WEBVTT - Paul Shaffer

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob left Setts Podcast.

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<v Speaker 1>My guess is the one and only Paul Schaeffer. Paul,

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<v Speaker 1>you're doing this benefit for pop culture with Jeff Barry

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<v Speaker 1>on September thirteenth in Los Angeles.

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<v Speaker 2>Tell me about that, well, how much time do we have?

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<v Speaker 2>We have plenty of time go for It's a convocated story.

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<v Speaker 2>First of all, my daughter, Victoria Lily Schaeffer, what she's

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<v Speaker 2>thirty years old now. What she does is run a

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<v Speaker 2>rescue association here in Los Angeles. I'm visiting her now

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<v Speaker 2>I'm Los Angeles now called pop Culture and it's the

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<v Speaker 2>title of her book as well. She wrote a book

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<v Speaker 2>about pop culture because it's obviously about puppies, but also

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<v Speaker 2>the whole culture of you know, dog lovers and how

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<v Speaker 2>it comes upon a person, you know, sometimes not of

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<v Speaker 2>their own volition. Anyway, that's what she does. And then

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<v Speaker 2>we have the great songwriter Jeff Barry, who, with his

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<v Speaker 2>late wife Ellie Greenwich, wrote all of I Don't Know

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<v Speaker 2>about You, but they're all my favorite songsble starting from

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<v Speaker 2>be My Baby by the Rawnetes baby I Love You,

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<v Speaker 2>I Can Hear Music Do, a ditty from which we

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<v Speaker 2>called the title for our evening that we're going to

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<v Speaker 2>have September thirteenth here in La doa Ditties for Doggies.

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<v Speaker 2>Jeff is eighty five years old now but still funny

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<v Speaker 2>as hell. And his list of songs going through I

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<v Speaker 2>Honestly Love You by Olivia Newton John that he wrote

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<v Speaker 2>with Peter Allen and stuff. You know, he's got stories

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<v Speaker 2>for days. And I am what Irwin Corey used to

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<v Speaker 2>call himself the world's foremost authority on his stuff. And

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<v Speaker 2>Ellie was one of my good friends, his late wife,

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<v Speaker 2>and I worked with Jeff in seventy four. It's a

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<v Speaker 2>whole michigs that I could get into about how we

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<v Speaker 2>met and how long we've met. Anyway, he surfaced in

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<v Speaker 2>my life just simontaneously. I told him about my kids.

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<v Speaker 2>If Victoria's out there, he's in the next canyon over.

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<v Speaker 2>That's the way they speak out here on the coast.

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<v Speaker 2>And he said, well, we should do something and give

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<v Speaker 2>the you know, an evening and give the my songs

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<v Speaker 2>and stories and we'll give the money to Victoria's rescue.

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<v Speaker 2>And I said, you're on. So du Ditty's four Doggies

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<v Speaker 2>is going to It's live at the club called the

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<v Speaker 2>Right Off Room, The Right Off Room in Studio City, California,

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<v Speaker 2>on venture, I believe, And it's going to be Jeff

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<v Speaker 2>and I and you know, it's on the internet, of

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<v Speaker 2>course you could. We would love people to buy tickets

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<v Speaker 2>and events, so we know, you know, if we got

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<v Speaker 2>a show, if we've got an evening or not. So

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<v Speaker 2>far we're doing pretty well. It's where I'm like a

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<v Speaker 2>month away, but I can't wait. I just you know,

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<v Speaker 2>these songs and group of songs I've just been obsessed

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<v Speaker 2>with since I saw the Rawnettes on American Bandstand Do

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<v Speaker 2>It in the afternoon when the American Bandstand was on

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<v Speaker 2>a Saturday afternoon, and then went skiing in the freezing

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<v Speaker 2>frozen North where I was growing up, but couldn't get

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<v Speaker 2>this song out of my mind. You know, be my Baby.

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<v Speaker 2>What a sound and what a sentiment and what I mean,

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<v Speaker 2>what girls the Rawnettes? Oh my goodness. I was just

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<v Speaker 2>starting to, you know, learn about girls and stuff. This

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<v Speaker 2>is the way to go, and to learn what an

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<v Speaker 2>explosion on Saturday afternoon. So then you know, meeting Jeff

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<v Speaker 2>Barry later and working with him was just you know,

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<v Speaker 2>for me, incredible and I can't wait because even there's

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<v Speaker 2>things I got to know that I still don't understand

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<v Speaker 2>and know about how they wrote certain songs and stuff. Okay,

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<v Speaker 2>so what exactly hanky panky is another one? Right now?

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<v Speaker 1>What I think was the show going to be?

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<v Speaker 2>Well, Jeff sings. He was a vocalist too, back in

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<v Speaker 2>the day and by the day, I mean, you know,

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<v Speaker 2>the late fifties, early sixties. Then he became a writer

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<v Speaker 2>and his first hit as a writer was Tell Laura

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<v Speaker 2>I love her. Remember that, repur Laura, I love it?

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<v Speaker 2>Come on exactly what great melody? And what you know?

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<v Speaker 2>What a story about a star car race and a death?

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<v Speaker 2>Tell Laura? Well he opens with that, you know, and

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<v Speaker 2>then we're just going to get into it. I want

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<v Speaker 2>to hear immediately about you know what, what is the

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<v Speaker 2>story behind it? And how did you know? Where the

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<v Speaker 2>hell did you come from? And all kinds of things.

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<v Speaker 2>And it turns out we have we both have Don

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<v Speaker 2>Rickles's stories. We've already established that. So we're going to

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<v Speaker 2>get those in, you know, before we do anything else.

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<v Speaker 2>And then just it's going to be all music. And

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<v Speaker 2>you know, when he does say the do ron ron,

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<v Speaker 2>the audience just will be singing along naturally, they can't

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<v Speaker 2>help themselves. He says, you know, once in a while,

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<v Speaker 2>he hasn't done it much, but once in a while

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<v Speaker 2>he does a thing like this with a pianist, he says.

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<v Speaker 2>You know, when I say, met him on Monday, and

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<v Speaker 2>he looks so fun the audience just is there to do, run, run,

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<v Speaker 2>you know. And so I'll be the pianist playing for him.

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<v Speaker 2>And nobody plays these songs better because nobody loves them

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<v Speaker 2>like I do. And we're just going to go through

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<v Speaker 2>all the hits, including I Honestly Love You, you know, for

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<v Speaker 2>Olivia Newton John that he's also going to sing, and

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<v Speaker 2>then you know, other surprises. But I'll give away one

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<v Speaker 2>surprises because you asked. But we have a dear friend

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<v Speaker 2>in common whose name is Ron Dante. And Ron was

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<v Speaker 2>the voice of the Archies when they sang Sugar Sugar,

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<v Speaker 2>another of Jeff's compositions. So I got and Ron really

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<v Speaker 2>got me started doing arrangements in the studios in New

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<v Speaker 2>York in the seventies because he heard a thing that

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<v Speaker 2>Jeff and I had done together, and so I just

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<v Speaker 2>called around. You know, He's going to come over and

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<v Speaker 2>sing sugar, Sugar, that'll be part of the evening too,

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<v Speaker 2>and you never know, there may be other surprise.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, you got to tell one Don Rickles story.

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<v Speaker 2>Okay, I'll tell mine. The first time he did Letterman,

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<v Speaker 2>I was thrilled because he had obviously watched the show

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<v Speaker 2>and knew my name was early in our run. And

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<v Speaker 2>he turned to me on the panel and he said, Paul,

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<v Speaker 2>have your self committed? That's it, jeffs is funny even.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, you're with your sister. You resume your daughter in

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<v Speaker 1>the Sian Finando, are you staying in her house or

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<v Speaker 1>staying in a hotel?

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<v Speaker 2>Staying at her house this time?

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<v Speaker 1>What is that like all these years later?

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<v Speaker 2>Well, first of all, she's got a wonderful gentleman with

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<v Speaker 2>whom you know who is sharing this house with her

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<v Speaker 2>as well, named Brandon More and you know, not not

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<v Speaker 2>involved in show business at all, but you know they

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<v Speaker 2>are a serious couple and we have to stay out

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<v Speaker 2>of their way and be respectful. So of course it's

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<v Speaker 2>a little bit of a of a tap dance, and

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<v Speaker 2>my wife can't help herself but to say, you know,

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<v Speaker 2>you haven't changed this light bulb since we were here, honey,

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<v Speaker 2>cool it with the lightbell. You know, it's it's as

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<v Speaker 2>exactly as you might imagine, but it's it's great to

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<v Speaker 2>see Victoria, and the fact that we can still do

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<v Speaker 2>it at all is I guess quite amazing.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, you come to the West Coast. Are you the

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<v Speaker 1>type of person who emails people in Vance and Texam

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<v Speaker 1>I'm coming. We got to get together or is it

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<v Speaker 1>more of a family homebody thing.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, and you know, different trips. Toy's been out here

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<v Speaker 2>for a few years now, I'm not even sure six

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<v Speaker 2>eight years, so every trip can be different. And I

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<v Speaker 2>do have some friends here, and some of my Canadian

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<v Speaker 2>friends live here, you know, transplants, and sometimes I do

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<v Speaker 2>get to get to see them, and sometimes it's just

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<v Speaker 2>all about Victoria and family visits too, so you know,

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<v Speaker 2>we do it both ways.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, certainly you have a long reputation as being mister

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<v Speaker 1>showbiz appreciating these people, knowing their backstories. Did you really

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<v Speaker 1>only see them on television when you were on the

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<v Speaker 1>show or are they friends?

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<v Speaker 2>Uh? Well, I've got to get some clarification on the question.

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<v Speaker 2>Currently you're talking about me today. Well, yes, give me

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<v Speaker 2>an example.

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<v Speaker 1>I don't need to separate. It could be. You know,

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<v Speaker 1>what I'm really asking is Dave was famous for not

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<v Speaker 1>hanging with the guests. Oh yeah, even though we saw

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<v Speaker 1>our guests all the time. Although Dave sort of stood

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<v Speaker 1>apart from showbiz, whereas you were heavily immersed in love,

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<v Speaker 1>showbiz knew everybody's story. So when people were in town

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<v Speaker 1>in New York to be on the show, would you

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<v Speaker 1>go hang with them after the show? When you came

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<v Speaker 1>to the West Coast, would you bring them up both

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<v Speaker 1>when you were on television all those nights a week

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<v Speaker 1>and now.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, certainly some you know, by the time I got

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<v Speaker 2>on on the Letterman Show, I was thirty two, had

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<v Speaker 2>already done you know, five years of the first five

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<v Speaker 2>years of Saturday Night Live. So for instance, I had

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<v Speaker 2>friends who had been you know, in the cast and

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<v Speaker 2>Saturday Night Live. It's still friends. If someone like it,

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<v Speaker 2>a Dan Ackroyd or something, we absolutely might have hung

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<v Speaker 2>out afterwards. Martin Short, you know who, with Eugene Levy

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<v Speaker 2>and Dave Thomash are really my three closest friends from Canada.

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<v Speaker 2>If any of them, well, when Martin Short would do it,

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<v Speaker 2>you know, we sort of had a tradition we would

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<v Speaker 2>we try to keep the limo that they sent for him,

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<v Speaker 2>and we we would specifically go hit the town, you know,

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<v Speaker 2>because he would come from. As I said, he lives

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<v Speaker 2>in Los Angeles, Like maybe not said it, but one

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<v Speaker 2>of the people that I might call up coming. So

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<v Speaker 2>you know, these are our actual friends. Now. Maybe back

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<v Speaker 2>in the eighties, Oh, we had a couple of classic

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<v Speaker 2>jam sessions after shows here and there, you know, where

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<v Speaker 2>a musician might say, hey, let's you know, can we

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<v Speaker 2>get a little rehearsal studio in jams. So that did

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<v Speaker 2>happen when we but we were we had the energy

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<v Speaker 2>to do it afterwards. By the end of the show,

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<v Speaker 2>Believe me, I was just as happy to go home.

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<v Speaker 2>So tired all the time. It was doing a show

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<v Speaker 2>every single day. You look at even the guys doing

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<v Speaker 2>these daily shows. Now, I saw Seth Meyers the other day.

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<v Speaker 2>Oh my god, it's just exhausted, just like I was

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<v Speaker 2>when you're doing it every single day.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, so the show ends, Yeah, and at first there's

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<v Speaker 1>a relief. But yeah, it must have been a big

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<v Speaker 1>emotional adjustment.

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<v Speaker 2>I think you're right. And it was physical too. First

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<v Speaker 2>of all, I was a migraine sufferer. During the show,

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<v Speaker 2>I was on a drug called Gaba Penton. There are a

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<v Speaker 2>lot of people seem to know what it is now, Yeah,

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<v Speaker 2>just for migraine headaches. On a huge dose of it.

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<v Speaker 2>And as soon as the show ended, it stopped working.

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<v Speaker 2>I got started getting headaches again, which was also kind

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<v Speaker 2>of part of it. Anyway, when you're a migraine suffer,

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<v Speaker 2>sometimes on the weekends, when the pressure's off, that's when

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<v Speaker 2>you get a headache. You know, during the week you're

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<v Speaker 2>kind of guarding. Anyway, that happened to me, and I

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<v Speaker 2>had to get off that Gaba Penton, which was a

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<v Speaker 2>whole another you know, ordeal, and so all of that happened,

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<v Speaker 2>and emotionally, well, you know, even before emotionally your schedule

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<v Speaker 2>is different. Absolutely start getting hyped up at about four

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<v Speaker 2>thirty because the tape you st roll at five thirty,

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<v Speaker 2>and then you wait, I don't have to do the show,

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<v Speaker 2>but boy, you certainly miss it. And I definitely missed it.

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<v Speaker 2>For my goodness, you know, certainly the first year or

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<v Speaker 2>two until I readjusted anything, I didn't feel busy at all.

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<v Speaker 2>Even if I had like a week of recording sessions.

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<v Speaker 2>There's just kind of nothing compared to how busy we

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<v Speaker 2>all were doing that daily show. And it was yeah,

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<v Speaker 2>pressure filled and I had headaches all the time, but

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<v Speaker 2>you get used to it, and you know, yeah, it

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<v Speaker 2>took me a while to get over it. Now I'm

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<v Speaker 2>over it and say, as I heard Dave let him

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<v Speaker 2>and say the other day, I think we may have

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<v Speaker 2>done it maybe five years too long because we were

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<v Speaker 2>up there and it takes some energy.

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<v Speaker 1>So you're saying the energy was depleted and it hurt

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<v Speaker 1>the show a little.

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<v Speaker 2>Bit, No, you know, because Dave would never let that happen.

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<v Speaker 2>I think it's more of a effect that I was saying,

0:13:10.760 --> 0:13:13.880
<v Speaker 2>attired all the time, You're gonna get up for that

0:13:13.960 --> 0:13:15.520
<v Speaker 2>show and do the best, you know, and he was.

0:13:16.120 --> 0:13:18.640
<v Speaker 2>He never stopped coming in super early in the morning,

0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:22.320
<v Speaker 2>staying super late analyzing the show. That never let up.

0:13:22.360 --> 0:13:24.640
<v Speaker 2>I think he just had to. It's a little harder

0:13:24.640 --> 0:13:25.640
<v Speaker 2>to summon the energy.

0:13:26.559 --> 0:13:30.240
<v Speaker 1>Okay. I've been to Canada a million times. Love Canada.

0:13:30.880 --> 0:13:35.200
<v Speaker 1>But starting in the eighties, so you're growing up in

0:13:35.240 --> 0:13:37.920
<v Speaker 1>the fifties and sixties, Like if you go to some

0:13:37.960 --> 0:13:41.200
<v Speaker 1>of these foreign countries like Norway, they were really in

0:13:41.280 --> 0:13:44.520
<v Speaker 1>the dark ages ultimately, Norway got money from Oyal and

0:13:44.559 --> 0:13:47.400
<v Speaker 1>had changed thing. Did you feel like you were on

0:13:47.440 --> 0:13:50.800
<v Speaker 1>the outside looking in or did you just feel part

0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:54.480
<v Speaker 1>of the whole United States stream?

0:13:54.520 --> 0:13:58.720
<v Speaker 2>Outside looking in? For sure? And I think that you

0:13:58.720 --> 0:14:02.480
<v Speaker 2>know a lot of people, Uh ask me and my

0:14:02.600 --> 0:14:06.040
<v Speaker 2>Canadian friends all the time, why there's so many you know,

0:14:06.160 --> 0:14:09.280
<v Speaker 2>especially in comedy. Why is there so much comedy coming

0:14:09.280 --> 0:14:13.160
<v Speaker 2>from Canada, Canadians coming to me. I think that's a

0:14:13.200 --> 0:14:15.840
<v Speaker 2>good part of it. We were so close to it,

0:14:16.679 --> 0:14:20.720
<v Speaker 2>but so far, and we were studying it, you know,

0:14:20.800 --> 0:14:25.680
<v Speaker 2>we studied the Ed Sullivan Show just as closely as

0:14:25.720 --> 0:14:28.760
<v Speaker 2>anybody else, but to us it was even more special

0:14:30.240 --> 0:14:33.480
<v Speaker 2>to get to see Sophie Tucker or something. And I

0:14:33.520 --> 0:14:36.000
<v Speaker 2>don't know, it was just really I was very far

0:14:36.040 --> 0:14:38.920
<v Speaker 2>away from it up in thunder Bay, Ontario.

0:14:40.040 --> 0:14:42.680
<v Speaker 1>Okay, you're growing up. What kind of kid are you?

0:14:45.360 --> 0:14:52.760
<v Speaker 2>Kind of shy and an only child, quiet and had

0:14:52.800 --> 0:14:59.120
<v Speaker 2>all the privacy I would want as a kid, didn't

0:14:59.160 --> 0:15:01.680
<v Speaker 2>really fit in. Have to be kind of rugged and

0:15:01.840 --> 0:15:06.480
<v Speaker 2>love the outdoors to feel comfortable in thunder Bay, Ontario,

0:15:06.560 --> 0:15:08.920
<v Speaker 2>And when I was a kid was called Fort William

0:15:09.400 --> 0:15:14.200
<v Speaker 2>and Port Arthur, and the two cities amalgamated. But if

0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:17.720
<v Speaker 2>you love you know, and I did ski for sure,

0:15:19.000 --> 0:15:21.040
<v Speaker 2>because it was you know, socially, as a kid, you

0:15:21.120 --> 0:15:24.360
<v Speaker 2>had to either ski or skate. And I was a skier.

0:15:24.360 --> 0:15:27.720
<v Speaker 2>And you know, a badge of honor would be if

0:15:27.720 --> 0:15:31.200
<v Speaker 2>you could stay up and party, you know, into the

0:15:31.240 --> 0:15:34.200
<v Speaker 2>evening and then be on the slopes at eight am

0:15:34.320 --> 0:15:37.280
<v Speaker 2>as soon as the chairlifts. You know that that's a man,

0:15:38.240 --> 0:15:40.400
<v Speaker 2>you know, or a gal who knows how to party.

0:15:40.440 --> 0:15:45.720
<v Speaker 2>But and I was doing that kind of stuff and

0:15:45.760 --> 0:15:47.280
<v Speaker 2>it was cold as hell.

0:15:48.160 --> 0:15:50.400
<v Speaker 1>Okay, let's stalk with the skiing thing for a minute.

0:15:50.560 --> 0:15:54.720
<v Speaker 1>On Dave's final show, the final shot is him skiing

0:15:54.800 --> 0:15:59.280
<v Speaker 1>with his son. There was video, beautiful. Okay, when was

0:15:59.320 --> 0:16:00.560
<v Speaker 1>the last time you skied?

0:16:01.680 --> 0:16:03.040
<v Speaker 2>Not since I left thunder Bay.

0:16:04.360 --> 0:16:06.640
<v Speaker 1>So once you left, that was it. Not when your

0:16:06.720 --> 0:16:09.080
<v Speaker 1>kids growing up, not like, well, let's do this as

0:16:09.120 --> 0:16:10.160
<v Speaker 1>a family now.

0:16:10.200 --> 0:16:12.360
<v Speaker 2>And I feel, as you know, one thing that I

0:16:12.480 --> 0:16:16.240
<v Speaker 2>was a little negligent. I really tried to step up

0:16:16.280 --> 0:16:18.360
<v Speaker 2>and be you know, and I had a son besides Victoria,

0:16:18.400 --> 0:16:21.720
<v Speaker 2>I've got a twenty four year old son. And you know,

0:16:22.200 --> 0:16:26.240
<v Speaker 2>just like in the movie you play Carousel, My god,

0:16:26.280 --> 0:16:28.880
<v Speaker 2>you got to be a father to a son, and

0:16:28.920 --> 0:16:31.320
<v Speaker 2>I did my best, but skiing, no, I would not,

0:16:31.560 --> 0:16:33.880
<v Speaker 2>you know, it wasn't worth it because I could. I

0:16:33.920 --> 0:16:38.760
<v Speaker 2>can't imagine having any kind of gortex or material things

0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:41.080
<v Speaker 2>that they have now that keep you warm. Oh yeah,

0:16:41.120 --> 0:16:44.880
<v Speaker 2>we better not only freezing but kind of bundled up,

0:16:45.280 --> 0:16:48.200
<v Speaker 2>could barely move ski poles in your hand and just

0:16:48.320 --> 0:16:51.840
<v Speaker 2>you know, coming, Oh my goodness. But as far as

0:16:51.840 --> 0:16:54.560
<v Speaker 2>the kind of kid I was, I've got this recollection

0:16:54.680 --> 0:17:00.200
<v Speaker 2>of waiting for the chairlift at the bottom, and when

0:17:00.200 --> 0:17:03.600
<v Speaker 2>you're not skiing, it's even colder. You're just standing there,

0:17:05.240 --> 0:17:08.920
<v Speaker 2>you know, it's way ah and you're in northern Ontario,

0:17:09.560 --> 0:17:13.080
<v Speaker 2>and the chairlift was blasting music like they might add

0:17:13.600 --> 0:17:17.000
<v Speaker 2>a carnival, you know, in front of a ride, blasting

0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:21.280
<v Speaker 2>out music. And I hear, you know, as I'm waiting,

0:17:21.400 --> 0:17:23.840
<v Speaker 2>I hear this for the very first time, and I

0:17:23.960 --> 0:17:30.760
<v Speaker 2>think I would have been twelve. I hear the Tokens

0:17:30.800 --> 0:17:35.280
<v Speaker 2>record the Lion sleeps. Oh wow. And it was again

0:17:35.480 --> 0:17:38.600
<v Speaker 2>sort of like that, you know, experience of the rawat

0:17:38.600 --> 0:17:41.280
<v Speaker 2>seeing the but even more immediate. That got me through

0:17:41.280 --> 0:17:44.439
<v Speaker 2>the day of skiing, and why I come down and

0:17:44.520 --> 0:17:49.000
<v Speaker 2>waiting again. You'd hear it again, and every time I

0:17:49.440 --> 0:17:53.359
<v Speaker 2>couldn't believe the sound. The sound just kind of galvanized me.

0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:57.000
<v Speaker 2>And that got me, you know. That's what became important

0:17:57.040 --> 0:17:58.560
<v Speaker 2>to me and kind of saved my life. I think

0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:01.280
<v Speaker 2>a lot of rock and rollers talk about it. Okay,

0:18:01.560 --> 0:18:04.359
<v Speaker 2>rock and roll will save my life. So music in

0:18:04.440 --> 0:18:07.400
<v Speaker 2>the household? And when did you start taking piano lessons?

0:18:09.359 --> 0:18:12.960
<v Speaker 2>My mother has said, you'll take lessons when you are six.

0:18:13.880 --> 0:18:17.360
<v Speaker 2>When do you start to learn how to read in school?

0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:21.840
<v Speaker 2>Read English? That's the time, That's what she believed. And

0:18:21.880 --> 0:18:24.320
<v Speaker 2>so I started lessons at age six.

0:18:24.760 --> 0:18:26.920
<v Speaker 1>You know, I took piano lessons at the same age,

0:18:27.359 --> 0:18:31.440
<v Speaker 1>actually started at five. But you can go to lessons

0:18:31.480 --> 0:18:34.239
<v Speaker 1>and not practice and not be into it, or you

0:18:34.280 --> 0:18:36.760
<v Speaker 1>can be into it. Were you always into it? Or

0:18:36.840 --> 0:18:39.679
<v Speaker 1>was when you heard the tokens on or something that

0:18:39.760 --> 0:18:41.520
<v Speaker 1>you became accelerated.

0:18:42.960 --> 0:18:45.040
<v Speaker 2>I always into it in that My mother kind of

0:18:45.080 --> 0:18:47.800
<v Speaker 2>set me up. She was one of those Jewish mothers

0:18:47.800 --> 0:18:50.639
<v Speaker 2>who had music in the house specifically so that I

0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:54.240
<v Speaker 2>would get involved in it. And she played chopin and

0:18:55.160 --> 0:18:59.639
<v Speaker 2>she played Broadway music the ethel Merman and Mary Martin

0:18:59.680 --> 0:19:03.680
<v Speaker 2>at Carnegie Hall and it just you know, it does

0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:07.000
<v Speaker 2>seep in rock, monerof and stuff. That was her music.

0:19:07.000 --> 0:19:12.600
<v Speaker 2>And then my dad, this conservative lawyer from thunder Bay,

0:19:13.200 --> 0:19:17.800
<v Speaker 2>small town lawyer, but he dug the great jazz vocalists

0:19:18.320 --> 0:19:21.520
<v Speaker 2>Billy Eckstein and Sarah vaugh and he turned me onto

0:19:21.600 --> 0:19:24.280
<v Speaker 2>Ray Charles. On Sundays, you know, he would put on

0:19:24.359 --> 0:19:31.040
<v Speaker 2>his records and won Ray Charles. So that was pretty,

0:19:31.119 --> 0:19:33.879
<v Speaker 2>you know, pretty good. And my mother also was a pianist,

0:19:34.480 --> 0:19:38.680
<v Speaker 2>played you know, not professionally or anything, but could play

0:19:38.720 --> 0:19:42.240
<v Speaker 2>the piano certain classical things from music. And I remember,

0:19:42.240 --> 0:19:45.240
<v Speaker 2>as an infant being under the piano as she played,

0:19:45.960 --> 0:19:50.960
<v Speaker 2>feeling of it, you know, the sound coming down. But

0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:53.879
<v Speaker 2>as soon as she got me playing taking lessons, she

0:19:53.960 --> 0:19:57.720
<v Speaker 2>stopped playing, never played again, almost like her work was

0:19:57.800 --> 0:20:02.680
<v Speaker 2>done because I was playing and I played these lessons,

0:20:02.760 --> 0:20:07.879
<v Speaker 2>and I don't know the first lesson. I came home

0:20:08.080 --> 0:20:12.080
<v Speaker 2>and I started figuring out my own, you know, melodies,

0:20:12.119 --> 0:20:14.520
<v Speaker 2>not that I ever wrote. I was not a writer,

0:20:14.680 --> 0:20:17.399
<v Speaker 2>but just I figured out that you could play the

0:20:17.560 --> 0:20:21.120
<v Speaker 2>William tell overture, which every kid was on our mind

0:20:21.119 --> 0:20:25.560
<v Speaker 2>because of the Lone Ranger television, mostly on all Black Keys.

0:20:26.280 --> 0:20:28.280
<v Speaker 2>But I couldn't even figure that out until that first

0:20:28.359 --> 0:20:30.600
<v Speaker 2>lesson came home, though, and that's what I wanted to. Hey,

0:20:32.760 --> 0:20:35.080
<v Speaker 2>you can actually, you know, and that's I kind of

0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:38.520
<v Speaker 2>started getting interested right away and playing by ear, and

0:20:38.560 --> 0:20:42.720
<v Speaker 2>that's really what, you know, what became important to me

0:20:42.760 --> 0:20:47.320
<v Speaker 2>and what I still really do. Maybe why I never

0:20:47.400 --> 0:20:50.040
<v Speaker 2>really wrote or I found you know, I only wrote

0:20:50.040 --> 0:20:52.480
<v Speaker 2>one or two songs my whole life because of what

0:20:52.560 --> 0:20:54.359
<v Speaker 2>I really like to do is sit down and play

0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:57.480
<v Speaker 2>the songs that I know. So I never bought records,

0:20:57.760 --> 0:20:59.720
<v Speaker 2>but as I was listening, you know, I didn't buy

0:20:59.760 --> 0:21:01.680
<v Speaker 2>Being My Baby, but I could sure play it and

0:21:01.720 --> 0:21:05.040
<v Speaker 2>I used to pound it out on the piano really loud,

0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:07.480
<v Speaker 2>get the sound up, you know, and kind of play

0:21:07.600 --> 0:21:11.200
<v Speaker 2>all the different parts, not on out the string part

0:21:11.240 --> 0:21:15.600
<v Speaker 2>and stuff, you know, just figuring out my ear. And

0:21:15.960 --> 0:21:17.679
<v Speaker 2>I still get my kicks doing that.

0:21:25.000 --> 0:21:29.760
<v Speaker 1>Okay, Brian Wilson feels the same way Be My Baby,

0:21:30.359 --> 0:21:33.760
<v Speaker 1>as you and me both know, interacting with Brian Wilson

0:21:33.840 --> 0:21:37.200
<v Speaker 1>is its own special, uh situation. But did you ever

0:21:37.240 --> 0:21:38.280
<v Speaker 1>discuss that with Brian?

0:21:40.000 --> 0:21:48.520
<v Speaker 2>Yeah? Sure you can almost have to. Well, Uh, there

0:21:48.560 --> 0:21:51.600
<v Speaker 2>was a point when and this is really it's not

0:21:51.680 --> 0:21:53.520
<v Speaker 2>my own story. I've been reported back to me, but

0:21:53.560 --> 0:21:55.240
<v Speaker 2>I kind of had something to do that I was.

0:21:55.560 --> 0:21:57.840
<v Speaker 2>I missed the second season of Saturday Night Life because

0:21:57.880 --> 0:22:00.639
<v Speaker 2>I was in California doing my show and got to

0:22:00.640 --> 0:22:04.160
<v Speaker 2>work with Jeff Barry. But during that season, Brian appeared

0:22:04.160 --> 0:22:08.720
<v Speaker 2>as a guest. I believe, and the singers were gotten.

0:22:08.840 --> 0:22:12.760
<v Speaker 2>You know Howard Shore Musical got Brian the singers background

0:22:12.760 --> 0:22:16.879
<v Speaker 2>singers the kind of people that I know. Susan Collins another,

0:22:17.440 --> 0:22:19.520
<v Speaker 2>you know, a woman who stands at attention for be

0:22:19.640 --> 0:22:23.840
<v Speaker 2>my Baby and can sing with that Ronnie sound, and

0:22:24.000 --> 0:22:27.879
<v Speaker 2>Ellie and Susan knew. Ellie Greenwich, the actual Eli Grittich,

0:22:27.960 --> 0:22:33.440
<v Speaker 2>sang background for for Brian Wilson, and Brian heard that

0:22:33.680 --> 0:22:37.960
<v Speaker 2>Ellie had written be my Baby. He was just, you know,

0:22:38.040 --> 0:22:42.400
<v Speaker 2>he was floored. He became, he became, he became her

0:22:42.440 --> 0:22:47.159
<v Speaker 2>baby and was saying, you know, Elley just you know,

0:22:48.000 --> 0:22:49.760
<v Speaker 2>just enjoying being her presence.

0:22:49.800 --> 0:22:55.159
<v Speaker 1>I think, okay, So you're practicing the piano, you're working

0:22:55.200 --> 0:22:58.200
<v Speaker 1>out songs. If I was in school with you, would

0:22:58.200 --> 0:23:00.199
<v Speaker 1>I say, oh, that's Paul shef for he plays the

0:23:00.200 --> 0:23:01.520
<v Speaker 1>piano or was it?

0:23:01.640 --> 0:23:05.320
<v Speaker 2>Yeah? I think so okay, Well, because I you know,

0:23:05.400 --> 0:23:09.880
<v Speaker 2>I was always called upon to play in the school assemblies.

0:23:10.640 --> 0:23:14.640
<v Speaker 2>I'm not sure how it started because I can't remember,

0:23:14.720 --> 0:23:17.760
<v Speaker 2>but I have a recollection of myself, but coming up

0:23:17.800 --> 0:23:20.080
<v Speaker 2>in front of the assembly when the whole school's assembled,

0:23:20.119 --> 0:23:23.040
<v Speaker 2>you know, and playing a little classical piece from my

0:23:23.160 --> 0:23:30.600
<v Speaker 2>lesson Mozart or something and boring everybody. But in what

0:23:30.640 --> 0:23:34.520
<v Speaker 2>we called junior high grade seven and eight up there

0:23:34.600 --> 0:23:38.800
<v Speaker 2>in Canada, I started becoming aware of rock and roll,

0:23:38.920 --> 0:23:44.480
<v Speaker 2>and I said, you know about grade seven, now you

0:23:44.480 --> 0:23:46.560
<v Speaker 2>know what instead of Mozart, I think I'm going to

0:23:46.600 --> 0:23:52.800
<v Speaker 2>play Pipeline by the Chantes And I'm not sure. Well no,

0:23:52.920 --> 0:23:55.919
<v Speaker 2>I mean, it's another whole story why I summoned the

0:23:55.920 --> 0:24:01.440
<v Speaker 2>nerve to do it. But when I did, it was pandemonia.

0:24:02.440 --> 0:24:11.480
<v Speaker 2>The kids were expecting, you know, Mozart and it's figured

0:24:11.480 --> 0:24:14.280
<v Speaker 2>out how to do that on the piano. Don't don't,

0:24:14.320 --> 0:24:16.280
<v Speaker 2>don't do do And I was like, you know, I

0:24:16.320 --> 0:24:19.960
<v Speaker 2>got a reaction that said, you don't have to write

0:24:19.960 --> 0:24:22.439
<v Speaker 2>your own songs, just you know, look at what you

0:24:22.480 --> 0:24:24.520
<v Speaker 2>can do to an audience just with a great song

0:24:25.040 --> 0:24:27.840
<v Speaker 2>and a performance of it. So I learned that early.

0:24:28.359 --> 0:24:30.920
<v Speaker 1>I had a friend who booked Oprah for live gigs,

0:24:31.600 --> 0:24:34.920
<v Speaker 1>and someone said, well, why does Oprah have to play

0:24:35.040 --> 0:24:38.760
<v Speaker 1>live gigs? And he said, you can't get that hit

0:24:39.240 --> 0:24:42.639
<v Speaker 1>anywhere else. So what was it like when they're reacting

0:24:42.680 --> 0:24:43.480
<v Speaker 1>to pipeline?

0:24:45.280 --> 0:24:46.200
<v Speaker 2>I'm sure it was great.

0:24:46.200 --> 0:24:46.359
<v Speaker 1>You know.

0:24:46.400 --> 0:24:49.960
<v Speaker 2>I was a child of about twelve, and so, as

0:24:50.000 --> 0:24:54.959
<v Speaker 2>I say, kind of life changing thought of I realized that, I,

0:24:55.080 --> 0:24:58.480
<v Speaker 2>you know, this works. I think that's what I thought

0:24:58.480 --> 0:25:01.760
<v Speaker 2>to myself, Hey, this and so when I would be

0:25:01.840 --> 0:25:06.440
<v Speaker 2>called upon, and I throughout my high school career play

0:25:06.520 --> 0:25:09.720
<v Speaker 2>the piano. You know, I started playing when the Beatles

0:25:09.760 --> 0:25:11.960
<v Speaker 2>came out a.

0:25:11.920 --> 0:25:16.080
<v Speaker 1>Little bit slower. Okay, So we have I Turner, Chuck

0:25:16.160 --> 0:25:19.560
<v Speaker 1>Berry's Sun Records. We have Elvis, Elvis kind of goes down.

0:25:20.160 --> 0:25:23.760
<v Speaker 1>We have Fabian, we have Bobby ry Dell. Were you

0:25:23.920 --> 0:25:27.679
<v Speaker 1>a fan of popular music in general before the bats

0:25:27.960 --> 0:25:29.600
<v Speaker 1>were just specific sounds?

0:25:30.440 --> 0:25:35.359
<v Speaker 2>No popular that music and what it could do to me?

0:25:35.520 --> 0:25:39.160
<v Speaker 2>Those chords they were so simple, they were all the same,

0:25:39.800 --> 0:25:42.919
<v Speaker 2>same four chords. And I found, you know, once I

0:25:43.040 --> 0:25:46.440
<v Speaker 2>learned them, I could play all these songs. Now. Bandstand.

0:25:46.480 --> 0:25:49.720
<v Speaker 2>I remember seeing my first American bandstand on a trip

0:25:49.960 --> 0:25:53.879
<v Speaker 2>family trip to Minneapolis, because we had no American television.

0:25:54.200 --> 0:25:56.240
<v Speaker 2>We only had one channel when I was, you know,

0:25:56.320 --> 0:26:01.760
<v Speaker 2>in elementary school, the CBC. It carried The Sullivan Show,

0:26:02.160 --> 0:26:04.880
<v Speaker 2>luckily CBC, and that's why I ed what and how

0:26:05.040 --> 0:26:08.639
<v Speaker 2>rye friends up in Canada. You know that was because

0:26:09.119 --> 0:26:12.639
<v Speaker 2>he had a seat Canadian audience. But I had to

0:26:12.640 --> 0:26:15.879
<v Speaker 2>go to Minneapolis with a family to see American Bandstand

0:26:15.920 --> 0:26:21.720
<v Speaker 2>and see Bobby ry Dell performed that afternoon, lip syncing

0:26:22.520 --> 0:26:25.040
<v Speaker 2>as they all did on American bands to Butterfly Baby,

0:26:25.680 --> 0:26:28.720
<v Speaker 2>and during the instrumental, pulling a girl out of the

0:26:28.760 --> 0:26:31.359
<v Speaker 2>audience a teeny bopper and a poodle skirt and dance

0:26:31.760 --> 0:26:36.560
<v Speaker 2>dancing with her was phenomenal and the girl was flushed afterwards,

0:26:36.600 --> 0:26:41.040
<v Speaker 2>Dick so suave. What did you think, my dear about

0:26:41.080 --> 0:26:44.960
<v Speaker 2>Bobby Red? You know? And this just stuck with me

0:26:46.359 --> 0:26:50.479
<v Speaker 2>and the Philly sound, I loved it both times. You know,

0:26:50.480 --> 0:26:52.720
<v Speaker 2>there's probably more than two, but you know, the last

0:26:52.720 --> 0:26:55.280
<v Speaker 2>time I remember it was a great gamble and huff

0:26:55.880 --> 0:26:59.399
<v Speaker 2>I'm Philly's soul. But before that, American Bandstand with with

0:26:59.480 --> 0:27:03.160
<v Speaker 2>the Dovells, d d Sharp, all these great acts coming

0:27:03.200 --> 0:27:08.240
<v Speaker 2>out of Philly, the uh Watusi you know, I think

0:27:08.280 --> 0:27:09.920
<v Speaker 2>I guess I was ddee sharp. But who am I

0:27:09.960 --> 0:27:15.440
<v Speaker 2>trying to think of the Orleans? Uh, don't hang up, no, no, man,

0:27:15.560 --> 0:27:19.560
<v Speaker 2>I used to after school. You know, I didn't buy

0:27:19.600 --> 0:27:24.679
<v Speaker 2>the records play play them. And you know that intro

0:27:24.840 --> 0:27:28.640
<v Speaker 2>of One Fine Day by the Chaffons that Peril King

0:27:28.800 --> 0:27:34.640
<v Speaker 2>played amazing to play that down, and so it's way

0:27:34.640 --> 0:27:37.520
<v Speaker 2>before the Beatles, really wait, by way before I made

0:27:37.520 --> 0:27:40.480
<v Speaker 2>man a good three years three three years before.

0:27:40.640 --> 0:27:44.439
<v Speaker 1>Okay, So at what point did you start playing in

0:27:44.560 --> 0:27:45.800
<v Speaker 1>bands with other people?

0:27:48.640 --> 0:27:51.600
<v Speaker 2>There was a hip guy in my in high school.

0:27:53.080 --> 0:27:57.719
<v Speaker 2>Uh Rick Lazar was his name. Uh. He was of

0:27:58.080 --> 0:28:05.959
<v Speaker 2>Assyrian origin, and he was himself a young musician, saxophone player,

0:28:07.080 --> 0:28:13.080
<v Speaker 2>smoker sacks always smell like cigarettes. And heard me, you know,

0:28:13.119 --> 0:28:15.680
<v Speaker 2>I would have been grade nine or something, first year

0:28:15.760 --> 0:28:19.520
<v Speaker 2>of high school, heard me. He would he a year older,

0:28:19.560 --> 0:28:23.520
<v Speaker 2>heard me in the assembly playing something by the Beatles

0:28:24.200 --> 0:28:28.000
<v Speaker 2>or something you know pop, and he actually, you know,

0:28:28.160 --> 0:28:31.480
<v Speaker 2>made his business to introduce himself to me and say,

0:28:31.560 --> 0:28:34.880
<v Speaker 2>let's I can get the music room. He said, at lunchtime,

0:28:34.920 --> 0:28:37.920
<v Speaker 2>we can go in there, let's play some records and

0:28:38.000 --> 0:28:40.360
<v Speaker 2>just play a little bit. My first real jam session

0:28:40.400 --> 0:28:46.760
<v Speaker 2>with another guy and we got on. We played the

0:28:46.760 --> 0:28:51.520
<v Speaker 2>Paul Butterfield album, first Paul Butterfield album that he had.

0:28:51.600 --> 0:28:53.760
<v Speaker 2>That's how Hippi he was, you know, up in thunder Bay,

0:28:54.320 --> 0:28:56.520
<v Speaker 2>and it set on the back of the album. Play

0:28:56.600 --> 0:29:00.040
<v Speaker 2>this for best results, play at top volume right and

0:29:00.120 --> 0:29:02.880
<v Speaker 2>we absolutely did, turned it up full and just a

0:29:02.920 --> 0:29:06.440
<v Speaker 2>little square vinyl player in the music room. And that

0:29:06.600 --> 0:29:09.120
<v Speaker 2>was and he had a band already. He was in

0:29:09.160 --> 0:29:15.480
<v Speaker 2>a band. They were first called the Laurentians, named after

0:29:15.520 --> 0:29:18.560
<v Speaker 2>a kind of Pontiac car that was only available on Canada.

0:29:18.840 --> 0:29:20.920
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, so they weren't named after the mountain range. They

0:29:20.920 --> 0:29:22.240
<v Speaker 1>were named after the Pontiac.

0:29:23.360 --> 0:29:26.040
<v Speaker 2>They were named after the Pontiac because another band even

0:29:26.120 --> 0:29:30.720
<v Speaker 2>earlier in town was called Bonneville's. And we had a

0:29:30.720 --> 0:29:32.719
<v Speaker 2>guy who wanted to do everything they did because they

0:29:32.760 --> 0:29:37.280
<v Speaker 2>seemed to be successful. So this is pretty early Ricky,

0:29:37.600 --> 0:29:41.080
<v Speaker 2>Funky Ricky. We called him Rick Lazar. His middle name

0:29:41.120 --> 0:29:45.920
<v Speaker 2>was shad Rack. Sometimes he went by Shad as a

0:29:45.960 --> 0:29:47.920
<v Speaker 2>guy who wrote my you know, I wrote a little

0:29:47.920 --> 0:29:52.000
<v Speaker 2>book with a great ghostwriter, David Rich, who said, oh

0:29:52.080 --> 0:29:53.880
<v Speaker 2>thank you in this part though, he said, I talked

0:29:53.920 --> 0:29:58.640
<v Speaker 2>about Funky Ricky and Rich's phrase was something like, you

0:29:58.680 --> 0:30:00.840
<v Speaker 2>know he was a two years he was a year

0:30:00.840 --> 0:30:04.040
<v Speaker 2>older in about a decade, Hipper. It was really true

0:30:04.080 --> 0:30:06.760
<v Speaker 2>of him. And I joined his band and they changed

0:30:06.760 --> 0:30:10.640
<v Speaker 2>their name eventually to the Fugitives, the Fabulous Fugitives, and

0:30:11.720 --> 0:30:15.720
<v Speaker 2>they had been a sax instrumental band, Ricky on sacks

0:30:15.760 --> 0:30:24.040
<v Speaker 2>playing Johnny and the Hurricanes stuff crossfire. Ricky could do

0:30:24.160 --> 0:30:29.080
<v Speaker 2>a technique called the flutter toongue I think, and Peter

0:30:29.200 --> 0:30:34.240
<v Speaker 2>Gunn of course. And then when the Beatles hit, right

0:30:34.280 --> 0:30:38.840
<v Speaker 2>as I was joining, they added vocals, one guy, Bobo

0:30:39.360 --> 0:30:42.160
<v Speaker 2>Bob Anyak. He could sing very well, and they added

0:30:42.200 --> 0:30:44.240
<v Speaker 2>me to their band on keyboards. They had had no

0:30:44.360 --> 0:30:47.480
<v Speaker 2>keyboard before. So now I started doing gigs and I

0:30:47.600 --> 0:30:52.720
<v Speaker 2>joined the af M Musicians Union. Even up there, I

0:30:52.800 --> 0:30:54.920
<v Speaker 2>had to join the unions. We were a union band.

0:30:56.480 --> 0:30:58.600
<v Speaker 2>Became a Union member, and we would do a gig.

0:31:00.120 --> 0:31:03.440
<v Speaker 2>Bucks sometimes was a scale for three hours or twenty

0:31:03.440 --> 0:31:06.760
<v Speaker 2>two dollars for four hour dance. That was the kind

0:31:06.760 --> 0:31:07.160
<v Speaker 2>of okay.

0:31:07.160 --> 0:31:11.400
<v Speaker 1>A couple of questions and what instrument were you taking?

0:31:11.440 --> 0:31:13.760
<v Speaker 1>Because it wasn't long after the Beatles broke in America

0:31:13.800 --> 0:31:17.320
<v Speaker 1>that the Dave Clark five broke and Mike Smith had

0:31:17.320 --> 0:31:20.520
<v Speaker 1>his portable organ whatever, So what were you taking the gigs?

0:31:20.640 --> 0:31:24.239
<v Speaker 2>Yes, sir, well, Mike Smith had the holy grail of

0:31:24.880 --> 0:31:31.800
<v Speaker 2>pol Combo organs, the Voux Continental, so beautifully designed. The

0:31:31.840 --> 0:31:35.400
<v Speaker 2>way it looked was fabulous, the chrome legs and the

0:31:35.440 --> 0:31:39.720
<v Speaker 2>shape of a Z. And they were made in Italy,

0:31:40.400 --> 0:31:43.800
<v Speaker 2>these these Vox organs, but marketed by Vox out of Britain.

0:31:43.800 --> 0:31:45.680
<v Speaker 1>I never knew the breed.

0:31:45.960 --> 0:31:48.280
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, they were. They took over I think it was

0:31:48.280 --> 0:31:51.400
<v Speaker 2>the Thomas something like that. There was a there was

0:31:51.440 --> 0:31:56.880
<v Speaker 2>a collapse. But these organs cost one thousand dollars in Canada,

0:31:56.960 --> 0:31:59.840
<v Speaker 2>a little out of my range. However, what they you know,

0:32:00.080 --> 0:32:03.160
<v Speaker 2>financial arrangement. I worked out with my dad to pay

0:32:03.240 --> 0:32:06.600
<v Speaker 2>him back a little bit each gig, which he eventually

0:32:06.600 --> 0:32:09.840
<v Speaker 2>forgot about. Don't worry about it. But I bought a

0:32:10.040 --> 0:32:17.040
<v Speaker 2>Honer organ. Honer organ just because it was in the

0:32:17.120 --> 0:32:19.680
<v Speaker 2>music store, really no other reason, and it didn't cost

0:32:19.680 --> 0:32:22.760
<v Speaker 2>a whole thousand dollars. And I got that in an amp.

0:32:23.360 --> 0:32:25.640
<v Speaker 2>And the amp was a Trainer amp because the Trainer

0:32:25.720 --> 0:32:29.080
<v Speaker 2>was a Canadian company out of Toronto, t R A

0:32:29.240 --> 0:32:32.920
<v Speaker 2>Y and O R. And you know again, better prices,

0:32:32.960 --> 0:32:35.560
<v Speaker 2>not a great not great for keyboards. I later got

0:32:35.560 --> 0:32:37.920
<v Speaker 2>a better you know, because it was good for guitar.

0:32:38.000 --> 0:32:40.680
<v Speaker 2>It had a lot of distortion. But yeah, lugging around

0:32:40.760 --> 0:32:44.680
<v Speaker 2>my own amp and keyboard. There was no such thing

0:32:44.720 --> 0:32:47.840
<v Speaker 2>as Roadie's then, I don't the word hadn't even come along.

0:32:48.880 --> 0:32:52.200
<v Speaker 2>And always thirty below, you know, So it was always

0:32:52.240 --> 0:32:56.160
<v Speaker 2>gigging after the gig, a little soaking, wet loading the

0:32:56.360 --> 0:33:01.200
<v Speaker 2>equipment into the back of the car. I think, ironically

0:33:01.360 --> 0:33:06.880
<v Speaker 2>we may have had a Pontiac lavension, always sit, always

0:33:06.920 --> 0:33:10.760
<v Speaker 2>getting the flu because you know, so cold and always

0:33:10.920 --> 0:33:14.440
<v Speaker 2>wet from the gig and stuff. Those are my my

0:33:14.560 --> 0:33:17.920
<v Speaker 2>Toronto can and sometimes even going by the A and

0:33:18.120 --> 0:33:22.760
<v Speaker 2>W drive in wet stuff in the back. Then you

0:33:22.840 --> 0:33:26.040
<v Speaker 2>get home, you know, after a big Hamburger from anw

0:33:27.120 --> 0:33:30.960
<v Speaker 2>too cold to unload. So sometimes try to leave the

0:33:31.000 --> 0:33:33.720
<v Speaker 2>amp out wow in the in the car, but you

0:33:33.800 --> 0:33:37.160
<v Speaker 2>only do that once because the tubes freeze in the

0:33:37.280 --> 0:33:40.240
<v Speaker 2>cold thirty below, and it's just you know, got to

0:33:40.240 --> 0:33:42.440
<v Speaker 2>replace all the tubes. Had all that happen to me.

0:33:42.640 --> 0:33:47.720
<v Speaker 1>Okay, so when did you first hear the Beatles?

0:33:49.200 --> 0:33:52.320
<v Speaker 2>I'm not sure if I heard any music before the

0:33:52.400 --> 0:33:57.480
<v Speaker 2>Sullivan Show or not their appearance on the Sullivan Show. Certainly,

0:33:57.520 --> 0:34:05.040
<v Speaker 2>I I could pick ups AM radio from Chicago as

0:34:05.040 --> 0:34:06.680
<v Speaker 2>early as Dick Beyondy.

0:34:06.640 --> 0:34:09.839
<v Speaker 1>And were you a big listener, Yes, with your transistor

0:34:09.880 --> 0:34:11.280
<v Speaker 1>under the pillow, the whole bit.

0:34:11.719 --> 0:34:16.319
<v Speaker 2>A whole bit. The transistor was a rocket radio in

0:34:16.360 --> 0:34:18.560
<v Speaker 2>the shape of a rocket. It was a crystal radio

0:34:19.960 --> 0:34:22.720
<v Speaker 2>where you tuned it in. I could hear Dick Beyondi

0:34:22.760 --> 0:34:26.279
<v Speaker 2>on this crystal radio and he just died. By the way.

0:34:26.320 --> 0:34:31.239
<v Speaker 2>Are you familiar with him? Yeah, well he I you know,

0:34:31.320 --> 0:34:34.799
<v Speaker 2>I came in contact with him a little bit later on,

0:34:36.960 --> 0:34:39.160
<v Speaker 2>so I you know, he's known to have played the

0:34:39.160 --> 0:34:40.759
<v Speaker 2>Beatles for the first time. I'm not sure if that's

0:34:40.760 --> 0:34:42.640
<v Speaker 2>true or not. So I may have heard the music,

0:34:42.719 --> 0:34:45.400
<v Speaker 2>but certainly saw no. I guess I did, because I

0:34:45.640 --> 0:34:47.279
<v Speaker 2>guess I kind of knew the songs a little bit

0:34:47.320 --> 0:34:51.160
<v Speaker 2>when I saw them on Sullivan and that was quite

0:34:51.160 --> 0:34:54.719
<v Speaker 2>a revelation. But I got to say, and I say

0:34:54.760 --> 0:34:56.920
<v Speaker 2>this more and more in my old crabby age, but

0:34:57.080 --> 0:35:02.279
<v Speaker 2>I can't believe the number of MUSICI certainly well Americans

0:35:02.280 --> 0:35:06.120
<v Speaker 2>and Canadians who just cite no matter how old, even

0:35:06.160 --> 0:35:09.440
<v Speaker 2>if they're older than I am. Cite that Beatles on Sullivan.

0:35:09.520 --> 0:35:12.480
<v Speaker 2>That's when I picked up a guitar, you know, Oh yeah,

0:35:12.719 --> 0:35:15.080
<v Speaker 2>they're all. Joe Walsh comes to mind. You know, a

0:35:15.120 --> 0:35:19.760
<v Speaker 2>guy you know who is such credibility as a musician

0:35:19.800 --> 0:35:22.359
<v Speaker 2>and stuff, but wasn't really into it till he heard

0:35:22.400 --> 0:35:26.239
<v Speaker 2>the Beatles. Not the case with me when I heard

0:35:26.280 --> 0:35:29.600
<v Speaker 2>the Four Seasons though, when they are.

0:35:29.560 --> 0:35:33.640
<v Speaker 1>Okay, So what are the key Four Seasons tracks for you?

0:35:35.360 --> 0:35:38.919
<v Speaker 2>Well, I mean, good goodness, gracious Sherry was the first one,

0:35:39.000 --> 0:35:43.919
<v Speaker 2>of course, infectious, Big Girls Don't Cry. That opening weird.

0:35:44.040 --> 0:35:47.319
<v Speaker 2>I mean, it's so the sound is, you know, just

0:35:47.400 --> 0:35:50.080
<v Speaker 2>stuck with me. Maybe that one, And that's what they

0:35:50.120 --> 0:35:53.040
<v Speaker 2>did on a Sullivan. They did Big Girls Don't Cry,

0:35:53.880 --> 0:35:58.160
<v Speaker 2>and that opening is just so strange, Frankie's voice on

0:35:58.200 --> 0:36:02.000
<v Speaker 2>the top, the way the other guys saying we're strange too.

0:36:02.800 --> 0:36:05.600
<v Speaker 2>Turns out they had been like club musicians in Jersey

0:36:06.000 --> 0:36:08.279
<v Speaker 2>all these years, and they were not young when they

0:36:08.360 --> 0:36:10.920
<v Speaker 2>hit Sullivan. They were already in there, maybe thirty five.

0:36:11.080 --> 0:36:14.040
<v Speaker 2>You know. They had a look that I wasn't familiar with,

0:36:16.840 --> 0:36:20.680
<v Speaker 2>and they had those ties those formal times. Yeah like that,

0:36:21.000 --> 0:36:24.719
<v Speaker 2>but that Wow. I mean that galvanized me. And then

0:36:24.760 --> 0:36:28.520
<v Speaker 2>the great Bob Gaudio, who wrote a lot of that

0:36:28.640 --> 0:36:32.120
<v Speaker 2>early stuff, and you know, was so kind of the

0:36:32.200 --> 0:36:36.439
<v Speaker 2>musical leader. The way he stood on stage, I'll never

0:36:36.480 --> 0:36:39.759
<v Speaker 2>forget it. He was pointed upstage. They didn't know how

0:36:39.800 --> 0:36:43.440
<v Speaker 2>to shoot or deal with a big piano or organ

0:36:43.480 --> 0:36:47.000
<v Speaker 2>at that time, so they had him kind of pointed

0:36:47.080 --> 0:36:49.920
<v Speaker 2>upstage and he would put stretch his neck around to

0:36:49.960 --> 0:36:51.920
<v Speaker 2>get back to the mic, and oh to see it,

0:36:53.440 --> 0:36:56.600
<v Speaker 2>you know, and that that kind of stuck with me.

0:36:58.560 --> 0:37:01.600
<v Speaker 2>But then followed them, and as you know, were they

0:37:01.840 --> 0:37:04.480
<v Speaker 2>really the only American group that kept having hits well

0:37:04.560 --> 0:37:05.440
<v Speaker 2>through through.

0:37:05.239 --> 0:37:09.080
<v Speaker 1>The one other band because we had Cherry, we had

0:37:09.360 --> 0:37:12.360
<v Speaker 1>you know, big girls, Beach Boys, and they exactly So

0:37:12.480 --> 0:37:13.520
<v Speaker 1>were you a beach.

0:37:15.200 --> 0:37:18.200
<v Speaker 2>Sure? How can you not be a Beach Boys fan? Absolutely?

0:37:18.280 --> 0:37:20.439
<v Speaker 1>Even though there's a summer of sixty four was Dawn

0:37:20.480 --> 0:37:23.279
<v Speaker 1>and Go Away, and I get around, But.

0:37:23.600 --> 0:37:26.399
<v Speaker 2>I get around it. You know, brilliant if they're both

0:37:26.440 --> 0:37:29.840
<v Speaker 2>brilliant in their own in their own way, and you

0:37:29.880 --> 0:37:31.840
<v Speaker 2>don't have to go to pet sounds, you know, for

0:37:31.920 --> 0:37:35.480
<v Speaker 2>the intellectual Beach Boys to think that they're great, I

0:37:35.560 --> 0:37:41.280
<v Speaker 2>get around. Was a knockout musically. Now do you know okay,

0:37:41.320 --> 0:37:43.439
<v Speaker 2>do you know the first line of the first lyric

0:37:43.520 --> 0:37:46.640
<v Speaker 2>of the one that Al Jardine sings.

0:37:48.520 --> 0:37:50.640
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, Well, since you put me down, I've been out

0:37:50.640 --> 0:37:51.520
<v Speaker 1>doing in my head.

0:37:52.120 --> 0:37:53.920
<v Speaker 2>Well you see that, out doing in my head. I

0:37:53.960 --> 0:37:57.360
<v Speaker 2>never learned that until I used to finally get to

0:37:57.360 --> 0:38:01.160
<v Speaker 2>see them live a little bit, became very close friends

0:38:01.200 --> 0:38:04.520
<v Speaker 2>with Billy Hinschy, one of their side. I knew Billy absolutely,

0:38:04.600 --> 0:38:08.600
<v Speaker 2>very sad passion, yes and so. But he told me

0:38:08.640 --> 0:38:11.480
<v Speaker 2>it was you know, nobody knows that but you and

0:38:11.520 --> 0:38:15.120
<v Speaker 2>me and Billy. Yeah out and Al Jardine out doing

0:38:15.200 --> 0:38:18.160
<v Speaker 2>in my head? What a what a crazy lyric? People

0:38:18.160 --> 0:38:19.600
<v Speaker 2>think it's you know, up to it in my.

0:38:19.600 --> 0:38:23.640
<v Speaker 1>Head or but there's some other ones okay on uh

0:38:23.880 --> 0:38:25.520
<v Speaker 1>summer days and summer nights.

0:38:26.000 --> 0:38:26.200
<v Speaker 2>Yeah.

0:38:26.200 --> 0:38:29.200
<v Speaker 1>That had California Girls first song on the second side,

0:38:29.560 --> 0:38:32.560
<v Speaker 1>and it had the single version of Helped Me Ronda

0:38:32.560 --> 0:38:34.840
<v Speaker 1>at the end of the first side when Beach Boys

0:38:34.880 --> 0:38:38.080
<v Speaker 1>Today had a studio version wasn't mixed the same way.

0:38:38.520 --> 0:38:42.720
<v Speaker 1>But before help Me Ronda, there's a song that Carl

0:38:42.840 --> 0:38:47.799
<v Speaker 1>sings called girl Don't Tell Me Hey Girl, And you

0:38:47.800 --> 0:38:51.520
<v Speaker 1>know there were saying you know there were certain lyrics there.

0:38:51.600 --> 0:38:54.560
<v Speaker 1>I didn't have any idea what they were until the internet. Hit.

0:38:56.200 --> 0:39:00.360
<v Speaker 2>Ah, that's a great one, girl, don't tell me. Oh right, yeah,

0:39:00.400 --> 0:39:04.400
<v Speaker 2>maybe Brian wrote those lyrics himself. You know, I'm not sure.

0:39:04.719 --> 0:39:07.359
<v Speaker 2>I'm kind of a Beach Boys student too, and I

0:39:07.440 --> 0:39:09.000
<v Speaker 2>you know, I can keep up with a lot of

0:39:09.000 --> 0:39:14.080
<v Speaker 2>these fanatics who can talk Beach Boys twenty four hours

0:39:14.080 --> 0:39:17.400
<v Speaker 2>a day, and I can be okay, I ask you,

0:39:17.520 --> 0:39:18.080
<v Speaker 2>right with them.

0:39:18.160 --> 0:39:21.440
<v Speaker 1>Let's go to the other fanatics. What about the Grateful

0:39:21.560 --> 0:39:23.279
<v Speaker 1>Dead in the Boss fanatics?

0:39:24.920 --> 0:39:27.000
<v Speaker 2>Well, okay, you want me to too.

0:39:26.880 --> 0:39:29.920
<v Speaker 1>No, No, I'm okay, I'm gonna go into this. Okay, Okay,

0:39:30.080 --> 0:39:33.279
<v Speaker 1>I'm fans of both of those acts. I always say

0:39:33.280 --> 0:39:36.279
<v Speaker 1>with Springsteen, I saw him at the bottom Line in

0:39:36.400 --> 0:39:40.160
<v Speaker 1>seventy four, the year before Born to Run, he premiered

0:39:40.239 --> 0:39:43.360
<v Speaker 1>jungle Land, and then The Grateful Dead I saw a

0:39:43.440 --> 0:39:46.080
<v Speaker 1>million times in the seventies. And you have all these

0:39:46.160 --> 0:39:49.000
<v Speaker 1>people who are not there, no matter what you say,

0:39:49.000 --> 0:39:51.920
<v Speaker 1>they're bigger authorities than you are. No, no, no, was

0:39:52.000 --> 0:39:54.200
<v Speaker 1>it this show blah blah blah blah blah. I was

0:39:54.239 --> 0:39:57.919
<v Speaker 1>wondering if you had any of those experiences.

0:39:57.400 --> 0:40:04.120
<v Speaker 2>Well, you know, reguarding the Dead, I must confess I

0:40:04.160 --> 0:40:06.279
<v Speaker 2>didn't really get them until I got a chance to

0:40:06.960 --> 0:40:08.600
<v Speaker 2>play with Jerry Garcia. Ok.

0:40:09.080 --> 0:40:11.920
<v Speaker 1>Well, a little bit slower because Jerry has such a

0:40:11.960 --> 0:40:15.239
<v Speaker 1>legend and you were familiar somewhat with the music by

0:40:15.320 --> 0:40:18.120
<v Speaker 1>time that happened. Uncle John's band been out, et cetera.

0:40:18.400 --> 0:40:20.880
<v Speaker 1>What was the experience of playing with Jerry?

0:40:22.040 --> 0:40:24.560
<v Speaker 2>Well, say, that's the whole thing. I mean, first time

0:40:24.560 --> 0:40:28.680
<v Speaker 2>I saw them live it was with the closing of

0:40:28.719 --> 0:40:35.520
<v Speaker 2>winter Land in about seventy eight, okay or seventy you

0:40:35.560 --> 0:40:39.160
<v Speaker 2>know where we I was with the Blues Brothers at

0:40:39.160 --> 0:40:42.320
<v Speaker 2>that time. Akroyd and Belushi from the SNL.

0:40:42.719 --> 0:40:44.680
<v Speaker 1>I saw you at the Universally Amphitheater.

0:40:45.320 --> 0:40:50.120
<v Speaker 2>Oh wow, sure the first time, of course. Well that

0:40:50.320 --> 0:40:53.120
<v Speaker 2>was you know, yeah, that was pretty good. The Rubber

0:40:53.120 --> 0:40:56.759
<v Speaker 2>Biscuit did that first album, Rubber Biscuit, right, Dakroyd just

0:40:57.480 --> 0:40:59.000
<v Speaker 2>came up with that one out of it, you know,

0:40:59.040 --> 0:41:02.200
<v Speaker 2>I don't know where, but we opened and then the

0:41:03.080 --> 0:41:06.319
<v Speaker 2>New Writers and the Dead right, so, you know, the

0:41:06.400 --> 0:41:11.000
<v Speaker 2>Dead were just starting at midnight and going on and

0:41:11.040 --> 0:41:14.960
<v Speaker 2>they broadcast live and stuff. And at this point, no,

0:41:15.040 --> 0:41:19.279
<v Speaker 2>I did not understand them. I started to understand, you know,

0:41:19.360 --> 0:41:22.720
<v Speaker 2>what they were supposed to be doing, but I couldn't

0:41:22.760 --> 0:41:30.080
<v Speaker 2>penetrate it. When Jerry and Bob where came on Letterman, uh,

0:41:31.040 --> 0:41:32.520
<v Speaker 2>and then I saw them, you know, we got to

0:41:32.600 --> 0:41:35.480
<v Speaker 2>I was around them when they did SNL two the

0:41:35.560 --> 0:41:37.440
<v Speaker 2>various time. But when the two of them just came

0:41:37.440 --> 0:41:39.879
<v Speaker 2>on and let him and play with my band, and

0:41:40.000 --> 0:41:45.080
<v Speaker 2>Jerry turned to the band like Miles Davis. Somehow he

0:41:45.239 --> 0:41:47.919
<v Speaker 2>was so open, he opened his heart up to us,

0:41:48.920 --> 0:41:52.120
<v Speaker 2>and I started hearing him. It was just it was

0:41:52.200 --> 0:41:57.000
<v Speaker 2>then that I realized what he's doing. I couldn't understand

0:41:57.040 --> 0:42:00.400
<v Speaker 2>it before, but he his spirit. You know, that's my

0:42:00.560 --> 0:42:06.319
<v Speaker 2>personal experience with him right musically unbelievable. I became an

0:42:06.360 --> 0:42:09.319
<v Speaker 2>accolade right there. Okay, is it acolyte?

0:42:09.520 --> 0:42:13.160
<v Speaker 1>So you were a keyboard player. A lot of prog

0:42:13.360 --> 0:42:16.719
<v Speaker 1>rock is keyboard beast. Were you a fan of prog rock?

0:42:17.960 --> 0:42:21.560
<v Speaker 2>I guess not not really. I didn't hear any I mean,

0:42:21.640 --> 0:42:26.160
<v Speaker 2>schmoss rock has not really even been named. But if

0:42:26.200 --> 0:42:29.359
<v Speaker 2>there was such a thing, that's me I'm looking for.

0:42:29.480 --> 0:42:33.839
<v Speaker 2>I don't know, chords, melodies, things like that. Certainly, yes,

0:42:34.160 --> 0:42:38.080
<v Speaker 2>you know some of those hits absolutely roundabout. Yeah, great,

0:42:38.560 --> 0:42:41.680
<v Speaker 2>I can hear it in my head and great, you

0:42:41.680 --> 0:42:45.160
<v Speaker 2>know all that keyboard is great, certainly, Rick Wickman a

0:42:45.200 --> 0:42:49.960
<v Speaker 2>fan Lord John Lord incredible. I don't know if that

0:42:50.040 --> 0:42:53.560
<v Speaker 2>counts as prog rock. When they did Hush, well, that's.

0:42:53.360 --> 0:42:56.319
<v Speaker 1>You know that they were there earlier. You know, we've

0:42:56.360 --> 0:42:58.000
<v Speaker 1>sort of gotten that. But let's go back. You were

0:42:58.040 --> 0:43:02.120
<v Speaker 1>talking about playing with the guy, the saxophone player playing

0:43:02.280 --> 0:43:05.240
<v Speaker 1>jamming on the Paul Butterfield band. I think East West

0:43:05.360 --> 0:43:08.120
<v Speaker 1>was the first one. No, that was the second one. Second,

0:43:08.120 --> 0:43:10.680
<v Speaker 1>first one. I was not a big Butterfield fan. I

0:43:10.719 --> 0:43:12.320
<v Speaker 1>was out of that bat. That of course, was that

0:43:12.440 --> 0:43:14.640
<v Speaker 1>you were playing the records at home on the piano.

0:43:14.920 --> 0:43:16.480
<v Speaker 1>This was in the era although I was in the

0:43:16.480 --> 0:43:18.920
<v Speaker 1>New York radio market. We had to own it to

0:43:19.000 --> 0:43:22.640
<v Speaker 1>hear it in many cases, so there's certain blank spots.

0:43:23.000 --> 0:43:26.480
<v Speaker 1>But Okay, the reason I bring this up is we

0:43:26.520 --> 0:43:30.040
<v Speaker 1>have the Beatles, we had the British invasion, We have

0:43:30.239 --> 0:43:35.840
<v Speaker 1>San Francisco, and in nineteen sixty seven in San Francisco

0:43:36.280 --> 0:43:41.880
<v Speaker 1>and in New York, the first underground FM radio stations. Okay,

0:43:41.920 --> 0:43:45.760
<v Speaker 1>and Hendrick is sixty seven, Cream is sixty eight we're

0:43:46.360 --> 0:43:48.840
<v Speaker 1>more of a top forty guy. Or when that stuff

0:43:48.880 --> 0:43:50.439
<v Speaker 1>came he said, I'm into that too.

0:43:51.360 --> 0:43:53.440
<v Speaker 2>Oh. I was into that too because I was in

0:43:53.520 --> 0:43:58.640
<v Speaker 2>college going to going to University of Toronto, and Toronto

0:43:58.760 --> 0:44:02.600
<v Speaker 2>had an relatively early FM station, CHUM FM.

0:44:03.200 --> 0:44:06.440
<v Speaker 1>Right of course, yeah, great station, okay, And so.

0:44:06.480 --> 0:44:09.440
<v Speaker 2>I was listening in college and you know, Knights in

0:44:09.480 --> 0:44:13.399
<v Speaker 2>White Satin comes to mind. Right, that was heavy rotation there.

0:44:13.440 --> 0:44:17.120
<v Speaker 2>But certain things I got a line on you spirit,

0:44:17.440 --> 0:44:20.080
<v Speaker 2>I guess I was kind of picking the hits out

0:44:20.120 --> 0:44:24.440
<v Speaker 2>of that stuff, but certainly was into how could you

0:44:24.520 --> 0:44:29.279
<v Speaker 2>not be into FM radio and those DJs? Who there

0:44:29.320 --> 0:44:32.279
<v Speaker 2>was one DJ still going up there. I think when

0:44:32.320 --> 0:44:37.160
<v Speaker 2>he first came on the scene, his name with Dave Mickey. Yeah,

0:44:37.239 --> 0:44:40.240
<v Speaker 2>he was like a beyond, you know, a BEYONDI of Canada.

0:44:40.760 --> 0:44:42.839
<v Speaker 2>But then he became Dave Marsen.

0:44:43.239 --> 0:44:47.839
<v Speaker 1>You know. Scott Muni was on AM seventy seven WABC

0:44:48.120 --> 0:44:51.359
<v Speaker 1>on number one in the nation, Scott Muni Show. Then

0:44:51.400 --> 0:44:55.319
<v Speaker 1>he was on WADW. Hello, this is Scott Beauty. I mean,

0:44:55.760 --> 0:44:57.279
<v Speaker 1>you couldn't believe it was the same guy.

0:44:58.880 --> 0:45:05.680
<v Speaker 2>Got a great Scott any story, Okay, tell us nineteen

0:45:05.719 --> 0:45:09.759
<v Speaker 2>eighty one, I was doing studio work. It was just

0:45:09.800 --> 0:45:13.680
<v Speaker 2>a year before Letterman started. And after I had left SNL,

0:45:15.000 --> 0:45:18.680
<v Speaker 2>just studio work, a lot of jingle work in New York,

0:45:19.160 --> 0:45:21.880
<v Speaker 2>playing on Coca Cola and whatever, you know, the products,

0:45:22.719 --> 0:45:25.799
<v Speaker 2>and I was in that business. And then I went

0:45:25.880 --> 0:45:29.000
<v Speaker 2>and took a little vacation to Hawaii with my wife

0:45:29.000 --> 0:45:33.600
<v Speaker 2>and gotten a bad car accident there and broke all

0:45:33.760 --> 0:45:36.759
<v Speaker 2>nine ribs in the shoulder and everything, and took a

0:45:36.840 --> 0:45:41.160
<v Speaker 2>good three years to recover. Letterman started in the middle

0:45:41.200 --> 0:45:44.440
<v Speaker 2>of my recovery. Dave Letterman still remembers you said there

0:45:44.480 --> 0:45:46.319
<v Speaker 2>was you came in for that first meeting. You said

0:45:46.320 --> 0:45:48.439
<v Speaker 2>you were kind of walking on an angle. I knew

0:45:48.440 --> 0:45:52.719
<v Speaker 2>something was wrong. I had had that I had had

0:45:52.719 --> 0:45:58.560
<v Speaker 2>that accident. I was in the hospital and in Honolulu

0:45:58.680 --> 0:46:02.440
<v Speaker 2>for twelve days. And while I was there, we kind

0:46:02.480 --> 0:46:04.640
<v Speaker 2>of got around in New York and all my lovely

0:46:04.680 --> 0:46:09.360
<v Speaker 2>friends in the studio business and jiggle business called me

0:46:09.520 --> 0:46:11.799
<v Speaker 2>there you you know, hope you're okay, and everything was

0:46:11.920 --> 0:46:16.480
<v Speaker 2>very nice of them. I was morphined out and stuff.

0:46:18.360 --> 0:46:21.080
<v Speaker 2>One guy though, and he's no longer with us, Hillary Lipsitz.

0:46:21.760 --> 0:46:24.640
<v Speaker 2>That's the way he spoke. He produced a lot of things,

0:46:24.680 --> 0:46:27.440
<v Speaker 2>including you know when the when the four seasons saying

0:46:27.520 --> 0:46:31.160
<v Speaker 2>things go better with coke in that era, he produced

0:46:31.200 --> 0:46:33.600
<v Speaker 2>all that stuff and he said, here, Paul, he spoke

0:46:33.719 --> 0:46:36.680
<v Speaker 2>like that all right over there in Honolulu, here's say

0:46:36.680 --> 0:46:38.640
<v Speaker 2>a load of my friend. He was a big drinker,

0:46:38.680 --> 0:46:41.160
<v Speaker 2>and he put his drinking buddy on the phone. Here,

0:46:41.200 --> 0:46:44.239
<v Speaker 2>this is Scott Muni. He says, say a load of

0:46:44.320 --> 0:46:47.799
<v Speaker 2>Daddy butter tie over there. Wqaw over there, good friend

0:46:47.800 --> 0:46:51.240
<v Speaker 2>of mine over there in Honolulu. Wow, I said, Scott,

0:46:51.239 --> 0:46:54.440
<v Speaker 2>I'm in an oxygen town. I'm not going to say

0:46:54.480 --> 0:46:59.319
<v Speaker 2>a load to a DJ. But thanks though. Anyway, that

0:46:59.440 --> 0:47:01.120
<v Speaker 2>was that lovelier of the colony.

0:47:01.360 --> 0:47:13.399
<v Speaker 3>Nonetheless, Okay, before we leave thunder Bay, what was it

0:47:13.480 --> 0:47:15.319
<v Speaker 3>like being Jewish in thunder Bay?

0:47:17.200 --> 0:47:20.080
<v Speaker 2>Well, not too many Jewish families, although when I was

0:47:21.520 --> 0:47:23.960
<v Speaker 2>a kid growing up there there were forty families. That

0:47:24.080 --> 0:47:25.799
<v Speaker 2>was a lot. I think it's a lot less now.

0:47:26.400 --> 0:47:29.760
<v Speaker 2>And yeah, it was different. I didn't you know, certainly

0:47:30.360 --> 0:47:33.880
<v Speaker 2>wasn't aware of any anti Semitism there. It may have existed.

0:47:33.920 --> 0:47:35.960
<v Speaker 2>I may have been just to it too naive to

0:47:36.760 --> 0:47:42.400
<v Speaker 2>know about it. Certainly didn't get into my in my way,

0:47:45.480 --> 0:47:49.959
<v Speaker 2>you know, we would take off the high holidays and

0:47:49.960 --> 0:47:52.719
<v Speaker 2>and that w was be big in the school and

0:47:52.800 --> 0:47:54.680
<v Speaker 2>we were allowed to miss a couple of days, you know,

0:47:54.760 --> 0:47:59.160
<v Speaker 2>but we would be watching the World Series anyway at home.

0:47:59.600 --> 0:48:01.799
<v Speaker 2>That's what I remember mostly, how about it?

0:48:02.960 --> 0:48:06.279
<v Speaker 1>So what point do you say this is my profession,

0:48:06.400 --> 0:48:09.439
<v Speaker 1>this is my job? When do you have that light

0:48:09.480 --> 0:48:10.160
<v Speaker 1>bulb moment?

0:48:11.680 --> 0:48:19.080
<v Speaker 2>Not until college University of Toronto, chum FM playing and

0:48:20.320 --> 0:48:24.720
<v Speaker 2>first year. I mean I certainly didn't have the nerve

0:48:24.880 --> 0:48:28.279
<v Speaker 2>to even think myself that I was going to go

0:48:28.360 --> 0:48:30.759
<v Speaker 2>into any kind of show business. No, absolutely too far

0:48:30.880 --> 0:48:35.480
<v Speaker 2>fetched coming from thunder Bay and the Canadian in general,

0:48:35.520 --> 0:48:39.640
<v Speaker 2>Canadians can be a little pessimistic. You know, who do

0:48:39.640 --> 0:48:42.560
<v Speaker 2>you think you are? You know you you got to

0:48:42.560 --> 0:48:48.000
<v Speaker 2>be a big stay. So I was. And my dad,

0:48:48.080 --> 0:48:50.680
<v Speaker 2>you know, would have loved me to have a profession,

0:48:51.120 --> 0:48:56.400
<v Speaker 2>a real profession. And I didn't. Law didn't see following

0:48:56.400 --> 0:48:59.319
<v Speaker 2>in his Footsessen scene, right, But I didn't. I was

0:48:59.320 --> 0:49:01.000
<v Speaker 2>going to try some thing. I don't know, but I

0:49:01.040 --> 0:49:08.879
<v Speaker 2>was taking liberal arts, sociology, philosophy and psychology. Got very

0:49:08.920 --> 0:49:12.560
<v Speaker 2>depressed first year. I didn't have a band anymore, I

0:49:12.560 --> 0:49:15.520
<v Speaker 2>had no you know, no musical outlet. I didn't exactly

0:49:15.560 --> 0:49:18.200
<v Speaker 2>know why, but I was just sleeping all the time.

0:49:18.840 --> 0:49:23.280
<v Speaker 2>Imagine today they'd be diagnosing it as Epstein Barr or something.

0:49:24.000 --> 0:49:26.200
<v Speaker 2>But I was just you know, so sad and then

0:49:29.040 --> 0:49:34.520
<v Speaker 2>but still in Toronto, and it was great because it

0:49:34.640 --> 0:49:37.800
<v Speaker 2>was you know, a real city and there were real

0:49:38.800 --> 0:49:43.759
<v Speaker 2>rock acts coming and blues acts and a nightclub called

0:49:43.760 --> 0:49:47.240
<v Speaker 2>the Rock Pile where you know, very Phil Moore asque

0:49:47.280 --> 0:49:51.799
<v Speaker 2>I guess just opened with Blood Sweat and Tears with

0:49:51.920 --> 0:49:56.120
<v Speaker 2>the Canadian David Clayton Thomas on vocals, whom we knew

0:49:56.160 --> 0:50:00.520
<v Speaker 2>because through his Canadian records and stuff. He was a

0:50:00.440 --> 0:50:04.560
<v Speaker 2>a phenomena up there too. I could sing great, and

0:50:05.120 --> 0:50:08.560
<v Speaker 2>they opened BS and t opened at the Rock Pile,

0:50:08.600 --> 0:50:11.800
<v Speaker 2>and I was at all four shows, two on Friday,

0:50:11.840 --> 0:50:17.360
<v Speaker 2>two on Saturday, just starting to you know, study this stuff,

0:50:17.840 --> 0:50:20.759
<v Speaker 2>get excited about it, but still you know, trying to

0:50:20.760 --> 0:50:25.840
<v Speaker 2>do philosophy and things, a little bit of an ecotomy.

0:50:26.400 --> 0:50:30.040
<v Speaker 2>Stayed in New York, stayed in Toronto that summer, didn't

0:50:30.080 --> 0:50:33.440
<v Speaker 2>go back to thunder Bay, and I said I'd love

0:50:33.520 --> 0:50:37.000
<v Speaker 2>to maybe, as you know, Blood Sweat and Tears in Chicago.

0:50:37.040 --> 0:50:41.200
<v Speaker 2>And so the first time horns started making their way,

0:50:41.400 --> 0:50:44.839
<v Speaker 2>although Bobby or Adell's records had horns, but they featured them,

0:50:44.880 --> 0:50:47.799
<v Speaker 2>I guess. And I said to my parents, I'd like

0:50:47.800 --> 0:50:51.480
<v Speaker 2>to stay in Toronto and take an arranging course this summer,

0:50:52.719 --> 0:50:56.760
<v Speaker 2>and they, you know, I sold them on that. Really

0:50:56.800 --> 0:51:00.800
<v Speaker 2>I wanted to be where the action was, oh, Toronto

0:51:00.880 --> 0:51:04.799
<v Speaker 2>town instead of you know, thunder Bay. But I took

0:51:04.840 --> 0:51:06.879
<v Speaker 2>this arrange of course, and it sure is a good

0:51:06.960 --> 0:51:09.640
<v Speaker 2>thing I did. It's really the only training I have

0:51:09.760 --> 0:51:12.480
<v Speaker 2>in arranging, and I kind of became an arranger. So

0:51:12.600 --> 0:51:17.160
<v Speaker 2>that was good, good luck. But one night, oh, I

0:51:17.239 --> 0:51:20.439
<v Speaker 2>started you know, listening, getting a little bit into the

0:51:20.480 --> 0:51:23.800
<v Speaker 2>Toronto jazz scene too, sometimes going to see a guitar

0:51:23.840 --> 0:51:30.560
<v Speaker 2>stuff there named Sonny Greenwich, incredible Coltrane inspired. And one night,

0:51:31.120 --> 0:51:35.200
<v Speaker 2>early morning, actually coming home that summer after I don't

0:51:35.200 --> 0:51:37.280
<v Speaker 2>know what, I got a job in a bar band

0:51:37.440 --> 0:51:42.400
<v Speaker 2>very easily and played covers that summer to support myself.

0:51:42.680 --> 0:51:45.560
<v Speaker 2>Coming home at six am. A guy sitting on a

0:51:45.600 --> 0:51:48.640
<v Speaker 2>stoop in their village. They had kind of a Greenwich

0:51:48.760 --> 0:51:53.360
<v Speaker 2>village there called Yorkville. A guy sitting on a stoop

0:51:53.520 --> 0:51:57.920
<v Speaker 2>of a deli playing guitar acoustic guitar and I walked

0:51:57.920 --> 0:52:00.840
<v Speaker 2>by and hear a couple of notes and said, holy,

0:52:01.600 --> 0:52:04.000
<v Speaker 2>I walk right. I double take and I go right

0:52:04.000 --> 0:52:08.720
<v Speaker 2>back and start listening to him, and it just blows

0:52:08.760 --> 0:52:12.279
<v Speaker 2>my mind. He's out, He's playing, you know, it's like

0:52:12.360 --> 0:52:17.040
<v Speaker 2>Coltrane again on guitar scales that I've never heard of,

0:52:17.520 --> 0:52:20.719
<v Speaker 2>not blues based in any way, only guitarists. Really, I

0:52:20.760 --> 0:52:23.160
<v Speaker 2>ever heard like that. I said, what are you doing?

0:52:23.239 --> 0:52:25.919
<v Speaker 2>And that very morning we went over to the UFT

0:52:26.640 --> 0:52:30.440
<v Speaker 2>practice room and he started showing me stuff, opening me

0:52:30.560 --> 0:52:34.000
<v Speaker 2>up and really in the old fashioned way. He started

0:52:34.040 --> 0:52:38.560
<v Speaker 2>me on standards. My parents knew all the standard and

0:52:38.640 --> 0:52:41.280
<v Speaker 2>I knew them, but couldn't hear them. Couldn't hear those

0:52:41.640 --> 0:52:45.160
<v Speaker 2>slightly more sophisticated chords. He showed me a couple of things.

0:52:45.200 --> 0:52:48.680
<v Speaker 2>All of a sudden, things started unlock, and I really

0:52:48.719 --> 0:52:52.080
<v Speaker 2>started to think I could maybe, maybe I could be

0:52:52.080 --> 0:52:56.200
<v Speaker 2>a musician. I started playing with him, apprenticing with him.

0:52:57.520 --> 0:52:59.560
<v Speaker 2>Eventually he came back to New York. He was in

0:52:59.600 --> 0:53:01.880
<v Speaker 2>New York originally, and I still play with him. I

0:53:01.960 --> 0:53:05.040
<v Speaker 2>just did an album, produced an album with him.

0:53:05.120 --> 0:53:07.239
<v Speaker 1>Just how is it somebody we know?

0:53:08.360 --> 0:53:13.080
<v Speaker 2>He's unknown? He should be known. His name is Desigi Munios,

0:53:13.680 --> 0:53:15.840
<v Speaker 2>maybe a little on you own because you can't pronounce

0:53:15.880 --> 0:53:19.160
<v Speaker 2>his name, but that's the kind of a spiritualistic name,

0:53:19.239 --> 0:53:21.000
<v Speaker 2>you know. Munios is his real last name.

0:53:21.520 --> 0:53:24.240
<v Speaker 1>What was he doing out at six am?

0:53:24.800 --> 0:53:27.319
<v Speaker 2>Uh? He had just gone to town and it was

0:53:27.360 --> 0:53:30.239
<v Speaker 2>free you know, we were free spirits. I was out

0:53:30.280 --> 0:53:33.840
<v Speaker 2>at six am two coming home walking through the village.

0:53:33.880 --> 0:53:40.879
<v Speaker 2>He was playing. I started playing with him right then

0:53:40.920 --> 0:53:44.480
<v Speaker 2>and then and then I got him. So I graduated

0:53:44.920 --> 0:53:47.360
<v Speaker 2>at that point, you could, you know, there were thirteen

0:53:48.160 --> 0:53:51.400
<v Speaker 2>years of high school, but then you could get a

0:53:51.440 --> 0:53:55.440
<v Speaker 2>degree after three years, which I took like an undergrad

0:53:55.800 --> 0:53:58.160
<v Speaker 2>bachelor's degree. And I said to my parents, let me,

0:53:59.239 --> 0:54:02.279
<v Speaker 2>you know, give me a year. See what happens if

0:54:02.320 --> 0:54:05.000
<v Speaker 2>I'm starving. I don't know. Maybe i'd go to grad school.

0:54:05.040 --> 0:54:07.520
<v Speaker 2>I don't know exactly, but you know, i'd try. Maybe

0:54:07.520 --> 0:54:09.279
<v Speaker 2>I could be a professor. I didn't, you know, I

0:54:09.360 --> 0:54:12.200
<v Speaker 2>still didn't over. Just give me a year. And I

0:54:12.320 --> 0:54:17.040
<v Speaker 2>played with Desigi Minios. These out gigs, hippie kind of

0:54:17.200 --> 0:54:23.920
<v Speaker 2>style gigs is what we played actually, and lounge gigs

0:54:23.960 --> 0:54:28.080
<v Speaker 2>at the same time. And then when I would accompany

0:54:29.160 --> 0:54:33.040
<v Speaker 2>people who were auditioning for shows. That was another thing

0:54:33.080 --> 0:54:35.200
<v Speaker 2>I could do and make like I would charge twenty

0:54:35.200 --> 0:54:35.920
<v Speaker 2>bucks wait, but.

0:54:35.880 --> 0:54:40.560
<v Speaker 1>A little bit slower because there are stars and then

0:54:40.600 --> 0:54:45.080
<v Speaker 1>they are working musicians, and anybody who knows working musicians

0:54:45.200 --> 0:54:49.560
<v Speaker 1>is it's all based on networking and the gift of gab.

0:54:50.320 --> 0:54:52.959
<v Speaker 1>So to what degree were you working it in order

0:54:53.000 --> 0:54:55.480
<v Speaker 1>to get these gigs for auditions, et cetera.

0:54:57.400 --> 0:55:00.880
<v Speaker 2>I was not smooth at all at that time. I

0:55:01.040 --> 0:55:05.919
<v Speaker 2>was shy and under confident. But I could play rock

0:55:05.960 --> 0:55:08.879
<v Speaker 2>and roll on the piano because I could do it

0:55:08.920 --> 0:55:14.840
<v Speaker 2>in that assembly with pipeline and people would remember me

0:55:14.920 --> 0:55:18.279
<v Speaker 2>if I could get heard. And that's all I was

0:55:18.280 --> 0:55:24.160
<v Speaker 2>trying to do too, and taking gigs, you know, lounge gigs,

0:55:24.160 --> 0:55:28.640
<v Speaker 2>Well I took. I took a gig just because I could,

0:55:28.719 --> 0:55:30.200
<v Speaker 2>you know, if it was going to be a cover band,

0:55:30.239 --> 0:55:32.680
<v Speaker 2>I just know all. I knew all the songs I

0:55:32.680 --> 0:55:34.880
<v Speaker 2>could play, and I already could play a little organ,

0:55:35.800 --> 0:55:39.040
<v Speaker 2>which was big, but you know, special technique involved with Oregon.

0:55:39.120 --> 0:55:41.000
<v Speaker 2>Of course I could do that. If I had to

0:55:41.080 --> 0:55:44.239
<v Speaker 2>audition for a band, you know, absolutely no problem. So

0:55:44.280 --> 0:55:47.319
<v Speaker 2>I had that confidence, but no confidence as far as

0:55:47.320 --> 0:55:50.440
<v Speaker 2>interpersonal or anything but confidence on the keyboard, and I

0:55:50.480 --> 0:55:53.880
<v Speaker 2>took a gig. We're going to go up to northern

0:55:53.920 --> 0:56:00.440
<v Speaker 2>Quebec and play for missile bases, Canadian missile based troops. There,

0:56:00.480 --> 0:56:04.440
<v Speaker 2>Canadian troops in the dead of winter on a bus

0:56:05.120 --> 0:56:08.400
<v Speaker 2>and I did that. It was like my first professional tour,

0:56:08.520 --> 0:56:12.279
<v Speaker 2>if you will. I had just a gas and I

0:56:12.320 --> 0:56:18.359
<v Speaker 2>met a girl on their Avril chown. She was a

0:56:18.400 --> 0:56:20.000
<v Speaker 2>singer who was going to do a few numbers for

0:56:20.040 --> 0:56:24.359
<v Speaker 2>the troops. And she said, I'm auditioning for a show.

0:56:24.400 --> 0:56:28.839
<v Speaker 2>It's coming on New York show Godspell, the auditions next week.

0:56:28.840 --> 0:56:32.200
<v Speaker 2>Could you play for me? And I want to do

0:56:32.239 --> 0:56:35.520
<v Speaker 2>a song from the show if we could learn it together,

0:56:35.680 --> 0:56:39.160
<v Speaker 2>which we did and she I charged you twenty bucks.

0:56:39.680 --> 0:56:42.080
<v Speaker 2>We learned one of the songs from the Godspell from

0:56:42.120 --> 0:56:44.640
<v Speaker 2>the cast album when we went to the auditions, and

0:56:44.719 --> 0:56:48.080
<v Speaker 2>she made it through the first auditions and for the

0:56:48.120 --> 0:56:51.680
<v Speaker 2>final audition. Stephen Schwartz came to town. He was the

0:56:52.120 --> 0:56:55.719
<v Speaker 2>composer of Godspell. That was his first show. Now he's

0:56:55.760 --> 0:56:59.280
<v Speaker 2>a composer of Wicked, biggest show ever. I think literally

0:57:00.440 --> 0:57:02.560
<v Speaker 2>two movies being made about it, as you know, right.

0:57:02.920 --> 0:57:05.839
<v Speaker 2>But anyway, he's in town and Avril comes up her

0:57:05.920 --> 0:57:10.879
<v Speaker 2>name Avril Chown and sings this song of his from

0:57:10.960 --> 0:57:12.520
<v Speaker 2>the show, and he says, I want to talk to

0:57:12.560 --> 0:57:17.640
<v Speaker 2>that piano player. And he said, can you play the

0:57:17.640 --> 0:57:20.440
<v Speaker 2>rest of the auditions? He said, this guy I've got

0:57:20.560 --> 0:57:24.360
<v Speaker 2>doesn't know any of the songs that people want to sing. Well,

0:57:24.560 --> 0:57:26.360
<v Speaker 2>you know, I know most of them were just singing

0:57:26.440 --> 0:57:29.440
<v Speaker 2>Aquarius from Hair anyway, So I played the rest of

0:57:29.480 --> 0:57:31.280
<v Speaker 2>the auditions for him, and at the end of the

0:57:31.360 --> 0:57:33.880
<v Speaker 2>day he said, can you put a band together and

0:57:33.880 --> 0:57:37.560
<v Speaker 2>conduct the show? And it was just like as I've

0:57:37.600 --> 0:57:42.320
<v Speaker 2>said Lana Turner and Schwabz, I was discovered, just like.

0:57:42.360 --> 0:57:47.439
<v Speaker 1>That, Okay, a little bit slower would before Avril, Were

0:57:47.440 --> 0:57:50.120
<v Speaker 1>you doing auditions for twenty dollars a show.

0:57:49.960 --> 0:57:53.280
<v Speaker 2>Once in a while? Yeah, maybe a local show or something,

0:57:53.320 --> 0:57:55.520
<v Speaker 2>you know, Yes? And I had was.

0:57:55.560 --> 0:57:58.600
<v Speaker 1>This, someone would tear your name off in the grocery store.

0:57:58.640 --> 0:58:00.000
<v Speaker 1>How did they find you?

0:58:01.480 --> 0:58:06.400
<v Speaker 2>Just they would find me? I don't know, I can't,

0:58:07.280 --> 0:58:09.600
<v Speaker 2>I don't know. I'm trying to get into the business.

0:58:09.640 --> 0:58:12.320
<v Speaker 2>So I might show up at a jam session or

0:58:12.360 --> 0:58:15.560
<v Speaker 2>something and somebody, hey, you know, can you play for me?

0:58:15.680 --> 0:58:18.440
<v Speaker 2>And okay, I had that you know, so.

0:58:18.480 --> 0:58:23.600
<v Speaker 1>You put together the band for Godspell. Godspell's playing, that's

0:58:23.680 --> 0:58:28.360
<v Speaker 1>a lot of work, okay, usually eight shows a week

0:58:28.480 --> 0:58:32.800
<v Speaker 1>whatever one say the week? Guess yes, okay, So in reality,

0:58:33.200 --> 0:58:36.400
<v Speaker 1>all that popular music, you're playing, lounge music whatever, you

0:58:36.400 --> 0:58:40.160
<v Speaker 1>don't even have time for that because you're playing a Godspell.

0:58:40.520 --> 0:58:41.360
<v Speaker 1>Was that well, that's right.

0:58:41.400 --> 0:58:43.640
<v Speaker 2>I left all those gigs behind and was that the final?

0:58:44.520 --> 0:58:47.160
<v Speaker 1>Was that fine with you? That now you're the musical

0:58:47.160 --> 0:58:50.160
<v Speaker 1>conductor and piano player for Godspell and you're not in

0:58:50.200 --> 0:58:51.480
<v Speaker 1>any other band whatever?

0:58:52.000 --> 0:58:56.560
<v Speaker 2>Oh? Absolutely? It was way more legit than I thought

0:58:56.600 --> 0:59:02.320
<v Speaker 2>I would go I and it turned out my career

0:59:02.400 --> 0:59:05.120
<v Speaker 2>kind of went in that direction. But I thought, you know,

0:59:05.200 --> 0:59:10.720
<v Speaker 2>I'd be in a band and work by ear as

0:59:10.800 --> 0:59:16.240
<v Speaker 2>bands do you know rock bands do. But I had taken, luckily,

0:59:16.280 --> 0:59:19.919
<v Speaker 2>I had taken some piano lessons and this one year

0:59:20.120 --> 0:59:23.840
<v Speaker 2>one arranging course. But you know, I could read my site.

0:59:23.840 --> 0:59:26.600
<v Speaker 2>Reading was never any good and it still isn't. The

0:59:27.520 --> 0:59:29.920
<v Speaker 2>piano teachers are right back when they said, you know,

0:59:30.040 --> 0:59:33.200
<v Speaker 2>don't play by ear, you won't learn to read, and

0:59:33.240 --> 0:59:35.560
<v Speaker 2>that was the case with me. I can play by year,

0:59:35.640 --> 0:59:38.200
<v Speaker 2>but I can't reading is not I can read and

0:59:38.240 --> 0:59:40.360
<v Speaker 2>I can arrange. I have the knowledge, I just can't

0:59:40.400 --> 0:59:44.200
<v Speaker 2>sight read some of these rehearsal canis put anything in

0:59:44.240 --> 0:59:46.800
<v Speaker 2>front of them, they could play it. I can't. So

0:59:46.880 --> 0:59:50.480
<v Speaker 2>they had to send me the score and I in advance.

0:59:50.600 --> 0:59:54.160
<v Speaker 2>Luckily they did, and I worked on it hard learning it.

0:59:54.400 --> 0:59:57.520
<v Speaker 2>Luckily I had the album I could I could learn,

0:59:57.600 --> 1:00:00.880
<v Speaker 2>you know, I had that to hear for that opening,

1:00:01.160 --> 1:00:03.640
<v Speaker 2>really hard. No, you know, I've worked and worked and

1:00:03.720 --> 1:00:06.440
<v Speaker 2>worked on thrilled to be in Godspell. No other bands.

1:00:07.080 --> 1:00:09.680
<v Speaker 1>That's where we are and how long you in Godspell

1:00:09.760 --> 1:00:10.880
<v Speaker 1>before the next step.

1:00:12.720 --> 1:00:18.680
<v Speaker 2>I did a year of Godspell in in Toronto, and

1:00:18.840 --> 1:00:26.480
<v Speaker 2>during that time Steven Schwartz got a movie deal and

1:00:26.520 --> 1:00:31.280
<v Speaker 2>they made a movie out of Godspell and he brought

1:00:31.320 --> 1:00:34.840
<v Speaker 2>me in from Toronto to play on the score first

1:00:34.840 --> 1:00:38.880
<v Speaker 2>time in New York in a New York recording studio.

1:00:39.320 --> 1:00:41.640
<v Speaker 2>I came into two different times, one to play on

1:00:42.720 --> 1:00:46.240
<v Speaker 2>various songs because he did like the leg you know.

1:00:46.280 --> 1:00:48.720
<v Speaker 2>He allowed me to put my own licks in because

1:00:48.760 --> 1:00:52.760
<v Speaker 2>I couldn't really read exact anyway, and he liked it

1:00:52.840 --> 1:00:54.880
<v Speaker 2>it put it on the movie score, and then he said,

1:00:55.080 --> 1:00:57.080
<v Speaker 2>when this show up here, I'd never take you out

1:00:57.120 --> 1:00:59.240
<v Speaker 2>of the show up here, he said, but when it's over,

1:00:59.320 --> 1:01:02.680
<v Speaker 2>I want you to come New York and he did

1:01:04.520 --> 1:01:08.000
<v Speaker 2>show ended. I spent some time just really not doing

1:01:08.080 --> 1:01:12.120
<v Speaker 2>much in Toronto, not committing, kind of having this in

1:01:12.160 --> 1:01:13.920
<v Speaker 2>the back of the mind. My mind is sure enough.

1:01:13.960 --> 1:01:17.400
<v Speaker 2>Shworts called, I'm doing this in nineteen seventy four. Now

1:01:17.400 --> 1:01:22.480
<v Speaker 2>I'm doing the Magic Show on Broadway, coincidentally with the Canadian,

1:01:22.520 --> 1:01:27.040
<v Speaker 2>the late great Doug Henning, the magician come down and

1:01:27.080 --> 1:01:28.960
<v Speaker 2>play for that. And that's when I moved to New York.

1:01:30.520 --> 1:01:35.120
<v Speaker 1>And any immigration issues or you got the well.

1:01:34.920 --> 1:01:38.960
<v Speaker 2>I got a I got My first permit was an

1:01:39.160 --> 1:01:47.680
<v Speaker 2>H two category, which they got me to do the

1:01:47.680 --> 1:01:51.960
<v Speaker 2>Magic show. But it said you can only play the

1:01:51.960 --> 1:01:57.120
<v Speaker 2>Magic show. You can't go and do other gigs. So

1:01:57.200 --> 1:01:59.480
<v Speaker 2>this isn't good for somebody who's trying to get around,

1:02:00.120 --> 1:02:02.600
<v Speaker 2>you know. I could only do things for free instead

1:02:02.600 --> 1:02:05.240
<v Speaker 2>of jam sessions and stuff. But at least I was

1:02:05.280 --> 1:02:08.760
<v Speaker 2>making a living doing the Magic show. Looking for an

1:02:08.800 --> 1:02:13.760
<v Speaker 2>immigration lawyer who can get me, you know, lead to

1:02:13.760 --> 1:02:16.520
<v Speaker 2>be into this country and open this visa maybe so

1:02:16.600 --> 1:02:20.400
<v Speaker 2>I could do other gigs, but no lawyers wanted any

1:02:20.440 --> 1:02:23.360
<v Speaker 2>you know, they just said, we got enough pianists here,

1:02:23.480 --> 1:02:26.320
<v Speaker 2>we don't need you. If you were a nuclear scientist,

1:02:26.560 --> 1:02:31.320
<v Speaker 2>maybe I can't help you. Finally, I came across one

1:02:31.360 --> 1:02:35.840
<v Speaker 2>guy who said, well, you've gone to prove to them

1:02:35.880 --> 1:02:39.160
<v Speaker 2>that you're not here to take a job away from

1:02:39.200 --> 1:02:44.560
<v Speaker 2>an America. You're here to provide a unique and that's

1:02:44.600 --> 1:02:49.120
<v Speaker 2>the keyword, unique service to America. And he says, if

1:02:49.120 --> 1:02:52.720
<v Speaker 2>you can come up with something like that, especially if

1:02:52.720 --> 1:02:57.400
<v Speaker 2>it's kind of technical and musical, an immigration officer couldn't

1:02:57.880 --> 1:03:00.240
<v Speaker 2>question it. You've got to be a musician, you know,

1:03:01.080 --> 1:03:04.400
<v Speaker 2>then we have a chance. First thing we would do

1:03:04.520 --> 1:03:09.120
<v Speaker 2>is get you your status change, and now if they

1:03:09.160 --> 1:03:13.520
<v Speaker 2>admit you're unique, then we can then go on get

1:03:13.560 --> 1:03:16.000
<v Speaker 2>you a green card, which I have eventually got and

1:03:16.040 --> 1:03:18.600
<v Speaker 2>now I'm a citizen and okay, proud of.

1:03:18.680 --> 1:03:21.320
<v Speaker 1>So tell me how did you prove you were unique?

1:03:21.400 --> 1:03:23.760
<v Speaker 2>Well? I said, how about this, the lawyer, what if

1:03:23.760 --> 1:03:28.320
<v Speaker 2>I could prove I'm an expert in music and comedy

1:03:28.360 --> 1:03:34.040
<v Speaker 2>and how they intercept, providing music for comedy and understanding comedy,

1:03:34.120 --> 1:03:37.240
<v Speaker 2>knowing where the laps are, what's funny, whatever you know?

1:03:38.120 --> 1:03:41.640
<v Speaker 2>And he said sounds good, And I got letters from

1:03:41.680 --> 1:03:44.280
<v Speaker 2>all kinds of people. I had done a few things already.

1:03:44.800 --> 1:03:46.640
<v Speaker 2>I was able to get a letter from Norman Lear

1:03:46.800 --> 1:03:49.800
<v Speaker 2>because I had done a pilot for him that went nowhere.

1:03:50.360 --> 1:03:54.640
<v Speaker 2>I got a letter from well, I can't remember, oh,

1:03:54.640 --> 1:03:57.720
<v Speaker 2>a guy who owned the National Lampoon. I was doing

1:03:57.720 --> 1:04:01.280
<v Speaker 2>stuff for the National Lampoon Radio hour, working with Chris

1:04:01.320 --> 1:04:05.400
<v Speaker 2>Guest there and Bill Murray. That's you know, networking, you

1:04:05.480 --> 1:04:08.720
<v Speaker 2>meet people. That's an example of it. So I got

1:04:08.840 --> 1:04:12.120
<v Speaker 2>letters and sure enough it worked, and it's exactly what

1:04:12.120 --> 1:04:14.960
<v Speaker 2>the immigration officer said. He said, I'm sure this is

1:04:15.000 --> 1:04:17.760
<v Speaker 2>you know, I can't question it. It's not my area.

1:04:18.160 --> 1:04:20.280
<v Speaker 2>And I got a different you know, that's when I

1:04:20.320 --> 1:04:21.280
<v Speaker 2>got my green card.

1:04:21.800 --> 1:04:24.360
<v Speaker 1>Okay, so your status changes. How does that open up

1:04:24.400 --> 1:04:24.920
<v Speaker 1>your career?

1:04:25.520 --> 1:04:28.880
<v Speaker 2>Then I get to do other things for other people,

1:04:29.920 --> 1:04:33.760
<v Speaker 2>sessions and stuff. Especially at that time, I thought if

1:04:33.800 --> 1:04:37.280
<v Speaker 2>I could be a session man, play on records, and

1:04:37.560 --> 1:04:40.120
<v Speaker 2>you know, we started to learn what that was us

1:04:40.160 --> 1:04:44.439
<v Speaker 2>fans when we heard about the Muscle Shoals, rhythm section

1:04:44.640 --> 1:04:47.560
<v Speaker 2>and stuff. And then now we know about the Wrecking

1:04:47.640 --> 1:04:50.960
<v Speaker 2>Crew and how there's these people making records in the

1:04:51.520 --> 1:04:56.040
<v Speaker 2>studios going from sessions. It sounded wonderful to me, and

1:04:56.720 --> 1:05:01.080
<v Speaker 2>I started getting little by little get dates like that

1:05:01.800 --> 1:05:06.280
<v Speaker 2>again networking. Like you said, what kind of dates, Well,

1:05:09.160 --> 1:05:11.920
<v Speaker 2>there was a I've left out an interesting thing. I

1:05:11.960 --> 1:05:16.840
<v Speaker 2>mentioned Norman Lear. I was very aware, you know, as

1:05:16.880 --> 1:05:21.800
<v Speaker 2>a fan up in Canada, even of Don Kirshner. He

1:05:22.080 --> 1:05:22.320
<v Speaker 2>was the.

1:05:22.240 --> 1:05:24.600
<v Speaker 1>Pubblic This was before the TV show when it was

1:05:24.640 --> 1:05:25.840
<v Speaker 1>the Monkeys and everything.

1:05:26.640 --> 1:05:30.440
<v Speaker 2>Well it was yeah, this is post monkeys. Yeah, but

1:05:30.640 --> 1:05:32.960
<v Speaker 2>in the seventies, right, he said, I was. I was

1:05:33.000 --> 1:05:36.040
<v Speaker 2>doing the Magic Show, right, you know, very early, knowing

1:05:36.160 --> 1:05:40.080
<v Speaker 2>various actors, though I knew Broadway type of people. There's

1:05:40.120 --> 1:05:45.200
<v Speaker 2>a guy named Don Scardino played Jesus in various Godspell companies.

1:05:46.120 --> 1:05:50.400
<v Speaker 2>He became a director TV director, very successful. And he said,

1:05:50.600 --> 1:05:52.120
<v Speaker 2>you know, we're all in our twenties. He said, I

1:05:52.120 --> 1:05:54.960
<v Speaker 2>had just auditioned for this show, Don Kirshner, He's going

1:05:55.000 --> 1:05:58.520
<v Speaker 2>to try to do a Monkey's in the seventies. And

1:05:59.360 --> 1:06:02.520
<v Speaker 2>I said, you know, I got the part for the pilot,

1:06:02.520 --> 1:06:05.200
<v Speaker 2>he said, And I told him, you know about you,

1:06:04.840 --> 1:06:08.800
<v Speaker 2>You're funny and maybe they want a real musician. So

1:06:08.880 --> 1:06:13.240
<v Speaker 2>I auditioned for Kirshner and got the part. And before

1:06:13.280 --> 1:06:15.520
<v Speaker 2>I knew it. I was in Hollywood and we made

1:06:15.560 --> 1:06:20.960
<v Speaker 2>a pilot called Hereafter, and Jeff Barry, one of Donnie's guys,

1:06:21.000 --> 1:06:23.920
<v Speaker 2>came in to produce and wrote the theme. That's when

1:06:23.960 --> 1:06:25.760
<v Speaker 2>I met how I met Jeff Barry. I'm going to

1:06:25.840 --> 1:06:29.000
<v Speaker 2>do this thing with him. On the September thirteenth, Jeff

1:06:29.000 --> 1:06:33.840
<v Speaker 2>and I made a song together. He produced it. I

1:06:33.880 --> 1:06:38.600
<v Speaker 2>wrote it with Scardino. Kirshner brings it back to New York.

1:06:38.640 --> 1:06:42.040
<v Speaker 2>He's playing it in his office. Kirshner's demo singer is

1:06:42.160 --> 1:06:46.600
<v Speaker 2>ron Dante, who has become Barry Manilo's producer. Barry knew

1:06:46.680 --> 1:06:50.080
<v Speaker 2>on the scene now and he's got Ohmandy and I

1:06:50.160 --> 1:06:52.960
<v Speaker 2>write the songs. Ron Dante produced all those things with

1:06:53.080 --> 1:06:57.120
<v Speaker 2>Barry and Rondante. Here's this Jeff Barry thing, and he

1:06:57.120 --> 1:07:02.200
<v Speaker 2>hears my arrangement. He says, that's not Jeff's style. Jeff

1:07:02.280 --> 1:07:06.480
<v Speaker 2>is sugar Sugar, so he says he started using me

1:07:06.520 --> 1:07:12.000
<v Speaker 2>as a ranger and first artist. His artist was a

1:07:12.040 --> 1:07:16.280
<v Speaker 2>guy named Paul Jabbara. Of course, Paul was going to

1:07:16.320 --> 1:07:19.680
<v Speaker 2>try to be an artist. I was doing a chart.

1:07:20.720 --> 1:07:24.960
<v Speaker 2>Paul's song was called One Man Ain't Enough. He was

1:07:25.600 --> 1:07:31.680
<v Speaker 2>already mining those humorous aspects of love, and we made

1:07:31.680 --> 1:07:34.200
<v Speaker 2>a good record, Ron producing and I got I wrote

1:07:34.200 --> 1:07:38.520
<v Speaker 2>strings and stuff disco. Nothing happened as an artist for

1:07:38.760 --> 1:07:42.600
<v Speaker 2>Paul Jabbara, but way later he moved to La He

1:07:42.640 --> 1:07:47.200
<v Speaker 2>won an Oscar for wrinning last Dance for Donna Summer,

1:07:47.920 --> 1:07:49.560
<v Speaker 2>and then he came back to New York. And this

1:07:49.600 --> 1:07:52.960
<v Speaker 2>is about eighty nineteen eighty one, and he called me

1:07:53.080 --> 1:07:56.240
<v Speaker 2>up and he said, you did a great job on

1:07:56.240 --> 1:07:59.240
<v Speaker 2>One Man. Ain't enough with Ron Dante. He said, I

1:07:59.240 --> 1:08:01.960
<v Speaker 2>got a title now for Donna Summer. I want you

1:08:02.000 --> 1:08:04.880
<v Speaker 2>to write it with me. What do you think about

1:08:04.920 --> 1:08:07.919
<v Speaker 2>It's raining Men? And I said I'll be right over.

1:08:08.120 --> 1:08:10.000
<v Speaker 2>And you know that became a.

1:08:12.040 --> 1:08:14.440
<v Speaker 1>But you said he was writing for Donna Summer. How

1:08:14.480 --> 1:08:16.360
<v Speaker 1>did it end up with the Weather Girls?

1:08:17.000 --> 1:08:22.760
<v Speaker 2>Well, because Donna Summer heard it and hated it. She

1:08:23.720 --> 1:08:28.479
<v Speaker 2>had become religious by this point and she didn't. She

1:08:28.560 --> 1:08:31.680
<v Speaker 2>was insulted by it and she didn't like especially when

1:08:31.680 --> 1:08:35.400
<v Speaker 2>it said Hallelujah, It's raining men, and she objected to it.

1:08:35.520 --> 1:08:38.640
<v Speaker 2>She sent a bible to Paul. She and Paul were

1:08:38.720 --> 1:08:43.639
<v Speaker 2>great friends, but she rejected the song, and Paul tried

1:08:43.760 --> 1:08:47.960
<v Speaker 2>everything because he knew his kind of flamboyant guy, if

1:08:47.960 --> 1:08:50.800
<v Speaker 2>you will, who knew all the divas at the time,

1:08:50.840 --> 1:08:55.320
<v Speaker 2>and he played it for everybody, Diana Ross, Patty LaBelle Cheer,

1:08:55.600 --> 1:09:00.160
<v Speaker 2>and they all hated it. It didn't daunt him. He

1:09:00.240 --> 1:09:05.120
<v Speaker 2>made a track and he remembered these two girls they

1:09:05.200 --> 1:09:08.479
<v Speaker 2>used to sing for Sylvester right under the name two

1:09:08.560 --> 1:09:11.880
<v Speaker 2>Tons of Fun. He put their voices on it and

1:09:11.960 --> 1:09:15.320
<v Speaker 2>called them the Weather Girls, and that when it became

1:09:15.360 --> 1:09:17.720
<v Speaker 2>a hit, they were glad to go and work as

1:09:17.720 --> 1:09:18.360
<v Speaker 2>the Wedder Girls.

1:09:25.800 --> 1:09:29.800
<v Speaker 1>A couple of questions, yes, sir, hey, what was it

1:09:30.120 --> 1:09:31.080
<v Speaker 1>like to have a hit?

1:09:32.800 --> 1:09:38.759
<v Speaker 2>Kind of amazing for me, of course, being so tuned

1:09:38.800 --> 1:09:42.680
<v Speaker 2>to the radio stade. This song took off very gradually,

1:09:44.320 --> 1:09:48.200
<v Speaker 2>interestingly enough, and it became a number one dance record

1:09:49.280 --> 1:09:53.360
<v Speaker 2>right away, but as far as top forty, it got

1:09:53.400 --> 1:09:54.400
<v Speaker 2>to about forty three.

1:09:55.479 --> 1:09:57.760
<v Speaker 1>It's one of those songs everybody knows, but if you

1:09:57.760 --> 1:09:59.960
<v Speaker 1>look it up in the chart numbers not qu.

1:10:00.479 --> 1:10:03.520
<v Speaker 2>Just forty three, just out of the top forty. Nonetheless,

1:10:04.200 --> 1:10:08.800
<v Speaker 2>it started taking off another country's end, and when it

1:10:08.880 --> 1:10:13.280
<v Speaker 2>turned out to be the right tempo for aerobics, it's fast.

1:10:14.240 --> 1:10:17.080
<v Speaker 2>It's a fast dance temple, which worked in the clubs,

1:10:17.520 --> 1:10:19.640
<v Speaker 2>and it also worked for aerobics, and that's when it

1:10:19.680 --> 1:10:24.120
<v Speaker 2>crossed out of the gay clubs into the masses. You know,

1:10:24.520 --> 1:10:27.800
<v Speaker 2>women liked it too in the gym. So it took

1:10:27.840 --> 1:10:30.360
<v Speaker 2>a long time. Took years for this to kind of happen,

1:10:30.800 --> 1:10:35.120
<v Speaker 2>and then people use it all over the world in

1:10:35.240 --> 1:10:38.280
<v Speaker 2>commercials or movies and stuff. But it kind of, as

1:10:38.320 --> 1:10:40.760
<v Speaker 2>I say, it's not like, wow, I got another top

1:10:40.800 --> 1:10:43.120
<v Speaker 2>ten record. Was never that. It's just kind of a

1:10:43.160 --> 1:10:44.160
<v Speaker 2>gradual swell.

1:10:44.360 --> 1:10:49.160
<v Speaker 1>Okay, you write that song? Who owns it? And what

1:10:49.280 --> 1:10:51.600
<v Speaker 1>was your percentage of the one hundred percent ownership?

1:10:54.560 --> 1:11:00.400
<v Speaker 2>I did not give up my half of the publishing.

1:11:00.800 --> 1:11:03.840
<v Speaker 2>You did not, No, I did not, So I for

1:11:03.920 --> 1:11:07.320
<v Speaker 2>the first time, I do have half the publishing on it.

1:11:07.960 --> 1:11:10.840
<v Speaker 2>Now there's a little deal in praised with Paul Jabbara

1:11:10.960 --> 1:11:16.320
<v Speaker 2>and his descendants. Now he's unfortunately left us, so with

1:11:16.479 --> 1:11:18.320
<v Speaker 2>my share, you know, I share it a little bit

1:11:18.320 --> 1:11:19.400
<v Speaker 2>with them.

1:11:20.360 --> 1:11:21.800
<v Speaker 1>Well what way did well?

1:11:21.920 --> 1:11:24.840
<v Speaker 2>Because Paul did say you know, hey, I you know

1:11:24.880 --> 1:11:27.760
<v Speaker 2>I want you to write this song. Well you you know,

1:11:27.840 --> 1:11:29.639
<v Speaker 2>And I don't want to get into the details of.

1:11:29.600 --> 1:11:32.479
<v Speaker 1>That, but just understand, didn't he have the other half

1:11:32.479 --> 1:11:32.920
<v Speaker 1>of the song.

1:11:33.080 --> 1:11:37.439
<v Speaker 2>He did, but he was signed to a company. He said,

1:11:37.479 --> 1:11:39.240
<v Speaker 2>I'm never going to make any money off this. You've

1:11:39.240 --> 1:11:41.559
<v Speaker 2>got to understand, I'm so in debt to them. With

1:11:41.680 --> 1:11:44.120
<v Speaker 2>all the sessions I do. By the time I recoup,

1:11:44.880 --> 1:11:46.680
<v Speaker 2>I won't make any money. So will you give me

1:11:46.720 --> 1:11:49.040
<v Speaker 2>a little money from your part of the publishing? And

1:11:49.080 --> 1:11:51.800
<v Speaker 2>I did. I'm happy to do it, and you still

1:11:52.080 --> 1:11:54.080
<v Speaker 2>will do it. I still do it, and you still

1:11:54.120 --> 1:11:57.920
<v Speaker 2>own the song. Yes, yes, and I have resisted. I

1:11:57.920 --> 1:12:00.680
<v Speaker 2>have been offered. You know, some of these well, I

1:12:00.720 --> 1:12:02.760
<v Speaker 2>don't know what they call these new publishers that are

1:12:02.760 --> 1:12:07.160
<v Speaker 2>coming buying up people's catalog. Mine certainly isn't worth what

1:12:07.800 --> 1:12:10.880
<v Speaker 2>Springsys is. I only got one song, but I all

1:12:10.920 --> 1:12:14.799
<v Speaker 2>wrote the Letterman theme too, but that was that. But still,

1:12:14.840 --> 1:12:17.519
<v Speaker 2>you know, some deals have come across. I just said,

1:12:17.560 --> 1:12:19.519
<v Speaker 2>come on, it's my only song. I'm just going to

1:12:19.600 --> 1:12:22.200
<v Speaker 2>hang on to this, see what happens, because I'll tell

1:12:22.200 --> 1:12:25.320
<v Speaker 2>you something when I want to use it for a

1:12:25.360 --> 1:12:29.160
<v Speaker 2>toothpaste commercial in Denmark. If you don't have any publishing,

1:12:29.200 --> 1:12:31.120
<v Speaker 2>you're not going to hear about it, period, and you're

1:12:31.160 --> 1:12:33.840
<v Speaker 2>not going to get paid for it's a different thing

1:12:33.880 --> 1:12:35.640
<v Speaker 2>when you have a little of the publishing than I

1:12:35.720 --> 1:12:38.679
<v Speaker 2>have have it. So that's absolutely true.

1:12:38.960 --> 1:12:41.360
<v Speaker 1>Okay, so you have this hit with the Weather Girls.

1:12:41.400 --> 1:12:42.559
<v Speaker 1>What's the next step for you?

1:12:44.240 --> 1:12:48.559
<v Speaker 2>Just continue? I was already on Letterman by that point.

1:12:48.720 --> 1:12:51.920
<v Speaker 1>No, no, well let's go back to chapter Oh so,

1:12:52.720 --> 1:12:58.760
<v Speaker 1>oh yeah, So how do you get from Godspell to SNL?

1:13:00.080 --> 1:13:03.920
<v Speaker 2>Godspell or Stephen Schwartz brought me to New York And

1:13:03.960 --> 1:13:06.559
<v Speaker 2>I was already in New York when the SNL people

1:13:06.680 --> 1:13:11.600
<v Speaker 2>showed up. After I had done Godspell in Toronto, I

1:13:11.720 --> 1:13:14.599
<v Speaker 2>was now a theatrical musician. I started doing a few

1:13:14.640 --> 1:13:19.200
<v Speaker 2>other shows getting those calls, and a guy came in

1:13:19.240 --> 1:13:22.080
<v Speaker 2>to play saxophone in the band for one of those

1:13:22.120 --> 1:13:27.080
<v Speaker 2>shows in Toronto, and it was Howard shore Uh. And

1:13:27.080 --> 1:13:32.000
<v Speaker 2>that's when we met and we hit it off. And

1:13:32.760 --> 1:13:35.640
<v Speaker 2>Howard turns out to have been he was in a

1:13:36.080 --> 1:13:39.280
<v Speaker 2>band up in Canada that had some success, Lighthouse of

1:13:39.320 --> 1:13:44.080
<v Speaker 2>course one morning. Yes, he was a saxophone player in that.

1:13:44.760 --> 1:13:49.000
<v Speaker 2>And he was also Lauren Michael's best friend. Oh he

1:13:49.080 --> 1:13:51.719
<v Speaker 2>had They had gone to summer camp and done shows together.

1:13:52.920 --> 1:13:57.679
<v Speaker 2>So Lauren came to town to do SNL and Howard

1:13:57.800 --> 1:14:01.679
<v Speaker 2>was his musical director from the old days in camp.

1:14:02.479 --> 1:14:04.840
<v Speaker 2>Howard was gonna, you know, and Howard did a great

1:14:04.920 --> 1:14:09.040
<v Speaker 2>job for them and for him. And I was already

1:14:09.080 --> 1:14:11.800
<v Speaker 2>in town doing the Magic show. Howard called me up,

1:14:12.640 --> 1:14:18.559
<v Speaker 2>had offered me this job, and I was thinking, oh

1:14:18.600 --> 1:14:21.200
<v Speaker 2>my god, it's going to be variety of every I

1:14:21.240 --> 1:14:26.160
<v Speaker 2>can have to new music every week. I don't know

1:14:26.240 --> 1:14:28.760
<v Speaker 2>if I can cut it. And after I accepted, I

1:14:28.840 --> 1:14:31.320
<v Speaker 2>called Howard one night, Howard, I don't think I'm the

1:14:31.400 --> 1:14:33.160
<v Speaker 2>right guy, and he had to talk me into it.

1:14:33.479 --> 1:14:35.880
<v Speaker 2>I said, it's not daily. You know, we're going to

1:14:35.960 --> 1:14:38.479
<v Speaker 2>have time to rehearse. You'll have the music. He calmed

1:14:38.479 --> 1:14:42.559
<v Speaker 2>me down, and that's how I got on that show,

1:14:42.640 --> 1:14:45.320
<v Speaker 2>hired by him. But he said, you know, you were

1:14:45.400 --> 1:14:49.200
<v Speaker 2>hiring a lot of people. You know. Gilda had been

1:14:49.200 --> 1:14:55.000
<v Speaker 2>in Godspell in Toronto. She was from Detroit really, but

1:14:55.080 --> 1:14:59.760
<v Speaker 2>had been up in Toronto. Ackroyd I knew he had

1:15:00.160 --> 1:15:04.599
<v Speaker 2>around backstage Godspell. Belushi was one of the first guys

1:15:04.640 --> 1:15:07.320
<v Speaker 2>I met when I came to New York. To another

1:15:07.479 --> 1:15:13.240
<v Speaker 2>connection I had Brian Doyle Murray. Bill Murray's older brother.

1:15:14.040 --> 1:15:18.400
<v Speaker 2>Brian introduced me around in New York. When I got there,

1:15:19.720 --> 1:15:23.559
<v Speaker 2>Brian introduced me the National Lampoon people. I started working

1:15:23.560 --> 1:15:27.040
<v Speaker 2>with the doing musical parodies and stuff with them.

1:15:27.280 --> 1:15:29.960
<v Speaker 1>Now, were you the pianist in Lemmings.

1:15:29.800 --> 1:15:32.920
<v Speaker 2>No, let Mes is before my time great pianist in

1:15:33.000 --> 1:15:37.240
<v Speaker 2>Lemmings named Paul Jacobs. He was with the Lampoon even

1:15:37.280 --> 1:15:40.559
<v Speaker 2>before I and Paul Jacobs and I worked together on

1:15:40.560 --> 1:15:43.840
<v Speaker 2>this one album we made for them called Goodbye Pop.

1:15:45.000 --> 1:15:48.600
<v Speaker 2>Christopher Guest was with us, that was what he was

1:15:48.640 --> 1:15:52.040
<v Speaker 2>doing at the time. He was in New York at

1:15:52.040 --> 1:15:55.200
<v Speaker 2>the time. We wrote some songs together. We wrote a

1:15:55.240 --> 1:16:01.000
<v Speaker 2>song together called Kung Fu Christmas. You know what if

1:16:01.000 --> 1:16:04.840
<v Speaker 2>the stylistics did a Christmas song? That type of thing,

1:16:05.520 --> 1:16:10.599
<v Speaker 2>and that's a collector's item. Goodbye Pop. Nonetheless, some funny

1:16:10.600 --> 1:16:11.120
<v Speaker 2>stuff on it.

1:16:12.080 --> 1:16:15.559
<v Speaker 1>Okay, SNL starts well, the first host was George Carlin

1:16:15.720 --> 1:16:18.320
<v Speaker 1>was either very yes, that's right, yes, And I watched

1:16:18.320 --> 1:16:20.200
<v Speaker 1>the first and I ate it was sort of hip.

1:16:20.479 --> 1:16:24.880
<v Speaker 1>It took a couple of months to become a phenomenon. Yeah,

1:16:24.880 --> 1:16:27.640
<v Speaker 1>what was it like being on the show? What was

1:16:27.680 --> 1:16:29.480
<v Speaker 1>your viewpoint? Looking out?

1:16:31.000 --> 1:16:36.200
<v Speaker 2>Awfully fun to do leading up to the first show,

1:16:36.320 --> 1:16:38.280
<v Speaker 2>I couldn't believe we were going to go alive. It

1:16:38.320 --> 1:16:44.800
<v Speaker 2>didn't seem possible. So many elements, so many different stages

1:16:44.840 --> 1:16:48.360
<v Speaker 2>in that big studio, eight h cutting from one to

1:16:48.400 --> 1:16:50.240
<v Speaker 2>another to another, and it's all going to be live.

1:16:51.560 --> 1:16:55.720
<v Speaker 2>There was no music on the very first show, you know,

1:16:55.800 --> 1:16:57.920
<v Speaker 2>no act that we had to play for or anything,

1:16:57.960 --> 1:17:01.080
<v Speaker 2>as I was man, just the theme and some ins

1:17:01.120 --> 1:17:04.679
<v Speaker 2>and outs, so not too much pressure and in general,

1:17:05.880 --> 1:17:09.160
<v Speaker 2>not so aware of any you know how successful the

1:17:09.200 --> 1:17:12.040
<v Speaker 2>show was being just having the time of my life,

1:17:12.080 --> 1:17:15.920
<v Speaker 2>really doing a doing a network show. And I remember

1:17:15.960 --> 1:17:19.760
<v Speaker 2>the Christmas Show, how much fun that was because of

1:17:19.840 --> 1:17:23.519
<v Speaker 2>remembering watching the you know, Dinah Shore's Christmas Show or

1:17:23.560 --> 1:17:28.000
<v Speaker 2>Andy Williams Christmas, this long tradition and how important television

1:17:28.120 --> 1:17:30.519
<v Speaker 2>was to me up in Canada, and then to be

1:17:30.560 --> 1:17:33.200
<v Speaker 2>a part of a Christmas show myself and getting to

1:17:33.240 --> 1:17:38.920
<v Speaker 2>play for Martha Reeves that that Christmas who Lauren booked.

1:17:39.560 --> 1:17:44.280
<v Speaker 1>Okay, your breakthrough on camera moment is is Don Kirshner.

1:17:44.640 --> 1:17:46.920
<v Speaker 1>How did that happen? Well?

1:17:48.760 --> 1:17:52.400
<v Speaker 2>Brian dol Murray was a good friend. As I mentioned, Billy,

1:17:52.760 --> 1:17:55.840
<v Speaker 2>his brother was already on the show. Brian later joined

1:17:55.960 --> 1:17:59.559
<v Speaker 2>SNL as a writer. In fact, he was there as

1:17:59.560 --> 1:18:02.920
<v Speaker 2>a writer when I came back from doing that Norman

1:18:03.040 --> 1:18:07.080
<v Speaker 2>Lear thing with Jeff Barry and Kirshner, and I got

1:18:07.120 --> 1:18:10.080
<v Speaker 2>my when it bombed, I got my old job back

1:18:10.479 --> 1:18:15.200
<v Speaker 2>on SNL and I returned, and I was as always

1:18:15.240 --> 1:18:17.960
<v Speaker 2>though part of writing meetings and stuff. I was there

1:18:18.040 --> 1:18:21.240
<v Speaker 2>for sir, you know, especially if things were going to

1:18:21.280 --> 1:18:24.800
<v Speaker 2>get musical. I was up late with everybody off and

1:18:24.840 --> 1:18:27.799
<v Speaker 2>on Tuesday nights.

1:18:25.760 --> 1:18:25.840
<v Speaker 1>And.

1:18:28.280 --> 1:18:35.120
<v Speaker 2>Brian had an idea for a musical number. We had

1:18:35.160 --> 1:18:37.280
<v Speaker 2>a character on the show, a running character. He was

1:18:37.320 --> 1:18:42.719
<v Speaker 2>really a writer, Michael O'donahue, one of the key guys,

1:18:42.960 --> 1:18:46.840
<v Speaker 2>uh you know, when it came to attitude, dangerous attitude

1:18:47.240 --> 1:18:50.040
<v Speaker 2>of the show, and he had a character he would

1:18:50.040 --> 1:18:53.879
<v Speaker 2>do on camera sometimes, mister Mike just he was dimly

1:18:53.960 --> 1:18:56.360
<v Speaker 2>lit and he was kind of eerie and stuff. And

1:18:56.600 --> 1:19:01.240
<v Speaker 2>Brian said, what if we do a thing Garrett Morris,

1:19:01.320 --> 1:19:05.160
<v Speaker 2>our dear friend and actor on it, the only black guy,

1:19:05.400 --> 1:19:08.320
<v Speaker 2>the only black actor on the show at the time, Garrett.

1:19:08.640 --> 1:19:12.200
<v Speaker 2>The idea is Garrett and drag doing Tina Turner, which

1:19:12.240 --> 1:19:16.280
<v Speaker 2>he really tore up, and mister Mike on guitar, and

1:19:16.320 --> 1:19:20.519
<v Speaker 2>so instead of it's instead of Eyking Tina, It's Mike

1:19:20.560 --> 1:19:24.679
<v Speaker 2>and Tina. That was the whole idea. Obviously not much

1:19:24.680 --> 1:19:27.040
<v Speaker 2>of an idea to hang your hat on, but it

1:19:27.240 --> 1:19:29.800
<v Speaker 2>required some exposition. You know, how are we going to

1:19:29.880 --> 1:19:33.680
<v Speaker 2>set this up? Explain that he's Mike, mister Mike, and

1:19:33.680 --> 1:19:36.960
<v Speaker 2>it's mister Mike and Tina. And I said, I could

1:19:36.960 --> 1:19:41.720
<v Speaker 2>introduce this as Don Kirshner. I had worked with Kirshner,

1:19:41.800 --> 1:19:45.080
<v Speaker 2>of course Jeff Barry on this on This Bomb Show

1:19:45.160 --> 1:19:49.080
<v Speaker 2>at seventy seven, and during that time out in La

1:19:49.600 --> 1:19:54.000
<v Speaker 2>Kirshner was hard again with his uh Don Kirshner's rock

1:19:54.080 --> 1:19:57.759
<v Speaker 2>concert first you know that? And there was another one anyway,

1:19:57.760 --> 1:20:03.800
<v Speaker 2>it didn't call you, yeah, exactly, And Kirscher called me

1:20:03.840 --> 1:20:05.920
<v Speaker 2>one day. He knew I was a big fan of it.

1:20:06.040 --> 1:20:07.720
<v Speaker 2>I gush all over him, you know, I knew all

1:20:07.760 --> 1:20:10.519
<v Speaker 2>about Tommy Boyce and Bobby Hart and all of his

1:20:11.200 --> 1:20:14.479
<v Speaker 2>all of that stuff. And he called me up and

1:20:14.520 --> 1:20:16.840
<v Speaker 2>he said, I'm going to go on I've had voiceovers

1:20:16.840 --> 1:20:20.160
<v Speaker 2>all this time on my show introducing the acts. I'm

1:20:20.200 --> 1:20:23.240
<v Speaker 2>going to go on camera myself. He said, you know,

1:20:23.360 --> 1:20:25.880
<v Speaker 2>people are saying, maybe I'm a little stiff. He said,

1:20:25.880 --> 1:20:27.840
<v Speaker 2>but Sullivan was stiff and he had the gig, you

1:20:27.880 --> 1:20:29.800
<v Speaker 2>know what I mean. And I got the gig. He

1:20:29.920 --> 1:20:33.320
<v Speaker 2>spoke very kind of fast and show busy in person.

1:20:33.760 --> 1:20:35.000
<v Speaker 2>You know, I got the gig. You know, I may

1:20:35.080 --> 1:20:36.920
<v Speaker 2>be stiff, and I got the gig, he says, So

1:20:37.000 --> 1:20:38.439
<v Speaker 2>I want you to be there. I'm going to go.

1:20:38.479 --> 1:20:40.160
<v Speaker 2>I want Lucky to be there when I go on

1:20:40.200 --> 1:20:42.840
<v Speaker 2>camera for the first time. And I drove down somewhere

1:20:42.920 --> 1:20:46.080
<v Speaker 2>near Hollywood and Vine to a studio and he's doing

1:20:46.120 --> 1:20:50.560
<v Speaker 2>these intros and I never saw anything so funny because

1:20:50.600 --> 1:20:54.040
<v Speaker 2>he was so animated and fast talking as a publisher.

1:20:54.760 --> 1:20:56.200
<v Speaker 2>But he said, forget about it. You know, we want

1:20:56.200 --> 1:20:58.280
<v Speaker 2>to talk about track record with the Neil Diamonds and

1:20:58.320 --> 1:21:01.040
<v Speaker 2>the Carol Kingdom. They saidakas ever looked at a contract,

1:21:01.280 --> 1:21:03.360
<v Speaker 2>he would go a mile a minute, but when he

1:21:03.439 --> 1:21:07.639
<v Speaker 2>got on camera, he froze up and he I'm Don

1:21:07.800 --> 1:21:13.160
<v Speaker 2>Kashner and this is rock constant, So you know, it

1:21:13.280 --> 1:21:16.640
<v Speaker 2>stuck with me. And I did at that time to

1:21:16.720 --> 1:21:20.200
<v Speaker 2>introduce my Contina Turner, and that's how that's how that

1:21:20.320 --> 1:21:23.280
<v Speaker 2>came about the show. God blessed them. They were so

1:21:23.439 --> 1:21:27.600
<v Speaker 2>loose that anybody was welcome to get in on it

1:21:27.720 --> 1:21:30.519
<v Speaker 2>if they if they had something that might be funny.

1:21:31.000 --> 1:21:35.320
<v Speaker 1>Okay, but a couple of things. This was when it

1:21:35.400 --> 1:21:39.559
<v Speaker 1>was the Hippis show in the country, and unlike today,

1:21:39.600 --> 1:21:44.560
<v Speaker 1>there was a limited number of outlets. Suddenly you're famous.

1:21:45.800 --> 1:21:51.800
<v Speaker 2>What's it like walking around not famous? Really starting to

1:21:51.800 --> 1:21:52.960
<v Speaker 2>get a little exposure.

1:21:54.800 --> 1:21:57.000
<v Speaker 1>You go to the grocery store people.

1:21:58.040 --> 1:21:59.880
<v Speaker 2>I have to say, no, I have to say that's

1:22:00.040 --> 1:22:03.640
<v Speaker 2>certainly did start to happen when Lettermans started. When A

1:22:03.680 --> 1:22:08.680
<v Speaker 2>Letterman Show started in eighty two, there was an amazing difference. Yes,

1:22:08.720 --> 1:22:13.120
<v Speaker 2>and I became sort of well known for sure, but

1:22:13.360 --> 1:22:16.679
<v Speaker 2>not during the you know, my little roles on SNL

1:22:16.720 --> 1:22:19.760
<v Speaker 2>and by the fifth season I was even known as

1:22:19.800 --> 1:22:22.920
<v Speaker 2>a featured player. These are these, you know, almost the

1:22:23.160 --> 1:22:26.360
<v Speaker 2>semi regular I got that billing and did a few

1:22:26.400 --> 1:22:28.720
<v Speaker 2>you know kershner was really the only thing I could do.

1:22:28.800 --> 1:22:31.120
<v Speaker 2>But they would work me into some other things too,

1:22:31.560 --> 1:22:34.479
<v Speaker 2>But no, I never really got you know, uh, it

1:22:34.640 --> 1:22:37.720
<v Speaker 2>was never really much of a recognition factor until the

1:22:37.920 --> 1:22:38.519
<v Speaker 2>Letterman Show.

1:22:39.439 --> 1:22:41.080
<v Speaker 1>And how did you end up in spinal Tap?

1:22:42.320 --> 1:22:48.320
<v Speaker 2>Well, fifth season of SNL, my fifth and last season,

1:22:49.160 --> 1:22:52.719
<v Speaker 2>Harry Shearer was It was one of his first two

1:22:53.200 --> 1:22:56.439
<v Speaker 2>appearances as a cast member. He became a cast member

1:22:56.479 --> 1:22:58.960
<v Speaker 2>that year and the two of us hit it off,

1:22:59.479 --> 1:23:06.160
<v Speaker 2>and we're still close friends, and we wrote together on SNL.

1:23:07.800 --> 1:23:10.880
<v Speaker 2>First thing we wrote together was a kind of a

1:23:10.920 --> 1:23:15.000
<v Speaker 2>parody of a backers audition. Lauren was really, you know,

1:23:15.800 --> 1:23:19.080
<v Speaker 2>hoping that the two of us would get together and

1:23:19.120 --> 1:23:23.240
<v Speaker 2>write something musical. We didn't know that you could be

1:23:23.360 --> 1:23:26.680
<v Speaker 2>like Tina Fay and then put it on Broadway. We

1:23:26.680 --> 1:23:29.360
<v Speaker 2>weren't thinking like that at all, you know, but we

1:23:29.400 --> 1:23:31.559
<v Speaker 2>wrote something that we thought was very funny. A backers

1:23:31.640 --> 1:23:38.000
<v Speaker 2>audition for the worst show you could possibly imagine, something

1:23:38.040 --> 1:23:43.599
<v Speaker 2>about the Manson family. B Arthur was a hostess, and

1:23:43.640 --> 1:23:46.760
<v Speaker 2>she played like a society woman who had lent her

1:23:46.800 --> 1:23:50.560
<v Speaker 2>home for this backers audition. Harry and I Young composers,

1:23:51.400 --> 1:23:54.679
<v Speaker 2>and the rest of the cast. Billy build a Garrett

1:23:54.720 --> 1:23:57.920
<v Speaker 2>playing of the different characters in the show, singing the

1:23:57.960 --> 1:24:02.639
<v Speaker 2>song Garrett as man and singing a song called nine

1:24:02.720 --> 1:24:05.040
<v Speaker 2>because we all know he was into that number nine.

1:24:05.120 --> 1:24:07.640
<v Speaker 2>And the hook was that it was in nine to

1:24:07.640 --> 1:24:11.400
<v Speaker 2>eight times, just like those silly songs in Superstar. Every

1:24:11.439 --> 1:24:14.360
<v Speaker 2>song had to be kind of in different times, so

1:24:14.439 --> 1:24:16.160
<v Speaker 2>that was our so we hit it off strong. And

1:24:16.160 --> 1:24:21.000
<v Speaker 2>when Harry and the guys were developed spinal Tap, Harry

1:24:21.040 --> 1:24:25.960
<v Speaker 2>sold them on me. This guy's funny, and you know

1:24:26.120 --> 1:24:28.680
<v Speaker 2>he would be great for this part. The local promo man,

1:24:29.600 --> 1:24:33.040
<v Speaker 2>and I knew them all. Rob Reiner had had hosted us,

1:24:33.040 --> 1:24:34.960
<v Speaker 2>and I knew them all a little bit. Chris of

1:24:35.000 --> 1:24:41.479
<v Speaker 2>course from from from National Lampoon and McKean socially, so

1:24:41.520 --> 1:24:44.519
<v Speaker 2>they all, you know, it didn't take too much. And

1:24:44.560 --> 1:24:46.240
<v Speaker 2>when I said to Harry, well, so you're going to

1:24:46.320 --> 1:24:49.719
<v Speaker 2>send me my lines, and he said, you'll be making

1:24:49.720 --> 1:24:53.920
<v Speaker 2>them up, I said what, And it turns out that

1:24:53.920 --> 1:24:56.720
<v Speaker 2>that's that's the way the movie was done. They had

1:24:56.880 --> 1:24:59.960
<v Speaker 2>just seen outlines. No, he had to make the prown lines.

1:25:00.400 --> 1:25:02.320
<v Speaker 1>How long did you actually work on set?

1:25:02.680 --> 1:25:06.120
<v Speaker 2>Two days work. I came out on a weekend to

1:25:06.120 --> 1:25:11.880
<v Speaker 2>do two days work. First day was the scene. Well,

1:25:13.320 --> 1:25:17.960
<v Speaker 2>there's a little problem because I was the local promo

1:25:18.040 --> 1:25:21.160
<v Speaker 2>man and my first scene was I arrived late after

1:25:21.200 --> 1:25:24.080
<v Speaker 2>a gig to the band's hotel and I have to

1:25:24.800 --> 1:25:27.240
<v Speaker 2>talk them into getting up super early the next morning

1:25:27.280 --> 1:25:29.280
<v Speaker 2>to do a radio interview, and they just don't want

1:25:29.360 --> 1:25:33.200
<v Speaker 2>to do it. And I'm going crazy and I this scene,

1:25:33.479 --> 1:25:37.920
<v Speaker 2>you know, well, I was. They put in a thing

1:25:37.960 --> 1:25:40.000
<v Speaker 2>where I took an egg. I once did it in

1:25:40.040 --> 1:25:43.519
<v Speaker 2>realized so frustrated that I smashed an egg right on

1:25:43.640 --> 1:25:47.200
<v Speaker 2>my head and that was in the move in the movie.

1:25:47.200 --> 1:25:50.240
<v Speaker 2>But then I do get them to the next day

1:25:50.280 --> 1:25:53.400
<v Speaker 2>we're shooting in the radio studio. I get them up

1:25:53.840 --> 1:25:58.639
<v Speaker 2>for the early morning interview and there's a DJ ready

1:25:58.680 --> 1:26:00.840
<v Speaker 2>to go to play, a guy playing a DJ. But

1:26:00.920 --> 1:26:03.880
<v Speaker 2>Harry sure is a DJ too, as I'm sure you know,

1:26:05.160 --> 1:26:08.840
<v Speaker 2>very much a perfectionist, and he did. He just didn't

1:26:08.840 --> 1:26:11.360
<v Speaker 2>approve of the way this DJ, the DJ couldn't you know,

1:26:11.560 --> 1:26:14.640
<v Speaker 2>operate his own slip his own card in queuing up

1:26:14.640 --> 1:26:17.400
<v Speaker 2>a record at the same time, couldn't know. Harry just

1:26:18.240 --> 1:26:22.000
<v Speaker 2>didn't approve. So that means that scene had to go,

1:26:22.680 --> 1:26:24.960
<v Speaker 2>and my scene leading up to it that really had

1:26:24.960 --> 1:26:27.200
<v Speaker 2>to go to Aloha. Thank god. It appears as a

1:26:27.240 --> 1:26:30.880
<v Speaker 2>bonus track on the DVD, the egg Stink the egg thing,

1:26:31.840 --> 1:26:34.519
<v Speaker 2>and then and then they then then they kicked my

1:26:34.560 --> 1:26:38.200
<v Speaker 2>ass scene in the in the record store. All in

1:26:38.400 --> 1:26:39.640
<v Speaker 2>all in two days.

1:26:40.080 --> 1:26:44.240
<v Speaker 1>Okay, the movie comes out. It's sort of the slow burn,

1:26:44.400 --> 1:26:48.120
<v Speaker 1>but it never went away this is Do you start

1:26:48.120 --> 1:26:51.559
<v Speaker 1>getting recognized from that and people telling your lines?

1:26:51.600 --> 1:26:56.519
<v Speaker 2>Do you Every band that came on Letterman had to

1:26:56.680 --> 1:26:59.880
<v Speaker 2>take the dvdeo on their on their bus, the touring bus,

1:27:00.760 --> 1:27:03.679
<v Speaker 2>so they were all familiar with it, and they all said,

1:27:03.840 --> 1:27:05.960
<v Speaker 2>many of them said the same thing, it's not funny

1:27:05.960 --> 1:27:09.680
<v Speaker 2>to us, so real that we don't you know that

1:27:09.760 --> 1:27:11.639
<v Speaker 2>we don't like it, but we watch it anyway.

1:27:12.439 --> 1:27:14.240
<v Speaker 1>Okay, So how'd you get the gig with Letterman?

1:27:15.200 --> 1:27:21.120
<v Speaker 2>Well, you know, at as Saturday at Light Live was

1:27:21.240 --> 1:27:24.080
<v Speaker 2>ending for me after the first after that fifth season,

1:27:24.840 --> 1:27:29.920
<v Speaker 2>Letterman was starting up a show, a morning show on

1:27:30.160 --> 1:27:36.280
<v Speaker 2>NBC Live in the morning, and they were asked me

1:27:36.360 --> 1:27:41.080
<v Speaker 2>to I got the call to do that show, or

1:27:41.080 --> 1:27:43.040
<v Speaker 2>at least to meet on it, but I may have

1:27:43.080 --> 1:27:47.160
<v Speaker 2>been actually to do it, but it just didn't seem

1:27:47.240 --> 1:27:50.800
<v Speaker 2>right to me the morning, you know how I had

1:27:50.920 --> 1:27:53.400
<v Speaker 2>known a little bit about David Letterban, not too much, though,

1:27:54.200 --> 1:27:57.920
<v Speaker 2>didn't seem right, and I passed on it. You know,

1:27:58.000 --> 1:28:01.320
<v Speaker 2>I felt like I was still young. I didn't have to,

1:28:01.439 --> 1:28:03.320
<v Speaker 2>you know, I didn't know the value of a gig

1:28:04.080 --> 1:28:06.519
<v Speaker 2>like I do now. I passed on and Letterman still

1:28:07.439 --> 1:28:09.240
<v Speaker 2>I would refer to it on the show, Paul, you

1:28:09.240 --> 1:28:12.720
<v Speaker 2>didn't do the morning show, did you know, Dave? Why not?

1:28:12.840 --> 1:28:17.160
<v Speaker 2>I couldn't get up that early. That became a running thing.

1:28:17.920 --> 1:28:20.960
<v Speaker 2>But the show was two hip for the room and

1:28:21.000 --> 1:28:24.080
<v Speaker 2>too hip for the hour, and it didn't succeed. But

1:28:24.160 --> 1:28:27.800
<v Speaker 2>when they they got their notice, you know, but you

1:28:27.880 --> 1:28:29.960
<v Speaker 2>got to keep doing shows. You were canceling, you, but

1:28:30.080 --> 1:28:32.880
<v Speaker 2>you got to keep doing shows for another month. That

1:28:33.000 --> 1:28:35.840
<v Speaker 2>was the funniest month I've ever seen because they were

1:28:36.000 --> 1:28:40.599
<v Speaker 2>no pressure. So I was watching that show not regretting

1:28:40.640 --> 1:28:42.479
<v Speaker 2>that I hadn't done it, though, and then they remembered

1:28:42.479 --> 1:28:45.280
<v Speaker 2>me two years later when he got his night show.

1:28:46.120 --> 1:28:49.000
<v Speaker 2>I got the call again, and this show was going

1:28:49.080 --> 1:28:51.839
<v Speaker 2>to be so late, it was going to be after

1:28:52.200 --> 1:28:56.200
<v Speaker 2>the tonight show, after Johnny carrs. I said, that's that's

1:28:56.280 --> 1:28:58.760
<v Speaker 2>more like it, you know, And I was thrilled to

1:28:58.840 --> 1:29:00.439
<v Speaker 2>do that show. And I came in for a meeting

1:29:00.439 --> 1:29:03.400
<v Speaker 2>with Dave and his producer and we hit it off.

1:29:04.479 --> 1:29:07.679
<v Speaker 1>And how did you hire the band?

1:29:08.200 --> 1:29:10.920
<v Speaker 2>Well, I had been working in the studios and I

1:29:11.080 --> 1:29:15.080
<v Speaker 2>just hired and I had actually produced for a record

1:29:15.120 --> 1:29:17.800
<v Speaker 2>for a couple of studio guys. Four Studio guys had

1:29:17.800 --> 1:29:21.200
<v Speaker 2>a band together called the twenty four Street Band. Their

1:29:21.400 --> 1:29:23.799
<v Speaker 2>success was only in Japan, but I made a record

1:29:23.800 --> 1:29:26.479
<v Speaker 2>with him, produced a record for that market, and they

1:29:26.479 --> 1:29:28.400
<v Speaker 2>were just some of the best guys and they already

1:29:28.400 --> 1:29:32.840
<v Speaker 2>played together. So it was Will Lee one of the

1:29:33.200 --> 1:29:35.600
<v Speaker 2>all time greatest bass players still to this day, and

1:29:35.760 --> 1:29:37.800
<v Speaker 2>was with me all through the whole Letterman Show till

1:29:37.840 --> 1:29:42.000
<v Speaker 2>the end. I still play with him. Steve Jordan on

1:29:42.080 --> 1:29:45.439
<v Speaker 2>dramas an incredible phenomenon at the time. He's got nothing

1:29:45.479 --> 1:29:49.280
<v Speaker 2>but bigger since then, and most recently joined the Rolling Stones.

1:29:50.080 --> 1:29:54.360
<v Speaker 2>And Hiram Bullock, the great him Book on Guitar, who

1:29:54.400 --> 1:30:02.400
<v Speaker 2>really was like Hendricks but with musical training, has left

1:30:02.439 --> 1:30:05.240
<v Speaker 2>us unfortunately. But he was a first guitar so that

1:30:05.320 --> 1:30:10.879
<v Speaker 2>first crack Man was really strong. The musicians still remembered,

1:30:11.320 --> 1:30:16.799
<v Speaker 2>and it lasted not too long. It is a certain

1:30:16.880 --> 1:30:18.479
<v Speaker 2>kind of you know, you need a certain kind of

1:30:18.479 --> 1:30:20.639
<v Speaker 2>discipline to be able to show up every single day.

1:30:21.800 --> 1:30:24.560
<v Speaker 2>Hiram may have been a little too free spirited.

1:30:24.520 --> 1:30:26.400
<v Speaker 1>So tell me about the evolution. And then you go

1:30:26.479 --> 1:30:30.559
<v Speaker 1>earlier on CBS and you get a female guitar player too.

1:30:31.200 --> 1:30:36.680
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, So Hiram, you know, I had to leave, and

1:30:36.760 --> 1:30:38.880
<v Speaker 2>I tried out lots of guitar players on the air,

1:30:38.920 --> 1:30:42.160
<v Speaker 2>and Sid McGinnis was the best. He had played with

1:30:42.200 --> 1:30:47.559
<v Speaker 2>Peter Gabriel, among many others, and I hired him. And

1:30:47.600 --> 1:30:51.920
<v Speaker 2>then when Steve Jordan left, he was getting a little hot,

1:30:52.000 --> 1:30:56.719
<v Speaker 2>you know, just too hot hang around. And Anton fig

1:30:56.920 --> 1:30:59.000
<v Speaker 2>I had met in the studios. He had played on

1:30:59.040 --> 1:31:02.760
<v Speaker 2>a number of the Kiss records on you know, uncredited,

1:31:03.840 --> 1:31:09.320
<v Speaker 2>and he was just a great, uh studio drummer with

1:31:09.439 --> 1:31:12.599
<v Speaker 2>a rock sound, and he played the show great. So

1:31:12.680 --> 1:31:15.000
<v Speaker 2>there was that when we did that, you know, all

1:31:15.040 --> 1:31:18.240
<v Speaker 2>those twelve years at NBC. But when it came time

1:31:18.280 --> 1:31:21.320
<v Speaker 2>to move to the earlier hour eleven thirty on CBS,

1:31:22.439 --> 1:31:24.400
<v Speaker 2>there was I just you know, Paul, you got to

1:31:24.400 --> 1:31:28.240
<v Speaker 2>get a bigger band. It's a bigger show. We just

1:31:28.320 --> 1:31:33.280
<v Speaker 2>want a bigger band. That's all that they specified. And

1:31:33.320 --> 1:31:38.640
<v Speaker 2>it was going to be tough because Dave was so spontaneous.

1:31:39.240 --> 1:31:41.439
<v Speaker 2>I think still to this day, we're the only show

1:31:41.520 --> 1:31:45.040
<v Speaker 2>that if something happens out of left field, it's really

1:31:45.080 --> 1:31:47.880
<v Speaker 2>happening out of left field. It's not we rehearsed it before,

1:31:48.360 --> 1:31:50.599
<v Speaker 2>you know, we would rehearse sketches of course they would

1:31:50.600 --> 1:31:52.880
<v Speaker 2>be obvious when we were reading lines. But but if

1:31:52.920 --> 1:31:55.519
<v Speaker 2>something funny happened, if somebody said it something funny in

1:31:55.560 --> 1:31:58.639
<v Speaker 2>the audience, Dave would just chase the whole show. Let's

1:31:58.680 --> 1:32:00.920
<v Speaker 2>go with that, let's you know instead of that, let's

1:32:01.000 --> 1:32:03.559
<v Speaker 2>you know, And then whatever I had planned, you know,

1:32:03.880 --> 1:32:07.920
<v Speaker 2>I stopped planning stuff. Original band only four peaces. We

1:32:07.920 --> 1:32:11.400
<v Speaker 2>could play anything. We didn't need charts. We all kind

1:32:11.400 --> 1:32:13.960
<v Speaker 2>of knew all the song I hired guy. All these guys,

1:32:14.000 --> 1:32:17.080
<v Speaker 2>although they were studio players, they had that in common

1:32:17.120 --> 1:32:20.080
<v Speaker 2>with me. They knew all the rock songs. They were

1:32:20.160 --> 1:32:24.800
<v Speaker 2>unusual studio players, often older jazz players. They looked down

1:32:24.840 --> 1:32:27.280
<v Speaker 2>on rock. But I found these guys who knew the

1:32:27.280 --> 1:32:30.439
<v Speaker 2>same songs. So it's tough to expand the band. But

1:32:30.479 --> 1:32:39.799
<v Speaker 2>eventually I got it right, Okay.

1:32:40.000 --> 1:32:44.280
<v Speaker 1>Was the original concept that when the bands come on,

1:32:44.520 --> 1:32:48.639
<v Speaker 1>when the musical acts come on, your band would play alone,

1:32:48.640 --> 1:32:51.080
<v Speaker 1>not one hundred percent of the time, but most times.

1:32:51.240 --> 1:32:55.240
<v Speaker 1>Whereas previously Skitch Henderson all these other people they played

1:32:55.320 --> 1:32:57.720
<v Speaker 1>during commercials, but when the musical act came on, they

1:32:57.720 --> 1:32:58.960
<v Speaker 1>had their own players.

1:32:59.720 --> 1:33:03.040
<v Speaker 2>Yes, but that wasn't really true of a doc. Severnson

1:33:03.560 --> 1:33:06.639
<v Speaker 2>who you know, if yet in rock and roll era, yeah,

1:33:06.640 --> 1:33:09.200
<v Speaker 2>he didn't play as much. But back in the day,

1:33:09.479 --> 1:33:13.280
<v Speaker 2>if Tony Benn was on, if Frank Sinatra was on,

1:33:13.439 --> 1:33:15.840
<v Speaker 2>you know the yes, the Pouseman was playing, because that

1:33:15.960 --> 1:33:21.000
<v Speaker 2>was their style. They were a big man. Yes, David

1:33:21.080 --> 1:33:23.760
<v Speaker 2>Letterman himself definitely would have loved it if we could

1:33:23.760 --> 1:33:27.040
<v Speaker 2>have played for everybody that He said, you know, anything

1:33:27.040 --> 1:33:30.120
<v Speaker 2>else you can see on MTV, Let's see them interact

1:33:30.160 --> 1:33:34.320
<v Speaker 2>with you guys, And he loved that. And for a

1:33:34.360 --> 1:33:36.360
<v Speaker 2>period of time we did play for a lot of

1:33:36.400 --> 1:33:40.080
<v Speaker 2>the acts. It was good because we didn't have much

1:33:40.080 --> 1:33:43.559
<v Speaker 2>of a stage. We had a very small studio at NBC,

1:33:46.320 --> 1:33:49.479
<v Speaker 2>and it just was nicer to have a few people

1:33:49.479 --> 1:33:55.680
<v Speaker 2>from the band come nice for everybody. But eventually when

1:33:55.720 --> 1:34:01.439
<v Speaker 2>we got to CBS, the competition for booking became strong.

1:34:01.520 --> 1:34:05.400
<v Speaker 2>There were other shows. Everybody wanted to get the act first,

1:34:05.479 --> 1:34:10.439
<v Speaker 2>you know, whether it be the Lemonheads or these various

1:34:11.920 --> 1:34:15.840
<v Speaker 2>acts in the nineties and stuff. Much easier for them

1:34:15.840 --> 1:34:19.760
<v Speaker 2>to come in with their own setup, and that's kind

1:34:19.760 --> 1:34:22.479
<v Speaker 2>of became you know, let them, you know, just let

1:34:22.720 --> 1:34:24.800
<v Speaker 2>make it easy. Otherwise they're going to go do jay,

1:34:25.479 --> 1:34:29.040
<v Speaker 2>you know, so that but why was why? It kind

1:34:29.040 --> 1:34:31.880
<v Speaker 2>of changed and we didn't play for as many people

1:34:31.960 --> 1:34:32.599
<v Speaker 2>by any meaning.

1:34:32.640 --> 1:34:37.679
<v Speaker 1>So were you involved in booking the acts at all?

1:34:38.000 --> 1:34:39.280
<v Speaker 2>No, not at all.

1:34:39.640 --> 1:34:42.360
<v Speaker 1>How far in advance would you know an act was

1:34:42.400 --> 1:34:47.599
<v Speaker 1>coming on and working with rehearsing the material, et cetera.

1:34:48.840 --> 1:34:53.360
<v Speaker 2>Well, it varied. Sometimes we would have enough notice, but

1:34:53.400 --> 1:34:57.120
<v Speaker 2>sometimes it could be the night before that we would

1:34:57.120 --> 1:35:01.320
<v Speaker 2>be playing with somebody and in that case, well, you know,

1:35:01.360 --> 1:35:04.760
<v Speaker 2>in the early days eighties, I was working with a

1:35:04.800 --> 1:35:08.559
<v Speaker 2>cassette machine and cassettes, and I would make cassettes of

1:35:08.680 --> 1:35:13.000
<v Speaker 2>these songs. Get them to everybody. There was no phones,

1:35:13.280 --> 1:35:17.040
<v Speaker 2>couldn't email it, track everybody, get the cassettes, start listening.

1:35:17.120 --> 1:35:22.439
<v Speaker 2>Everyone would do their homework. I started out writing charts

1:35:22.479 --> 1:35:25.880
<v Speaker 2>for people, but then I realized, let them just learn it.

1:35:25.960 --> 1:35:28.120
<v Speaker 2>That was what I really loved, everybody learning it from

1:35:28.160 --> 1:35:32.200
<v Speaker 2>the record like I used to as a kid. But eventually,

1:35:32.240 --> 1:35:35.799
<v Speaker 2>you know, when I got horns, then I needed charts,

1:35:35.840 --> 1:35:38.559
<v Speaker 2>and then you know, and I had to It was

1:35:38.600 --> 1:35:42.799
<v Speaker 2>back to getting an arranger and getting arrangements for these things.

1:35:43.160 --> 1:35:48.320
<v Speaker 1>Okay, send out the cassettes the next day the act

1:35:48.439 --> 1:35:50.040
<v Speaker 1>is there, Then what happens.

1:35:50.600 --> 1:35:53.920
<v Speaker 2>Well, we had very little time to do it, less

1:35:53.920 --> 1:35:57.519
<v Speaker 2>than an hour to set them up and also rehearse

1:35:57.600 --> 1:36:01.439
<v Speaker 2>with them. We were we had to be as prepared

1:36:01.479 --> 1:36:04.160
<v Speaker 2>as we could be, that's all. And for the most part,

1:36:04.200 --> 1:36:10.639
<v Speaker 2>they were really surprised and happy, you know, that we

1:36:10.640 --> 1:36:13.479
<v Speaker 2>were able to play their stuff so well. Sometimes we

1:36:13.520 --> 1:36:16.160
<v Speaker 2>would play it more like the record. They hadn't heard

1:36:16.160 --> 1:36:17.880
<v Speaker 2>it that way. They've been doing it differently on the

1:36:17.960 --> 1:36:20.639
<v Speaker 2>road with their own bands. You know, we played record versions.

1:36:20.680 --> 1:36:23.160
<v Speaker 2>Sometimes they got a kick out of it. Only a

1:36:23.200 --> 1:36:27.360
<v Speaker 2>couple of times, you know, people weren't so happy. Just

1:36:27.400 --> 1:36:30.400
<v Speaker 2>a few times. I certainly did it. I got my

1:36:30.520 --> 1:36:33.800
<v Speaker 2>share of tires when I really blew it, though not

1:36:33.840 --> 1:36:36.600
<v Speaker 2>necessarily in those acts, but you know, at certain.

1:36:36.320 --> 1:36:38.280
<v Speaker 1>Times tell me about blowing it.

1:36:39.400 --> 1:36:43.400
<v Speaker 2>Well, one thing that comes to mind is I blew

1:36:43.439 --> 1:36:46.519
<v Speaker 2>it with mister Anthony Newley, one of my favorites of

1:36:46.560 --> 1:36:51.640
<v Speaker 2>all time. We had a running thing going. This was

1:36:51.680 --> 1:36:55.519
<v Speaker 2>a Letterman eighties from NBC had a running thing going

1:36:55.560 --> 1:36:59.280
<v Speaker 2>for a while with a theme song. We had a

1:36:59.360 --> 1:37:01.920
<v Speaker 2>viewer male theme song. We used to answer viewer male,

1:37:03.280 --> 1:37:05.960
<v Speaker 2>what if there was a theme song? What if we

1:37:06.000 --> 1:37:08.880
<v Speaker 2>could get Henry Mancini to write it, which we did.

1:37:09.840 --> 1:37:13.240
<v Speaker 2>Henry came in conducted and he had written a theme

1:37:13.280 --> 1:37:14.439
<v Speaker 2>song for viewer mail.

1:37:14.600 --> 1:37:15.599
<v Speaker 1>My girlfriend's father.

1:37:17.120 --> 1:37:21.599
<v Speaker 2>I heard. I happen to know this, Okay, give.

1:37:21.479 --> 1:37:24.920
<v Speaker 1>He wrote the theme song for your male keep going.

1:37:24.880 --> 1:37:29.640
<v Speaker 2>Give her my best. I will yes, and then it

1:37:29.680 --> 1:37:33.400
<v Speaker 2>became a you know, he came in and when Tails

1:37:33.439 --> 1:37:36.000
<v Speaker 2>conducted it, he wrote us more of a thing like,

1:37:36.560 --> 1:37:39.599
<v Speaker 2>you know, the New Heart theme, that kind of style,

1:37:39.800 --> 1:37:44.920
<v Speaker 2>very jaunty. And then we started doing his theme with

1:37:45.040 --> 1:37:47.599
<v Speaker 2>other people, with other celebrities. What if we could get

1:37:48.000 --> 1:37:51.640
<v Speaker 2>Johnny Mathis to sing the Mancinis theme. You know, we

1:37:51.640 --> 1:37:53.520
<v Speaker 2>were doing all of this, but it was just a

1:37:53.560 --> 1:37:58.360
<v Speaker 2>silly viewer male thing. Nonetheless, one week Anthony Knewley was

1:37:58.400 --> 1:38:03.760
<v Speaker 2>going to sing it. It's gonna at Mancini's theme to

1:38:03.840 --> 1:38:11.679
<v Speaker 2>viewer male, view a male. That's what Henry wrote. He said,

1:38:11.680 --> 1:38:16.080
<v Speaker 2>I wanted something like Hallelujah to be view were male.

1:38:16.720 --> 1:38:18.960
<v Speaker 2>So I had Newly. And then often, you know, as

1:38:19.000 --> 1:38:21.880
<v Speaker 2>a writer of special material, as I am, I would

1:38:21.880 --> 1:38:27.240
<v Speaker 2>write a section in for the different artists. So for Newly,

1:38:27.280 --> 1:38:30.679
<v Speaker 2>I wrote in a section the viewer male clown. Because

1:38:30.720 --> 1:38:33.519
<v Speaker 2>he was always singing about the happy clown. He's great

1:38:33.920 --> 1:38:38.000
<v Speaker 2>the viewer mail clown view a male. So that was

1:38:38.040 --> 1:38:45.559
<v Speaker 2>the idea. And Tony, excuse me, newly, Tony newly, if

1:38:45.600 --> 1:38:48.360
<v Speaker 2>I may. That's what the rat pag is to call Tony,

1:38:48.400 --> 1:38:51.200
<v Speaker 2>and I had a reversal. It was great. He had

1:38:51.200 --> 1:38:53.840
<v Speaker 2>a great sense of humor about it. One of those

1:38:53.840 --> 1:38:56.679
<v Speaker 2>songs I really stole from in one of the lines

1:38:57.120 --> 1:39:01.400
<v Speaker 2>viewer male clown. He's only funny, but mistake, he said,

1:39:01.400 --> 1:39:05.400
<v Speaker 2>Oh that's mine, you know which. I appreciate it, but

1:39:05.600 --> 1:39:09.800
<v Speaker 2>I'm so cocky that I didn't write any of it down.

1:39:11.080 --> 1:39:14.040
<v Speaker 2>I thought I'll just remember it. It's just me and

1:39:14.120 --> 1:39:17.920
<v Speaker 2>him piano, and he sings, and we sing the first section,

1:39:18.040 --> 1:39:21.519
<v Speaker 2>Doo the mail, and it's going great. And then I

1:39:21.640 --> 1:39:25.120
<v Speaker 2>got to modulate into the new slow section the viewer

1:39:25.160 --> 1:39:31.120
<v Speaker 2>maile clown. I modulate wrong. I come out about a

1:39:31.160 --> 1:39:35.360
<v Speaker 2>fifth higher than it's supposed to be. And he his

1:39:35.479 --> 1:39:39.840
<v Speaker 2>ear is so good. He follows me into the new key.

1:39:40.000 --> 1:39:43.160
<v Speaker 2>But now he's up well laugh at the viewer mail.

1:39:43.840 --> 1:39:47.160
<v Speaker 2>He's way high and I'm just dying, Oh my god,

1:39:47.240 --> 1:39:50.519
<v Speaker 2>what have I done? And then he hits this note

1:39:50.520 --> 1:39:54.600
<v Speaker 2>at the end of view of milk. He hits it.

1:39:54.600 --> 1:39:58.960
<v Speaker 2>It's out of anybody's range. He hits the note. It's brilliant.

1:39:59.400 --> 1:40:01.559
<v Speaker 2>He gets a clause as he goes off. I hear

1:40:01.640 --> 1:40:08.400
<v Speaker 2>this from backstage. Fuck. He's so mad, so mad that

1:40:08.880 --> 1:40:11.160
<v Speaker 2>producer happened to run into him later at the Friars

1:40:11.160 --> 1:40:13.760
<v Speaker 2>Club said, oh, Paul Fields so terrible about it. And

1:40:13.840 --> 1:40:18.599
<v Speaker 2>he said, oh, Paul feels terrible. But I wrote him,

1:40:18.760 --> 1:40:21.360
<v Speaker 2>you know, the nicest letter I could in England, and

1:40:21.400 --> 1:40:25.519
<v Speaker 2>he a lovely letter, humorous letter. He wrote me back.

1:40:25.560 --> 1:40:27.080
<v Speaker 2>You know I hit a note, he said, I hid

1:40:27.160 --> 1:40:31.360
<v Speaker 2>notes that dogs from miles away. You know, whatever it was,

1:40:32.280 --> 1:40:33.559
<v Speaker 2>Thank god he forgave me.

1:40:34.320 --> 1:40:38.559
<v Speaker 1>Okay, when you were playing with bands, did you ever

1:40:38.640 --> 1:40:40.439
<v Speaker 1>mess it up during the show such he had to

1:40:40.439 --> 1:40:40.920
<v Speaker 1>redo it.

1:40:46.880 --> 1:40:50.920
<v Speaker 2>Well, yes, for soon reason. Yeah, once in a while

1:40:51.040 --> 1:40:54.080
<v Speaker 2>would happened. Not sometimes my mess sure, or somebody would

1:40:54.080 --> 1:40:57.799
<v Speaker 2>mess up. Yeah, we'd always redo it for technical reason,

1:40:57.960 --> 1:41:00.280
<v Speaker 2>you know, if there was a feedback or something. Yeah,

1:41:00.320 --> 1:41:02.920
<v Speaker 2>we'll do it again. We do it right after the show,

1:41:02.960 --> 1:41:05.759
<v Speaker 2>do it one more time sometimes, Okay.

1:41:06.160 --> 1:41:08.720
<v Speaker 1>I became a fan of the show, would record it

1:41:08.800 --> 1:41:14.040
<v Speaker 1>every night and then watch it on the VCR. Sons

1:41:14.080 --> 1:41:20.639
<v Speaker 1>commercials such that I would save certain performances that blew

1:41:20.720 --> 1:41:27.120
<v Speaker 1>my mind. I'm gonna bring up the two performances that

1:41:27.320 --> 1:41:31.519
<v Speaker 1>I remember most and let me know if you actually

1:41:31.560 --> 1:41:39.160
<v Speaker 1>remember those. Okakay, Melissa Ethridge, I'm the only one. She

1:41:39.360 --> 1:41:41.839
<v Speaker 1>came out and she was stopping. That was what really

1:41:41.960 --> 1:41:44.040
<v Speaker 1>she She'd had a few albums before, and I certainly

1:41:44.120 --> 1:41:46.120
<v Speaker 1>knew her and had the records. But she came out

1:41:46.120 --> 1:41:49.439
<v Speaker 1>and just killed. That is that anything that resonates at all?

1:41:50.439 --> 1:41:53.800
<v Speaker 2>I remember it, and I remember you know, she was

1:41:53.960 --> 1:41:58.400
<v Speaker 2>just a great performer and a live performer who, like me,

1:41:58.600 --> 1:42:00.640
<v Speaker 2>had been I don't know where she came up in

1:42:00.720 --> 1:42:05.439
<v Speaker 2>bars or or what, but she could. You know, she

1:42:05.640 --> 1:42:07.799
<v Speaker 2>gave it her all and you know nothing went wrong.

1:42:08.600 --> 1:42:10.719
<v Speaker 1>Okay, then what's the one easy?

1:42:10.920 --> 1:42:13.519
<v Speaker 2>And and she you know, she did kill. And I

1:42:13.560 --> 1:42:16.000
<v Speaker 2>got to play with her a number of other places

1:42:16.000 --> 1:42:20.080
<v Speaker 2>and times of various you know, charity events whatever. She

1:42:20.160 --> 1:42:22.960
<v Speaker 2>always came through, always killed another.

1:42:23.000 --> 1:42:27.559
<v Speaker 1>One's been in the news recently because of her untimely death.

1:42:28.000 --> 1:42:32.160
<v Speaker 1>But shinead O'Connor, did you made me the Thief of

1:42:32.240 --> 1:42:36.320
<v Speaker 1>your Heart? From the movie In the Name of the Father.

1:42:36.960 --> 1:42:39.400
<v Speaker 1>She was just unbelievable. Any memory of that.

1:42:40.439 --> 1:42:43.120
<v Speaker 2>Well, I saw a cliff recently in the wake of

1:42:43.160 --> 1:42:47.000
<v Speaker 2>her death. I don't know the title, but she was

1:42:47.000 --> 1:42:49.559
<v Speaker 2>doing the one that goes du du exactly.

1:42:50.439 --> 1:42:52.320
<v Speaker 1>It's the titles called you made Me the Thief of

1:42:52.320 --> 1:42:55.040
<v Speaker 1>Your Right. You know, as I say, it's confusing.

1:42:55.080 --> 1:42:59.200
<v Speaker 2>Again, you know, smooth she had, you know, sometimes I

1:42:59.240 --> 1:43:02.160
<v Speaker 2>think she could be affectionists. And of course we all

1:43:02.160 --> 1:43:06.040
<v Speaker 2>remember the Saturday Night Live episode and stuff. It just

1:43:06.080 --> 1:43:09.599
<v Speaker 2>went down smoothly. I noticed I'd gotten another I hired

1:43:09.600 --> 1:43:11.960
<v Speaker 2>an extra guitar player for her, a guy that I knew,

1:43:12.000 --> 1:43:13.640
<v Speaker 2>and do you know she came out and killed it.

1:43:14.920 --> 1:43:20.360
<v Speaker 1>Okay, So a couple of your own memorable experiences of

1:43:20.439 --> 1:43:24.440
<v Speaker 1>musical guests that really touched you, either because it's personal

1:43:24.640 --> 1:43:26.840
<v Speaker 1>or because they were hit it way out of the park.

1:43:28.040 --> 1:43:32.840
<v Speaker 2>Well, James Brown is I always say when he did

1:43:32.880 --> 1:43:34.679
<v Speaker 2>the show, he did it in a number of times

1:43:34.680 --> 1:43:37.600
<v Speaker 2>with the very first time, and I had the original

1:43:37.640 --> 1:43:42.040
<v Speaker 2>band and we were all so into James Brown we

1:43:42.200 --> 1:43:45.920
<v Speaker 2>couldn't wait. And he did it very early, one of

1:43:45.920 --> 1:43:48.800
<v Speaker 2>the early guys who came on and did it with us,

1:43:49.280 --> 1:43:52.439
<v Speaker 2>and I think it was because we were playing his

1:43:52.600 --> 1:43:55.760
<v Speaker 2>stuff a lot for the ins and out of commercials.

1:43:56.200 --> 1:43:59.439
<v Speaker 2>He probably heard us playing something by him because we

1:43:59.439 --> 1:44:01.320
<v Speaker 2>were playing his stuff all the time, and he might

1:44:01.320 --> 1:44:05.800
<v Speaker 2>have seen it in his Askaf statement too. Anyway, his

1:44:05.920 --> 1:44:09.560
<v Speaker 2>agent called and said, he wants to come on ah

1:44:10.560 --> 1:44:14.320
<v Speaker 2>and you know great. We weren't having musical guests every night.

1:44:15.320 --> 1:44:19.040
<v Speaker 2>It was not a pattern as it became, and they

1:44:19.040 --> 1:44:21.559
<v Speaker 2>didn't you know, they weren't relegated to the very last

1:44:21.600 --> 1:44:24.519
<v Speaker 2>spot after the last commercial. At this point it was

1:44:25.040 --> 1:44:27.480
<v Speaker 2>it was new to us. We hadn't had many musicians

1:44:27.479 --> 1:44:30.000
<v Speaker 2>at all. We said to him, how what does he

1:44:30.080 --> 1:44:32.639
<v Speaker 2>want to play? He said, what does a man want

1:44:32.640 --> 1:44:36.360
<v Speaker 2>to play with me? Great? You know, very smart? You

1:44:36.400 --> 1:44:41.240
<v Speaker 2>know what do they know? So Steve said, I got it.

1:44:41.360 --> 1:44:44.920
<v Speaker 2>I want love to do sex Machine with him because

1:44:44.960 --> 1:44:49.200
<v Speaker 2>of that beat. Hiram said, there was a time, because

1:44:49.240 --> 1:44:52.040
<v Speaker 2>of that guitar party don't don't, don't, don't don't do

1:44:52.240 --> 1:44:57.400
<v Speaker 2>one of the early single line parts. Well, you know

1:44:57.439 --> 1:45:02.160
<v Speaker 2>it just thrilled with all of it, and he said, okay, cool,

1:45:02.200 --> 1:45:03.960
<v Speaker 2>we were going to do those two. There was a

1:45:04.040 --> 1:45:09.559
<v Speaker 2>time and sex Machine. He brought two horn players. That's

1:45:09.600 --> 1:45:12.320
<v Speaker 2>it hit two of his own horn players. And played

1:45:12.320 --> 1:45:14.479
<v Speaker 2>with us four guys. We couldn't none of us could

1:45:14.479 --> 1:45:17.879
<v Speaker 2>believe we were playing with him. But when he started

1:45:17.920 --> 1:45:22.439
<v Speaker 2>singing and dancing, it was just so strong you couldn't

1:45:22.439 --> 1:45:25.800
<v Speaker 2>help but play. We sounded better than we ever thought

1:45:25.880 --> 1:45:33.120
<v Speaker 2>we would, and we did the second song. We ran

1:45:33.160 --> 1:45:34.920
<v Speaker 2>out of time in the rehearsal. We didn't get a

1:45:35.000 --> 1:45:37.559
<v Speaker 2>chance to end. We didn't get a chance to make

1:45:37.640 --> 1:45:40.559
<v Speaker 2>up an ending for the second song. There was a

1:45:40.600 --> 1:45:42.919
<v Speaker 2>time which he was going to demonstrate all the dances,

1:45:44.360 --> 1:45:46.280
<v Speaker 2>so I didn't know what was going to happen. But

1:45:46.320 --> 1:45:48.800
<v Speaker 2>there we were on the air and he just, you know,

1:45:49.280 --> 1:45:53.519
<v Speaker 2>he just cut us off. He's no problem. And then

1:45:53.560 --> 1:45:58.040
<v Speaker 2>he heard us doing a third one of his and

1:45:58.080 --> 1:46:02.599
<v Speaker 2>he said, and we all, you know, all of us

1:46:02.640 --> 1:46:05.880
<v Speaker 2>in the band had gotten our first VCRs. At the

1:46:05.920 --> 1:46:09.599
<v Speaker 2>time home VCRs. We used to get together after every

1:46:09.640 --> 1:46:13.120
<v Speaker 2>show and watch that the tape of it. We couldn't

1:46:13.160 --> 1:46:16.720
<v Speaker 2>believe it. And we memorized all the dialogue too, with

1:46:16.920 --> 1:46:21.519
<v Speaker 2>the entry you know, on the panel. And he James

1:46:21.520 --> 1:46:23.920
<v Speaker 2>took over the show at the end after we heard

1:46:24.000 --> 1:46:26.680
<v Speaker 2>us to David Letterman, you have to do it now

1:46:27.880 --> 1:46:33.160
<v Speaker 2>before you cruise. Can we cruise with I got the feeling,

1:46:34.360 --> 1:46:36.720
<v Speaker 2>and then you hear Steve Jodd whoa his voice like

1:46:37.040 --> 1:46:39.439
<v Speaker 2>just out of the area he had taken over. Dave said,

1:46:39.479 --> 1:46:41.840
<v Speaker 2>we can, We'll take a commercial, came back and he

1:46:41.880 --> 1:46:47.040
<v Speaker 2>did a third song. Unrehearsed that show. God never got

1:46:47.040 --> 1:46:49.800
<v Speaker 2>over it. Still I think one of the greatest, and

1:46:49.880 --> 1:46:55.440
<v Speaker 2>a terrific performance on him dancing unbelievable, not much rehearsal,

1:46:57.120 --> 1:47:00.599
<v Speaker 2>camera shot of his feet, you know, iconic, keep going,

1:47:01.439 --> 1:47:07.759
<v Speaker 2>just wonderful. Sly another one, Slim in the family Stone tell.

1:47:07.600 --> 1:47:11.080
<v Speaker 1>Me that story.

1:47:11.200 --> 1:47:19.800
<v Speaker 2>He came in looking great, wearing a track suit, and

1:47:19.880 --> 1:47:23.960
<v Speaker 2>he was wonderful to work with. We rented him a

1:47:24.040 --> 1:47:26.519
<v Speaker 2>clavinet and a wah wah pedal or some kind of

1:47:26.520 --> 1:47:29.120
<v Speaker 2>problem with it. He didn't care. Didn't let him, you know,

1:47:29.160 --> 1:47:32.240
<v Speaker 2>and he did two numbers. Again. He was just terrific.

1:47:35.680 --> 1:47:37.679
<v Speaker 2>And then he at the end of it, he bought

1:47:37.680 --> 1:47:47.559
<v Speaker 2>a hundred bucks from me. But this is the most

1:47:47.640 --> 1:47:51.680
<v Speaker 2>amazing part of it. A couple of years later, I

1:47:51.920 --> 1:47:56.880
<v Speaker 2>had been reading in Rolling Stone magazine that Sly was

1:47:56.920 --> 1:48:02.719
<v Speaker 2>around working with Bobby Womack in Los Angeles, and somehow

1:48:02.720 --> 1:48:06.400
<v Speaker 2>we Bobby Walmack got booked on Letterman. He came into

1:48:06.400 --> 1:48:08.800
<v Speaker 2>the rehearsal and came after me. First thing he did,

1:48:08.920 --> 1:48:12.599
<v Speaker 2>take his wallet out, give me a hundred bucks. He says. Here,

1:48:12.640 --> 1:48:14.960
<v Speaker 2>he says, you'll never get this from slot. This is

1:48:15.000 --> 1:48:17.439
<v Speaker 2>my money, but I'm giving this to you. So what

1:48:17.560 --> 1:48:19.840
<v Speaker 2>a mind blower that was. That was when I knew

1:48:19.920 --> 1:48:23.759
<v Speaker 2>I was in show business. It was one of the cats.

1:48:23.800 --> 1:48:26.519
<v Speaker 2>Then Bobby Walmack paid me back.

1:48:28.240 --> 1:48:29.920
<v Speaker 1>Leaving me sort of speechless.

1:48:30.080 --> 1:48:32.200
<v Speaker 2>Who has a story like that? I know you can't

1:48:32.200 --> 1:48:34.000
<v Speaker 2>take it. You have.

1:48:35.880 --> 1:48:40.360
<v Speaker 1>Anybody you didn't play with who was alive during you know,

1:48:40.520 --> 1:48:41.639
<v Speaker 1>the Letterman era.

1:48:42.880 --> 1:48:49.760
<v Speaker 2>Well, Sinatra and Elvis obviously I did pretty well though

1:48:50.000 --> 1:48:52.479
<v Speaker 2>you know, I played with Carl Perkins. We got pretty

1:48:52.479 --> 1:48:57.439
<v Speaker 2>close to Elvis and others of course, and as far

1:48:57.479 --> 1:49:01.360
<v Speaker 2>as Sinatra, well, I did play with Sammy. Both times

1:49:01.400 --> 1:49:05.479
<v Speaker 2>were amazing lessons for me. Playing with Sammy Davis and

1:49:05.760 --> 1:49:08.120
<v Speaker 2>Tony Bennett I got to play with. So I did

1:49:08.680 --> 1:49:10.559
<v Speaker 2>awfully well.

1:49:10.840 --> 1:49:13.880
<v Speaker 1>Now the show I remember correctly, The Late Night Show

1:49:14.000 --> 1:49:19.080
<v Speaker 1>ended with Bruce Springsteen and did you're the team the booker?

1:49:19.280 --> 1:49:22.559
<v Speaker 1>Did they try to get Well, it's too late for Elvis,

1:49:22.560 --> 1:49:24.120
<v Speaker 1>but did they try to get Sinatra.

1:49:25.400 --> 1:49:30.680
<v Speaker 2>I don't know the answer. Not sure. I'm sure they

1:49:30.760 --> 1:49:33.919
<v Speaker 2>must have, but I just, you know, I have no information,

1:49:34.120 --> 1:49:37.240
<v Speaker 2>don't know. That's I really was not involved in the booking,

1:49:37.280 --> 1:49:42.320
<v Speaker 2>and I when I tried to be once, it just exploded.

1:49:42.360 --> 1:49:45.799
<v Speaker 2>It's so hard dealing with the agents and pr agents

1:49:45.840 --> 1:49:50.840
<v Speaker 2>and stuff, you know. Ah, so I stayed out of Who.

1:49:50.720 --> 1:49:51.920
<v Speaker 1>Is it that you wanted a book?

1:49:53.200 --> 1:49:57.559
<v Speaker 2>Well, okay, I'll tell the story. It was Paul Carrick.

1:49:57.800 --> 1:49:59.440
<v Speaker 2>Do you remember that, gentleman.

1:49:59.479 --> 1:50:03.400
<v Speaker 1>I noted, Oh, Kerrick, Yeah, absolutely? How long has this

1:50:03.479 --> 1:50:04.280
<v Speaker 1>been going on?

1:50:05.520 --> 1:50:09.559
<v Speaker 2>Yes? How long? That's right. He had a solo record

1:50:09.560 --> 1:50:14.599
<v Speaker 2>that I just loved. Right, I've forgotten it, and I

1:50:14.640 --> 1:50:20.000
<v Speaker 2>was in my mind and I was thinking, how long now? Anyway,

1:50:21.400 --> 1:50:24.880
<v Speaker 2>I just you know, the show was it had booked

1:50:24.880 --> 1:50:26.320
<v Speaker 2>a number of acts in a row that I just

1:50:26.360 --> 1:50:29.000
<v Speaker 2>didn't get. And I said to myself that Paul Carrack

1:50:29.080 --> 1:50:31.920
<v Speaker 2>song is so great, Let's get him on. And I just,

1:50:32.040 --> 1:50:34.519
<v Speaker 2>you know, as they say, stuck my neck out a

1:50:34.520 --> 1:50:37.200
<v Speaker 2>little bit. Let's get Paul Carrock. Can we not even

1:50:37.240 --> 1:50:42.720
<v Speaker 2>know the song? Don't shuit it on me, Ma, that's

1:50:42.760 --> 1:50:46.320
<v Speaker 2>the song that he had out of the time, So

1:50:46.439 --> 1:50:49.880
<v Speaker 2>they book him and then the word comes back, but

1:50:49.960 --> 1:50:52.640
<v Speaker 2>he doesn't want to do that song. He wants to

1:50:52.640 --> 1:50:55.519
<v Speaker 2>do his new song. So I put on a new

1:50:55.560 --> 1:50:58.559
<v Speaker 2>song and I'm no, you know, excuse me, but it's

1:50:58.640 --> 1:51:01.559
<v Speaker 2>just to me. It didn't have that That other song

1:51:01.720 --> 1:51:04.680
<v Speaker 2>was just so great. But here I am. You know,

1:51:04.760 --> 1:51:08.440
<v Speaker 2>now I got it and I'm gonna either one. Afterwards,

1:51:08.479 --> 1:51:11.120
<v Speaker 2>Paul is that's you wanted that guy on, you know,

1:51:11.120 --> 1:51:12.439
<v Speaker 2>because he was going to do a song that I

1:51:12.960 --> 1:51:16.120
<v Speaker 2>didn't want him to do. Somehow he got a bad

1:51:16.160 --> 1:51:18.439
<v Speaker 2>throat infection. He didn't do the show at all, so

1:51:18.720 --> 1:51:21.479
<v Speaker 2>it was came, came, moved. But that kind of was

1:51:21.520 --> 1:51:23.920
<v Speaker 2>a lesson, stay out of that. We have people that

1:51:24.040 --> 1:51:26.680
<v Speaker 2>do that, they know how to do it. Well.

1:51:26.760 --> 1:51:29.840
<v Speaker 1>Yeah, it's interesting. He's put out all these albums of

1:51:30.000 --> 1:51:33.640
<v Speaker 1>covers that no one seems to know about. Check it

1:51:33.640 --> 1:51:36.000
<v Speaker 1>out because I think you'd find it interesting. It was

1:51:36.040 --> 1:51:38.320
<v Speaker 1>that one album that you know, we got the play

1:51:38.360 --> 1:51:41.439
<v Speaker 1>on MTV was in the eighties. I can't remember the

1:51:41.520 --> 1:51:47.040
<v Speaker 1>name of that track either. Okay, so what keeps you busy? Now?

1:51:48.720 --> 1:51:52.960
<v Speaker 2>Well, I am having recovered from that initial shock of

1:51:53.000 --> 1:51:59.080
<v Speaker 2>not doing the show anymore. I'm just really enjoying myself.

1:52:00.040 --> 1:52:03.920
<v Speaker 2>I do various music. I'm doing sessions again. There aren't

1:52:04.200 --> 1:52:07.639
<v Speaker 2>sessions like they used to be because the computer plays

1:52:07.680 --> 1:52:11.960
<v Speaker 2>all the stuff now. But just did an album with

1:52:12.000 --> 1:52:16.000
<v Speaker 2>a guy named Fred Lipschis, who was the arrangements. Yeah,

1:52:16.080 --> 1:52:18.599
<v Speaker 2>so that was again, you know, kind of a full circle.

1:52:18.640 --> 1:52:22.200
<v Speaker 2>And I did one two that I'm in the middle

1:52:22.200 --> 1:52:25.240
<v Speaker 2>of with Casigi Minuos. I kind of am going back

1:52:25.280 --> 1:52:28.800
<v Speaker 2>to the you know, straight music when I look back

1:52:28.880 --> 1:52:32.599
<v Speaker 2>at my career and I have more time to do

1:52:32.680 --> 1:52:38.320
<v Speaker 2>so now I'm enjoying my kids, of course, and practicing again,

1:52:38.479 --> 1:52:41.200
<v Speaker 2>practicing the piano. And I was about to say, when

1:52:41.240 --> 1:52:46.760
<v Speaker 2>I look back, my favorite stuff is not even you know,

1:52:46.800 --> 1:52:50.200
<v Speaker 2>getting on TV that was wonderful, of course, but the

1:52:50.720 --> 1:52:53.759
<v Speaker 2>sessions I got to do. How fast I got going

1:52:54.439 --> 1:52:57.120
<v Speaker 2>as a session player, and I made a record with

1:52:57.160 --> 1:53:00.960
<v Speaker 2>Burt Backreck in about nineteen seventy six. I can't believe it,

1:53:01.040 --> 1:53:02.920
<v Speaker 2>you know, It's just one of those things. And that's

1:53:02.960 --> 1:53:06.280
<v Speaker 2>what really I'm the proudest stuff I think.

1:53:07.600 --> 1:53:09.880
<v Speaker 1>And did you play sessions when you were on with

1:53:10.000 --> 1:53:11.880
<v Speaker 1>Letterman or that was just wasn't enough time?

1:53:12.080 --> 1:53:14.280
<v Speaker 2>No, I was. I did some of the but you know,

1:53:14.360 --> 1:53:18.400
<v Speaker 2>it was disappearing, and not only the whole scene disappearing,

1:53:18.439 --> 1:53:21.400
<v Speaker 2>but also disappearing for me. If you're on TV, people

1:53:21.439 --> 1:53:24.360
<v Speaker 2>think you're busy. You know, you need to be in

1:53:24.400 --> 1:53:26.639
<v Speaker 2>the scene. But I still do things here and there.

1:53:27.120 --> 1:53:28.720
<v Speaker 1>And how did you get involved with the Rock and

1:53:28.800 --> 1:53:29.880
<v Speaker 1>Roll Hall of Fame.

1:53:31.880 --> 1:53:36.800
<v Speaker 2>From a session thing? I had done a session that

1:53:36.960 --> 1:53:40.439
<v Speaker 2>involved Almited Urtigan, the founder of Atlantic Records and then

1:53:40.520 --> 1:53:41.960
<v Speaker 2>and one of the founders of the Rock Roll Hall

1:53:42.000 --> 1:53:50.479
<v Speaker 2>of Fame. Uh it was the Honey Drippers with Robert

1:53:50.520 --> 1:53:55.559
<v Speaker 2>plant That was during Letterman or earlier in Letterman run.

1:53:55.640 --> 1:53:58.240
<v Speaker 2>I just got a call, It's a session Saturday and

1:53:58.320 --> 1:54:01.800
<v Speaker 2>Sunday Robert plant Of course, you know I'm going to

1:54:01.880 --> 1:54:08.320
<v Speaker 2>be there, and it was let's see, well, Jeff Beck

1:54:08.400 --> 1:54:11.280
<v Speaker 2>and Ile Rogers were there as guitars. Wayne Peeswater and

1:54:11.360 --> 1:54:15.519
<v Speaker 2>based the Late Grade and the drummer has moved to

1:54:15.600 --> 1:54:19.120
<v Speaker 2>Los Angeles now name this case. But that was, you know,

1:54:19.240 --> 1:54:22.000
<v Speaker 2>just a session call. But I got to work for

1:54:22.240 --> 1:54:24.599
<v Speaker 2>Robert Planting. To hear his voice in the in the

1:54:24.600 --> 1:54:27.680
<v Speaker 2>phones was pretty amazing. And I hit it off with

1:54:27.760 --> 1:54:31.400
<v Speaker 2>Almet and he you know, and then he started seeing

1:54:31.439 --> 1:54:35.000
<v Speaker 2>me on Letterman and he called me for the Rock

1:54:35.040 --> 1:54:38.960
<v Speaker 2>Roll Hall of Fame and the first one was they

1:54:39.000 --> 1:54:41.480
<v Speaker 2>were afraid to the first one was with Fatz Nomeno

1:54:41.600 --> 1:54:44.920
<v Speaker 2>and everybody, you know, all the greats that were alive,

1:54:45.360 --> 1:54:49.200
<v Speaker 2>Elvis posthumously of course, and they said, well, we can't

1:54:49.240 --> 1:54:52.360
<v Speaker 2>ask we don't want to ask them to play because

1:54:52.360 --> 1:54:55.520
<v Speaker 2>we're honoring them. How can we ask them to work?

1:54:55.600 --> 1:54:57.120
<v Speaker 2>Yet we've got to have, you know, how are we

1:54:57.200 --> 1:55:00.680
<v Speaker 2>going to finesse some kind of a jam session? And

1:55:00.760 --> 1:55:04.440
<v Speaker 2>Bill Graham was still alive and he was on the committee,

1:55:04.440 --> 1:55:06.560
<v Speaker 2>and he said, well, I'll just you know, I'll say,

1:55:06.680 --> 1:55:09.320
<v Speaker 2>let's come up for a group photo and we'll just

1:55:09.440 --> 1:55:13.240
<v Speaker 2>have instruments, amps and guitars and see what and we

1:55:13.360 --> 1:55:15.680
<v Speaker 2>know they're going to play. Well, they took that photo

1:55:15.680 --> 1:55:19.080
<v Speaker 2>and they went running for the instruments. The greats, they

1:55:19.080 --> 1:55:22.240
<v Speaker 2>couldn't wait, and the jam was just on. They were

1:55:22.280 --> 1:55:24.840
<v Speaker 2>calling their own tunes and playing. It was just fantastic.

1:55:26.040 --> 1:55:26.960
<v Speaker 2>It just erupted.

1:55:27.480 --> 1:55:29.880
<v Speaker 1>And at this point you still involved or what?

1:55:30.560 --> 1:55:33.440
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, that was the first show. So I was involved

1:55:33.440 --> 1:55:36.920
<v Speaker 2>the first time. I mean I was involved really all

1:55:36.960 --> 1:55:41.640
<v Speaker 2>through John Winner's era of it. So almost thirty years

1:55:41.720 --> 1:55:44.880
<v Speaker 2>I think to varying degrees to every year depending on

1:55:45.280 --> 1:55:48.360
<v Speaker 2>who the inductees were. But that first year was incredible

1:55:48.360 --> 1:55:51.520
<v Speaker 2>and it was totally spontaneous, And when Bill Graham was alive,

1:55:52.120 --> 1:55:56.560
<v Speaker 2>he really politic for that jam. It shouldn't be rehearsed.

1:55:56.560 --> 1:55:59.160
<v Speaker 2>Don't try to get a show. It's the only time

1:55:59.240 --> 1:56:03.280
<v Speaker 2>you're going to see music. Absolutely jamming, and so while

1:56:03.320 --> 1:56:06.000
<v Speaker 2>he was alive, that's the way it was. And that

1:56:06.160 --> 1:56:08.880
<v Speaker 2>jan Winner, however, also a great friend of mine. He

1:56:09.000 --> 1:56:13.040
<v Speaker 2>wanted more of a rehearsed television show, so that's what

1:56:13.240 --> 1:56:16.400
<v Speaker 2>it morphed into. But initially it was absolutely a jam.

1:56:18.240 --> 1:56:25.080
<v Speaker 1>One final question, Okay, Al Cooper, you had a legendary

1:56:25.240 --> 1:56:29.760
<v Speaker 1>career with the blues project Blood, Sweat and Tears, Supersession

1:56:29.840 --> 1:56:33.280
<v Speaker 1>of course, had the albums with Sounds of the South

1:56:33.360 --> 1:56:38.840
<v Speaker 1>with Leonard skinnerd etc. He says his only income is

1:56:38.880 --> 1:56:43.120
<v Speaker 1>for performing rights, and that you started to use his

1:56:43.400 --> 1:56:47.920
<v Speaker 1>song with the Cape every Friday night. Yeah, and he

1:56:48.040 --> 1:56:50.800
<v Speaker 1>was saying he got paid and then one night they

1:56:50.880 --> 1:56:53.640
<v Speaker 1>retired the Cape. How did you end up using his

1:56:53.800 --> 1:56:56.000
<v Speaker 1>song and how did you end up retiring it?

1:56:57.080 --> 1:57:01.240
<v Speaker 2>One of these things where Dave I was playing it

1:57:01.400 --> 1:57:04.080
<v Speaker 2>and singing it myself, I love you more than you'll

1:57:04.080 --> 1:57:07.800
<v Speaker 2>ever know. And I was playing it for a bumper

1:57:07.920 --> 1:57:11.839
<v Speaker 2>or something. And Dave Letterman, who was much more musical

1:57:11.840 --> 1:57:15.080
<v Speaker 2>than anybody would have given him credit for, he heard every

1:57:15.120 --> 1:57:18.720
<v Speaker 2>note that we played all through those years. He said, gee,

1:57:18.720 --> 1:57:24.120
<v Speaker 2>that sounds like a James Brown thing. I should feel

1:57:24.160 --> 1:57:25.920
<v Speaker 2>like I should come out with a cape or something.

1:57:26.240 --> 1:57:29.320
<v Speaker 2>And of course Al had been inspired by It's a

1:57:29.360 --> 1:57:31.920
<v Speaker 2>Man's World when he wrote that. You know, I think

1:57:31.960 --> 1:57:34.800
<v Speaker 2>he would be the first to tell us that, and

1:57:34.920 --> 1:57:36.800
<v Speaker 2>Dave thought it was a James Brown turned out to

1:57:36.840 --> 1:57:40.960
<v Speaker 2>Al Cooper, So that's why it became one of ol

1:57:41.320 --> 1:57:44.400
<v Speaker 2>songs instead of one of James's. But after Dave made

1:57:44.440 --> 1:57:48.800
<v Speaker 2>that suggestion of cape, it looks like something about a cape.

1:57:49.360 --> 1:57:51.760
<v Speaker 2>I don't know exactly, but we started doing the cape bit.

1:57:52.840 --> 1:57:55.120
<v Speaker 2>We just rased it all go down on my knees,

1:57:55.720 --> 1:57:58.120
<v Speaker 2>you come out with the cape, and we did that.

1:57:58.520 --> 1:58:02.840
<v Speaker 2>Dave put the cape on me and then it just

1:58:02.840 --> 1:58:04.920
<v Speaker 2>just like that other story I told. It became a

1:58:05.000 --> 1:58:09.160
<v Speaker 2>runner and we started getting celebrities to put the cape

1:58:09.160 --> 1:58:12.360
<v Speaker 2>on me, and it came every Friday night and we

1:58:12.400 --> 1:58:15.720
<v Speaker 2>would actually come back from the commercial for the id spot,

1:58:16.280 --> 1:58:19.080
<v Speaker 2>I would be doing that cape. Whether it was Heidi

1:58:19.200 --> 1:58:23.560
<v Speaker 2>Klume or President Trump, all these people came out with

1:58:23.680 --> 1:58:28.840
<v Speaker 2>the cape, and James himself came out and put the

1:58:28.880 --> 1:58:31.800
<v Speaker 2>cape on me. And then you know, two years this

1:58:31.840 --> 1:58:34.360
<v Speaker 2>went on. Al said he built himself a new bathroom,

1:58:36.640 --> 1:58:40.360
<v Speaker 2>only he would put it that way. It had run

1:58:40.360 --> 1:58:43.200
<v Speaker 2>its course, you know, and we had run out of celebrities,

1:58:43.240 --> 1:58:48.760
<v Speaker 2>my goodness, we had everybody. And so it happened that

1:58:48.800 --> 1:58:51.440
<v Speaker 2>on an episode of American Idol that year, Paul Anka

1:58:51.520 --> 1:58:55.920
<v Speaker 2>saying my way. I couldn't for no reason. So I

1:58:56.000 --> 1:58:59.360
<v Speaker 2>just said, well, let's get Paul Ankle here and with

1:58:59.520 --> 1:59:03.720
<v Speaker 2>new spec lyrics about the cape, retiring the cape, and

1:59:03.800 --> 1:59:07.400
<v Speaker 2>that all came to pass. Paul sang my way about

1:59:07.400 --> 1:59:12.520
<v Speaker 2>the cape, something about well, we had agreed to work

1:59:12.560 --> 1:59:15.839
<v Speaker 2>with him. He is the master of special lyrics.

1:59:15.880 --> 1:59:19.400
<v Speaker 1>You know, he wrote special lyrics for my birthday. I mean, God,

1:59:19.480 --> 1:59:22.160
<v Speaker 1>bless you, my jaw is still dropped.

1:59:23.200 --> 1:59:27.480
<v Speaker 2>Well, our writers made the mistake of sending him some

1:59:27.600 --> 1:59:31.520
<v Speaker 2>lyrics that they had written. When he came in. He

1:59:31.720 --> 1:59:34.040
<v Speaker 2>came in by saying, you know, he says, yeah, you guys,

1:59:34.240 --> 1:59:36.520
<v Speaker 2>thank the lyrics. You saved me. You saved me two

1:59:36.560 --> 1:59:39.879
<v Speaker 2>days work, he says. But I kept one of your jokes,

1:59:41.120 --> 1:59:44.280
<v Speaker 2>which was that they had written which was about the

1:59:44.320 --> 1:59:47.040
<v Speaker 2>celebrities putting the cape when every case, in every case

1:59:48.160 --> 1:59:53.600
<v Speaker 2>they showed their true face except Joan Rivers that he liked.

1:59:54.840 --> 1:59:59.520
<v Speaker 2>But otherwise you readid everything very funny, and they retired

1:59:59.520 --> 2:00:01.560
<v Speaker 2>the cape and al you know, I'm sorry. I did

2:00:01.600 --> 2:00:02.600
<v Speaker 2>the best I could for you.

2:00:03.600 --> 2:00:05.840
<v Speaker 1>And on that note, Paul, I think we're going to

2:00:05.960 --> 2:00:07.840
<v Speaker 1>draw it to a close. I want to thank you

2:00:07.960 --> 2:00:11.360
<v Speaker 1>so much for taking the time to speak to my audience.

2:00:11.400 --> 2:00:15.200
<v Speaker 1>And I want to remind everybody September thirteenth, your gig

2:00:15.240 --> 2:00:16.200
<v Speaker 1>with Jeff Barret.

2:00:17.280 --> 2:00:19.280
<v Speaker 2>It's going to be a fun night. You know. I'm

2:00:19.320 --> 2:00:23.120
<v Speaker 2>the world's foremost authority. See you there, Bob, A lot

2:00:23.160 --> 2:00:26.600
<v Speaker 2>of fun. Say hi to your lovely one.

2:00:26.880 --> 2:00:30.480
<v Speaker 1>Okay, till next time. This is Bob left Stets