 --> 1:51:53.559 of them. So al Teller was running a MCA at 1:51:53.600 --> 1:51:58.479 the time, and he offered me a label deal. I said, 1:51:58.600 --> 1:52:00.759 you know, man, I don't do these little pop records. 1:52:00.760 --> 1:52:04.080 He said, no, no, no, just be yourself. So I signed 1:52:04.160 --> 1:52:11.800 Chris Christofferson, Felix Cavaliery and then Brian Wilson, and I 1:52:11.880 --> 1:52:14.920 had first job here is to clean up at this point. 1:52:14.920 --> 1:52:17.000 Now by the time I'd made a deal with him, 1:52:17.040 --> 1:52:18.800 by the time we got around to that show, in fact, 1:52:18.840 --> 1:52:23.600 Elizabeth Glazier's thing Landy was gone. He was an obstacle 1:52:23.680 --> 1:52:34.600 to progress. And I signed him to signed him to 1:52:34.600 --> 1:52:37.040 our label, and I thought, the first thing is, let's 1:52:37.080 --> 1:52:41.479 get all the unsavory stuff, the National Inquirer kind of 1:52:41.880 --> 1:52:44.880 twenty four hour shrink stuff. Let's get that out of 1:52:44.880 --> 1:52:47.479 the way. Let's get the focus back on why this 1:52:47.560 --> 1:52:52.800 is probably the greatest record maker of all times. So 1:52:52.880 --> 1:52:57.559 I thought, well, let's make a documentary film. And I 1:52:57.560 --> 1:52:59.040 could see it in my head. I knew what it 1:52:59.080 --> 1:53:01.920 was supposed to be, and I started taking all these 1:53:01.920 --> 1:53:05.639 meetings and anyone who's going to kick in money had 1:53:05.680 --> 1:53:10.680 some opinion about what it should be, and just fucket, man, 1:53:10.680 --> 1:53:13.280 I'll pay for this myself and I'll direct it. I 1:53:13.320 --> 1:53:15.640 didn't know anything about directing doctor, but I knew what 1:53:15.800 --> 1:53:18.599 story to tell, and I was able to surround myself 1:53:18.720 --> 1:53:21.280 with the great people. I had a lot of help, 1:53:21.760 --> 1:53:26.439 great DP, great editor, great producer, and we made this 1:53:26.520 --> 1:53:29.000 little thing that was really supposed to be kind of 1:53:29.000 --> 1:53:32.800 an infomercial just to change people's minds and get the 1:53:32.840 --> 1:53:38.799 focus back on. Submitted it to Sundance. I got accepted 1:53:38.800 --> 1:53:42.280 at Sundance. So now Brian and I we're going to 1:53:42.360 --> 1:53:46.519 go to Sundance. We'll show the movie and play afterwards. 1:53:48.120 --> 1:53:50.519 And we got all these offers all of a sudden, 1:53:50.560 --> 1:53:55.160 I was a documentary director and we were in profit 1:53:55.240 --> 1:53:58.920 before we started. All the money came back and we 1:53:58.960 --> 1:54:03.200 made TV deal, some home distribution deals, and it was 1:54:03.200 --> 1:54:07.000 a nice glimpse into who Brian was. It still holds 1:54:07.080 --> 1:54:09.519 up to this day. I think is a nice portrait 1:54:09.560 --> 1:54:14.320 of him. And people got to see him singing his 1:54:14.400 --> 1:54:20.240 songs with the degree of musicality that he was capable 1:54:20.240 --> 1:54:23.719 of bringing. To the songs, and it got his confidence 1:54:23.800 --> 1:54:25.760 up and he started going out on tour after that. 1:54:25.880 --> 1:54:27.320 I never thought he could get to We made it 1:54:27.360 --> 1:54:29.400 because I didn't think he could get through a show. 1:54:31.360 --> 1:54:33.480 But he certainly could, and he went on to do 1:54:33.560 --> 1:54:36.520 some incredible things that pet sounds to it and smile 1:54:36.600 --> 1:54:37.000 to it. 1:54:44.360 --> 1:54:48.760 Okay, I'm a huge Beach Boys fan. I mean gigantic. 1:54:49.040 --> 1:54:50.920 I tell people all the time. I've been tell him 1:54:50.960 --> 1:54:53.040 for fifty years to I live in California because of 1:54:53.080 --> 1:54:58.200 the Beach Boys. There are some very surprising moments, most 1:54:58.240 --> 1:55:02.440 of them in the seventies. Marcella carl and the Passions 1:55:03.880 --> 1:55:08.040 not mediocre record. That track is unbelievable. Of course, there's 1:55:08.040 --> 1:55:11.720 selon Sailor on holland good. 1:55:11.560 --> 1:55:14.680 Time in on La the Light album. 1:55:15.640 --> 1:55:19.440 But as he goes back on tour, because you and 1:55:19.480 --> 1:55:21.600 me both know he sang all the high parts on 1:55:21.760 --> 1:55:26.839 all those original records, it seemed to me a little 1:55:27.080 --> 1:55:31.720 bit of the Emperor's new clothes. I saw him many times. 1:55:31.840 --> 1:55:35.480 Was evolved on a very oblique level with the redoers. 1:55:35.000 --> 1:55:36.320 Smile, and. 1:55:39.160 --> 1:55:43.919 His voice was far from perfect. Let's not talk about 1:55:44.040 --> 1:55:48.760 his psychological state, which always wasn't the best and I 1:55:48.800 --> 1:55:54.240 had inside information. Did he still really have it those 1:55:54.320 --> 1:55:55.640 last thirty odd years? 1:55:56.040 --> 1:56:02.600 Yes, Yes, And I remember when we were we were 1:56:02.600 --> 1:56:07.839 recording something and had a studio full of guys Waddie 1:56:08.360 --> 1:56:11.560 Ben montench Keltner. We were cutting some song for him 1:56:12.160 --> 1:56:13.960 and he was sitting at it. He walked in and 1:56:14.040 --> 1:56:16.720 sat down at the piano, put his head down, and 1:56:16.760 --> 1:56:18.920 I thought he was asleep, right, But we just kept 1:56:18.960 --> 1:56:23.560 cutting the song and we get to like the third verse. 1:56:25.040 --> 1:56:27.120 All of a sudden, we're here in piano and his 1:56:27.280 --> 1:56:31.040 head still down. I thought he was Gone's bilt man. 1:56:31.400 --> 1:56:36.280 And he played the most exquisite part, and he obviously 1:56:36.360 --> 1:56:38.280 was just waiting for that to roll around, and he 1:56:38.400 --> 1:56:45.240 was just listening and he had that absolutely had that spark. 1:56:45.240 --> 1:56:52.480 And I'd seen him. There's a group of folks who 1:56:52.680 --> 1:56:55.440 we used to get together with him some you know, 1:56:55.520 --> 1:56:58.320 not that long ago, maybe six months ago. We'd have 1:56:58.760 --> 1:57:05.000 outings at Moose on Frank's and he still has unfinished 1:57:05.240 --> 1:57:09.240 material that he wanted me to work on, and you know, 1:57:09.480 --> 1:57:14.640 talked a little bit about that. I think he Yeah, 1:57:14.720 --> 1:57:22.360 I think he was enigmatic. You never knew how present 1:57:22.640 --> 1:57:25.000 he was, but he'd always surprise. 1:57:24.680 --> 1:57:29.160 You Okay, forget you go to sundance. Yeah, that means 1:57:29.160 --> 1:57:31.640 you've got to spend a good amount of time with 1:57:31.760 --> 1:57:33.000 him not working. 1:57:33.240 --> 1:57:34.560 Yeah. 1:57:34.560 --> 1:57:37.600 Could you have a conversation like a regular personager? 1:57:38.320 --> 1:57:43.520 Yeah? Yeah, I mean, well there's nothing regular about him. Okay, 1:57:44.480 --> 1:57:48.640 but could I have a conversation yes, And he lived 1:57:48.680 --> 1:57:53.080 a really interesting life and you know, remembered everything, even 1:57:53.320 --> 1:57:56.320 towards the end. He remembered everything from the past and 1:57:56.520 --> 1:58:04.920 could tell you great stories. And also, sometimes it's just 1:58:05.000 --> 1:58:13.320 not necessary to make aimless chatter small talk. You know, 1:58:14.520 --> 1:58:18.560 sometimes you can have an artistic relationship with someone that 1:58:18.760 --> 1:58:19.520 transcends that. 1:58:22.520 --> 1:58:27.160 Okay, then let's switch gears back to the Stones. They 1:58:27.240 --> 1:58:32.800 agreed to make a record. Stones they legendarily would make records. 1:58:32.800 --> 1:58:35.960 They'd bring in a piece that was recorded years before, 1:58:36.720 --> 1:58:39.560 they would write the songs in the studio. People did 1:58:39.600 --> 1:58:41.480 that after, but they were one of the first people. 1:58:42.600 --> 1:58:45.640 So what is your role. Now, Let's say you're finally 1:58:45.680 --> 1:58:49.520 working with the Stones. Certainly, as time went on, they 1:58:49.640 --> 1:58:51.280 made some records that were not as good as the 1:58:51.320 --> 1:58:55.240 early records. So your goal is to get beyond that. 1:58:56.400 --> 1:58:57.160 So what do you do? 1:59:00.200 --> 1:59:03.000 Well, the first thing is just start with songs, which, 1:59:03.040 --> 1:59:05.920 by the way, is something peculiar to the Rolling Stones. 1:59:05.920 --> 1:59:11.160 It's for everybody. If you don't have great songs, you're 1:59:11.200 --> 1:59:14.040 not going to make a great record. So it was 1:59:14.120 --> 1:59:21.200 to try to encourage them to write to the level 1:59:21.240 --> 1:59:22.560 of greatness that they. 1:59:23.360 --> 1:59:26.080 Ok, let's be clear, you make a deal. Do you 1:59:26.080 --> 1:59:29.480 have the studio time booked? Are they writing these songs 1:59:29.520 --> 1:59:31.360 before you go to the studio or are you waiting 1:59:31.400 --> 1:59:33.040 for them to write songs for you do go in 1:59:33.080 --> 1:59:33.640 the studio. 1:59:34.120 --> 1:59:37.720 They were working on songs before I got together with them, 1:59:38.360 --> 1:59:42.280 and then I went to Ireland. They're the rehearse in 1:59:42.440 --> 1:59:48.160 at Ronnie Woods Place, and both Mick and Keith were 1:59:48.240 --> 1:59:52.360 incredibly prolific. In that period of time. There were probably 1:59:53.320 --> 1:59:57.960 forty to fifty songs really parts of songs that could 1:59:57.960 --> 2:00:03.040 be developed. Yeah, they had a lot of stuff. Ah, 2:00:03.440 --> 2:00:06.800 and so it was narrowing it down and I tried 2:00:06.800 --> 2:00:12.360 to I remember muh trying to get them to agree 2:00:12.440 --> 2:00:15.040 to write the lyrics before we got to the studio, 2:00:15.280 --> 2:00:18.280 so that we could shape the tracks to the molder 2:00:18.400 --> 2:00:23.040 of the lyrics. And I thought I remembered Keith saying, 2:00:23.040 --> 2:00:27.800 all right, great, we'll do that. I came home from 2:00:27.880 --> 2:00:31.600 Dublin and I get a fact from him. A couple 2:00:31.640 --> 2:00:33.520 of days later. He said, all right, we're starting Tuesday. 2:00:33.600 --> 2:00:38.120 B Uh, you know, get back on a plane, be here. 2:00:38.120 --> 2:00:42.800 We're gonna cut it. Wind Mill Lane backed them back, said, wait, 2:00:42.840 --> 2:00:46.040 I thought you were going to write lyrics to the songs. 2:00:46.720 --> 2:00:52.040 He said, just remember when you get here, improvise adapt 2:00:52.400 --> 2:00:56.120 overcome and pe fuckings don't paint yourself into a quarner. 2:00:57.200 --> 2:00:59.920 I thought, shit, I lost them before we even stopped. 2:01:01.520 --> 2:01:04.480 But it was great advice. I ended up making shirts 2:01:04.520 --> 2:01:08.840 of it from his facts improvised adapt overcome on the 2:01:08.840 --> 2:01:12.040 back pe fucking s don't paint yourself into a corner. 2:01:12.480 --> 2:01:14.880 And it became kind of a mantra like just open 2:01:14.960 --> 2:01:16.000 up your mind and. 2:01:16.560 --> 2:01:21.080 Okay, you show up next Tuesday. Where are you working. 2:01:21.360 --> 2:01:23.480 We're working at Windmill Lane. Okay. 2:01:24.000 --> 2:01:26.600 Is there a thought that you're going to finish something 2:01:27.000 --> 2:01:28.680 or is it we're going to be here for month? 2:01:28.720 --> 2:01:29.960 Lord only knows. 2:01:30.440 --> 2:01:34.680 I think we had a finite timebook and you thought 2:01:34.680 --> 2:01:36.800 you were going to finish an album in that time. 2:01:36.880 --> 2:01:40.520 Now we're just going to get basic tracks cut. Okay, Yeah, 2:01:40.560 --> 2:01:45.200 and so we did. I think food Launch is a 2:01:45.200 --> 2:01:52.800 really good record. Every album I did with them, there 2:01:52.880 --> 2:01:55.360 was a we did a version that was thirty six 2:01:55.440 --> 2:01:58.480 minutes long. I was aware that there's a legacy that 2:01:58.520 --> 2:02:02.080 you had to keep up with. But albums like Beggars 2:02:02.120 --> 2:02:07.640 Banquet and Let It Bleed, those those records are short, 2:02:08.440 --> 2:02:12.000 you know, and the songs because you because you have 2:02:12.520 --> 2:02:15.320 a finite amount of real estate on a vinyl disc, 2:02:15.440 --> 2:02:19.120 which was the main medium for it them right, so 2:02:19.160 --> 2:02:22.440 you really thought about do we need eight bars between 2:02:22.720 --> 2:02:25.680 the first chorus and the second verse. No, man, you'd 2:02:25.720 --> 2:02:29.160 probably do it with four, do it with two. Let's 2:02:29.200 --> 2:02:32.920 you know. You did a lot of self editing. And 2:02:32.960 --> 2:02:37.640 then in the CD era there was I think a 2:02:37.720 --> 2:02:41.240 myth that people would be willing to pay twenty bucks 2:02:41.280 --> 2:02:43.800 for this if you give them seventy two minutes of 2:02:43.920 --> 2:02:48.160 music instead of thirty six, which I think was one 2:02:48.160 --> 2:02:50.600 of the most damaging things that ever happened in the 2:02:50.680 --> 2:03:02.440 music business. That was a really bill informed strategy, because 2:03:02.480 --> 2:03:04.080 that means you just fill up the space. 2:03:04.200 --> 2:03:06.960 Well, it was worse than that because on a vinyl record, 2:03:07.600 --> 2:03:09.880 you knew the first track on both sides and the 2:03:10.000 --> 2:03:12.680 last track on both sides were the best tracks, so 2:03:12.720 --> 2:03:15.080 you would know where to start, whereas on a CD 2:03:15.200 --> 2:03:16.840 it ran all the way through where the fuck do 2:03:16.920 --> 2:03:17.360 you start? 2:03:17.440 --> 2:03:21.520 And that's a real thing. Also, each side would have 2:03:21.760 --> 2:03:28.000 a mood to it too, and it was it was 2:03:28.120 --> 2:03:30.760 very difficult to find seventy two minutes to listen to 2:03:30.800 --> 2:03:35.040 something as a whole, almost insane. Yeah, but Evan could 2:03:35.040 --> 2:03:37.440 find fifteen to twenty minutes to listen to a side. 2:03:40.400 --> 2:03:44.360 So we did versions that were tight edits and left 2:03:44.360 --> 2:03:48.760 out a bunch of songs, and it was really good, 2:03:51.760 --> 2:03:55.560 which stood the test of time against what's considered to 2:03:55.600 --> 2:04:00.000 be their classic period. I think there's some great stuff. 2:04:01.440 --> 2:04:03.280 I think there's great stuff on all the records we did. 2:04:03.360 --> 2:04:04.920 There's just maybe too much stuff. 2:04:06.280 --> 2:04:12.440 Okay, these are very experienced people on every level, experience 2:04:12.480 --> 2:04:16.280 in the studio, experience stars. They know what their image is, whatever, 2:04:18.000 --> 2:04:20.640 what's the special sauce, because they proved a lot of 2:04:20.680 --> 2:04:26.000 records themselves, because the Glimmer Twins. So are you basically saying, well, 2:04:26.080 --> 2:04:28.800 you know, I gotta be low key and know when 2:04:28.800 --> 2:04:30.680 to hold them, when to fold them. What did you 2:04:30.720 --> 2:04:31.440 actually do? 2:04:34.480 --> 2:04:39.960 Well, there's a lot, you know, it's hard to just 2:04:40.080 --> 2:04:45.440 overgeneralize the thing. But it was first of all, keeping 2:04:46.320 --> 2:04:50.960 the vibe in the room conducive to making music, making 2:04:51.000 --> 2:04:58.120 good music and stressing. I wasn't Keith's guy. I wasn't 2:04:58.200 --> 2:05:02.440 mixed guy, a Rolling Stones guy. I love the Rolling 2:05:02.480 --> 2:05:06.960 Stones and I believe that they're at their best when 2:05:07.000 --> 2:05:14.920 they cooperate, and when you get both, you get everybody's 2:05:15.040 --> 2:05:16.680 essence on there. And I don't, by the way, I 2:05:16.960 --> 2:05:24.120 don't underestimate the power Charlie Watts or Ronnie would in 2:05:24.160 --> 2:05:30.240 this equation as well. Charlie was as important as anybody 2:05:30.320 --> 2:05:30.880 in that pill. 2:05:31.920 --> 2:05:35.440 You know, the stuff sends him and you know, on 2:05:35.600 --> 2:05:38.800 record and live it's like we were talking about ron Carter. 2:05:39.520 --> 2:05:42.360 They're playing, but if you're a student, you could hear 2:05:42.360 --> 2:05:42.919 the difference. 2:05:43.040 --> 2:05:47.000 Yeah, oh yeah, they I got to play with them 2:05:47.000 --> 2:05:49.840 a lot, you know. If Daryl Jones couldn't make it 2:05:49.840 --> 2:05:54.160 to a rehearsal, something I play, and that really gave 2:05:54.200 --> 2:05:58.200 me a great understanding of what they were about, because 2:05:58.200 --> 2:06:03.160 it was and being on the interior of the conversation, 2:06:04.680 --> 2:06:08.240 I realized that all that, all the tension that everybody 2:06:08.320 --> 2:06:11.560 reports on and everything like that, which is based in reality, 2:06:12.720 --> 2:06:16.480 it vanishes the minute they start playing. The conversation is 2:06:16.560 --> 2:06:21.640 so jocular man, and they're they're tossing, they're lobbing beautiful 2:06:21.760 --> 2:06:25.080 soft balls right in the gloves. It reminds me what's 2:06:25.120 --> 2:06:27.920 it called in baseball before the inning starts, when they 2:06:28.040 --> 2:06:30.920 they're like four or five different balls being past. 2:06:31.920 --> 2:06:34.000 I don't know what you're talking about in a in 2:06:34.040 --> 2:06:34.360 a in. 2:06:34.320 --> 2:06:37.520 A baseball game before the inning starts, the infield or 2:06:37.560 --> 2:06:39.680 just toss balls around. Yeah, I think that's just the 2:06:39.680 --> 2:06:45.640 warm up. So that's what the Rolling Stones are like. 2:06:45.880 --> 2:06:48.840 They're playing musical. Charlie plays something on his high hat 2:06:48.840 --> 2:06:51.400 to Keith to pick up on and play off of it. 2:06:51.480 --> 2:06:55.640 That would affect how mcphrased. And it was jocular and 2:06:55.680 --> 2:06:58.680 they were having fun and it was super relaxed. It 2:06:58.760 --> 2:07:01.400 was beautiful. When Darryl Jones was a comeback, it broke 2:07:01.480 --> 2:07:03.840 my heart because I enjoyed being in that space with 2:07:03.920 --> 2:07:04.600 them so much. 2:07:06.120 --> 2:07:10.280 You know, I've seen the Stones a million times. It's 2:07:10.360 --> 2:07:12.440 kind of like The Grateful Dead. They'd say they don't 2:07:12.440 --> 2:07:15.240 play that long Grateful Dead do. I saw plenty of 2:07:15.360 --> 2:07:18.280 times they played for four hours. I only saw him 2:07:18.320 --> 2:07:22.120 be consistently good from beginning to end. Once other times 2:07:22.120 --> 2:07:25.600 play for four hours, one hour unlistenable, one hour great, 2:07:25.680 --> 2:07:29.640 two hours sort of. So until this last tour at 2:07:29.760 --> 2:07:34.320 so far was it two summers ago, maybe maybe last summer. 2:07:35.640 --> 2:07:38.720 I've never seen him be good from beginning ten stonesh 2:07:38.720 --> 2:07:41.280 you tell them, yeah, I mean I remember in seventy 2:07:41.320 --> 2:07:44.280 five day Pleader. That was when the petal opening whatever 2:07:45.160 --> 2:07:48.640 I played basically an hour and a half wasn't until 2:07:48.760 --> 2:07:52.120 like there was like a half hour they played Tumbling Dice. 2:07:52.160 --> 2:07:53.880 You know this is one of these Now we're gonna 2:07:53.880 --> 2:07:57.280 start telling rock and roll stories. There are certain Eggs 2:07:57.320 --> 2:08:00.400 All on main Street came out. Seventy two tour was 2:08:00.440 --> 2:08:04.200 the biggest tour ever up until this Taylor Swift tour. 2:08:04.480 --> 2:08:06.800 The amount of coverage of the seventy two tour is unreal. 2:08:07.520 --> 2:08:10.200 Eggs All on Mainstream is release, immediately goes to number one, 2:08:10.880 --> 2:08:15.840 tours over immediately falls off, rocks off, not a huge shit. 2:08:16.280 --> 2:08:20.800 Tumbling Dice. They're playing for a short period of time, Okay, 2:08:21.040 --> 2:08:23.120 I'm talking about radio, and all of a sudden I 2:08:23.120 --> 2:08:24.760 go on this tour. This is three years later. I've 2:08:24.760 --> 2:08:26.520 seen him in between. It's tell them the seventy two 2:08:27.160 --> 2:08:30.080 and they lock on Okay, I mean, you can just 2:08:30.200 --> 2:08:35.160 feel it. But I found remember seeing the funniest two 2:08:35.200 --> 2:08:38.600 funny things about the Stones. They don't go out with 2:08:38.680 --> 2:08:41.560 any hard drives. They don't go out with anybody off stage. 2:08:41.880 --> 2:08:44.160 What you see is what you get. So you get 2:08:44.160 --> 2:08:48.160 a bar band at the rose Ball. Everybody else too 2:08:48.200 --> 2:08:53.640 afraid to do that. And before they lock on, it's 2:08:53.680 --> 2:08:55.240 a little weird. 2:08:56.400 --> 2:08:58.240 Any band, it's kind of like that. Takes a minute 2:08:58.280 --> 2:09:00.600 to get going, I think, But that's just part of 2:09:00.640 --> 2:09:04.360 the thing. The audience needs to sink into it too, 2:09:04.400 --> 2:09:05.080 a little bit, you know. 2:09:05.680 --> 2:09:09.720 Yeah, but the game has changed. Okay, you know. 2:09:11.320 --> 2:09:11.640 You would. 2:09:12.120 --> 2:09:14.600 I'm sure you saw a million acts. Forget the acts 2:09:14.600 --> 2:09:17.840 that are headline acts like the Stones. You would go 2:09:18.360 --> 2:09:20.920 because you have the record, you love this band. You 2:09:21.000 --> 2:09:23.800 go to seem at someplace, a whole a few thousand 2:09:23.840 --> 2:09:28.080 people had an experience and came home and then tell 2:09:28.080 --> 2:09:29.400 your buddy's got to come the next time. 2:09:29.480 --> 2:09:29.680 Through it. 2:09:30.280 --> 2:09:35.840 Today a lot of arena shows that's like an MTV 2:09:36.080 --> 2:09:39.720 video Come Alive. Yeah, I agree, it's not really the 2:09:39.800 --> 2:09:43.120 same thing, which brings me to the question of where 2:09:43.200 --> 2:09:43.760 is it going. 2:09:47.160 --> 2:09:50.840 Well, that's a good question, man. I don't know, I 2:09:50.880 --> 2:09:56.720 think there are some underpinnings to music that can't be 2:09:57.040 --> 2:10:00.280 You can't get rid of these things. And that's has 2:10:00.320 --> 2:10:06.320 to do with making an emotional connection to the listeners. 2:10:06.880 --> 2:10:09.600 You gotta touch them, you gotta make them feel something. 2:10:12.560 --> 2:10:17.280 Hopefully it's not just a random feeling. Hopefully it's helpful. 2:10:17.400 --> 2:10:20.120 You know, it helps them make sense out of their 2:10:20.200 --> 2:10:27.160 life somehow. You know, life is crazy. Music helps him 2:10:27.160 --> 2:10:29.760 make sense of it. That's why it's so important. 2:10:29.800 --> 2:10:35.320 Okay, let's be very specific. Lou Christie recently died. Whatever 2:10:35.520 --> 2:10:38.960 is in Lightning Strikes and I'm not I say, there 2:10:39.040 --> 2:10:41.840 is something in that record that is just undeniable. 2:10:42.840 --> 2:10:43.240 What was it? 2:10:43.400 --> 2:10:45.120 Narls Barkley Crazy. 2:10:45.600 --> 2:10:47.160 That's a more modern. 2:10:46.840 --> 2:10:51.040 Record where there's something, you know what. The New York 2:10:51.200 --> 2:10:53.480 I never do this, but they had, like they put 2:10:53.480 --> 2:10:55.960 out a weekly playlist of, you know, ten tracks, and 2:10:56.040 --> 2:11:01.480 this was the Women, all of them except one was terrible, 2:11:01.640 --> 2:11:04.240 the Sabrina Carpenter track, which and I've got no time 2:11:04.280 --> 2:11:06.400 for her. I said, I hear this as a hit, 2:11:07.800 --> 2:11:10.920 but it's nothing like Lightning Strikes whatever. So it's got 2:11:10.960 --> 2:11:14.760 these changes. Whatever, it does not communicate on that emotional 2:11:14.840 --> 2:11:16.160 level that you're talking about. 2:11:16.320 --> 2:11:21.400 Yeah, it might, it might go deep. 2:11:22.120 --> 2:11:27.040 I don't think so, because this is ridiculous. I remember 2:11:27.120 --> 2:11:31.960 buying Disraeli gears and not many people talk about this track, 2:11:32.040 --> 2:11:34.440 but it's the opening on the second side is Tales 2:11:34.440 --> 2:11:38.360 of Brave Ulysses. We're telling my mother had no interest 2:11:38.400 --> 2:11:41.320 in rock and roll. I gotta play this for you. Yeah, 2:11:41.960 --> 2:11:44.640 this shit has sound wheel, it goes. There was a 2:11:44.720 --> 2:11:48.320 thought that lat Winter. It's like there was a feeling 2:11:48.800 --> 2:11:49.720 in that record. 2:11:51.680 --> 2:11:56.040 I'll tell you something, man, if you can get seventy 2:11:56.280 --> 2:11:59.520 thousand people, fifty thousand people into us to come to 2:11:59.560 --> 2:12:04.320 a state him to sit in traffic, pay for parking, 2:12:04.560 --> 2:12:09.680 pay for babysitters, whatever you know, and to come there, 2:12:12.480 --> 2:12:16.120 it's speaking to you in a in some kind of way. 2:12:16.720 --> 2:12:18.840 You don't go. If it's not. 2:12:26.680 --> 2:12:28.840 Okay, I'm just gonna fuck with you. Then what do 2:12:28.880 --> 2:12:30.120 you say about new kids. 2:12:29.880 --> 2:12:32.320 On the block. I think they spoke to somebody. 2:12:32.640 --> 2:12:36.280 Wait, wait, so the question is I'm not arguing with 2:12:36.440 --> 2:12:41.000 people deciding to go pay their money now more than ever, 2:12:41.480 --> 2:12:45.600 there's a penumber, You shoot selfies, you post on social media. 2:12:46.120 --> 2:12:49.640 Things are hot. Yeah, okay, we both I mean the 2:12:49.680 --> 2:12:51.520 biggest thing you live in Los Angeles because you see 2:12:51.520 --> 2:12:54.840 these people. People who could leave the hotel room now 2:12:54.880 --> 2:12:58.160 you see them at Ralph's. It's hysterical. Nobody's making a 2:12:58.160 --> 2:13:00.760 big deal about them where they're where other people go, 2:13:01.280 --> 2:13:03.640 like Brian Wilson, it's just to be in this Prince. 2:13:03.760 --> 2:13:08.320 Holy fuck, that is the guy. It's in there somewhere. 2:13:09.720 --> 2:13:16.320 Well, I see it. Yeah, I'll tell you a story. Man. 2:13:17.560 --> 2:13:21.200 In nineteen ninety, not was got booked on the Club 2:13:21.360 --> 2:13:25.720 MTV tour. So we were out with a tone low 2:13:26.680 --> 2:13:36.600 Paula Abdul, Millie Vanilli Us and the Information Society. We're 2:13:36.640 --> 2:13:41.040 the only ones playing live and we were bombing every night. 2:13:41.040 --> 2:13:47.680 That required the extreme generosity and kind spirit of downtown 2:13:47.800 --> 2:13:50.560 Julie Brown to come out with her dancers and rescue 2:13:50.600 --> 2:13:55.560 our set every night because because the people wanted to 2:13:55.560 --> 2:13:58.120 hear the records, like the records, and we didn't sound 2:13:58.200 --> 2:14:00.760 like Well, one night we get to move. It's the 2:14:00.840 --> 2:14:04.240 Riverfront Festival. It's like fifteen thousand people and it's on 2:14:04.280 --> 2:14:08.640 a very steep incline, so you could see the whole audience. 2:14:09.640 --> 2:14:16.400 Milli Vanilli comes out and something was technically wrong Sinclavia. 2:14:16.440 --> 2:14:20.160 It wasn't connected to the direct box or something, so 2:14:20.200 --> 2:14:22.080 you could hear drums and they come out and they're 2:14:22.160 --> 2:14:24.480 dancing for about a minute and a half. There's no music. 2:14:25.760 --> 2:14:30.600 They storm off stage, go back in the bus, they 2:14:30.600 --> 2:14:34.680 fix whatever was wrong, to find what's unplugged downtown. Julie 2:14:34.720 --> 2:14:37.000 Brown goes out to convince him to come back in 2:14:38.280 --> 2:14:41.000 and to be honest with you, my band and I 2:14:41.160 --> 2:14:44.160 was standing on the side of the stage just gloating, 2:14:44.920 --> 2:14:48.880 you know, I think, finally some justice, right. So Millie 2:14:48.920 --> 2:14:52.440 Vanilli came back out after going through all that, after 2:14:52.480 --> 2:14:57.040 everyone saw that nothing was real, and they started over 2:14:57.560 --> 2:15:05.840 and nobody cared. So what does that tell us that 2:15:06.160 --> 2:15:08.720 What it told me was that we were the idiots 2:15:08.960 --> 2:15:11.560 we were. I think we were trying to enforce some 2:15:13.200 --> 2:15:15.920 musical aesthetic on an audience that wasn't there for that. 2:15:15.960 --> 2:15:19.640 They were there for something else, and they were paying 2:15:19.720 --> 2:15:22.360 money to see the videos come to life, and we 2:15:22.520 --> 2:15:29.360 didn't provide that. Milli Vanilli did, And I came to 2:15:29.440 --> 2:15:35.600 respect the fact that it's not just a meritocracy based 2:15:35.640 --> 2:15:39.000 on what we value. It's their ability to communicate with 2:15:39.080 --> 2:15:42.800 the audience. So there's a lot of music that's out 2:15:42.800 --> 2:15:45.960 now that young people are listening to that. That leaves 2:15:46.040 --> 2:15:49.240 me cold. But I see the reaction, you know, and 2:15:49.280 --> 2:15:52.880 I see people going night wait, wait, wait, wait, wait wait. Fine. 2:15:53.200 --> 2:15:57.440 Yeah, it is not like it was in the sixties 2:15:57.440 --> 2:15:58.600 and seventhes. Not for you and me. 2:15:58.760 --> 2:16:01.040 But it's not It would. 2:16:00.840 --> 2:16:02.240 Have been seventy in the sixties. 2:16:02.280 --> 2:16:04.920 We'd have we are seventy. Well. 2:16:05.200 --> 2:16:09.760 I always say, there's a renaissance. Okay, they painted and sculptured, Retaissance. 2:16:10.640 --> 2:16:14.240 They've painted and sculpted hundreds of years since. There's never 2:16:14.320 --> 2:16:19.200 been another renaissance. There've been great painters and great sculptors, 2:16:19.560 --> 2:16:21.160 but was in the you know, a lot of things 2:16:21.200 --> 2:16:24.440 had to come together, the radio without all this stuff 2:16:24.480 --> 2:16:28.720 like that. And also the other thing is today middle 2:16:28.800 --> 2:16:32.920 class people know the reality of society. You talk to someone, 2:16:33.000 --> 2:16:35.520 they don't want to be broke. I remember I graduated 2:16:35.520 --> 2:16:37.440 from college. I was a skee bump for a couple 2:16:37.400 --> 2:16:40.000 of years. People don't do that anymore. I got to 2:16:40.000 --> 2:16:41.640 have a career otherwise I'm going to be a loser. 2:16:41.680 --> 2:16:45.280 It's too expensive to live your life. So you got 2:16:45.280 --> 2:16:48.360 middle class people. I mean, the famous thing was when 2:16:48.600 --> 2:16:52.320 Bill Graham managed Jefferson airplane for a while, sod As 2:16:52.360 --> 2:16:53.879 soon as they made any money, I couldn't get them 2:16:53.920 --> 2:16:56.200 to work. Want to stay home and smoke dope. That's 2:16:56.200 --> 2:17:00.000 what it is. I mean, that's not what's going on today. 2:17:00.040 --> 2:17:02.360 Makes me crazy when people say, oh yeah, you know, 2:17:02.440 --> 2:17:05.280 you're just too old and it's the same as it 2:17:05.320 --> 2:17:08.000 ever was. It's not the same, is it ever? 2:17:08.040 --> 2:17:10.240 With? It might be strong? Look at all the people 2:17:10.440 --> 2:17:13.200 the Taylor Swift drass to the shows. Man, you know 2:17:13.920 --> 2:17:15.840 you know she's speaking directly. 2:17:15.879 --> 2:17:20.760 Wait, I'm gonna let's get since you're a pro dangerous 2:17:20.800 --> 2:17:24.560 subject because she wrote a song about me. But the 2:17:24.640 --> 2:17:29.840 first two albums that she wrote, the songs with Liz Rose, 2:17:30.600 --> 2:17:35.920 it was like teenage Joni Mitchell, phenomenal. Okay, whatever she's 2:17:35.959 --> 2:17:40.400 selling now, it is not the same thing. This is 2:17:40.440 --> 2:17:46.040 a business proposition because the previous tour did not go clean. Okay, 2:17:46.520 --> 2:17:48.320 if I put all the tickets on sale, it wance, 2:17:48.320 --> 2:17:51.879 it'll be such mania. And then you there's fomo et cetera. 2:17:52.520 --> 2:17:56.240 It's it's you know, there are these subtle things. It's 2:17:56.320 --> 2:17:58.879 like you two, you two went out and did the 2:17:58.959 --> 2:18:03.000 Joshua Tree done for new music. It's like a nostalgia play. 2:18:03.080 --> 2:18:07.240 They're all these certain subtle things. People are not going 2:18:07.280 --> 2:18:10.200 to be singing. We will never ever get back together 2:18:10.400 --> 2:18:13.039 fifteen years from now like they were singing Beatles songs 2:18:13.080 --> 2:18:13.560 to this day. 2:18:13.640 --> 2:18:15.360 I don't know that that's true. I don't think I 2:18:15.400 --> 2:18:18.360 agree with you. I was in a played in Tronto. 2:18:18.440 --> 2:18:23.400 We've played a two thousand seater the same night that 2:18:23.440 --> 2:18:27.000 Taylor Swift was doing one of several nights in the stadium, 2:18:28.280 --> 2:18:30.640 and I, you know, I went out for a walk 2:18:30.760 --> 2:18:36.680 in all these women with the sparkles and the bracelets 2:18:36.800 --> 2:18:42.240 and dressed a certain way. It means as much to 2:18:42.320 --> 2:18:44.760 them as give piece of Chance meant to you. 2:18:44.800 --> 2:18:48.400 And I'll leave it here because I don't agree with you, 2:18:48.840 --> 2:18:53.720 but I'm gonna whip out a bad analogy. Okay, television 2:18:53.760 --> 2:18:58.199 today compared to what it was when we were growing up, Yeah, okay, 2:18:58.360 --> 2:19:01.240 we would have said Banana's a phenomenal show. Yeah my 2:19:01.280 --> 2:19:03.600 mother the Car maybe I watched it and not great. 2:19:04.560 --> 2:19:08.520 The sopranos, I mean, holy fuck, better than any movie 2:19:08.520 --> 2:19:09.080 in the theater. 2:19:09.800 --> 2:19:10.279 Okay. 2:19:10.600 --> 2:19:12.680 There are people, you know, you go somewhere. They can 2:19:12.720 --> 2:19:15.840 sing all the theme song, they can talk about mash whatever, 2:19:16.000 --> 2:19:20.520 mash was in the league of What's on TV today crap. 2:19:21.000 --> 2:19:24.400 I will agree that these people like it by all, 2:19:24.959 --> 2:19:28.920 just to go one step for this was everything for us. 2:19:29.640 --> 2:19:33.200 People don't understand, just like I was talking about. You 2:19:33.240 --> 2:19:37.720 can pick out the Republicans on campus. Okay. I remember 2:19:37.760 --> 2:19:39.680 being at the New York World's Fair the second year, 2:19:40.040 --> 2:19:42.880 getting off the mono rail close to midnight and the 2:19:42.920 --> 2:19:44.879 speaker system is playing Satisfaction. 2:19:45.000 --> 2:19:45.760 That's sixty five. 2:19:46.160 --> 2:19:49.240 There was not a soul alive on the planet who 2:19:49.280 --> 2:19:52.720 had not heard Satisfaction, not a single person. Doesn't mean 2:19:52.760 --> 2:19:54.800 they liked it, but they heard it the same way. 2:19:54.840 --> 2:19:57.000 I can sing every lick of Hello Dolly by Louis 2:19:57.120 --> 2:19:59.640 Armstrong because I had to sit through it to hear 2:19:59.640 --> 2:20:05.200 the beat song. Things do change, you know, there is 2:20:05.720 --> 2:20:09.120 and there are different eras. So the question would become, 2:20:09.840 --> 2:20:13.960 if we circle back forget the reissues. That's something different. 2:20:14.520 --> 2:20:20.080 You're making these records on blue note. You call them postcards, 2:20:20.080 --> 2:20:23.080 good analogy, but you're just basically sending. 2:20:22.800 --> 2:20:23.400 Him to the ether. 2:20:24.040 --> 2:20:29.240 There's not enough promotion, marketing dollars to reach even a 2:20:29.320 --> 2:20:32.040 fraction of people to make it work. You're just putting 2:20:32.080 --> 2:20:36.680 it out their audience knows it. You could get lucky, 2:20:37.280 --> 2:20:40.080 just like Mom Dommie. I don't want to talk about 2:20:40.080 --> 2:20:42.840 the politics whatever, blah blah blah. Big story in the 2:20:42.840 --> 2:20:47.200 paper today saying that on social media it was embraced 2:20:47.560 --> 2:20:51.039 by all these people who made their own videos. So 2:20:51.200 --> 2:20:54.200 you don't know nothing is going to be as big 2:20:54.240 --> 2:20:56.959 because we don't live in a monoculture anymore. But you 2:20:57.040 --> 2:20:59.640 don't know if the records are as good as you say. 2:21:00.200 --> 2:21:03.880 And I truly believe one could connect it. George Benson. 2:21:04.440 --> 2:21:09.320 George Benson was just a fucking jazz musician. Wait a minute, No, 2:21:09.440 --> 2:21:11.720 what I'm trying to say is he did that album 2:21:11.760 --> 2:21:15.560 with on Broadway. He became a phenomenon. It's not like 2:21:15.600 --> 2:21:18.320 the label said, oh we got a big plan, this 2:21:18.360 --> 2:21:19.119 is going to happen. 2:21:19.240 --> 2:21:27.800 Song can take off. Yeah, it's I don't think it's 2:21:27.800 --> 2:21:30.480 all that complicated. Man. You know, you try to try 2:21:30.520 --> 2:21:35.360 to make records for soulful people, communicative people. They have 2:21:35.480 --> 2:21:39.800 more choice today. You can hear everything all the time. 2:21:39.840 --> 2:21:42.120 You have millions of songs we couldn't before. You know, 2:21:42.920 --> 2:21:45.160 I was just I just found my copy of I 2:21:45.200 --> 2:21:48.280 Get Around, which I had Brian sign and for me 2:21:48.320 --> 2:21:50.200 in the nineties, and I still got the jacket them 2:21:50.240 --> 2:21:54.480 walking up the steps. It was two sides, man. I 2:21:54.560 --> 2:21:57.400 played it to death because I paid a dollar for it. 2:21:58.240 --> 2:22:02.320 I didn't have a second dollar. Yeah, so I got 2:22:02.320 --> 2:22:05.520 into that. Well, it's different. People have a choice, But 2:22:06.120 --> 2:22:13.160 you can't deny if someone connects the way Taylor Swift connects. 2:22:13.840 --> 2:22:16.960 You just can't deny that there's artistry in place, and 2:22:17.000 --> 2:22:21.640 that there's art is about communication. Great artists communicate, and 2:22:21.680 --> 2:22:25.600 she's a great communicator. She's not communicating. It's not speaking 2:22:25.640 --> 2:22:27.760 to me, but it's not supposed to speak to me. 2:22:27.959 --> 2:22:30.480 It's the same way that satisfaction was not meant to 2:22:30.520 --> 2:22:33.120 speak to my grandfather. You know that it was a 2:22:33.160 --> 2:22:36.600 secret language. That's what made it Special's. 2:22:36.160 --> 2:22:39.920 Let's leave Taylor Swift in her career out in terms 2:22:39.959 --> 2:22:45.160 of identity for a second. But she made records with 2:22:45.400 --> 2:22:51.040 Max Martin unbelievably talented. Yeah, okay, Mutt Lang didn't make 2:22:51.080 --> 2:22:53.560 as many records, but he can make the records himself. 2:22:53.160 --> 2:22:53.879 In his day. 2:22:54.400 --> 2:22:59.880 But in today's mainstream record business, there's a lot of 2:23:00.440 --> 2:23:07.560 writing by committee remixing. What is your philosophy on those processes? 2:23:09.400 --> 2:23:12.560 If it touches people who cares how you came up 2:23:12.560 --> 2:23:14.120 with it, Man, it doesn't matter. 2:23:14.360 --> 2:23:16.640 You don't think you can squeeze out the essence. 2:23:19.959 --> 2:23:22.280 I can show you shitty records that were made in 2:23:22.520 --> 2:23:27.000 every era, any any golden period. You want a sight, 2:23:28.760 --> 2:23:32.160 probably probably the week that like a rolling Stone was 2:23:32.240 --> 2:23:34.800 number one, Probably like they're coming to take me away? 2:23:34.920 --> 2:23:41.879 That was probably right. There's always great stuff, there's always 2:23:41.920 --> 2:23:44.480 bad stuff. Just try to make stuff that you believe in. 2:23:44.800 --> 2:23:49.080 It's it's so uncomplicated. It's so simple, man. Just make 2:23:49.160 --> 2:23:52.200 real stuff, work with people who can who can tap 2:23:52.280 --> 2:23:56.520 into their heart and and and and that's what an 2:23:56.600 --> 2:23:59.800 artist does. An artist feels something, puts it into another 2:24:00.520 --> 2:24:05.120 and the hope that someone who's observing it, a listener 2:24:05.240 --> 2:24:09.240 or a viewer, will decode it and it'll convert back 2:24:09.280 --> 2:24:17.640 into language again and an emotion. And that's I just 2:24:17.760 --> 2:24:20.120 try to make records with people who can communicate. 2:24:20.280 --> 2:24:24.680 Okay, going on the road, running blue note. Are you 2:24:24.800 --> 2:24:26.600 still available to produce albums? 2:24:26.879 --> 2:24:29.560 I am? What does it take? 2:24:30.520 --> 2:24:32.560 You have a limited amount of time or an unlimited 2:24:32.560 --> 2:24:34.119 amount of time if it's the right stuff. 2:24:35.040 --> 2:24:41.120 I got a limited amount of time. I couldn't I 2:24:41.160 --> 2:24:43.720 couldn't do another Stones album if they wanted me to, 2:24:43.879 --> 2:24:45.800 you know, I mean, I don't have that kind of time. 2:24:46.280 --> 2:24:49.760 Try it. You know, my favorite album, man, one of 2:24:49.760 --> 2:24:52.800 my favorite albums I was Blue and Lonesome, which is 2:24:52.800 --> 2:24:57.160 the last finished record that was three days. 2:24:58.720 --> 2:25:02.880 I like those kind of records, but you know there's 2:25:02.879 --> 2:25:05.200 something you can capture in three days to boot. 2:25:05.320 --> 2:25:05.720 Yeah. 2:25:05.840 --> 2:25:09.920 Okay, So you're a musician. You talk about going on 2:25:09.959 --> 2:25:13.560 the road, going on to make these Stones records. 2:25:14.440 --> 2:25:15.640 How do you have a. 2:25:15.600 --> 2:25:19.000 Family and raise your kids and have them be reasonable? 2:25:19.040 --> 2:25:23.320 How do you balance that out? Well? You do it. 2:25:23.360 --> 2:25:29.039 You make the effort. When when my youngest kids, Solomon 2:25:29.440 --> 2:25:34.680 sal was produced Beyonce, really, all my kids are musicians 2:25:34.720 --> 2:25:40.480 and they're all I'll produce and I'll play. So when 2:25:40.800 --> 2:25:44.959 I dropped them at USC, which when all three of 2:25:44.959 --> 2:25:47.920 my kids went to USC and they all graduated, only 2:25:48.040 --> 2:25:55.720 Henry graduated. Uh, family tradition, right, rights. But dropping them 2:25:55.720 --> 2:25:59.199 off is maybe one of the worst days you're gonna 2:25:59.360 --> 2:26:02.160 have and you're your life. It's like you've lost your kid. 2:26:02.600 --> 2:26:10.600 It's dark for a parent. And I remember tearfully saying 2:26:10.680 --> 2:26:16.920 to him, I said, look, man, it was always my 2:26:17.000 --> 2:26:19.720 intention to be around more, and I'm sorry I wasn't 2:26:20.400 --> 2:26:23.560 and soals just such a sweet guy man, He said, Well, 2:26:24.400 --> 2:26:27.360 there's any consolation to you, He said, I remember about 2:26:27.480 --> 2:26:31.800 twenty things from when I was twelve and under and 2:26:31.840 --> 2:26:41.880 you were there for all of them. Wow, And so yeah, 2:26:41.920 --> 2:26:45.040 I missed stuff, but I guess I was there. Okay. 2:26:45.200 --> 2:26:49.680 Just a couple more questions. Hey, do you ever go 2:26:49.879 --> 2:26:51.400 on a traditional vacation? 2:26:53.000 --> 2:27:00.360 Ah? No, okay? 2:27:01.440 --> 2:27:06.120 Is music all consuming? Or do you have other passions? 2:27:06.200 --> 2:27:10.280 Or do you watch streaming TV? Read books? What your 2:27:10.520 --> 2:27:11.600 everyday life look like? 2:27:13.320 --> 2:27:15.720 I'm pretty much in it all the time. I got 2:27:15.800 --> 2:27:18.760 three or four things going on. Last night at midnight 2:27:18.920 --> 2:27:23.080 I was I do two radio shows. You know, you 2:27:23.160 --> 2:27:26.640 gotta like you prepared for this. There's research that goes on. 2:27:26.720 --> 2:27:29.200 It takes it takes time. I did a I do 2:27:29.280 --> 2:27:32.120 a two hour live radio show every Friday night on 2:27:32.200 --> 2:27:35.640 a station called wd E T, the NPR station in Detroit. 2:27:37.600 --> 2:27:39.800 And it's work. You know, it's okay. 2:27:39.840 --> 2:27:42.560 So if someone is not in Detroit, how can they 2:27:42.640 --> 2:27:43.280 hear it? 2:27:43.240 --> 2:27:45.480 A streams on wd et dot org. 2:27:45.840 --> 2:27:47.600 And is it available after you do it? 2:27:47.720 --> 2:27:49.480 Yeah, for a couple of weeks and then I do 2:27:49.520 --> 2:27:53.680 them every f so what is the show. It's pretty 2:27:53.720 --> 2:27:58.160 free for him. I play everything from Albert Eiler to 2:27:59.400 --> 2:28:00.680 you know her Hermits. 2:28:03.080 --> 2:28:04.720 What's your favorite Herman's Hermits song? 2:28:05.720 --> 2:28:08.959 I like, can't you Hear My Heartbeat? It's pretty great. Uh, 2:28:10.080 --> 2:28:11.920 I just I was just watching him the other night. 2:28:11.959 --> 2:28:14.240 He was at some so on some kind of cruise. 2:28:15.040 --> 2:28:15.879 He's a badass. 2:28:16.120 --> 2:28:19.080 Oh yeah, he knows what he's doing and he's got 2:28:19.080 --> 2:28:21.640 a sense that you were about himself. Somewhat it works. 2:28:21.640 --> 2:28:23.920 He's a good guy. Yeah, I really I thought he 2:28:23.959 --> 2:28:27.000 was quite good. He's hitting all the notes and yeah, 2:28:27.200 --> 2:28:29.920 can't you hear my heartbeat? Listen to people? Pretty great song. 2:28:30.080 --> 2:28:34.039 Phenomenal, Yeah, phenomenal. I was going to say, you know 2:28:34.080 --> 2:28:36.879 when first it was Missus Brown, but really it's listened 2:28:36.879 --> 2:28:39.560 to people. Just the sound of that record came out 2:28:39.560 --> 2:28:42.320 in the winter. Just to go back a step, the 2:28:42.360 --> 2:28:47.400 best Stones record is other than the ones you made. 2:28:47.320 --> 2:28:48.600 You're taking those off the board? 2:28:51.920 --> 2:28:56.080 Well late come around more to Between the Buttons. I 2:28:56.080 --> 2:28:59.560 think Between the button's pretty great. But I you know, 2:29:00.040 --> 2:29:02.480 you got a rank. I don't know that anyone's made 2:29:02.480 --> 2:29:05.000 a better record than Beggars Banquet. Or let it bleed. 2:29:05.120 --> 2:29:06.160 You know, I'm with you. 2:29:06.480 --> 2:29:08.320 People talk about sticky fingers. I don't want to say 2:29:08.360 --> 2:29:12.400 anything negative about sticky fingers, but let it bleed unbelievable 2:29:12.680 --> 2:29:15.000 and at dis laid date. I don't want to sound 2:29:15.040 --> 2:29:17.039 like a hipster, but Eggs on Main Street is really 2:29:17.360 --> 2:29:18.080 really something. 2:29:18.240 --> 2:29:21.680 It's pretty cool. I'll go through different phases with it. 2:29:21.720 --> 2:29:24.040 And it's cool because I've been able to listen to 2:29:24.080 --> 2:29:28.200 it with them, you know, and I've played records. Keith 2:29:28.240 --> 2:29:31.000 once gave me a verbal tour through Exile and Okay 2:29:31.000 --> 2:29:31.680 Street just. 2:29:31.600 --> 2:29:34.520 To hang in there. Just want to see his face 2:29:35.280 --> 2:29:36.520 what he say about that. 2:29:36.640 --> 2:29:37.279 I don't remember. 2:29:38.720 --> 2:29:41.320 That is such an eerie record. I think one of 2:29:41.360 --> 2:29:45.760 the other problems is, you know, they sent me these 2:29:45.879 --> 2:29:48.080 really great genial X speakers. 2:29:48.120 --> 2:29:50.400 No one would have speakers like this for your computer. 2:29:50.840 --> 2:29:53.680 I think it's retail, like sixteen hundred dollars or something. 2:29:54.480 --> 2:29:56.800 So those are really good. And if you're listening in 2:29:57.000 --> 2:30:00.600 high res, you know whatever, that's great. But I fired 2:30:00.680 --> 2:30:03.800 up the big rig the other day, which is not 2:30:04.000 --> 2:30:08.520 far away. They sound different when you play these records. 2:30:08.560 --> 2:30:12.199 They take up the whole room. The experience is different 2:30:12.520 --> 2:30:14.880 from listening on headphones or earbuds. 2:30:14.920 --> 2:30:18.480 Oh yeah, and listening to vinyl too. It's a great 2:30:19.320 --> 2:30:22.400 In the last few years, we cracked the code on 2:30:23.040 --> 2:30:24.000 pressing good vinyl. 2:30:24.959 --> 2:30:29.240 Just just just with this deep Okay. If a record 2:30:29.360 --> 2:30:34.040 is cut digitally, yeah, does it make any sense to 2:30:34.120 --> 2:30:36.840 press it on vinyl. I'm talking about I don't an 2:30:36.840 --> 2:30:37.959 audio level forget. 2:30:38.200 --> 2:30:42.280 Yeah, yes, yeah, uh it does. It's not gonna sound 2:30:42.480 --> 2:30:44.760 the same as it does coming from analog tape. 2:30:45.400 --> 2:30:48.199 Well, it's gonna you know, as you talk to the experts, 2:30:48.200 --> 2:30:50.080 you say, well, vinyl has a sound. 2:30:50.600 --> 2:30:52.600 Vinyl has a sound. By the way, it's the sound 2:30:52.640 --> 2:30:56.040 of it. You could call it distortion. I'm gonna yeah, 2:30:56.080 --> 2:30:59.960 it's just a distortion. Is great, right, Jimmy Hendrix, Right, great, 2:31:00.120 --> 2:31:03.680 you said MC five great use of distortion. So the 2:31:03.840 --> 2:31:06.320 distortion is not a bad thing, But as far as 2:31:06.360 --> 2:31:10.520 it being an accurate reflection of what the thing sounds like, no, 2:31:11.640 --> 2:31:14.760 But I love vinyl and there are ways to make 2:31:14.800 --> 2:31:20.080 great vinyl. You know, I grew up producing vinyl records. 2:31:20.080 --> 2:31:22.039 That's where I started, right, So when I first started 2:31:22.040 --> 2:31:24.879 a Blue Note it's our seventy fifth anniversary picked one 2:31:24.920 --> 2:31:28.800 hundred records to remaster and get out on vinyl, which 2:31:28.840 --> 2:31:34.080 I thought would be wildly appreciated. I was wildly criticized 2:31:34.120 --> 2:31:39.520 because they didn't sound great to audio files. I'm not 2:31:39.600 --> 2:31:40.560 really an audio file. 2:31:40.600 --> 2:31:42.480 Wait, wait, just break it down a little bit. But 2:31:42.680 --> 2:31:45.400 forget the audio fields, which is a world done to itself. 2:31:46.360 --> 2:31:49.160 Did they prefer the original pressings? 2:31:50.440 --> 2:31:52.200 I don't know. I just know we got a lot 2:31:52.200 --> 2:31:55.280 of criticism over it. And then what happened was we 2:31:55.680 --> 2:31:58.920 had been licensing the masters out to a company called 2:31:59.000 --> 2:32:03.920 Music Matters who were doing audio file vinyl, and so 2:32:03.959 --> 2:32:06.880 I started listening to those and I'm like, Wow, in 2:32:06.920 --> 2:32:09.920 the world do they make this happen? And I finally 2:32:09.959 --> 2:32:12.320 met the guy, a guy named Joe Hurley masters with 2:32:12.440 --> 2:32:17.640 Kevin Gray, and I was just in awe of him. 2:32:17.840 --> 2:32:20.480 I really couldn't figure out what he was doing. But 2:32:20.600 --> 2:32:24.360 I said, instead of licensing from why don't you come 2:32:24.400 --> 2:32:29.320 to work with us and and we'll do audio file ersion. 2:32:29.440 --> 2:32:32.080 So we started doing that. It's called the Tone Poet series. 2:32:32.240 --> 2:32:38.160 It's been immensely popular, and Joe knows how to press vinyl, 2:32:38.440 --> 2:32:41.120 and the audio file is happy. They're thrilled. Yeah, I 2:32:41.120 --> 2:32:41.920 haven't seen a. 2:32:41.879 --> 2:32:44.760 Bad word so do you have any idea with the 2:32:44.800 --> 2:32:46.040 secret sauces? 2:32:45.879 --> 2:32:48.640 It's no one thing. But I can tell you one 2:32:48.640 --> 2:32:51.840 thing he taught me I never considered I don't think 2:32:51.879 --> 2:32:56.280 anyone considered this before. He believes that individual presses have 2:32:56.360 --> 2:32:59.920 a sound, so it could be by the same manufacturer. 2:33:01.720 --> 2:33:04.400 And if you apply it to like musical instruments, every 2:33:04.440 --> 2:33:07.480 fender strat sounds different. It's an individual piece of wood. Man, 2:33:07.720 --> 2:33:10.120 two pieces of wood, They're all going to have a 2:33:10.160 --> 2:33:13.360 different characteristic, even if you put the same pickups. And 2:33:13.400 --> 2:33:17.039 by the way, if human beings winding the pickups, each 2:33:17.080 --> 2:33:20.520 pickup's going to sound a little different too. So why 2:33:20.560 --> 2:33:24.920 wouldn't a press. And he's found a press that he 2:33:25.000 --> 2:33:27.560 thinks is the most conducive in the world too. Is 2:33:27.600 --> 2:33:33.840 that something you can reveal RTI in Oh huh. And 2:33:33.879 --> 2:33:36.600 they do an incredible job of plating two plating You 2:33:36.600 --> 2:33:38.440 can change everything that Have you ever been to a 2:33:38.480 --> 2:33:43.240 pressing plan? You see the plating process. It's alchemy, man, 2:33:43.320 --> 2:33:46.879 it's mind blowing. You take this lacquer that's that you've 2:33:46.959 --> 2:33:51.360 carved on a lathe, you spray it perfectly with the silver, 2:33:51.840 --> 2:33:56.120 you dip it overnight in a bath of liquid nickel. 2:33:56.240 --> 2:33:58.680 That's got to be a two hundred eight degrees, not 2:33:58.760 --> 2:34:01.600 two hundred and nine, that two hundred and seven, and 2:34:01.680 --> 2:34:06.800 the nickel gravitates to the to the silver plated lacquer 2:34:07.040 --> 2:34:11.160 and forms a perfect mirror image, and that becomes you know, 2:34:11.240 --> 2:34:17.640 your mother of the stamper. It's alchemy, it's incredible and 2:34:17.640 --> 2:34:20.800 and there's so many variables in that. So every step 2:34:20.800 --> 2:34:24.039 of the way, you got to have someone who's willing 2:34:24.120 --> 2:34:27.320 to make sure that the nickel bath is two hundred 2:34:27.320 --> 2:34:30.039 and eight degrees exactly and it stays there. You have 2:34:30.080 --> 2:34:32.280 to have a plant that's willing to throw out a 2:34:32.280 --> 2:34:34.400 batch of records if they don't sound right and just 2:34:34.520 --> 2:34:37.600 eat the cost. That's that's one of the main differences 2:34:37.640 --> 2:34:40.560 between a great plant who's going to be a hack 2:34:40.600 --> 2:34:43.119 and just make you pay for any garbage, or who's 2:34:43.160 --> 2:34:45.880 going to have quality control. RTI is one of the 2:34:45.920 --> 2:34:47.720 best plants on the face of the earth. 2:34:55.400 --> 2:34:58.920 So on these records, catalog records, Yeah, how much vinyl 2:34:58.959 --> 2:35:00.240 do you press? 2:35:01.640 --> 2:35:03.080 We can do twenty thousand of them. 2:35:04.160 --> 2:35:07.520 And you know there's much more capacity than there used 2:35:07.560 --> 2:35:12.039 to be. Is your relationship and volumes such that you 2:35:12.080 --> 2:35:13.720 can get all the stuff pressed in time. 2:35:15.160 --> 2:35:20.320 The delay times are coming down, and you build relationships 2:35:20.320 --> 2:35:24.560 with plants where that they'll help you. Artier has been 2:35:24.600 --> 2:35:26.160 real good to us. A few other plants have been 2:35:26.160 --> 2:35:30.240 good to us. But we do all the all the 2:35:31.040 --> 2:35:34.040 all the all the tone poet stuff. It's mastered by 2:35:34.120 --> 2:35:39.000 Kevin Gray at his place and manufactured at Artier. 2:35:39.879 --> 2:35:42.039 Okay, do you have a great stereo at. 2:35:41.920 --> 2:35:46.400 Home, not like Joe Harley, who's got you know, like 2:35:46.800 --> 2:35:50.360 the Wilsons whatever table? Yeah, but okay, you don't have 2:35:50.400 --> 2:35:53.280 a boom box either. I go to your house. Yeah, 2:35:53.360 --> 2:35:56.360 you're going to play me two records to say, the 2:35:56.520 --> 2:35:58.480 sound on these is unbelievable. 2:35:58.600 --> 2:36:02.920 Yeah, other than Blue Note, what would you play? 2:36:03.720 --> 2:36:06.160 You remember everyone used to play The Night Fly by 2:36:06.160 --> 2:36:14.920 Donald Fagan that that's still a pretty great sound record. Uh. Well, 2:36:15.959 --> 2:36:18.160 I don't really show off the things. But for my 2:36:18.240 --> 2:36:22.520 own reference, uh, I play Born and Raised, the John 2:36:22.520 --> 2:36:26.240 Mayer record. I play something I know you know I'll play. 2:36:26.600 --> 2:36:28.600 I'm proud of that record. Born and Raised. John Mayer 2:36:28.680 --> 2:36:29.640 is a bad motherfucker. 2:36:29.879 --> 2:36:32.800 Okay, just to stay on John Mayer. You made one 2:36:32.840 --> 2:36:36.000 record with him, I made three records. Okay, what was 2:36:36.400 --> 2:36:37.520 was that the first born and. 2:36:37.520 --> 2:36:39.280 Raised, Born and raised the first one. Then we did 2:36:39.360 --> 2:36:42.440 Paradise Valley and we did Sad Rock during COVID. 2:36:44.040 --> 2:36:47.879 So who have you not produced that you have a 2:36:47.920 --> 2:36:50.640 hankrey for it? Mean you've been to the mountaintop with 2:36:50.720 --> 2:36:54.000 the Stones. But if I said, forget about Blue note 2:36:54.080 --> 2:36:57.000 your schedule, we're dreaming here, you know, who would you want? 2:36:57.000 --> 2:36:57.200 Who? 2:36:57.520 --> 2:36:59.000 I think my point is clear, who would you want 2:36:59.000 --> 2:36:59.440 to work with? 2:37:01.040 --> 2:37:04.200 Well, I've pretty much been to my bucket list of 2:37:04.280 --> 2:37:06.879 living people. You know. I wish Muddy Waters to come back. 2:37:07.280 --> 2:37:12.360 I wish John Lennon would come back, but they're not 2:37:12.400 --> 2:37:16.640 coming back. I like people who are really expressive. I 2:37:17.360 --> 2:37:20.039 played live with Miley Cyrus. I thought she was awesome. 2:37:21.000 --> 2:37:23.120 I'd make a record with her in a minute. Yeah, 2:37:23.480 --> 2:37:24.680 that's something I think it's great. 2:37:24.840 --> 2:37:27.440 Let's just assume you make a record with Miley Cris. 2:37:27.760 --> 2:37:31.520 She brings her talent. Is your goal to get that talent? 2:37:31.720 --> 2:37:33.720 Or do you say I have a vision where I 2:37:33.720 --> 2:37:35.039 can take my Lee Cris. 2:37:35.360 --> 2:37:37.080 I don't do that to anybody. I wouldn't do that 2:37:37.240 --> 2:37:39.400 to a new artist that no one's ever heard of. 2:37:39.520 --> 2:37:42.959 That's not my style of producing. My style producing very specific. 2:37:43.280 --> 2:37:45.920 I try to sit with an artist and figure out 2:37:46.240 --> 2:37:49.200 what they're hearing in their head, and I try to 2:37:49.240 --> 2:37:50.760 help them get there. 2:37:50.879 --> 2:37:54.240 Just how would you uncover what they're hearing in their head? 2:37:55.520 --> 2:37:59.160 You talk, you play records, What do you think of 2:37:59.160 --> 2:38:01.760 this sound like? You like the way this record sounds? 2:38:01.800 --> 2:38:08.200 You just spend time and talk about things. I worked 2:38:08.200 --> 2:38:13.440 with Waylon Jennings, and I know what his records sound like. 2:38:13.480 --> 2:38:17.800 But what do you want to do? He said he 2:38:17.920 --> 2:38:23.800 wanted he liked Mercy Bob Dylan record Daniel Daniel, and 2:38:23.840 --> 2:38:28.800 it's it's Bob with some great songs, singing beautifully and 2:38:29.280 --> 2:38:36.800 uh and the atmospheric things that Daniel specializes in. All right, 2:38:37.080 --> 2:38:39.320 I get that, all right? So we make of Waylon 2:38:39.400 --> 2:38:43.520 Jennings record with with atmosphere and and we did that. 2:38:43.600 --> 2:38:45.560 It's a pretty cool record, and he was thrilled with it. 2:38:46.040 --> 2:38:50.240 And if I have to be the one to provide 2:38:50.480 --> 2:38:52.680 the vibe and the vision, I don't do the record. 2:38:53.400 --> 2:38:56.400 I'm not interested that. I like working with artists who 2:38:56.480 --> 2:39:00.640 have vision and an idea, and I like helping them 2:39:00.720 --> 2:39:03.280 realize that there's no right or wrong way to make 2:39:03.280 --> 2:39:06.000 a record. I don't judge any producers. Man, You know 2:39:06.760 --> 2:39:12.560 some people are a tour producers. You know. They they 2:39:12.600 --> 2:39:15.199 can play all the instruments, they lay down a guide vocals, 2:39:15.200 --> 2:39:17.080 and then you come in. They have you imitate that 2:39:17.160 --> 2:39:20.480 vocal and they have hits doing that. That's a that's 2:39:20.480 --> 2:39:23.240 a perfectly legitimate means of doing business. If that, If 2:39:23.240 --> 2:39:26.240 you can do that, it's just not it's not my 2:39:26.400 --> 2:39:33.840 strong suit. My strong suit is working with with great 2:39:33.959 --> 2:39:37.240 artists and helping them. They'll go k interesting they want. 2:39:37.440 --> 2:39:41.080 You know, back when the business was more comprehensible, there 2:39:41.080 --> 2:39:45.600 were legendary producers, and then there were engineers. Then a 2:39:45.640 --> 2:39:49.800 lot of the engineers became producers. Well, there are a 2:39:49.840 --> 2:39:52.600 lot of things the old traditional producers might do that 2:39:52.640 --> 2:39:53.720 an engineer doesn't. 2:39:54.600 --> 2:39:54.720 You know. 2:39:54.879 --> 2:39:57.000 First it might be well we need a bridge here 2:39:57.160 --> 2:39:59.800 or something like that. To what degree might you rear 2:40:00.040 --> 2:40:02.760 change or change the song in what degree? Why you 2:40:03.000 --> 2:40:05.720 actually participate, say well, let me play this for you, 2:40:05.800 --> 2:40:07.840 not writing the whole song, but let me play you 2:40:07.920 --> 2:40:11.120 this part, or why don't we change this line instead 2:40:11.120 --> 2:40:11.320 of this? 2:40:11.480 --> 2:40:16.080 How about this? Will you do that? Sure? Yeah, I 2:40:16.120 --> 2:40:20.960 won't write it for them without invitation. I think that's 2:40:20.959 --> 2:40:23.440 a bit presumptuous, and it's become suspect. It looks like 2:40:23.480 --> 2:40:27.480 a publishing grab. And I told the Stones when we 2:40:27.520 --> 2:40:30.440 first started, I said, I'm going to suggest things that 2:40:30.520 --> 2:40:32.320 have to do with songwriting. And I don't want you 2:40:32.360 --> 2:40:35.000 to think that I'm it's a money grab. It's because 2:40:35.000 --> 2:40:37.920 I think it'll make a better record. So consider me 2:40:38.080 --> 2:40:40.879 an editor, not a co writer, even if I do 2:40:41.000 --> 2:40:47.360 things that might be considered co writing. And yeah, I 2:40:47.879 --> 2:40:50.440 think it was a co writer on Love Shack, really, 2:40:50.560 --> 2:40:53.400 you know, but I said the same thing to be 2:40:53.480 --> 2:40:56.680 fifty two said. They gave me like this really long, 2:40:56.760 --> 2:40:59.440 twelve minute thing. They said, see if you can it's 2:40:59.480 --> 2:41:02.920 nothing the hook, There was no chorus, but all the 2:41:02.959 --> 2:41:05.800 parts were in there, and I went through and cut 2:41:05.840 --> 2:41:07.760 it up and made it a three and a half 2:41:07.840 --> 2:41:11.240 minute song. And that was just part of producing. I 2:41:11.280 --> 2:41:17.160 didn't think it. You know, I'd have a better car today. Maybe. 2:41:17.840 --> 2:41:21.760 Okay, you have interests in a lot of records that 2:41:21.800 --> 2:41:25.880 have sold records, so they're in the blacks something. Usually producers, 2:41:25.920 --> 2:41:28.840 they're paid from record one. What are you finding that 2:41:28.920 --> 2:41:30.920 you're accounted to accurately? 2:41:34.440 --> 2:41:41.040 Yeah, it seems about right. You know, I've worked. I've 2:41:41.080 --> 2:41:45.760 been part of the Universal Music Group for fifteen years. 2:41:45.920 --> 2:41:51.680 I've never ever encountered a situation where someone was deliberately 2:41:51.760 --> 2:41:56.640 trying to steal an artists money. It's mythology I've never 2:41:57.080 --> 2:42:02.720 once had. I've only had a positive experience of Blue Note. 2:42:03.120 --> 2:42:06.320 Lucian Grange has never said to me, don you need 2:42:06.360 --> 2:42:10.160 to do this or do that. He's always supported stuff. 2:42:11.240 --> 2:42:13.840 You're doing a great job with Blue Note. You keep 2:42:13.879 --> 2:42:16.600 doing it and call me if you need help. You 2:42:16.640 --> 2:42:19.800 know that all the stuff that I used to fear 2:42:19.920 --> 2:42:22.200 about record companies. I used to hate record company. I thought, 2:42:22.200 --> 2:42:24.879 but the record company was the enemy until I started 2:42:24.920 --> 2:42:27.640 working there, and then I thought, wait a minute, the enemy. 2:42:27.720 --> 2:42:30.600 This is mostly kids in their twenties who love music 2:42:30.840 --> 2:42:33.320 and are willing to stay here till eleven o'clock at night. 2:42:33.400 --> 2:42:36.800 Maybe they haven't even met the artists, but they love 2:42:36.879 --> 2:42:41.320 the music so much they're willing to, you know, to 2:42:42.520 --> 2:42:47.800 fall on the sword to get this music heard. That's 2:42:47.800 --> 2:42:50.360 what a record company actually is. It's just the young 2:42:50.360 --> 2:42:53.880 people who are working there. That's the majority of what 2:42:53.920 --> 2:42:56.840 you encounter. So I've really had to change my thinking 2:42:56.840 --> 2:42:59.440 about it. Up until that point, I thought they're the 2:42:59.440 --> 2:43:02.119 people who come to the session give you terrible notes 2:43:02.120 --> 2:43:04.120 that ruin the record, and if it doesn't ruin the 2:43:04.120 --> 2:43:06.039 record and you have a hit, they steal your money. 2:43:06.200 --> 2:43:08.560 That's that was what I thought a record company was, 2:43:08.879 --> 2:43:11.320 and I really had to re examine that. 2:43:12.640 --> 2:43:15.840 Would you sell your rights? 2:43:17.600 --> 2:43:20.160 Yeah? I think so. Yeah. I don't have any sentimental 2:43:20.200 --> 2:43:20.960 attachment to it. 2:43:21.080 --> 2:43:24.879 I mean at this point, I must believe you've gotten offers. Yeah, 2:43:24.879 --> 2:43:26.640 I've had offers, So what would it take? 2:43:26.800 --> 2:43:36.120 Just the right number? Uh? Yeah, I mean I'm not 2:43:36.160 --> 2:43:46.440 opposed to it at all. A feel I feel a 2:43:46.480 --> 2:43:50.080 little bit weird. As a producer, your deals are sometimes 2:43:50.120 --> 2:43:54.080 with the artists directly, So like if I were to 2:43:54.080 --> 2:43:57.400 do a deal like that for what the Rolling Stones catalog, 2:43:57.920 --> 2:44:01.120 then they're going to have some people who are going 2:44:01.200 --> 2:44:03.240 to come in and audit all the time and not 2:44:03.560 --> 2:44:06.560 be as genial as I am about it. And I 2:44:06.600 --> 2:44:09.520 don't know that I love this guy, So I'm grateful 2:44:09.560 --> 2:44:11.959 to them or what they did. I'm not sure I 2:44:11.959 --> 2:44:15.000 would want to. Well, that's what happened with Hall and Oates. 2:44:16.080 --> 2:44:16.160 And. 2:44:17.640 --> 2:44:22.640 I get that and I understand how he felt. So 2:44:23.080 --> 2:44:26.160 that's really been my hesitation. You know, I'm going to 2:44:26.200 --> 2:44:28.400 bring some people going to come in and audit Bonnie. 2:44:28.480 --> 2:44:31.280 I never audited Bonnie right ever? Man, never is your 2:44:31.320 --> 2:44:34.119 deal with her? Yeah? Yeah? Okay. 2:44:34.200 --> 2:44:36.360 Final question, Gregory Porter? 2:44:36.680 --> 2:44:37.560 Yeah, okay. 2:44:38.280 --> 2:44:41.160 First time I heard him, saw it, you know, face 2:44:41.200 --> 2:44:43.879 to face. I didn't know anything about him other than 2:44:43.959 --> 2:44:44.320 his name. 2:44:45.160 --> 2:44:49.720 Mind blowing? Yeah. Is there any way I thought you 2:44:49.760 --> 2:44:52.400 had to think of capital right time? Yeah, that's right. 2:44:52.640 --> 2:44:55.480 I thought this guy was on the verge of superstardom. 2:44:55.959 --> 2:44:59.720 Is there any way or what is holding back? 2:44:59.800 --> 2:45:01.920 Or where are the stars? Not a line? Why is 2:45:01.959 --> 2:45:05.480 this guy not a household name in the United States? 2:45:05.800 --> 2:45:09.520 Because he had huge success in He sold a million records. 2:45:09.520 --> 2:45:11.480 The first album that came out in Blue Note sold 2:45:11.520 --> 2:45:12.480 a million. 2:45:12.400 --> 2:45:15.280 Records, So how many domestic how many for him. 2:45:15.440 --> 2:45:19.720 Forty thousand domestic rest forms? So he concentrated on where 2:45:19.760 --> 2:45:22.000 that audience was, and he spends most of his time. 2:45:22.480 --> 2:45:26.480 He lives in Bakersfield. I know he spends most of 2:45:26.520 --> 2:45:30.920 his time overseas. And if he really decided to focus 2:45:31.840 --> 2:45:36.240 a grass roots campaign over a long period of time 2:45:37.240 --> 2:45:41.040 on this country, I think you would be better now. 2:45:41.080 --> 2:45:43.640 But he's got you know, like four or five Grammys, 2:45:43.680 --> 2:45:46.640 and he can sell out the well turned theater. I 2:45:46.760 --> 2:45:48.840 just went to see mc Carnegie Hall this year. Sold 2:45:48.840 --> 2:45:52.200 that out. He does a Valentine's Day show there every year. 2:45:55.800 --> 2:45:57.039 I think he's pretty successful. 2:45:59.120 --> 2:46:03.360 Okay, then I'll add one more question once again, records. 2:46:03.400 --> 2:46:08.000 You haven't worked with a couple of records that these 2:46:08.000 --> 2:46:17.080 should have been giant hits and they fell through the cracks. 2:46:17.080 --> 2:46:23.440 Some of I love Buddy Miller's records. Yeah, Buddy should 2:46:23.520 --> 2:46:27.680 have more recognition. Buddy and Julie his wife, great lyricists. Man. 2:46:27.800 --> 2:46:32.480 You know, they're great songwriters and they're both incredibly soulful 2:46:32.879 --> 2:46:37.000 singers and musicians. Play a lot with Buddy. I've done 2:46:37.000 --> 2:46:39.040 a lot of kicks them. I play with them every 2:46:39.120 --> 2:46:44.680 year at the Americana Awards. I've done it, Yeah, fifteen 2:46:44.760 --> 2:46:46.680 sixteen years, I've gone and been in the house band. 2:46:46.840 --> 2:46:52.920 Mainly is I want to play with Buddy, and that's 2:46:53.000 --> 2:46:55.560 that's one guy deserving a wider recognition. 2:46:57.200 --> 2:47:01.160 Okay, keep adding more questions your every day life. Are 2:47:01.160 --> 2:47:04.720 people looking to get we put the right connotation here, 2:47:05.400 --> 2:47:08.440 not so much to get something from you, but are 2:47:08.440 --> 2:47:13.280 they looking for something, whether it be free work or whatever. Yeah, 2:47:13.920 --> 2:47:15.920 are you having to fend that often do you do 2:47:16.000 --> 2:47:20.920 that yourself? You don't have somebody else, you know. 2:47:21.480 --> 2:47:25.600 I remember, like it was yesterday, being in the position 2:47:25.840 --> 2:47:31.640 of needing someone to help me, right, I remember taking 2:47:32.240 --> 2:47:35.320 that before, Yeah, I remember taking that was and I 2:47:35.440 --> 2:47:37.680 was thing with the two songs to a public image 2:47:37.720 --> 2:47:41.120 show and Corner and John Lyden with it. Here's what 2:47:41.120 --> 2:47:44.640 we're doing. I think you'll dig it. It breaks my 2:47:44.720 --> 2:47:48.600 heart thinking of the desperation it takes to do that, 2:47:48.760 --> 2:47:56.160 to subject a guide to that, you know. So my 2:47:56.240 --> 2:48:01.440 heart breaks for people who've chosen a career like this. 2:48:01.560 --> 2:48:04.400 And I don't know why I've been so lucky, you know. 2:48:04.640 --> 2:48:10.920 And I know that in La, at any given moment 2:48:11.000 --> 2:48:14.160 in La, there's someone within one square mile of you 2:48:14.440 --> 2:48:17.680 who's great, who hasn't gotten the breaks for whatever reason. 2:48:19.720 --> 2:48:23.039 So I try to be as attentive as I can. 2:48:23.560 --> 2:48:28.039 I really sympathize with people in the position I have, 2:48:28.080 --> 2:48:31.520 and to present this thing. It's not a comfortable thing 2:48:31.600 --> 2:48:37.240 to do. And I hate saying no. That's that's the 2:48:37.280 --> 2:48:40.920 only I love the job. Man. Everybody has been great 2:48:40.959 --> 2:48:44.680 to me. I really enjoy doing it. I hate saying 2:48:45.040 --> 2:48:47.119 no to people. I've had to drop artists. A couple 2:48:47.160 --> 2:48:49.800 of times I haven't been able to do it with 2:48:49.920 --> 2:48:51.720 a crying and it's just. 2:48:52.440 --> 2:48:56.360 You drop them for purely economical reasons. 2:48:56.800 --> 2:49:06.480 Uh, well it it's not purely. It manifests itself in economically. 2:49:07.879 --> 2:49:08.080 I mean. 2:49:08.080 --> 2:49:11.240 What people also don't realize about this business is people 2:49:11.240 --> 2:49:13.880 don't want to work with assholes. So a lot of 2:49:13.920 --> 2:49:17.120 people don't know because they don't actually interact with these people. Hey, 2:49:17.160 --> 2:49:18.640 I don't care how talent you are, I just. 2:49:18.560 --> 2:49:21.320 Don't want to work with you. Whether it's stubborn or whatever. 2:49:21.320 --> 2:49:24.040 They hard to work with. I'm also luly that too, 2:49:24.120 --> 2:49:29.320 because I've been warned off of so many people about 2:49:29.360 --> 2:49:32.000 producing them. It's going to be a nightmare for you. 2:49:32.040 --> 2:49:33.040 And it was never a nightmare. 2:49:33.040 --> 2:49:34.680 I just had to have people said, oh, you know, 2:49:34.720 --> 2:49:38.840 I just mentioned one Ricky Lee Jones. Everybody said, oh 2:49:38.920 --> 2:49:43.560 yeah to her, she was the greatest. It was like, 2:49:43.600 --> 2:49:46.640 you know, we went to school together. So you try 2:49:46.680 --> 2:49:50.600 to tell yourself, but usually most of these people, it's 2:49:50.600 --> 2:49:52.520 not a one on one thing. Anyway, I was in 2:49:52.600 --> 2:49:55.320 the studio, I was the assistant engineer or something like that. 2:49:56.080 --> 2:50:02.440 It's if you treat people with respect, they usually return 2:50:02.640 --> 2:50:09.320 the favor. You know, you know, it's just simple basic stuff. 2:50:09.400 --> 2:50:12.440 Treat musicians the way you want to be treated in 2:50:12.480 --> 2:50:17.840 the like. One of the things is I was explaining 2:50:17.879 --> 2:50:20.720 to there was this kid who came with Ron Carter 2:50:20.840 --> 2:50:25.400 to the studio and I let him produce the overdub, 2:50:25.520 --> 2:50:28.360 sit there and talk to him on the talkback, just 2:50:28.600 --> 2:50:32.360 to get some experience doing it and understand what was involved. 2:50:32.400 --> 2:50:35.360 And I kept saying, keep your finger on the talkback button. Man, 2:50:35.400 --> 2:50:38.879 don't make the guy think he's here alone, that you're 2:50:38.920 --> 2:50:44.160 not listening to. Just be up. Just keep your finger 2:50:44.200 --> 2:50:47.240 on the button all the time and let him know 2:50:47.320 --> 2:50:50.240 what's going on all the time. That's just a common 2:50:50.360 --> 2:50:52.240 courtesy because I've been on the other side of it. 2:50:52.280 --> 2:50:55.520 I've been produced, I've been a session musician. You play 2:50:55.560 --> 2:50:58.680 something you think is great, and then there's silence for 2:50:58.760 --> 2:51:02.280 twenty seconds and you're just sitting there and limbo, like 2:51:02.400 --> 2:51:05.480 what And then they come back and say, let's try 2:51:05.480 --> 2:51:09.840 another one. Well those are all with that one. Give 2:51:09.840 --> 2:51:14.800 me some direction here. That felt pretty good to me. 2:51:16.400 --> 2:51:19.680 You sure you were paying attention, and you can you 2:51:19.720 --> 2:51:23.480 can lose people really easily. Uh, but yet you got 2:51:23.520 --> 2:51:26.480 to be empathetic and pay attention, and if you do that, 2:51:27.000 --> 2:51:28.440 they'll reward you. 2:51:36.160 --> 2:51:40.080 Well, you've certainly been empathetic and kept everybody's attention this afternoon. 2:51:40.879 --> 2:51:42.880 Don I want to thank you for taking this time 2:51:42.920 --> 2:51:43.680 with my audience. 2:51:43.720 --> 2:51:45.680 It's a pleasure, man, It's really good to talk to you. 2:51:45.800 --> 2:51:48.760 I think you're a great interviewer. We've we've talked about 2:51:48.800 --> 2:51:53.480 this before. I've actually, you know, I do a lot 2:51:53.480 --> 2:51:57.600 of interview viewing of other people, and I've studied your technique. 2:51:57.920 --> 2:51:59.840 You're you're, you're, you're really good. 2:52:00.560 --> 2:52:05.199 Well, two things I remember vividly doing that gig grammy 2:52:05.280 --> 2:52:07.360 time sixteen months ago, and you came up to me 2:52:07.400 --> 2:52:11.199 and he goes, I see what you're doing. That meant 2:52:11.320 --> 2:52:14.000 so much, right, I told my psychiatrist said, I gotta 2:52:14.040 --> 2:52:20.280 tell you this story now. Oh absolutely. I mean, first 2:52:20.280 --> 2:52:24.520 and foremost, being a writer is I don't want to 2:52:24.560 --> 2:52:26.240 say it's a lonely jump. First of all, I don't 2:52:26.280 --> 2:52:27.800 want don't put me in the camp of people who 2:52:27.800 --> 2:52:30.760 are normally right. I'm hearing from people all day long, 2:52:31.480 --> 2:52:38.480 but it's not the same as interacting, and most people 2:52:38.840 --> 2:52:41.240 are giving the audience what they want. 2:52:41.600 --> 2:52:42.840 There's way if you. 2:52:42.879 --> 2:52:48.320 Go out, you find forget the point. You don't always 2:52:48.320 --> 2:52:50.680 do it great yourself. I mean, if I do something 2:52:50.720 --> 2:52:53.280 that's eleven, I know. Can I do something that's eleven 2:52:53.320 --> 2:52:56.760 every day? No fucking way. But you know when you 2:52:56.800 --> 2:53:00.440 reach it. So when someone you know, this is back point, 2:53:00.480 --> 2:53:02.680 I mean talking more. I remember I was in a 2:53:02.800 --> 2:53:06.520 really bad spot thirty years ago. That's an understatement, really 2:53:06.560 --> 2:53:10.560 bad spot. First, since you mentioned the psychiatrist says, well, 2:53:10.560 --> 2:53:14.040 what's a fallback position? They go, there is no fallback position. 2:53:14.840 --> 2:53:15.800 This is it is. 2:53:17.480 --> 2:53:19.359 Nothing. Okay. 2:53:19.680 --> 2:53:21.800 The other thing is, well, what are you doing you 2:53:21.840 --> 2:53:24.640 know to sell this that I said. Listen, Whenever I 2:53:24.760 --> 2:53:28.080 tried to advance my career never works because the people. 2:53:27.879 --> 2:53:29.199 Don't get it. 2:53:29.200 --> 2:53:32.000 It's like someone says, come speak at my conference for 2:53:32.080 --> 2:53:34.280 you know, Yeah, you pay me, I'll go. Is it'll 2:53:34.320 --> 2:53:36.440 be good for you, good for me? If I stay 2:53:36.480 --> 2:53:39.520 home and write something phenomenal, that will be good for 2:53:39.600 --> 2:53:43.560 me and all the benefits have come from that. So 2:53:46.280 --> 2:53:49.440 you're a smart guy, very smart and I'm not saying 2:53:49.480 --> 2:53:53.320 that to stroke you. So you got it because it's 2:53:53.400 --> 2:53:58.480 like I don't come with a list of questions. It's like, 2:53:58.840 --> 2:54:01.200 where are you going? To go and where are you 2:54:01.200 --> 2:54:01.640 gonna go? 2:54:01.840 --> 2:54:02.600 By? Save Doug? 2:54:02.680 --> 2:54:04.119 And I know shit, I want to cover. I got 2:54:04.120 --> 2:54:08.760 a circle in my brain. I'm coming back because you know, 2:54:08.879 --> 2:54:10.320 some of these people are friends of mine. 2:54:10.360 --> 2:54:11.800 But two things. 2:54:12.160 --> 2:54:15.520 We've had conversation only for one reason. I was talking 2:54:15.560 --> 2:54:22.080 to Peter Wolf. Peter Wolf, fascinating character, because gin me, 2:54:22.160 --> 2:54:25.280 your guys, what the fuck was going on with you 2:54:25.680 --> 2:54:28.160 that they done away wanted you? 2:54:28.320 --> 2:54:28.680 Okay? 2:54:29.800 --> 2:54:31.760 Some people, you know, you just got to take one 2:54:31.800 --> 2:54:34.440 look at him. That's not Peter Wolf. Not that he's 2:54:34.440 --> 2:54:39.320 an unattractive guy, okay, and your talk. I couldn't figure 2:54:39.360 --> 2:54:43.279 it out for a really long time. Is he's actually 2:54:43.360 --> 2:54:48.200 empathetic and interested, which almost I was at a party 2:54:48.280 --> 2:54:50.400 last night. I got somebody's life story. You know how 2:54:50.480 --> 2:54:54.320 much they asked me about me? Zero didn't even occur 2:54:54.520 --> 2:54:57.760 to them. Okay, not that I have to tell my story, 2:54:58.200 --> 2:55:00.160 but okay, I got your story. It's not like I'm 2:55:00.200 --> 2:55:04.440 dying to talk to you again. So those moments are 2:55:04.560 --> 2:55:08.800 few and far between when somebody gets it, and that's 2:55:08.800 --> 2:55:11.680 what you live for. There aren't enough of those moments. 2:55:11.680 --> 2:55:13.680 I think maybe in conventional work, you get paid, you 2:55:13.720 --> 2:55:16.640 get a big payday. That's good, but in creative work, 2:55:16.680 --> 2:55:17.840 you're waiting. 2:55:17.520 --> 2:55:18.560 For that moment. 2:55:19.040 --> 2:55:21.320 The other thing that I loved that you said was 2:55:21.840 --> 2:55:27.600 talked about getting the job and the copy repair. Everybody 2:55:27.600 --> 2:55:30.320 who's made it big time, they were all on the verge. 2:55:30.320 --> 2:55:33.040 You're giving up at some point. It's just really desperate. 2:55:33.040 --> 2:55:35.280 So in any event, circled back to the Peter Wolf thing. 2:55:35.800 --> 2:55:37.800 At the end, he's opening up you. 2:55:37.920 --> 2:55:38.440 He wrote a. 2:55:38.400 --> 2:55:41.959 Book and got a lot of press. It's a fucking 2:55:42.000 --> 2:55:44.760 book business, so we antiquate it, and they didn't press 2:55:44.840 --> 2:55:47.280 enough copies, so for like six weeks there are no 2:55:47.280 --> 2:55:49.960 books in the story. He's doing press and I'm talking 2:55:49.959 --> 2:55:52.240 to him about it. I didn't think twice I was 2:55:52.280 --> 2:55:54.400 gonna cut it off. All the emails and oh when 2:55:54.400 --> 2:55:57.480 you were talking to him about that. So when we 2:55:57.560 --> 2:56:00.160 started off, I mean, even like on these you know, 2:56:00.200 --> 2:56:05.840 i'd also think these philosophical points, like you're talking about 2:56:05.879 --> 2:56:09.600 the altruism, et cetera. I mean, there's right and left, 2:56:09.879 --> 2:56:13.160 red and blue. But if you're not invested. Most people 2:56:13.200 --> 2:56:15.920 are invested to the point where they can't stand back 2:56:15.959 --> 2:56:21.080 and see what it's really going on here, And you know, 2:56:21.200 --> 2:56:25.720 to get into that those are the topics that are interesting, 2:56:26.320 --> 2:56:29.000 whereas most people are how much money you make in 2:56:29.120 --> 2:56:31.480 where we going to dinner? And that's a great thing 2:56:31.480 --> 2:56:35.160 about music because it transcends that. What I always say is, 2:56:35.160 --> 2:56:36.440 you know, you could put a five year old in 2:56:36.440 --> 2:56:38.920 front of the TV watch a program. Did you like 2:56:38.959 --> 2:56:39.400 it to dinner? 2:56:39.879 --> 2:56:40.039 Oh? 2:56:40.120 --> 2:56:43.480 It wasn't believable, the acting was bad. You put somebody 2:56:43.520 --> 2:56:45.240 listen to record about it? As most they can say 2:56:45.320 --> 2:56:47.400 is had a good beat and I could dance to it. 2:56:47.600 --> 2:56:50.520 I love it right, But it has that power. 2:56:50.640 --> 2:56:54.920 Yeah, yeah, it's the greatest, man, It's absolutely essential. 2:56:56.040 --> 2:56:57.800 Do you have a go to track like when you're 2:56:57.840 --> 2:56:59.080 in a bad mood or something? 2:56:59.240 --> 2:57:02.039 I do. It's actually a Blue Note album. I've been 2:57:02.040 --> 2:57:04.680 going to it since it came out in sixty six. 2:57:04.959 --> 2:57:07.520 I think I bought it like sixty eight sixty nine 2:57:08.200 --> 2:57:10.440 Speak No Evil by Way in Shorter, which I think 2:57:10.560 --> 2:57:16.880 is my favorite record in the catalog side too. When 2:57:16.920 --> 2:57:20.560 I was nineteen, man, I was, I was, I dropped 2:57:20.560 --> 2:57:22.520 out of school, movedan I wanted to be in a 2:57:22.520 --> 2:57:25.600 band like the Stooges or the MC five. Only gig 2:57:25.680 --> 2:57:29.680 I could get was playing at a bowling alley in Ipsilanti, Michigan, 2:57:30.280 --> 2:57:35.160 with the band that was doing Carpenter's covers and things. 2:57:35.600 --> 2:57:39.560 I just felt like all my plans had gotten derailed. 2:57:40.120 --> 2:57:43.040 I get pretty lost. When I was feeling lost, I 2:57:43.120 --> 2:57:45.520 go back and I put on this album side to 2:57:45.720 --> 2:57:49.720 Speak No Evil, and I could relate to the players 2:57:49.720 --> 2:57:53.640 as individuals. Elvin Jones playing drums, Detroit guy, right, so 2:57:53.720 --> 2:57:56.960 I appreciated his energy. He's just a little too exuberant, 2:57:57.280 --> 2:58:01.480 and I thought, yeah, all right, I get that. Herbie Hancock, 2:58:02.040 --> 2:58:05.320 even in his twenties, probably knew more about harmony than 2:58:06.120 --> 2:58:09.800 any anybody around, you know. And I listen to what 2:58:09.840 --> 2:58:11.840 he's playing and think, all right, be smart. I'm a 2:58:11.879 --> 2:58:14.800 smart guy. I can relate to Herbie. But it was 2:58:14.800 --> 2:58:18.959 really Wayne. I'd hear a saxophone and didn't sound like saxophone. Didn't. 2:58:19.000 --> 2:58:21.800 I didn't hear reads or keys or technique or anything. 2:58:21.920 --> 2:58:25.200 I heard conversation. He was like he was speaking to me. 2:58:25.240 --> 2:58:28.800 And I imagine walking down Main Street in ann Arbor 2:58:29.360 --> 2:58:31.879 with Wayne Short and he's saying, like watch out for 2:58:31.959 --> 2:58:34.480 that guy, Like let's cross the street here and just 2:58:34.600 --> 2:58:37.000 keep walking. Don't look this cat and eye and like 2:58:37.040 --> 2:58:40.000 he was giving me directions. I had a duck and 2:58:40.080 --> 2:58:45.600 dive in life, and somehow all of that combined with 2:58:45.680 --> 2:58:50.920 this beautiful soul touch in music. By the time I 2:58:50.959 --> 2:58:54.880 get to the end of the side, I remembered who 2:58:54.920 --> 2:58:58.560 I was, who who I set out to be, and 2:58:59.240 --> 2:59:02.000 I knew how to get back on track, at least 2:59:02.080 --> 2:59:05.760 till the next time I got derailed right, and that 2:59:05.920 --> 2:59:09.640 was that was powerful, you know, And by the way, 2:59:09.720 --> 2:59:10.840 it still works. Man. 2:59:11.080 --> 2:59:11.800 Oh yeah, if I. 2:59:11.720 --> 2:59:13.920 Have a rough day, I'll put on that record. By 2:59:13.959 --> 2:59:17.320 the time I get from Hollywood to Santa Monica, I'm good. 2:59:20.360 --> 2:59:24.879 And thankfully, you know, we got to sign Wayne. We 2:59:25.040 --> 2:59:27.240 re signed him the Blue Note first year I was 2:59:27.280 --> 2:59:30.040 there and I made a couple of records, but him, 2:59:30.040 --> 2:59:32.080 I got to know him, beautiful guy. I got to 2:59:32.080 --> 2:59:32.520 tell him that. 2:59:33.360 --> 2:59:36.200 And really, well, it sounds like you got to tell 2:59:36.240 --> 2:59:38.720 the number of your heroes, got to tell Brian Wilson. 2:59:39.640 --> 2:59:42.400 Did you ever tell the Stones you were a fan? Sure? 2:59:42.760 --> 2:59:46.080 Yeah, they knew. I think fans make the best producers. 2:59:46.320 --> 2:59:47.440 I would find that reassuring. 2:59:47.600 --> 2:59:49.840 Are you trying to create a bond that that sort 2:59:49.879 --> 2:59:50.800 of separates you? 2:59:52.800 --> 2:59:56.080 I think that if you try to make the record 2:59:56.640 --> 3:00:01.840 that you would buy. That's that's that's that's good producing. 3:00:03.440 --> 3:00:06.320 You just got to assume that other people share your taste. 3:00:06.600 --> 3:00:11.279 Okay, but you're a very soulful guy who is warm. 3:00:11.480 --> 3:00:14.280 Is it important to make the musicians of the room 3:00:14.720 --> 3:00:16.200 feel that they're connecting with you. 3:00:16.800 --> 3:00:20.000 It's important to make them feel comfortable. They don't. I 3:00:20.040 --> 3:00:22.560 don't care whether they feel that they're connected. They're not 3:00:22.560 --> 3:00:24.960 making a record for me, they but I want them 3:00:25.000 --> 3:00:29.200 to feel is safe enough that if they take a 3:00:29.280 --> 3:00:32.600 chance on something and it fails and they fall off 3:00:32.640 --> 3:00:36.600 the cliff musically, that it's okay, get no, mad man, 3:00:37.680 --> 3:00:40.040 We'll do another take, you know, like but to feel 3:00:40.040 --> 3:00:43.520 comfortable to take the chance, so you don't just get 3:00:44.640 --> 3:00:50.760 you know, the biggest enemy making a record is good 3:00:51.640 --> 3:00:54.120 making a good record. There's no point in making a 3:00:54.120 --> 3:00:56.760 good record. Make it fucking great or don't make it. 3:00:57.360 --> 3:01:04.960 You know. Sometimes people have to always, man, you got 3:01:04.959 --> 3:01:07.640 to go the extra mile, put that little bit of 3:01:07.680 --> 3:01:10.720 extra something in there. And sometimes it takes a while 3:01:10.760 --> 3:01:13.439 to draw that out. And people have to be comfortable 3:01:14.000 --> 3:01:15.720 and feel that they're not going to be judged or 3:01:15.760 --> 3:01:18.720 look foolish. Shift if they try something and it doesn't work, 3:01:19.480 --> 3:01:21.600 So that's what I care about. 3:01:21.680 --> 3:01:23.320 Well, do you have a technique to push them to 3:01:23.320 --> 3:01:24.039 get into grate? 3:01:24.240 --> 3:01:29.640 You know, it's really weird. I've been told that this happens, 3:01:29.680 --> 3:01:32.039 but it's nothing I do deliberately. I don't know what 3:01:32.160 --> 3:01:35.920 I do, but something puts people at ease. I'm aware 3:01:36.160 --> 3:01:38.800 of the phenomena, but I don't know. I don't know 3:01:39.080 --> 3:01:42.039 why it happens. There's nothing deliberate. 3:01:42.280 --> 3:01:43.000 It's like Mick. 3:01:43.480 --> 3:01:48.000 I remember telling him he's got something in his voice. 3:01:48.040 --> 3:01:51.400 He's audiogenic. I don't know what that word means. Well, 3:01:51.440 --> 3:01:55.080 you know what photogenic is Claudia Schiffer on an ad 3:01:55.320 --> 3:01:58.560 and she jumps out, catches your eye because she just 3:01:58.600 --> 3:02:01.640 got this quality. And that's why she's a popular model, 3:02:01.680 --> 3:02:04.600 because it draws your attention to the genes they're trying 3:02:04.640 --> 3:02:09.240 to sell. That's photogenic. Audiogenic means your voice leaps out 3:02:09.240 --> 3:02:13.200 of the speakers. And some people just have this thing. 3:02:13.440 --> 3:02:16.200 It's a gift. It's not something you can't eq it in. 3:02:16.480 --> 3:02:19.920 It's got something to do with the EQ curve of 3:02:19.959 --> 3:02:21.920 the voice, but it's got to do also with some 3:02:22.040 --> 3:02:26.160 invisible kind of magical charisma. Some people just have it. 3:02:26.800 --> 3:02:30.160 Mick Jagger. Listen, you mentioned Tumblin Dice earlier in the discussion. 3:02:31.240 --> 3:02:33.640 Listen how low his vocal is. No one in the 3:02:33.800 --> 3:02:36.160 right minds would ever put out a record with the 3:02:36.240 --> 3:02:38.760 vocal mix that low. But it doesn't matter because he 3:02:38.920 --> 3:02:42.480 leaps out of the speakers. Garth Brooks leaps out of 3:02:42.480 --> 3:02:45.800 the speakers. I was a stun man when I work with him. 3:02:46.640 --> 3:02:49.760 He left out of the speakers so far as like 3:02:49.800 --> 3:02:54.800 he was standing behind me man. And that's why I knew. 3:02:54.840 --> 3:02:58.400 I was understood why he was the most successful artists 3:02:58.400 --> 3:03:00.440 in the world at that time, because he had this 3:03:00.520 --> 3:03:09.160 incredible gift of audio charisma. Aretha Franklin and Bonnie's Got It. 3:03:09.959 --> 3:03:12.280 Yeah, those are two good examples. But you're working with 3:03:12.400 --> 3:03:15.840 Mick is if they are one hundred percent of the timer. 3:03:16.000 --> 3:03:17.040 You have to get him in the zone. 3:03:18.160 --> 3:03:20.960 He warms up into the character and you can see 3:03:20.959 --> 3:03:25.240 the physical transformation and it's just it's it's so awesome, 3:03:25.360 --> 3:03:28.760 especially if you're a fan. Right, so comes in, he's 3:03:28.760 --> 3:03:31.000 got a sweater and a dress shirt, you know, and 3:03:31.120 --> 3:03:34.480 he stands there and he's singing It's Mick Jagger, but 3:03:34.600 --> 3:03:38.160 he's he's not the guy and you gotta go four 3:03:38.240 --> 3:03:42.480 or five takes in and then sweater comes off, the 3:03:42.560 --> 3:03:46.240 dress shirt comes off. Now he's in a T shirt 3:03:46.640 --> 3:03:51.440 and the lips start, they transform. He becomes the character. 3:03:52.360 --> 3:03:55.280 And then he'll give you two or three passes of 3:03:55.320 --> 3:03:57.600 it where he's the thing, and then he knows he's 3:03:57.720 --> 3:04:09.160 done it. He knows when he's there and when he's not. Hey, 3:04:09.959 --> 3:04:14.160 he's just phenomenal, man, he's just so's you know, he's 3:04:14.160 --> 3:04:18.440 the greatest front man ever, right, greatest front man of 3:04:18.520 --> 3:04:18.880 the banned. 3:04:19.080 --> 3:04:21.600 Well, they just to stay on the stones for a minute, 3:04:22.160 --> 3:04:26.360 especially at glaston very recently with all the controversies with 3:04:26.800 --> 3:04:33.480 villains and the kneecap. The stones were dangerous back in 3:04:33.520 --> 3:04:37.560 their era. And then of course in the sixty nine 3:04:37.640 --> 3:04:39.640 to seventy two era, I mean there were no cell 3:04:39.680 --> 3:04:42.080 phone cameras. They were in the south of France. There's 3:04:42.080 --> 3:04:44.600 been some footage town. It was almost as fucked up 3:04:44.640 --> 3:04:48.800 as they said it was okay, whereas now it's fifty 3:04:48.920 --> 3:04:51.320 years later. I mean, Joe Walls had a great line 3:04:51.400 --> 3:04:54.400 about this because I'm too old to die young, and 3:04:54.440 --> 3:04:58.200 it's like, you know, it's not their fault at all, 3:04:58.720 --> 3:04:59.800 and it's got nothing to eat. 3:05:00.280 --> 3:05:01.240 Just weird. 3:05:02.200 --> 3:05:04.200 I mean, it's really weird if something. This is why 3:05:04.240 --> 3:05:06.720 I got to give Keith Richards much credit. He's not 3:05:06.800 --> 3:05:09.480 trying to look young. It's like when these guys get 3:05:09.480 --> 3:05:12.120 plastic surgery and they look forty years younger than the 3:05:12.160 --> 3:05:17.240 audience it's coming to see them. But as they say, 3:05:17.240 --> 3:05:19.879 it's not the Stones, I guess it's the same thing 3:05:20.520 --> 3:05:22.680 in the show. There's always a moment where it locks 3:05:22.720 --> 3:05:25.160 on and you go, that is it. 3:05:25.920 --> 3:05:29.119 They're fucking great man. I've seen him. I've seen him 3:05:29.120 --> 3:05:31.200 as a I started the first time I went to 3:05:31.200 --> 3:05:33.720 see him as in sixty four, they played for two 3:05:33.840 --> 3:05:38.920 hundred people at Olympia Stadium, which is an arena in Detroit, 3:05:38.920 --> 3:05:41.920 two hundred people in an eighteen thousand seat places. Before 3:05:41.920 --> 3:05:44.160 they were on that Cellivant show, I saw him three 3:05:44.280 --> 3:05:48.240 or four times with Brian Jones, so I'm gonna gimme 3:05:48.320 --> 3:05:53.280 shelter tour. I've seen him, you know, throughout, and then 3:05:53.320 --> 3:05:55.480 once I started working with him, I saw him another 3:05:55.680 --> 3:05:59.800 fifty times, and I'm always blown away. I've never seen 3:06:00.320 --> 3:06:01.520 a shitty Stone show. 3:06:01.720 --> 3:06:04.800 Okay, did you go to the show with Fonda? Okay, 3:06:05.760 --> 3:06:11.240 they were great but it's the stones in a room 3:06:11.280 --> 3:06:15.800 with under two thousand people. Song ends all the rabble rousing. 3:06:16.360 --> 3:06:19.160 You know, you think it's the fucking stones. They don't 3:06:19.160 --> 3:06:21.920 do a lot of pattern between the numbers anyway. It 3:06:22.040 --> 3:06:26.560 was just it was disrespectful. But I just couldn't believe it. 3:06:26.560 --> 3:06:29.360 It was a weird It was an industry audience, I 3:06:29.360 --> 3:06:31.560 think you could call it, and that's a that's a 3:06:31.560 --> 3:06:34.080 tough audience to play for. I thought they were great. 3:06:34.160 --> 3:06:37.039 I saw them at the Echoplex too, and I didn't 3:06:37.040 --> 3:06:39.800 see that show. That was just the most surreal thing. 3:06:39.879 --> 3:06:42.920 To be in a bar with the rolling stones. 3:06:45.400 --> 3:06:48.040 Well, the great thing about them is they are a 3:06:48.080 --> 3:06:48.680 bar band. 3:06:49.160 --> 3:06:53.119 Well they can be the roots. 3:06:53.520 --> 3:06:56.279 We go into the production era of let it bleed whatever, 3:06:56.760 --> 3:06:59.640 But at the core, it's guys who listened to a 3:06:59.680 --> 3:07:01.879 lot of blues records and want it to be and 3:07:01.920 --> 3:07:04.520 that's out is supposed to someone who, you know, other 3:07:04.560 --> 3:07:07.520 than satanic majesties, maybe supposed to someone who blew with 3:07:07.560 --> 3:07:11.480 the wind. It's pure to what it is and very 3:07:11.520 --> 3:07:12.920 few things are that long. 3:07:13.000 --> 3:07:15.039 That's why I love the Blue and Lonesome record, because 3:07:15.040 --> 3:07:18.959 I think that was utterly not only was it made 3:07:19.080 --> 3:07:26.680 utterly without self consciousness or thinking they've adjust themselves. And 3:07:26.720 --> 3:07:29.400 because it was all in one room and the drum 3:07:29.520 --> 3:07:33.440 sound was coming primarily from mixed vocal mic, there was 3:07:33.560 --> 3:07:37.920 no overdubbing, no punching, no fixing, nothing. That's just listen 3:07:37.959 --> 3:07:40.680 out what a great band they are. 3:07:41.000 --> 3:07:44.840 The problem is, you'll remember in the seventies, you know, 3:07:45.160 --> 3:07:48.040 bands put out live albums to get out of their contracts, 3:07:48.040 --> 3:07:50.800 and they change the contracts, doesn't count as an album. 3:07:50.600 --> 3:07:53.119 Et cetera. Live music was so weird. 3:07:53.160 --> 3:07:56.240 I remember it was in a bar in Aspen, Colorado 3:07:56.280 --> 3:07:58.840 in nineteen seventy They taped the concert off the radio 3:07:59.160 --> 3:07:59.920 and they had it. 3:08:00.040 --> 3:08:00.720 You could listen to it. 3:08:00.840 --> 3:08:03.160 Then there was a King Biscuit flower arm. This ship 3:08:03.360 --> 3:08:07.080 was so rare. If the Stones had got nothing to 3:08:07.080 --> 3:08:08.800 do with the record. But if the Stones are put 3:08:09.040 --> 3:08:10.640 low down on whatever the hell the name of the 3:08:10.640 --> 3:08:13.360 track is that if they put it out in nineteen 3:08:13.400 --> 3:08:17.080 seventy three, it would have been like everybody would have 3:08:17.120 --> 3:08:17.440 known it. 3:08:17.800 --> 3:08:22.640 Times changed, yeah, times changed. But what I love is 3:08:22.680 --> 3:08:28.120 that they you know, Keith Richard's man, he's just he's 3:08:28.200 --> 3:08:33.279 such a great soulful musician. You know, he's one hundred 3:08:33.360 --> 3:08:37.480 percent for real. And I've gone to see them live 3:08:37.520 --> 3:08:42.160 and I've seen him like walk past on the runway there. 3:08:42.520 --> 3:08:46.720 He's like transfixed. Man, he's in a trance, and I've 3:08:46.760 --> 3:08:50.560 had eye contact with him, and but he's he's somewhere else. 3:08:50.600 --> 3:08:54.160 He's so deep into what he's playing. And he said, 3:08:54.440 --> 3:08:56.640 night after night after night, he goes there every night. 3:08:56.879 --> 3:09:00.800 He doesn't he changes his position the guitar. So if 3:09:00.800 --> 3:09:03.520 it's a g chord, you'll play it down here one night, 3:09:03.680 --> 3:09:05.920 you'll play it up here another night. And that leads 3:09:05.959 --> 3:09:10.000 to a whole other thing. He's he's improvising in a 3:09:10.280 --> 3:09:15.040 very narrow framework. There's not a whole lot of room 3:09:15.080 --> 3:09:21.679 for it. But nothing's ever on autopilot with him. He's 3:09:21.800 --> 3:09:24.080 for real and he's so sold. 3:09:25.040 --> 3:09:27.959 Well, you know, I don't know whether you went to 3:09:28.080 --> 3:09:30.400 the Metropolitan Museum of Art and then it was the 3:09:30.480 --> 3:09:32.959 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame whatever they called it, 3:09:33.000 --> 3:09:37.160 with everybody's guitars and you saw his less Paul with 3:09:37.360 --> 3:09:41.080 four strings. That's when it all came out. And then 3:09:41.080 --> 3:09:43.879 I remember being on stage talking to his guitar deck. 3:09:43.920 --> 3:09:46.160 I said, you know what the deal was, We let 3:09:46.200 --> 3:09:48.080 it do we go on the road, we have to 3:09:48.120 --> 3:09:52.600 have it. It's like the came But you know, it's 3:09:52.720 --> 3:09:55.280 the same thing with Eddie van Halen's Frankenstein guitar, because 3:09:55.600 --> 3:09:57.440 if it was my guitar, I wouldn't take it out 3:09:57.440 --> 3:09:59.720 of my bedroom. I'd be afraid that it fall apart. 3:10:00.480 --> 3:10:02.199 But we all grew. 3:10:02.120 --> 3:10:03.000 Up in there. The factor. 3:10:02.959 --> 3:10:06.160 You know you only gonna play on four strings. 3:10:05.480 --> 3:10:07.040 Etcetera, etcetera, etcetera. 3:10:07.440 --> 3:10:09.000 What do you think of the Mick Taylor era? 3:10:09.800 --> 3:10:11.920 That's beautiful. 3:10:12.200 --> 3:10:15.359 I can talk because I didn't work with him. Although 3:10:15.440 --> 3:10:18.600 Ronnie Wood, you know, bass player with Jeff Beck, the 3:10:18.600 --> 3:10:23.160 ship that he did with Rod Stewart unbelievable. Okay, the 3:10:23.200 --> 3:10:26.160 only problem I have with Ronnie Wood is his sound 3:10:26.240 --> 3:10:30.440 is somewhat similar to Keith's, whereas Mick Taylor was came 3:10:30.480 --> 3:10:31.840 from a completely different place. 3:10:34.200 --> 3:10:38.400 Well, Ronnie is one of these guys man. You could 3:10:38.440 --> 3:10:42.320 put anything in his hands. One time I ordered there's 3:10:42.360 --> 3:10:46.000 like an oil can dulcimer. There's like someone put a neck, 3:10:47.000 --> 3:10:50.320 a dulcimer neck on an oil can and strung it 3:10:50.400 --> 3:10:54.600 up and they brought it to the studio for me. Right, 3:10:55.800 --> 3:10:58.480 I sound like a jerk. Playing It just gonna take 3:10:58.480 --> 3:11:04.400 some time. And to Ronnie, he just made something spectacular 3:11:04.520 --> 3:11:11.320 happen almost instantly on this thing, and just found a 3:11:11.320 --> 3:11:16.680 way to be expressive. He's a super talented guy. And 3:11:18.320 --> 3:11:23.680 because he's got to share responsibilities with Keith, he's accepted 3:11:23.840 --> 3:11:27.600 somewhat of a shadow role in the Rolling Stones. But 3:11:28.600 --> 3:11:32.480 he's world class. I just remember another thing. There was this. 3:11:33.680 --> 3:11:36.000 Now there are tons of stadium shows. There weren't shows 3:11:36.080 --> 3:11:37.880 for a couple of decades. People don't know in the 3:11:37.920 --> 3:11:42.119 seventies all these stadium shows. I've already living in la 3:11:42.400 --> 3:11:48.359 and it was Fleetwood Mac with Stevie and Lindsay Loggins 3:11:48.360 --> 3:11:51.320 in the scene in the headline were the faces, okay. 3:11:52.040 --> 3:11:56.400 And that was just when rumors were seventy five, just 3:11:56.480 --> 3:11:58.560 when rumors were coming out that he was going to 3:11:58.600 --> 3:12:03.160 be the Stones guitarist. Well now it's fifty years later, 3:12:03.360 --> 3:12:07.160 he's been the Stones guitarist. You know, Brian Jone isn't 3:12:07.160 --> 3:12:09.720 even making a decade. He's like the new guy. It's 3:12:09.760 --> 3:12:10.760 a strange thing. 3:12:11.040 --> 3:12:16.760 Strangely, but when you live the phenomenon you're talking about, 3:12:17.360 --> 3:12:21.840 it's tougher for him. On songs that Mick Taylor originally played. 3:12:23.040 --> 3:12:27.440 He's better on the songs where he initiated the part, 3:12:27.520 --> 3:12:31.000 like Beast of Burden. Those are the guitar weaving that 3:12:31.200 --> 3:12:34.600 goes on. It's a different relationship Keith and Ronnie. You 3:12:34.640 --> 3:12:38.720 have a different relationship than Keith and Brian Head. I'm 3:12:38.720 --> 3:12:42.600 talking about musically, and they do this guitar weaving thing 3:12:42.720 --> 3:12:44.920 for which you do have to be like minded. You 3:12:44.920 --> 3:12:46.240 can't be one hundred and eighty right. 3:12:46.360 --> 3:12:48.600 It's like when Mick Taylor or whatever it was supposed 3:12:48.600 --> 3:12:50.240 to be the fifty at the anniversary too, I think 3:12:50.240 --> 3:12:52.440 it was the fifty first, and he would sit in 3:12:52.480 --> 3:12:54.920 for a couple of songs. Yeah, whatever he was playing 3:12:55.040 --> 3:12:57.039 was nothing like what they were playing. 3:12:57.080 --> 3:13:00.840 Yeah, yeah, yeah, Well and it was great. You know, yeah, 3:13:00.879 --> 3:13:03.680 they've been at it for a while. Well. 3:13:03.720 --> 3:13:07.440 The only other thing we know is for years we've 3:13:07.440 --> 3:13:09.600 been hearing it. I mean, you and me go under 3:13:09.640 --> 3:13:10.960 different circumstances here. 3:13:11.000 --> 3:13:13.800 You know, you gotta go. It could be the last time. 3:13:14.400 --> 3:13:17.280 Now we're getting to the point where, fuck, everybody's dying. 3:13:17.320 --> 3:13:19.280 You don't know, it could be the last time. 3:13:20.480 --> 3:13:23.160 I remember that we cut one song right over here 3:13:23.160 --> 3:13:27.600 in Hollywood. It's now called East West we're in studio too, 3:13:27.720 --> 3:13:30.600 and it was meant to be the last song on 3:13:31.400 --> 3:13:34.960 for Just a Babylon Well, how can I stop? It 3:13:35.040 --> 3:13:38.119 was one of Keith's songs and we were all set 3:13:38.200 --> 3:13:40.520 up in a circle and there were other people playing. 3:13:40.600 --> 3:13:44.680 Jim Keltner was there with Charlie and Wayne Shorter is 3:13:44.720 --> 3:13:49.039 playing on it. Blondie Chaplin was playing the grand piano. 3:13:50.360 --> 3:13:53.480 Keith was singing live, the backgrounds were live. I was 3:13:53.520 --> 3:14:01.000 playing a Wurlitzer piano and at the end of the song, Charlie, 3:14:01.040 --> 3:14:03.760 who had a car waiting in the alley, It's like 3:14:03.800 --> 3:14:05.879 five in the morning. He had a flight back to 3:14:05.959 --> 3:14:10.280 London that day. Charlie hits this flourish on the symbols. 3:14:10.320 --> 3:14:12.560 When the song was done, then it goes into the 3:14:12.720 --> 3:14:15.680 whole other thing. It's like Wayne's playing soprano sacks. It 3:14:15.760 --> 3:14:19.320 sounds like it's Coltrane, sounds like Love Supreme, kind of right, 3:14:19.959 --> 3:14:22.920 this whole other thing. And as we were doing it, 3:14:22.959 --> 3:14:25.920 I started crying because I thought, Oh my god, this 3:14:26.000 --> 3:14:28.520 is this is the last song the Stones are ever 3:14:28.560 --> 3:14:32.000 gonna cut. This is their coda. What a spectacular way 3:14:32.120 --> 3:14:34.480 to take it out. It's the last song. I'm Bridges 3:14:34.480 --> 3:14:36.480 to Babylon. Check it out and check out the end. 3:14:36.520 --> 3:14:39.400 Ding and Charlie. We finished, Charlie got in the car 3:14:39.520 --> 3:14:42.560 drove off. I thought, wow, I was there for the 3:14:42.680 --> 3:14:44.440 last session of the Stones. 3:14:45.120 --> 3:14:49.000 Well, since you're talking the Bridges to Babylon, my favorite 3:14:49.080 --> 3:14:52.519 song on that track is not unknown, not that it 3:14:52.560 --> 3:14:54.280 was a huge hit, sane of. 3:14:54.400 --> 3:14:56.199 Me, Oh, you never mixed saying to me, yeah. 3:14:57.000 --> 3:15:00.240 Yeah, it's just got to feel that it's just great. 3:15:00.520 --> 3:15:03.840 Yeah, it's a cool track. Yeah, yeah, they're good moments. 3:15:04.280 --> 3:15:05.039 There are great. 3:15:04.840 --> 3:15:10.080 Moments on all all those records. I think that it's 3:15:10.080 --> 3:15:12.360 a it's a tough thing to live up to. Man. 3:15:12.440 --> 3:15:17.520 You know, when when when people have so much of 3:15:17.560 --> 3:15:26.039 their own personal memories intertwined with certain music, it takes 3:15:26.440 --> 3:15:29.360 twenty It's only now are people starting to tell me 3:15:30.000 --> 3:15:34.480 how good Voodoo Lounge is. It takes it takes decades 3:15:34.680 --> 3:15:39.880 to attach your own sensory triggers to these songs and 3:15:40.440 --> 3:15:43.440 then it becomes something special. But to have to compete 3:15:43.520 --> 3:15:48.560 with with, you know, like memories of you make it 3:15:48.600 --> 3:15:50.000 out in the car in high school. 3:15:50.000 --> 3:15:52.760 Man, you know how the interesting thing not at this level, 3:15:52.800 --> 3:15:57.400 but Todd Rungren, who's really incredibly successful. He goes on 3:15:57.440 --> 3:16:00.680 the road, no matter how much he till people, I'm 3:16:00.680 --> 3:16:02.080 gonna do my electronic stuff. 3:16:02.120 --> 3:16:02.600 They come. 3:16:02.920 --> 3:16:04.800 They want to hear the hits. They want to hear 3:16:04.840 --> 3:16:07.480 more than Hello, it's me, and they can't believe it. 3:16:07.520 --> 3:16:10.520 I give them credit for doing it, but it's got 3:16:10.520 --> 3:16:11.040 to be tough. 3:16:14.120 --> 3:16:16.160 You just do it because that's what you do. Man. 3:16:16.280 --> 3:16:18.480 Musicians play, you just want to play. I think it's 3:16:18.800 --> 3:16:20.400 it's really most of the. 3:16:20.200 --> 3:16:24.080 People from our era, not the ones on the oldies tours, 3:16:24.560 --> 3:16:29.400 who can sell out areenas whatever they've sailed far beyond that, 3:16:30.480 --> 3:16:34.480 because a it is about the money, because they have 3:16:34.600 --> 3:16:37.480 lifestyles that they you know, they're not keeping every one 3:16:37.520 --> 3:16:40.120 of these dollars. And then the other thing is they 3:16:40.120 --> 3:16:44.720 need the adulation, and many will not take that risk. 3:16:45.000 --> 3:16:50.240 Well, the people I know, Bob Dylan stones, that's not 3:16:50.280 --> 3:16:53.160 what they don't need the bread, They don't really need 3:16:53.160 --> 3:16:56.600 the adulation. It's what you do, man, Dylan. 3:16:56.920 --> 3:17:01.520 Dylan wrote the fucking book. I mean you look at 3:17:01.520 --> 3:17:05.240 the Beatles. They didn't do any endorsements whatever, which influencer, 3:17:05.480 --> 3:17:08.119 but they didn't really know what they were doing. Bob 3:17:08.240 --> 3:17:12.160 Dylan was conscious of all this stuff that he was doing. 3:17:12.640 --> 3:17:15.720 And then you know, you remember Self Portrait came out 3:17:16.120 --> 3:17:18.560 first of his records to get negative reviews. That came 3:17:18.560 --> 3:17:21.520 out in June, comes out with New Morning in October, 3:17:22.000 --> 3:17:25.880 and it's phenomenal. Okay, and there's some recor. I mean, 3:17:25.959 --> 3:17:31.360 now you just never know. Listen. He gets number one 3:17:31.440 --> 3:17:35.400 credit in my book because he's doing it his way 3:17:35.879 --> 3:17:39.200 on stage. Yeah, okay, I have seen it. I will 3:17:39.240 --> 3:17:42.680 be honest with you. Not always eager to see it. 3:17:42.760 --> 3:17:45.440 Somebody says friend of mine's the agent, but whatever, but 3:17:45.600 --> 3:17:48.680 he's making it interesting for himself. Otherwise, how can you 3:17:48.760 --> 3:17:49.000 do it? 3:17:49.240 --> 3:17:52.520 You can't. He has an adventure every night if you 3:17:52.640 --> 3:17:55.640 listen closely, because I follow him on YouTube and Minched, 3:17:55.959 --> 3:18:00.920 I watch all the shows. Man, he's he digs in real, 3:18:01.080 --> 3:18:04.200 he doesn't throw away syllables. He's a great singer, and 3:18:04.240 --> 3:18:08.720 he's really he's not walking through it. He's really trying 3:18:08.800 --> 3:18:12.320 to interpret the songs and do it fresh every night. 3:18:12.600 --> 3:18:14.199 Bob Wear does the same thing. 3:18:14.600 --> 3:18:19.200 But Bob weare that's the roots. Yeah yeah, But with Dylan, 3:18:19.879 --> 3:18:22.199 as I say, I agree with everything you said here. 3:18:22.120 --> 3:18:26.039 Him with Barbi straisand I haven't heard yet it's fucking great, 3:18:26.440 --> 3:18:31.959 and he sounds awesome, and he cuts closer to the 3:18:32.040 --> 3:18:37.039 emotional core of that song than just about anybody, and 3:18:37.080 --> 3:18:41.320 he does it without historyonics, without showing off. He does 3:18:41.320 --> 3:18:44.920 it through understatement. It's a brilliant reading of that song. 3:18:44.959 --> 3:18:46.640 And he sounds wonderful too. 3:18:47.920 --> 3:18:49.880 I mean, I could talk about so many Dylan things, 3:18:49.879 --> 3:18:52.120 but you talk about the go to tracks. This is 3:18:52.160 --> 3:18:54.800 not number one, but it's in the top five. I 3:18:55.040 --> 3:19:00.360 and I from Infidels. You know, I literally can picture 3:19:00.400 --> 3:19:03.640 of place when the song wasn't even out yet. Is 3:19:03.800 --> 3:19:08.760 it just resonates. It's just so incredible. 3:19:09.040 --> 3:19:09.240 You know. 3:19:09.320 --> 3:19:11.520 The other thing about DM, I remember he was he 3:19:11.640 --> 3:19:14.520 was hyping some album he works too, and he was 3:19:14.520 --> 3:19:16.360 in he said, you know, they talked about the earlier records, 3:19:16.360 --> 3:19:20.039 goes can't do that anymore. And then you get old 3:19:20.120 --> 3:19:22.440 enough you realize it's not that you lose something. 3:19:22.440 --> 3:19:27.200 You have to get to the next thing. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. 3:19:27.640 --> 3:19:34.120 I think he's been as consistently great over a sixty 3:19:34.520 --> 3:19:38.160 seventy sixty year period as anybody. 3:19:38.280 --> 3:19:40.800 So if you want to compare him with somebody, absolutely well, 3:19:40.840 --> 3:19:44.160 he's the only person who's making different records as time 3:19:44.200 --> 3:19:47.360 goes by everybody else if they're making them. I mean, 3:19:49.080 --> 3:19:51.600 it's like the movie. I had a problem with the 3:19:51.640 --> 3:19:55.480 movie because A it was not always accurate and B 3:19:55.640 --> 3:20:03.199 it's hot giography. The guy is fucking from Hibbing, Minnesota 3:20:03.520 --> 3:20:08.080 comes to New York. People have no idea how hard 3:20:08.120 --> 3:20:12.320 it is to make it, no idea sticking to his 3:20:12.400 --> 3:20:14.760 vision and any of the other thing, you know, no 3:20:14.800 --> 3:20:17.840 matter what budgets were. Then he got these records fast, 3:20:18.840 --> 3:20:22.440 but he knew what he was doing and nobody else did. 3:20:23.400 --> 3:20:28.360 Yeah. True. Well, you know, one time I asked him 3:20:28.720 --> 3:20:32.119 how come you can write Gates of Eden and I can't, which, 3:20:32.879 --> 3:20:36.240 actually it's a line in the movie, right everyone wants 3:20:36.640 --> 3:20:40.440 but I was unaware. This is probably nineteen ninety or 3:20:40.480 --> 3:20:43.400 something like that, and he said, well, look, man, if 3:20:43.400 --> 3:20:46.480 it makes you feel any better, I didn't actually write it, 3:20:46.560 --> 3:20:49.400 he said, I remember moving the pencil of old Age, 3:20:49.480 --> 3:20:53.959 but it came from without. And at the time I 3:20:53.959 --> 3:20:55.760 thought I was very sweet of him. He's just trying 3:20:55.760 --> 3:20:59.560 to make me feel better about this. Then I started 3:20:59.600 --> 3:21:02.039 hearing the same You're in the same thing, Keith Richards. 3:21:02.280 --> 3:21:05.240 He's riches, by the way, in a session he didn't say, uh, 3:21:05.440 --> 3:21:07.320 hold a hold, I got an idea. He says, hold 3:21:07.320 --> 3:21:13.680 a whole incoming income or or Willie or Chris and 3:21:14.320 --> 3:21:17.760 any writer's work this on Brian Wilson, I'll tell you 3:21:17.800 --> 3:21:19.360 the same thing. I don't know where it came from 3:21:19.440 --> 3:21:22.039 him through me and Okay. 3:21:21.840 --> 3:21:24.360 I don't want to compare myself to those people. But 3:21:24.480 --> 3:21:26.760 when done right, you are channeling. 3:21:27.040 --> 3:21:27.840 Yeah. 3:21:27.879 --> 3:21:31.839 And the worst thing is when you realize you're channeling. 3:21:31.480 --> 3:21:32.360 And then it goes left. 3:21:32.440 --> 3:21:36.560 Oh yeah, yeah, it's like you're just so there's always 3:21:36.560 --> 3:21:40.520 an inspiration and motivation, but it comes out. I mean, 3:21:40.640 --> 3:21:43.400 I have my tricks. One I won't mention, the other 3:21:43.440 --> 3:21:46.000 one to take a shower. It's like you have no 3:21:46.240 --> 3:21:48.760 idea what will come to try to get you in 3:21:48.879 --> 3:21:49.680 the zone. 3:21:49.600 --> 3:21:54.960 Yeah, but it's hard, man. You don't you don't control it. 3:21:55.040 --> 3:21:57.760 You know. It's like surfing. You can you can learn 3:21:57.800 --> 3:21:59.480 how to stay up on the board, but you don't 3:21:59.480 --> 3:22:03.000 control the fucking ocean. Man. You know, it's like the ocean. 3:22:03.080 --> 3:22:06.360 You're gonna get the waves you get and you can't 3:22:06.480 --> 3:22:09.040 make him bigger. You can't change him. Okay. 3:22:09.080 --> 3:22:11.879 One of my favorite stories, al Cooper is not doing 3:22:11.920 --> 3:22:15.480 great now, good friend of mine. He's getting inducted. 3:22:15.080 --> 3:22:16.080 To the Rock Walk. 3:22:16.240 --> 3:22:19.880 You know whatever the guitar said, I'm talking to him backstage. 3:22:20.200 --> 3:22:22.880 I guess he was telling the story of Sweet Home Alabama, 3:22:23.440 --> 3:22:26.080 how the first album Leonard Skinnard had just come out 3:22:26.840 --> 3:22:29.120 and he got a call from Ronnie van Zen, like 3:22:29.360 --> 3:22:31.600 very shortly thereafter, I got a new song got to 3:22:31.680 --> 3:22:34.920 come up. And that was on a Friday. They came 3:22:35.000 --> 3:22:38.119 in and they cut it on Monday. Sweet Home Alabama 3:22:38.520 --> 3:22:40.480 did not come out for a year. 3:22:41.320 --> 3:22:45.240 Okay, I said, al did you know he goes it 3:22:45.400 --> 3:22:52.240 was Sweet Home Alabama. 3:22:52.680 --> 3:22:56.840 You know it's like that thing. Yeah, you know when 3:22:56.879 --> 3:23:00.959 you know when people I mean yeah, things can be 3:23:01.120 --> 3:23:04.040 hits not hits. It's like we connected in your movie. 3:23:04.040 --> 3:23:06.400 You made a big bit about till I Die off 3:23:06.480 --> 3:23:10.039 surfs Up, which I never heard anybody talk about whatever's 3:23:10.080 --> 3:23:13.000 in that record, and whenever read, you know, they don't 3:23:13.040 --> 3:23:15.240 have to play it on the radio every twenty minutes, 3:23:15.280 --> 3:23:18.800 et cetera. And when you do something like that, you 3:23:19.200 --> 3:23:23.279 absolutely know. The only thing I'm interested in is people. 3:23:24.440 --> 3:23:26.640 I mean, I know all these people, but I haven't 3:23:26.680 --> 3:23:32.040 gotten this discussion. The Eagles, who work very slowly put 3:23:32.480 --> 3:23:36.560 put things together. But some of the lines of you know, 3:23:36.640 --> 3:23:38.440 wasted time. You know, you can go on with your 3:23:38.480 --> 3:23:40.560 life and I can go on with mine, and maybe 3:23:40.600 --> 3:23:43.320 someday we will find it wasn't just wasted time. If 3:23:43.360 --> 3:23:46.760 you work that slowly, how you can mean it? Because 3:23:46.800 --> 3:23:49.440 all you're talking about the flash of brilliance. One day 3:23:49.480 --> 3:23:52.760 I got you know, Gates even came out complete and 3:23:53.040 --> 3:23:55.840 I just don't know. I mean, he's steely. Dan's another 3:23:55.840 --> 3:24:00.760 one works slow. How do they maintain because people are hacks, 3:24:01.120 --> 3:24:02.879 they've never been there, so they don't get it. 3:24:03.520 --> 3:24:05.760 Well, how about I'll go step further. How about Bob 3:24:06.040 --> 3:24:10.440 still rewrites his lyrics. We were with Weird we do 3:24:10.720 --> 3:24:15.200 when I paint my masterpiece right, and Bob Dylan must 3:24:15.200 --> 3:24:18.200 have heard it, and he said, tell Bob we are 3:24:18.200 --> 3:24:23.240 he's singing the wrong lyrics. What do you mean? He said, no, 3:24:23.320 --> 3:24:25.720 I changed him and he and he and he typed 3:24:25.760 --> 3:24:27.720 him out for me to give to the Weird to 3:24:27.760 --> 3:24:31.760 sing And okay, this is, you know, on an amateur level, 3:24:32.000 --> 3:24:33.880 but starting I think it was a seventy four. 3:24:33.920 --> 3:24:37.080 He put out a big lyric book. Okay, yeah, the 3:24:37.160 --> 3:24:39.080 lyrics are not the same as they are on the record. 3:24:39.320 --> 3:24:42.360 If you on the website now, they're not necessarily the same. 3:24:42.400 --> 3:24:43.959 I don't know if you continue sin, but they're not 3:24:44.000 --> 3:24:45.280 the same as they are on the record. 3:24:45.280 --> 3:24:50.280 He's updating constantly, so yes, it might have come from 3:24:50.920 --> 3:24:54.959 a flash in the moment, but he's still refining it. Well. 3:24:54.959 --> 3:24:58.039 It's interesting because Joni Mitchell has no time for him, 3:24:59.200 --> 3:25:02.800 and she's pretty crazy, but when she was at her peak, 3:25:03.560 --> 3:25:06.080 as good as any of them. 3:25:06.400 --> 3:25:12.400 Yeah, I don't know what Joni's issues, but he's he's 3:25:12.440 --> 3:25:14.800 a superhero as far as i'm Yeah, but you know, 3:25:16.959 --> 3:25:18.599 you don't want to be these people. 3:25:20.280 --> 3:25:24.040 Because you can't go anywhere. I mean, he could talk 3:25:24.080 --> 3:25:28.000 to you. There's a lot of So are you ever starstruck? 3:25:29.200 --> 3:25:35.879 Yeah? Sure, I try. If I'm working with someone, I 3:25:35.959 --> 3:25:39.320 try to be professional. There's no place for that. That's 3:25:39.360 --> 3:25:47.879 not why you're there. But yeah, always, I'm always starting. 3:25:49.600 --> 3:25:51.520 It'll be, it'll be. It looks like you're talking about 3:25:51.560 --> 3:25:55.039 it's a flash. I'll be sitting in the control room 3:25:55.080 --> 3:25:58.000 and I go, oh my god, that's wait short, Oh 3:25:58.040 --> 3:26:01.880 my god. Last week iding with bron Carter. Bron Carter 3:26:01.959 --> 3:26:04.440 is a lifetime here. It comes from Detroit, grew up 3:26:04.440 --> 3:26:06.119 about a mile and a half from where I did. 3:26:07.200 --> 3:26:09.480 He's fifteen years older than me, but so when I 3:26:09.520 --> 3:26:12.120 was a teenager, he was making what I still considered 3:26:12.160 --> 3:26:14.720 to be the greatest records ever made. Which of those 3:26:15.080 --> 3:26:21.320 Miles Davis Quintet records from esp through Miles in the Sky, 3:26:21.800 --> 3:26:26.879 you know, than that era. And I couldn't believe I 3:26:26.920 --> 3:26:30.600 was watching him play bass, you know, you know, a 3:26:30.680 --> 3:26:35.119 couple of feet away in the studio this last week recording. 3:26:35.440 --> 3:26:38.360 I've had those moments, and I know exactly what you're 3:26:38.400 --> 3:26:42.959 talking about. I'm talking about a slightly different moment, somewhat 3:26:43.040 --> 3:26:47.480 similar to your initial Brian Wilson thing where you're so 3:26:47.920 --> 3:26:52.480 starstruck either you can't say anything or you can't shut 3:26:52.560 --> 3:26:53.959 up as you're saying. 3:26:53.680 --> 3:27:00.199 Oh, yeah, it happens. I mean the other thing. 3:27:00.680 --> 3:27:04.840 You know, people say most of these people are tortured, okay, 3:27:05.720 --> 3:27:08.080 ian most don't live up to who you want them 3:27:08.080 --> 3:27:10.080 to be. But then they're occasionally people to do like 3:27:10.600 --> 3:27:14.480 Steven Tyler. I say, no, he's that guy. He lives 3:27:14.560 --> 3:27:18.320 up to the rep So I guess, you know, going 3:27:18.360 --> 3:27:24.240 back to our earlier conversation, these people they were not entertainment. 3:27:25.400 --> 3:27:29.080 They were then they were not only successful, what they 3:27:29.080 --> 3:27:32.680 were saying was so important. Even some of the penumbra. 3:27:33.520 --> 3:27:36.480 Remember when you you you lived a slightly different world. 3:27:37.000 --> 3:27:41.960 The Beatles were on drugs. No Beatles aren't taking drugs. 3:27:43.200 --> 3:27:49.400 And then you know it's legitimized. Everybody's taking drugs. You 3:27:49.440 --> 3:27:52.119 know you got the messages. Okay, don enough of your time, 3:27:52.640 --> 3:27:56.040 Thanks so much for doing this until next time. 3:27:56.160 --> 3:28:19.120 This is Bob Left, says sh