WEBVTT - Joe Grushecky 0:00:08.600 --> 0:00:12.480 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Lefts That's Podcast. 0:00:13.000 --> 0:00:16.599 My guest today is Job Brusheky So Joe, how do 0:00:16.640 --> 0:00:17.800 you know Brewce Springsteen. 0:00:19.079 --> 0:00:22.920 Well, back in the day nineteen eighty we did a 0:00:22.960 --> 0:00:25.120 record called Have a Good Time to Get Out Alive 0:00:26.040 --> 0:00:30.080 that Steve van Zant was participating in for a while. 0:00:30.120 --> 0:00:33.760 He was doing some production work. Stephen was really good 0:00:33.840 --> 0:00:38.440 friends with Steve Popovich, who was the president CEO of 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:44.240 Cleveland Entertainment Cleveland International. They had Meatloaf. We were rehearsing 0:00:44.280 --> 0:00:49.280 in SR Studios in New York City to record the 0:00:49.320 --> 0:00:55.600 album Media Sound and Steve pop Which brought Steve van 0:00:55.720 --> 0:01:01.000 Zant to the rehearsals and eventually into studio and produced 0:01:01.000 --> 0:01:06.560 some tracks on that particular record. And after the initial 0:01:06.600 --> 0:01:10.800 tracks were finished, we took a break and Mick Ronson 0:01:10.880 --> 0:01:14.760 was also working on that record and went home to 0:01:14.800 --> 0:01:16.919 Pittsburgh for a while, came back to New York City 0:01:17.040 --> 0:01:21.360 and Mick was working with Meatloaf to do the follow 0:01:21.440 --> 0:01:23.160 up to Bat Out of Hell. And he invited me 0:01:23.280 --> 0:01:26.360 down to the power station one night and in the 0:01:26.440 --> 0:01:29.680 next room one of the studios a I think the 0:01:30.400 --> 0:01:36.319 Mick Ronson and Meeto for studio b Steve and Bruce 0:01:36.480 --> 0:01:39.280 z Vansant and Bruce were working on the River and 0:01:39.440 --> 0:01:44.040 just happened to run into him and were introduced, and 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:49.840 Bruce became a fan of that particular record, and we 0:01:50.200 --> 0:01:53.680 hooked up one night in Big Man's Claire's Clements Club, 0:01:53.920 --> 0:01:56.840 Red Bank, New Jersey, and hung out for most of 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:00.720 the evening and just hit it off, became friends, and 0:02:01.840 --> 0:02:06.120 basically that's how we met. But we played New Jersey 0:02:06.120 --> 0:02:09.400 a lot, and some of Bruce's crew and you know 0:02:10.000 --> 0:02:11.800 people who work for him, It comes to his play 0:02:11.800 --> 0:02:12.400 all the time. 0:02:13.320 --> 0:02:16.440 So since you know him personally, what does the average 0:02:16.480 --> 0:02:18.760 person or the media and not know about Bruce? 0:02:20.320 --> 0:02:20.440 Uh? 0:02:22.000 --> 0:02:25.840 He's very kind, he's funny, he's hilarious. He could be 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:28.920 a stand up comic. If he decides this rock and 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:30.480 roll thing's not going to work out. 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:34.960 Okay, you end up writing songs with him? How does 0:02:34.960 --> 0:02:35.519 that happen? 0:02:38.320 --> 0:02:42.840 Well, the first record we did together was called American 0:02:42.919 --> 0:02:47.320 Babylon and I had He invited me out to Los Angeles. 0:02:47.360 --> 0:02:50.440 I played him a couple of songs he really liked. 0:02:51.080 --> 0:02:53.600 At the end of the session, he asked me what 0:02:53.720 --> 0:02:56.080 else I had I played him a few more songs. 0:02:56.120 --> 0:03:00.320 They weren't very good. He said, you gotta write better 0:03:00.440 --> 0:03:03.000 songs than that, and I agreed with him. I didn't 0:03:03.040 --> 0:03:06.040 have a really good batch of songs at that particular moment. 0:03:06.800 --> 0:03:09.920 So when I came back to Pittsburgh, I had a 0:03:10.000 --> 0:03:15.600 determination to write better, better, better music. And uh so 0:03:15.680 --> 0:03:18.000 I came up with a set of lyrics for a 0:03:18.080 --> 0:03:22.640 song called Homestead, which is uh the uh, you know, 0:03:22.720 --> 0:03:27.720 the quintin central Pittsburgh steel mill town that I had 0:03:27.760 --> 0:03:30.399 known all the guys who worked in the union there 0:03:30.400 --> 0:03:33.600 and we had helped set up food banks, et cetera 0:03:33.919 --> 0:03:37.960 over the years. And so the next time Bruce and 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:40.560 I got together to finish those particular songs we were 0:03:40.600 --> 0:03:42.880 working on in Los Angeles was in New York City, 0:03:43.440 --> 0:03:48.680 and just on you know, on a whim or you know, 0:03:48.760 --> 0:03:50.880 built my courage and gave him a set of lyrics. 0:03:51.040 --> 0:03:55.240 He liked it. So we wrote Homestead together. Then we 0:03:55.320 --> 0:04:00.800 wrote Dark and Bloody Ground together. As for my je accident, 0:04:01.600 --> 0:04:05.600 we started working a bit on you know, something that 0:04:05.640 --> 0:04:08.000 we hoped that was going to be a Bruce Springsteen 0:04:08.080 --> 0:04:11.080 project for a while, and did a bunch of other 0:04:11.120 --> 0:04:14.160 co writes the ones that come out just recently. 0:04:15.400 --> 0:04:19.920 Okay, So you're sitting in Pittsburgh and Bruce calls you 0:04:19.960 --> 0:04:22.600 and says, come out to LA. I mean, tell me 0:04:22.640 --> 0:04:23.680 a little bit more about that. 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:25.360 Uh. 0:04:25.440 --> 0:04:32.280 Well, I was at the uh A trough in my career. 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:37.000 I wasn't doing that great and my wife Leanne mentioned 0:04:37.080 --> 0:04:39.120 she said, you know, you're pretty good friends with Bruce. 0:04:39.160 --> 0:04:42.920 Why don't you give him a call and ask him 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:46.520 if he'd consider playing on one of your records. So 0:04:46.560 --> 0:04:52.640 I was doing a weekday gig at a singles club, 0:04:53.480 --> 0:04:55.520 which is something I rarely do, but I was doing 0:04:55.560 --> 0:04:59.200 a single solo show acoustic. 0:05:00.040 --> 0:05:00.200 Yeah. 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.360 It was one of those gays where nobody was particular 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:05.160 and interested in what I had to sing, you know. 0:05:05.520 --> 0:05:07.560 And you know, so I'm up. 0:05:07.520 --> 0:05:13.880 There playing away and re evaluating my career choices and 0:05:14.800 --> 0:05:17.520 during the break my sonme and Brian Coleman. He comes 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:19.320 over and says, hey, you better call home right away. 0:05:19.400 --> 0:05:21.719 In the end, just call it. So this is the 0:05:21.800 --> 0:05:25.760 days before cell phones. So I went back into the 0:05:25.839 --> 0:05:29.880 kitchen and you know, the kitchen help was banging pots 0:05:29.920 --> 0:05:31.880 and pans. It was a restaurant and there was a 0:05:31.920 --> 0:05:33.520 lot of noise. I asked him to keep it down 0:05:33.560 --> 0:05:36.440 a bit, and I call it home. She said, Bruce 0:05:36.560 --> 0:05:38.960 just called and he wants you to give him a bus. 0:05:39.080 --> 0:05:41.640 I called. Bruce was out in Los Angeles in those days, 0:05:42.040 --> 0:05:43.880 and he invited me out to work on a song. 0:05:44.000 --> 0:05:47.960 So you know, I had to actually borrow money from 0:05:47.960 --> 0:05:50.640 my mom and dad to get plane ticket and went 0:05:50.680 --> 0:05:54.040 to Los Angeles and worked on chain smoking and never 0:05:54.080 --> 0:05:56.320 be enough time to forget about you. 0:05:58.000 --> 0:05:59.800 So you go to LA you stay at his house? 0:06:00.760 --> 0:06:01.440 Yes, I did? 0:06:01.839 --> 0:06:03.040 And how long did you stay? 0:06:04.839 --> 0:06:07.919 The first time? Couple of days, three or four days? Maybe, 0:06:09.080 --> 0:06:11.520 second time, same thing. And then and then I went 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:14.960 to hung out with him in New Jersey for a while, 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:17.800 and then we just got you know, we just hit 0:06:17.839 --> 0:06:22.159 it off. We had a nice easy wrapoor for writing 0:06:23.160 --> 0:06:30.320 and just started working together a lot back in mid 0:06:30.320 --> 0:06:31.520 to late nineties. 0:06:33.000 --> 0:06:36.680 Okay, if your wife hadn't pushed you, are you the 0:06:36.760 --> 0:06:38.919 type of guy who would have reached out to the boss. 0:06:39.880 --> 0:06:44.080 Probably not, No, No, I probably would not have. 0:06:45.440 --> 0:06:50.119 Okay, so you're talking about the material you written being 0:06:50.160 --> 0:06:55.560 on this extravaganza that Bruce recently released, right, So did 0:06:55.560 --> 0:06:58.400 you think those songs would never see the light of day. 0:06:59.000 --> 0:07:01.920 Well, it took a while. It took a while for 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:06.000 him to get here, I'll say that, but uh, you know, 0:07:06.160 --> 0:07:09.520 I'm more than happy they're out now, more than happy 0:07:09.520 --> 0:07:12.280 they're out period. But yeah, yeah, I am happy there 0:07:12.360 --> 0:07:17.520 they're out. I think they're really good representative examples of 0:07:17.560 --> 0:07:18.920 what we were doing in those days. 0:07:19.880 --> 0:07:22.480 So you wrote a number of songs, I mean, Elton 0:07:22.600 --> 0:07:25.320 John you know they call it two rooms. Bernie wrote 0:07:25.320 --> 0:07:29.360 the lyrics and Elton wrote the melodies the changes. How 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:31.080 did you and Bruce do it? You talked to that 0:07:31.240 --> 0:07:33.520 you gave him the lyrics for one time. Is that 0:07:33.560 --> 0:07:35.560 how you normally did or you'd sit in the same room. 0:07:36.560 --> 0:07:36.680 Uh? 0:07:38.680 --> 0:07:38.960 Both. 0:07:40.200 --> 0:07:44.120 Sometimes I gave him the lyrics, sometimes I sent them 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:48.960 the lyrics, and sometimes we wrote face to face. But basically, 0:07:49.840 --> 0:07:51.440 you know, I did most of the lyrics that he 0:07:51.520 --> 0:07:56.120 contributed some. He did almost all the music. I contributed 0:07:56.200 --> 0:07:58.040 bits and pieces along the way. 0:07:58.920 --> 0:08:01.920 So how do you feel, I mean, you emailed me 0:08:02.000 --> 0:08:04.680 that you had some songs on the new project, But 0:08:04.800 --> 0:08:06.720 how do you feel when people talk to you and 0:08:06.760 --> 0:08:08.600 they just want to talk about Springsteen? 0:08:10.000 --> 0:08:12.800 Well, you know that's part of you cast a large 0:08:12.800 --> 0:08:17.200 shadow if you want to work with him, and you know, 0:08:17.280 --> 0:08:20.480 so it was just part of the partner procedure. But 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:24.280 I'm confident enough in my own abilities that you know, 0:08:24.280 --> 0:08:25.640 I'm not intimidated by it. 0:08:26.480 --> 0:08:29.480 Well, needless to say, although you had major label records 0:08:29.480 --> 0:08:35.200 on MCA, you and the House Rockers did not reach ubiquity. 0:08:35.800 --> 0:08:39.000 But no, we did not when you were working with Springsteen. 0:08:39.520 --> 0:08:41.679 Did you feel this was my break? This is going 0:08:41.760 --> 0:08:42.160 to happen? 0:08:43.200 --> 0:08:45.439 Well, you know every record I do, I feel this 0:08:45.480 --> 0:08:47.880 is my break. This is going to happen. Of course, 0:08:47.880 --> 0:08:50.800 if Bruce said a little bit more exposure, maybe more 0:08:50.840 --> 0:08:53.280 people want to hear what he's up to, what you know, 0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:58.880 why he picked me to work with So you know, yeah, 0:08:58.880 --> 0:09:02.160 I'm always hoping to for that one song that you know, 0:09:02.240 --> 0:09:04.559 Chris Fiel Easy Street like everybody else. 0:09:05.760 --> 0:09:08.000 Okay, he has played live with you a number of 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:09.960 times too. 0:09:09.840 --> 0:09:12.560 Yes, over fifty times we're played together. 0:09:13.679 --> 0:09:14.640 And what is that like? 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:18.760 Well, it's like, you know, you got a baseball team 0:09:18.800 --> 0:09:21.079 and you got Mickey Manno playing a center field, or 0:09:21.080 --> 0:09:23.680 Willie Mays, or you got a football team you got 0:09:23.760 --> 0:09:27.679 Joe Montana sitting in a quarterback. So you know, he's 0:09:27.720 --> 0:09:32.160 a great musician and it automatically elevates what you're doing. 0:09:33.360 --> 0:09:35.800 You talked about your wife saying to call the boss. 0:09:35.840 --> 0:09:37.280 How many times have you been married? 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:39.200 Twice? 0:09:40.360 --> 0:09:42.320 And how long each time? 0:09:43.040 --> 0:09:46.160 The first time was about five years and we're over 0:09:46.240 --> 0:09:47.160 thirty on this one. 0:09:48.160 --> 0:09:52.480 Okay, to what degree did being a musician affect your 0:09:52.640 --> 0:09:57.079 first relationship and how is being a musician affected your 0:09:57.160 --> 0:09:58.680 second marriage? 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:03.920 Well, the first my first wife was very wonderful girl, 0:10:04.120 --> 0:10:10.600 very smart, very intelligent, just just wasn't into the music thing. 0:10:10.679 --> 0:10:15.040 So that was a factor and a splitting And my 0:10:15.120 --> 0:10:18.200 current wife is you know, she's been there through thick 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:22.120 and thin thirty years on in and as you know, 0:10:22.160 --> 0:10:24.800 if I'm talking to multiple musicians, you know it's not 0:10:24.880 --> 0:10:25.880 an easy thing to do. 0:10:27.080 --> 0:10:29.599 So how did you meet your president mine? 0:10:30.960 --> 0:10:33.120 I met her at a job. I was playing guitar 0:10:33.200 --> 0:10:35.880 and she grew up said hello, and she's one of 0:10:35.920 --> 0:10:36.560 those things. 0:10:37.000 --> 0:10:41.560 You know. Here we go, and do you have kids? 0:10:42.480 --> 0:10:47.000 I have two children. I have a daughter, Desiree and 0:10:47.040 --> 0:10:51.319 my son Johnny, who's current band member and producer of 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:53.239 my last several records. 0:10:54.360 --> 0:10:55.720 And what is your daughter up to? 0:10:57.080 --> 0:10:59.480 She works for P and C Bank, she's in the 0:10:59.559 --> 0:11:00.319 corporate world. 0:11:02.000 --> 0:11:06.440 Okay, So how did you decide to become a musician. 0:11:09.760 --> 0:11:14.240 Well, pretty much, my family was musical. My father was 0:11:14.280 --> 0:11:19.040 a musician. We were coal miners. Both sides of my 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:24.120 family were coal miners. Yeah, but dad's family especially was 0:11:24.320 --> 0:11:29.599 very poor and music was just his passion and he 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:33.320 played could play just about any instrument you put in 0:11:33.360 --> 0:11:37.440 front of him, and he was pretty serious at it. 0:11:37.679 --> 0:11:40.880 Before World War Two he had a band called the 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:46.120 Happy Serenaders, who you know, would play on AM radio 0:11:46.720 --> 0:11:50.120 live in those days as they did all around one microphone. 0:11:50.679 --> 0:11:53.080 So I grew up in a house full of music, 0:11:54.480 --> 0:11:59.280 everything from old time country, western to swing to polka's 0:11:59.320 --> 0:12:06.080 to ethnic music. My mother was in a Tamba rits 0:12:06.080 --> 0:12:09.960 in groups, which is an ethnic group here in Pittsburgh. 0:12:10.280 --> 0:12:13.200 Wait, wait, tell me what was the name of what 0:12:13.200 --> 0:12:14.000 what kind of music? 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:17.400 It was called the Tamba Ritson's. Uh, there's a huge 0:12:17.480 --> 0:12:22.320 Tamba Ritson's organization that plays out at Duquine University. But 0:12:22.400 --> 0:12:32.800 this was local, local ethnic music. Played a Serbian, Russian, Ukrainian, Lithuanian, 0:12:33.960 --> 0:12:40.720 Slovenian folk songs and dances. So she did that and 0:12:40.800 --> 0:12:42.880 she also had a beautiful voice as she sang. 0:12:43.080 --> 0:12:43.200 Uh. 0:12:43.720 --> 0:12:45.839 You know that she sang the standards of the day 0:12:45.880 --> 0:12:48.640 around the house all the time. So there was music 0:12:48.679 --> 0:12:51.679 going all the time. That that was, you know, their 0:12:51.760 --> 0:12:55.920 form of entertainment. Uh. I can remember my mother washing 0:12:56.000 --> 0:12:58.760 clothes and my dad sitting on a sellar steps playing 0:12:58.760 --> 0:13:01.720 guitar and my mother sang on it. And then I 0:13:01.760 --> 0:13:04.880 had an uncle who was, you know, more of a 0:13:04.920 --> 0:13:08.120 Fonsie type with the slick back hair, and you know, 0:13:08.200 --> 0:13:11.600 he was into uh rock and roll, and at a 0:13:11.679 --> 0:13:16.440 very young age, I can remember him combing his hair 0:13:16.480 --> 0:13:20.760 in the mirror and uh he had a little record player. 0:13:21.000 --> 0:13:23.320 You know, it looked like a little little box with 0:13:23.360 --> 0:13:27.480 a spindle, played forty fives and to this thing, I 0:13:27.520 --> 0:13:31.040 could still remember the songs Speed Up by the Cadillact, 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:38.040 the Great Pretenders, uh Platters right, Great Balls of Fire, 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:43.080 Jerry y Lewis who wears short shorts to Royal Teams, 0:13:44.280 --> 0:13:48.040 Great Balls of Fire, Elvis. And they played an old 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:50.559 stack of records. But he combed his hair and then 0:13:50.960 --> 0:13:54.000 he missed his hair up, pull the records back up 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:56.000 and start all over again. So it was it was 0:13:56.040 --> 0:13:59.800 a Saturday ritual and uh, you know, once I heard that, 0:14:00.679 --> 0:14:04.120 you know, it just became part and parcel of you know, 0:14:04.320 --> 0:14:07.680 just who I was. And then of course like the 0:14:07.760 --> 0:14:11.160 big bang for for my generations, the Beatles on Sullivan Show, 0:14:11.920 --> 0:14:14.440 and so they said, oh man, these guys, you know, 0:14:14.559 --> 0:14:15.920 I want to be a part of that. 0:14:16.120 --> 0:14:20.200 Before we get to the Beatles. How many generations were 0:14:20.280 --> 0:14:22.120 your parents' families in America? 0:14:23.600 --> 0:14:27.720 Uh, well, my grandparents came over, so my parents were 0:14:27.760 --> 0:14:31.960 born here, but one set of parents, grandparents came over 0:14:32.000 --> 0:14:36.680 from Ukrainia i was part of the Austrian Hungarian Empire 0:14:36.720 --> 0:14:39.760 at the time, and the other set of grandparents came 0:14:39.800 --> 0:14:40.440 over from. 0:14:40.240 --> 0:14:43.920 Serbia, which was also part of the Austrian Hungarian Empire at 0:14:43.920 --> 0:14:44.280 the time. 0:14:45.000 --> 0:14:46.920 So how did they end up in Pittsburgh and how 0:14:46.920 --> 0:14:48.760 did they become coal miners? 0:14:50.080 --> 0:14:53.920 Well, they're a I believe probably imported from their villages 0:14:54.040 --> 0:14:58.600 to come work to coal mines. And so, you know, 0:14:59.000 --> 0:15:01.360 I grew up western prences of any one little coal 0:15:01.400 --> 0:15:04.800 patch we used to call it after another. So they were. 0:15:06.480 --> 0:15:06.640 There. 0:15:06.840 --> 0:15:12.080 They were, you know, all coal miners. My grandfather. By 0:15:12.120 --> 0:15:17.120 the time I was born, the still steel mills were 0:15:17.160 --> 0:15:19.760 going strong, but the coal miners coal mining in this 0:15:19.880 --> 0:15:26.200 area where I grew up, it was primarily all mine out. Uh. 0:15:26.280 --> 0:15:28.720 My grandfather I just to remember him coming home from 0:15:28.760 --> 0:15:30.000 from working the coal mines. 0:15:30.680 --> 0:15:30.800 Uh. 0:15:30.920 --> 0:15:34.080 My dad and all his brothers were coal miners, and 0:15:34.280 --> 0:15:37.480 all my uncles were coal miners. So I was basically 0:15:37.560 --> 0:15:40.320 the first generation out of the coal mine for both 0:15:40.320 --> 0:15:41.240 sides of the family. 0:15:49.080 --> 0:15:52.200 So you know, you hear you know, black lung and 0:15:52.320 --> 0:15:55.600 all the negative effects of being in coal mines. Was 0:15:55.640 --> 0:15:56.680 that in your family too? 0:15:57.760 --> 0:16:02.280 Yeah, my father had black mom and uh, you know, 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:05.760 it was not something that he aspired to do. Uh. 0:16:05.800 --> 0:16:08.720 He he started working at Koleman when he's twelve years 0:16:08.760 --> 0:16:18.200 old and uh got paid by the ton, so uh, yeah, 0:16:18.240 --> 0:16:20.840 he was he was not a fan of that particular 0:16:20.880 --> 0:16:23.560 line of work, to say the least. 0:16:23.840 --> 0:16:26.400 At what age did he die after? 0:16:26.480 --> 0:16:30.400 After World War Two he became a Uh he tinkered 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:32.400 around with electronics for a while and then he settled 0:16:32.400 --> 0:16:37.080 on fixing cars. He was a musician for a while, uh, 0:16:37.160 --> 0:16:41.200 you know, a part time musician, and and you know 0:16:41.240 --> 0:16:44.600 he played in uh one of the big joys of 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:45.120 his life. 0:16:45.280 --> 0:16:45.720 Uh. 0:16:46.000 --> 0:16:49.200 He was combat veteran World War two. But after World 0:16:49.200 --> 0:16:51.400 War Two he was stationed in Paris, and he played 0:16:51.400 --> 0:16:53.880 in a swing band in Paris for a couple of 0:16:53.920 --> 0:16:57.520 months after the war ended. And uh, that seemed to 0:16:57.560 --> 0:17:01.280 be like his you know, uh, most funny ever had 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:02.120 according to him. 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:05.840 Okay, but we think of coal miners dying young. Did 0:17:05.880 --> 0:17:06.760 your father die on. 0:17:07.520 --> 0:17:10.000 No, he did not. He was fortunately lived to be 0:17:10.080 --> 0:17:10.680 eighty nine. 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:13.560 Wow, my father died at seventeen and he was never 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:15.120 underground until he died. Yeah. 0:17:15.680 --> 0:17:18.879 Yeah, I'm fortunate. I have. You know, all my family 0:17:19.200 --> 0:17:22.560 at pretty extended, extended runs, and they were all coal miners, 0:17:22.640 --> 0:17:24.920 So yeah, I got longevity on my side. 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:27.679 Okay, how many kids in your family? 0:17:28.560 --> 0:17:28.840 Two? 0:17:29.600 --> 0:17:35.480 You the older, the younger. I'm the oldest, and your sibling. Boy, girl, 0:17:36.720 --> 0:17:37.120 I have a. 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:40.720 Brother who's a retired school teacher. 0:17:42.080 --> 0:17:44.600 Okay, And how did your parents meet? 0:17:45.119 --> 0:17:48.520 They met World War Two. My dad was home on leave. 0:17:49.040 --> 0:17:51.359 I was a song called nineteen forty five on a 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:56.239 coming home record. I have a special ed degree. I 0:17:56.280 --> 0:17:59.440 was teaching a special ed at the time. In nineteen 0:18:00.520 --> 0:18:04.639 ninety five, I guess ninety five, fifty years since the 0:18:04.760 --> 0:18:10.440 end of World War Two. I decided that I was 0:18:10.480 --> 0:18:15.720 gonna call my parents and interview them and get the 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:18.760 details on how they met, so I would say we'd 0:18:18.840 --> 0:18:22.120 be able to pass that information that their story done 0:18:22.160 --> 0:18:25.480 to my children. And so I interviewed them, and of 0:18:25.560 --> 0:18:27.320 course my dad, you know, he was one of the 0:18:27.400 --> 0:18:29.600 generations hard to get anything out of him. He didn't 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:33.200 talk too much about in the past. But my mother 0:18:33.240 --> 0:18:36.080 gave me the story they met when my dad was 0:18:36.119 --> 0:18:40.400 home on furlough before he shipped overseas for World War Two. 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.760 So I wrote a song called nineteen forty five, which Bruce, 0:18:44.000 --> 0:18:48.920 you know, Bruce and I collaborated on. It's the truest 0:18:49.240 --> 0:18:51.720 story I've ever written. It's about my mom and dad 0:18:51.760 --> 0:18:57.639 meeting during the world World War two, and you know 0:18:57.680 --> 0:19:03.800 how my thoughts of reuniting with her kept my dad 0:19:03.840 --> 0:19:06.400 alive when he was fighting. 0:19:07.359 --> 0:19:12.760 Okay, you're a child of the fifties. What was your skies? Yeah, 0:19:12.840 --> 0:19:14.720 fifties and sixties. Well, I mean, you know you're coming 0:19:14.760 --> 0:19:17.960 of age. You're born in nineteen forty eight, so that 0:19:18.119 --> 0:19:21.600 you see what was your experience rock and roll? Depending 0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:23.919 on who we just you know, it is either fifty one, 0:19:24.080 --> 0:19:26.480 fifty three de bandon who we decided it was Rocket 0:19:26.480 --> 0:19:30.040 eighty eight, rock around the clock, whatever. But you know 0:19:30.119 --> 0:19:34.360 that era. His scene is, you know, mostly people being oblivious, 0:19:34.440 --> 0:19:38.439 having fun even though there was racism everywhere. What was 0:19:38.480 --> 0:19:42.040 your growing up like before the sixties and all the 0:19:42.480 --> 0:19:43.960 youth changes. 0:19:45.840 --> 0:19:51.040 Well, you know, I guess pretty pretty fifties sixty is 0:19:51.080 --> 0:19:54.640 you know, it wasn't you know, music was a big 0:19:54.720 --> 0:19:58.480 important part. Listen to music all the time. I was 0:19:58.880 --> 0:20:01.399 in love with rock and roll and always listened to it. 0:20:02.240 --> 0:20:04.359 You know, it was into Chuck Berry and Boat Diddley 0:20:04.359 --> 0:20:10.040 and all that stuff. And uh there AM radio was 0:20:10.160 --> 0:20:12.879 king here in Pittsburgh, and you would hear all the 0:20:12.920 --> 0:20:15.880 top forty stuff on AM radio, but there was always 0:20:16.680 --> 0:20:22.600 outlying stations that had these really unique disc jockeys, and 0:20:22.720 --> 0:20:27.439 starting Friday night about six six or seven o'clock in 0:20:27.480 --> 0:20:31.439 the evening, they would start trying to obscure each other. So, 0:20:31.920 --> 0:20:35.280 you know, I grew up listening to the Stones and uh, 0:20:35.760 --> 0:20:39.119 you know in the sixties of Stones, the Beatles, you know, 0:20:39.280 --> 0:20:42.320 Motown and all that stuff. But I also was hearing 0:20:42.359 --> 0:20:48.480 all these really obscure rhythm and blues rock and roll artists, 0:20:48.760 --> 0:20:51.200 uh that were really big here in Pittsburgh. They were 0:20:51.200 --> 0:20:55.240 called the Pittsburgh Sound. So I listened to everything I could, 0:20:55.280 --> 0:20:59.760 and you know, went to school dances. Uh, you know, 0:21:00.080 --> 0:21:06.000 not much of a socialite, pretty much introverted and lost 0:21:06.080 --> 0:21:09.600 in the wilderness until I got a guitar, and then 0:21:09.960 --> 0:21:14.399 I started realizing, I think I really like to do 0:21:14.440 --> 0:21:15.720 this for the rest of my life. 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:17.399 When did you get a guitar? 0:21:18.560 --> 0:21:21.800 I got a guitar, probably a couple weeks after I 0:21:21.840 --> 0:21:25.159 saw the Beatles on it at Sullivan Electric Guitar, but 0:21:25.200 --> 0:21:28.399 we did have an acoustic guitar at home that I 0:21:28.480 --> 0:21:29.280 banged around on. 0:21:29.680 --> 0:21:33.240 Okay, so tell me the experience of watching the Beatles 0:21:33.280 --> 0:21:36.240 before you saw them. Did you like them? They were 0:21:36.280 --> 0:21:38.120 on three Sundays on Ed Sullivan. 0:21:38.440 --> 0:21:43.200 Tell me, well, somehow I was able. Jack Parr had 0:21:43.200 --> 0:21:47.280 the original Tonight Show and my dad and I watched 0:21:47.280 --> 0:21:51.720 the Beatles during a promotional clip of it She Loves You. 0:21:51.960 --> 0:21:55.280 I saw that too. No one seems to remember November. 0:21:54.960 --> 0:22:02.560 Sember vividly, and I thought, wow, it's really great. And then, somehow, miraculously, 0:22:02.600 --> 0:22:07.840 again before they were actually on TV, I found a 0:22:07.880 --> 0:22:11.320 copy of their album and uh, you know, they used 0:22:11.320 --> 0:22:14.040 to sell where I had to buy records when I 0:22:14.080 --> 0:22:19.200 was growing up. I was you know, basically country suburbs. 0:22:19.200 --> 0:22:21.520 There was no record stores, but like at a five 0:22:21.600 --> 0:22:24.200 and ten they used to call them five and ten 0:22:24.240 --> 0:22:32.160 set store of wool Worse, and they all had areas 0:22:32.200 --> 0:22:35.960 where you could buy records and listen to records. And 0:22:36.280 --> 0:22:38.480 I found a copy of Meet the Beatles there before 0:22:38.520 --> 0:22:41.080 they were on the Sullivan Show, so I was actually 0:22:41.840 --> 0:22:46.720 able to hear their music before most people did, because 0:22:46.760 --> 0:22:48.680 I just lucked upon this record. I don't know how 0:22:48.760 --> 0:22:50.880 to this day they had it there, but they did, 0:22:51.520 --> 0:22:55.640 and you know of course that you know, it was thrilling. 0:22:55.760 --> 0:22:59.640 It was like, wow, man, I want to be part 0:22:59.640 --> 0:23:02.439 of that. Yeah, And the part of it was, you know, 0:23:02.480 --> 0:23:06.120 you saw guys that were close to your age actually 0:23:06.280 --> 0:23:10.160 playing guitar and singing. Most of the bands around town 0:23:10.200 --> 0:23:12.560 where I grew up there were rock bands, but they 0:23:12.600 --> 0:23:18.240 were mostly instrumental bands, surf bands, the guitars, very few 0:23:18.320 --> 0:23:22.000 vocal stuff. But you know, the Beatles were all self contained. 0:23:22.000 --> 0:23:25.240 And then and then find out they're writing their own songs, 0:23:25.280 --> 0:23:28.800 as wow, you know, man, what is this? And they 0:23:28.840 --> 0:23:35.199 looked like aliens, so that made their appeal stronger. But uh, 0:23:35.960 --> 0:23:38.040 and then what's still the deal for me was the Stones. 0:23:38.280 --> 0:23:43.040 You know, because the Beatles were too perfect, too many chords. 0:23:43.640 --> 0:23:46.560 They sang two pretty but the Stones stones. When I 0:23:46.600 --> 0:23:49.280 heard the Stones, it's more like the music I've been 0:23:49.320 --> 0:23:51.840 listening to. I think I could whack whack out a 0:23:51.880 --> 0:23:53.000 couple of these songs. You know. 0:23:53.080 --> 0:23:57.600 So okay, So how do you get the electric guitar? 0:23:58.720 --> 0:24:00.640 You beg your appearance? How to go down? 0:24:01.280 --> 0:24:04.440 I bought it myself. I always worked part time jobs, 0:24:04.880 --> 0:24:07.040 everything from being a paper boy to working in a 0:24:08.359 --> 0:24:11.280 to be in a caddie to working in a lumberyard. 0:24:12.080 --> 0:24:16.919 And uh, I bought a guitar at Sears roebucks. I 0:24:16.920 --> 0:24:22.399 think it was sixty some bucks, and uh there was 0:24:22.440 --> 0:24:26.760 an amplifier built in the case, and that was it. 0:24:27.480 --> 0:24:31.680 Okay, those were looked down upon the time, but then 0:24:31.840 --> 0:24:35.880 it flipped and everybody was into those silver tone guitars. Yeah, 0:24:35.960 --> 0:24:36.879 do you still have it? 0:24:38.119 --> 0:24:40.600 No? I wish I did, And I wish I had 0:24:40.600 --> 0:24:44.040 a silvertone amp that I eventually bought too. But you know, 0:24:44.080 --> 0:24:48.080 in those days, we traded traded guitars and amps like 0:24:48.119 --> 0:24:50.360 we traded baseball cards. I wish I had my baseball 0:24:50.400 --> 0:24:56.720 cards too. That let go. But you know, so, uh yeah, 0:24:56.760 --> 0:24:58.720 but they're great, you know, a great sound and little 0:24:58.840 --> 0:25:03.359 little things that there were four and everybody had one. Everybody, 0:25:03.960 --> 0:25:06.040 just about everybody I knew went out and bought a guitar. 0:25:06.640 --> 0:25:10.159 A lot of us kept it up a lot, a lot. Yeah, 0:25:10.440 --> 0:25:14.040 I went into mom's cupboard somewhere under the bed. 0:25:14.800 --> 0:25:17.280 Okay, you go to Stiers, you buy the guitar. How 0:25:17.320 --> 0:25:19.960 do you learn how to play it? Uh? 0:25:20.000 --> 0:25:24.120 Well, my neighbor was a little bit younger than maybe. 0:25:24.160 --> 0:25:28.640 He had been taking guitar lesson since he was six 0:25:28.760 --> 0:25:31.600 seven years old, so he was quite proficient when the 0:25:31.600 --> 0:25:33.919 bells already hit. He taught me a bunch of stuff. 0:25:33.920 --> 0:25:35.760 And my dad could play guitar, so he taught me 0:25:35.800 --> 0:25:38.879 a bunch of stuff. And then, uh, there was a 0:25:38.920 --> 0:25:42.720 bunch of teen nightclubs that go on a weekend. You 0:25:42.760 --> 0:25:46.200 hear all. I saw obscure Pittsburgh Music, and you got 0:25:46.240 --> 0:25:48.760 to see like Mitch Ryner and Detroit Wills and Bo 0:25:48.920 --> 0:25:54.360 Diddley and Sam de Sham and the Pharaohs and Wilson Pickett. 0:25:54.600 --> 0:25:58.159 You know, so all those guys, h Junior Walker and 0:25:58.200 --> 0:26:00.600 the All Stars, and I make my way down front 0:26:00.600 --> 0:26:03.320 and just watch what they're playing. And plus there are 0:26:03.359 --> 0:26:07.680 all the local bands too. A local band, uh eventually 0:26:07.680 --> 0:26:10.600 became a Tommy James band. It became to Shawn Delsa 0:26:11.040 --> 0:26:13.320 from my home area. 0:26:14.800 --> 0:26:17.919 So when did you start forming bands? When did you 0:26:17.960 --> 0:26:19.480 start playing outside the house. 0:26:20.440 --> 0:26:24.439 Uh, well, we tried right away. Uh. You know, it 0:26:24.480 --> 0:26:27.320 probably took us a couple months to learn enough chords, 0:26:27.359 --> 0:26:30.399 but uh, you know, as fast as I could. And 0:26:30.640 --> 0:26:34.120 in high school, Uh, you know, I played dances. Uh. 0:26:34.560 --> 0:26:37.640 We had I thing here in Pittsburgh called Swans's which 0:26:37.720 --> 0:26:40.679 is a dance at a swimming pool. I played those. 0:26:41.000 --> 0:26:43.240 Uh wait, wait, tell me more about that. I've never 0:26:43.320 --> 0:26:43.800 heard of that. 0:26:44.480 --> 0:26:48.480 Well, they have a swimming pool and in the evening 0:26:48.600 --> 0:26:51.640 on a Friday night or or maybe a weeknight during 0:26:51.640 --> 0:26:53.920 the well obviously in the summer, kids weren't in school 0:26:54.000 --> 0:26:57.359 that you know that they have a band playing, uh 0:26:58.200 --> 0:27:00.800 you know, somewhere in the refreshment area, and the kids 0:27:00.840 --> 0:27:04.199 would swim and get out of swimming pool, dance and 0:27:05.040 --> 0:27:07.560 even played a couple of bars. Back in the day 0:27:07.600 --> 0:27:11.600 when I was growing up, down and Go Go dancers, 0:27:11.640 --> 0:27:13.359 you know, the whole nine yards. 0:27:14.480 --> 0:27:16.800 Okay, you graduate from high school, then what. 0:27:18.280 --> 0:27:22.760 Then I went to college. It's not something I had 0:27:22.800 --> 0:27:25.399 a burning desire to do. But I promised my father 0:27:25.960 --> 0:27:32.280 since he had did not receive an education because he 0:27:32.320 --> 0:27:34.800 had to drop by of school when he was twelve 0:27:34.880 --> 0:27:37.359 years old, then went to sixth grade. But I promised 0:27:37.440 --> 0:27:40.280 him I would go to college and went to college 0:27:40.480 --> 0:27:47.080 at a okay California State College at his California, Pennsylvania, 0:27:47.200 --> 0:27:50.840 which is a little mill town we called Harvard on 0:27:50.920 --> 0:27:56.080 Demon and you know, it was like just you know, 0:27:56.119 --> 0:27:59.240 I thought I was going to be going where everybody 0:27:59.280 --> 0:28:02.000 had long hair and beatles songs, and it was it 0:28:02.040 --> 0:28:06.359 was like a throwback to the fifties and it was 0:28:06.840 --> 0:28:10.479 time work in a bad way. And so I was 0:28:10.520 --> 0:28:13.840 not able to have a guitar in my dorm room 0:28:13.880 --> 0:28:16.119 for a couple of years. So it was for boating, 0:28:16.800 --> 0:28:21.840 no guitarist, no music, no fun. And after I moved 0:28:21.840 --> 0:28:25.120 out of the dorm one summer, I went to spent 0:28:25.240 --> 0:28:30.920 summer Atlantic City and bought my first telecaster to lay 0:28:30.920 --> 0:28:33.560 away at a pawn shop and swear to myself I 0:28:33.640 --> 0:28:36.280 was never going to quit playing. So I've been playing 0:28:36.280 --> 0:28:40.160 NonStop since nineteen sixty eight. I'd you end up in 0:28:40.360 --> 0:28:44.080 Atlantic City. I just went there to work for the summer. 0:28:44.960 --> 0:28:52.200 What did you do any city racetrack? I was mostly 0:28:52.200 --> 0:28:54.960 a bus boy. I didn't like being a waiter. I 0:28:55.040 --> 0:29:00.880 preferred not to have to socialize with the with the 0:29:01.000 --> 0:29:06.000 people who were ordering food or bartender. So I just 0:29:06.080 --> 0:29:10.440 cleaned up and uh we found a niche at the 0:29:10.520 --> 0:29:14.680 Atlantic City Racetrack, which served us well the following year 0:29:14.680 --> 0:29:18.360 because they had the Atlantic City Polk Festival there. Pretty 0:29:18.400 --> 0:29:22.960 much to run out of Atlantic City Racetrack because everybody 0:29:23.080 --> 0:29:29.000 knew us, and you know, just went back to school, 0:29:29.680 --> 0:29:32.960 formed the band and went at it. Try to try 0:29:33.000 --> 0:29:35.040 to just playing as much as I could. 0:29:35.960 --> 0:29:39.320 So you're in college, is this being playing gigs? 0:29:40.840 --> 0:29:43.960 Yeah? I played bars. I played a lot of frat parties. 0:29:45.640 --> 0:29:47.760 There were a lot of places to play in those days. 0:29:48.080 --> 0:29:52.640 Live music was still a huge, huge thing. You could 0:29:52.640 --> 0:29:56.640 play pretty much as much as you wanted to, and 0:29:56.920 --> 0:30:00.320 h you know, the pay was you know, to hundred 0:30:00.320 --> 0:30:02.280 bucks was like tops. If you got two hundred bucks, 0:30:02.320 --> 0:30:05.120 you were really doing something if you walked out. I 0:30:05.200 --> 0:30:09.840 was played in small bands, trios or quartets, but my 0:30:09.920 --> 0:30:12.440 college band was a trio. So you know, if we 0:30:12.440 --> 0:30:14.280 could make one hundred and fifty bucks, I was fifty 0:30:14.280 --> 0:30:17.480 bucks each you live there for a couple of weeks 0:30:17.480 --> 0:30:19.680 of fifty bucks on those days in a college town. 0:30:20.800 --> 0:30:23.360 Okay, if your band is a trio in nineteen sixty eight, 0:30:23.360 --> 0:30:25.800 what are you playing? Cream songs? What are you playing? 0:30:26.400 --> 0:30:28.880 Yeah, well we did some originals. 0:30:29.440 --> 0:30:30.040 I did have. 0:30:30.000 --> 0:30:33.480 An audition with RCA Records. 0:30:34.000 --> 0:30:37.800 Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. You're going to California State College. 0:30:38.320 --> 0:30:40.920 How do you get an audition for OURCA Records. 0:30:41.840 --> 0:30:43.640 We had a friend who was a musician, and he 0:30:43.800 --> 0:30:46.840 told there was a guy from Pittsburgh who worked with 0:30:47.000 --> 0:30:50.560 RCA named Tom Causey, and he told him about us. 0:30:51.920 --> 0:30:54.560 We're one of the few bands that were playing originals 0:30:55.120 --> 0:31:02.240 plus the usual Beatles, Stones, Creamimi Hendricks, you know blues 0:31:02.320 --> 0:31:07.080 stuff that everybody else is playing, long extended jams, you know, 0:31:07.360 --> 0:31:11.000 really long hair, which is a bit dangerous in that area. 0:31:11.640 --> 0:31:16.040 And anyways, we we did have an audition. I just 0:31:16.400 --> 0:31:20.360 ran into the audition, ran in, just discovered the audition 0:31:20.520 --> 0:31:22.520 tape for the studio. I work out all the time. 0:31:23.160 --> 0:31:27.120 Uh the Tom had uh delivered to the studio having 0:31:28.720 --> 0:31:32.400 transfer into the digital but uh, for one reason or another, 0:31:32.520 --> 0:31:37.120 we never did. The guy showed up late. My band disappeared. 0:31:37.760 --> 0:31:41.320 I gave him, uh the demo tape, never heard from 0:31:41.440 --> 0:31:41.800 him again. 0:31:42.680 --> 0:31:44.880 Well, since you listened to the demo tape today, what'd 0:31:44.920 --> 0:31:45.240 you think? 0:31:46.200 --> 0:31:48.200 You know what? I haven't been able to listen to 0:31:48.320 --> 0:31:50.320 it yet because it was all real, the real stuff. 0:31:50.360 --> 0:31:54.360 But uh, I gotta still track it down. I keep 0:31:54.440 --> 0:31:57.720 bugging them for it. As I recall, it wasn't too bad. 0:31:57.840 --> 0:32:01.520 There was a couple of good songs, but yeah, you know, 0:32:02.400 --> 0:32:05.240 it was definitely a sixty sounded thing, a lot of 0:32:05.280 --> 0:32:05.920 heavy guitar. 0:32:13.480 --> 0:32:15.120 How do you start writing songs? 0:32:16.880 --> 0:32:18.960 Well, I originally started writing songs probably that was it 0:32:19.080 --> 0:32:24.840 wasn't good enough to copy. I was never never my 0:32:25.000 --> 0:32:29.160 forte sitting down and copying somebody else's stuff. No perfect 0:32:29.240 --> 0:32:32.040 like a lot of my friends could do. So, uh I, 0:32:32.160 --> 0:32:35.440 plus the Beatles and the Stones and everybody else is writing. 0:32:35.720 --> 0:32:39.080 You know, everybody's playing originals. So you know that's what 0:32:39.200 --> 0:32:41.440 you inspired to do. You put you wrote originals? 0:32:42.800 --> 0:32:44.560 So you graduate from college? Then on. 0:32:46.120 --> 0:32:46.720 And then I. 0:32:48.680 --> 0:32:52.080 Didn't do anything spectacular for a while. I worked in 0:32:52.160 --> 0:32:58.760 a mental institution, uh I noticed is not politically correct, 0:32:58.800 --> 0:33:01.440 but they call it a mental institution for the mentally 0:33:01.560 --> 0:33:04.640 retarded at that time. I was the first wave into 0:33:05.280 --> 0:33:09.200 the mental institutions when they opened them up to public 0:33:09.280 --> 0:33:14.080 schools and I had a class there. The kids rolled 0:33:14.840 --> 0:33:17.840 in cloth diaperson when I got there, Lena on the floor. 0:33:18.080 --> 0:33:23.240 Nobody was torely trained, nobody could eat themselves, nobody could walk. 0:33:24.080 --> 0:33:27.000 And we sort of stayed there for a couple of 0:33:27.120 --> 0:33:31.320 years and more young kids come in. I was very 0:33:31.400 --> 0:33:34.320 young at the time, in my early twenties. We transformed 0:33:34.360 --> 0:33:38.280 the place, changed these kids' lives, and I was young 0:33:38.360 --> 0:33:40.160 and single. I was saving up all my money and 0:33:41.040 --> 0:33:45.280 got a band together in Pittsburgh, was rented a house, 0:33:45.440 --> 0:33:49.560 bought a PA and we started recording demos in my 0:33:49.640 --> 0:33:53.240 basement and rehearsing every night with the idea that we 0:33:53.360 --> 0:33:58.120 were going to make a record one day. My partner 0:33:58.680 --> 0:34:02.920 for many years is our Deani and I started to band. 0:34:03.320 --> 0:34:05.640 We called ourselves the brick Ally Band. At the time. 0:34:06.800 --> 0:34:08.960 Okay, let's go back. What was your calling that you 0:34:09.040 --> 0:34:11.800 wanted to work with a mentally challenged as they say. 0:34:11.680 --> 0:34:19.960 To that, Uh, well, my calling was uh kel State. 0:34:21.239 --> 0:34:24.680 Kel U was a teacher's college at that time, and 0:34:26.360 --> 0:34:30.920 I was to stay in school. I had to transfer 0:34:31.040 --> 0:34:36.839 out as liberal arts into to UH education and UH 0:34:37.320 --> 0:34:39.680 why did you have to do that to stay in school? Well, 0:34:39.719 --> 0:34:42.080 because it was the height of the Vietnam War and 0:34:42.160 --> 0:34:45.840 they were canceling all liberal arts deferments. And I promised 0:34:45.880 --> 0:34:48.279 my father I was going to graduate from college no 0:34:48.400 --> 0:34:51.440 matter what. I was there for a couple of years, 0:34:52.080 --> 0:34:55.920 doing really well, and then I UH to finish school, 0:34:55.960 --> 0:34:59.080 I had to transfer out of what I was doing. 0:34:59.800 --> 0:35:03.520 So UH me and a couple other my buddies, we 0:35:03.640 --> 0:35:05.520 were at a loss for words. We didn't know what 0:35:05.600 --> 0:35:08.800 we were going to do. And uh kel you was 0:35:09.080 --> 0:35:14.520 a very tiny school at the time, and uh during 0:35:14.560 --> 0:35:20.040 the registration drive were we found out our the pharmacy 0:35:20.040 --> 0:35:22.840 had be canceled, and couldn't decide what we were going 0:35:22.920 --> 0:35:26.080 to do with our lives, and and made the decision 0:35:26.560 --> 0:35:29.479 on the line. The special ed was the shortest line, 0:35:30.239 --> 0:35:32.600 so we went over there to register, just to get 0:35:32.640 --> 0:35:33.640 it done and over with it. 0:35:34.200 --> 0:35:36.200 And then I grew up. 0:35:37.200 --> 0:35:41.920 My best friend had had two uh disabled brother and sister, 0:35:42.440 --> 0:35:44.759 and I had an uncle who was several policies, so 0:35:44.880 --> 0:35:50.680 I had I had a a feeling, ah that I 0:35:50.840 --> 0:35:53.799 might be able to help some of these kids and uh, 0:35:54.840 --> 0:35:58.759 you know, I once I went into the to the 0:35:59.239 --> 0:36:03.279 Western Center, which was the institution I worked at, after 0:36:03.400 --> 0:36:07.560 the shock of being there and seeing the conditions, I 0:36:08.040 --> 0:36:12.759 really really loved working with those kids, so that it 0:36:12.800 --> 0:36:16.480 was probably the best job ever had. Yeah, so how 0:36:16.560 --> 0:36:20.960 did you end up avoiding the draft? I've finished out. 0:36:21.320 --> 0:36:25.400 I ended up getting a federal scholarship to study special education, 0:36:26.640 --> 0:36:33.960 and then my number I was one fifty. I was 0:36:34.040 --> 0:36:37.040 gonna get drafted anyways. Then I got a federal scholarship. 0:36:37.520 --> 0:36:44.600 My last year teaching under federal you know, everything paid 0:36:45.000 --> 0:36:48.680 full both as a special ed was a new field 0:36:48.719 --> 0:36:52.759 at that time, and they needed people to go and 0:36:52.920 --> 0:36:56.799 work and work with these kids. And the next year, 0:36:58.040 --> 0:37:02.800 you know, the country decided that the whole Vietnam experience 0:37:02.920 --> 0:37:08.480 wasn't that a great idea, and the draft went down significantly. 0:37:08.680 --> 0:37:10.600 So I went back into the draft pool, but my 0:37:10.760 --> 0:37:12.520 number wasn't high enough to be drafted. 0:37:14.440 --> 0:37:18.480 Okay, so you have this brick Alley band. What is 0:37:18.560 --> 0:37:19.919 the status of that band? 0:37:21.840 --> 0:37:23.920 Well, the status of that band was we were playing 0:37:24.080 --> 0:37:33.400 clubs after well, we were rehearsing and writing religiously that 0:37:33.560 --> 0:37:37.840 for about a year and we just finally decided, you know, 0:37:38.440 --> 0:37:42.640 we better go get some gigs because otherwise we're never 0:37:42.680 --> 0:37:45.200 going to get out of the basement. And we try 0:37:45.239 --> 0:37:49.680 to learn some covers top forty stuff just to work, 0:37:50.440 --> 0:37:53.399 because in those days Pittsburgh was pretty much the top 0:37:53.560 --> 0:37:59.800 forty song type of club scene. You played ten o'clock, 0:38:00.000 --> 0:38:02.440 went to ten forty, he took twenty minutes off eleven 0:38:02.520 --> 0:38:05.960 eleven forty. There were strict rules about what you could 0:38:06.000 --> 0:38:12.640 do and not do, and we were terrible, terrible Top forty. 0:38:13.320 --> 0:38:16.479 We sucked. I mean, I couldn't stand this. We didn't 0:38:16.719 --> 0:38:19.120 We weren't very good at it. Our hearts wasn't in it. 0:38:19.960 --> 0:38:23.320 And we found a guy who was named Marty Pizzano 0:38:24.160 --> 0:38:29.359 at a club on West Liberty Avenue and we uh 0:38:29.920 --> 0:38:31.759 talked to him in and letting us play there, and 0:38:31.880 --> 0:38:34.319 I guess she wasn't doing too well, so we said, hey, 0:38:34.440 --> 0:38:38.239 you know, can we have a night and we'll just 0:38:38.320 --> 0:38:40.560 take the door, let us do anything we want to do, 0:38:41.120 --> 0:38:44.000 and he said yeah, And within a short time we 0:38:44.120 --> 0:38:49.919 built up a big following there and at the same 0:38:50.000 --> 0:38:55.239 time Cleveland Entertainment Steve Popovic got one of my demos and. 0:38:58.040 --> 0:39:02.920 A little bit slower Okay, you're a bad top forty band, right, 0:39:03.160 --> 0:39:04.960 what is building the following. 0:39:06.280 --> 0:39:09.160 Uh, Well, we went in and just played whatever we 0:39:09.239 --> 0:39:13.399 wanted to play, and we have been rehearsing for a year, 0:39:13.520 --> 0:39:16.920 so we're a really good band and we play one 0:39:17.000 --> 0:39:21.880 set of original material. We were determined to make a record, 0:39:22.400 --> 0:39:27.359 so the music that we were playing in those days. 0:39:27.400 --> 0:39:29.719 Eventually it became our first record, Love So Tough, on 0:39:29.840 --> 0:39:33.080 Cleveland International. So at the same time that we were 0:39:33.120 --> 0:39:35.319 playing I was we were making demo tapes and sending 0:39:35.400 --> 0:39:38.520 them out and Steve Popovich. 0:39:38.560 --> 0:39:42.440 Before we get to pop there's a different era. Everybody 0:39:42.520 --> 0:39:46.040 doesn't have a laptop. You go into the studio to 0:39:46.120 --> 0:39:47.040 make these demos. 0:39:47.760 --> 0:39:50.520 Oh yeah, yeah, there was no home recording, you know. 0:39:50.960 --> 0:39:54.280 And so who's paying for that? Well, I was because 0:39:54.320 --> 0:39:58.279 I was teaching. I had any money. I would say, 0:39:58.320 --> 0:40:01.719 my rock and roll career was financed by special ed. 0:40:02.880 --> 0:40:05.879 And then if you're not doing any gigs, it's hard 0:40:06.000 --> 0:40:08.200 to keep a band together. So how'd you keep the 0:40:08.280 --> 0:40:08.920 band together? 0:40:09.800 --> 0:40:11.960 Well, after the first year, we decided we were going 0:40:12.040 --> 0:40:13.960 out and play play some gigs, and we caught on 0:40:14.120 --> 0:40:19.720 this club called the Gazebo, and we started working almost 0:40:19.760 --> 0:40:22.960 immediately after people. I don't know. It was just like 0:40:23.080 --> 0:40:25.800 one of the seismic things that happens in music in 0:40:25.920 --> 0:40:30.080 a particular down. People just got got tuned into what 0:40:30.200 --> 0:40:30.719 we were doing. 0:40:32.120 --> 0:40:37.120 Okay, how many demos had you sent out before Steve reacted? 0:40:38.480 --> 0:40:41.560 Only two? You remember what happened with those two? 0:40:43.360 --> 0:40:46.880 Uh? Well, the second one we got a record doing. 0:40:46.960 --> 0:40:50.839 The first one wasn't very good. I got a couple 0:40:50.880 --> 0:40:55.000 of rejection records. And Steve, you're familiar with Steve Pofferman. 0:40:55.080 --> 0:40:56.399 I knew Steve well. 0:40:56.440 --> 0:41:02.080 Steve was originally from western Pennsylvania. And uh, you know 0:41:02.160 --> 0:41:07.279 Popovich a Serbian name. I had Papovich relatives. You know, 0:41:07.360 --> 0:41:09.200 there was just a connection to what we were doing 0:41:09.280 --> 0:41:15.000 and and and you know his his personal life, and uh, 0:41:15.280 --> 0:41:19.560 I guess you heard something that he related to and 0:41:21.120 --> 0:41:24.319 he invited us. We were playing at this point, after 0:41:24.400 --> 0:41:27.040 a year in my basement, we were out playing pretty 0:41:27.200 --> 0:41:30.920 pretty regularly. We're starting to become more and more popular 0:41:31.000 --> 0:41:35.840 around town. We had found this after the gazebo. He 0:41:35.960 --> 0:41:40.040 sold the gazebo, Marty was sold the gazebo. We found 0:41:40.080 --> 0:41:43.920 a herm turf in the College section of Pittsburgh. Oakland 0:41:44.520 --> 0:41:48.400 called the Decade, and we were immediate success at the 0:41:48.520 --> 0:41:52.000 Decade and we played. We had a Thursday night residency 0:41:52.120 --> 0:41:55.000 for a long time and a lot of a lot 0:41:55.000 --> 0:41:58.960 of weeks we played Thursday and Saturday. So Uh. At 0:41:59.000 --> 0:42:02.040 the same time, we were making demo tapes. And one 0:42:02.080 --> 0:42:05.440 of the tapes, UH, Steve put out say Goodbye to 0:42:05.520 --> 0:42:12.200 Hollywood in full page Addam Billboard Magazine, Ronnie Spector Billy 0:42:12.280 --> 0:42:17.600 Joel song produced by Steve van Zant, recorded by the 0:42:17.760 --> 0:42:23.759 street band Cleveland Popovich. It just seemed like a you know, 0:42:24.560 --> 0:42:28.279 uh a place I should send the song stick and UH, 0:42:29.200 --> 0:42:33.719 so I headed out the door one one Friday, I 0:42:33.800 --> 0:42:37.680 believe we had a out of town gig. And I 0:42:37.760 --> 0:42:41.200 got a phone call and Steve and he liked the 0:42:41.280 --> 0:42:41.879 demo tape. 0:42:41.880 --> 0:42:42.400 I sent him. 0:42:42.680 --> 0:42:46.400 Advised us up to Cleveland on the following Sunday. He 0:42:46.440 --> 0:42:49.880 said he's having a little get together, a little uh picnic. 0:42:50.960 --> 0:42:52.960 So we make our way up to Cleveland, me and 0:42:53.040 --> 0:42:56.040 a couple of guys in the band, and UH find 0:42:56.080 --> 0:42:58.759 our way to Steve's house and Water's house outday out 0:42:58.800 --> 0:43:05.560 the suburbs. Uh Cleveland. Knock on the door, door opens 0:43:05.719 --> 0:43:11.320 and there's Ronnie Spector in a fluorescent purple bikini almost 0:43:11.360 --> 0:43:14.520 fell over right right there on the spot, and it's 0:43:14.719 --> 0:43:18.239 very friendly invites us in. Uh ron back, she said, 0:43:18.520 --> 0:43:21.600 go on back, Steve will be here pretty soon and 0:43:23.040 --> 0:43:26.040 then we're gonna have a little picnic. So go around back. 0:43:26.080 --> 0:43:29.160 And a little while later, a big tour bus pulls 0:43:29.239 --> 0:43:34.480 up and I jumped Steve Popovich, Marty Mooney, uh By, 0:43:36.600 --> 0:43:39.400 Jukes Side, Johnny and the Juice Southside went there. But 0:43:39.520 --> 0:43:42.320 the Jukes were there and bos skags. We had the 0:43:42.400 --> 0:43:44.879 number one country song in the country at the time, 0:43:44.960 --> 0:43:48.520 the Silk Degrees number one record. So in the middle 0:43:48.560 --> 0:43:50.920 of this party, we're sitting there, you know, being total 0:43:51.920 --> 0:43:55.399 totally uncomfortable because you know, we're such outsiders and we're 0:43:55.520 --> 0:43:59.640 all with all these heavy hitters, and uh Steve throws 0:43:59.680 --> 0:44:05.640 on demo tape and you know, of course we're cringing, 0:44:06.360 --> 0:44:09.920 and Boss Guys walks over and says he really liked 0:44:09.960 --> 0:44:12.719 it and shakes my hand and said, you know, yeah, 0:44:13.280 --> 0:44:16.920 hook up with Steve. He's still do good bye you. 0:44:17.760 --> 0:44:21.680 So yeah, a little while later, we had a private 0:44:21.760 --> 0:44:24.360 meeting with Steve, and you know, I always say to 0:44:24.440 --> 0:44:26.480 people that he sent us back to Pittsburgh with a 0:44:26.560 --> 0:44:29.279 pocket full of hope. He decided he was going to 0:44:29.360 --> 0:44:33.080 finance our demo sessions and we went back to a 0:44:33.160 --> 0:44:39.280 couple more demo sessions, signed us to Cleveland Entertainment, Cleveland 0:44:39.400 --> 0:44:45.080 National Management, and a production company, and then eventually signed 0:44:45.320 --> 0:44:48.200 signed the band. UH placed the band on mc A. 0:44:50.600 --> 0:44:53.839 Okay, so now it's time to make a record, right 0:44:54.400 --> 0:44:55.080 so you know. 0:44:55.080 --> 0:44:58.440 We play Thursday night. Well, Steve and Marty Mooney were 0:44:58.560 --> 0:45:03.920 the de facto producers of the first record, and there 0:45:04.000 --> 0:45:07.960 was a club in Cleveland, the Agora Club, very popular club, 0:45:08.120 --> 0:45:12.320 and above the club they had a recording studio called Agency. 0:45:13.640 --> 0:45:16.480 So a lot of knights would play Thursday night, get 0:45:16.560 --> 0:45:21.960 up Friday, drive to Cleveland, record Friday, sometimes take Friday 0:45:22.080 --> 0:45:26.200 night off, sometimes drive back and play Friday night. But 0:45:26.320 --> 0:45:32.040 we recorded basically our stage show at the Agency without 0:45:33.400 --> 0:45:35.200 you know, no more than one day at a time. 0:45:36.160 --> 0:45:37.960 We never did two days in a row. We never 0:45:38.000 --> 0:45:41.520 stayed overnight. We drove up, played come back. A couple 0:45:41.560 --> 0:45:44.280 of weeks later we would go record a couple more songs, 0:45:45.280 --> 0:45:54.200 and Steve Popovich placed us on MCA Records, and right 0:45:54.280 --> 0:45:56.440 when the record was getting ready, to come out. They 0:45:56.600 --> 0:46:00.640 decided to remix it and do some over So I 0:46:01.560 --> 0:46:04.920 went to New Jersey, to the House of Music in 0:46:05.000 --> 0:46:09.000 New Jersey and did some overdubs and some lead guitar, 0:46:11.360 --> 0:46:14.360 and then eventually the record came out in May of 0:46:15.640 --> 0:46:22.919 seventy nine, and it was very, very critically acclaimed. People 0:46:23.040 --> 0:46:26.040 loved it. And by that time I decided I was, 0:46:26.280 --> 0:46:28.360 you know, I was going to through my hat and 0:46:28.400 --> 0:46:31.640 a ring and go full time musicians. So, you know, 0:46:31.920 --> 0:46:34.560 just felt like I was never going to get that chance, 0:46:35.440 --> 0:46:37.640 probably never going to get that chance again. So I 0:46:37.760 --> 0:46:39.280 took it and went played. 0:46:40.160 --> 0:46:42.680 Okay, a couple of questions, So you stop working in 0:46:42.800 --> 0:46:49.160 special education? Right? How did the name of the band change? Oh? 0:46:49.280 --> 0:46:55.239 Well, Uh, brick Ellie was a name of an infamous 0:46:55.440 --> 0:47:01.120 red light district here in a section of Pittsburgh called 0:47:01.239 --> 0:47:08.279 McKey Sport. And uh he Steve hated the name, and 0:47:08.400 --> 0:47:10.440 my mother hated the name too, by the way, but 0:47:11.000 --> 0:47:15.560 that's a whole different story. But uh, he hated the name, 0:47:15.800 --> 0:47:18.480 and uh he want us to change it. Uh, So 0:47:18.600 --> 0:47:25.719 we came up with Houserockers, and uh, not too long ago, 0:47:25.760 --> 0:47:30.920 I discovered that Steve Poffovich with Steve van Zandt decided 0:47:30.960 --> 0:47:35.040 to christen us ourn City House Rockers because they were 0:47:35.120 --> 0:47:38.239 really into the regional thing at the time and wanted 0:47:38.280 --> 0:47:42.920 us to be a regional band be accepted in our 0:47:43.040 --> 0:47:46.239 own part of the world. So he dubbed us the 0:47:46.320 --> 0:47:47.560 Honest City Houserockers. 0:47:48.280 --> 0:47:49.920 And you know, we. 0:47:51.800 --> 0:47:54.640 Probably whined and cried about a little bit, but not 0:47:54.760 --> 0:47:56.520 too much because we were just happy to have a 0:47:56.600 --> 0:47:57.880 record coming out. 0:48:06.800 --> 0:48:10.719 So the record comes out, gets positive reviews, but it 0:48:10.800 --> 0:48:11.479 doesn't sell. 0:48:13.000 --> 0:48:14.040 It didn't sell too much. 0:48:14.200 --> 0:48:15.160 Now I did that. 0:48:15.320 --> 0:48:19.319 They made the sixty seventy thousand copies at the time, 0:48:21.440 --> 0:48:23.160 which are still pretty good. We got read up and 0:48:23.239 --> 0:48:27.560 Rolling Stone. I think it's surprised a hell lot everybody 0:48:27.800 --> 0:48:30.880 how well it did. Actually, And in those days, you know, 0:48:30.960 --> 0:48:33.040 you had to come up with a follow up really quickly. 0:48:33.880 --> 0:48:37.680 So we were back in this We put that out 0:48:37.719 --> 0:48:39.640 in seventy nine. We were back in the studio in 0:48:39.760 --> 0:48:44.120 February of nineteen eighty to record the follow up come. 0:48:44.040 --> 0:48:46.560 Out in May. Did you have all of those songs ready? 0:48:49.840 --> 0:48:52.480 Yeah, well we had a lot of them ready. You know, 0:48:55.960 --> 0:48:58.040 that's all I was doing, right, So I was playing 0:48:58.520 --> 0:49:04.600 they're not playing We had the misfortune of trying to 0:49:04.680 --> 0:49:08.640 monitor tour during the first real gas shortage. When you 0:49:08.680 --> 0:49:12.640 get gased, like if you had an odd number, even number, 0:49:13.080 --> 0:49:16.200 determined whether you had enough gas to go anywhere. So 0:49:16.320 --> 0:49:22.239 it's very, very difficult to tour. And I had it 0:49:22.400 --> 0:49:25.600 turned out to be a cancer scare. They found a 0:49:25.680 --> 0:49:29.040 tumor in my throat and I had at an emergency 0:49:29.080 --> 0:49:32.600 operation which turned out to be benign, thank god, so 0:49:32.760 --> 0:49:35.439 that not be off for a while. So our first 0:49:35.520 --> 0:49:40.919 record we did not tour much. We played probably from 0:49:43.400 --> 0:49:47.600 May to October a lot, and then then I had 0:49:47.640 --> 0:49:51.279 to take a couple of months off and used it 0:49:51.360 --> 0:49:54.360 to write a lot and then we're back in the 0:49:54.400 --> 0:49:55.440 studio in February. 0:49:56.760 --> 0:50:00.200 Okay, Now, when you're back in the studio, is it 0:50:00.320 --> 0:50:03.080 still one day on the weekends or is it more 0:50:03.160 --> 0:50:05.200 conventional where you're there for a few weeks. 0:50:06.040 --> 0:50:09.319 Now, we were, we were living the high life. Then 0:50:09.520 --> 0:50:15.640 it was New York City s I R Studios actually 0:50:15.760 --> 0:50:21.919 rehearsing and uh Steve and his partner Marty Moody. Steve 0:50:22.000 --> 0:50:26.799 Poppas and Marty Mudy were really loved music, really really 0:50:27.600 --> 0:50:31.160 good music guys, but they could not put their ideas 0:50:31.239 --> 0:50:37.319 across they weren't musically adept enough to describe what they 0:50:37.440 --> 0:50:41.879 wanted us to do. That I guess it made any sense. 0:50:42.960 --> 0:50:47.720 So one day, the first day in the studio, Steve 0:50:47.800 --> 0:50:52.800 Puppovitch shows up with Nick Ronson. Uh, it's because he 0:50:52.840 --> 0:50:56.640 had signed Ian Hunter and Hunter Ronson band at the 0:50:56.719 --> 0:51:03.440 moment that uh the record that Ian did Cleveland Rocks 0:51:04.400 --> 0:51:08.200 along with a schizophrenic And so mc ronson came in 0:51:08.280 --> 0:51:12.759 and start working with us, and then one day we 0:51:12.840 --> 0:51:15.440 had about a week or ten days of rehearse person 0:51:15.560 --> 0:51:20.440 at si R eight ten hours a day. Would usually 0:51:20.520 --> 0:51:25.919 rehearse in the morning by ourselves, then McK ronson would 0:51:25.920 --> 0:51:28.440 come in and work with us in the afternoon, and 0:51:28.560 --> 0:51:31.200 one morning Steve Papa shows up with Steve van ZANDT. 0:51:31.960 --> 0:51:34.200 So Steve van Zant would start working with us in 0:51:34.280 --> 0:51:37.960 the morning, and then mc ronson would come in in 0:51:38.040 --> 0:51:41.120 the afternoon. And then we went in the studio and 0:51:41.239 --> 0:51:45.080 sometimes Steve was there, sometimes Mick was there. Sometimes we're 0:51:45.160 --> 0:51:50.960 both there. And then Steve left to work on the River. 0:51:51.160 --> 0:51:54.640 I told he was working with the River was with 0:51:55.719 --> 0:52:01.239 Bruce and Ian Hunter started showing up. Mick Ronson, so 0:52:01.600 --> 0:52:07.920 There was a whole cast of characters contributing to that 0:52:08.040 --> 0:52:09.960 record have a Good Time to Get Out of Lives 0:52:10.000 --> 0:52:15.520 And Mick Ronson was responsible for so many arrangements. Steve 0:52:15.560 --> 0:52:19.000 an Zant was responsible for some of the arrangements, Ian 0:52:19.120 --> 0:52:22.440 Hunter was responsible for some of them, and and some 0:52:22.520 --> 0:52:25.799 of them were the band We were just transferred from 0:52:26.040 --> 0:52:27.359 what we were doing at home. 0:52:28.160 --> 0:52:31.279 Okay, So what was the special sauce of each of 0:52:31.320 --> 0:52:32.160 these individuals? 0:52:33.560 --> 0:52:37.759 Well, uh, first of all, uh, you know, they were 0:52:37.800 --> 0:52:40.960 the first rock stars we ever met. Uh, you know, 0:52:41.320 --> 0:52:45.400 we knew nothing about the music business. Uh and we 0:52:46.160 --> 0:52:48.680 we didn't even know anybody who worked in a record store. 0:52:50.000 --> 0:52:53.160 So they were pretty phenomenal. I mean we were raw 0:52:53.520 --> 0:52:59.279 as raw could be, and each of them had you know, 0:52:59.520 --> 0:53:04.320 they were all really good musicians obviously, and you know 0:53:04.440 --> 0:53:10.680 they were able to take a song and like rock 0:53:10.760 --> 0:53:15.720 Ola that closed the record. We went intoto that session 0:53:15.840 --> 0:53:21.640 with it being the fastest song on our in our 0:53:21.719 --> 0:53:24.960 repertoire that we were presenting everybody and just couldn't make 0:53:25.040 --> 0:53:29.400 it work. And Mick Ronson, who was a very good pianist, 0:53:29.880 --> 0:53:33.880 whatever and start playing the song as a ballad and 0:53:34.000 --> 0:53:38.640 completely transformed the song, and oh man, you know, how 0:53:38.719 --> 0:53:40.200 do they do that? You know, it just gave us 0:53:40.200 --> 0:53:43.120 a whole different perspective of how songs were written. And 0:53:43.239 --> 0:53:45.359 Steve van Zander did the same thing with the song 0:53:45.440 --> 0:53:48.560 that Ronson worked on. It was very slow called old 0:53:48.640 --> 0:53:53.120 Man's Bar and van Zane heard it and he changed 0:53:53.160 --> 0:53:57.440 it into Junior's Bar, which was one of our more 0:53:57.520 --> 0:54:02.880 popular songs to get played on the underground. And just 0:54:03.000 --> 0:54:06.600 watching this guy's work and how they arranged the the 0:54:06.880 --> 0:54:12.840 instruments and uh, you know, what not to play just 0:54:12.920 --> 0:54:16.080 as important as what to play. Give us some spaces 0:54:16.160 --> 0:54:18.840 and stuff, so you know. And then Ian come in 0:54:18.960 --> 0:54:21.160 and you know, he did the same thing. He just 0:54:21.360 --> 0:54:24.080 he took took one song and had nothing to do 0:54:24.320 --> 0:54:30.360 with the way he eventually, uh guided us through a 0:54:30.400 --> 0:54:33.200 song called Hypnotized, and it was just a germ of 0:54:33.239 --> 0:54:35.680 an idea and watch these guys just create something on 0:54:35.800 --> 0:54:39.480 the spot like that was. It was very very inspirational 0:54:39.680 --> 0:54:40.600 and educational. 0:54:42.160 --> 0:54:44.279 So tell me about the title track, have a good 0:54:44.320 --> 0:54:45.359 Time to get out a Lot. 0:54:46.320 --> 0:54:50.880 Yeah, well that's one we pretty much uh brought in 0:54:51.000 --> 0:54:56.200 from Pittsburgh. Well we're playing the bars in Pittsburgh in 0:54:56.280 --> 0:54:58.360 those days, it was a pretty rough time. You know, 0:54:58.440 --> 0:55:01.440 it's still it was still a lot of still workers, 0:55:02.440 --> 0:55:07.600 really tough. You know, the steelers were tough, the bars 0:55:07.680 --> 0:55:10.920 were tough, and some of the guys, Uh, we were 0:55:11.000 --> 0:55:14.320 drawing these really big crowds, and night after night it 0:55:14.360 --> 0:55:18.880 would break out in fights. And uh, during one of 0:55:18.960 --> 0:55:23.320 the uh riots when we were playing, you know, I 0:55:23.640 --> 0:55:27.560 stopped singing and trying to calm everybody down, and just 0:55:27.840 --> 0:55:29.680 a phrase just come out of my mouth. Hey guys, 0:55:29.719 --> 0:55:31.040 you know, I have a good time to get out 0:55:31.080 --> 0:55:34.160 of here alive, you know. And for some reason I 0:55:34.239 --> 0:55:36.600 got home that night and uh, I saw I'm basically 0:55:36.719 --> 0:55:40.360 just reade itself. Yeah, just one of those gifts that 0:55:40.480 --> 0:55:41.759 come to you occasionally. 0:55:42.000 --> 0:55:43.200 And what about Pumping Iron? 0:55:44.239 --> 0:55:48.440 Pumping Iron was the same thing. It was just about 0:55:48.480 --> 0:55:51.880 the local guys that we were hanging out with. And uh, 0:55:52.880 --> 0:55:55.920 you know, those those were two that pretty much stayed 0:55:55.960 --> 0:56:02.239 the same from the demo sessions. Uh. We did a 0:56:02.760 --> 0:56:06.680 two CD release of that on Cleveland not too long ago, 0:56:06.920 --> 0:56:09.840 and we put all the demos of those songs on it. 0:56:10.000 --> 0:56:12.600 So I don't know if we put the demo Pump Now, 0:56:12.719 --> 0:56:15.800 but Pump Now didn't change much there's pretty much what 0:56:15.960 --> 0:56:16.520 we were doing. 0:56:17.520 --> 0:56:19.399 Okay, you talk about the demos. A lot of people 0:56:19.480 --> 0:56:23.719 can't find the tracks from hit records. Are you a 0:56:23.840 --> 0:56:25.800 pack rat and you kept all this stuff or you 0:56:25.960 --> 0:56:28.600 have to look for it? I kept. 0:56:28.960 --> 0:56:31.600 I kept everything that I could get my hands on 0:56:31.719 --> 0:56:36.960 it through the years. You know, when we were doing 0:56:37.040 --> 0:56:38.840 Have a Good Time to Get Out Alive. It was 0:56:39.360 --> 0:56:44.239 forty years, and we transferred a lot of stuff from 0:56:44.320 --> 0:56:48.600 cassettes because that was like the main thing I would 0:56:48.640 --> 0:56:50.399 come home from the studio with. I had a good 0:56:50.480 --> 0:56:53.359 cassette player, and I didn't want to reel the real 0:56:54.920 --> 0:56:57.240 I didn't have one, so I'd come home with cassettes. 0:56:57.640 --> 0:57:02.080 But I did keep old, real copies of most everything 0:57:02.160 --> 0:57:08.080 I did so so I was able to be forcing 0:57:08.280 --> 0:57:11.400 enough to keep keep keep just about everything I've ever recorded. 0:57:12.600 --> 0:57:15.439 Okay, the album comes out gets a lot of ink, 0:57:15.520 --> 0:57:17.720 a lot of positive reviews. What was it like from 0:57:17.760 --> 0:57:18.520 your side of the. 0:57:18.560 --> 0:57:23.640 Fence, Well, it was one of those things were all 0:57:23.680 --> 0:57:26.160 of a sudden we were legit. You know, we were 0:57:26.280 --> 0:57:29.640 being talked about in the same breath as the Clash 0:57:29.840 --> 0:57:34.960 and Leonard Skinner and Bruce and Jay Giles and you know, 0:57:35.120 --> 0:57:38.080 all the guys that you know, we were big fans of, 0:57:38.840 --> 0:57:42.680 so it was it was a bit transformational and uh 0:57:43.680 --> 0:57:48.560 to realize that, you know, we're connecting in that fashion 0:57:49.440 --> 0:57:52.200 with a lot of people is very gratifying. 0:57:54.320 --> 0:57:58.120 Okay, so what's the process of that album coming out, 0:57:58.320 --> 0:58:00.600 going on the road, and then going back in the studio. 0:58:02.360 --> 0:58:08.200 Well, we played for as long as we could, and again, 0:58:08.360 --> 0:58:11.080 you know, we're doing an album a year. So it 0:58:11.520 --> 0:58:18.560 came around to the spring and Steve Popovich was very, 0:58:18.720 --> 0:58:24.160 very instrumental in our career and uh, you know, I 0:58:24.200 --> 0:58:27.040 don't want to second guests or think what those guys 0:58:27.120 --> 0:58:30.520 were doing, but they became, to my knowledge, they became 0:58:30.600 --> 0:58:35.439 embroiled trying to do a follow up about a bad 0:58:35.480 --> 0:58:38.840 out of Hell. It was a very very painful process 0:58:38.960 --> 0:58:42.000 for him. There was a lot of infighting and we 0:58:42.120 --> 0:58:47.360 were sort of left by the wayside, and we decided 0:58:47.440 --> 0:58:50.440 to go on our own and and just record the 0:58:50.520 --> 0:58:55.959 record because nobody was responding to us. So Denny rosen 0:58:56.080 --> 0:59:00.560 Krantz was our connection in Los Angeles, and he flew 0:59:00.680 --> 0:59:05.920 me out to l A and uh, he suggested we 0:59:06.120 --> 0:59:10.440 use Steve Cropper, and uh, you know, I took him 0:59:10.480 --> 0:59:13.080 up on it immediately because you know, a chance to 0:59:13.160 --> 0:59:15.960 work with all time greats, how could you pass that up? 0:59:17.000 --> 0:59:22.480 So we went back to Pittsburgh, wrote some songs Steve. 0:59:22.760 --> 0:59:26.200 Steve came in and sat with us for a week, 0:59:26.280 --> 0:59:30.360 ten days rehearsed, and every day went a couple of gigs. Uh, 0:59:30.520 --> 0:59:35.920 you know, just a real Trooper, and went out to 0:59:35.960 --> 0:59:39.360 Los Angeles and recorded Blood on the Bricks, our follow 0:59:39.480 --> 0:59:43.760 up at Cherokee Studios. By the way, on nov Our 0:59:43.840 --> 0:59:49.960 Records just did a two CD release re release of 0:59:51.560 --> 0:59:55.800 Blood on the Bricks, completely remastered in a CD of 0:59:55.920 --> 1:00:01.040 demos and live songs included in it, which really really 1:00:02.600 --> 1:00:11.080 great sounding compilation. And you know that really put a 1:00:11.120 --> 1:00:12.560 new shine on some of the songs. 1:00:13.840 --> 1:00:16.600 So what did Cropper bring to the studio? 1:00:17.760 --> 1:00:21.200 Well, Cropper. You know, when Steve my first thought that 1:00:21.280 --> 1:00:22.920 I was playing with Steve Cropper, of course I was 1:00:23.360 --> 1:00:26.480 thrilled beyond belief. But when he actually showed up the rehearsals, 1:00:26.520 --> 1:00:28.680 I sat down room. I was so nervous, my hands 1:00:28.720 --> 1:00:33.000 were shaken. I barely play guitar. But Steve just you know, 1:00:33.120 --> 1:00:36.120 he had a sense of rhythm and timing that was 1:00:36.560 --> 1:00:45.280 just impeccable and uh uh arrange arranging, you know, he 1:00:45.480 --> 1:00:50.200 he he he. He deferred to us if I was 1:00:50.280 --> 1:00:54.800 really adamant about doing something a particular song went to 1:00:54.880 --> 1:00:58.480 keep in. But you know, I just think, you know, uh, 1:00:58.800 --> 1:01:01.920 he brought out the best in the band because we 1:01:02.040 --> 1:01:06.160 were all so in all of them that we picked 1:01:06.240 --> 1:01:09.240 up everybody picked up their game as far as musically, 1:01:10.280 --> 1:01:14.120 just trying to show Steve we were worthy of playing 1:01:14.200 --> 1:01:14.520 with them. 1:01:16.040 --> 1:01:20.360 Okay, what was the consequence of that album coming. 1:01:20.160 --> 1:01:24.880 Out, Well, we had a remember Solid Gold. We were 1:01:24.960 --> 1:01:31.120 pick hitter a week on Solid Gold with Marilyn McCoo 1:01:31.160 --> 1:01:37.720 and Andy Gibb were the the co host. We recorded 1:01:37.920 --> 1:01:41.160 the Solid Gold the night the Dodgers won the World 1:01:41.280 --> 1:01:43.520 Series I think in nineteen eighty It was nineteen eighty 1:01:43.560 --> 1:01:47.880 one in La We were there that night and we 1:01:48.000 --> 1:01:50.880 were afraid that we weren't going to be able to 1:01:50.920 --> 1:01:53.040 get to the airport because the whole city would be 1:01:53.080 --> 1:01:56.240 going crazy. I Meanwhile, it barely made a blip on 1:01:56.320 --> 1:01:58.400 the map because when the Parts won the World Series 1:01:58.480 --> 1:02:03.560 in seventy nine just destroyed the city. The fans. 1:02:05.080 --> 1:02:08.760 Okay, the album comes out, it doesn't quite make the 1:02:08.880 --> 1:02:10.480 mark of the previous record. 1:02:11.600 --> 1:02:15.600 No, well again, Steve, Steve Puffett, we had no management, 1:02:16.680 --> 1:02:24.400 were rutterless, and it was very disheartening. And you know, 1:02:24.440 --> 1:02:27.600 in retrospect, you know, maybe we shouldn't have made that record, 1:02:27.640 --> 1:02:30.800 Maybe should have waited till we had our our act 1:02:30.880 --> 1:02:34.800 a little bit together, more together. But you know, we 1:02:34.920 --> 1:02:39.120 were young, and you know, we wanted to go. We 1:02:39.240 --> 1:02:40.920 want to keep going. We didn't want to just sit 1:02:40.960 --> 1:02:42.160 around and do nothing. 1:02:43.840 --> 1:02:48.120 And then you make one more record for MCA. 1:02:48.720 --> 1:02:51.960 Right cracking under pressure. I think they dropped us like 1:02:52.080 --> 1:02:54.520 three days after the record come on, and it wasn't 1:02:54.560 --> 1:02:57.400 a record we wanted to make anyway. So it's one 1:02:57.440 --> 1:02:59.439 of those things less said about it the better. 1:03:00.080 --> 1:03:01.440 What do you mean you didn't want to make it? 1:03:02.480 --> 1:03:05.680 Well, it's you know, we were using it was very 1:03:05.800 --> 1:03:10.120 eighty sounding. In retrospect, we should you know, we should have, 1:03:11.160 --> 1:03:14.680 and we were getting pressure from the record company to 1:03:15.120 --> 1:03:18.000 sound a certain way and you know, try to come 1:03:18.080 --> 1:03:22.240 up with a hit song and et cetera, et cetera, 1:03:22.960 --> 1:03:27.200 and you know we should have probably just again not 1:03:27.280 --> 1:03:31.680 it recorded that particular record, but we were impatient. 1:03:32.360 --> 1:03:34.800 Okay, but you know, the big gets dropped and then 1:03:34.840 --> 1:03:35.800 the band breaks up. 1:03:36.840 --> 1:03:39.520 Right, the band breaks up then, So what was that 1:03:39.760 --> 1:03:43.960 like for you? Well, everybody, it was very, very frustrating. 1:03:44.560 --> 1:03:45.160 And then. 1:03:47.120 --> 1:03:50.480 Art and I, you know, and jeff O Simmons is 1:03:50.600 --> 1:03:53.360 still playing with me. We put a band together and 1:03:55.440 --> 1:03:58.320 decided I wasn't going to go by Krisheky because I 1:03:58.440 --> 1:04:03.600 was tired of people butchering. I went by my childhood 1:04:03.680 --> 1:04:06.560 nicknamed Joey G. So we went back to Joey G 1:04:06.680 --> 1:04:08.520 in a Brooke Alley band. We had a local hit 1:04:08.560 --> 1:04:12.200 here in Pittsburgh, the very eighties sounded thing again, and 1:04:14.640 --> 1:04:20.880 and then that sort of ran its course and I 1:04:21.000 --> 1:04:25.000 was able to get back to the basics and got 1:04:25.080 --> 1:04:30.080 a record do with Brounder, and I decided from now 1:04:30.160 --> 1:04:33.600 on I was going to be uh put my name 1:04:33.640 --> 1:04:37.959 out front, uh just in case, you know, started losing 1:04:38.000 --> 1:04:41.280 band members again, because when I went from Iron City 1:04:41.360 --> 1:04:44.680 House Rockers to joe Brishecky, a lot of people did 1:04:44.800 --> 1:04:47.160 not recognize my name. I mean a lot of people 1:04:47.200 --> 1:04:51.160 knew who the Iron City House Rockers were, but people, 1:04:51.720 --> 1:04:55.400 unless they were fans in the band, didn't realize, you know, 1:04:55.440 --> 1:04:55.840 it was me. 1:05:04.040 --> 1:05:07.880 Okay, but you've been to the mountaintop and now you're 1:05:07.960 --> 1:05:08.920 back in the Valley. 1:05:09.160 --> 1:05:14.000 I've been to the mountaintop, oh Man, Big Valley, Big Valley. 1:05:14.840 --> 1:05:20.240 But you know, we were played locally. Yeah, we're from Boston, 1:05:20.400 --> 1:05:24.840 d C. New York City at Cleveland, so we had 1:05:24.880 --> 1:05:27.480 a you know, four or five state area that we 1:05:27.560 --> 1:05:29.040 played in pretty regularly. 1:05:30.080 --> 1:05:32.320 But it's not like today today. You know, it's hard 1:05:32.400 --> 1:05:36.600 to have a hit that everybody knows. Everybody's regional. Back then, 1:05:36.680 --> 1:05:39.280 it was about being on MTV, being on the radio, 1:05:39.400 --> 1:05:41.440 and if you didn't have a major label, that couldn't 1:05:41.440 --> 1:05:43.200 even happen relevant what you recorded. 1:05:43.480 --> 1:05:48.800 Yeah, you're you know, we were playing because we love 1:05:48.880 --> 1:05:50.040 to play basically. 1:05:50.600 --> 1:05:54.600 Well, how disillusioning was it that you came so close 1:05:55.560 --> 1:05:56.800 but it didn't happen for you. 1:05:59.240 --> 1:06:02.240 I was bitter for a while, for a long time, 1:06:02.920 --> 1:06:07.880 maybe a good five six seven years, especially because during 1:06:07.920 --> 1:06:13.040 the Blood of brick Are we had a uh, we 1:06:13.120 --> 1:06:16.120 were having conversations with Freddie demand. You know, Freddie is 1:06:16.200 --> 1:06:21.120 sure with ultimately work with Madonna. Yeah, yeah, he wanted 1:06:21.120 --> 1:06:24.040 to sign us he could, and we had a hard 1:06:24.120 --> 1:06:28.680 time getting free of our old contracts, and you know, 1:06:28.760 --> 1:06:32.600 he went on signed Madonna and we got one way 1:06:32.640 --> 1:06:33.760 ticket to the Lucaville. 1:06:35.080 --> 1:06:38.600 So well, how did you ultimately make peace that it 1:06:38.760 --> 1:06:39.920 wasn't gonna happen for you? 1:06:40.800 --> 1:06:45.240 Well, you know, I got married, remarried, start having children 1:06:45.320 --> 1:06:49.320 and realized that, you know, music is just part of 1:06:49.400 --> 1:06:53.200 my life. It wasn't my whole life. And uh, you know, 1:06:53.320 --> 1:06:55.000 realize if you have kids, you got to take care 1:06:55.000 --> 1:06:58.120 of him. They were more important than having a hit record. 1:06:59.120 --> 1:07:02.520 So when did you start working a day job? Again? Uh? 1:07:03.920 --> 1:07:09.160 Did rod eighty eight? 1:07:09.880 --> 1:07:11.080 And how did that come together? 1:07:12.440 --> 1:07:14.760 Well? I had a teaching degree, so I went down 1:07:14.840 --> 1:07:21.919 in communities uh uh community uh center in McKees Rocks, 1:07:21.920 --> 1:07:25.720 Pennsylvania and started teaching uh people to get their g 1:07:25.880 --> 1:07:29.360 e eds General Equivalency diploma. 1:07:30.000 --> 1:07:30.120 Uh. 1:07:30.560 --> 1:07:34.120 And it was very successful at it got hundreds of 1:07:34.200 --> 1:07:38.240 people their their high school diplomas and also did a 1:07:38.280 --> 1:07:45.040 little bit English as the second language. And but yeah, 1:07:45.360 --> 1:07:50.360 and then uh, you know, Johnny came along, and then I, 1:07:51.120 --> 1:07:54.800 you know, I was having the kids were having some 1:07:54.880 --> 1:07:57.240 health problems. I had no health insurance, so I had 1:07:57.280 --> 1:08:01.640 to get a job of some health chores. So I 1:08:01.720 --> 1:08:04.919 went into uh the special ed thing again. 1:08:06.520 --> 1:08:13.000 Okay, I mean is it tough emotionally or because you 1:08:13.080 --> 1:08:16.360 have a family. You say this is superior or do 1:08:16.479 --> 1:08:19.760 you feel like, as you say, bitter, how do you know, 1:08:19.960 --> 1:08:21.880 as I say, it's got to be really tough. You 1:08:21.960 --> 1:08:23.920 know a lot of people are musicians. You had a 1:08:24.040 --> 1:08:26.960 number of major label loubums. We're hanging with rock stars. 1:08:27.000 --> 1:08:31.280 Now you're back in Pittsburgh, right, Well, I just live 1:08:31.360 --> 1:08:35.080 with it. You know where it went. 1:08:35.280 --> 1:08:37.640 You know, we had our shot, we didn't quite make it, 1:08:37.800 --> 1:08:41.640 and you know I wanted to keep playing music. I 1:08:41.760 --> 1:08:42.720 just found a way to do it. 1:08:43.240 --> 1:08:43.599 I mean. 1:08:45.160 --> 1:08:48.719 When I uh, you know, we did a couple of records, 1:08:48.960 --> 1:08:55.519 and we were going nowhere fast, and I was start 1:08:55.600 --> 1:08:58.439 teaching special at again, and I was working with again. 1:08:58.520 --> 1:09:01.799 This is a misnomber of kids who were called socially 1:09:01.840 --> 1:09:06.679 and emotionally mal adjusted, were violent, A lot of violent kids. 1:09:07.000 --> 1:09:13.719 License to restrain. We're working there and still teaching ged 1:09:13.880 --> 1:09:16.840 at night. So I taught. I worked all day, taught 1:09:16.920 --> 1:09:20.439 G G D night, had a steady Wednesday night gig, 1:09:20.960 --> 1:09:23.520 and then we tried to playing most Fridays and Saturdays 1:09:24.280 --> 1:09:27.920 and some I still did a record called end of 1:09:28.000 --> 1:09:31.120 the Century of course man slightly out of time or 1:09:31.240 --> 1:09:36.360 end of the century. It was nineteen ninety two, and anyway, 1:09:38.479 --> 1:09:40.600 it was about it. I was about the end of 1:09:40.680 --> 1:09:46.040 my rope. And that's when my wife suggested that I 1:09:46.160 --> 1:09:50.120 give Bruce a call and turned into American Babylon Project, 1:09:50.200 --> 1:09:52.040 which gave me a new lease in life. 1:09:53.760 --> 1:09:56.120 Do you ever make any money as a house rocker? 1:09:57.160 --> 1:10:04.439 Uh? No, occasionally occasionally nice payday here and there, But yeah, 1:10:04.560 --> 1:10:06.400 I worked at Bay Gig til I was seventy five 1:10:06.479 --> 1:10:06.880 years old. 1:10:06.960 --> 1:10:13.320 So much kind So at this point any royalties, Uh. 1:10:15.280 --> 1:10:18.520 I don't know. Wait waiting for that big boat to arrive. 1:10:18.479 --> 1:10:22.559 You know, so obviously the kids are out of the house. 1:10:22.600 --> 1:10:24.479 What kept you working until seventy five? 1:10:27.560 --> 1:10:31.120 I like put food on the table. I got to 1:10:31.120 --> 1:10:33.680 the point where I had a serious back injury. It 1:10:33.760 --> 1:10:40.720 made it tough to to travel, and you know, just 1:10:41.439 --> 1:10:44.400 get used to a certain level of income. And you know, 1:10:44.560 --> 1:10:49.200 in a way it was very free because for some reason, 1:10:50.320 --> 1:10:53.040 you know, all these years of teaching, I was still 1:10:53.080 --> 1:10:57.200 able to write all these records. And my first year 1:10:57.240 --> 1:11:04.479 I had off as a retiree, I didn't write a 1:11:04.600 --> 1:11:08.479 song the whole year. You know, I just found a 1:11:08.520 --> 1:11:10.479 way to do it, maybe because I don't want to 1:11:10.520 --> 1:11:15.759 give up and you know, I always love playing music, 1:11:15.880 --> 1:11:22.400 and even in uh the worst of times, you know, 1:11:22.640 --> 1:11:24.439 it was it was something I always wanted to do. 1:11:24.920 --> 1:11:28.200 And my son started playing with me, and uh, I 1:11:28.280 --> 1:11:31.360 can remember one gig and I'm thinking, what am I? 1:11:31.680 --> 1:11:34.519 You know, I'm getting old. I'm up there killing myself 1:11:34.600 --> 1:11:37.120 as people even care what I'm doing. And I look 1:11:37.200 --> 1:11:40.280 over and he's to my right and he's just bashing 1:11:40.320 --> 1:11:42.280 away on a guitar and he's having the time of 1:11:42.400 --> 1:11:45.960 his life. And I think, yeah, you know, that's why 1:11:46.000 --> 1:11:49.080 I started doing this. So I always try to keep 1:11:49.120 --> 1:11:49.639 that in mind. 1:11:51.160 --> 1:11:53.320 So how do you finally decide to stop teaching? 1:11:54.600 --> 1:11:58.920 Well, I got offer for a buyot for health insurance, uh, 1:11:59.760 --> 1:12:01.800 you know, and I was getting up there in age 1:12:02.160 --> 1:12:05.840 so and I never had easy jobs. I had always 1:12:06.479 --> 1:12:10.240 worked in rough neighborhoods with really tough kids, so it 1:12:10.360 --> 1:12:11.880 was the easiest thing in the world to do. 1:12:12.320 --> 1:12:16.360 So if these kids are prone to being violent, how 1:12:16.400 --> 1:12:17.840 do you manage them? What do you how do you 1:12:17.920 --> 1:12:19.120 teach them? What's the key? 1:12:20.800 --> 1:12:24.800 Well, you have to be consistent, uh, you know, you 1:12:24.920 --> 1:12:28.600 have to set expectations and try to get them to 1:12:28.680 --> 1:12:30.400 live up to it. And you've got to show you 1:12:30.520 --> 1:12:35.000 care about them, and and uh, the ones that buy 1:12:35.080 --> 1:12:37.760 into that you have some results. And some of the 1:12:37.840 --> 1:12:41.400 kids are so damaged by the time you get them. 1:12:41.600 --> 1:12:44.800 You know that you just hope that they have some 1:12:45.040 --> 1:12:48.840 kind of decent life ahead of them. But yeah, you know, 1:12:48.880 --> 1:12:51.880 I run into kids all the time, now, you know 1:12:52.120 --> 1:12:55.479 that I tip back in the day, I just got 1:12:55.600 --> 1:13:01.080 an email from from somebody on LinkedIn, so vice president 1:13:01.200 --> 1:13:03.720 of the company, and he said, you know, thank you, 1:13:03.840 --> 1:13:07.000 mister chief for helping me out. You know, I had 1:13:07.040 --> 1:13:11.080 a bunch of kids that I was really really close to, 1:13:11.920 --> 1:13:17.080 and you know, I'm still contact with them. They still hey, 1:13:17.200 --> 1:13:19.800 mister G. You know, we love you, mister G. And 1:13:20.800 --> 1:13:22.880 one guy said I was the father he never had. 1:13:22.960 --> 1:13:25.760 So yeah, so I mean it's worth it, you know, 1:13:25.920 --> 1:13:29.400 less time in purgatory for me in some work, guys. 1:13:29.640 --> 1:13:35.439 You know, Okay, So how rewarding is that work compared 1:13:35.520 --> 1:13:40.160 to being on stage and having an audience response. 1:13:41.920 --> 1:13:48.240 Well, they're both rewarding in different ways. Having the audience 1:13:48.280 --> 1:13:50.880 response immediate, it's right there, boom boom boom. You know, 1:13:51.000 --> 1:13:52.679 some of these kids, you work with them for years 1:13:53.040 --> 1:13:57.479 before you see any kind of progress, and you know, 1:13:57.560 --> 1:14:00.240 it's it's it's it's really you can't compare you of them. 1:14:00.240 --> 1:14:04.639 They're they're too far apart. There's too they're so completely opposite. 1:14:04.680 --> 1:14:08.120 I mean, you know, as an artist and a musician, uh, 1:14:09.000 --> 1:14:12.200 you know, it's sort of like a you know, I 1:14:12.240 --> 1:14:15.160 don't give a ship, you know, when when you're gonna play, 1:14:15.439 --> 1:14:17.479 when I get there, when I feel like it, you know, 1:14:17.840 --> 1:14:19.320 what are you gonna do? I don't know. Let's make 1:14:19.360 --> 1:14:21.880 it up as we go along. But as a special 1:14:22.040 --> 1:14:24.720 ed teacher, with the kind of kids I worked with, 1:14:24.800 --> 1:14:27.599 you had to be very structured. You know, you had 1:14:27.640 --> 1:14:28.400 to be on the ball. 1:14:29.160 --> 1:14:29.360 Ah. 1:14:31.560 --> 1:14:33.880 You know, I used music a lot. I did a 1:14:33.960 --> 1:14:36.240 lot of a lot of music with some of the kids. 1:14:37.680 --> 1:14:40.760 You know, we did some great, great shows when I 1:14:40.840 --> 1:14:43.519 started working at a high school with some of the 1:14:43.680 --> 1:14:48.040 kids that I worked with, we did a motown review 1:14:48.160 --> 1:14:52.640 one time. It's terrific, and uh, you know, it's just 1:14:52.720 --> 1:14:57.920 two completely different parts of the brain at work. And 1:14:58.040 --> 1:15:04.000 I'm really right side. And for me to be organized 1:15:04.200 --> 1:15:09.519 and a teacher requires way way more effort than we 1:15:09.600 --> 1:15:10.799 get out and playing guitar. 1:15:12.479 --> 1:15:16.600 Okay, you've done a certain amount of charity work. Parkinson's 1:15:16.720 --> 1:15:19.720 tree of life. What's the motivation and how much of that. 1:15:19.800 --> 1:15:28.200 Do you do? Well? We've literally done hundreds of charity 1:15:28.240 --> 1:15:32.280 gigs over the years, and my parents always, you know, 1:15:33.560 --> 1:15:37.160 taught me to give to others less fortunate than yourself. 1:15:37.240 --> 1:15:42.439 And you know, the House Rockers, we always felt we're 1:15:42.520 --> 1:15:46.280 part of the community here in Pittsburgh. Whether everybody thinks 1:15:46.320 --> 1:15:49.439 that or not, we do. And as part of being 1:15:49.520 --> 1:15:52.960 good citizens, to give back to the community and personally, 1:15:54.200 --> 1:15:57.400 you know, to help others less fortunate than yourself, I 1:15:57.479 --> 1:16:00.559 think is something everybody should do. I mean, that's sort 1:16:00.600 --> 1:16:03.519 of a no brainer, right, everybody should do that. Why 1:16:03.560 --> 1:16:06.120 wouldn't you if you could, why wouldn't you help you 1:16:06.200 --> 1:16:06.720 fellow man? 1:16:08.720 --> 1:16:12.120 So if you leave the house and you go around, 1:16:12.160 --> 1:16:16.120 to what degree are you recognize in the Pittsburgh area, Uh. 1:16:17.400 --> 1:16:20.800 Various degrees. All depends the age group. Not so much 1:16:20.880 --> 1:16:24.479 with the youngsters, you know, probably under forties, under thirties. 1:16:24.960 --> 1:16:28.200 But you know, I mean everybody. You know, I go 1:16:28.360 --> 1:16:30.360 to the grocery store, people knows me. I go to 1:16:30.400 --> 1:16:37.639 the post office, you know, gas station, the mechanics pretty 1:16:37.720 --> 1:16:41.479 much buddies with with all of them. You know, Pittsburgh 1:16:41.560 --> 1:16:45.000 is a small city, but a big town. And uh, 1:16:45.760 --> 1:16:49.120 you know, there's always a small degree of separation. You 1:16:49.200 --> 1:16:52.280 know if you go to another town. You know, my 1:16:52.360 --> 1:16:56.479 son is over in Rome, and you know he runs 1:16:56.520 --> 1:17:02.360 into a musicians parents Rome. Hey, I shouldad doing, you know. 1:17:03.720 --> 1:17:10.280 And so you know it's Pittsburgh. Everybody is connected pretty closely, 1:17:11.840 --> 1:17:13.560 especially the musical community. 1:17:14.000 --> 1:17:18.520 So what is it about Pittsburgh. Certainly in the sixties, 1:17:19.680 --> 1:17:22.280 you know, you had the Pirates, you had Bill Masarowski. 1:17:23.240 --> 1:17:25.400 Then at the end of the decade the seventies, the 1:17:25.479 --> 1:17:30.880 steel mills closed. Now Pittsburgh is very hip again. I 1:17:31.000 --> 1:17:33.920 mean it used to be that Pittsburgh might as well 1:17:33.960 --> 1:17:35.000 have been Iowa City. 1:17:35.200 --> 1:17:35.320 Right. 1:17:35.640 --> 1:17:38.120 What is Pittsburgh like and how has it changed over 1:17:38.200 --> 1:17:40.240 your lifetime? Uh? 1:17:40.600 --> 1:17:42.400 Well, it used to be a lot tougher. 1:17:42.920 --> 1:17:43.080 You know. 1:17:43.360 --> 1:17:46.400 It was you know, a shot and a beer steel mill. 1:17:46.720 --> 1:17:50.719 You know, still those twenty four hours a day, terribly 1:17:50.840 --> 1:17:57.160 smelling dirty, and it has progressed into it and then it, 1:17:57.479 --> 1:17:59.679 you know, the hard time set and it had lost 1:17:59.720 --> 1:18:02.479 the world a lot of people. You know, we during 1:18:02.479 --> 1:18:05.800 the Iron City Houserocker era, we lost a third of 1:18:05.880 --> 1:18:08.960 our population here in Pittsburgh and a lot of our 1:18:09.080 --> 1:18:14.200 fans had to move out to uh find employment elsewhere. 1:18:16.960 --> 1:18:19.280 I don't know what it is about Pittsburgh. It's it's uh, 1:18:19.880 --> 1:18:28.760 it's it's community, neighborhood, family oriented people here, you know, 1:18:29.120 --> 1:18:34.040 pretty always sort of friendly once you get to know everybody. 1:18:34.080 --> 1:18:39.439 Everybody's kind of friendly and very few errors about. You know, 1:18:40.680 --> 1:18:46.160 nobody has a feeling of superorit superior superiority, being from 1:18:46.320 --> 1:18:50.600 uh you know, Lawrenceville Homestead, and. 1:18:52.439 --> 1:18:53.360 You know it was a lot of. 1:18:55.280 --> 1:18:59.640 Immigrant roots and people bomb together. Uh. 1:19:00.040 --> 1:19:02.040 You know, the town I grew up in. 1:19:02.200 --> 1:19:06.840 Was a small still uh, the coal mining town, and uh, 1:19:07.439 --> 1:19:10.560 there was nobody there but Serbians and Italians and the 1:19:10.640 --> 1:19:14.200 mixed marriage was a servant Italian and you know my 1:19:14.400 --> 1:19:18.719 grandmother could a Serbian man, could she cook good Italian food? 1:19:18.880 --> 1:19:23.280 Just because she was friends with everybody, and uh, you know, 1:19:23.320 --> 1:19:25.439 it was a rough time, but everybody sort of had 1:19:25.520 --> 1:19:33.080 your back. And uh, I think the Steelers when Pittsburgh 1:19:33.200 --> 1:19:36.400 was coming out at the uh the steelmalls collapsed and 1:19:36.720 --> 1:19:41.880 the Steelers and the Pirates sort of epitomized that. That's 1:19:41.920 --> 1:19:46.120 why the town became sports crazy, because it gave the 1:19:46.240 --> 1:19:51.320 town and identity. Hey, you know, we're tough, we're gonna 1:19:52.080 --> 1:19:54.400 we're gonna persevere, and we're gonna come out on top. 1:19:54.760 --> 1:19:58.360 That was always sort of the you know, people were 1:19:58.400 --> 1:19:59.559 not afraid of hard work here. 1:20:01.040 --> 1:20:03.280 So what's the status of your music career today and 1:20:03.400 --> 1:20:04.719 what were you playing writing? 1:20:05.640 --> 1:20:11.719 Well, my status is we signed to Omnivore Records. Last 1:20:11.800 --> 1:20:16.280 year we put out house rocker at Joe Grasheki Anthology, 1:20:16.439 --> 1:20:21.160 which was thirty six remastered tracks with a booklet and 1:20:21.240 --> 1:20:26.799 all the recording information. Extremely proud of that particular project. 1:20:26.880 --> 1:20:28.720 If I was going to say, hey, what were you 1:20:28.800 --> 1:20:32.160 doing for the last forty years, well here, yeah, listen 1:20:32.240 --> 1:20:36.519 to this. I'll tell you very very pleased with the 1:20:36.600 --> 1:20:41.880 results and sounds terrific. The music sounds, for the most part, 1:20:42.760 --> 1:20:45.519 sounds very current, like it could have been recorded and 1:20:45.640 --> 1:20:49.200 played that day or even written today. Then we put 1:20:49.240 --> 1:20:55.040 out a record called Cannot Run a Memory, which I 1:20:55.080 --> 1:20:57.439 think is one of my finest records we've ever done 1:20:58.080 --> 1:21:00.920 with a new band that we have Arnie Grosheky on 1:21:01.320 --> 1:21:10.320 guitar and helped produce it, Danny Gackner on guitar, Jeff 1:21:10.360 --> 1:21:15.360 Garrison on bass, and Jeff Jeffrey Jeffers Simon is on drums. 1:21:15.400 --> 1:21:19.080 He's been with me since nineteen eighty four. And Rick 1:21:19.120 --> 1:21:27.120 Wakowski is our producer all around jack altrades everything from 1:21:27.200 --> 1:21:31.680 vocals to keyboards and guitarist percussion. I still have the 1:21:31.760 --> 1:21:34.960 same road crew I've had for thirty years or more, 1:21:35.160 --> 1:21:38.640 Bryan Coleman, Rick U Black or a couple of new 1:21:38.720 --> 1:21:45.080 guys Mikey O'Toole and mikey Rita. Very fortunate have very 1:21:45.200 --> 1:21:53.960 loyal carrying band members. Blooding the Bricks came out, the 1:21:54.040 --> 1:21:59.600 Steve Cropper double CD we just put out, and a 1:21:59.680 --> 1:22:02.080 couple weeks we're going to release a new single called 1:22:02.439 --> 1:22:06.360 Living in a Blues Song, which is a statement on 1:22:06.479 --> 1:22:11.320 gun violence. Ah, we're getting ready to drop that, hopefully 1:22:11.400 --> 1:22:15.000 beyond two or three weeks. And we're working on a 1:22:15.080 --> 1:22:18.719 new record. So we're still going full speed ahead. 1:22:19.640 --> 1:22:22.200 And to what degree do you still have the dream 1:22:23.000 --> 1:22:25.360 or hopes? Are you're just saying this is what I do? 1:22:26.600 --> 1:22:29.479 Well, you know, this is it is what I do? 1:22:29.600 --> 1:22:32.800 You know? And like you say, people ask when I 1:22:32.840 --> 1:22:35.519 am not I can say well, I'm a musician before 1:22:35.560 --> 1:22:37.519 I say well, I'm a musician and a school teacher. 1:22:37.640 --> 1:22:40.400 Now I'm back to being a musician. And you know, 1:22:40.680 --> 1:22:42.680 I'm always thinking the next one I write is going 1:22:42.760 --> 1:22:45.040 to be the one that's gonna you know, put me 1:22:45.160 --> 1:22:49.439 on Easy Street, We'll buy the new Lexus. So you know, 1:22:49.520 --> 1:22:52.240 there's always that hope that so I'm always shooting for it. 1:22:52.360 --> 1:22:54.679 You know, I want that one big song, Bob. 1:22:55.000 --> 1:22:58.519 You know, well I hope you get it. Joe. I 1:22:58.640 --> 1:23:01.080 want to thank you so much for we're telling your 1:23:01.160 --> 1:23:02.360 story to my audience. 1:23:03.320 --> 1:23:05.439 Well, thank you for having me. It was great fun. 1:23:06.360 --> 1:23:09.000 Until next time. This is Bob left Sid