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Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.

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Speaker 1: My guest today is the one and only John Cob. John.

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Speaker 1: Good to have you on the program, but it's great

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Speaker 1: to be here, Thanks Bob. So you've been on the

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Speaker 1: road since last summer. Have you had any problems with

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Speaker 1: COVID and touring? Of course, a lot of it being

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Speaker 1: you're taking all the precautions, wearing a mask everywhere. Once

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Speaker 1: in a while, a member of your crew or a

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Speaker 1: member in the place where you're playing, or you know,

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Speaker 1: COVID is around and that person has to then disappear

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Speaker 1: and go isolate for ten days, two weeks, or whatever

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Speaker 1: the rule we're under at the time. UM. But yeah,

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Speaker 1: I mean it's it's always present, just behind the screen,

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Speaker 1: behind the curtain, I guess. And it still was, you know,

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Speaker 1: hasn't gone away yet. Have you gotten COVID or anybody

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Speaker 1: in the band? I believe I've gotten COVID twice. The

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Speaker 1: first time was right at the beginning of when we

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Speaker 1: were just beginning to hear that this new thing was coming.

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Speaker 1: He was in the January early February, UM, and I

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Speaker 1: got mainly at night I would be copying, trying to

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Speaker 1: sleep and you know, a lot of symptoms like that.

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Speaker 1: I felt kind of strange, but I didn't really know that.

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Speaker 1: I went to my doctor and just tried to get antibiotics.

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Speaker 1: In fact, I went through his first run of him

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Speaker 1: and the second run of them, uh, and still wasn't

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Speaker 1: any better. And in the midst of the second run,

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Speaker 1: he said, why would you continue the same medicine if

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Speaker 1: it wasn't working. But I'm not a doctor. I don't

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Speaker 1: think like that. I just said, well, I'll take this

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Speaker 1: some more. Um. But looking back, I'm pretty sure that

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Speaker 1: was COVID. Then went through the whole you know, that

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Speaker 1: horrible year when there was no protection, no vaccine. Um,

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Speaker 1: I ran down. You know, I was first on my

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Speaker 1: block to run down when the vaccine became available, or

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Speaker 1: at least uh, I was right there at the beginning.

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Speaker 1: So then I ended up getting the first and second shot,

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Speaker 1: and then after my booster shot, which is the third shot.

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Speaker 1: About three weeks after that, three to a month, UM,

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Speaker 1: that old symptom of the cough came back at night,

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Speaker 1: and I think my wife was away on a trip

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Speaker 1: or something, and I was telling her I was having

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Speaker 1: a heck of a time. She said, you gotta test yourself.

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Speaker 1: Sure enough, I was positive even after all those vaccines.

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Speaker 1: But of course, as we all know, with the vaccine,

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Speaker 1: the consequences were not dire. It was I had a

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Speaker 1: little bit of that cough, but it was that same cough,

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Speaker 1: but nothing else was wrong. I didn't really even feel tired.

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Speaker 1: I was still going running, you know, in all the

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Speaker 1: normal things. I tested again, and maybe three days or so,

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Speaker 1: you know, immediately started staying away from people. But um,

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Speaker 1: I've still had it. And after ten days I tested

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Speaker 1: it again and still had it. It took about two

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Speaker 1: weeks for it to you know, where I finally wasn't positive.

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Speaker 1: Have you had to cancel any dates because of COVID.

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Speaker 1: Right at the beginning, we were literally going. We played

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Speaker 1: a show in at a casino in Laughlin, Nevada, and

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Speaker 1: which I really by then I didn't want to do this.

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Speaker 1: And then uh, and this I believe was late February

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Speaker 1: early March of and there was another show the next night. Nice.

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Speaker 1: I just really didn't want to go through with it,

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Speaker 1: but we were sort of obligated. But finding the governor

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Speaker 1: of Nevada got wise to the thing and just shut

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Speaker 1: people down. And so like five minutes before I would

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Speaker 1: have gone on stage, they canceled the show. We ended up,

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Speaker 1: of course, it was postponed, not canceled. A year and

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Speaker 1: a half later we played that show, but yeah, we

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Speaker 1: we lost some of those. So you mentioned your wife

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Speaker 1: in the press. You've always said positive things about your wife.

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Speaker 1: How long you've been married to your wife now? Well,

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Speaker 1: officially thirty one years. Our anniversary was about a month ago, congratulations,

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Speaker 1: thank you very much. And how many years before the

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Speaker 1: official probably four years before that, three something like that.

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Speaker 1: So how did your meter? We met in UM six

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Speaker 1: in Indianapolis. I was on tour and uh after the show,

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Speaker 1: a bunch of the fellas in the band said, Hey,

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Speaker 1: there's this club right around the corner of our hotel.

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Speaker 1: We're all going down there, and uh so I showed

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Speaker 1: up probably twenty minutes later and kind of walked around

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Speaker 1: the whole place, and you know, I decided I was

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Speaker 1: going to leave, and just as I had kind of

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Speaker 1: made up my mind to leave, the sort of the

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Speaker 1: people parted. Uh you know, these shadowy figures in the dark,

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Speaker 1: and suddenly I'm staring at this beautiful girl in a

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Speaker 1: red dress, and I literally said to myself that's the

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Speaker 1: most beautiful girl I've ever seen. And my world stopped

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Speaker 1: in its tracks right there. Um, that's how we met. Okay,

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Speaker 1: continue the story. You see her in the waves part

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Speaker 1: like in a movie. Do you approach er? What do

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Speaker 1: you say? Literally, she came walking towards me and because

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Speaker 1: she was Yeah, I found all this out later she

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Speaker 1: was with a group of people, and most she was

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Speaker 1: with her sister and helping her sister move across Indiana

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Speaker 1: to a new location. But they had just stopped in

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Speaker 1: at this club and they were only going to be

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Speaker 1: there an hour, said they. You know, the the whole

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Speaker 1: idea I think for my wife was if I'm gonna

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Speaker 1: go down to where you are and bring you back

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Speaker 1: up to where I am, and it's gonna be a

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Speaker 1: six hour slept, maybe we can have a little bit

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Speaker 1: of fun in between. And that was sort of their

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Speaker 1: motive at the time. Um. And then you know, they

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Speaker 1: had just met other people and she was talking to

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Speaker 1: them and one of them noticed who I was, so

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Speaker 1: sort of on a dare, my wife said I'm going

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Speaker 1: to go up and talk to him, and she comes up,

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Speaker 1: you know, kind of like that old scene in the

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Speaker 1: commercial where the couple is in slow motion walking, you know.

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Speaker 1: I see her walking really slowly towards me, and she

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Speaker 1: sticks out her hand and says, can I shake your hand?

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Speaker 1: Mr foger They so all the thoughts in my head

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Speaker 1: that were, let's say, not all above board were suddenly

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Speaker 1: just throwing out the window with that Mr Fogerty. I

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Speaker 1: kind of, oh my goodness. Um. But we talked a

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Speaker 1: while and ended up talking the whole night. They until

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Speaker 1: they closed the place. You know, just sat at a

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Speaker 1: table sort of. This place had a dance floor, by

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Speaker 1: the way, I literally got up and danced with this

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Speaker 1: girl for one dance. Do you normally dance or was

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Speaker 1: this an exception? I don't dance. I do not dance,

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Speaker 1: but I felt like dancing. We always joked. The song

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Speaker 1: was Sledgehammer. You know. We went back and sat out

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Speaker 1: and talked some more. I just she was so well,

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Speaker 1: I was just taken with her, smitten. Uh, and it's

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Speaker 1: a wonderful feeling. You know. It went totally away from

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Speaker 1: that other characterization that I was sort of just being

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Speaker 1: a typical musician on the road. Uh. All of that

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Speaker 1: kind of changed into sort of a boy scout talking

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Speaker 1: to somebody who was charming and cute and funny, and

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Speaker 1: you know, I just became this other I was in

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Speaker 1: this other mood and she was certainly somebody I really

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Speaker 1: wanted to spend more time with. But needles to say,

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Speaker 1: she's an Indianapolis and you're on the road, So how

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Speaker 1: do you maintain the relationship. Well, a few days later,

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Speaker 1: I mean it might have been a couple of weeks. Really, Um,

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Speaker 1: I got word that she was going to be at

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Speaker 1: a show that was It was really not that far

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Speaker 1: away as the crow Flags. I think it was in Maryville,

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Speaker 1: and the place it was it was a concert venue,

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Speaker 1: and also the hotel where I was staying. Um and uh,

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Speaker 1: our head road guy guy named Slice, got the message.

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Speaker 1: She came walking up to him in the afternoon and said, know,

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Speaker 1: she knew I was playing there, and she said, can

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Speaker 1: I if I could you a message? Can you give

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Speaker 1: it to John? And he said sure, And so she

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Speaker 1: either gave him a little note or a you know,

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Speaker 1: a verbal message, and he came and told me, and

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Speaker 1: I was delighted. I said, well, yeah, see, you're telling

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Speaker 1: But it was really easy because the hotel and the

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Speaker 1: bar and all that stuff was right in that same building,

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Speaker 1: and you know, you didn't have to drive down a

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Speaker 1: dark road somewhere. I said, I'll meet her after the show.

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Speaker 1: I would be great, because by then I was probably

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Speaker 1: in sound check. Um. And by then, by the way, uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, I came and met her in the bar.

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Speaker 1: But I was a teetotaler. I had actually had some

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Speaker 1: well publicized problems with alcohol, and now I was not

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Speaker 1: drinking at all. And she was shocked at the difference

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Speaker 1: in my appearance and demeanor, you know, the guys she

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Speaker 1: saw before the first time, she said it was it

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Speaker 1: was like walking up to Willie Nelson, you know, which

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Speaker 1: I think I take as a compliment, but I think

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Speaker 1: she met I looked a little haggard to kind a phrase,

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Speaker 1: and this time, you know, I was all cleaned up.

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Speaker 1: I looked probably healthier, gained a few pounds, you know,

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Speaker 1: my hair was called um. And I was not drinking.

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Speaker 1: Her and her girlfriend were, but I was not. And

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Speaker 1: I just sat there and talked until you know, they

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Speaker 1: retired and had to go home. Okay, then what well,

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Speaker 1: I really wanted to get to see her again, so

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Speaker 1: I said, gosh, you gotta give me your phone number.

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Speaker 1: And so, sitting right at the table. It's kind of

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Speaker 1: a booth actually in this uh little uh I would

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Speaker 1: call it a bar and a holiday inn. But you know,

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Speaker 1: so you get the picture and there's a little uh

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Speaker 1: matchbooks there with the name of the place on the

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Speaker 1: match So she grabbed the match book, gets a pen

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Speaker 1: and writes down what I think is her phone number.

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Speaker 1: Her name is uh to her her name is anyway,

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Speaker 1: her name is Julie Lebzinski. And I don't know if

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Speaker 1: she wrote down Lebezynski or her uh earlier name, which

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Speaker 1: was Kramer. But anyway, um, I, you know, dutifully okay,

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Speaker 1: And I took that and put in my shirt pocket

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Speaker 1: and I was all smiles. And they had to leave

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Speaker 1: and you know, drive back to South Bend where she's from.

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Speaker 1: And uh, next day, I'm sitting on the bus, said, wow,

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Speaker 1: I want to I want to look at her number.

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Speaker 1: And I pull out the matchbook and it's kind of

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Speaker 1: like that scene with Steve Allen in the Jerk where

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Speaker 1: he's sitting in the bathtub. And I opened the matchbooks

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Speaker 1: to see Julie's information and it says love love, lovel love.

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Speaker 1: It's all scribbled that it it I can't read it.

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Speaker 1: And now I'm heartbroken. Well, by God, I'm gonna call

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Speaker 1: every Julie in the South Bend phone book until I

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Speaker 1: find there. I didn't quite have to do that. A

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Speaker 1: few weeks later she came and found me. A very

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Speaker 1: few weeks, it might have been even two. I was

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Speaker 1: playing out in California at Universal. So she came out

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Speaker 1: and found you, and then you were off to the

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Speaker 1: races or to take how long until you were actually

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Speaker 1: together living in the same place. Well, if you really

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Speaker 1: want me to finish the story, I will. Uh you know,

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Speaker 1: this is my favorite thing to talk about in the world. Okay,

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Speaker 1: keep going. Okay, So I'm playing at Universal, I think

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Speaker 1: two nights and so, which is a venue in southern

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Speaker 1: California in l A and So I'm staying in the hotel.

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Speaker 1: There's there's two of them there and and ones a Sherton,

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Speaker 1: and the other is something else and I can't remember

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Speaker 1: it might have been called Universal It anyway, she gets

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Speaker 1: out there to Southern California. She's staying with her aunt

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Speaker 1: and uncle, I believe, and she sees in the paper

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Speaker 1: I'm playing at Universal now I have given the hotel

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Speaker 1: strict um because I'm registered under my own name, because

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Speaker 1: how can I say it's a a compt room because

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Speaker 1: it goes with playing at the venue, right, So it's

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Speaker 1: under my name. But I've given them strict orders do

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Speaker 1: not put any calls through to my room or they're

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Speaker 1: asking for John Pokery because I'll be getting calls at

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Speaker 1: three am. You know, I need my rest. Um. Well,

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Speaker 1: you know, on the other side of reality. There, she

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Speaker 1: looks in the paper, sees I'm playing at the Universal,

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Speaker 1: says wow, I'm just gonna call him up. And so

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Speaker 1: she you know, looks in the phone book or somehow

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Speaker 1: figures he's at that hotel there. So she calls up

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Speaker 1: the hotel says yes, can I please talk to John

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Speaker 1: Pogotty and they put her right through. Well, if you

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Speaker 1: know my girl, Julie, I've been with her for thirty

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Speaker 1: five years or so, this is absolutely on Q. She

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Speaker 1: is the man manifesto of the universe and she can

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Speaker 1: make anything happen and and obviously always does. So there

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Speaker 1: she is on my phone. I pick up the phone

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Speaker 1: and she has HI, John, It's Julie. Now I was,

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Speaker 1: at that same moment in time, a very mournful, sorrowful person. Um,

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Speaker 1: I had my first marriage was breaking up. I was

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Speaker 1: feeling like the tour was coming to an end. My

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Speaker 1: career seem, I don't know, stalled, you know, for all

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Speaker 1: those reasons that a person can get themselves into a

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Speaker 1: sor of a place, I just I literally felt like

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Speaker 1: I was standing on the dock with one end of

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Speaker 1: a rope tight around my ankle and the other end

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Speaker 1: around a big rock, and I was just about to

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Speaker 1: throw the rock in the water. Anyway, I pick up

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Speaker 1: the bones. She says, Hi, John, this is Julie. And

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Speaker 1: the next thing that happened was I started laughing. I'm

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Speaker 1: laughing so so fully and completely that I'm laying on

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Speaker 1: the floor in my room. She says, what's the matter

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Speaker 1: with you? And I tell her the story about the

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Speaker 1: dock and the rock and the rope. I said, Honey,

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Speaker 1: I I don't know how life can go from one

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Speaker 1: swing from one end to another in fifteen seconds, but

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Speaker 1: it just did, you know? I said, hello, how are you?

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Speaker 1: I've been looking for you? Uh, And turned out she

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Speaker 1: was staying down in Hollywood at a hotel, and uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, we talked, and I think the next day

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Speaker 1: I finally got to see her. So you saw her

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Speaker 1: how long until she moved from Indianapolis to where you were?

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Speaker 1: We stayed about a year apart. I know that. Uh,

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Speaker 1: let's see what we were together during that time. That

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Speaker 1: week or so, I was in at the Universal. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And then she had to go back to her home. UM.

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Speaker 1: But around New Year's I wanted to go. I was

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Speaker 1: just compelled to come see her. And then I had

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Speaker 1: to go back to California. I mean, you know, I

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Speaker 1: don't know why we do those things, but something said, well, yeah,

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Speaker 1: well that's where you're staying, and so you're supposed to

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Speaker 1: go back there. So I went back, and you know,

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Speaker 1: it turned out that every couple of weeks I would

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Speaker 1: fly to South Bend. I remember one time we were

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Speaker 1: walking in the airport um parking lot, you know, to

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Speaker 1: where the planes were whatever the determinal, and she stomped

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Speaker 1: her foot. She just she stopped her foot down on

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Speaker 1: the asphalt and I looked at her. It was just

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Speaker 1: the cutest thing, you know, motion I've seen guys do it,

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Speaker 1: but I've really never seen a girl do that. And

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Speaker 1: I said, well, what's the matter, and she said, you're leaving?

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Speaker 1: And it was my idea really, or or inclination I

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Speaker 1: after a couple three times, flying back to South Bend

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Speaker 1: every second week or so to spend a few days

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Speaker 1: with her, I began to realize I was really in love. Um,

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Speaker 1: but I was terrified that she would be you know,

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Speaker 1: I tend to get tumatic too dramatic sometimes in life.

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Speaker 1: I was terrified that she would be that entity that

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Speaker 1: we some call it sometimes called the rebound. And so

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Speaker 1: a guy will break up with his wife and then

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Speaker 1: he'll meet, you know, somebody in a bar and they're

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Speaker 1: together for six months, but that's all, and then he

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Speaker 1: shakes him self thoroughly and drives out and then starts

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Speaker 1: planning his real life. And so susie Q kind of

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Speaker 1: goes away along with all those other things he just

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Speaker 1: went through. I didn't want that to be my reality,

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Speaker 1: and so I kind of kept it as it. Well,

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Speaker 1: I'll come and see you, but I think we should

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Speaker 1: stay apart. And I had this idea that it would

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Speaker 1: last a year. I you know, don't ask me why now.

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Speaker 1: It seems silly, um, but I guess there was some

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Speaker 1: wisdom in that, because once we got together, you know,

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Speaker 1: we've been together for thirty five years and without ever

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Speaker 1: a hiccup I mean, it's just it's been wonderful. There's

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Speaker 1: it's the deepest relationship I've ever had, and and and

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Speaker 1: there's just no question ever you know about who is

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Speaker 1: your soul mate and who you want to be with,

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Speaker 1: who you run to with, what you're excited about, or

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Speaker 1: with your problems. You know, Um, if you have such

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Speaker 1: a thing, Bob, then you know exactly what I'm talking about, right,

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Speaker 1: Just to get the landscape you were married before. How

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Speaker 1: old were you when you got married the first time?

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Speaker 1: I got married at twenty and there ought to be

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Speaker 1: a law. What was your motivation for getting married at twenty? Well,

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Speaker 1: you know, I thought I was in love at the time,

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Speaker 1: but I think you're at that age pretty young to

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Speaker 1: to actually really know what you're talking about. I mean,

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Speaker 1: you know, I was not insincere about my feelings, but

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Speaker 1: also there was a large dose of um my mom

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Speaker 1: was pushing me out of the house. You know, I

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Speaker 1: was still living at home with my mother, and it

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Speaker 1: was all I think at one point she you know,

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Speaker 1: I was almost the last kid at home. I think, yeah,

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Speaker 1: I think my brother Bob was still at home, But

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Speaker 1: how can I say it? I was acting like a

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Speaker 1: foot loose, twenty year old, you know, coming in with

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Speaker 1: Remember I'm still twenty, not even one, uh coming in

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Speaker 1: late night, making a bunch of noise, I'm sure. I know.

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Speaker 1: One time I went to give her a ride somewhere

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Speaker 1: in the car and there was a six pack of

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Speaker 1: beer sitting on the floor of the front seat that

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Speaker 1: I had forgotten about as I put her in the

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Speaker 1: Let's just kind of looked at that, you know, and

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Speaker 1: I kind of to myself and oops, you know, so

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Speaker 1: I was being kind of tossed out or else i'd

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Speaker 1: have to pay rent. I think that's how she put it,

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Speaker 1: And it was kind of her, you know, her way

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Speaker 1: of saying, gee, I'm kind of tired of this re

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Speaker 1: this situation. Let's change it, which I totally understand now,

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Speaker 1: of course. But uh So, there was some of that

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Speaker 1: I was kind of I don't know, there was there

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Speaker 1: was a bit of coercion or pressure on me that

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Speaker 1: I didn't understand, and that may have been some of

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Speaker 1: the impetus toward getting married the first time. How did

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Speaker 1: you meet your first wife? I worked in a gas station,

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00:21:02,400 --> 00:21:05,800
Speaker 1: and so I met her and her sister and that

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Speaker 1: sister's boyfriend. All at the same time at the place

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Speaker 1: I used to pump gas. They would come in rather late,

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Speaker 1: and probably that happened two or three times. Okay, So

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Speaker 1: you had kids with your first marriage, Yes, three kids.

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Speaker 1: Three kids? What are they up to today? I'm not

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Speaker 1: in a real close contact, but uh, you know these

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Speaker 1: are people. These are all adults in their fifties. Now. Okay,

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Speaker 1: So were you eager to have children with Julie or

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Speaker 1: did you say, hey, you know, I've already had children.

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Speaker 1: How do you decide to have children again? Well, Julie

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Speaker 1: already had a daughter, Lindsay, who was about two and

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Speaker 1: a half when we met. I know this because I

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Speaker 1: have changed a diaper or two, um. And I think

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Speaker 1: when that happened, she might have looked over and said, oh,

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Speaker 1: that's a keeper, you know, because I was. I hadn't

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Speaker 1: done it in a while, but I certainly knew I

356
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Speaker 1: was doing um. And then I think I think we

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Speaker 1: both put it this way. We would talk rather vaguely

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Speaker 1: about marriage at first. I think she'd been in a

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Speaker 1: marriage that had not worked out, And of course I've

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Speaker 1: been married for twenty years, um with less than spectacular results. Um.

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Speaker 1: And so I think we were both very skittish about

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Speaker 1: that idea. It's bob, it's the weirdest thing. I mean,

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Speaker 1: you're in love with someone and yet another part of

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Speaker 1: your brain is sort of clanging against the metal walls

365
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Speaker 1: with a ball peen hammer, going no, no, no, no

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Speaker 1: marriage no. You know. So uh, I think things just

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00:22:51,320 --> 00:22:58,040
Speaker 1: sort of evolved naturally. And UM, at some point we decided,

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Speaker 1: all right, we're going, we're gonna. I know how it happened.

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00:23:04,600 --> 00:23:08,639
Speaker 1: I finally came to my senses. She she was back

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Speaker 1: in um South Bend, and I was with her, and

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Speaker 1: I had an epiphany. I realized that she didn't she

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Speaker 1: would talk about me to her girlfriends, and by then

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Speaker 1: I was getting to know everybody, her mom, you know, sisters. Um.

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Speaker 1: It had been a few years, and I don't know

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Speaker 1: that anyone talked about marriage openly. You know. I think

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00:23:38,040 --> 00:23:40,040
Speaker 1: that's that's a subject. How do you talk about that

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Speaker 1: in front of the two people That might get awkward? Right? Um,

378
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Speaker 1: But I had an epiphany. I I was I was

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Speaker 1: I'm a runner, so I was out running, and a

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Speaker 1: lot of times when you're running, my your head well

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Speaker 1: just clear. It seems like it's a good place for

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Speaker 1: to think, you know, all the other instant pressures of

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Speaker 1: you know, I'm hungry or it's raining or all that

384
00:24:05,000 --> 00:24:07,320
Speaker 1: goes away, and you just sort of go into a

385
00:24:08,160 --> 00:24:11,000
Speaker 1: how the zone, I guess you call it. And I

386
00:24:11,080 --> 00:24:14,240
Speaker 1: had an epiphany about what why she's seeing all her

387
00:24:14,280 --> 00:24:16,920
Speaker 1: friends and you know, her girlfriend. I could really see that,

388
00:24:17,240 --> 00:24:20,240
Speaker 1: not so much that her family, but her girlfriends the

389
00:24:20,280 --> 00:24:24,760
Speaker 1: one she wants to talk to intimately, and she doesn't

390
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Speaker 1: have a ring to show them. I mean, I could

391
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Speaker 1: really I could feel her position, what her heart must

392
00:24:31,640 --> 00:24:35,600
Speaker 1: be like, it's wow, that's awful. She's telling them about

393
00:24:35,600 --> 00:24:37,840
Speaker 1: this guy, you know, and we're committed to each other.

394
00:24:37,880 --> 00:24:41,120
Speaker 1: But I just had my picture of I guess from

395
00:24:41,119 --> 00:24:43,840
Speaker 1: the movies, see and they hold up their hand and

396
00:24:43,880 --> 00:24:48,879
Speaker 1: there's a little beautiful, uh one carrot sweet little uh

397
00:24:48,920 --> 00:24:52,280
Speaker 1: engagement ring, you know, and that's sort of that's sort

398
00:24:52,320 --> 00:24:55,879
Speaker 1: of to a guy, that would be a contract, you know,

399
00:24:56,200 --> 00:24:59,679
Speaker 1: like a book, you know, but to a girl, it's

400
00:24:59,720 --> 00:25:03,520
Speaker 1: it's sort of established with that thing on her finger.

401
00:25:03,640 --> 00:25:08,560
Speaker 1: It's a it's a very momentous part of telling the tale.

402
00:25:09,160 --> 00:25:11,560
Speaker 1: And I just really could feel that, so literally I

403
00:25:11,680 --> 00:25:15,240
Speaker 1: finished my run. My run went down to a local

404
00:25:15,280 --> 00:25:19,119
Speaker 1: mall and bought a one carrot engagement you know, and

405
00:25:19,200 --> 00:25:21,560
Speaker 1: paid way too much money. I think they saw me

406
00:25:21,680 --> 00:25:24,360
Speaker 1: coming with you know, stars in my eyes. Oh man,

407
00:25:24,440 --> 00:25:28,960
Speaker 1: look at this roube. Wow, he's in love. We'll get him. Um.

408
00:25:29,000 --> 00:25:33,399
Speaker 1: Because even though you know, because I'm a rock and

409
00:25:33,480 --> 00:25:36,280
Speaker 1: roller and and I have a pretty good career going

410
00:25:36,359 --> 00:25:41,960
Speaker 1: and all that, some people, especially nowadays since Twitter and

411
00:25:42,000 --> 00:25:48,360
Speaker 1: TikTok and uh certain famous family that's on the internet

412
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:52,119
Speaker 1: all the time, people think that an engagement ring is

413
00:25:52,440 --> 00:25:56,080
Speaker 1: a career move, you know, a statement of your place

414
00:25:56,160 --> 00:26:01,440
Speaker 1: in your stature in life. But I didn't. To me, Uh,

415
00:26:01,480 --> 00:26:03,920
Speaker 1: I was relating to when I was, you know, fifteen

416
00:26:04,040 --> 00:26:05,959
Speaker 1: and going to the movie. So I bought her this

417
00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:13,720
Speaker 1: sweet little maall engagement ring and literally uh went to

418
00:26:14,080 --> 00:26:18,800
Speaker 1: a rest a restaurant. It's famous in South Bend called

419
00:26:18,800 --> 00:26:23,280
Speaker 1: Tippy Canoe because it uh used to be the student

420
00:26:23,320 --> 00:26:28,840
Speaker 1: Baker mansion. But also uh maybe that political candidate from

421
00:26:28,880 --> 00:26:31,560
Speaker 1: a hundred and fifty years ago may have stayed there,

422
00:26:31,760 --> 00:26:35,679
Speaker 1: owned it or whatever. Uh. And I talked with the

423
00:26:35,720 --> 00:26:38,159
Speaker 1: people the waiter and said, look, I'm gonna bring my

424
00:26:39,000 --> 00:26:43,240
Speaker 1: beautiful wife or my beautiful girlfriend down here and have dinner.

425
00:26:43,440 --> 00:26:45,800
Speaker 1: And I'm going to give her this ring, but I

426
00:26:45,840 --> 00:26:48,320
Speaker 1: want you to put this in the glass of wine

427
00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:51,959
Speaker 1: that we're gonna order. Okay, okay, you know, and so

428
00:26:52,119 --> 00:26:56,720
Speaker 1: the the jinks was in, you know, the fix was in. Anyway,

429
00:26:57,119 --> 00:27:00,080
Speaker 1: So later that day we come to dinner Robbily's and

430
00:27:00,200 --> 00:27:03,560
Speaker 1: and I go around everything, okay, you know, yeah, because

431
00:27:03,560 --> 00:27:06,880
Speaker 1: I knew there wouldn't be time to arrange that at night.

432
00:27:07,920 --> 00:27:10,320
Speaker 1: And of course, well, honey, have some of your wine,

433
00:27:10,359 --> 00:27:12,600
Speaker 1: you know. She takes a little sip of it, and

434
00:27:13,760 --> 00:27:16,840
Speaker 1: uh yeah, and I can clearly see the ring in

435
00:27:16,880 --> 00:27:19,359
Speaker 1: the bottom of that glass of wine from where I'm sitting.

436
00:27:19,680 --> 00:27:22,200
Speaker 1: I see that, Well, how do you have another sip

437
00:27:22,200 --> 00:27:26,800
Speaker 1: of that wine? And probably you know, after the second

438
00:27:26,920 --> 00:27:29,359
Speaker 1: or third, you know, she finds these looks, Hey, what's

439
00:27:29,359 --> 00:27:33,720
Speaker 1: going on here? You know? Anyway, then the story was out.

440
00:27:33,760 --> 00:27:35,800
Speaker 1: You know. That was the best feeling in the whole

441
00:27:35,800 --> 00:27:46,000
Speaker 1: wide world. I gotta tell you. Okay, So what waves

442
00:27:46,160 --> 00:27:50,400
Speaker 1: has your wife changed your life or helped you make

443
00:27:50,480 --> 00:27:55,160
Speaker 1: decisions in your life? Everything? Bob. I think that's probably

444
00:27:55,280 --> 00:27:57,359
Speaker 1: the only reason you allowed me to go on with

445
00:27:57,440 --> 00:28:02,760
Speaker 1: this rather biblical story. Um is you've probably had an

446
00:28:02,800 --> 00:28:09,520
Speaker 1: inkling Um, Julie has been there to be my sounding board, UM,

447
00:28:09,560 --> 00:28:14,320
Speaker 1: my counsel when I needed to figure something out or

448
00:28:14,760 --> 00:28:18,520
Speaker 1: a lot of times. Is what happens more often than

449
00:28:18,640 --> 00:28:25,040
Speaker 1: not now is she actually thinks about stuff, especially UM

450
00:28:25,320 --> 00:28:28,639
Speaker 1: career kind of stuff more than I ever do, and

451
00:28:29,680 --> 00:28:33,280
Speaker 1: figures it out or at least gets a plan of

452
00:28:33,560 --> 00:28:36,240
Speaker 1: how to approach it and and maybe how to make

453
00:28:36,280 --> 00:28:39,000
Speaker 1: it come to pass, which is why I call her

454
00:28:39,080 --> 00:28:42,680
Speaker 1: the manifesto. Uh. You know, a lot of times, I

455
00:28:43,640 --> 00:28:46,160
Speaker 1: how can I say if there's things I just have accepted,

456
00:28:46,200 --> 00:28:51,600
Speaker 1: You might say, I'm I'm just very happy that I'm happy.

457
00:28:51,800 --> 00:28:54,000
Speaker 1: I think you probably know that I've had a lot

458
00:28:54,040 --> 00:28:58,000
Speaker 1: of really bad, uh show biz crap happened to me

459
00:28:58,120 --> 00:29:01,560
Speaker 1: that I wouldn't wish on even my worst enemy, who

460
00:29:01,640 --> 00:29:07,960
Speaker 1: happens to be one of the reasons. And um, you know, uh,

461
00:29:08,000 --> 00:29:10,400
Speaker 1: and I've gotten through all that, and it was a

462
00:29:10,440 --> 00:29:14,640
Speaker 1: really hard time that was not pleasant, and life was

463
00:29:14,680 --> 00:29:17,880
Speaker 1: not pleasant and in the years, I mean, I'll just

464
00:29:17,920 --> 00:29:20,080
Speaker 1: take a shortcut here and tell you that I'm a

465
00:29:20,120 --> 00:29:25,360
Speaker 1: really happy person, very happy and looking forward to life

466
00:29:25,400 --> 00:29:28,040
Speaker 1: and looking forward to every morning getting up and the

467
00:29:28,120 --> 00:29:33,120
Speaker 1: possibilities that I have getting to work on, you know, music,

468
00:29:33,200 --> 00:29:37,000
Speaker 1: and also getting the see the members of my family

469
00:29:37,080 --> 00:29:40,480
Speaker 1: and just enjoy that I have this life. I mean,

470
00:29:42,640 --> 00:29:44,960
Speaker 1: that's really where I'm living, and I'm smart enough to

471
00:29:45,000 --> 00:29:48,720
Speaker 1: realize that's a good thing and it's probably the best

472
00:29:48,760 --> 00:29:53,520
Speaker 1: you could ever hope for. Uh far more. I do

473
00:29:53,680 --> 00:29:56,680
Speaker 1: know this to my soul that that is far more

474
00:29:56,840 --> 00:30:00,720
Speaker 1: meaningful than any career thing, or any materi aerial thing,

475
00:30:01,360 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 1: or any career thing you could try to go after

476
00:30:06,240 --> 00:30:10,000
Speaker 1: and accomplished, because just having the right person with you

477
00:30:10,240 --> 00:30:14,520
Speaker 1: is all of it is the whole meaning of life. Okay,

478
00:30:14,680 --> 00:30:19,600
Speaker 1: you talk about that moment at the Universal Hotel we

479
00:30:19,640 --> 00:30:22,840
Speaker 1: were at the end of the dock before you met Julie.

480
00:30:23,200 --> 00:30:26,520
Speaker 1: Do you tend towards depression or you a glass half

481
00:30:26,560 --> 00:30:29,479
Speaker 1: empty or glass half full kind of gone? I would

482
00:30:29,520 --> 00:30:32,920
Speaker 1: say that. I mean, looking back over my life, I

483
00:30:32,960 --> 00:30:37,239
Speaker 1: think I I have had to have been depressed at

484
00:30:37,280 --> 00:30:43,080
Speaker 1: several different times. Um. You know, sometimes I've actually wondered

485
00:30:43,120 --> 00:30:46,440
Speaker 1: if I might be bipolar or not. I mean, I've

486
00:30:46,480 --> 00:30:49,600
Speaker 1: seen other people who are literally I think we just

487
00:30:49,680 --> 00:30:53,080
Speaker 1: call that manic depressive, and you know, at one point

488
00:30:53,120 --> 00:30:56,000
Speaker 1: they'd be bouncing off the walls they're so happy, and

489
00:30:56,040 --> 00:30:59,400
Speaker 1: then at other points to be laying on the you know,

490
00:30:59,440 --> 00:31:04,200
Speaker 1: I'm talking spiritually laying on the floor, they're so unhappy.

491
00:31:04,280 --> 00:31:08,720
Speaker 1: And I don't think I'm like that. I'm always functioning,

492
00:31:08,800 --> 00:31:12,720
Speaker 1: But I do know that during the very dark days

493
00:31:13,040 --> 00:31:17,600
Speaker 1: of still being owned by Fantasy Records, which is where

494
00:31:17,760 --> 00:31:22,840
Speaker 1: the label that Credence at first had success with UM,

495
00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:27,680
Speaker 1: getting through that whole quagmire was very depressing to me.

496
00:31:27,720 --> 00:31:29,800
Speaker 1: I mean, there were there were times I could not

497
00:31:29,960 --> 00:31:34,120
Speaker 1: get that evil person out of my mind, and whenever,

498
00:31:34,480 --> 00:31:39,840
Speaker 1: sometimes just seeing the word Fantasy could spoil my day.

499
00:31:39,880 --> 00:31:43,680
Speaker 1: So I think you would call that depressed. And it

500
00:31:43,760 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 1: was hard, and it was really hard for someone to

501
00:31:46,360 --> 00:31:50,000
Speaker 1: tell me, come come to talk to me and just

502
00:31:50,080 --> 00:31:55,360
Speaker 1: say something light and have me react. How can I

503
00:31:55,400 --> 00:31:58,560
Speaker 1: say in an unbiased fashion, like the way we expect

504
00:31:58,880 --> 00:32:02,720
Speaker 1: normal people to to have interplay with each other, you know,

505
00:32:02,760 --> 00:32:08,360
Speaker 1: I would be so tilted towards a um bad mood

506
00:32:08,400 --> 00:32:11,320
Speaker 1: and and can't you see this ugly thing that's happening

507
00:32:11,320 --> 00:32:15,440
Speaker 1: to me, you know, that sort of mood um, which

508
00:32:15,560 --> 00:32:18,240
Speaker 1: I wouldn't wish on anyone. I mean, that's a horrible place,

509
00:32:18,400 --> 00:32:21,400
Speaker 1: you know. I I'm a lot lighter. But I do

510
00:32:21,560 --> 00:32:23,800
Speaker 1: see that from time to time. I mean, I'm not

511
00:32:23,880 --> 00:32:28,680
Speaker 1: a perfect saint by any means, don't get me wrong, um,

512
00:32:28,720 --> 00:32:32,440
Speaker 1: but I'm not captured anymore. That stuff doesn't own me.

513
00:32:33,280 --> 00:32:37,680
Speaker 1: And I realized now that it's really quirky too, because

514
00:32:37,760 --> 00:32:39,640
Speaker 1: I do it in my life. I'll walk up to

515
00:32:39,720 --> 00:32:45,360
Speaker 1: someone and start to talk and not here uh interplay

516
00:32:45,480 --> 00:32:47,840
Speaker 1: you know, a response, and you know they're in a

517
00:32:47,880 --> 00:32:53,320
Speaker 1: bad mood. I'll just let them have their space, you know,

518
00:32:54,040 --> 00:32:55,880
Speaker 1: And it can happen, I mean to someone you know,

519
00:32:56,040 --> 00:32:58,400
Speaker 1: or even if you go into a store and there's

520
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:01,320
Speaker 1: a salesman and you know and supposed to help you,

521
00:33:01,400 --> 00:33:05,600
Speaker 1: but he's not helpful. And you, the older, you get

522
00:33:05,640 --> 00:33:09,920
Speaker 1: that you know time and shorter bob Um, I'm pretty

523
00:33:09,960 --> 00:33:15,480
Speaker 1: aware about time, and I'm much more uh, much more

524
00:33:15,600 --> 00:33:21,040
Speaker 1: wanting to use my time in positive uh endeavors and

525
00:33:21,120 --> 00:33:25,560
Speaker 1: not waste time stuck in things that are you know,

526
00:33:25,680 --> 00:33:27,920
Speaker 1: a waste or going to drag you down or give

527
00:33:27,960 --> 00:33:31,440
Speaker 1: you a bad mood. To what degree was duly influential

528
00:33:31,640 --> 00:33:35,800
Speaker 1: in getting you to play the Creeden songs again? Oh,

529
00:33:36,040 --> 00:33:40,400
Speaker 1: she was huge, hugely influential. I believe that it was

530
00:33:40,440 --> 00:33:44,479
Speaker 1: because I was. The way I put it is as

531
00:33:44,520 --> 00:33:47,760
Speaker 1: I fell more and more deeply in love with Julie.

532
00:33:48,440 --> 00:33:51,720
Speaker 1: And by the way, I think, forty years ago, I

533
00:33:51,720 --> 00:33:56,400
Speaker 1: couldn't even talk like this as a grown man. I

534
00:33:56,440 --> 00:34:00,960
Speaker 1: couldn't talk about love as a real thing and not

535
00:34:01,080 --> 00:34:07,320
Speaker 1: be embarrassed or awkward about it. It just, you know,

536
00:34:07,520 --> 00:34:13,600
Speaker 1: it seemed like something you didn't talk about polite company. Um.

537
00:34:13,880 --> 00:34:17,319
Speaker 1: You know, I was very strange and clunky trying to

538
00:34:17,400 --> 00:34:24,120
Speaker 1: even say the word oh love. So later, as I

539
00:34:24,160 --> 00:34:27,799
Speaker 1: had fallen so deeply in love with Julie, I think

540
00:34:27,800 --> 00:34:30,360
Speaker 1: my motive is I talk about it all the time

541
00:34:31,040 --> 00:34:34,400
Speaker 1: because I know what it is and I'm really happy

542
00:34:34,480 --> 00:34:38,360
Speaker 1: about it, and I also sort of say it out loud.

543
00:34:39,520 --> 00:34:42,640
Speaker 1: I guess I'm a happy that it happened for me.

544
00:34:43,239 --> 00:34:46,000
Speaker 1: But also when I see other people that they know

545
00:34:46,080 --> 00:34:51,239
Speaker 1: what I'm talking about and that it that it obviously resonates. Uh,

546
00:34:51,640 --> 00:34:55,080
Speaker 1: you know, I just feel good for them because that's

547
00:34:55,120 --> 00:34:59,080
Speaker 1: where life should that's where we should all be as

548
00:34:59,160 --> 00:35:02,960
Speaker 1: human beings know. And it could be love with your sweetheart.

549
00:35:03,280 --> 00:35:05,720
Speaker 1: It could be God's love, which is how some people

550
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:09,719
Speaker 1: have it. It could be love in the situation you

551
00:35:09,760 --> 00:35:13,120
Speaker 1: know your family members and all that, but certainly it's

552
00:35:13,120 --> 00:35:18,360
Speaker 1: a that feeling of love is probably to say it

553
00:35:18,400 --> 00:35:21,759
Speaker 1: a little religious or spiritually would be that's what God

554
00:35:21,840 --> 00:35:26,640
Speaker 1: had intended for all of us. Um anyhow, to be

555
00:35:26,880 --> 00:35:31,800
Speaker 1: in that state is where I was, uh, even though

556
00:35:31,840 --> 00:35:37,239
Speaker 1: I was not playing my songs again. But you may

557
00:35:37,280 --> 00:35:42,040
Speaker 1: have heard about my trips to Mississippi. Um. There there

558
00:35:42,160 --> 00:35:46,279
Speaker 1: was a time when I came to Julie. I was

559
00:35:46,480 --> 00:35:52,040
Speaker 1: had been feeling this this urge, this urgency that I

560
00:35:52,040 --> 00:35:56,040
Speaker 1: didn't even quite understand what. But it finally took shape

561
00:35:56,160 --> 00:36:00,960
Speaker 1: as almost a feeling or a voice. You have to

562
00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:05,000
Speaker 1: go to Mississippi. But here's how that. Then it finally

563
00:36:05,000 --> 00:36:08,600
Speaker 1: got so strong I had to do something about it.

564
00:36:08,920 --> 00:36:11,480
Speaker 1: And it was a morning time and I walked up

565
00:36:11,480 --> 00:36:15,359
Speaker 1: to Julie, probably in the kitchen. I said, honey, um,

566
00:36:15,440 --> 00:36:18,759
Speaker 1: I gotta tell you something. And she said, okay. I said, well,

567
00:36:19,280 --> 00:36:22,480
Speaker 1: I have to go to Mississippi. She just stops for

568
00:36:22,520 --> 00:36:25,240
Speaker 1: a minute and her eyes get big and she says,

569
00:36:25,800 --> 00:36:34,600
Speaker 1: okay when and I said, now, uh, okay, okay, it's

570
00:36:34,600 --> 00:36:36,680
Speaker 1: all right. I said, you know, honey, oh And then

571
00:36:36,719 --> 00:36:42,080
Speaker 1: she says why And I said, I don't know which

572
00:36:42,200 --> 00:36:44,880
Speaker 1: was literally the truth. I mean, the only thing I

573
00:36:44,920 --> 00:36:48,840
Speaker 1: could think of was I was interested in the blues tree,

574
00:36:49,320 --> 00:36:51,759
Speaker 1: kind of the family tree of the blues, because that's

575
00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:56,839
Speaker 1: literally all I knew about Mississippi. I believe that I

576
00:36:56,920 --> 00:37:01,200
Speaker 1: literally had not set foot in Mrs Hippy in my

577
00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:04,600
Speaker 1: entire life. As much as I've been around music and

578
00:37:04,680 --> 00:37:08,440
Speaker 1: had toured the South with credence, I know I've been

579
00:37:08,480 --> 00:37:11,960
Speaker 1: in Arkansas and Louisiana, but I don't think I've ever

580
00:37:12,000 --> 00:37:17,279
Speaker 1: been in Mississippi and trying to make it, you know,

581
00:37:17,400 --> 00:37:20,640
Speaker 1: done and hop over this. Uh. I didn't really know

582
00:37:20,680 --> 00:37:24,040
Speaker 1: why I was going there, but I certainly was interested

583
00:37:24,880 --> 00:37:29,200
Speaker 1: in the blues, and I vague knew that a couple

584
00:37:29,200 --> 00:37:30,880
Speaker 1: of the people I had grown up, I mean it

585
00:37:31,160 --> 00:37:33,800
Speaker 1: started when I was seven eight years old that I

586
00:37:33,840 --> 00:37:39,440
Speaker 1: had heard about. I vaguely knew some names from Mississippi.

587
00:37:40,040 --> 00:37:43,479
Speaker 1: I love the blues, but I experienced the blues as

588
00:37:43,520 --> 00:37:48,279
Speaker 1: a current thing, not in a library. I and I

589
00:37:48,320 --> 00:37:50,799
Speaker 1: was old enough or born at the right time. I

590
00:37:50,880 --> 00:37:55,120
Speaker 1: heard Howling Wolf on the radio and Muddy Waters on

591
00:37:55,200 --> 00:37:58,320
Speaker 1: the radio. They were having hit records on the Rhythm

592
00:37:58,400 --> 00:38:02,359
Speaker 1: and Blues station out of Oakland, whose letters then where

593
00:38:02,480 --> 00:38:08,360
Speaker 1: kW br um and so I knew these musicians and

594
00:38:10,000 --> 00:38:12,719
Speaker 1: had read a little bit about jazz and blues, you know,

595
00:38:12,760 --> 00:38:14,799
Speaker 1: and it was sort of a vague thing to me,

596
00:38:15,960 --> 00:38:19,480
Speaker 1: and so I just thought, I'm gonna go to Mississippi,

597
00:38:20,360 --> 00:38:23,880
Speaker 1: um poke around, kind of learn more about the you know.

598
00:38:23,960 --> 00:38:26,720
Speaker 1: I was not much of a plan, tell you the truth,

599
00:38:27,920 --> 00:38:30,480
Speaker 1: But I was very lucky in a lot of ways.

600
00:38:30,560 --> 00:38:33,480
Speaker 1: First of all, that Julie was so open to letting

601
00:38:33,520 --> 00:38:37,480
Speaker 1: me go, because I know that when you know you're

602
00:38:37,560 --> 00:38:40,960
Speaker 1: it's a partnership, but between you and your spouse, and

603
00:38:41,080 --> 00:38:43,000
Speaker 1: there can be times when your spouse is just not

604
00:38:43,120 --> 00:38:47,680
Speaker 1: happy about something, and one spouse or the other can

605
00:38:47,760 --> 00:38:50,960
Speaker 1: make the person do something they don't want to do,

606
00:38:51,080 --> 00:38:54,840
Speaker 1: just when they feel very strongly. I've you know, met

607
00:38:54,960 --> 00:38:57,560
Speaker 1: many men and women to say, well, Joe was never

608
00:38:57,560 --> 00:39:00,800
Speaker 1: gonna let me do that, or Free is never gonna

609
00:39:00,840 --> 00:39:03,920
Speaker 1: let me do that. And it's a strange power, but

610
00:39:04,040 --> 00:39:07,319
Speaker 1: we give our spouse that power because we love them.

611
00:39:08,120 --> 00:39:11,879
Speaker 1: But yet here in this instance, which was so much

612
00:39:11,960 --> 00:39:16,160
Speaker 1: on the flim flam, it seems she said yeah, okay,

613
00:39:16,200 --> 00:39:19,279
Speaker 1: it's all right, and uh, you know, went down the

614
00:39:19,320 --> 00:39:23,080
Speaker 1: first time and kind of poked around, and uh, I

615
00:39:23,160 --> 00:39:26,439
Speaker 1: didn't have much of a plan. I had heard about

616
00:39:26,560 --> 00:39:28,840
Speaker 1: Robert Johnson, but I'm not sure that I knew he

617
00:39:28,920 --> 00:39:32,160
Speaker 1: was from Mississippi. Of course, of course grew up with

618
00:39:32,239 --> 00:39:36,640
Speaker 1: Jimmy Reid, but had no idea that Jimmy Reid was Mississippi.

619
00:39:37,160 --> 00:39:40,080
Speaker 1: And so there, you know, and as I uh ended

620
00:39:40,160 --> 00:39:44,160
Speaker 1: up taking several trips two, three, four or five I'm

621
00:39:44,160 --> 00:39:49,360
Speaker 1: not quite sure, um, but any time I would stay

622
00:39:49,400 --> 00:39:52,640
Speaker 1: five days or so. The first in fact, the first

623
00:39:52,680 --> 00:39:56,720
Speaker 1: time I went, I think I flew to New Orleans

624
00:39:56,800 --> 00:40:00,000
Speaker 1: and went across that way, which is I totally missed

625
00:40:00,080 --> 00:40:03,040
Speaker 1: the delta myself. I mean I didn't know. I had

626
00:40:03,080 --> 00:40:05,759
Speaker 1: heard of delta, but I didn't know what. I didn't

627
00:40:05,800 --> 00:40:09,719
Speaker 1: know anything. I didn't even know how Mississippi related to Memphis.

628
00:40:09,760 --> 00:40:12,440
Speaker 1: You know, what geography there was, all these things. Of

629
00:40:12,480 --> 00:40:16,359
Speaker 1: course I knew about all this, and Tupelo um the

630
00:40:16,400 --> 00:40:18,719
Speaker 1: same thing. And so that was the way I went

631
00:40:18,760 --> 00:40:21,200
Speaker 1: the first time. The second time I went to Memphis

632
00:40:21,360 --> 00:40:26,040
Speaker 1: and drove down. Um, it's just sort of a it

633
00:40:26,120 --> 00:40:28,600
Speaker 1: was important to me. I mean, this was this was

634
00:40:28,680 --> 00:40:32,480
Speaker 1: really when I say it was important, I felt it important.

635
00:40:32,520 --> 00:40:37,200
Speaker 1: But also in the long run in what was important

636
00:40:37,239 --> 00:40:40,239
Speaker 1: to my life. It was important that way, and I

637
00:40:40,280 --> 00:40:45,719
Speaker 1: believe it was probably the second time where um, I

638
00:40:45,800 --> 00:40:49,239
Speaker 1: had read enough that I got some instruction in the

639
00:40:49,400 --> 00:40:52,840
Speaker 1: in the kind of blues books I was reading that

640
00:40:52,960 --> 00:40:56,720
Speaker 1: there was a person in I think more Head City,

641
00:40:57,719 --> 00:41:01,520
Speaker 1: Uh it might have been more Head. Um it was

642
00:41:01,520 --> 00:41:05,400
Speaker 1: a postmaster who knew where Robert Johnson was buried. And

643
00:41:05,400 --> 00:41:07,800
Speaker 1: then this was a mystery. I now realized it because

644
00:41:07,840 --> 00:41:12,760
Speaker 1: I liked Robert Johnson. By the way. Um. At first

645
00:41:12,840 --> 00:41:18,840
Speaker 1: I was buying UM cassettes and putting them on. Excuse me,

646
00:41:18,880 --> 00:41:22,160
Speaker 1: at first, I was buying LP records and putting them on,

647
00:41:22,840 --> 00:41:25,759
Speaker 1: making my own cassettes and taking the cassette with me

648
00:41:26,840 --> 00:41:29,600
Speaker 1: on my trip. Right that was I think I started

649
00:41:29,600 --> 00:41:34,200
Speaker 1: doing that the second trip. But after that I thought, well,

650
00:41:34,239 --> 00:41:36,000
Speaker 1: you know what, I'm going to get a c D.

651
00:41:36,520 --> 00:41:38,759
Speaker 1: I think it was Big Bill Bruns. I wanted to hear.

652
00:41:39,360 --> 00:41:43,879
Speaker 1: So I went to uh, uh, you know, a federated

653
00:41:44,000 --> 00:41:46,920
Speaker 1: or best Buyer, one of those kind of big box places,

654
00:41:47,360 --> 00:41:50,919
Speaker 1: and I bought a boom box and then I bought

655
00:41:50,960 --> 00:41:53,560
Speaker 1: a CD of Big Bill Bruns. I had a couple

656
00:41:53,600 --> 00:41:56,239
Speaker 1: of them, and I put it in on the front

657
00:41:56,239 --> 00:41:58,359
Speaker 1: seat of my rented card. I started driving down the road.

658
00:41:58,480 --> 00:42:02,239
Speaker 1: But the boom box is going, well we got this morning,

659
00:42:02,400 --> 00:42:05,520
Speaker 1: Well got the plan. You know it's I'm going this

660
00:42:05,640 --> 00:42:08,879
Speaker 1: is the stupidest thing I ever out. I can't play

661
00:42:09,040 --> 00:42:11,120
Speaker 1: my CD, but I wanted the world to know that

662
00:42:11,200 --> 00:42:15,080
Speaker 1: John Fogerty finally bought a CD was in the the

663
00:42:15,120 --> 00:42:18,239
Speaker 1: new high tech world because of a blue song and

664
00:42:18,280 --> 00:42:22,040
Speaker 1: a blues guy. Uh, and I'll always remember that. Of

665
00:42:22,080 --> 00:42:27,080
Speaker 1: course CDs are now dinosaurs. Um where were they going

666
00:42:27,080 --> 00:42:30,879
Speaker 1: with all that? Anyway, I ended up, uh going down

667
00:42:30,960 --> 00:42:34,960
Speaker 1: the road finding this more Head place, which was, you know,

668
00:42:35,120 --> 00:42:38,480
Speaker 1: sort of a speck on the map, opening the door

669
00:42:38,480 --> 00:42:41,439
Speaker 1: to the finding the post office. You know, parked the car,

670
00:42:42,280 --> 00:42:44,960
Speaker 1: opened the door, and the man is sitting there looking

671
00:42:45,000 --> 00:42:47,120
Speaker 1: at me. He's at a table. As I opened the door,

672
00:42:47,320 --> 00:42:51,960
Speaker 1: he's at a table directly like he's waiting for me, right,

673
00:42:52,080 --> 00:42:55,279
Speaker 1: I mean it was. And I said, oh, you know,

674
00:42:55,520 --> 00:42:57,200
Speaker 1: I thought there would be like one of those little

675
00:42:57,239 --> 00:42:59,680
Speaker 1: cages with a you know, a guy be a little

676
00:42:59,680 --> 00:43:02,399
Speaker 1: post answer with those hats and all that kind of thing,

677
00:43:02,600 --> 00:43:05,880
Speaker 1: the little green hat. I think, Um, I said, well,

678
00:43:05,920 --> 00:43:09,480
Speaker 1: this is a strange question, But I've heard that you

679
00:43:09,560 --> 00:43:13,400
Speaker 1: know where Robert Johnson is buried. He says, oh, yeah, sure,

680
00:43:13,640 --> 00:43:15,719
Speaker 1: And he tells me to drive up to this the

681
00:43:15,840 --> 00:43:18,720
Speaker 1: road there and turn right, and there's a certain church

682
00:43:19,080 --> 00:43:21,120
Speaker 1: and I can't quite remember the name, but I knew it.

683
00:43:21,160 --> 00:43:25,120
Speaker 1: Then he said, go into that churchyard, to go into

684
00:43:25,120 --> 00:43:27,560
Speaker 1: the back where there's a little cemetery. And there's a

685
00:43:27,600 --> 00:43:31,600
Speaker 1: great big tree there, and I can't I've heard that

686
00:43:31,640 --> 00:43:34,560
Speaker 1: it's called a pecan tree, but in my mind's eye

687
00:43:34,600 --> 00:43:37,440
Speaker 1: now it was a great big tree um to me

688
00:43:37,800 --> 00:43:40,120
Speaker 1: more like an oak tree. But anyhow, he says, and

689
00:43:40,200 --> 00:43:44,680
Speaker 1: Robert's buried right under that tree. He said, there's no marker,

690
00:43:44,840 --> 00:43:48,280
Speaker 1: so you just have to know he's buried there. Okay,

691
00:43:48,520 --> 00:43:51,759
Speaker 1: So I go up and I did what he said,

692
00:43:52,239 --> 00:43:55,400
Speaker 1: end up at the little graveyard. But it had rained

693
00:43:55,440 --> 00:43:57,920
Speaker 1: like a son of a gun for the week before

694
00:43:58,000 --> 00:44:02,120
Speaker 1: I got there. In fact, you would all that hurricane probably,

695
00:44:02,480 --> 00:44:05,440
Speaker 1: so there was about a foot of water, uh in

696
00:44:05,560 --> 00:44:09,319
Speaker 1: this cemetery, and certainly out by the tree, it was

697
00:44:09,320 --> 00:44:11,600
Speaker 1: a swamp and there was a bunch of I mean

698
00:44:11,640 --> 00:44:15,600
Speaker 1: it was surrounded with brush or bramble bushes or whatever,

699
00:44:16,600 --> 00:44:20,440
Speaker 1: and so I see the graveyard and I see the stuff,

700
00:44:20,480 --> 00:44:26,000
Speaker 1: and uh, I you know, started to walk away. You know,

701
00:44:26,160 --> 00:44:28,080
Speaker 1: it's like a lake out there where that tree is,

702
00:44:28,120 --> 00:44:31,000
Speaker 1: and I'm walking away, and then I go, wait a minute.

703
00:44:31,600 --> 00:44:34,120
Speaker 1: I came all this way because I want to know

704
00:44:34,160 --> 00:44:37,480
Speaker 1: where Robert Johnson's you know, it had become more and

705
00:44:37,520 --> 00:44:42,280
Speaker 1: more important because I I had heard about Robert Johnson,

706
00:44:42,280 --> 00:44:46,240
Speaker 1: by the way, because the the box set had been released,

707
00:44:46,239 --> 00:44:49,759
Speaker 1: the CD box set. Okay, So I turned around. I

708
00:44:49,800 --> 00:44:51,719
Speaker 1: looked at that big tree and said, my god, I'm

709
00:44:51,719 --> 00:44:53,920
Speaker 1: gonna touch that tree. At least I don't know where

710
00:44:53,920 --> 00:44:56,560
Speaker 1: the place on the ground is. So I wade out

711
00:44:56,600 --> 00:45:00,720
Speaker 1: through the water. I'm an experienced spishermen, and I fished

712
00:45:00,719 --> 00:45:03,560
Speaker 1: that way. I always get wet up to my knees,

713
00:45:03,760 --> 00:45:07,880
Speaker 1: so I wasn't um. I didn't have any misgivings about

714
00:45:07,880 --> 00:45:11,520
Speaker 1: getting wet, but still it was kind of swampy, you know,

715
00:45:11,680 --> 00:45:14,759
Speaker 1: mosquito water whatever. And I made my way through all

716
00:45:14,800 --> 00:45:18,359
Speaker 1: those bushes and touched that tree and felt like I

717
00:45:18,400 --> 00:45:22,799
Speaker 1: had kind of component comp what's that word I'm looking for,

718
00:45:23,600 --> 00:45:30,400
Speaker 1: calm and sit now consummated my trip. Yeah, by touching

719
00:45:30,400 --> 00:45:33,439
Speaker 1: the tree, it felt like you know, there was closure there,

720
00:45:34,440 --> 00:45:39,680
Speaker 1: um and this was my my the first time being

721
00:45:39,719 --> 00:45:44,839
Speaker 1: there at Robert's gravesite. I didn't have a camera with me, right,

722
00:45:45,360 --> 00:45:49,600
Speaker 1: But anyway, I walked back and kind of look around

723
00:45:49,680 --> 00:45:54,840
Speaker 1: the other parts of the little churchyard, and it was

724
00:45:54,880 --> 00:45:57,600
Speaker 1: really hot, even though there's water deep water like that

725
00:45:57,680 --> 00:46:00,160
Speaker 1: on the ground. I get back up where its kind

726
00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:02,520
Speaker 1: of dry, you know. I mean, so it's hundred ten

727
00:46:02,560 --> 00:46:08,560
Speaker 1: degrees and probably ninety five percent humidity, really sweltering. And

728
00:46:08,600 --> 00:46:13,239
Speaker 1: so now I'm kind of taken with the whole Robert Johnson,

729
00:46:13,320 --> 00:46:15,000
Speaker 1: you know. I mean, I'm just sort of in one

730
00:46:15,120 --> 00:46:18,839
Speaker 1: frame of mind about Robert as again, the fact that

731
00:46:18,880 --> 00:46:22,120
Speaker 1: he's got a CD out. I'm thinking, Wow, you know,

732
00:46:22,440 --> 00:46:26,640
Speaker 1: I wonder, I wonder who owns those songs. And then,

733
00:46:26,960 --> 00:46:30,600
Speaker 1: you know, because it's been all these years and all that,

734
00:46:30,760 --> 00:46:35,399
Speaker 1: it couldn't be whoever did it way back when it's like, yeah,

735
00:46:35,480 --> 00:46:38,360
Speaker 1: they probably passed through. You know, this the normal stuff

736
00:46:38,640 --> 00:46:44,960
Speaker 1: that unfortunately so many Blues Guy's legacy has traveled. And

737
00:46:44,960 --> 00:46:47,160
Speaker 1: I said wow, I said, wow, you know, it's probab

738
00:46:47,560 --> 00:46:51,720
Speaker 1: some stinking lawyers some wise guy in a tall building

739
00:46:52,200 --> 00:46:55,800
Speaker 1: in the big cities probably had a big fat cigar,

740
00:46:56,400 --> 00:47:00,800
Speaker 1: and it doesn't. He don't care at all about Robert Johnson.

741
00:47:01,000 --> 00:47:04,360
Speaker 1: He just owns that property. You know. I'm saying it

742
00:47:04,680 --> 00:47:07,960
Speaker 1: to myself in the most disgusting way because I'm really

743
00:47:08,320 --> 00:47:12,480
Speaker 1: sickened by how that always happens, you know, And and

744
00:47:12,520 --> 00:47:15,680
Speaker 1: I finally, I'm so disgusted, and I'm wet up to

745
00:47:15,760 --> 00:47:19,200
Speaker 1: my knees, and go it. It doesn't matter. I'm I'm

746
00:47:19,680 --> 00:47:24,000
Speaker 1: I'm sure I'm semi delirious because of the heat and all,

747
00:47:24,719 --> 00:47:27,880
Speaker 1: and I'm you know, it just doesn't Robert. I'm speaking

748
00:47:27,880 --> 00:47:32,480
Speaker 1: actually personally now to that fellow over there under that tree, Robert.

749
00:47:32,600 --> 00:47:36,640
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. The whole world knows those are your songs, Robert.

750
00:47:37,040 --> 00:47:40,640
Speaker 1: Those are your songs, and everybody knows it. And of course,

751
00:47:40,680 --> 00:47:44,600
Speaker 1: since I'm the only one around, there's a deafening silence

752
00:47:44,640 --> 00:47:49,840
Speaker 1: after I say it. The whole world knows it. I stopped,

753
00:47:50,239 --> 00:47:53,000
Speaker 1: and I realized what I have just said. I mean,

754
00:47:53,840 --> 00:47:58,920
Speaker 1: I don't think in any other instance the deafening silence

755
00:47:58,960 --> 00:48:03,080
Speaker 1: would have led me to this thought process. But because

756
00:48:03,120 --> 00:48:06,279
Speaker 1: I said that about somebody that was so important, it

757
00:48:06,360 --> 00:48:08,880
Speaker 1: was still ringing in my own ears. As I said

758
00:48:09,320 --> 00:48:13,360
Speaker 1: everybody knows those are your songs. And I've heard that

759
00:48:13,480 --> 00:48:16,719
Speaker 1: said to me a couple of times. Boynette said that

760
00:48:16,840 --> 00:48:21,120
Speaker 1: to me, Chubby Checker said that to me, um, And

761
00:48:22,480 --> 00:48:25,920
Speaker 1: I think it was that that that I said that,

762
00:48:26,200 --> 00:48:29,839
Speaker 1: you know that hearing those voices all ringing in that

763
00:48:29,880 --> 00:48:32,800
Speaker 1: deafening silence in my eyes, I'm sure got real big

764
00:48:33,080 --> 00:48:36,719
Speaker 1: as I chewed on this thought, and I went, wow,

765
00:48:37,760 --> 00:48:42,160
Speaker 1: oh my good, John, you gotta start singing your songs

766
00:48:42,239 --> 00:48:46,000
Speaker 1: before you're sitting there in the ground like Robert. I mean,

767
00:48:46,040 --> 00:48:49,560
Speaker 1: I literally had that thought. And that was the first time,

768
00:48:49,600 --> 00:48:52,520
Speaker 1: and I don't know how many years that my heart

769
00:48:52,680 --> 00:48:57,400
Speaker 1: was actually happy about the idea that I was gonna

770
00:48:57,520 --> 00:49:00,600
Speaker 1: sing my songs again, because I don't know, if you

771
00:49:00,680 --> 00:49:04,280
Speaker 1: know this thing. I had made a pact with myself

772
00:49:04,600 --> 00:49:07,400
Speaker 1: not to do the songs because of certainly because of

773
00:49:07,440 --> 00:49:11,800
Speaker 1: Saul's aunts and Fantasy records, because it was so personal.

774
00:49:11,920 --> 00:49:16,359
Speaker 1: One man owned my songs and owned those records. And

775
00:49:16,719 --> 00:49:20,480
Speaker 1: you know, it wasn't like he owned some other artists

776
00:49:20,480 --> 00:49:22,920
Speaker 1: and all that, but none of them were like Credence.

777
00:49:23,400 --> 00:49:25,680
Speaker 1: It was it was just one on one and he

778
00:49:25,760 --> 00:49:29,839
Speaker 1: was very evil. So that I had made a very

779
00:49:29,880 --> 00:49:33,280
Speaker 1: strong pact with myself to never sing those songs again

780
00:49:33,560 --> 00:49:38,560
Speaker 1: because it would bring him such riches, right that that

781
00:49:38,640 --> 00:49:42,160
Speaker 1: to do so was just playing into his hands. And

782
00:49:42,200 --> 00:49:45,359
Speaker 1: so I have been, of course very unhappy about that

783
00:49:45,440 --> 00:49:49,719
Speaker 1: whole situation. Gordian's not You might say that I could

784
00:49:49,719 --> 00:49:54,360
Speaker 1: not solve the puzzle, and so that moment in Robert

785
00:49:54,560 --> 00:50:02,280
Speaker 1: Johnson's um Grave area, Uh overcome by this that story,

786
00:50:02,440 --> 00:50:07,279
Speaker 1: And I guess you might say the unfairness. But yet

787
00:50:07,520 --> 00:50:13,440
Speaker 1: the inescapable logic that I had said to myself, I

788
00:50:13,560 --> 00:50:18,040
Speaker 1: realized I could now do it. I wasn't whimping out

789
00:50:18,520 --> 00:50:22,120
Speaker 1: or going back on, you know, my word or all.

790
00:50:22,160 --> 00:50:26,680
Speaker 1: You know, if somehow the not had become open and free,

791
00:50:27,360 --> 00:50:30,840
Speaker 1: and you know, without me changing my values, you might say,

792
00:50:31,360 --> 00:50:34,360
Speaker 1: I guess, because that's what I literally happened. You know,

793
00:50:34,440 --> 00:50:38,000
Speaker 1: I suppose a negative, a cynical person would twisted some

794
00:50:38,200 --> 00:50:41,799
Speaker 1: other way. But I'm not listening. You know. I had

795
00:50:41,840 --> 00:50:45,600
Speaker 1: this epiphany that said, you can sing your songs now,

796
00:50:46,239 --> 00:50:51,560
Speaker 1: and that's what happened. But okay, but of course I

797
00:50:51,600 --> 00:50:54,799
Speaker 1: wasn't touring, I wasn't out in the world. What I

798
00:50:54,880 --> 00:50:58,120
Speaker 1: was doing it was, I was trying to write new

799
00:50:58,160 --> 00:51:01,239
Speaker 1: songs and make a record, so you know, and I

800
00:51:01,280 --> 00:51:05,480
Speaker 1: made several more trips down to Mississippi actually before I

801
00:51:05,480 --> 00:51:08,080
Speaker 1: stopped doing that and went on to something else, mostly

802
00:51:08,120 --> 00:51:10,759
Speaker 1: trying to write songs and taken up the dough bro.

803
00:51:11,960 --> 00:51:17,800
Speaker 1: But um, as time went on, I finally wrote some songs,

804
00:51:18,719 --> 00:51:24,040
Speaker 1: painfully got them recorded, and then finally happily got them

805
00:51:24,080 --> 00:51:28,120
Speaker 1: recorded and Blue Moon Swamp became the album. This was

806
00:51:28,160 --> 00:51:33,200
Speaker 1: now seven years later, and I had kind of forgotten

807
00:51:33,200 --> 00:51:38,080
Speaker 1: all about what got me here. I was just happy

808
00:51:38,120 --> 00:51:40,520
Speaker 1: that I had some songs and a new album, and

809
00:51:40,560 --> 00:51:44,040
Speaker 1: I went into the record company to do what you

810
00:51:44,120 --> 00:51:47,920
Speaker 1: might call, um make a press kit. And you know

811
00:51:47,920 --> 00:51:50,920
Speaker 1: what they got to get together for releasing a record,

812
00:51:51,560 --> 00:51:53,640
Speaker 1: and part of that was to, you know, to tell

813
00:51:53,719 --> 00:51:56,800
Speaker 1: my story to someone that's going to write it down

814
00:51:56,960 --> 00:52:01,879
Speaker 1: and make a bio a short story of your situation

815
00:52:02,000 --> 00:52:06,200
Speaker 1: that they can stand out with the new record, and

816
00:52:06,200 --> 00:52:11,160
Speaker 1: that pressed people can have, as I guess, materials that

817
00:52:11,239 --> 00:52:16,120
Speaker 1: helped publicize the record. And at some point, remember this

818
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:21,000
Speaker 1: is now I'm telling my story. And then I I

819
00:52:21,719 --> 00:52:25,560
Speaker 1: some somehow come up come up telling the story of

820
00:52:26,040 --> 00:52:29,360
Speaker 1: I begin telling the story of Mississippi and Robert Johnson.

821
00:52:29,400 --> 00:52:32,120
Speaker 1: I said, hey, you know, I made some trips down there.

822
00:52:32,120 --> 00:52:35,760
Speaker 1: I was pretty fascinated. And one day I was standing,

823
00:52:36,080 --> 00:52:39,480
Speaker 1: uh in front of the grave of Robert Johnson, and

824
00:52:39,719 --> 00:52:43,480
Speaker 1: you know, I didn't really know why I was going

825
00:52:43,560 --> 00:52:46,600
Speaker 1: to Mississippi, but I finally decided, you know, back then,

826
00:52:46,600 --> 00:52:48,400
Speaker 1: it must be so I can look up all the

827
00:52:48,440 --> 00:52:51,960
Speaker 1: old blues people. And I ended up, you know, having

828
00:52:52,000 --> 00:52:56,680
Speaker 1: a little conversation about Barbert Johnson with myself and realizing

829
00:52:56,800 --> 00:52:59,920
Speaker 1: his songs belonged to him and the world knew that.

830
00:53:00,200 --> 00:53:02,720
Speaker 1: And I said, and then I realized my songs belong

831
00:53:02,800 --> 00:53:06,200
Speaker 1: to me, and I should start recording my songs again.

832
00:53:06,400 --> 00:53:09,000
Speaker 1: And I stopped, and I looked at the fella, and

833
00:53:09,120 --> 00:53:13,239
Speaker 1: I said, oh my god, that was why I was

834
00:53:13,280 --> 00:53:17,360
Speaker 1: supposed to go to Mississippi. That's what this whole thing was.

835
00:53:17,480 --> 00:53:20,680
Speaker 1: Seven years later, you know, I was my brain exploded.

836
00:53:21,400 --> 00:53:24,200
Speaker 1: I mean, because I did not realize it at the time.

837
00:53:24,239 --> 00:53:28,160
Speaker 1: I realized that seven years later, what was the purpose

838
00:53:28,239 --> 00:53:33,280
Speaker 1: of that trip? To me? That's still that weird stuff

839
00:53:33,320 --> 00:53:37,440
Speaker 1: we uh all have happened to us, that where you

840
00:53:37,520 --> 00:53:42,160
Speaker 1: realize somebody's paying attention. Okay, let's go back to fantasy.

841
00:53:42,200 --> 00:53:44,839
Speaker 1: You talked about seven years that you didn't go on

842
00:53:44,880 --> 00:53:48,160
Speaker 1: the road. You're making this record at this late date.

843
00:53:48,320 --> 00:53:51,400
Speaker 1: People know most of the money is in the publishing

844
00:53:51,480 --> 00:53:55,239
Speaker 1: and you sold those rights. How did you survive financially

845
00:53:55,280 --> 00:53:59,680
Speaker 1: all these years? Good question. We got hey, we got

846
00:54:00,200 --> 00:54:04,600
Speaker 1: married enough fever. Um. I know we got paid as

847
00:54:04,719 --> 00:54:12,880
Speaker 1: credence um, haltingly. You know, in fits and spurts. We

848
00:54:12,960 --> 00:54:17,600
Speaker 1: always had to audit and sometimes got I mean it

849
00:54:17,719 --> 00:54:22,280
Speaker 1: was begrudgingly. Did we ever get paid? But I tried

850
00:54:22,400 --> 00:54:28,600
Speaker 1: to save as I tried to live frugally. You might say, um,

851
00:54:28,640 --> 00:54:32,719
Speaker 1: and so I had money in the bank, but we're

852
00:54:32,840 --> 00:54:37,320
Speaker 1: talking in the hundreds of thousands, not living like a

853
00:54:37,400 --> 00:54:41,120
Speaker 1: king in a mansion. But I mean I was living

854
00:54:41,200 --> 00:54:43,680
Speaker 1: frugally at the time. I mean there was a there

855
00:54:43,760 --> 00:54:46,160
Speaker 1: was one point you may remember this story in the

856
00:54:46,200 --> 00:54:49,880
Speaker 1: middle eighties where I was sued for sounding like myself.

857
00:54:50,600 --> 00:54:53,800
Speaker 1: Without going into that whole story, at that moment in time,

858
00:54:54,080 --> 00:54:57,120
Speaker 1: Fantasy not only stopped paying me for that one song,

859
00:54:57,640 --> 00:55:00,920
Speaker 1: they stopped paying me for. Their issue was we're not

860
00:55:00,960 --> 00:55:03,799
Speaker 1: gonna pay you for any of the songs. And that's

861
00:55:03,800 --> 00:55:08,160
Speaker 1: what they did. I mean, that's outrageous. They had fifties

862
00:55:08,160 --> 00:55:11,000
Speaker 1: songs of mine or something on Credence albums, you know,

863
00:55:11,040 --> 00:55:18,000
Speaker 1: probably Mary uh Um, Bad Moon, Rising, Green River, Commotion,

864
00:55:18,480 --> 00:55:21,000
Speaker 1: Born on the Buyou Down on the Corner, and Fortunates.

865
00:55:21,000 --> 00:55:23,080
Speaker 1: You know, they had all of them, all the album

866
00:55:23,200 --> 00:55:25,759
Speaker 1: songs they've written, and they weren't paying a time for

867
00:55:25,800 --> 00:55:29,120
Speaker 1: any of them until we after I won the trial.

868
00:55:29,640 --> 00:55:32,680
Speaker 1: That was quite a few years. And even my own

869
00:55:32,760 --> 00:55:35,480
Speaker 1: lawyer said, man, how did you manage to stay afloat

870
00:55:35,520 --> 00:55:39,279
Speaker 1: without even getting paid? Well? I was living frugally, you know.

871
00:55:39,320 --> 00:55:41,720
Speaker 1: I didn't go out and buy a bunch of stuff

872
00:55:41,760 --> 00:55:45,080
Speaker 1: that that I really couldn't afford, and then you know,

873
00:55:45,120 --> 00:55:48,560
Speaker 1: buy it on time with the idea of future royalties

874
00:55:48,800 --> 00:55:53,840
Speaker 1: what not when you're on Fantasy. Um, So that was

875
00:55:53,960 --> 00:55:56,680
Speaker 1: That's basically how I was able to get by. But yeah,

876
00:55:56,719 --> 00:56:06,680
Speaker 1: for years and years I was not paid ya, Just

877
00:56:06,800 --> 00:56:11,080
Speaker 1: so we get the history straight. When you sold to Fantasy,

878
00:56:11,360 --> 00:56:16,680
Speaker 1: they already owned the recordings, they therefore owned the songs,

879
00:56:16,760 --> 00:56:20,799
Speaker 1: but they still played you writer's royalties. What exactly was

880
00:56:20,880 --> 00:56:23,000
Speaker 1: the deal? Yes, and by the way, we did not

881
00:56:23,560 --> 00:56:27,400
Speaker 1: sell in my mind anyway. You know, their lawyers speak

882
00:56:28,000 --> 00:56:34,120
Speaker 1: in a whole language of gobblygook, and anybody that's lived

883
00:56:34,200 --> 00:56:37,840
Speaker 1: longer than twenty years starts to learn that they're basically

884
00:56:38,719 --> 00:56:43,600
Speaker 1: charge some multiple of a certain number by how many

885
00:56:43,719 --> 00:56:48,080
Speaker 1: words they write or speak. It's so, yeah, it might

886
00:56:48,120 --> 00:56:51,160
Speaker 1: be several thousand dollars per word, but it's the more

887
00:56:51,239 --> 00:56:55,040
Speaker 1: words they can cram into any document, the higher they

888
00:56:55,080 --> 00:56:57,480
Speaker 1: get paid. It's as simple as that. And don't you

889
00:56:57,520 --> 00:57:01,640
Speaker 1: try to tell me it's something else, because it's not true. Um.

890
00:57:01,680 --> 00:57:03,960
Speaker 1: And so they just jam all these words in there

891
00:57:04,040 --> 00:57:07,279
Speaker 1: that no human being can understand. And I believe that's

892
00:57:07,280 --> 00:57:10,319
Speaker 1: why when you get all done with this contract that

893
00:57:10,400 --> 00:57:14,040
Speaker 1: you've sunk your life into and placed your faith in,

894
00:57:14,880 --> 00:57:18,000
Speaker 1: five years later, some other lawyer comes along and says, well, actually,

895
00:57:18,000 --> 00:57:22,680
Speaker 1: those words don't mean that that those words mean, and

896
00:57:23,000 --> 00:57:25,960
Speaker 1: you're screwed anyway, even though you paid a lot of money.

897
00:57:26,000 --> 00:57:27,920
Speaker 1: And by the way, does that first lawyer give you

898
00:57:27,960 --> 00:57:32,920
Speaker 1: the money back? Does it didn't work? No? So uh,

899
00:57:33,000 --> 00:57:36,360
Speaker 1: at the beginning of the beginning, when the first when

900
00:57:36,360 --> 00:57:40,360
Speaker 1: that record contract was signed, in the same contract, they

901
00:57:40,440 --> 00:57:44,440
Speaker 1: already own a future song that I will write. I

902
00:57:44,520 --> 00:57:46,440
Speaker 1: did not have a song and walk in there and

903
00:57:46,440 --> 00:57:49,479
Speaker 1: then some man says Hey, John, that sounds pretty good.

904
00:57:49,640 --> 00:57:53,160
Speaker 1: I'll give you three dollars for that song. You know.

905
00:57:53,320 --> 00:57:56,480
Speaker 1: It wasn't like that. I knew better than that. But

906
00:57:56,640 --> 00:58:01,920
Speaker 1: we had already signed our rights away. Actually before I

907
00:58:02,040 --> 00:58:05,480
Speaker 1: actually started writing the majority of the songs, we were

908
00:58:05,520 --> 00:58:11,160
Speaker 1: already under a contract that said Saul owns your songs

909
00:58:11,240 --> 00:58:14,920
Speaker 1: that you write for the next several years. Okay, but

910
00:58:15,120 --> 00:58:19,320
Speaker 1: the legend is that the three other members of the

911
00:58:19,360 --> 00:58:23,440
Speaker 1: band talked to some professional and that a certain asset

912
00:58:24,040 --> 00:58:27,720
Speaker 1: was sold to Fantasy for a million dollars or something.

913
00:58:27,760 --> 00:58:30,760
Speaker 1: It's that ring a bell. No, I'm not sure I

914
00:58:30,800 --> 00:58:33,560
Speaker 1: even know what that means. All I know is we

915
00:58:33,560 --> 00:58:38,720
Speaker 1: were all under contract for recording, and we were all

916
00:58:38,760 --> 00:58:43,400
Speaker 1: also under contract for songwriting. It's just that the other

917
00:58:43,560 --> 00:58:49,800
Speaker 1: three didn't write any songs until after that contract had expired.

918
00:58:49,880 --> 00:58:53,920
Speaker 1: The only one that had songs written that Saul's ants

919
00:58:54,000 --> 00:58:58,760
Speaker 1: owned was me. Um. He might say I served the

920
00:58:58,840 --> 00:59:02,000
Speaker 1: time for that. Um. You know, had had it been

921
00:59:02,160 --> 00:59:06,080
Speaker 1: a situation where Tom wrote songs or Doug Clifford wrote

922
00:59:06,160 --> 00:59:13,120
Speaker 1: songs during that time, Saul would have owned those songs. Um.

923
00:59:13,160 --> 00:59:19,640
Speaker 1: At the time. After the credence broke up in seventy two.

924
00:59:20,040 --> 00:59:22,720
Speaker 1: Tom left the band at the end of nineteen seventy,

925
00:59:22,800 --> 00:59:27,080
Speaker 1: but Credence kind of soldiered on as a trio, but

926
00:59:27,200 --> 00:59:33,280
Speaker 1: officially broke up in seventy two, at which point, even

927
00:59:33,320 --> 00:59:37,120
Speaker 1: though we were all under contracts yeah for a fleeting

928
00:59:37,120 --> 00:59:39,400
Speaker 1: amount of time, I thought that meant, well, the group

929
00:59:39,520 --> 00:59:43,400
Speaker 1: is no more now I'm free. Didn't happen that way.

930
00:59:43,720 --> 00:59:49,479
Speaker 1: I was not free, but Fantasy almost immediately sent three

931
00:59:49,560 --> 00:59:52,479
Speaker 1: letters to the other three members of Credence and said,

932
00:59:53,240 --> 00:59:58,760
Speaker 1: you are now not under contract to Fantasy. Therefore, we

933
00:59:58,840 --> 01:00:01,320
Speaker 1: will not pay for any albums you go out and

934
01:00:01,400 --> 01:00:03,760
Speaker 1: record or any of the rest of it, because they

935
01:00:03,760 --> 01:00:07,040
Speaker 1: didn't want them to spend any money because I'm sure

936
01:00:07,680 --> 01:00:10,440
Speaker 1: I didn't see much future in what they would record.

937
01:00:11,040 --> 01:00:13,520
Speaker 1: But they didn't let me go. I was still under

938
01:00:14,440 --> 01:00:20,800
Speaker 1: contract as a recording artist until finally I sold my

939
01:00:20,960 --> 01:00:27,680
Speaker 1: rights to two artists royalties back to them in so

940
01:00:27,760 --> 01:00:32,720
Speaker 1: that I would no longer owe them future recordings. That

941
01:00:32,880 --> 01:00:38,160
Speaker 1: was at the end near the Was that a significant amount.

942
01:00:39,200 --> 01:00:41,800
Speaker 1: Here's the way I looked at it, Bob, Since you

943
01:00:41,840 --> 01:00:44,760
Speaker 1: guys are screwing me out of my artist royalties, you know,

944
01:00:44,840 --> 01:00:46,880
Speaker 1: every other week, and I have to go get a

945
01:00:46,960 --> 01:00:51,959
Speaker 1: lawyer and literally, as we speak, auditing you for two

946
01:00:52,000 --> 01:00:57,080
Speaker 1: different periods of time that you have not paid me, right, uh,

947
01:00:57,120 --> 01:01:00,440
Speaker 1: And these were times after the initial couple three years.

948
01:01:01,040 --> 01:01:04,880
Speaker 1: These were times from maybe seventy five to seventy seven

949
01:01:04,960 --> 01:01:08,120
Speaker 1: and then seventies seven to eighty or something like that.

950
01:01:09,000 --> 01:01:11,400
Speaker 1: And since you're screwing me out of so much money,

951
01:01:11,720 --> 01:01:13,880
Speaker 1: I mean, the way I had to tell myself, even

952
01:01:13,920 --> 01:01:16,760
Speaker 1: though there would be a long future, you know, years

953
01:01:16,800 --> 01:01:19,720
Speaker 1: into the future that I could hope to get paid

954
01:01:20,720 --> 01:01:24,120
Speaker 1: artists royalties, it was I had to tell myself, it's

955
01:01:24,120 --> 01:01:28,000
Speaker 1: gonna be so minimal. And remember, I'm one quarter of

956
01:01:28,000 --> 01:01:31,680
Speaker 1: a band, right and we were getting paid pennies, and

957
01:01:31,720 --> 01:01:36,200
Speaker 1: then that had to be I got one quarter of that. Um.

958
01:01:36,320 --> 01:01:39,280
Speaker 1: I just looked at it as my next three albums

959
01:01:39,280 --> 01:01:42,840
Speaker 1: are gonna be great records, and I don't want them

960
01:01:42,880 --> 01:01:46,680
Speaker 1: to own an album way into the future. And to

961
01:01:46,880 --> 01:01:51,240
Speaker 1: tell you how meaningful that was, if I had not

962
01:01:51,400 --> 01:01:55,080
Speaker 1: done that in Night, they would have owned Blue Moon

963
01:01:55,240 --> 01:02:00,800
Speaker 1: Swamp in and that's the name of that story. Well, okay,

964
01:02:00,880 --> 01:02:05,000
Speaker 1: so ultimately Fantasy was bought by Concorde. What is the

965
01:02:05,080 --> 01:02:10,360
Speaker 1: status of your ownership and royalty situation in all those records. Today,

966
01:02:10,600 --> 01:02:14,880
Speaker 1: I get paid artists royalties such as it was at

967
01:02:14,920 --> 01:02:22,360
Speaker 1: the time Credence existed by Concord Records on the Concorde

968
01:02:22,360 --> 01:02:29,440
Speaker 1: on the records that Concord distributes that were Credence records. UM.

969
01:02:29,560 --> 01:02:33,280
Speaker 1: And I've managed to get myself a little bit of

970
01:02:33,320 --> 01:02:40,880
Speaker 1: a bump upward by um signing on with Concord for

971
01:02:41,120 --> 01:02:44,600
Speaker 1: UM there at various times, like I made a record

972
01:02:45,080 --> 01:02:51,920
Speaker 1: for Concord in uh believe it was two thousand seven

973
01:02:52,080 --> 01:02:55,880
Speaker 1: something like that. I know that when Fantasy was finally

974
01:02:55,920 --> 01:02:58,720
Speaker 1: sold by and saw I didn't own it anymore, that

975
01:02:58,880 --> 01:03:02,440
Speaker 1: seemed like a pretty positive thing to me and Julie

976
01:03:02,480 --> 01:03:06,240
Speaker 1: and I went back and tried to ingratiate ourselves with

977
01:03:06,320 --> 01:03:09,560
Speaker 1: the new owners and it's sort of worked, and it

978
01:03:09,720 --> 01:03:11,520
Speaker 1: sort of did. I don't want to get into all

979
01:03:11,560 --> 01:03:16,320
Speaker 1: the stuff, but um, you know, record companies end up

980
01:03:16,360 --> 01:03:21,280
Speaker 1: acting like record companies, and it unfortunately, UM, it is

981
01:03:21,320 --> 01:03:24,520
Speaker 1: a business, I'll just say it that way. And for

982
01:03:24,600 --> 01:03:28,720
Speaker 1: a for an artist and for a person who's personal

983
01:03:29,920 --> 01:03:35,080
Speaker 1: value system and belief system is sort of an artistic system,

984
01:03:35,120 --> 01:03:39,440
Speaker 1: it's just really hard and difficult when people see only

985
01:03:39,520 --> 01:03:43,080
Speaker 1: the business side, and everything is bottom line, and you

986
01:03:43,120 --> 01:03:45,520
Speaker 1: know I will never listen to I want to hold

987
01:03:45,560 --> 01:03:48,720
Speaker 1: your hand and sit here and think about what the

988
01:03:48,760 --> 01:03:51,720
Speaker 1: bottom line must look like. That's not how I relate

989
01:03:51,760 --> 01:03:55,640
Speaker 1: to the musical world, nor how I relate to John

990
01:03:55,720 --> 01:04:00,160
Speaker 1: Lennon and McCartney and the Beatles, and or Otis reading

991
01:04:00,640 --> 01:04:04,160
Speaker 1: or book or team the MGS, or even Elvis, who

992
01:04:04,240 --> 01:04:07,280
Speaker 1: you know certainly got involved in a lot of whose

993
01:04:07,320 --> 01:04:10,400
Speaker 1: business became well known. Let's say, I mean all that

994
01:04:10,600 --> 01:04:15,360
Speaker 1: music that stirred my soul. Um, you know, I still

995
01:04:15,400 --> 01:04:19,840
Speaker 1: relate to it that way, and thankfully so, and I

996
01:04:19,880 --> 01:04:21,919
Speaker 1: hope it stays that way un till the day I die.

997
01:04:22,080 --> 01:04:24,800
Speaker 1: Just to put a bow on it. You're sophisticated, Maybe

998
01:04:24,800 --> 01:04:27,800
Speaker 1: not everybody. The audience is. There's a hundred cents in

999
01:04:27,840 --> 01:04:32,000
Speaker 1: the dollar publishing. Traditionally, if someone else owns the publishing,

1000
01:04:32,080 --> 01:04:35,480
Speaker 1: they get fifty cents and the writer gets fifty cents.

1001
01:04:35,960 --> 01:04:39,479
Speaker 1: How is your publishing split up today, just the same way,

1002
01:04:39,720 --> 01:04:47,440
Speaker 1: as far as I know, it is right, Um, the

1003
01:04:46,800 --> 01:04:51,680
Speaker 1: the the whole context of that is, somebody actually owns

1004
01:04:52,160 --> 01:04:56,080
Speaker 1: Proud Mary or any other song that has copyright. Someone

1005
01:04:56,120 --> 01:05:00,600
Speaker 1: actually has ownership and having the ownership of the song

1006
01:05:01,920 --> 01:05:06,000
Speaker 1: means you get to determine the destiny of that song,

1007
01:05:06,040 --> 01:05:13,280
Speaker 1: in other words, how it's used. Um. And so as

1008
01:05:13,320 --> 01:05:16,560
Speaker 1: you said, there's a hundred, there's a hundred pennies. And

1009
01:05:16,680 --> 01:05:20,240
Speaker 1: if the publishing or if the ownership is to make

1010
01:05:20,240 --> 01:05:24,480
Speaker 1: it simpler, if the ownership is split fifty fifty, the

1011
01:05:24,560 --> 01:05:27,800
Speaker 1: person that is the publisher is getting fifty cents and

1012
01:05:27,840 --> 01:05:31,920
Speaker 1: the person that is the songwriter is getting fifty cents.

1013
01:05:31,920 --> 01:05:35,200
Speaker 1: And that's the most fair way that that should be.

1014
01:05:35,680 --> 01:05:39,760
Speaker 1: But the owner, who is also probably that publisher that

1015
01:05:39,800 --> 01:05:43,680
Speaker 1: I just named, he's getting to the side how that

1016
01:05:43,800 --> 01:05:48,960
Speaker 1: song is used. For instance, if Proud Mary gets used

1017
01:05:49,000 --> 01:05:52,480
Speaker 1: as an underarm deodorant and the poor guy that wrote

1018
01:05:52,520 --> 01:05:56,480
Speaker 1: the song takes offense at that doesn't want to see

1019
01:05:56,520 --> 01:06:03,680
Speaker 1: some lumberjack's hairy armpit connect did with his song, um um,

1020
01:06:04,600 --> 01:06:09,920
Speaker 1: proud Mary or Send in the Clowns or love as

1021
01:06:09,960 --> 01:06:13,520
Speaker 1: a mini splendid thing, you know, I mean, But the

1022
01:06:13,560 --> 01:06:17,600
Speaker 1: writer probably does not get to control that destiny. The

1023
01:06:17,920 --> 01:06:21,880
Speaker 1: publisher or the owner does. And that's where you hear

1024
01:06:22,080 --> 01:06:27,400
Speaker 1: song Usually songwriters hawking about how things get used. Certainly

1025
01:06:27,440 --> 01:06:31,960
Speaker 1: this songwriter anyway, so how's royalty revenue these days? For you?

1026
01:06:32,440 --> 01:06:34,600
Speaker 1: I don't pay as much attention to that as you

1027
01:06:34,640 --> 01:06:38,080
Speaker 1: would hope a guy like you just called me sophisticated. Thanks,

1028
01:06:38,320 --> 01:06:44,439
Speaker 1: I resemble that. Um, you know, it kind of never

1029
01:06:44,480 --> 01:06:47,760
Speaker 1: really works out. I mean, all the years that I

1030
01:06:47,840 --> 01:06:52,760
Speaker 1: was on Fantasy, I always suspected that, um, you know,

1031
01:06:52,800 --> 01:06:55,720
Speaker 1: that there were other pressing plants somewhere and making pressing

1032
01:06:55,760 --> 01:07:00,479
Speaker 1: records and selling them that I never even saw any

1033
01:07:00,560 --> 01:07:06,400
Speaker 1: kind of report about. And you'll never you'll never convince

1034
01:07:06,480 --> 01:07:09,480
Speaker 1: me that didn't happen, because every other thing that saw

1035
01:07:10,040 --> 01:07:14,240
Speaker 1: Zance did was so crooked. Um, it's just hard to

1036
01:07:14,240 --> 01:07:17,960
Speaker 1: believe that he avoided that very easy thing for him,

1037
01:07:18,000 --> 01:07:20,160
Speaker 1: that in fact, he's the guy that told me about

1038
01:07:20,200 --> 01:07:24,360
Speaker 1: such situations in the first place. And I always I

1039
01:07:24,480 --> 01:07:27,600
Speaker 1: know that one time, think this was the early days

1040
01:07:27,640 --> 01:07:33,080
Speaker 1: of credent success and um you know, ah g, we've

1041
01:07:33,200 --> 01:07:35,880
Speaker 1: John's writing all these songs. And I was actually visiting

1042
01:07:35,960 --> 01:07:40,720
Speaker 1: Saul in his office at the at one of the

1043
01:07:40,800 --> 01:07:45,960
Speaker 1: earlier locations, which was the place in Oakland that Fantasy

1044
01:07:46,040 --> 01:07:50,200
Speaker 1: had for it was almost temporary, only one block from

1045
01:07:50,360 --> 01:07:54,440
Speaker 1: the famous Ducky Market. It's the front cover of Willie

1046
01:07:54,440 --> 01:07:57,720
Speaker 1: and the Poor Boys. But anyway, I was down there visiting,

1047
01:07:58,520 --> 01:08:00,840
Speaker 1: and there was a man from being my which is

1048
01:08:00,960 --> 01:08:08,720
Speaker 1: the uh uh songwriters Performance Association that keeps track of

1049
01:08:08,720 --> 01:08:12,800
Speaker 1: how many times records are played so that the songwriter

1050
01:08:13,200 --> 01:08:16,920
Speaker 1: usually the publisher too. But it's a it's a way

1051
01:08:16,960 --> 01:08:20,040
Speaker 1: that the creator of the song can be paid for

1052
01:08:20,120 --> 01:08:23,760
Speaker 1: all those uh times that the songs played on the

1053
01:08:23,880 --> 01:08:27,400
Speaker 1: radio or even in movies and other things. So this

1054
01:08:27,400 --> 01:08:31,160
Speaker 1: guy from it is called Broadcast Music Incorporated b m I.

1055
01:08:31,560 --> 01:08:34,200
Speaker 1: Any songwriter will tell you. So there was happen to

1056
01:08:34,240 --> 01:08:37,479
Speaker 1: be a guy there in the office where I'm visiting.

1057
01:08:37,560 --> 01:08:40,680
Speaker 1: You know, we're all flushed with this new success and

1058
01:08:41,400 --> 01:08:44,640
Speaker 1: Saul sitting there and this fella from b m I,

1059
01:08:44,760 --> 01:08:48,120
Speaker 1: and so I kind of just innocently said, well, um, well,

1060
01:08:48,120 --> 01:08:52,280
Speaker 1: how does b m I spit split the relationship between

1061
01:08:52,280 --> 01:08:55,759
Speaker 1: the publisher and the songwriter? You know? Is it fifty

1062
01:08:55,840 --> 01:09:00,080
Speaker 1: cents for each? And saw suddenly face turns bright. It

1063
01:09:00,280 --> 01:09:02,640
Speaker 1: I mean, smoke is coming out of his ears and

1064
01:09:02,680 --> 01:09:08,960
Speaker 1: he's you know, and this fella herb um, and I

1065
01:09:09,000 --> 01:09:11,559
Speaker 1: won't go any further than that. He says, well, I

1066
01:09:11,560 --> 01:09:16,040
Speaker 1: think it's paid a little more for the publisher than

1067
01:09:16,080 --> 01:09:20,800
Speaker 1: the songwriter. And that was the first inkling I had that, Oh,

1068
01:09:20,960 --> 01:09:23,920
Speaker 1: there's stuff back there behind that curtain that I'm not

1069
01:09:23,960 --> 01:09:27,920
Speaker 1: supposed to pay attention to, and uh wow, I better

1070
01:09:27,960 --> 01:09:30,680
Speaker 1: not bring it up here today because I'm about to

1071
01:09:30,720 --> 01:09:35,200
Speaker 1: be lanced, you know. But obviously I had, and quite

1072
01:09:35,200 --> 01:09:38,599
Speaker 1: innocently I wasn't. I I thought we were all friends here.

1073
01:09:39,000 --> 01:09:42,280
Speaker 1: I thought we were so happy that I can hope,

1074
01:09:42,280 --> 01:09:46,360
Speaker 1: against hope, we're having actually having hit records, because none

1075
01:09:46,360 --> 01:09:50,439
Speaker 1: of us had ever experienced that before. But you know,

1076
01:09:50,560 --> 01:09:53,920
Speaker 1: like that those scenes in Treasure of the Sierra Madre

1077
01:09:54,120 --> 01:09:57,600
Speaker 1: where the poor fellas actually discover a gold mine and

1078
01:09:57,640 --> 01:10:01,479
Speaker 1: then things go really bad. Um, that's kind of what

1079
01:10:01,640 --> 01:10:05,439
Speaker 1: happened forgetting all the business shenan against the contracts. Just

1080
01:10:05,520 --> 01:10:08,800
Speaker 1: talking about what's coming into your bank account. Is that

1081
01:10:08,920 --> 01:10:14,639
Speaker 1: a good amount of money today? Yeah? Sure, by any stretch. Um,

1082
01:10:14,680 --> 01:10:18,960
Speaker 1: that's makes me happy. It's far less than what it

1083
01:10:19,120 --> 01:10:22,519
Speaker 1: used to be. UM. And the simple answer, of course,

1084
01:10:22,640 --> 01:10:28,360
Speaker 1: is that because of the online streaming, an actual physical

1085
01:10:28,520 --> 01:10:33,120
Speaker 1: record doesn't get sold very much anymore. You know, a

1086
01:10:33,160 --> 01:10:40,360
Speaker 1: CD or whatever physical um thing holds an album, and

1087
01:10:40,439 --> 01:10:43,920
Speaker 1: so most of the music gets listened to by streaming

1088
01:10:43,960 --> 01:10:49,280
Speaker 1: off the internet and so the way and people can

1089
01:10:49,320 --> 01:10:53,640
Speaker 1: buy those, um, I suppose from iTunes or Spotify or

1090
01:10:54,080 --> 01:10:58,160
Speaker 1: there must be other places. Um, but you are paid

1091
01:10:58,520 --> 01:11:02,960
Speaker 1: pennies on the dollar for what uh what it used

1092
01:11:03,040 --> 01:11:05,240
Speaker 1: to be. I know, the cost of an album is

1093
01:11:05,280 --> 01:11:09,320
Speaker 1: far less that way. And also the record companies all

1094
01:11:09,760 --> 01:11:14,240
Speaker 1: it's like that clam at the bottom, the giant clam

1095
01:11:14,360 --> 01:11:19,920
Speaker 1: that grabbed the pearl diver in the song leah Uh,

1096
01:11:19,960 --> 01:11:24,120
Speaker 1: they snap shut. When streaming was invented, he said, okay,

1097
01:11:24,200 --> 01:11:27,720
Speaker 1: we have a new um, what do you call new technology?

1098
01:11:27,840 --> 01:11:32,000
Speaker 1: And now you know we used to pay you, um,

1099
01:11:32,000 --> 01:11:35,000
Speaker 1: eight dollars or whatever it was on an album or

1100
01:11:35,040 --> 01:11:37,880
Speaker 1: four dollar or whatever it was. Then we're now going

1101
01:11:37,960 --> 01:11:41,960
Speaker 1: to pay you far less, you know, some percentage because

1102
01:11:42,000 --> 01:11:46,400
Speaker 1: there's no physical actual property and they could be the same,

1103
01:11:46,560 --> 01:11:48,680
Speaker 1: but there they don't. I mean, they could pay you

1104
01:11:48,720 --> 01:11:54,879
Speaker 1: the same percentage. Let's say it was percent of retail

1105
01:11:55,080 --> 01:11:58,679
Speaker 1: or something like that, but they don't. They'll pay you

1106
01:11:59,800 --> 01:12:03,360
Speaker 1: for eight percent ever, you know, it's some a ridiculous number. Again,

1107
01:12:03,479 --> 01:12:06,679
Speaker 1: you end up, if you're a successful artist, you're making

1108
01:12:07,240 --> 01:12:10,639
Speaker 1: into the millions of dollars. So trust me, Bob, I'm

1109
01:12:10,640 --> 01:12:13,680
Speaker 1: not sitting here crying in my beer. Um. I'm just

1110
01:12:13,720 --> 01:12:16,840
Speaker 1: trying to explain that it's now far less than it

1111
01:12:17,000 --> 01:12:20,880
Speaker 1: used to be because of that situation. Okay, you talk

1112
01:12:20,960 --> 01:12:25,080
Speaker 1: about all this traveling to Mississippi, going into the post office,

1113
01:12:25,080 --> 01:12:30,000
Speaker 1: is going to visit Julian, Indiana. The people recognize you everywhere.

1114
01:12:30,160 --> 01:12:33,800
Speaker 1: What's it like being John Fogerty once you leave your house? Well,

1115
01:12:33,960 --> 01:12:37,519
Speaker 1: you know, the pen the pandemic has been wonderful. I'm

1116
01:12:37,520 --> 01:12:40,080
Speaker 1: walking around with a mask on, you know, the one

1117
01:12:40,120 --> 01:12:43,559
Speaker 1: that says Johnpoverty across the frame. And you know, I'm

1118
01:12:43,600 --> 01:12:47,120
Speaker 1: just like everybody else. I'll take it back a few years.

1119
01:12:47,200 --> 01:12:52,639
Speaker 1: Let me click back, Um, when people would stop me,

1120
01:12:53,200 --> 01:12:55,720
Speaker 1: you know a lot of times, you know, excuse me.

1121
01:12:55,760 --> 01:12:59,160
Speaker 1: When I when I was first getting to know Julie,

1122
01:12:59,240 --> 01:13:02,439
Speaker 1: her daughter Lindsay was two and a half three, Like

1123
01:13:02,479 --> 01:13:08,720
Speaker 1: I said, you know, we finally we're cohabiting and a family. Um.

1124
01:13:08,880 --> 01:13:11,920
Speaker 1: Lenzy was getting to be four years old and quite

1125
01:13:11,920 --> 01:13:17,599
Speaker 1: a little um manifesto herself. And one day she actually

1126
01:13:17,640 --> 01:13:22,439
Speaker 1: said to Julie and I, John, how come people always

1127
01:13:22,439 --> 01:13:25,120
Speaker 1: come up to you and say, aren't you John Bogoty.

1128
01:13:25,439 --> 01:13:27,800
Speaker 1: You know, she's a kid and she's wondering why that

1129
01:13:27,840 --> 01:13:31,840
Speaker 1: would happen, and I mean, it was an interesting phenomenon

1130
01:13:31,920 --> 01:13:35,120
Speaker 1: to a child. And I I told her, you know,

1131
01:13:35,200 --> 01:13:38,000
Speaker 1: we both kind of Saturday and said, well, you know,

1132
01:13:38,160 --> 01:13:41,479
Speaker 1: John is a famous musician and people like his music.

1133
01:13:41,560 --> 01:13:43,719
Speaker 1: So when they see him, you know, and they actually

1134
01:13:43,760 --> 01:13:46,600
Speaker 1: really like, oh, that's him. You know at the supermarket,

1135
01:13:47,280 --> 01:13:49,200
Speaker 1: the ones that are let's say a little less shy

1136
01:13:49,360 --> 01:13:52,080
Speaker 1: will come up and talk. And what the reason I

1137
01:13:52,120 --> 01:13:56,160
Speaker 1: bring this up is I always approach those moments in

1138
01:13:56,200 --> 01:14:01,160
Speaker 1: the most sweet way because it's a blessing, you know.

1139
01:14:01,640 --> 01:14:05,000
Speaker 1: Number one, It's solidified to me in my mind the

1140
01:14:05,040 --> 01:14:08,799
Speaker 1: way I felt about Julie and lindsay, this was happening

1141
01:14:08,840 --> 01:14:11,600
Speaker 1: to us together and it was kind of it was

1142
01:14:11,640 --> 01:14:14,200
Speaker 1: really sweet. I wasn't like a horde of people like

1143
01:14:14,240 --> 01:14:16,120
Speaker 1: in the Beatle movies or something, you know. I was

1144
01:14:16,640 --> 01:14:18,679
Speaker 1: used a man and wife, maybe a man and wife

1145
01:14:18,680 --> 01:14:22,240
Speaker 1: with one child. And it was always low key because

1146
01:14:22,600 --> 01:14:25,519
Speaker 1: in those days I wasn't touring there. There wasn't new

1147
01:14:25,600 --> 01:14:29,160
Speaker 1: music out yet. You know, later on as music came

1148
01:14:29,160 --> 01:14:31,920
Speaker 1: out and I was on tour, or certainly if I

1149
01:14:32,000 --> 01:14:36,080
Speaker 1: was anywhere near a place I was performing, there would

1150
01:14:36,120 --> 01:14:41,000
Speaker 1: be an obvious connection, and it got a little more hectic,

1151
01:14:41,080 --> 01:14:44,400
Speaker 1: but I tried to deal with it the best I could,

1152
01:14:44,960 --> 01:14:48,440
Speaker 1: and I was I was very naive about this. UM

1153
01:14:48,640 --> 01:14:53,599
Speaker 1: started touring after Blue Moon Swamp, and of course you're

1154
01:14:53,640 --> 01:14:57,120
Speaker 1: flying to towns that aren't within driving distance that means

1155
01:14:57,160 --> 01:15:01,000
Speaker 1: almost every place, and and at an airport, and there

1156
01:15:01,000 --> 01:15:05,000
Speaker 1: would suddenly be these strangers that had um sheets of

1157
01:15:05,040 --> 01:15:10,840
Speaker 1: paper and uh, sometimes guitars and sometimes drumheads, and they

1158
01:15:10,880 --> 01:15:14,040
Speaker 1: want you to sign this stuff, or even pictures or albums,

1159
01:15:14,479 --> 01:15:17,280
Speaker 1: and I would sign them all. Okay, you know, I

1160
01:15:17,280 --> 01:15:20,439
Speaker 1: started signing them, and you know just I mean, that

1161
01:15:20,479 --> 01:15:23,840
Speaker 1: went on for several years. And I remember around in

1162
01:15:23,880 --> 01:15:28,439
Speaker 1: that time seeing Mark McGuire, the famous baseball player, who

1163
01:15:28,840 --> 01:15:33,919
Speaker 1: was talking about how he came to not sign things anymore.

1164
01:15:34,000 --> 01:15:36,320
Speaker 1: He said, he'd be in a motel, you know, the

1165
01:15:36,360 --> 01:15:39,559
Speaker 1: A's or whatever team he's with, was on the road,

1166
01:15:40,520 --> 01:15:43,760
Speaker 1: and a man came knock on his motel door. You know,

1167
01:15:43,920 --> 01:15:47,400
Speaker 1: it was signed my baseball bat or whatever, and he

1168
01:15:47,479 --> 01:15:49,680
Speaker 1: started to get a little grumpy because he realized they

1169
01:15:49,680 --> 01:15:52,320
Speaker 1: were running off and selling these things. He said, so

1170
01:15:52,360 --> 01:15:54,680
Speaker 1: then they started knocking on the door and they'd have

1171
01:15:54,760 --> 01:15:58,400
Speaker 1: the little kid stand there and Daddy wasn't anywhere in sight.

1172
01:15:58,960 --> 01:16:02,720
Speaker 1: But Mark knew that how does this kid managed to

1173
01:16:02,760 --> 01:16:06,000
Speaker 1: come to where I am? You know? And they put

1174
01:16:06,000 --> 01:16:08,599
Speaker 1: a little b in my bonnet at least. But still

1175
01:16:08,640 --> 01:16:11,559
Speaker 1: I was signing all the people that came to see me.

1176
01:16:12,400 --> 01:16:14,519
Speaker 1: Finally I got it in my head that these people

1177
01:16:14,560 --> 01:16:17,760
Speaker 1: were just turning around and selling everything on eBay. They

1178
01:16:17,800 --> 01:16:20,760
Speaker 1: weren't necessarily pains. I mean, when a guy walks up

1179
01:16:20,800 --> 01:16:24,920
Speaker 1: to you has got a briefcase full of everything connected

1180
01:16:24,960 --> 01:16:30,160
Speaker 1: to you, but he's also got other briefcases. You know.

1181
01:16:30,920 --> 01:16:35,280
Speaker 1: That particularly would happen um in airports where there was

1182
01:16:35,320 --> 01:16:38,320
Speaker 1: like a festival, and so these guys were showing up,

1183
01:16:38,720 --> 01:16:43,200
Speaker 1: Um who were gonna snag anybody who you know, any

1184
01:16:43,280 --> 01:16:47,000
Speaker 1: fly that that landed here on the fly paper, and

1185
01:16:47,160 --> 01:16:49,080
Speaker 1: it didn't matter who he was. They probably had it

1186
01:16:49,240 --> 01:16:52,160
Speaker 1: covered with a couple of items, you know, And I

1187
01:16:52,200 --> 01:16:54,040
Speaker 1: would do it. And it started to know it started

1188
01:16:54,040 --> 01:16:57,280
Speaker 1: to be inconvenient to my family because I'm I'm trying

1189
01:16:57,280 --> 01:17:00,960
Speaker 1: to get my family to our The next part of

1190
01:17:00,960 --> 01:17:04,200
Speaker 1: our ride are either the the car, the so called

1191
01:17:04,280 --> 01:17:07,000
Speaker 1: limo that's going to take you to your hotel or

1192
01:17:07,040 --> 01:17:11,439
Speaker 1: to your venue or whatever. Um. And I had little

1193
01:17:11,520 --> 01:17:14,320
Speaker 1: kids with me, and it started to actually be dangerous

1194
01:17:14,360 --> 01:17:16,760
Speaker 1: at times. So you know, Julie would look at me

1195
01:17:16,840 --> 01:17:20,080
Speaker 1: and you know, I really wanted to do it and

1196
01:17:20,120 --> 01:17:23,760
Speaker 1: then assign it, I mean and being obligating uh, obliging

1197
01:17:24,439 --> 01:17:28,559
Speaker 1: um artists. And then other times I begin to actually

1198
01:17:28,560 --> 01:17:33,400
Speaker 1: see a businessman stare me in the face. The worst, Bob,

1199
01:17:33,439 --> 01:17:35,600
Speaker 1: the worst one of these that ever happened was I

1200
01:17:35,880 --> 01:17:39,760
Speaker 1: couldn't even tell you what town. Uh. It's back when

1201
01:17:40,240 --> 01:17:43,800
Speaker 1: people could follow you right to your gate where you

1202
01:17:43,840 --> 01:17:46,360
Speaker 1: were going to take off. And this guy had this

1203
01:17:47,280 --> 01:17:51,240
Speaker 1: among Us video camera on his shoulder and he comes

1204
01:17:51,280 --> 01:17:55,439
Speaker 1: walking up and says, well, John, UM, tell me some

1205
01:17:55,479 --> 01:17:57,960
Speaker 1: words about that. And I looked at and said, well, yeah, okay,

1206
01:17:58,000 --> 01:18:01,000
Speaker 1: I'm I'm happy to be touring. And then he's asking

1207
01:18:01,000 --> 01:18:03,400
Speaker 1: me a couple of more questions and I'm you know,

1208
01:18:03,439 --> 01:18:05,680
Speaker 1: I've got my kids with me, and well, I want

1209
01:18:05,720 --> 01:18:08,040
Speaker 1: to get to the gate, you know, and get everybody settled.

1210
01:18:08,200 --> 01:18:10,800
Speaker 1: We don't have a lot of time. He says, well, no,

1211
01:18:10,960 --> 01:18:14,400
Speaker 1: you are you going to honest, buddy? I I gave

1212
01:18:14,400 --> 01:18:17,000
Speaker 1: you a little time. Now. Now my brother Bob comes up.

1213
01:18:17,280 --> 01:18:21,200
Speaker 1: He sees I, I'm in a hopeless situation. I'm trying

1214
01:18:21,240 --> 01:18:26,120
Speaker 1: to be nice, so I can't be firm because he's

1215
01:18:26,200 --> 01:18:29,080
Speaker 1: switched from the guy. It doesn't matter if he gets

1216
01:18:29,080 --> 01:18:31,519
Speaker 1: me as a nice guy and I have something polite

1217
01:18:31,560 --> 01:18:35,360
Speaker 1: to say, that's probably one kind of paparazzi stuff. But

1218
01:18:35,400 --> 01:18:38,320
Speaker 1: if he can get me to actually turn purple, because

1219
01:18:38,360 --> 01:18:40,680
Speaker 1: now I'm mad at the guy, this is better and

1220
01:18:40,720 --> 01:18:43,400
Speaker 1: you'll get he can sell it for more money. So

1221
01:18:43,479 --> 01:18:46,000
Speaker 1: he's trying to make me mad. He's starting to bait me.

1222
01:18:46,280 --> 01:18:49,559
Speaker 1: And that's when Bob, here's it, and I'm I don't

1223
01:18:49,600 --> 01:18:54,000
Speaker 1: know how to react right, I'm still almost being sophisticated.

1224
01:18:54,400 --> 01:18:56,920
Speaker 1: Bob comes up, says, the buddy, you're just gonna have

1225
01:18:57,000 --> 01:18:59,519
Speaker 1: to turn it off. Take it away. John gave you

1226
01:18:59,520 --> 01:19:02,800
Speaker 1: a little bit, now, please go away. Says well, I

1227
01:19:02,840 --> 01:19:04,720
Speaker 1: hope you have a miserable this is the guy. I

1228
01:19:04,720 --> 01:19:07,120
Speaker 1: hope you have a bad fight. I hope the airplane

1229
01:19:07,160 --> 01:19:12,560
Speaker 1: crashes and I'm going wow. And after that I realized

1230
01:19:12,600 --> 01:19:17,120
Speaker 1: that it's it's pretty complicated to get involved with people

1231
01:19:17,160 --> 01:19:21,080
Speaker 1: that want something from you while you're traveling especially with

1232
01:19:21,120 --> 01:19:23,840
Speaker 1: your family. Going back to the beginning, what kind of

1233
01:19:23,960 --> 01:19:26,080
Speaker 1: kid were you? Were you kind of kid who had

1234
01:19:26,080 --> 01:19:28,120
Speaker 1: a lot of friends, or the kid who was staying

1235
01:19:28,160 --> 01:19:32,400
Speaker 1: at home reading comic books. We're a good student, bad student.

1236
01:19:32,840 --> 01:19:35,959
Speaker 1: I was all of those, you know, don't get me started,

1237
01:19:36,200 --> 01:19:38,840
Speaker 1: but the big huge I was just talking with someone

1238
01:19:39,360 --> 01:19:43,080
Speaker 1: yesterday about this subject. That the time I remember, you know,

1239
01:19:43,120 --> 01:19:45,639
Speaker 1: when you were a kid. There's even a good country

1240
01:19:45,720 --> 01:19:49,120
Speaker 1: song I love has this in it. We were outside.

1241
01:19:49,760 --> 01:19:52,080
Speaker 1: You know what he's stayed in around? We were outside.

1242
01:19:52,120 --> 01:19:54,280
Speaker 1: There was nothing in your house. Your parents are in

1243
01:19:54,320 --> 01:19:57,040
Speaker 1: your house. Who wants to be in your house? You

1244
01:19:57,120 --> 01:20:00,439
Speaker 1: go outside and mess around. You know, we're gonna see

1245
01:20:00,479 --> 01:20:04,280
Speaker 1: our friends. We're gonna go mess around. Uh do stuff

1246
01:20:04,280 --> 01:20:07,080
Speaker 1: on our bicycle, you know, Uh, get on our bikes,

1247
01:20:07,320 --> 01:20:11,360
Speaker 1: go over to someplace that's a bacon a lot. I mean, wow,

1248
01:20:11,600 --> 01:20:14,760
Speaker 1: a bacon lot was such a world, a universe. We

1249
01:20:14,760 --> 01:20:17,919
Speaker 1: didn't even have malls yet. I get it. I understand

1250
01:20:17,960 --> 01:20:20,920
Speaker 1: why a mall is an attraction. But I'm talking all

1251
01:20:21,000 --> 01:20:24,040
Speaker 1: the time before that, you just you found things to do.

1252
01:20:24,160 --> 01:20:28,479
Speaker 1: You probably had a bicycle, um and your friends and

1253
01:20:28,520 --> 01:20:31,960
Speaker 1: you all did things outside. It was just that was

1254
01:20:32,240 --> 01:20:36,639
Speaker 1: a good life. Um. Later, of course, because of TV

1255
01:20:36,880 --> 01:20:40,519
Speaker 1: and especially because of gaming, you know, the video games

1256
01:20:40,560 --> 01:20:43,639
Speaker 1: and stuff, and then online people started more and more

1257
01:20:43,800 --> 01:20:48,720
Speaker 1: congregate in. But I was an outdoor kid. I did

1258
01:20:48,760 --> 01:20:52,040
Speaker 1: all of that. I love messing around. I loved going

1259
01:20:52,080 --> 01:20:54,599
Speaker 1: with a couple of friends and hiking over the um

1260
01:20:54,960 --> 01:20:58,000
Speaker 1: Indian Rock. We client as a place in the Bay Area.

1261
01:20:58,160 --> 01:21:01,960
Speaker 1: I'm sure it's still there a few miles from my house.

1262
01:21:02,479 --> 01:21:05,360
Speaker 1: You know, all all the cool things. I was in traffics,

1263
01:21:05,400 --> 01:21:10,120
Speaker 1: and that means I was helped the students across the crosswalk. Uh,

1264
01:21:10,200 --> 01:21:15,080
Speaker 1: during recesses and times when school was either coming in

1265
01:21:15,200 --> 01:21:19,080
Speaker 1: or going out, and so we got little passes to

1266
01:21:19,160 --> 01:21:23,240
Speaker 1: the local theater. And I love going down on Saturday

1267
01:21:23,840 --> 01:21:30,240
Speaker 1: and seeing a movie for free or for five cents. Uh.

1268
01:21:30,280 --> 01:21:34,600
Speaker 1: You know, I loved music early, so I began to

1269
01:21:34,680 --> 01:21:38,400
Speaker 1: be fascinated. We had an old Stella guitar. Believe it

1270
01:21:38,520 --> 01:21:41,320
Speaker 1: or not, I was blessed and lucky enough that that's

1271
01:21:41,960 --> 01:21:46,280
Speaker 1: part of my upbringing. Uh. It didn't work very well,

1272
01:21:46,920 --> 01:21:49,120
Speaker 1: but it's acoustic. But the fact that it was a

1273
01:21:49,200 --> 01:21:52,479
Speaker 1: Stella rather than some other brand name. By the way,

1274
01:21:52,479 --> 01:21:55,919
Speaker 1: that's probably Sears Roebuck. It's where my parents got it.

1275
01:21:55,920 --> 01:21:59,240
Speaker 1: It's really hard to play, as my brother Bob says, Yeah,

1276
01:21:59,280 --> 01:22:02,439
Speaker 1: we played baseball all with that thing. Yeah, we use

1277
01:22:02,520 --> 01:22:04,720
Speaker 1: it for a bat, but it was built like a

1278
01:22:04,760 --> 01:22:09,520
Speaker 1: tank and it's the same kind lead belly had, you know. Um,

1279
01:22:09,680 --> 01:22:12,880
Speaker 1: So those things were in in my life. You know,

1280
01:22:13,080 --> 01:22:16,240
Speaker 1: I think I had the normal amount of friends, but

1281
01:22:16,360 --> 01:22:19,120
Speaker 1: they were there and I was I loved hanging out

1282
01:22:19,160 --> 01:22:22,519
Speaker 1: with them. There were other times when I was in

1283
01:22:22,600 --> 01:22:25,640
Speaker 1: my room, you know, like the wonderful song by the

1284
01:22:25,640 --> 01:22:29,519
Speaker 1: Beach Boys. I suppose it's Brian Wilson. Um that just

1285
01:22:29,600 --> 01:22:33,000
Speaker 1: says it so well. You know, it's that that area

1286
01:22:33,160 --> 01:22:37,280
Speaker 1: of your life where that's your sanctuary, that's your place

1287
01:22:37,320 --> 01:22:39,880
Speaker 1: where a lot of your thinking gets done or a

1288
01:22:39,920 --> 01:22:42,759
Speaker 1: lot of your fears. You know, it's a it really

1289
01:22:42,840 --> 01:22:45,880
Speaker 1: is a true thing. And for me, of course, I

1290
01:22:45,920 --> 01:22:49,559
Speaker 1: had my radio and my little record player and a

1291
01:22:49,600 --> 01:22:57,480
Speaker 1: lot of my world exploring music. You know, the whole mysterious,

1292
01:22:57,640 --> 01:23:02,120
Speaker 1: magical thing to me, and music was certainly that. I mean,

1293
01:23:02,360 --> 01:23:05,920
Speaker 1: first I loved music or I was attracted, but it

1294
01:23:05,960 --> 01:23:09,600
Speaker 1: became this It was so full of mystery, and you know,

1295
01:23:09,680 --> 01:23:11,599
Speaker 1: I had the old fashioned kind of radio, I guess

1296
01:23:11,600 --> 01:23:14,280
Speaker 1: you'd call that analog. And so at night you would

1297
01:23:14,320 --> 01:23:19,360
Speaker 1: be was edging the dial, the tuning dial between stations,

1298
01:23:19,400 --> 01:23:22,920
Speaker 1: and sometimes you get stations from out of town you

1299
01:23:23,000 --> 01:23:26,320
Speaker 1: never heard before. It might be Montana or you know,

1300
01:23:26,400 --> 01:23:29,360
Speaker 1: some other far away place that just because of the

1301
01:23:29,439 --> 01:23:34,280
Speaker 1: atmospheric anomalies, it was bouncing off a cloud and coming

1302
01:23:34,280 --> 01:23:38,720
Speaker 1: to you but in sort of a uh rhythmically an

1303
01:23:38,800 --> 01:23:41,720
Speaker 1: unclear pulse, and a lot of times it made the

1304
01:23:41,760 --> 01:23:46,480
Speaker 1: record sound even better, you know, and more mysterious. Um.

1305
01:23:46,520 --> 01:23:48,960
Speaker 1: And certainly the other part of that experience, by the way,

1306
01:23:49,000 --> 01:23:51,680
Speaker 1: having your radio in your room as a kid in

1307
01:23:51,680 --> 01:23:56,519
Speaker 1: your bedroom, the tubes, yes I said, tubes lit up

1308
01:23:57,000 --> 01:24:00,519
Speaker 1: and with dance, certain little shadows on the ceiling of

1309
01:24:00,600 --> 01:24:03,479
Speaker 1: your bedroom. All the lights are out, and this thing

1310
01:24:03,479 --> 01:24:06,800
Speaker 1: would kind of flicker on the ceiling as you listen

1311
01:24:06,880 --> 01:24:11,519
Speaker 1: to some far away station. And sometimes you heard, you know,

1312
01:24:11,600 --> 01:24:15,000
Speaker 1: your current rock and roll record or a new record,

1313
01:24:15,360 --> 01:24:19,040
Speaker 1: or sometimes you heard weird things like gene Autry, you know,

1314
01:24:19,280 --> 01:24:24,719
Speaker 1: or a blues record oh by Lightning Hopkins called Mojo

1315
01:24:24,880 --> 01:24:28,799
Speaker 1: hand that hadn't quite made it to your area yet. Um.

1316
01:24:28,880 --> 01:24:31,760
Speaker 1: And when these things would happen. You felt like you

1317
01:24:31,800 --> 01:24:36,759
Speaker 1: had found a portal to Mars or something that nobody

1318
01:24:36,760 --> 01:24:41,360
Speaker 1: else could find. Sorry, I went on, but that was

1319
01:24:41,400 --> 01:24:44,920
Speaker 1: my relationship with music. In some ways. It was so

1320
01:24:45,040 --> 01:24:48,240
Speaker 1: mysterious and magical because I knew there was a big

1321
01:24:48,280 --> 01:24:50,600
Speaker 1: thing out there. I guess that's what I'm saying. I

1322
01:24:50,680 --> 01:24:54,000
Speaker 1: knew there was way more than I knew, and I

1323
01:24:54,040 --> 01:24:59,439
Speaker 1: was just dying, craving two get to it, to be

1324
01:25:00,120 --> 01:25:03,839
Speaker 1: immersed in it, to discover it. Okay. Was this interest

1325
01:25:03,880 --> 01:25:07,600
Speaker 1: in music generated by your parents or by siblings, Like

1326
01:25:07,680 --> 01:25:10,560
Speaker 1: my parents, they would take us through the young Kids concerts,

1327
01:25:10,600 --> 01:25:12,960
Speaker 1: they would play the show tunes. Was this something you

1328
01:25:13,040 --> 01:25:16,240
Speaker 1: discovered alone or was this something all your family was

1329
01:25:16,320 --> 01:25:20,920
Speaker 1: exposed to? Absolutely my family first. Um, when I was

1330
01:25:21,040 --> 01:25:25,439
Speaker 1: quite young. I remember, I think being on vacation is

1331
01:25:26,200 --> 01:25:28,719
Speaker 1: you know. So we were probably up at the Poda

1332
01:25:28,760 --> 01:25:33,479
Speaker 1: Creek in northern California. It's near Winters, and I'd be

1333
01:25:34,000 --> 01:25:36,160
Speaker 1: this be night, maybe they're going to drive to the

1334
01:25:36,200 --> 01:25:38,400
Speaker 1: grocery store. But to me it was like taking a

1335
01:25:38,439 --> 01:25:41,800
Speaker 1: long trip. I'm sitting between them in the dark, and

1336
01:25:41,880 --> 01:25:46,000
Speaker 1: my mom and my dad are harmonizing and they would sing,

1337
01:25:46,120 --> 01:25:49,960
Speaker 1: you know, old standards from their day, like by the

1338
01:25:50,040 --> 01:25:53,320
Speaker 1: Light of the Silvery Moon. Um. One of the songs

1339
01:25:53,439 --> 01:25:57,040
Speaker 1: they sang was baby Face. You know, baby face, you

1340
01:25:57,120 --> 01:25:59,559
Speaker 1: got that cute, as did Obey. But they would sing

1341
01:26:00,040 --> 01:26:03,439
Speaker 1: add lack you got the keys that right, that was

1342
01:26:03,479 --> 01:26:07,840
Speaker 1: their own little Um. They're already in the blues tradition.

1343
01:26:08,160 --> 01:26:12,960
Speaker 1: They took something there that they liked and rewrote it. Um.

1344
01:26:13,160 --> 01:26:16,000
Speaker 1: But that I discovered they were harmonizing, you know. And

1345
01:26:16,200 --> 01:26:19,360
Speaker 1: again I was probably three to four years old and

1346
01:26:19,479 --> 01:26:23,160
Speaker 1: asked them, well, why are your voices different? And my

1347
01:26:23,240 --> 01:26:27,080
Speaker 1: mom explained that to me. Another very very important thing

1348
01:26:27,080 --> 01:26:30,479
Speaker 1: that happened. I was about three and a half. We

1349
01:26:30,640 --> 01:26:33,280
Speaker 1: came My mom was one of the parents and also

1350
01:26:33,360 --> 01:26:36,759
Speaker 1: what I think a teacher or part time parent teacher

1351
01:26:36,880 --> 01:26:40,400
Speaker 1: at preschool nursery school. That's the way she said it

1352
01:26:40,439 --> 01:26:43,280
Speaker 1: to me. And we came home in the afternoon from

1353
01:26:44,040 --> 01:26:47,120
Speaker 1: one of the days and she sat me down and

1354
01:26:47,200 --> 01:26:50,759
Speaker 1: she presented me with a little record record, a record

1355
01:26:51,160 --> 01:26:55,360
Speaker 1: yellow record, and she explained to me that the songwriter

1356
01:26:55,520 --> 01:26:59,920
Speaker 1: of these songs is Stephen Foster. So she wasn't telling

1357
01:27:00,040 --> 01:27:05,400
Speaker 1: me who the singers were who. I really actually don't know. Um,

1358
01:27:05,439 --> 01:27:07,720
Speaker 1: it might have been a Little Golden Book or a

1359
01:27:07,720 --> 01:27:11,920
Speaker 1: Little Golden Orchestra or whatever. But the songs were Oh

1360
01:27:12,080 --> 01:27:18,040
Speaker 1: Susannah and Camptown Races. Do uh Do? She played both sides,

1361
01:27:18,160 --> 01:27:22,760
Speaker 1: maybe several times, but again she explained to me the

1362
01:27:22,840 --> 01:27:27,240
Speaker 1: song writer of these songs is Stephen Foster, and that

1363
01:27:27,320 --> 01:27:31,040
Speaker 1: went in and stayed. I mean, I remember that. I

1364
01:27:31,080 --> 01:27:33,920
Speaker 1: can still see myself sitting in that chair and being

1365
01:27:34,240 --> 01:27:39,920
Speaker 1: taught about Stephen Foster. And as I've grown, you know,

1366
01:27:40,000 --> 01:27:44,160
Speaker 1: I've just find that remarkable that anyone, any parent of

1367
01:27:44,160 --> 01:27:47,360
Speaker 1: a kid who obviously loved music, because I was dancing

1368
01:27:47,400 --> 01:27:50,559
Speaker 1: around and singing and you know, noticing somebody with a

1369
01:27:50,680 --> 01:27:55,439
Speaker 1: drum or a pickle or whatever the piano um and

1370
01:27:55,560 --> 01:27:59,160
Speaker 1: wanting to know about it. Telling a person about a

1371
01:27:59,240 --> 01:28:03,840
Speaker 1: songwriter at that age is just unusual. And it has

1372
01:28:03,880 --> 01:28:08,160
Speaker 1: stayed with me ever since. And I believe even to

1373
01:28:08,280 --> 01:28:11,280
Speaker 1: the sort of music that I like, which you know,

1374
01:28:11,320 --> 01:28:15,400
Speaker 1: the education probably continued, you know, as time went on,

1375
01:28:15,640 --> 01:28:19,519
Speaker 1: but meaning my mother's influence, but the fact that you know,

1376
01:28:19,600 --> 01:28:23,080
Speaker 1: Stephen wrote a certain kind of you know, I didn't

1377
01:28:23,080 --> 01:28:28,440
Speaker 1: know at the time he was America's first professional songwriter. Um,

1378
01:28:28,560 --> 01:28:31,920
Speaker 1: that's pride, a thing. But and also he got screwed

1379
01:28:31,960 --> 01:28:36,360
Speaker 1: out of his royalties, became an alcoholic, and died pretty young.

1380
01:28:36,920 --> 01:28:39,800
Speaker 1: Well everything there is true, except hopefully for the part

1381
01:28:39,840 --> 01:28:44,320
Speaker 1: about dying pretty young, um as far as applied to me.

1382
01:28:45,160 --> 01:28:51,200
Speaker 1: But anyway, um, I think even though I grew into

1383
01:28:51,200 --> 01:28:53,600
Speaker 1: teenage years and became a what I would call a

1384
01:28:53,720 --> 01:28:58,400
Speaker 1: normal rock and roll kid, somehow when it became time

1385
01:28:58,439 --> 01:29:01,360
Speaker 1: for me to create my own music, I hear a

1386
01:29:01,439 --> 01:29:04,960
Speaker 1: lot of Stephen Foster in what I do, and I

1387
01:29:05,000 --> 01:29:09,519
Speaker 1: think that that influence just went in there and stayed

1388
01:29:09,600 --> 01:29:13,880
Speaker 1: there and became part of my voice. Another thing that

1389
01:29:14,000 --> 01:29:18,080
Speaker 1: was very also very influential is my I'm kind of

1390
01:29:18,080 --> 01:29:22,080
Speaker 1: trace backwards, but I think I think this is really important.

1391
01:29:22,120 --> 01:29:24,640
Speaker 1: It was the forties. You know, I'm three, four or

1392
01:29:24,680 --> 01:29:29,639
Speaker 1: five years old. I'm born in um My mom was

1393
01:29:30,000 --> 01:29:34,559
Speaker 1: one of the first folkies. You know. Um obviously her

1394
01:29:34,600 --> 01:29:39,720
Speaker 1: politics were liberal left. My dad too. My parents split up,

1395
01:29:39,760 --> 01:29:41,479
Speaker 1: by the way, when I was about eight. That's why

1396
01:29:41,479 --> 01:29:44,679
Speaker 1: I talked about sitting between them in the car. That's

1397
01:29:44,800 --> 01:29:47,880
Speaker 1: that some of the last memories I have that way.

1398
01:29:47,920 --> 01:29:53,000
Speaker 1: But anyway, um my mom's so she's a liberal person

1399
01:29:53,120 --> 01:29:56,400
Speaker 1: listening to folk music and at some point she starts

1400
01:29:56,439 --> 01:30:01,599
Speaker 1: telling me about those guys, like especially Pete Seeger, and

1401
01:30:02,160 --> 01:30:05,479
Speaker 1: she was a Pete Seeger freak, And so I became

1402
01:30:05,520 --> 01:30:11,400
Speaker 1: a Pete Seeger freak. Before the folks scare, before Tom Dooley,

1403
01:30:11,600 --> 01:30:15,200
Speaker 1: Let's say, I was already knowing a lot about Pete

1404
01:30:15,240 --> 01:30:19,200
Speaker 1: Seeger and his music, but and and a lot of

1405
01:30:19,240 --> 01:30:22,439
Speaker 1: the other artists like Sam Hinton and Burrow Lives and

1406
01:30:23,120 --> 01:30:27,200
Speaker 1: uh several other the weavers. My mom would sing Goodnight

1407
01:30:27,240 --> 01:30:29,760
Speaker 1: Irene all the time. But I was a kid. I

1408
01:30:29,760 --> 01:30:33,559
Speaker 1: didn't have it all historically correct. It was just music.

1409
01:30:34,400 --> 01:30:39,519
Speaker 1: But when the folk festival thing finally happened, and I

1410
01:30:39,560 --> 01:30:44,000
Speaker 1: will say as a result of the Kingston Trio and

1411
01:30:44,120 --> 01:30:49,360
Speaker 1: Tom Dooley. Even though all those old guard folkies hated

1412
01:30:49,360 --> 01:30:54,200
Speaker 1: the Kingston Trio, I think because they were successful commercially,

1413
01:30:54,960 --> 01:30:58,400
Speaker 1: even though you asked about royalties. By the way, all

1414
01:30:58,400 --> 01:31:03,720
Speaker 1: that pezze weren't all at bad um. He was selling records.

1415
01:31:03,760 --> 01:31:08,120
Speaker 1: But somehow the old guard folky's hated that Tom Dooley

1416
01:31:08,400 --> 01:31:12,000
Speaker 1: by the Kingston Trio was on the jukebox right, And

1417
01:31:12,080 --> 01:31:15,719
Speaker 1: so I started to hear from some of the true

1418
01:31:15,720 --> 01:31:18,240
Speaker 1: folkey people. My mom actually took me down to get

1419
01:31:18,600 --> 01:31:23,080
Speaker 1: folk music guitar lessons at light Bolk Park in Berkeley, right,

1420
01:31:23,680 --> 01:31:27,080
Speaker 1: And I remember Barry Olivier, who I consider a very

1421
01:31:27,120 --> 01:31:30,320
Speaker 1: influential person on me, but he was in their crowd.

1422
01:31:30,479 --> 01:31:35,040
Speaker 1: He's an older person, and he talked about how Tom Dooley, Yeah,

1423
01:31:35,439 --> 01:31:38,960
Speaker 1: they put that little pause in there, Tom Dooley, so

1424
01:31:39,080 --> 01:31:40,920
Speaker 1: that the guy at the bar would you know, slip

1425
01:31:40,960 --> 01:31:44,960
Speaker 1: and follow up his elbow with the hiccup, would bother him.

1426
01:31:45,160 --> 01:31:48,000
Speaker 1: And I thought, gee, that had an attitude. Why did

1427
01:31:48,000 --> 01:31:52,639
Speaker 1: he say that. Well, anyway, folk music really took off

1428
01:31:52,680 --> 01:31:56,840
Speaker 1: after Tom Dooley and they started having folk music festivals.

1429
01:31:57,160 --> 01:32:00,160
Speaker 1: The one near me was called the Berkeley Bolk Best

1430
01:32:00,200 --> 01:32:03,920
Speaker 1: of All and put on by this same fella, Barry Olivier,

1431
01:32:04,720 --> 01:32:08,759
Speaker 1: And all those cats were there, Pete Seeger, uh Sam

1432
01:32:08,840 --> 01:32:15,200
Speaker 1: Hinton one year was Lightning Hopkins, um Uh Alan Lomax,

1433
01:32:16,120 --> 01:32:21,320
Speaker 1: uh Ewan McCall, Peggy Seeger, you know, uh, Jesse Fuller,

1434
01:32:21,400 --> 01:32:24,679
Speaker 1: all these people, and Pete of course was the sort

1435
01:32:24,720 --> 01:32:29,960
Speaker 1: of un un anointed god of the whole thing. Also,

1436
01:32:30,720 --> 01:32:33,519
Speaker 1: he's the best entertainer I ever saw. And it's the

1437
01:32:33,560 --> 01:32:37,720
Speaker 1: most blessed experience if you could have ever been in

1438
01:32:37,800 --> 01:32:42,280
Speaker 1: and I've seen Frank and Sammy and Elvis and Dino

1439
01:32:42,800 --> 01:32:45,160
Speaker 1: and you know all that stuff. And uh, I've seen

1440
01:32:45,160 --> 01:32:48,599
Speaker 1: Wayne on Wayne Newton on TV. I mean that they

1441
01:32:48,600 --> 01:32:51,840
Speaker 1: call that entertainers, you know, the Vegas kind of thing.

1442
01:32:52,200 --> 01:32:56,240
Speaker 1: But what Pete did was engaged in entire audience into

1443
01:32:56,280 --> 01:32:58,800
Speaker 1: that world and make them part of it. And you

1444
01:32:58,880 --> 01:33:04,360
Speaker 1: left out of there like had been in church. Um so, yes,

1445
01:33:04,520 --> 01:33:14,400
Speaker 1: you asked me who was influential? Yeah, my mom. So

1446
01:33:14,640 --> 01:33:16,479
Speaker 1: you were born in fourty five. I was born in

1447
01:33:17,200 --> 01:33:20,799
Speaker 1: fifty three, and it was different because I certainly remember

1448
01:33:20,840 --> 01:33:23,840
Speaker 1: the folk boom. I certainly remember the nylon string guitars,

1449
01:33:24,360 --> 01:33:28,479
Speaker 1: taken lessons from somebody in the neighborhood, etcetera. But for

1450
01:33:28,680 --> 01:33:33,240
Speaker 1: my generation, it was when the Beatles broke that everybody

1451
01:33:33,280 --> 01:33:38,040
Speaker 1: got an electric guitar and everybody formed bands. You're older,

1452
01:33:38,520 --> 01:33:42,040
Speaker 1: when did you start to perform? What music were you

1453
01:33:42,240 --> 01:33:45,439
Speaker 1: doing and what was it like when the Beatles hit?

1454
01:33:45,640 --> 01:33:48,360
Speaker 1: Can I do that as a two parter? Do it? However?

1455
01:33:48,400 --> 01:33:54,040
Speaker 1: You want to? Sure? Well, because because of the folk

1456
01:33:54,160 --> 01:33:59,000
Speaker 1: people I literally I'm talking about in the fifth and

1457
01:33:59,200 --> 01:34:03,960
Speaker 1: sixth grade, but usually particularly in the sixth grade, I

1458
01:34:04,040 --> 01:34:09,280
Speaker 1: started organizing a few of the other kids, boys and girls,

1459
01:34:09,320 --> 01:34:11,320
Speaker 1: and I don't think it was more than five of us.

1460
01:34:11,439 --> 01:34:16,559
Speaker 1: But um, well, first before that, about a year before that,

1461
01:34:16,680 --> 01:34:19,200
Speaker 1: I had partnered with my best friend, I Felt, a

1462
01:34:19,280 --> 01:34:24,120
Speaker 1: kid named Bob Carlton. We were pantomiming Stan Freeberg records.

1463
01:34:24,520 --> 01:34:27,040
Speaker 1: They were, you know, these were these comedy bits that

1464
01:34:27,120 --> 01:34:30,719
Speaker 1: he he made fun of Heartbreak Hotel, or he made

1465
01:34:30,720 --> 01:34:34,800
Speaker 1: fun of the song d O by um Harry Belafonte.

1466
01:34:34,960 --> 01:34:37,559
Speaker 1: So we would dress up in little costumes and stand

1467
01:34:37,600 --> 01:34:41,280
Speaker 1: in front of the school class and just pantomime them.

1468
01:34:41,280 --> 01:34:43,799
Speaker 1: We we didn't write anything, and we didn't say anything.

1469
01:34:43,880 --> 01:34:46,880
Speaker 1: Just our lips moved our you know, we held a microphone.

1470
01:34:47,360 --> 01:34:49,400
Speaker 1: So I was already getting used to the idea of

1471
01:34:49,439 --> 01:34:52,679
Speaker 1: standing in front of an audience. In the sixth grade.

1472
01:34:52,760 --> 01:34:56,400
Speaker 1: Kind of halfway through, I organized a group of kids

1473
01:34:56,520 --> 01:34:59,880
Speaker 1: and we had bongos and shakers and stuff. Nobody could

1474
01:35:00,000 --> 01:35:04,200
Speaker 1: actually play a real instrument, but we were doing banana

1475
01:35:04,240 --> 01:35:09,320
Speaker 1: boat song or story whatever it's the real name, deo um,

1476
01:35:09,360 --> 01:35:12,040
Speaker 1: maybe a couple other of those sort of clips. So

1477
01:35:12,160 --> 01:35:17,120
Speaker 1: we folk songs and mostly just singing all right. Um.

1478
01:35:17,520 --> 01:35:19,680
Speaker 1: Seventh eighth grade, I think it's right in there. I

1479
01:35:19,800 --> 01:35:24,320
Speaker 1: take those begin I've already playing guitar. I think I

1480
01:35:24,400 --> 01:35:28,679
Speaker 1: was in the seventh grade. I talked my mom into

1481
01:35:28,720 --> 01:35:33,120
Speaker 1: help me get a Seares electric guitar out of the

1482
01:35:33,160 --> 01:35:37,320
Speaker 1: catalog with my paper route money. And so it takes me,

1483
01:35:37,840 --> 01:35:41,080
Speaker 1: you know, ten months to pay off eight dollars. It's

1484
01:35:41,120 --> 01:35:46,599
Speaker 1: eighty dollars. It's thirty for a guitar, an am, and

1485
01:35:46,720 --> 01:35:52,280
Speaker 1: over the time of eight ten months, it's eight dollars interest. Um,

1486
01:35:52,280 --> 01:35:55,000
Speaker 1: But she co signs, so I get to have the

1487
01:35:55,080 --> 01:35:59,080
Speaker 1: thing now, you know, with eight months in a kid's life.

1488
01:35:59,080 --> 01:36:02,240
Speaker 1: Oh my god, an I start on that. So I'm

1489
01:36:02,280 --> 01:36:05,280
Speaker 1: in both worlds. I've got electric guitar, and of course

1490
01:36:05,320 --> 01:36:10,240
Speaker 1: I'm seeing the people from the fifties Elvis. Uh. There

1491
01:36:10,280 --> 01:36:12,840
Speaker 1: was a song called Honky Talk by Bill Dogg that

1492
01:36:12,960 --> 01:36:17,479
Speaker 1: was way over my pay grade. Um. The first song

1493
01:36:17,520 --> 01:36:20,599
Speaker 1: that I remember on that electric guitar there is pre Beatles,

1494
01:36:20,640 --> 01:36:25,439
Speaker 1: of course, was that I sounded like something was Endless

1495
01:36:25,439 --> 01:36:30,559
Speaker 1: Sleep by Jody Reynolds. I remember on on Endless Sleep

1496
01:36:30,640 --> 01:36:33,479
Speaker 1: by Jody was a big hit record, and it was

1497
01:36:33,560 --> 01:36:37,360
Speaker 1: a it was a suicide record, you might say, well,

1498
01:36:37,400 --> 01:36:40,559
Speaker 1: except it has a happy ending. But um it's called

1499
01:36:40,680 --> 01:36:44,040
Speaker 1: endless sleep. But anyway, they're using a whammy bar to

1500
01:36:44,160 --> 01:36:46,880
Speaker 1: make a lower note become a higher note. And so

1501
01:36:47,040 --> 01:36:51,200
Speaker 1: with that sense of going bom bom bom, boom boon't

1502
01:36:51,240 --> 01:36:53,880
Speaker 1: like that, but it's a guitar doing this. The way

1503
01:36:53,880 --> 01:36:57,800
Speaker 1: I mimic that with my electric guitar with my amp

1504
01:36:57,880 --> 01:37:01,120
Speaker 1: you know, turned up was to him are on the chord.

1505
01:37:01,240 --> 01:37:03,519
Speaker 1: I kind of just discovered it myself. I could go.

1506
01:37:04,240 --> 01:37:10,080
Speaker 1: It's an actual technique that especially lead guitar players, especially

1507
01:37:10,120 --> 01:37:13,320
Speaker 1: in the eighties. Eddie van Halen people like that used

1508
01:37:13,320 --> 01:37:15,800
Speaker 1: this technique to hammer on. But I kind of discovered

1509
01:37:15,840 --> 01:37:19,639
Speaker 1: it to mimic this song I love called Endless Sleep.

1510
01:37:19,720 --> 01:37:24,519
Speaker 1: So I could play these chords. Um enough, there were

1511
01:37:24,560 --> 01:37:26,599
Speaker 1: three chords in this song, and I figured out those

1512
01:37:26,640 --> 01:37:30,559
Speaker 1: three chords from a burl Ives songbook, by the way,

1513
01:37:31,600 --> 01:37:35,719
Speaker 1: and played could play that song all the way through

1514
01:37:35,840 --> 01:37:38,400
Speaker 1: with nobody else around, you know, did it like during

1515
01:37:38,680 --> 01:37:42,080
Speaker 1: lunchtime from school. I'd rushed home and try and play

1516
01:37:42,120 --> 01:37:43,760
Speaker 1: that like and I would just as soon as I

1517
01:37:43,800 --> 01:37:46,200
Speaker 1: finish it, I just started again. That probably played six

1518
01:37:46,240 --> 01:37:48,160
Speaker 1: times in a row, singing as loud as I I

1519
01:37:48,240 --> 01:37:52,760
Speaker 1: wasn't shy because there was nobody home right um, and

1520
01:37:52,800 --> 01:37:57,479
Speaker 1: so by n fifty nine, towards the end of my

1521
01:37:58,479 --> 01:38:03,360
Speaker 1: eighth grade, I had a wonderful music teacher named Mrs Stark,

1522
01:38:03,880 --> 01:38:05,840
Speaker 1: I think in seventh and eighth grade. By now I'm

1523
01:38:05,880 --> 01:38:09,760
Speaker 1: going to junior high. And she let me come into

1524
01:38:09,840 --> 01:38:13,120
Speaker 1: her room after school and just bang on the piano.

1525
01:38:14,080 --> 01:38:16,720
Speaker 1: And I started doing that every day. Uh. And I

1526
01:38:16,800 --> 01:38:18,720
Speaker 1: knew a little boogie woggie and I was playing in

1527
01:38:18,760 --> 01:38:22,120
Speaker 1: wrong keys like all black keys, matter of fact, f

1528
01:38:22,320 --> 01:38:25,519
Speaker 1: sharp um. But she let me do it, and that

1529
01:38:25,680 --> 01:38:29,000
Speaker 1: her room. The door to her room was right at

1530
01:38:29,040 --> 01:38:32,120
Speaker 1: the It was right by the stairs where you went

1531
01:38:32,200 --> 01:38:35,920
Speaker 1: down to the boys and girls gym, so any of

1532
01:38:35,920 --> 01:38:39,479
Speaker 1: the after school stuff, everybody had to pass by there.

1533
01:38:39,960 --> 01:38:42,519
Speaker 1: So pretty soon there was a crowd of twenty people

1534
01:38:43,240 --> 01:38:47,559
Speaker 1: sitting there at that piano watching John play do you

1535
01:38:47,560 --> 01:38:51,000
Speaker 1: want to Dance? Uh? God, what was Do you Want

1536
01:38:51,000 --> 01:38:52,760
Speaker 1: to Dance? Was when I knew all of it could

1537
01:38:52,760 --> 01:38:56,599
Speaker 1: play on the piano. Um, right now I can't think

1538
01:38:56,640 --> 01:38:59,040
Speaker 1: of the other ones, but you know, it doesn't matter anything.

1539
01:38:59,080 --> 01:39:02,000
Speaker 1: I could, Oh, Hollo Gully, I could play Holly Gully

1540
01:39:02,160 --> 01:39:07,120
Speaker 1: really loud and sing it pretty good too. Eventually, Uh,

1541
01:39:07,280 --> 01:39:11,080
Speaker 1: Doug Clifford and I linked up at school because he

1542
01:39:11,120 --> 01:39:15,680
Speaker 1: was at the junior high And sometime after that, uh

1543
01:39:15,920 --> 01:39:21,000
Speaker 1: Stu Cook, who became the bass player in Credence. Uh,

1544
01:39:21,040 --> 01:39:23,800
Speaker 1: we linked up and we formed a little band called

1545
01:39:23,840 --> 01:39:28,280
Speaker 1: the Blue Velvets that mainly we were going to be instrumental,

1546
01:39:29,000 --> 01:39:31,120
Speaker 1: but we you know, we were a band. It's like

1547
01:39:31,520 --> 01:39:34,679
Speaker 1: blood brothers. We have this thing and we probably could

1548
01:39:34,760 --> 01:39:39,200
Speaker 1: play fIF twenty instrumentals, the like of which were Dwayne Eddie,

1549
01:39:39,280 --> 01:39:42,640
Speaker 1: the Ventures and Tall Cool One by the Whalers. And

1550
01:39:43,160 --> 01:39:46,560
Speaker 1: you know that was an era of rock and roll instrumentals.

1551
01:39:47,160 --> 01:39:51,639
Speaker 1: Um BENSI I learned how to play honky talk um again.

1552
01:39:51,680 --> 01:39:54,680
Speaker 1: I'm sure in those days I had none of the

1553
01:39:54,720 --> 01:39:59,280
Speaker 1: sophistication of Billy Butler, who was the guitar player. UM,

1554
01:39:59,720 --> 01:40:02,640
Speaker 1: but sure appreciated. I mean, that's still one of the

1555
01:40:02,640 --> 01:40:07,360
Speaker 1: best records ever made. Uh in you know my negative Woods. Anyway,

1556
01:40:07,640 --> 01:40:11,720
Speaker 1: and so by the time the Beatles came, Uh, I

1557
01:40:11,720 --> 01:40:14,200
Speaker 1: started hearing the Beatles at the end of my senior

1558
01:40:14,240 --> 01:40:19,680
Speaker 1: year of high school. UM. I was miss hearing that

1559
01:40:19,960 --> 01:40:26,120
Speaker 1: they were playing a song called Please Please Me, and

1560
01:40:26,200 --> 01:40:28,920
Speaker 1: I thought It was by the Shields, and they played

1561
01:40:28,920 --> 01:40:32,320
Speaker 1: it in heavy rotation as a pick of the week

1562
01:40:32,479 --> 01:40:34,680
Speaker 1: or whatever, and I would hear it drive. I was

1563
01:40:34,760 --> 01:40:37,040
Speaker 1: driving in my car on my way every day for

1564
01:40:37,080 --> 01:40:42,800
Speaker 1: about a week. It's like May of sixty three, and

1565
01:40:43,960 --> 01:40:46,000
Speaker 1: you know, I liked it. I said, hey, wow, those

1566
01:40:46,000 --> 01:40:48,479
Speaker 1: Shields are pretty cool. You know. I knew there was

1567
01:40:48,520 --> 01:40:51,240
Speaker 1: some old band that had I think you cheated, you lied,

1568
01:40:51,840 --> 01:40:55,240
Speaker 1: but that's what I was hearing. Then for some reason,

1569
01:40:56,400 --> 01:40:58,120
Speaker 1: I didn't know they had turned the record over, but

1570
01:40:58,160 --> 01:41:01,639
Speaker 1: they started playing another record the Shields. It was called

1571
01:41:01,680 --> 01:41:04,639
Speaker 1: from Me to You, and that was so cool. I said,

1572
01:41:04,640 --> 01:41:07,960
Speaker 1: oh my god, who are these guys? You know, this

1573
01:41:08,040 --> 01:41:11,240
Speaker 1: is really great. And then after two weeks they went

1574
01:41:11,280 --> 01:41:14,400
Speaker 1: away and I didn't hear any more about it until

1575
01:41:15,400 --> 01:41:18,680
Speaker 1: somewhere around December. I read in Time magazine there was

1576
01:41:18,720 --> 01:41:22,839
Speaker 1: this band in England and they had played some concert

1577
01:41:22,920 --> 01:41:25,519
Speaker 1: for the Queen. I mean, that was the way it

1578
01:41:25,520 --> 01:41:28,920
Speaker 1: all came together. And one of the band members said, um,

1579
01:41:29,880 --> 01:41:32,960
Speaker 1: you people in the cheap seats just clap your hands

1580
01:41:33,120 --> 01:41:36,479
Speaker 1: and the rest of you rattled your jewels, and I,

1581
01:41:36,600 --> 01:41:40,680
Speaker 1: you know, it was endearing already that these guys were

1582
01:41:40,720 --> 01:41:43,760
Speaker 1: working whoever the Beatles were. I said, hey, I saw

1583
01:41:44,080 --> 01:41:48,000
Speaker 1: a title that I reckon. That's those guys, wow, you know,

1584
01:41:48,040 --> 01:41:50,559
Speaker 1: And they were I think they were in that that

1585
01:41:50,760 --> 01:41:53,720
Speaker 1: stairway picture, you know, in the stairway that we're all

1586
01:41:53,760 --> 01:41:56,799
Speaker 1: wearing black, and they just looked it was all together.

1587
01:41:56,960 --> 01:42:00,960
Speaker 1: It was a group, you know, just but not our fashion,

1588
01:42:01,320 --> 01:42:05,400
Speaker 1: this whole different look. While the rest of the world

1589
01:42:05,439 --> 01:42:07,880
Speaker 1: found out about it must have been a matter of

1590
01:42:07,920 --> 01:42:10,479
Speaker 1: weeks when suddenly you were here and I want to

1591
01:42:10,479 --> 01:42:14,120
Speaker 1: hold your hand, and it uh the way I the

1592
01:42:14,160 --> 01:42:16,800
Speaker 1: way I sometimes say it is when we were when

1593
01:42:17,000 --> 01:42:20,720
Speaker 1: we were seniors in high school at Elsevito High, we

1594
01:42:20,720 --> 01:42:24,000
Speaker 1: were the only band in the school. The next year

1595
01:42:24,200 --> 01:42:30,519
Speaker 1: there were a hundred bands. Also, not long thereafter, we

1596
01:42:30,560 --> 01:42:33,840
Speaker 1: have the famous San Francisco scene, which starts to you know,

1597
01:42:33,920 --> 01:42:37,000
Speaker 1: percolate in the mid sixties, and by time we hit

1598
01:42:37,080 --> 01:42:41,479
Speaker 1: the sixties, seven Jefferson Airplane has a hit that's across

1599
01:42:41,840 --> 01:42:44,120
Speaker 1: the river from you. But to what degree did you

1600
01:42:44,200 --> 01:42:46,920
Speaker 1: feel part of that scene? And did you partake of

1601
01:42:47,000 --> 01:42:49,600
Speaker 1: that scene? Go to the film or whatever. It was

1602
01:42:49,640 --> 01:42:55,680
Speaker 1: all mixed up together. Um, the politics or philosophy of

1603
01:42:55,800 --> 01:43:01,360
Speaker 1: young people, the war Vietnam, l b J being the

1604
01:43:01,479 --> 01:43:04,679
Speaker 1: first Nixon, then lb excuse me, lb J, then Nixon.

1605
01:43:04,760 --> 01:43:08,200
Speaker 1: But at this time it was lb J and that war,

1606
01:43:08,520 --> 01:43:13,040
Speaker 1: you know, sixty s or so and the music and

1607
01:43:13,120 --> 01:43:17,000
Speaker 1: at some I mean you, I'm trying to give you

1608
01:43:17,040 --> 01:43:21,840
Speaker 1: the first blush of this thing. There were protesters protesting

1609
01:43:22,640 --> 01:43:26,360
Speaker 1: the war. Uh. Actually before that, there had been this

1610
01:43:26,400 --> 01:43:29,719
Speaker 1: thing on the cal campus cal Berkeley called the free

1611
01:43:29,760 --> 01:43:34,760
Speaker 1: speech Movement and Mario Savio and they wanted the right

1612
01:43:34,880 --> 01:43:36,920
Speaker 1: to be able to say the F bomb. And I'm

1613
01:43:36,920 --> 01:43:39,439
Speaker 1: not gonna say it here because even though I say

1614
01:43:39,479 --> 01:43:42,960
Speaker 1: it all the time, and I regretted even around my

1615
01:43:43,080 --> 01:43:47,840
Speaker 1: kids who are adults. Um, I try not to say

1616
01:43:47,880 --> 01:43:51,559
Speaker 1: I say it when I I'm agitated, but I try

1617
01:43:51,640 --> 01:43:54,680
Speaker 1: to not just say it as an affectation. I don't

1618
01:43:54,680 --> 01:43:56,880
Speaker 1: know if that makes any sense to you. But so

1619
01:43:56,960 --> 01:44:01,720
Speaker 1: that was sort of a short lived political movement, the

1620
01:44:01,840 --> 01:44:05,640
Speaker 1: very speech movement. It's kind of silly, but all the

1621
01:44:05,720 --> 01:44:09,280
Speaker 1: mechanics were in place for what later became the anti

1622
01:44:09,360 --> 01:44:12,760
Speaker 1: war movement. But the funny thing was, in the beginning

1623
01:44:13,200 --> 01:44:16,479
Speaker 1: the anti war movement was was a bit messed up.

1624
01:44:17,040 --> 01:44:21,160
Speaker 1: I know that, Um, there was this there was gonna

1625
01:44:21,200 --> 01:44:24,559
Speaker 1: be a troop train go by somewhere on the tracks

1626
01:44:25,320 --> 01:44:28,519
Speaker 1: down in the lower part of Berkeley and Oakland, and

1627
01:44:28,560 --> 01:44:32,080
Speaker 1: of all people, the Hell's Angels were there. But there

1628
01:44:32,120 --> 01:44:33,920
Speaker 1: were you know, there were a few people that were

1629
01:44:33,920 --> 01:44:38,479
Speaker 1: trying to stop the train, and then the Hell's Angels

1630
01:44:38,479 --> 01:44:42,960
Speaker 1: were actually acting like true blooded Americans in the John

1631
01:44:42,960 --> 01:44:47,720
Speaker 1: Wayne uh songbook and helped keep the train moving. You know.

1632
01:44:48,200 --> 01:44:50,800
Speaker 1: It was just a strange thing. Of course, later the

1633
01:44:50,800 --> 01:44:55,960
Speaker 1: Hell's Angels became what's the word, They had enough cred that, uh,

1634
01:44:56,040 --> 01:44:59,560
Speaker 1: they were now seen as liberals where they were unfortunately

1635
01:45:00,080 --> 01:45:04,559
Speaker 1: are to be bodyguards at Altamont, but eventually kind of

1636
01:45:04,600 --> 01:45:08,599
Speaker 1: seen as criminals. And the whole thing was actually pretty scummy,

1637
01:45:08,760 --> 01:45:13,040
Speaker 1: you know, pretty bad um. And that's just a blip

1638
01:45:13,040 --> 01:45:17,200
Speaker 1: on the radar to leading up to the music I had.

1639
01:45:17,320 --> 01:45:22,000
Speaker 1: I had only vaguely heard about something happening in Golden

1640
01:45:22,000 --> 01:45:25,760
Speaker 1: Gate Park and that there was musicians and music over there,

1641
01:45:25,800 --> 01:45:31,000
Speaker 1: and it kind of it felt like it was amateurish um.

1642
01:45:31,040 --> 01:45:35,400
Speaker 1: But then by nineteen sixty seven, at least from me,

1643
01:45:36,520 --> 01:45:39,760
Speaker 1: there was a local radio station called k mp X.

1644
01:45:40,280 --> 01:45:46,080
Speaker 1: It eventually became known as the world's first underground video

1645
01:45:46,160 --> 01:45:50,120
Speaker 1: station and lo and behold, it was Tom Donahue who

1646
01:45:50,200 --> 01:45:52,320
Speaker 1: was the main guy. He had He had been a

1647
01:45:52,360 --> 01:45:55,760
Speaker 1: normal rock and roll DJ on k y A, a

1648
01:45:55,840 --> 01:46:00,120
Speaker 1: top forty station in the Bay Area. Tom Donahue and

1649
01:46:00,320 --> 01:46:04,720
Speaker 1: uh Mitchell, Bob Mitchell, Mitchell and Donahue were kind of

1650
01:46:04,760 --> 01:46:07,680
Speaker 1: the kings of the rock and roll in Bay the

1651
01:46:07,720 --> 01:46:10,920
Speaker 1: Bay Area, you know, the normal place. And I was

1652
01:46:10,960 --> 01:46:13,840
Speaker 1: getting a little older, you know, rock was getting a

1653
01:46:13,840 --> 01:46:17,160
Speaker 1: little older, and now there was just underground thing that

1654
01:46:17,280 --> 01:46:20,519
Speaker 1: was really cool because you know, there was a lot

1655
01:46:20,560 --> 01:46:24,320
Speaker 1: of music that was perhaps not played on the rock,

1656
01:46:24,479 --> 01:46:27,920
Speaker 1: the top forty station, or maybe not played right away.

1657
01:46:27,960 --> 01:46:30,559
Speaker 1: And I'm talking about what we kind of called stacks

1658
01:46:30,680 --> 01:46:33,400
Speaker 1: music or soul music. And I was, of course, I

1659
01:46:33,400 --> 01:46:36,080
Speaker 1: always listened to the black station, the R and B station,

1660
01:46:36,640 --> 01:46:40,280
Speaker 1: and you heard much of the music that made it

1661
01:46:40,400 --> 01:46:42,760
Speaker 1: later into the top forty you would hear it on

1662
01:46:42,800 --> 01:46:45,519
Speaker 1: the R and B station. First. I'm talking about Otis

1663
01:46:45,560 --> 01:46:50,320
Speaker 1: Redding and Eddie Floyd. As far as the San Francisco scene,

1664
01:46:51,400 --> 01:46:55,720
Speaker 1: it starts to it starts to become more noticed for

1665
01:46:55,800 --> 01:46:58,839
Speaker 1: at least for me, when when one of the Stacks artists,

1666
01:46:59,720 --> 01:47:02,160
Speaker 1: and certainly it was there that you started to hear

1667
01:47:03,720 --> 01:47:09,759
Speaker 1: Grateful Dead, Quicksilver, the Airplane, you know, the San Francisco bands,

1668
01:47:10,720 --> 01:47:16,400
Speaker 1: and that was it was quite clearly also politically involved

1669
01:47:16,439 --> 01:47:21,040
Speaker 1: with what young people were feeling at the time. There

1670
01:47:21,120 --> 01:47:25,720
Speaker 1: was there was there was no real party, you know,

1671
01:47:25,840 --> 01:47:29,479
Speaker 1: it was that organized quite that way. I think the

1672
01:47:29,560 --> 01:47:32,960
Speaker 1: real thing that was that everyone had in common is

1673
01:47:33,000 --> 01:47:35,599
Speaker 1: that they were young, uh, and it was just a

1674
01:47:35,640 --> 01:47:40,439
Speaker 1: different mindset obviously than let's say L. B. J or

1675
01:47:40,520 --> 01:47:44,760
Speaker 1: Hubert Humphrey or any of the other old people you

1676
01:47:44,800 --> 01:47:49,360
Speaker 1: know that we were looking at and the music because

1677
01:47:49,439 --> 01:47:55,720
Speaker 1: it was even more um, even more free form than

1678
01:47:55,840 --> 01:47:58,240
Speaker 1: rock and roll. You know, rock and roll was sort

1679
01:47:58,240 --> 01:48:01,639
Speaker 1: of on the top forty stations, and this was kind

1680
01:48:01,640 --> 01:48:04,599
Speaker 1: of a new thing that was. I mean, we loved

1681
01:48:04,840 --> 01:48:07,880
Speaker 1: at that place. We loved the records by Stas, We

1682
01:48:08,000 --> 01:48:12,320
Speaker 1: loved Van Morrison, you know, people that kind of that

1683
01:48:12,360 --> 01:48:15,880
Speaker 1: blues based rock. But then there was this other new

1684
01:48:15,960 --> 01:48:21,160
Speaker 1: thing coming in, particularly from San Francisco bands, and that

1685
01:48:21,360 --> 01:48:23,920
Speaker 1: was getting played on k mp X. And to what

1686
01:48:24,080 --> 01:48:26,680
Speaker 1: degree were you into that. Were you more of a

1687
01:48:26,800 --> 01:48:30,920
Speaker 1: roots rocker or were you buying those records, listening to

1688
01:48:30,960 --> 01:48:35,960
Speaker 1: those records, doing drugs, going on trips. The funny thing was, well,

1689
01:48:36,000 --> 01:48:40,240
Speaker 1: I went on I went on active duty for the military,

1690
01:48:40,280 --> 01:48:45,439
Speaker 1: for the Army in late January of nineteen sixty seven.

1691
01:48:45,640 --> 01:48:47,800
Speaker 1: Before you tell us this story, how did you end

1692
01:48:47,880 --> 01:48:51,320
Speaker 1: up going into the military, because that was our worst fear. Yes,

1693
01:48:51,360 --> 01:48:56,879
Speaker 1: but I got drafted. I got drafted in early nineteen

1694
01:48:57,479 --> 01:49:03,920
Speaker 1: sixty six. Um, do you want to hear that story? Yes,

1695
01:49:04,479 --> 01:49:09,920
Speaker 1: every every young person, every young male, I guess, was

1696
01:49:10,960 --> 01:49:18,720
Speaker 1: pretty much uh having trepidation, trepidation about being drafted. Um.

1697
01:49:18,880 --> 01:49:21,120
Speaker 1: There was this war in Vietnam that none of us

1698
01:49:21,200 --> 01:49:25,720
Speaker 1: knew much about, and strangely, there had been this kind

1699
01:49:25,760 --> 01:49:33,200
Speaker 1: of surprise announcement right at the end of August. On

1700
01:49:33,439 --> 01:49:37,400
Speaker 1: August thirty one, who I heard. I heard the announcement

1701
01:49:37,439 --> 01:49:40,960
Speaker 1: on the radio at about eleven thirty twelve o'clock in

1702
01:49:41,000 --> 01:49:44,600
Speaker 1: the morning, and it said, all of you who have

1703
01:49:45,479 --> 01:49:51,120
Speaker 1: draft deferments because of various reasons, will now not have

1704
01:49:51,760 --> 01:49:56,840
Speaker 1: draft deferments, and you will all be eligible for the

1705
01:49:56,960 --> 01:50:06,439
Speaker 1: draft after August at the first nineteen unless you happen

1706
01:50:06,479 --> 01:50:10,759
Speaker 1: to be married. And I was getting married in five days,

1707
01:50:12,160 --> 01:50:16,240
Speaker 1: and I remember thinking for five minutes or something, Wow,

1708
01:50:17,040 --> 01:50:19,960
Speaker 1: maybe I should go get married now up in Reno

1709
01:50:20,160 --> 01:50:23,759
Speaker 1: or something. But you know, I kind of it almost

1710
01:50:23,760 --> 01:50:28,720
Speaker 1: felt like that was a travesty to kind of to

1711
01:50:30,240 --> 01:50:35,040
Speaker 1: let this affect something as beautiful as a marriage, right, uh, deferment.

1712
01:50:35,160 --> 01:50:38,240
Speaker 1: And I got a draft notice and that was giving

1713
01:50:38,240 --> 01:50:41,680
Speaker 1: me a certain time that I was to report, and

1714
01:50:41,760 --> 01:50:44,840
Speaker 1: I got pretty agitated about all that. I actually went

1715
01:50:44,880 --> 01:50:48,280
Speaker 1: down to the draft board and this young lady who

1716
01:50:48,320 --> 01:50:54,439
Speaker 1: was probably twenty one. You know, but you're almost seeing

1717
01:50:55,000 --> 01:50:58,680
Speaker 1: the wicked witch from the Wizard of Oz talking to you,

1718
01:50:58,800 --> 01:51:02,160
Speaker 1: because you know they're on the what's the word there

1719
01:51:02,160 --> 01:51:06,479
Speaker 1: in the untouchable seats and your own situation is much worse.

1720
01:51:07,120 --> 01:51:10,800
Speaker 1: And she says something like, well, if your wife could

1721
01:51:10,840 --> 01:51:16,439
Speaker 1: become come pregnant before and I'm going you mean become

1722
01:51:16,479 --> 01:51:24,280
Speaker 1: pregnant as of yesterday. So none of that was working. Um,

1723
01:51:24,360 --> 01:51:27,679
Speaker 1: And finally, what what happened, I was I was pretty

1724
01:51:27,720 --> 01:51:32,040
Speaker 1: agitated about going in right away, going into the regular army.

1725
01:51:32,680 --> 01:51:36,200
Speaker 1: And I poked around and and you know, the word

1726
01:51:36,720 --> 01:51:40,080
Speaker 1: went to all the National Guards and called people and

1727
01:51:40,160 --> 01:51:45,679
Speaker 1: all the rest, and finally found an army reserve unit

1728
01:51:46,600 --> 01:51:51,040
Speaker 1: that I was able to get into. And the truth

1729
01:51:51,080 --> 01:51:55,599
Speaker 1: of the matter, matter is I believe my now wife,

1730
01:51:55,680 --> 01:51:59,280
Speaker 1: young wife had called that place and the fella that

1731
01:51:59,520 --> 01:52:03,639
Speaker 1: was the sergeant in charge of that unit said something,

1732
01:52:04,200 --> 01:52:06,800
Speaker 1: you just tell him to get on down here and

1733
01:52:06,840 --> 01:52:09,160
Speaker 1: we'll sign him up, and she had you know, she

1734
01:52:09,240 --> 01:52:12,800
Speaker 1: had heard something in her voice. I've always thought that,

1735
01:52:12,840 --> 01:52:14,599
Speaker 1: you know, if I had a called, he probably would

1736
01:52:14,640 --> 01:52:17,280
Speaker 1: have said, you get down here, buddy, and you know

1737
01:52:17,880 --> 01:52:21,439
Speaker 1: they're going to Vietnam. Um. So that was how I

1738
01:52:21,520 --> 01:52:25,840
Speaker 1: got into the Army reserves, which meant I still had

1739
01:52:25,880 --> 01:52:29,599
Speaker 1: an obligation for active duty, and I was looking at

1740
01:52:29,680 --> 01:52:34,760
Speaker 1: probably six years of total of service, meaning once a

1741
01:52:34,800 --> 01:52:40,400
Speaker 1: month meetings, once once a month, weekends, and also every

1742
01:52:40,439 --> 01:52:45,639
Speaker 1: summer two weeks worth of UH boot camp all over again,

1743
01:52:45,680 --> 01:52:49,120
Speaker 1: I guess you'd say. So it turned out that my

1744
01:52:49,240 --> 01:52:55,120
Speaker 1: active duty came up in January of sixty seven. But

1745
01:52:55,240 --> 01:52:58,000
Speaker 1: the guys in what I was musically what the guys

1746
01:52:58,360 --> 01:53:01,040
Speaker 1: what I was getting to is we travel on these

1747
01:53:01,080 --> 01:53:06,680
Speaker 1: long um. I was already going to Army meetings by

1748
01:53:06,680 --> 01:53:10,280
Speaker 1: the way, reserve meetings, and sometimes we would be three

1749
01:53:10,680 --> 01:53:14,080
Speaker 1: miles away playing a show on on a Friday night

1750
01:53:14,520 --> 01:53:17,479
Speaker 1: and have to get back to my home so that

1751
01:53:17,560 --> 01:53:20,880
Speaker 1: I could be at seven o'clock um in the morning

1752
01:53:21,640 --> 01:53:25,439
Speaker 1: Army Reserve meeting, and a lot of times on the

1753
01:53:25,520 --> 01:53:27,960
Speaker 1: way back, I was talking to the guys about some

1754
01:53:28,040 --> 01:53:31,920
Speaker 1: of these records I had, and they were, um, some

1755
01:53:32,040 --> 01:53:34,840
Speaker 1: of them were available. They were it was through our

1756
01:53:34,880 --> 01:53:37,960
Speaker 1: Holy Records, but it didn't say our Holy. It said

1757
01:53:38,000 --> 01:53:42,680
Speaker 1: something like old time classics, things like that. And I

1758
01:53:42,760 --> 01:53:46,800
Speaker 1: had these copies of tracks I had never heard before

1759
01:53:46,840 --> 01:53:50,440
Speaker 1: in my life, one of which was rolling in Tumbling

1760
01:53:51,160 --> 01:53:55,719
Speaker 1: by I think it was baby Face Leroy was actually

1761
01:53:55,760 --> 01:53:58,000
Speaker 1: I didn't find out untill later that that actually was

1762
01:53:58,080 --> 01:54:02,439
Speaker 1: Mighty Waters, but they contry actually he was recording somewhere

1763
01:54:02,479 --> 01:54:04,760
Speaker 1: else where he wasn't supposed to be, so they named

1764
01:54:04,760 --> 01:54:09,439
Speaker 1: the track after the artist. After the drummer. Um, I

1765
01:54:09,520 --> 01:54:12,240
Speaker 1: heard an old song called Honey, take a whiff on Me,

1766
01:54:13,040 --> 01:54:15,960
Speaker 1: A lot of old blues things, and I would tell

1767
01:54:16,000 --> 01:54:18,360
Speaker 1: the guys about them, and somehow I think I had

1768
01:54:18,360 --> 01:54:21,759
Speaker 1: a little recorder. I was able to play stuff back

1769
01:54:21,800 --> 01:54:25,679
Speaker 1: in this old Volkswagen that we would have a van

1770
01:54:25,840 --> 01:54:28,600
Speaker 1: that we would travel in. So anyway, there it was

1771
01:54:28,640 --> 01:54:33,640
Speaker 1: almost like before active duty and after active duty. So

1772
01:54:33,680 --> 01:54:37,480
Speaker 1: I was telling the guys about this music four or

1773
01:54:37,480 --> 01:54:40,600
Speaker 1: five months and then I went on active duty. By

1774
01:54:40,640 --> 01:54:43,000
Speaker 1: time I came back, they were telling me about this

1775
01:54:43,200 --> 01:54:45,880
Speaker 1: radio station that was playing all these things, you know,

1776
01:54:46,000 --> 01:54:49,440
Speaker 1: and I, oh, cool, Yeah, that was exactly what, you know,

1777
01:54:49,520 --> 01:54:54,240
Speaker 1: the the touchstone you might say, of the place. And

1778
01:54:54,320 --> 01:54:57,440
Speaker 1: so now you could tune into a radio station and

1779
01:54:57,920 --> 01:55:00,200
Speaker 1: hear all this stuff. I was talking about a lot

1780
01:55:00,240 --> 01:55:03,480
Speaker 1: of other groovy stuff. And of course the local bands

1781
01:55:03,520 --> 01:55:07,720
Speaker 1: were also getting played. So that kind of for the

1782
01:55:07,880 --> 01:55:11,520
Speaker 1: for the pilgrims that joined the Faithful, that sort of

1783
01:55:11,560 --> 01:55:15,280
Speaker 1: became the altar, the place where you started listening to

1784
01:55:16,840 --> 01:55:21,200
Speaker 1: more often than not, because you're gonna be surprised, you know,

1785
01:55:21,600 --> 01:55:23,920
Speaker 1: on a top board the station you sort of had

1786
01:55:23,960 --> 01:55:28,080
Speaker 1: the way wade your way through the cow sills and

1787
01:55:28,120 --> 01:55:31,440
Speaker 1: all the you know, I mean pop music in the middle,

1788
01:55:31,760 --> 01:55:35,400
Speaker 1: you know, centrist, if you're gonna use political terms, it's centrist,

1789
01:55:36,000 --> 01:55:39,440
Speaker 1: kind of sappy, but it's vanilla, and the most people

1790
01:55:39,560 --> 01:55:42,840
Speaker 1: like that. And then there's that small percentage it might

1791
01:55:42,880 --> 01:55:45,040
Speaker 1: be ten pc it's on I'm talking about on the

1792
01:55:45,040 --> 01:55:49,040
Speaker 1: pop station that's really sort of edgy, and even the

1793
01:55:49,040 --> 01:55:52,920
Speaker 1: censers like some of that, and they can't believe how

1794
01:55:52,960 --> 01:55:55,720
Speaker 1: great it is once once they get in the mood

1795
01:55:56,600 --> 01:55:59,920
Speaker 1: um and that stuff. You know, the Beatles where they

1796
01:56:00,040 --> 01:56:02,240
Speaker 1: in the beginning, and so was Alvis at the beginning

1797
01:56:02,240 --> 01:56:05,360
Speaker 1: of their careers. I mean, and then there came a

1798
01:56:05,400 --> 01:56:09,320
Speaker 1: time when in the Bay Area all these bands like

1799
01:56:09,880 --> 01:56:13,800
Speaker 1: Big Brother and the Airplane and even the Dead or

1800
01:56:13,840 --> 01:56:16,880
Speaker 1: a moment, you know, they were that edgy thing that

1801
01:56:17,000 --> 01:56:18,800
Speaker 1: was just too far out for the you know, that

1802
01:56:18,840 --> 01:56:21,280
Speaker 1: middle of vanilla place. But anyway that was it was

1803
01:56:21,520 --> 01:56:26,000
Speaker 1: a a wonderful It was almost like the beginning of

1804
01:56:26,080 --> 01:56:29,720
Speaker 1: rock and roll in nineteen all over again. Here it

1805
01:56:29,800 --> 01:56:33,400
Speaker 1: was a nineteen sixty seven with k mp X sort

1806
01:56:33,440 --> 01:56:38,360
Speaker 1: of bringing clearly into focus this way of thinking, which

1807
01:56:38,400 --> 01:56:42,640
Speaker 1: I think is part of it, um and this way

1808
01:56:42,680 --> 01:56:45,440
Speaker 1: of listening to music and a certain kind of music

1809
01:56:46,120 --> 01:56:49,440
Speaker 1: that was cool, and some were even more edgy than cool,

1810
01:56:49,520 --> 01:56:51,680
Speaker 1: you know. There it took a while to kind of

1811
01:56:52,640 --> 01:56:55,520
Speaker 1: get out there with those you know, with those people,

1812
01:56:55,600 --> 01:57:00,200
Speaker 1: but eventually that was brought into it. You know. At

1813
01:57:00,200 --> 01:57:02,240
Speaker 1: the same time some of the shows we were doing

1814
01:57:02,280 --> 01:57:05,400
Speaker 1: that we're late, we'd we'd come home listening to Wolfman

1815
01:57:05,560 --> 01:57:09,960
Speaker 1: Jack and during the middle sixties there he was definitely

1816
01:57:10,000 --> 01:57:13,440
Speaker 1: in that same place. I don't know that I don't

1817
01:57:13,440 --> 01:57:17,640
Speaker 1: think there was one word about politics. Um, but wolf

1818
01:57:17,640 --> 01:57:22,280
Speaker 1: Man jack was definitely cool. And the music, um, I

1819
01:57:22,760 --> 01:57:25,240
Speaker 1: just spoke for itself. And that's that's where I heard

1820
01:57:25,560 --> 01:57:30,880
Speaker 1: things like Mistake Eyes or that wonderful Freddie Scott record

1821
01:57:30,920 --> 01:57:34,560
Speaker 1: and it I think it's called are You Lonely for Me? Baby?

1822
01:57:34,600 --> 01:57:38,200
Speaker 1: But all I remember is it's my last bus to Jacksonville.

1823
01:57:38,280 --> 01:57:43,200
Speaker 1: Whatever became a a mainstream hit. But I first heard

1824
01:57:43,280 --> 01:57:53,080
Speaker 1: stuff like that on Wolfman. Okay, when was the first

1825
01:57:53,080 --> 01:57:55,280
Speaker 1: time you heard yourself on the radio And what was

1826
01:57:55,320 --> 01:58:01,760
Speaker 1: that experience? Like, it's a lot earlier than you might think. Um,

1827
01:58:01,840 --> 01:58:08,600
Speaker 1: we the Blue Velvets. That was that trio of Doug

1828
01:58:08,640 --> 01:58:13,920
Speaker 1: and Stu and I uh. In junior high school. We

1829
01:58:13,920 --> 01:58:18,880
Speaker 1: we got adopted by our local boys club, which was

1830
01:58:19,160 --> 01:58:22,440
Speaker 1: really half a block away from our junior high school.

1831
01:58:22,520 --> 01:58:26,520
Speaker 1: It was right there. And this wonderful man named Bob.

1832
01:58:26,600 --> 01:58:30,200
Speaker 1: And I confess that I've looked for his name and

1833
01:58:30,200 --> 01:58:33,640
Speaker 1: tried to google. You know that Bob. Here's another Bob

1834
01:58:33,760 --> 01:58:36,520
Speaker 1: by the way, that person that was with the Del

1835
01:58:36,600 --> 01:58:42,160
Speaker 1: Crito Boys Club in nine And you know, I've never

1836
01:58:42,200 --> 01:58:46,320
Speaker 1: been able to track down his full name, his last name,

1837
01:58:46,800 --> 01:58:51,400
Speaker 1: but he adopted us. Um. I mean, now it kind

1838
01:58:51,400 --> 01:58:54,000
Speaker 1: of makes more sense, but at the time I was

1839
01:58:54,080 --> 01:58:57,600
Speaker 1: just a kid fourteen years old with a paper out

1840
01:58:57,640 --> 01:59:01,240
Speaker 1: with two of my musical friends. We had this, you know,

1841
01:59:01,360 --> 01:59:06,640
Speaker 1: we considered ourselves a little little amateur band, um, and

1842
01:59:06,680 --> 01:59:10,480
Speaker 1: we were a rock and roll band. And he adopted

1843
01:59:10,600 --> 01:59:14,680
Speaker 1: us to go represent our boys club and play in

1844
01:59:14,720 --> 01:59:19,240
Speaker 1: these get togethers with all the other boys clubs, you know,

1845
01:59:19,280 --> 01:59:24,120
Speaker 1: like a Saturday on into evening type festival. And it

1846
01:59:24,200 --> 01:59:27,720
Speaker 1: was the most wonderful thing because at that very early age,

1847
01:59:27,800 --> 01:59:32,000
Speaker 1: we were being presented as something in a white shirt

1848
01:59:32,080 --> 01:59:34,560
Speaker 1: with a I think that was called a continental tie

1849
01:59:34,840 --> 01:59:38,280
Speaker 1: that that, you know, and made us look finished. I

1850
01:59:38,320 --> 01:59:41,080
Speaker 1: think we were all allowed to just have any We

1851
01:59:41,080 --> 01:59:43,720
Speaker 1: didn't have pants because that was too expensive, so we

1852
01:59:43,760 --> 01:59:46,880
Speaker 1: had each had some kind of black pants and some

1853
01:59:46,960 --> 01:59:49,240
Speaker 1: kind of we didn't there were no beatle boots yet,

1854
01:59:49,240 --> 01:59:53,040
Speaker 1: but we weren't quite that uniform. We were kids, but

1855
01:59:53,200 --> 01:59:57,959
Speaker 1: we were being presented and treated as if we mattered

1856
01:59:58,120 --> 02:00:01,240
Speaker 1: like like that. It was legitimate, and you know, we'd

1857
02:00:01,280 --> 02:00:04,440
Speaker 1: go play a couple of songs. We might play Walk

1858
02:00:04,480 --> 02:00:08,640
Speaker 1: Don't Run, or we might play an original one of

1859
02:00:08,680 --> 02:00:12,480
Speaker 1: the songs. I had written as an instrumental, and Bob

1860
02:00:13,200 --> 02:00:15,280
Speaker 1: would drive us there and talk to us. You know.

1861
02:00:15,360 --> 02:00:18,040
Speaker 1: We had the whole well, the piano was there. It

1862
02:00:18,200 --> 02:00:24,640
Speaker 1: was drums, guitar and piano was the instrumentation, and uh

1863
02:00:24,840 --> 02:00:26,880
Speaker 1: Doug had a few drums and I had my little

1864
02:00:26,920 --> 02:00:29,720
Speaker 1: guitar set up. But Bob would talk to us, you know,

1865
02:00:29,840 --> 02:00:34,000
Speaker 1: and kind of give us adult lessons. I'll tell you

1866
02:00:34,040 --> 02:00:37,360
Speaker 1: the most important one I ever had. We had been

1867
02:00:37,480 --> 02:00:41,160
Speaker 1: driven to a place to play, and we were going

1868
02:00:41,240 --> 02:00:45,520
Speaker 1: to you know, we were the boys club representative. And

1869
02:00:46,280 --> 02:00:48,960
Speaker 1: for some reason I was trying to plug in my amplifier,

1870
02:00:49,040 --> 02:00:53,440
Speaker 1: but my AMP would not reach the electrical outlet. I

1871
02:00:53,520 --> 02:00:57,480
Speaker 1: needed an extension cord, which wasn't part of my arsenal,

1872
02:00:58,280 --> 02:01:01,320
Speaker 1: and so I went over to find you know, I

1873
02:01:01,320 --> 02:01:03,160
Speaker 1: gotta find Bob. I gotta find, you know, because I'm

1874
02:01:03,160 --> 02:01:07,880
Speaker 1: in a strange location to do this. But I I

1875
02:01:07,920 --> 02:01:10,320
Speaker 1: don't even actually remember doing it, but I know it

1876
02:01:10,400 --> 02:01:14,839
Speaker 1: happened because I heard the the playback of the tape,

1877
02:01:14,880 --> 02:01:17,840
Speaker 1: you might say, from Bob. I walked up and Bob

1878
02:01:17,880 --> 02:01:22,600
Speaker 1: was sitting talking with another gentleman who was obviously in

1879
02:01:22,640 --> 02:01:26,920
Speaker 1: a similar position with another Boys Club but I must

1880
02:01:26,920 --> 02:01:32,040
Speaker 1: have kind of interrupted urgently, sort of certainly, without asking

1881
02:01:32,320 --> 02:01:35,360
Speaker 1: please or may I interrupt you? I probably walked up

1882
02:01:35,360 --> 02:01:38,960
Speaker 1: and said something like I really needed extension cord. My

1883
02:01:39,000 --> 02:01:41,560
Speaker 1: aunt's not gonna work without, you know, like I'm so

1884
02:01:41,640 --> 02:01:45,640
Speaker 1: important in other words, um, and Bob looked at me,

1885
02:01:46,200 --> 02:01:49,120
Speaker 1: looked at the other gentleman. Because I didn't realize I

1886
02:01:49,160 --> 02:01:52,680
Speaker 1: had done this. I just suddenly, he was now saying

1887
02:01:53,640 --> 02:01:59,400
Speaker 1: his mannerism, said whoa time out? Slow down? Right? And

1888
02:01:59,520 --> 02:02:04,480
Speaker 1: he said, first you should say please. Now I realized

1889
02:02:04,520 --> 02:02:07,920
Speaker 1: I've done something wrong that you should ask me as

1890
02:02:07,920 --> 02:02:12,720
Speaker 1: a request, may I please have your help, your assistance,

1891
02:02:13,280 --> 02:02:17,520
Speaker 1: because I really need to find an extension court and

1892
02:02:17,680 --> 02:02:21,840
Speaker 1: I forgot to bring one. I've looked at Bob, and

1893
02:02:21,880 --> 02:02:23,960
Speaker 1: of course I'm sure I was hot under the collar

1894
02:02:24,040 --> 02:02:28,480
Speaker 1: then did what he said. But in all the years later,

1895
02:02:28,560 --> 02:02:31,160
Speaker 1: when I've thought about that moment and and Bob, through

1896
02:02:31,200 --> 02:02:34,560
Speaker 1: many more appearances that we did and a couple of

1897
02:02:34,640 --> 02:02:39,480
Speaker 1: years of it, actually I've thanked him in my mind that, wow,

1898
02:02:40,040 --> 02:02:42,840
Speaker 1: you know, I was a snotty kid who thought he

1899
02:02:42,920 --> 02:02:47,200
Speaker 1: was important, that I was obviously what's the word embarrassed

1900
02:02:47,240 --> 02:02:50,480
Speaker 1: that I didn't have it together, and so now I

1901
02:02:50,520 --> 02:02:54,080
Speaker 1: was urgently whatever that is, because that's so big. You

1902
02:02:54,160 --> 02:02:57,000
Speaker 1: see so much of that crop. In fact, now we

1903
02:02:57,120 --> 02:03:01,320
Speaker 1: expect it from our celebrities. Is horrible. And Bob kind

1904
02:03:01,320 --> 02:03:04,840
Speaker 1: of stopped me in my tracks at probably fourteen years old,

1905
02:03:05,680 --> 02:03:07,360
Speaker 1: kind of just you know, he's an adult and I'm

1906
02:03:07,400 --> 02:03:10,760
Speaker 1: a kid, kind of saying you're acting like a kid.

1907
02:03:10,880 --> 02:03:15,000
Speaker 1: You're being immature. It's rude and you you know you

1908
02:03:15,040 --> 02:03:19,800
Speaker 1: won't get very far doing that, And how can I

1909
02:03:19,840 --> 02:03:22,800
Speaker 1: say it? I've had a good enough upbringing less their

1910
02:03:22,840 --> 02:03:27,000
Speaker 1: heart from my mom and what other teachers had cared

1911
02:03:27,040 --> 02:03:32,120
Speaker 1: to bother You know that I understood what this lesson was.

1912
02:03:32,640 --> 02:03:37,400
Speaker 1: So um Again, I'm a human being. I've certainly had

1913
02:03:37,480 --> 02:03:40,720
Speaker 1: my moments, but that was important to me and it's

1914
02:03:40,720 --> 02:03:44,480
Speaker 1: still important to me. Okay, the band has huge success,

1915
02:03:44,560 --> 02:03:49,200
Speaker 1: starts with Susie Q. Proud Mary is gigantic. I'm sure

1916
02:03:49,240 --> 02:03:51,520
Speaker 1: you're on a roll, you're feeling good, you have a

1917
02:03:51,520 --> 02:03:55,640
Speaker 1: couple more hits. Then, how hard is it to write

1918
02:03:55,680 --> 02:03:58,400
Speaker 1: these songs? Do you feel well, I have to write

1919
02:03:58,400 --> 02:04:00,640
Speaker 1: a song is good or close to as good as

1920
02:04:00,680 --> 02:04:03,960
Speaker 1: the other ones? Do you discard other ones? How much

1921
02:04:04,000 --> 02:04:07,720
Speaker 1: pressure internal pressure. There's always external pressure deliver a hit,

1922
02:04:08,480 --> 02:04:13,240
Speaker 1: but how much internal pressure not? How did you manage that? Well? Now,

1923
02:04:13,320 --> 02:04:17,400
Speaker 1: remember um, when the four when I got off of

1924
02:04:17,440 --> 02:04:23,480
Speaker 1: active duty, the four of us sort of resolved to

1925
02:04:24,280 --> 02:04:30,240
Speaker 1: make it or break it. We gave ourselves vaguely a year. Right.

1926
02:04:31,360 --> 02:04:35,760
Speaker 1: Amazingly it happened within that year. But we figured that

1927
02:04:35,840 --> 02:04:38,280
Speaker 1: Tom was the only kind of quote adult. He was

1928
02:04:38,320 --> 02:04:41,800
Speaker 1: over twenty one, had a real job at pgn E,

1929
02:04:42,320 --> 02:04:47,200
Speaker 1: that's the electrical company, also became a band. Yeah, that's right,

1930
02:04:47,360 --> 02:04:51,480
Speaker 1: and we were rehearsing every day and took it very seriously.

1931
02:04:51,600 --> 02:04:54,280
Speaker 1: We were trying to get better. And you know, we

1932
02:04:54,280 --> 02:04:58,000
Speaker 1: we really as gollywogs that had made the records earlier

1933
02:04:58,040 --> 02:05:02,560
Speaker 1: with Fantasy that was kind of churish, not unlike so

1934
02:05:02,720 --> 02:05:07,400
Speaker 1: many records of that era, like perhaps Psychotic Reaction by

1935
02:05:07,440 --> 02:05:11,560
Speaker 1: the Count Five and many others. Yeah, So just to

1936
02:05:11,640 --> 02:05:13,640
Speaker 1: be clear, because I don't want to leave this hanging.

1937
02:05:14,000 --> 02:05:16,120
Speaker 1: When you were with the Boys Club, did they make

1938
02:05:16,160 --> 02:05:18,200
Speaker 1: a record? It was not the first time you heard

1939
02:05:18,200 --> 02:05:22,600
Speaker 1: yourself on the radio? Yeah? Absolutely, That's why I went there.

1940
02:05:22,720 --> 02:05:27,440
Speaker 1: Um at one of the places we played, and I

1941
02:05:27,760 --> 02:05:31,480
Speaker 1: know it was an outdoor race track, and that's all

1942
02:05:31,520 --> 02:05:35,440
Speaker 1: I can remember about it. But this young man named

1943
02:05:35,520 --> 02:05:39,440
Speaker 1: James Powell came up and it was had seen us play,

1944
02:05:39,560 --> 02:05:41,760
Speaker 1: and he said, I would like you to get you

1945
02:05:41,800 --> 02:05:45,080
Speaker 1: guys to help me make a record. And you know,

1946
02:05:45,280 --> 02:05:51,280
Speaker 1: he was twenty five or so, we were about fourteen, okay, Uh, needless, well,

1947
02:05:51,520 --> 02:05:56,760
Speaker 1: James was a black fella. Um. His music was decidedly

1948
02:05:57,000 --> 02:06:00,200
Speaker 1: doo wop, but he was really good at it. I

1949
02:06:00,200 --> 02:06:03,120
Speaker 1: mean he you know, if I was to sing a

1950
02:06:03,160 --> 02:06:05,839
Speaker 1: song like that, it would have sounded like a fourteen

1951
02:06:05,920 --> 02:06:10,840
Speaker 1: year old middle class white boy, and James really sounded

1952
02:06:11,000 --> 02:06:14,600
Speaker 1: exactly like that was his wheelhouse, right, And he had

1953
02:06:14,640 --> 02:06:18,600
Speaker 1: a few songs, if I remember correctly, almost every song

1954
02:06:18,680 --> 02:06:22,880
Speaker 1: he had was a girl's name, and so his the

1955
02:06:23,360 --> 02:06:28,560
Speaker 1: we recorded two songs to be uh that first record,

1956
02:06:29,400 --> 02:06:32,480
Speaker 1: and he, by the way, he already had a relationship

1957
02:06:32,680 --> 02:06:37,040
Speaker 1: with a record company which was I believe it was

1958
02:06:37,080 --> 02:06:40,480
Speaker 1: called Christie Records, And we eventually met the owner of

1959
02:06:40,600 --> 02:06:45,960
Speaker 1: a man named Joe jarros Um, and we rehearsed with

1960
02:06:46,240 --> 02:06:51,720
Speaker 1: James and eventually went over to Coast Recorders in San

1961
02:06:51,760 --> 02:06:56,560
Speaker 1: Francisco and recorded these two songs, Beverly Angel and the

1962
02:06:56,560 --> 02:07:00,320
Speaker 1: other side was Martha mke Darling Beverly Angel. It was

1963
02:07:00,360 --> 02:07:05,360
Speaker 1: an absolute classic four chord slow song in the Vein

1964
02:07:05,480 --> 02:07:09,400
Speaker 1: of Earth angel or in the Still of the Night. Uh.

1965
02:07:09,600 --> 02:07:13,520
Speaker 1: Not quite as good as those in for sonic reasons

1966
02:07:13,640 --> 02:07:18,040
Speaker 1: or others, but pretty dangn close. And I literally got

1967
02:07:18,080 --> 02:07:20,600
Speaker 1: to hear that on the R and B station by

1968
02:07:20,640 --> 02:07:27,000
Speaker 1: the way, uh one time. And I believe Stu Cook

1969
02:07:27,120 --> 02:07:29,440
Speaker 1: may have he may have actually heard it at school

1970
02:07:30,400 --> 02:07:33,640
Speaker 1: one time because he was in I think the story

1971
02:07:33,720 --> 02:07:36,800
Speaker 1: goes he was, you know, the electronics class, and he

1972
02:07:37,120 --> 02:07:39,839
Speaker 1: supposed to build a radio, and he built a radio,

1973
02:07:39,960 --> 02:07:43,400
Speaker 1: and as it came together, he tuned in that station

1974
02:07:43,800 --> 02:07:47,680
Speaker 1: and they were playing Beverly Angel. If that was true,

1975
02:07:47,720 --> 02:07:54,440
Speaker 1: I can't imagine the mental Hey that's me. Um. So

1976
02:07:54,520 --> 02:07:56,800
Speaker 1: that was the first time I heard myself, although I

1977
02:07:56,880 --> 02:07:59,600
Speaker 1: you know, I was not the singer. I was in

1978
02:07:59,640 --> 02:08:03,480
Speaker 1: the back. Well, you give yourselves a year, So continue

1979
02:08:03,520 --> 02:08:06,080
Speaker 1: with that narrative. You were telling the story, all right,

1980
02:08:06,400 --> 02:08:10,839
Speaker 1: So this is nineteen seven. We've resolved to do everything

1981
02:08:10,880 --> 02:08:13,880
Speaker 1: we can to make it. And at some point, you know,

1982
02:08:13,960 --> 02:08:16,680
Speaker 1: we we say, well, we're all gonna write songs, and

1983
02:08:16,680 --> 02:08:19,400
Speaker 1: we're all gonna play and all that, and we actually

1984
02:08:19,440 --> 02:08:23,400
Speaker 1: released a song that I had already written and that

1985
02:08:23,520 --> 02:08:28,200
Speaker 1: had been released with I Believe, with myself and my

1986
02:08:28,320 --> 02:08:32,480
Speaker 1: brother Tom credited as the writer. The song was called

1987
02:08:32,520 --> 02:08:37,040
Speaker 1: porter Bill. I had written this song basically marching around

1988
02:08:37,080 --> 02:08:40,040
Speaker 1: in the army in the hot sun. It was um

1989
02:08:41,480 --> 02:08:43,760
Speaker 1: It was sort of a pivotal moment in my life

1990
02:08:43,800 --> 02:08:46,080
Speaker 1: where you're doing all this marching. You can only imagine.

1991
02:08:46,080 --> 02:08:49,880
Speaker 1: It's really hot on the asphalt. It's what they call

1992
02:08:49,960 --> 02:08:53,240
Speaker 1: a parade ground. It was a mile square, so you

1993
02:08:53,320 --> 02:08:56,640
Speaker 1: could march a long way in one distance in the

1994
02:08:57,040 --> 02:09:02,000
Speaker 1: august heat, and I would tune into this personal radio station.

1995
02:09:02,120 --> 02:09:06,000
Speaker 1: I started doing this song that was kind of kind

1996
02:09:06,000 --> 02:09:09,760
Speaker 1: of my life and kind of not and turning it

1997
02:09:09,840 --> 02:09:11,960
Speaker 1: into this story that was going to be a song.

1998
02:09:12,360 --> 02:09:14,720
Speaker 1: I got out of the army or off active duty

1999
02:09:15,120 --> 02:09:19,520
Speaker 1: and finished that song. I had learned how to do

2000
02:09:19,640 --> 02:09:23,720
Speaker 1: something I hadn't done before anyway. That song got released

2001
02:09:23,720 --> 02:09:29,400
Speaker 1: by the Golliwogs and called Porterville. But when we changed

2002
02:09:29,520 --> 02:09:33,240
Speaker 1: our name to Credence pre Credence clear Water Revival, UH

2003
02:09:33,360 --> 02:09:39,920
Speaker 1: Fantasy re released the song by Credence Clearwater Revival, and

2004
02:09:40,040 --> 02:09:43,760
Speaker 1: now the the credit at where the songwriter is was

2005
02:09:44,200 --> 02:09:49,920
Speaker 1: t spice bush swallowtail and what that was meant to be? Yeah,

2006
02:09:49,920 --> 02:09:52,839
Speaker 1: that's something Doug came up with. We were all smoking

2007
02:09:52,880 --> 02:09:55,600
Speaker 1: pot at the time and I guess it sounds like

2008
02:09:55,600 --> 02:09:59,480
Speaker 1: it doesn't it. Um. Anyway, it was a It was

2009
02:09:59,520 --> 02:10:03,000
Speaker 1: a word or phrase that was supposed to represent all

2010
02:10:03,040 --> 02:10:06,480
Speaker 1: four of us writing the song. Well, obviously since I

2011
02:10:06,520 --> 02:10:09,600
Speaker 1: wrote the song in the first place, you can see that,

2012
02:10:09,800 --> 02:10:14,200
Speaker 1: I uh, can I say, generously shared my credit with

2013
02:10:14,560 --> 02:10:18,800
Speaker 1: my bandmates, which is something that happened quite a bit

2014
02:10:19,680 --> 02:10:25,560
Speaker 1: um during that period of time and even later. It's, Uh,

2015
02:10:25,840 --> 02:10:28,720
Speaker 1: all I'm gonna say about is if you know about me,

2016
02:10:29,040 --> 02:10:31,560
Speaker 1: you know that that you know that I did that

2017
02:10:31,640 --> 02:10:35,320
Speaker 1: a lot and it's kind of surprising actually, But anyway,

2018
02:10:35,360 --> 02:10:42,840
Speaker 1: that was um, that was how our songwriting. I'm can

2019
02:10:42,840 --> 02:10:46,040
Speaker 1: I say it became collected for a while. But after

2020
02:10:46,120 --> 02:10:49,720
Speaker 1: the first album was beginning to take shape and I

2021
02:10:49,800 --> 02:10:55,640
Speaker 1: had written I think all the songs that were not

2022
02:10:56,280 --> 02:11:00,480
Speaker 1: cover songs, I finally went to the band that they said,

2023
02:11:01,560 --> 02:11:05,040
Speaker 1: I don't like this arrangement. It was now six seven

2024
02:11:05,040 --> 02:11:08,640
Speaker 1: months later, eight months later, and I had written all

2025
02:11:08,640 --> 02:11:10,720
Speaker 1: the songs and it had kind of turned out that

2026
02:11:10,760 --> 02:11:15,440
Speaker 1: the other guys weren't coming up with ideas. I think literally,

2027
02:11:15,480 --> 02:11:18,280
Speaker 1: I would show up at our everyday practice and you know,

2028
02:11:18,360 --> 02:11:23,840
Speaker 1: rehearsal and go, well, does anybody have anything? And everybody

2029
02:11:23,880 --> 02:11:26,400
Speaker 1: would kind of look at the ground, you know, look

2030
02:11:26,400 --> 02:11:30,520
Speaker 1: at their shoe tops and say and so I would

2031
02:11:30,520 --> 02:11:33,080
Speaker 1: show them what I had. And this happened day after

2032
02:11:33,200 --> 02:11:36,360
Speaker 1: day for months, and we and the course of which

2033
02:11:36,400 --> 02:11:40,280
Speaker 1: we started to learn musical ideas, you know, RiPPs, things

2034
02:11:40,320 --> 02:11:44,680
Speaker 1: like that, drum beats, things that I had created, baselines,

2035
02:11:45,480 --> 02:11:49,000
Speaker 1: and eventually several songs the best of the best I

2036
02:11:49,000 --> 02:11:51,760
Speaker 1: could come up with were those ones that appear on

2037
02:11:51,840 --> 02:11:54,960
Speaker 1: that album. And I didn't want to share the credit.

2038
02:11:55,160 --> 02:11:58,640
Speaker 1: So what I said would look, I'll share the money,

2039
02:11:58,720 --> 02:12:03,520
Speaker 1: but I think I should get credit for something I've written. Um,

2040
02:12:03,560 --> 02:12:07,880
Speaker 1: at least I did that, and it's true. Uh, the

2041
02:12:08,040 --> 02:12:11,240
Speaker 1: songwriting was split four ways at that time for the

2042
02:12:11,280 --> 02:12:16,520
Speaker 1: next two years on the next four albums, I believe,

2043
02:12:16,680 --> 02:12:20,680
Speaker 1: all of which were uh, you know, multi platinum around

2044
02:12:20,720 --> 02:12:25,240
Speaker 1: the world. I think I finally said, okay, you're all

2045
02:12:25,280 --> 02:12:29,560
Speaker 1: millionaires several times old is many years. Hence I said,

2046
02:12:29,600 --> 02:12:36,480
Speaker 1: I think I don't have to share the money. Anymore. Um,

2047
02:12:36,520 --> 02:12:40,760
Speaker 1: I realized that that sounds like backsliding. But it wasn't

2048
02:12:41,360 --> 02:12:44,400
Speaker 1: too many days after that that the band broke up,

2049
02:12:44,720 --> 02:12:49,400
Speaker 1: So I think it was almost with self defense. You

2050
02:12:49,480 --> 02:12:54,680
Speaker 1: might say, Uh, you know, we're talking nineteen seventy one

2051
02:12:55,240 --> 02:12:59,800
Speaker 1: or so. Anyhow, Okay, to go back to your question,

2052
02:13:00,360 --> 02:13:03,600
Speaker 1: which was, let me ask a different question. When you

2053
02:13:03,720 --> 02:13:08,240
Speaker 1: wrote proud Mary, did you know it was a smash? Uh?

2054
02:13:08,720 --> 02:13:11,760
Speaker 1: What a question? And I was the only one in

2055
02:13:11,800 --> 02:13:16,200
Speaker 1: the room, Um, believe it or not. Now we we

2056
02:13:16,800 --> 02:13:21,120
Speaker 1: skip up to nineteen sixty eight. I've done my active duty.

2057
02:13:22,640 --> 02:13:27,200
Speaker 1: I've determined that I'm going to try and get released

2058
02:13:27,280 --> 02:13:30,840
Speaker 1: from the military. So I I started volunteering. Said, look,

2059
02:13:30,880 --> 02:13:32,720
Speaker 1: I'll come in during the week and do my work.

2060
02:13:32,760 --> 02:13:34,560
Speaker 1: I don't even have to show up to the official

2061
02:13:34,600 --> 02:13:37,640
Speaker 1: meeting in my uniform and you know, make you guys

2062
02:13:37,680 --> 02:13:40,040
Speaker 1: angry at me. But they wouldn't go for that, so

2063
02:13:40,280 --> 02:13:44,320
Speaker 1: I began trying to figure out ways to actually get released. Okay,

2064
02:13:44,840 --> 02:13:48,920
Speaker 1: so April even May of sixty eight, I'm trying to

2065
02:13:48,960 --> 02:13:53,920
Speaker 1: get released from the Army reserves. But I know I'm

2066
02:13:53,920 --> 02:13:58,600
Speaker 1: gonna have to go to uh summer camp. And I

2067
02:13:58,680 --> 02:14:02,400
Speaker 1: also know that here's that guy, there's that communist. They're

2068
02:14:02,400 --> 02:14:04,440
Speaker 1: gonna they're gonna have their way with me if I

2069
02:14:04,440 --> 02:14:08,640
Speaker 1: have to go through that thing. So it was probably

2070
02:14:08,800 --> 02:14:12,560
Speaker 1: Midsummer of and I don't know, I can't pin down

2071
02:14:12,560 --> 02:14:15,400
Speaker 1: the month any better than that. But there's this thing

2072
02:14:15,680 --> 02:14:18,520
Speaker 1: on the steps. There's an envelope sitting there, and it's

2073
02:14:18,520 --> 02:14:21,879
Speaker 1: got a big government stamp on it. I literally stepped

2074
02:14:21,920 --> 02:14:25,840
Speaker 1: over it two or three days in a row. I'm

2075
02:14:25,880 --> 02:14:29,720
Speaker 1: a kid in a little apartment what finally, because it

2076
02:14:30,040 --> 02:14:33,400
Speaker 1: kept being there, and it's in front of my neighbor's

2077
02:14:33,440 --> 02:14:37,560
Speaker 1: door actually, and I look closer and it says John Fogerty,

2078
02:14:37,680 --> 02:14:43,160
Speaker 1: Private John Fogerty. I look inside and it's my honorable discharge,

2079
02:14:44,160 --> 02:14:49,240
Speaker 1: and I go, WHOA, Yes, are you kidding that? After

2080
02:14:49,320 --> 02:14:52,760
Speaker 1: the journey I had been through. WOA, Yes. I was

2081
02:14:52,800 --> 02:14:56,080
Speaker 1: so happy. And I literally there's a little patch of

2082
02:14:56,120 --> 02:14:59,120
Speaker 1: grass in front of our apartment building. And I did

2083
02:14:59,240 --> 02:15:02,600
Speaker 1: a cart We don't ask me how, but I did

2084
02:15:02,600 --> 02:15:05,200
Speaker 1: a cart wheel. My brain was saying, you're gonna want

2085
02:15:05,200 --> 02:15:07,640
Speaker 1: to know you did a cart whale, and I did.

2086
02:15:08,080 --> 02:15:11,040
Speaker 1: I ran in the house and I grabbed my Rickenbacker.

2087
02:15:11,520 --> 02:15:14,440
Speaker 1: I started playing with these chords I've been playing before,

2088
02:15:14,720 --> 02:15:18,320
Speaker 1: kind of the vaguely the Beethoven's Fifth Thing, you know,

2089
02:15:18,320 --> 02:15:20,480
Speaker 1: blah blah blah blah blah blah blah, you know. And

2090
02:15:20,520 --> 02:15:23,480
Speaker 1: I started doing him again and suddenly I'm you know,

2091
02:15:23,560 --> 02:15:28,800
Speaker 1: I'm euphori. Wow. Wow. And I started working on this

2092
02:15:28,920 --> 02:15:31,120
Speaker 1: song with these chords, and the next thing, you know,

2093
02:15:31,200 --> 02:15:34,000
Speaker 1: and left a good job in the city because I

2094
02:15:34,040 --> 02:15:37,760
Speaker 1: just did working boat a man every night and day. Wow,

2095
02:15:38,400 --> 02:15:41,520
Speaker 1: I'm playing these chords, you know, I'm all by myself, right,

2096
02:15:41,560 --> 02:15:44,280
Speaker 1: and the screen door is I mean, the door is open,

2097
02:15:44,360 --> 02:15:47,360
Speaker 1: but there's a screen door that I've come in from

2098
02:15:47,360 --> 02:15:53,000
Speaker 1: outside where that just happened, this bolt of whatever from

2099
02:15:53,040 --> 02:15:55,840
Speaker 1: the sky. I mean, I was just in this euphoria.

2100
02:15:56,200 --> 02:16:00,440
Speaker 1: I'm strumming away and suddenly I'm rolling, rolling, rolling, Wow,

2101
02:16:00,480 --> 02:16:02,920
Speaker 1: what are you rolling on the river? Cat? I mean,

2102
02:16:02,920 --> 02:16:06,600
Speaker 1: it was just all slamming together in my brain. I'm

2103
02:16:06,640 --> 02:16:11,360
Speaker 1: so excited and happy, you know, And what's this about? What?

2104
02:16:11,360 --> 02:16:13,560
Speaker 1: What is this thing? Rolling on the I left a

2105
02:16:13,600 --> 02:16:16,760
Speaker 1: good job and so I grabbed this little thing. And

2106
02:16:16,800 --> 02:16:19,400
Speaker 1: it's a whole another story, Bob, And we don't have time.

2107
02:16:19,680 --> 02:16:22,160
Speaker 1: But it was my song book that I had only

2108
02:16:22,240 --> 02:16:25,680
Speaker 1: just started a few months before. I flipped through it,

2109
02:16:25,800 --> 02:16:27,880
Speaker 1: flipped through it and looking around for some kind of

2110
02:16:27,920 --> 02:16:30,680
Speaker 1: and the very first thing I ever wrote in that book,

2111
02:16:31,840 --> 02:16:36,160
Speaker 1: the prior October was the very first injury in the

2112
02:16:36,200 --> 02:16:40,320
Speaker 1: book is the words proud Mary. And when I wrote

2113
02:16:40,360 --> 02:16:43,040
Speaker 1: them there, I had no idea what the hell is

2114
02:16:43,080 --> 02:16:47,640
Speaker 1: proud Mary? Who is that? But now I'm I opened

2115
02:16:47,680 --> 02:16:52,560
Speaker 1: my book and I Proud Mary. Proud Mary. That sounds

2116
02:16:52,560 --> 02:16:55,879
Speaker 1: like a name of a boat. Oh, this is a

2117
02:16:55,920 --> 02:16:59,560
Speaker 1: song about a boat rolling on the Oh my goodness.

2118
02:16:59,560 --> 02:17:02,240
Speaker 1: I mean it really happened, just like I'm living. And

2119
02:17:02,280 --> 02:17:07,680
Speaker 1: now it was what oblong I'm trying to say, obscure

2120
02:17:07,800 --> 02:17:12,640
Speaker 1: things coming from obscure corners, sort of clinging together in

2121
02:17:12,680 --> 02:17:17,279
Speaker 1: a way that made sense to me from the structure

2122
02:17:17,360 --> 02:17:21,760
Speaker 1: that I had loosely set up around myself without realizing it.

2123
02:17:22,240 --> 02:17:29,200
Speaker 1: And within an hour of picking up that that envelope,

2124
02:17:29,959 --> 02:17:32,640
Speaker 1: I had a song that was called Proud Mary. I

2125
02:17:32,680 --> 02:17:35,720
Speaker 1: can't say that every single verse had every single word,

2126
02:17:36,080 --> 02:17:40,800
Speaker 1: but it certainly wasn't finished. I had three verses, I

2127
02:17:40,840 --> 02:17:44,440
Speaker 1: had a chorus, and I had this yellow piece of

2128
02:17:45,000 --> 02:17:49,039
Speaker 1: like that legal pad paper, and I used those days

2129
02:17:49,080 --> 02:17:53,039
Speaker 1: I used this felt tip kind of ink pin and

2130
02:17:53,080 --> 02:17:56,000
Speaker 1: I was sitting there looking at Proud Mary. It said

2131
02:17:56,040 --> 02:17:59,120
Speaker 1: at the top of these three verses and choruses, and

2132
02:17:59,200 --> 02:18:04,400
Speaker 1: I bob setting and sitting in my room. I was, wow, Wow,

2133
02:18:04,560 --> 02:18:08,360
Speaker 1: this is really this is a standard. That was my phrase,

2134
02:18:08,680 --> 02:18:11,039
Speaker 1: because I was kind of old fashioned, you know, meaning

2135
02:18:11,080 --> 02:18:14,440
Speaker 1: like Irving Berlin or Jogi car Michael. I said, this

2136
02:18:14,520 --> 02:18:17,600
Speaker 1: is a standard. This is a really, really good song.

2137
02:18:18,040 --> 02:18:24,080
Speaker 1: And I'm shaking with with such realization that how hected

2138
02:18:24,320 --> 02:18:28,199
Speaker 1: me do this right? I mean, it was like if

2139
02:18:28,280 --> 02:18:32,280
Speaker 1: you were had stumbled in the mountains and found the

2140
02:18:32,360 --> 02:18:34,920
Speaker 1: Holy Grail or whatever. You know, I'm too dumb to

2141
02:18:35,000 --> 02:18:38,920
Speaker 1: do this, but somehow I had stumbled into this and

2142
02:18:39,240 --> 02:18:43,160
Speaker 1: here it is, and I knew it was great, absolutely,

2143
02:18:44,600 --> 02:18:47,280
Speaker 1: with every core, you know, every bone in my body.

2144
02:18:47,320 --> 02:18:51,160
Speaker 1: I just knew it. And there was nobody ever, no

2145
02:18:51,200 --> 02:18:53,760
Speaker 1: one else knew. There was nobody for me to tell.

2146
02:18:53,879 --> 02:18:58,400
Speaker 1: And yet my own consciousness was absolutely that this stands

2147
02:18:58,520 --> 02:19:02,440
Speaker 1: up next to I don't know, Blue Skies or star

2148
02:19:02,560 --> 02:19:06,199
Speaker 1: Dust or you know. I don't know if I dared

2149
02:19:06,240 --> 02:19:08,560
Speaker 1: to think I want to hold your hand yet, but

2150
02:19:09,000 --> 02:19:15,000
Speaker 1: I knew this song was for a long time. Well,

2151
02:19:15,040 --> 02:19:18,400
Speaker 1: I find it interesting. Everybody says, uh, no one knows

2152
02:19:18,480 --> 02:19:21,279
Speaker 1: what to hit. But when you talk to the masters,

2153
02:19:22,240 --> 02:19:24,960
Speaker 1: they say it exactly like you when you really ring

2154
02:19:25,040 --> 02:19:27,640
Speaker 1: the bell, when you hit it eleven. You know. So

2155
02:19:27,680 --> 02:19:30,800
Speaker 1: in any event you start having hits, how do you

2156
02:19:30,840 --> 02:19:34,760
Speaker 1: write songs thereafter? And how about the internal pressure? Okay?

2157
02:19:34,800 --> 02:19:39,320
Speaker 1: So I have a spice bush swallowtail because for a

2158
02:19:39,360 --> 02:19:41,840
Speaker 1: while there was that limited idea that we would all

2159
02:19:41,920 --> 02:19:46,040
Speaker 1: be writing songs kind of like uh, named bands that

2160
02:19:46,120 --> 02:19:49,200
Speaker 1: do that, and I can't think of one right now now,

2161
02:19:49,480 --> 02:19:53,640
Speaker 1: not them, um, you know where it's a collaborative kind

2162
02:19:53,640 --> 02:19:57,759
Speaker 1: of maybe more like Dan Halen or something like that. Um.

2163
02:19:57,800 --> 02:20:02,440
Speaker 1: But clearly because of Proud Mary and Born on the Bayou,

2164
02:20:02,560 --> 02:20:05,400
Speaker 1: which was the other side, and that second album that

2165
02:20:05,480 --> 02:20:09,520
Speaker 1: they were on, um, something had happened. At least it

2166
02:20:09,640 --> 02:20:11,800
Speaker 1: was clear to me. I mean, like you know, it

2167
02:20:11,920 --> 02:20:14,800
Speaker 1: was clear to everybody. Come on, well, I don't know.

2168
02:20:14,959 --> 02:20:17,680
Speaker 1: The guys in my band got real started to get

2169
02:20:17,720 --> 02:20:23,840
Speaker 1: real weird about this, Okay. So then I knew I

2170
02:20:23,879 --> 02:20:26,240
Speaker 1: wanted to follow this up, and I knew there was

2171
02:20:26,320 --> 02:20:30,080
Speaker 1: nothing else on that album. The album being the second

2172
02:20:30,120 --> 02:20:33,760
Speaker 1: album being Byou Country had Borne on the Bayou and

2173
02:20:33,800 --> 02:20:37,200
Speaker 1: Proud Mary, and then a few clicks down was a

2174
02:20:37,240 --> 02:20:40,160
Speaker 1: track called good Golly, Miss Molly, which was also a

2175
02:20:40,200 --> 02:20:43,240
Speaker 1: great track, but there were there wasn't anything else that

2176
02:20:43,560 --> 02:20:46,480
Speaker 1: was like Proud Mary, okay, And that meant I had

2177
02:20:46,520 --> 02:20:51,080
Speaker 1: to write a new song to try and compete, you know,

2178
02:20:51,120 --> 02:20:53,360
Speaker 1: be at that level. But it would be an orphan

2179
02:20:54,520 --> 02:20:56,800
Speaker 1: meaning it would be a single. It's not on an album.

2180
02:20:56,840 --> 02:20:58,880
Speaker 1: That didn't bother me. I didn't, you know, but it

2181
02:20:58,920 --> 02:21:04,560
Speaker 1: was by itself. So I eventually wrote Bad Moon Rising

2182
02:21:04,640 --> 02:21:08,280
Speaker 1: and Low Die, and even in my own heart, it

2183
02:21:08,360 --> 02:21:11,440
Speaker 1: was it was the very best I could do, and

2184
02:21:12,520 --> 02:21:15,879
Speaker 1: I almost felt like it didn't quite measure up to

2185
02:21:15,920 --> 02:21:20,160
Speaker 1: Proud Mary. I actually told the guys, uh, well, we've

2186
02:21:20,200 --> 02:21:24,160
Speaker 1: got two B sides, you know, and I guess they

2187
02:21:24,160 --> 02:21:27,600
Speaker 1: were good enough, but I I mean, I feel differently now.

2188
02:21:27,800 --> 02:21:31,200
Speaker 1: But it once you've had Proud Mary be taken the

2189
02:21:31,240 --> 02:21:35,280
Speaker 1: way it was with everyone kind of almost did anybody

2190
02:21:35,320 --> 02:21:38,039
Speaker 1: actually write that or was it just there all the time,

2191
02:21:38,600 --> 02:21:42,720
Speaker 1: you know, because that's how it felt, because I had unwittingly,

2192
02:21:42,959 --> 02:21:45,240
Speaker 1: you know, all that stuff we talked about Pete Seeger

2193
02:21:45,360 --> 02:21:49,360
Speaker 1: and Stephen Foster in America and whatever. All that sort

2194
02:21:49,360 --> 02:21:54,359
Speaker 1: of air dust is that we kind of just intuitively

2195
02:21:54,480 --> 02:21:59,720
Speaker 1: understand as our country and who we are and all that. Um.

2196
02:21:59,840 --> 02:22:07,880
Speaker 1: I had somehow blindly tapped into that, and you know, how,

2197
02:22:08,080 --> 02:22:10,800
Speaker 1: how's that ever gonna happen again? I thought Bad Moon

2198
02:22:10,879 --> 02:22:15,480
Speaker 1: was good anyway, so that was what I did, and

2199
02:22:16,040 --> 02:22:19,520
Speaker 1: Bad Moon Rising became a big hit. In fact, it

2200
02:22:19,600 --> 02:22:21,640
Speaker 1: started to be a hit and was on the charts

2201
02:22:21,720 --> 02:22:24,760
Speaker 1: before pril Mary was off the charts, which was a

2202
02:22:24,840 --> 02:22:29,199
Speaker 1: wonderful thing. So now he was, Okay, I gotta start,

2203
02:22:29,560 --> 02:22:33,040
Speaker 1: you know, get busy. And now there was sort of

2204
02:22:33,080 --> 02:22:36,560
Speaker 1: the attitude that, well, I can see I'm I'm the

2205
02:22:36,600 --> 02:22:40,000
Speaker 1: guy that's kind of got to do this otherwise it's

2206
02:22:40,800 --> 02:22:46,560
Speaker 1: not going to get done. And I had always you know,

2207
02:22:46,600 --> 02:22:49,120
Speaker 1: I loved Sun Records, and I loved the sound of

2208
02:22:49,160 --> 02:22:52,400
Speaker 1: a band like that that would be on Sun Records,

2209
02:22:52,840 --> 02:22:58,520
Speaker 1: and we hadn't quite officially gone there yet, and I

2210
02:22:58,600 --> 02:23:02,040
Speaker 1: wanted to do that. You know what, you might if

2211
02:23:02,040 --> 02:23:04,800
Speaker 1: it was the top artist, it would be an Elvis track,

2212
02:23:05,240 --> 02:23:06,840
Speaker 1: and if it was one of the other guys at

2213
02:23:06,840 --> 02:23:11,000
Speaker 1: my Perkins or um certainly not Jerry Lee. But although

2214
02:23:11,040 --> 02:23:14,160
Speaker 1: he had the spirit but the kind of guitar oriented

2215
02:23:14,280 --> 02:23:18,360
Speaker 1: music that came out of Son Johnny Cash even and

2216
02:23:19,440 --> 02:23:21,760
Speaker 1: you know, I had this idea about the Green River

2217
02:23:21,879 --> 02:23:24,480
Speaker 1: that had been carrying around since I was eight years old,

2218
02:23:25,040 --> 02:23:30,040
Speaker 1: and I managed to collect all that imagery and feeling

2219
02:23:30,080 --> 02:23:33,320
Speaker 1: with the music, and I knew what it should sound like,

2220
02:23:33,680 --> 02:23:36,640
Speaker 1: and I knew really nobody else was touching that. I mean,

2221
02:23:37,240 --> 02:23:40,360
Speaker 1: it was my favorite stuff. If somebody would make that record,

2222
02:23:40,400 --> 02:23:44,680
Speaker 1: I'd buy it, you know. And that's what I kind

2223
02:23:44,680 --> 02:23:47,800
Speaker 1: of set out to do to make that music. That

2224
02:23:47,959 --> 02:23:53,080
Speaker 1: song that is my very very favorite thing of all Um.

2225
02:23:53,160 --> 02:23:56,440
Speaker 1: It's sort of that acoustic sounding rock and roll that

2226
02:23:56,520 --> 02:23:59,800
Speaker 1: came out of Son, and I thought I did it

2227
02:24:00,920 --> 02:24:04,280
Speaker 1: Um And so that was the next thing, and we

2228
02:24:04,280 --> 02:24:07,760
Speaker 1: were there's one of the sad stories in our band

2229
02:24:08,080 --> 02:24:11,320
Speaker 1: that it's where one of the first cracks showed up.

2230
02:24:11,840 --> 02:24:18,000
Speaker 1: We were in rehearsal at Dougs Place and we were

2231
02:24:18,080 --> 02:24:23,440
Speaker 1: learning the new song Green River, and probably commotion to

2232
02:24:23,560 --> 02:24:25,879
Speaker 1: get it ready, you know, to be this was going

2233
02:24:25,920 --> 02:24:28,640
Speaker 1: to be the third album, but we weren't anywhere near

2234
02:24:28,680 --> 02:24:32,400
Speaker 1: recording the album, but we were getting ready to record

2235
02:24:33,600 --> 02:24:37,879
Speaker 1: the single. Green River especially was what we were working on,

2236
02:24:38,480 --> 02:24:40,560
Speaker 1: we're done, we get out to the curve. I remember

2237
02:24:40,560 --> 02:24:43,760
Speaker 1: I had my Gibson guitar sitting in that the way

2238
02:24:43,800 --> 02:24:47,360
Speaker 1: that certain guitar case looked, and I was going to pack.

2239
02:24:47,640 --> 02:24:50,760
Speaker 1: You know, We're all saying goodbye, and Tom says to me,

2240
02:24:51,440 --> 02:24:55,320
Speaker 1: you're really getting quite a repertoire. But he doesn't say

2241
02:24:55,360 --> 02:25:01,400
Speaker 1: it in a loving, admirab like admiring way. I could

2242
02:25:01,440 --> 02:25:03,840
Speaker 1: just tell, because we're all human beings were sensitive to

2243
02:25:03,920 --> 02:25:07,080
Speaker 1: tone of voice. And you know, even though the words

2244
02:25:07,160 --> 02:25:12,560
Speaker 1: were like an acknowledgement or even a U a pep talk,

2245
02:25:13,000 --> 02:25:16,960
Speaker 1: it was it was just he hissed it through his teeth,

2246
02:25:17,560 --> 02:25:20,080
Speaker 1: you know, And I mean it scared me. It was

2247
02:25:20,160 --> 02:25:24,279
Speaker 1: really unsettling to me because of all the journeys since

2248
02:25:24,360 --> 02:25:28,320
Speaker 1: I had been home from active duty, every single day

2249
02:25:28,480 --> 02:25:34,400
Speaker 1: had been positive, every single step along this path, even

2250
02:25:34,800 --> 02:25:37,640
Speaker 1: nights when we played someplace in some bar and there

2251
02:25:37,640 --> 02:25:40,920
Speaker 1: were only three people in the audience, you know, it

2252
02:25:41,080 --> 02:25:46,119
Speaker 1: was always a positive motion of us um. I mean,

2253
02:25:46,160 --> 02:25:49,840
Speaker 1: if you're together and you hang together, you can overcome anything.

2254
02:25:49,959 --> 02:25:55,200
Speaker 1: That's just the way Blood Brothers operate. And this was

2255
02:25:55,280 --> 02:25:58,960
Speaker 1: the first moment of like what they call trouble in paradise,

2256
02:25:59,040 --> 02:26:01,560
Speaker 1: you know, it's like and I just I didn't. I

2257
02:26:01,600 --> 02:26:04,160
Speaker 1: didn't even know what to make of it. I didn't understand,

2258
02:26:05,640 --> 02:26:08,760
Speaker 1: as they say, where it was coming from. What you know.

2259
02:26:09,000 --> 02:26:11,600
Speaker 1: It was the first also the first time I thought, yeah,

2260
02:26:11,640 --> 02:26:13,640
Speaker 1: I've got a couple of three songs now that are

2261
02:26:13,640 --> 02:26:16,800
Speaker 1: pretty good, you know. But all I could see was

2262
02:26:16,840 --> 02:26:19,440
Speaker 1: to put my head down and get that shovel digging

2263
02:26:19,480 --> 02:26:25,760
Speaker 1: in the ground. The delay, the telegraphed, the unhappiness emotion,

2264
02:26:26,360 --> 02:26:30,080
Speaker 1: but I really didn't understand it at all. Okay, we're

2265
02:26:30,080 --> 02:26:32,000
Speaker 1: gonna have to do a whole another thing with all

2266
02:26:32,080 --> 02:26:34,720
Speaker 1: the songs and all the credence. But let's jump forward

2267
02:26:35,080 --> 02:26:39,240
Speaker 1: at this late date. Fortunate son and who will Stop

2268
02:26:39,320 --> 02:26:42,840
Speaker 1: the Rain? Relevant of your intention when writing them, have

2269
02:26:43,000 --> 02:26:46,720
Speaker 1: become part of the canon. Stephen Foster, as you mentioned earlier,

2270
02:26:47,520 --> 02:26:52,000
Speaker 1: protest songs, anti war songs. Leave it at that, even

2271
02:26:52,000 --> 02:26:56,080
Speaker 1: though sometimes the right has tried to glam onto those songs.

2272
02:26:56,200 --> 02:27:00,840
Speaker 1: So as the son of left wingers, as a liberal

2273
02:27:00,879 --> 02:27:03,800
Speaker 1: in your error, what do you think about what's going

2274
02:27:03,879 --> 02:27:08,199
Speaker 1: on in the United States now? And could music play

2275
02:27:08,240 --> 02:27:11,240
Speaker 1: a part like it did in the sixties and change

2276
02:27:11,280 --> 02:27:16,359
Speaker 1: people's thoughts? You had to go and ask this one. Uh.

2277
02:27:16,560 --> 02:27:19,520
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, there's only one way to answer,

2278
02:27:20,480 --> 02:27:23,040
Speaker 1: and so I'm going to answer that way. But what

2279
02:27:23,080 --> 02:27:28,320
Speaker 1: I mean is not holding back anything, not trying to

2280
02:27:28,400 --> 02:27:33,519
Speaker 1: filter anything. Sometimes people think I may be a little abrasive.

2281
02:27:34,320 --> 02:27:39,760
Speaker 1: Um and is I'm saddened. This all makes me very sad.

2282
02:27:40,520 --> 02:27:49,040
Speaker 1: Um the political, emotional, philosophical place. I'm not talking about

2283
02:27:49,040 --> 02:27:52,879
Speaker 1: the music on their radio. I'm talking about the genuine,

2284
02:27:53,160 --> 02:28:02,000
Speaker 1: the genuine, the general demeanor of our cultural topography. And

2285
02:28:02,000 --> 02:28:06,560
Speaker 1: I'm sorry that he's two dollar words there. It makes

2286
02:28:06,600 --> 02:28:12,120
Speaker 1: me really sad because boy, in the sixties, you know,

2287
02:28:12,160 --> 02:28:17,519
Speaker 1: when people would say you know everybody, and they meant everybody.

2288
02:28:17,640 --> 02:28:21,120
Speaker 1: We should be better people as a country. We are

2289
02:28:21,240 --> 02:28:25,400
Speaker 1: better than this. We should welcome all of our people.

2290
02:28:25,879 --> 02:28:29,120
Speaker 1: We should welcome all of our citizens. We should be

2291
02:28:29,160 --> 02:28:37,040
Speaker 1: willing to help the lowest in our society economically pull

2292
02:28:37,160 --> 02:28:41,440
Speaker 1: themselves up because they can't perhaps do it themselves. We

2293
02:28:41,480 --> 02:28:44,360
Speaker 1: should lend a hand so that we all get to

2294
02:28:44,520 --> 02:28:47,080
Speaker 1: ride at a higher level. I mean that to me

2295
02:28:47,280 --> 02:28:52,480
Speaker 1: was the dominating feeling, certainly of young people in the sixties,

2296
02:28:53,000 --> 02:28:59,119
Speaker 1: you know, And a lot of words were used like peace, love, happiness. Um,

2297
02:29:00,120 --> 02:29:04,000
Speaker 1: they were. They were genuinely meant by most people then

2298
02:29:04,400 --> 02:29:10,560
Speaker 1: and felt by most people then, and certainly by young people. Um,

2299
02:29:10,600 --> 02:29:12,520
Speaker 1: I know that. You know, back in the day, there

2300
02:29:12,520 --> 02:29:16,320
Speaker 1: would be somebody like a Less Dramatics who happened to

2301
02:29:16,360 --> 02:29:22,960
Speaker 1: be from the South, or Governor Wallace, who, um, what's

2302
02:29:23,000 --> 02:29:26,600
Speaker 1: the word obviously stood for a certain point of view,

2303
02:29:27,120 --> 02:29:31,879
Speaker 1: but acknowledged it publicly. You know. Um, there were some

2304
02:29:31,920 --> 02:29:35,960
Speaker 1: other guys who were even worse. These were basically, in

2305
02:29:36,040 --> 02:29:40,119
Speaker 1: one form or another, white supremacsts. But you didn't say

2306
02:29:40,160 --> 02:29:42,800
Speaker 1: that out loud, and you certainly were not proud to

2307
02:29:42,840 --> 02:29:46,400
Speaker 1: say something like that. You should be in shame on you.

2308
02:29:46,400 --> 02:29:49,160
Speaker 1: You should be embarrassed to think that way. That's how

2309
02:29:49,200 --> 02:29:53,440
Speaker 1: I personally feel. And we're America. We're not hey one

2310
02:29:53,480 --> 02:29:58,240
Speaker 1: corner of America. Now we are America. You know when

2311
02:29:58,240 --> 02:30:01,520
Speaker 1: all those people started fleeing in Europe for hopefully a

2312
02:30:01,560 --> 02:30:05,600
Speaker 1: better place, um, that's what they had in mind. They

2313
02:30:05,640 --> 02:30:10,600
Speaker 1: wanted to set up a utopia. And slowly but surely

2314
02:30:10,680 --> 02:30:14,520
Speaker 1: we've arrived. You know, some of these things you can legislate,

2315
02:30:14,720 --> 02:30:18,240
Speaker 1: and a lot of these things you can't. It's it's

2316
02:30:18,280 --> 02:30:23,160
Speaker 1: really hard to make a document that for tells every

2317
02:30:23,640 --> 02:30:28,960
Speaker 1: way human beings will try to circumvent other human beings. Um,

2318
02:30:29,120 --> 02:30:33,000
Speaker 1: you you just have to have a premise that of

2319
02:30:33,160 --> 02:30:36,760
Speaker 1: tolerance of you know, yes, you deserve to be here

2320
02:30:36,959 --> 02:30:39,760
Speaker 1: just as much as I deserve to be here. And

2321
02:30:39,760 --> 02:30:43,760
Speaker 1: we're gonna start with that premise. So go ahead, tell

2322
02:30:43,760 --> 02:30:46,440
Speaker 1: me you're bad stuff, and I'll tell you my bed stuff.

2323
02:30:46,760 --> 02:30:49,480
Speaker 1: You know, let's see if we can work this out. Um,

2324
02:30:49,520 --> 02:30:52,080
Speaker 1: that's how it was in the sixties. It was volatile

2325
02:30:52,760 --> 02:30:58,480
Speaker 1: and clanging and loud, and people were yelling. But aside

2326
02:30:58,480 --> 02:31:00,880
Speaker 1: from a few of the crime and ofstden I'm talking

2327
02:31:00,879 --> 02:31:06,400
Speaker 1: about people who were politically I'm gonna leave, I'm gonna

2328
02:31:06,480 --> 02:31:09,080
Speaker 1: shut up and just keep it. People who look like

2329
02:31:09,240 --> 02:31:13,600
Speaker 1: they were just politicians, but actually behind the scenes they

2330
02:31:13,600 --> 02:31:18,920
Speaker 1: were much more evil than that, um, and had control

2331
02:31:19,040 --> 02:31:23,640
Speaker 1: of certain arms of our government. Uh, most of us

2332
02:31:23,840 --> 02:31:28,200
Speaker 1: really wanted to find that utopia. When I hear a

2333
02:31:28,280 --> 02:31:32,600
Speaker 1: president of the United States nowadays utter a phrase that

2334
02:31:32,720 --> 02:31:35,560
Speaker 1: could have he could have just said it after the

2335
02:31:35,600 --> 02:31:40,200
Speaker 1: Buffalo shooting. Someone like that guy could have said, you know,

2336
02:31:40,920 --> 02:31:44,600
Speaker 1: I think there's very good people on both sides. How

2337
02:31:44,640 --> 02:31:47,520
Speaker 1: the hell do you say that. I mean, does that

2338
02:31:47,560 --> 02:31:51,720
Speaker 1: sound ludicrous to you or what? That's that's how I

2339
02:31:51,760 --> 02:31:55,920
Speaker 1: would I'm so sad that we now have politicians even

2340
02:31:55,959 --> 02:32:03,280
Speaker 1: a week later now expousing this trap about replacement. I

2341
02:32:03,360 --> 02:32:05,720
Speaker 1: can't let one of those people in my country because

2342
02:32:05,760 --> 02:32:08,800
Speaker 1: he's gonna take my place. That's not what we're doing here.

2343
02:32:09,160 --> 02:32:12,280
Speaker 1: We're inviting everybody. Yeah. I realized there's got to be

2344
02:32:12,320 --> 02:32:16,760
Speaker 1: some kind of quota system, but nobody's like walking around

2345
02:32:17,080 --> 02:32:22,600
Speaker 1: the back of the auditorium and eliminating you. Right, you're here,

2346
02:32:22,640 --> 02:32:27,920
Speaker 1: they're here. Let's work it out. Um, yes, I'm I'm

2347
02:32:28,200 --> 02:32:32,520
Speaker 1: I'm uh like like that. That's a legitimate way of thinking.

2348
02:32:32,600 --> 02:32:37,039
Speaker 1: I no wonder other people get mad. Uh. We gotta

2349
02:32:37,120 --> 02:32:41,840
Speaker 1: do better, We gotta we gotta start to agree that

2350
02:32:41,920 --> 02:32:45,039
Speaker 1: you you don't have the right to go wipe out

2351
02:32:45,040 --> 02:32:48,120
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of people, and then some politician is

2352
02:32:48,120 --> 02:32:50,000
Speaker 1: going to give you a you know, an elbow and

2353
02:32:50,280 --> 02:32:53,960
Speaker 1: wink a nudge and say it's okay, we understand that one.

2354
02:32:54,480 --> 02:32:58,879
Speaker 1: That's wrong. Okay. We believe that music could change the

2355
02:32:58,920 --> 02:33:01,720
Speaker 1: world in the six these is there a role for

2356
02:33:02,000 --> 02:33:06,400
Speaker 1: music and changing people's thoughts and moving the country to

2357
02:33:06,520 --> 02:33:10,119
Speaker 1: a place where you would be more uh, you would

2358
02:33:10,160 --> 02:33:13,000
Speaker 1: be happier about the state. So you're asking about You're

2359
02:33:13,040 --> 02:33:19,120
Speaker 1: asking me about something that hasn't occurred now. But all

2360
02:33:19,240 --> 02:33:23,640
Speaker 1: I can the answer is, yes, is there? Yes, I

2361
02:33:23,720 --> 02:33:33,200
Speaker 1: absolutely believe music, the arts, certainly, and music being perhaps

2362
02:33:33,200 --> 02:33:39,160
Speaker 1: the most accessible form of art um does have the

2363
02:33:39,200 --> 02:33:44,720
Speaker 1: potential to change hearts and minds everywhere. Can I see

2364
02:33:44,760 --> 02:33:52,880
Speaker 1: that happening in this America in two thousand twenty two? Yes, Um,

2365
02:33:52,959 --> 02:33:57,560
Speaker 1: I think you know even my own experience and emotion

2366
02:33:58,240 --> 02:34:03,080
Speaker 1: that I did not realize I possessed. And it's happened

2367
02:34:03,120 --> 02:34:08,800
Speaker 1: to me many times, you know, sort of a little

2368
02:34:08,840 --> 02:34:11,440
Speaker 1: bit off center here. But one of those songs to

2369
02:34:11,520 --> 02:34:16,160
Speaker 1: me was a song called Sending the Clowns, which I've

2370
02:34:16,200 --> 02:34:19,240
Speaker 1: been both the clown and the guy on the ground,

2371
02:34:19,800 --> 02:34:24,720
Speaker 1: you know, And at some point hearing that song and

2372
02:34:24,800 --> 02:34:28,640
Speaker 1: hearing how it is so full of humanity, you know,

2373
02:34:29,560 --> 02:34:32,240
Speaker 1: I'm sure when I was twenty one, my my heart

2374
02:34:32,800 --> 02:34:36,320
Speaker 1: didn't even know how to experience that. I'm sure you

2375
02:34:36,400 --> 02:34:40,119
Speaker 1: understand what I'm saying. And I realized I was I

2376
02:34:40,200 --> 02:34:44,120
Speaker 1: was not that person at twenty. Um I am now,

2377
02:34:44,600 --> 02:34:49,200
Speaker 1: you know, And I hope that my words can convey it,

2378
02:34:49,280 --> 02:34:54,160
Speaker 1: at least to my family certainly how I feel about them. Um,

2379
02:34:54,360 --> 02:34:56,920
Speaker 1: there's been many of these kind of things where I see,

2380
02:34:58,160 --> 02:35:05,040
Speaker 1: gosh you oh. Um. I'm trying to be specific, and

2381
02:35:05,080 --> 02:35:10,920
Speaker 1: I don't have a great there's a car. There's a

2382
02:35:10,959 --> 02:35:16,920
Speaker 1: couple of moments. I remember hearing Jesse jacksonation and we were,

2383
02:35:17,040 --> 02:35:20,680
Speaker 1: you know, some of us at least were Remember Reagan

2384
02:35:20,920 --> 02:35:26,440
Speaker 1: at some point said apartheid is good. So at least

2385
02:35:26,480 --> 02:35:29,560
Speaker 1: it's on the record. I can use that one. I didn't,

2386
02:35:29,640 --> 02:35:33,560
Speaker 1: of course believe that, And there was at some point

2387
02:35:33,640 --> 02:35:37,760
Speaker 1: in his presidency Jesse Jackson said it is not Ronald

2388
02:35:37,879 --> 02:35:41,959
Speaker 1: Reagan's fault that he's president. And I actually listened to

2389
02:35:42,000 --> 02:35:44,640
Speaker 1: those words and and thought about those. Of course, he

2390
02:35:44,680 --> 02:35:49,879
Speaker 1: didn't elect himself. Other people made him president. That's the

2391
02:35:50,000 --> 02:35:54,080
Speaker 1: upsetting thing here. Um. Look, I'm not trying to sit

2392
02:35:54,080 --> 02:35:56,560
Speaker 1: here and say Ronald Reagan was a bad man. He

2393
02:35:56,680 --> 02:35:59,280
Speaker 1: just didn't happen to be in you know, my political

2394
02:35:59,720 --> 02:36:03,080
Speaker 1: real house. But he was the guy that said apartheid

2395
02:36:03,280 --> 02:36:08,360
Speaker 1: is good. Go ask Nelson Mandela. Um, So I learned

2396
02:36:08,400 --> 02:36:12,800
Speaker 1: something from that phrase. I also in my lifetime, through

2397
02:36:12,879 --> 02:36:18,680
Speaker 1: my life, have I have listened to Martin Luther King Jr.

2398
02:36:19,040 --> 02:36:22,279
Speaker 1: Say those words over and over about I have seen

2399
02:36:22,760 --> 02:36:26,680
Speaker 1: the other side of the mountain. I may not get

2400
02:36:26,720 --> 02:36:30,800
Speaker 1: there with you. And holy smokes, if that doesn't make

2401
02:36:31,000 --> 02:36:34,320
Speaker 1: if you were alive when he was alive, and you

2402
02:36:34,400 --> 02:36:37,560
Speaker 1: think about that as I'm almost doing right now, that

2403
02:36:37,600 --> 02:36:42,520
Speaker 1: makes you cry and you realize there are heroes in

2404
02:36:42,560 --> 02:36:46,800
Speaker 1: our world. Um, some you know, some of the parents

2405
02:36:47,480 --> 02:36:53,680
Speaker 1: of these people in this last tragedy in Buffalo. Um,

2406
02:36:53,680 --> 02:36:55,840
Speaker 1: it's sorrd for me, as a white person to even

2407
02:36:59,240 --> 02:37:02,400
Speaker 1: express it all, you know, any anywhere near the way

2408
02:37:02,680 --> 02:37:07,400
Speaker 1: a person from that community would say it. But when

2409
02:37:07,480 --> 02:37:11,920
Speaker 1: you hear the son of a person have to deal

2410
02:37:11,959 --> 02:37:18,480
Speaker 1: with the death of their mom, and you hear them

2411
02:37:18,520 --> 02:37:25,640
Speaker 1: just trying to keep their memory alive right in the

2412
02:37:25,680 --> 02:37:28,800
Speaker 1: heat of the moment, when you know, I can only

2413
02:37:28,840 --> 02:37:34,360
Speaker 1: imagine the anger and the frustration and all that. You know, Um,

2414
02:37:34,600 --> 02:37:36,640
Speaker 1: we got to start talking to each other because just

2415
02:37:37,240 --> 02:37:40,840
Speaker 1: we've when you've got eighteen year old boys running around

2416
02:37:40,840 --> 02:37:45,200
Speaker 1: it are here. As I said earlier, I don't know

2417
02:37:45,240 --> 02:37:47,280
Speaker 1: who I was at twenty, but I'm not who I am.

2418
02:37:47,480 --> 02:37:50,760
Speaker 1: It wasn't who I am now I know an eighteen

2419
02:37:50,800 --> 02:37:53,680
Speaker 1: year old doesn't even understand what the f he's doing,

2420
02:37:54,360 --> 02:37:58,680
Speaker 1: and he's here seeing and hearing all this dribble and

2421
02:37:58,720 --> 02:38:02,240
Speaker 1: being in doctor aided, you know, because older people who

2422
02:38:02,320 --> 02:38:05,480
Speaker 1: should know better are telling him it's okay with a

2423
02:38:05,520 --> 02:38:09,880
Speaker 1: wink and a and uh, a real tickle from an elbow.

2424
02:38:10,320 --> 02:38:14,360
Speaker 1: I mean, that's horrible. Uh. It wouldn't make any difference

2425
02:38:14,400 --> 02:38:17,480
Speaker 1: if that kid had been fifty six. No, but it's

2426
02:38:17,520 --> 02:38:24,199
Speaker 1: just worse because because young people can be so misguided,

2427
02:38:24,320 --> 02:38:27,600
Speaker 1: so idealistic, you know, is it only takes a couple

2428
02:38:27,640 --> 02:38:32,280
Speaker 1: of twick tweaks of the radio station too to make

2429
02:38:32,280 --> 02:38:35,000
Speaker 1: it seem like it's some kind of cause, like their

2430
02:38:35,080 --> 02:38:39,680
Speaker 1: rebel without a cause, you know, and turned into turned

2431
02:38:39,720 --> 02:38:43,959
Speaker 1: into that. I'm sorry, I'm I'm trying to I'm babbling

2432
02:38:44,000 --> 02:38:48,760
Speaker 1: a little bit, But yes, I am very unsettled about

2433
02:38:50,200 --> 02:38:54,680
Speaker 1: what I see on the landscape of America now, because

2434
02:38:55,440 --> 02:38:59,920
Speaker 1: we have senators and congress people and sometimes even President

2435
02:39:00,040 --> 02:39:05,000
Speaker 1: is talking in ways that's just outrageous as far as

2436
02:39:05,480 --> 02:39:10,600
Speaker 1: lack of humanity for our fellow man, well articulated. You know,

2437
02:39:10,640 --> 02:39:13,160
Speaker 1: you talk about talking to each other. I've loved listening

2438
02:39:13,240 --> 02:39:15,920
Speaker 1: to you, you know, there's so much we didn't cover.

2439
02:39:16,080 --> 02:39:17,720
Speaker 1: I didn't want to, you know, go too deep in

2440
02:39:17,760 --> 02:39:20,800
Speaker 1: the stuff that's been covered by so many other people before.

2441
02:39:21,360 --> 02:39:23,920
Speaker 1: But I just want to add one note. You know,

2442
02:39:24,000 --> 02:39:27,120
Speaker 1: there was this rock artist coalition for a minute there

2443
02:39:27,160 --> 02:39:29,680
Speaker 1: in the beginning of this century, and there was a

2444
02:39:29,800 --> 02:39:34,720
Speaker 1: concert at the Forum which you participated in, and you

2445
02:39:34,840 --> 02:39:36,880
Speaker 1: just blew me away. I wrote it, so it's not

2446
02:39:36,920 --> 02:39:39,640
Speaker 1: like I'm lying. You can look it up. Whatever. People

2447
02:39:39,640 --> 02:39:44,279
Speaker 1: who haven't seen you have no idea. It's beyond the songs.

2448
02:39:44,320 --> 02:39:46,240
Speaker 1: You have one of the best bands. You have Kenny

2449
02:39:46,240 --> 02:39:50,039
Speaker 1: Aaron Off on drums, and there's a power just in

2450
02:39:50,120 --> 02:39:53,960
Speaker 1: the sound. Never mind, you still have your voice and delivery,

2451
02:39:54,440 --> 02:39:56,600
Speaker 1: and therefore you're on the road. People should go see.

2452
02:39:56,640 --> 02:40:00,680
Speaker 1: I can say that with all my sincerity. But John,

2453
02:40:00,720 --> 02:40:02,560
Speaker 1: I want to thank you so much for taking the

2454
02:40:02,600 --> 02:40:06,480
Speaker 1: time to talk to me in my audience today. But well,

2455
02:40:07,080 --> 02:40:09,440
Speaker 1: thank you for those kind words and some of which

2456
02:40:09,760 --> 02:40:13,920
Speaker 1: I know you have also written for which I'm so appreciative.

2457
02:40:13,959 --> 02:40:18,199
Speaker 1: Thank you, sir um. But I do want to say,

2458
02:40:18,320 --> 02:40:20,560
Speaker 1: you know, there was a movie called The Wizard of

2459
02:40:20,600 --> 02:40:24,160
Speaker 1: Oz and at one point one of the characters started

2460
02:40:24,440 --> 02:40:27,880
Speaker 1: talking about his importance and some day don't build a

2461
02:40:28,080 --> 02:40:32,400
Speaker 1: statue for me. And then the ladies say, I think

2462
02:40:32,400 --> 02:40:34,360
Speaker 1: it's anti m but it said, I said, well, don't

2463
02:40:34,360 --> 02:40:38,960
Speaker 1: start posing for it now, and seconds later the other

2464
02:40:39,000 --> 02:40:43,440
Speaker 1: fellow ranges it's a twist stop, it's a twist stop. Um,

2465
02:40:43,480 --> 02:40:46,080
Speaker 1: thank you for all of that. I I just I

2466
02:40:46,160 --> 02:40:51,680
Speaker 1: try to I take the music very seriously. I tried

2467
02:40:51,720 --> 02:40:54,560
Speaker 1: to present what I can, you know, in the best

2468
02:40:54,560 --> 02:40:57,840
Speaker 1: way possible. I mean, um, I try not to be

2469
02:40:58,040 --> 02:41:01,039
Speaker 1: self important about it, though I'm sort of the conduit

2470
02:41:01,360 --> 02:41:04,640
Speaker 1: lucky enough to get to do this, and you know,

2471
02:41:04,760 --> 02:41:08,240
Speaker 1: I'm in all humility. I want people to understand it

2472
02:41:09,360 --> 02:41:12,120
Speaker 1: like if I was if I was at Babe Ruth,

2473
02:41:12,520 --> 02:41:15,680
Speaker 1: I would probably look in the mirror and go, yeah,

2474
02:41:15,800 --> 02:41:18,560
Speaker 1: you're doing pretty good today. You know. I'm not Babe Ruth,

2475
02:41:18,600 --> 02:41:21,680
Speaker 1: but I'm I can only imagine what that must have

2476
02:41:21,760 --> 02:41:26,160
Speaker 1: been like to be that guy. You know. Um, there's that.

2477
02:41:27,120 --> 02:41:31,840
Speaker 1: There's that I can say, personality. Duty to yourself to

2478
02:41:31,959 --> 02:41:38,000
Speaker 1: try and then you owe it to everyone, especially yourself too,

2479
02:41:38,840 --> 02:41:42,400
Speaker 1: to give that a hundred percent effort to make sure

2480
02:41:42,440 --> 02:41:45,720
Speaker 1: that you always operate that way. Listen. I grew up

2481
02:41:45,760 --> 02:41:48,400
Speaker 1: in the era when baseball stars were heroes. I was

2482
02:41:48,440 --> 02:41:51,720
Speaker 1: even there when Roger Merris in his sixty one and

2483
02:41:51,879 --> 02:41:55,240
Speaker 1: Babe Ruth is a legend. Yeah, I was there at

2484
02:41:55,320 --> 02:41:57,840
Speaker 1: Yankee Stadium. I can tell you the whole story where

2485
02:41:57,840 --> 02:41:59,800
Speaker 1: I was sitting while did the ball goes? Really some

2486
02:42:00,080 --> 02:42:06,680
Speaker 1: them October one. But music superseded baseball for so many

2487
02:42:06,760 --> 02:42:10,680
Speaker 1: of us. And I'm not lying whatsoever. I would say

2488
02:42:10,760 --> 02:42:14,959
Speaker 1: most boomers would say, you're bigger than Babe Ruth. Babe

2489
02:42:15,040 --> 02:42:18,720
Speaker 1: Ruth it is seven fourteen or fifteen home runs and

2490
02:42:18,720 --> 02:42:20,560
Speaker 1: he had a great career. I don't wanna take anything,

2491
02:42:20,840 --> 02:42:24,360
Speaker 1: but your songs have lived on for fifty years and

2492
02:42:24,440 --> 02:42:28,160
Speaker 1: will continue to live and affect people in a three

2493
02:42:28,200 --> 02:42:32,960
Speaker 1: dimensional way that an athlete cannot reach. A human being. Well,

2494
02:42:33,000 --> 02:42:35,480
Speaker 1: I hope to always kind of live up to that,

2495
02:42:35,600 --> 02:42:37,560
Speaker 1: you know what you're saying. I I do try to

2496
02:42:37,600 --> 02:42:41,360
Speaker 1: write songs now, and of course there's always that specter

2497
02:42:41,560 --> 02:42:43,880
Speaker 1: of you know, probad Mary just sitting there kind of

2498
02:42:43,959 --> 02:42:49,200
Speaker 1: laughing at me. And in some ways that's almost another person,

2499
02:42:49,879 --> 02:42:52,480
Speaker 1: you know. I think that's a device. By the way

2500
02:42:52,520 --> 02:42:56,879
Speaker 1: some of us use two what's the word release yourself

2501
02:42:56,879 --> 02:42:59,200
Speaker 1: from that guy, so that I can look at him

2502
02:42:59,200 --> 02:43:02,400
Speaker 1: and go, hey, he was pretty was your He was

2503
02:43:02,440 --> 02:43:06,480
Speaker 1: pretty good? You know, didn't you used to be John Fogerty.

2504
02:43:06,480 --> 02:43:09,240
Speaker 1: Oh yeah. The older I get, the better I was.

2505
02:43:11,840 --> 02:43:15,320
Speaker 1: It's all of that stuff because you you tried. You know,

2506
02:43:15,400 --> 02:43:19,800
Speaker 1: at the time, I know my intensity and and even now, um,

2507
02:43:20,120 --> 02:43:22,680
Speaker 1: I don't. I don't think I've hit that mark in

2508
02:43:22,680 --> 02:43:26,000
Speaker 1: the last five years, although I don't know. Maybe we've

2509
02:43:26,000 --> 02:43:30,039
Speaker 1: been in the Promised Lands. Pretty good song. Um you

2510
02:43:30,040 --> 02:43:32,560
Speaker 1: know what I'm saying, though, it's you. You have to

2511
02:43:32,640 --> 02:43:36,320
Speaker 1: be able to have a little humor about it and

2512
02:43:36,400 --> 02:43:41,279
Speaker 1: laugh at yourself trying to do that because others and

2513
02:43:41,360 --> 02:43:44,199
Speaker 1: by that shadow that won't let me have a good time,

2514
02:43:44,840 --> 02:43:48,600
Speaker 1: because I think that's the undoing of At some point

2515
02:43:49,120 --> 02:43:52,080
Speaker 1: the things deteriorate and you can't hit that home run.

2516
02:43:52,560 --> 02:43:56,120
Speaker 1: But um are you know, artists and writers and that

2517
02:43:56,200 --> 02:43:58,800
Speaker 1: sort of thing. We can keep going, but there is

2518
02:43:58,879 --> 02:44:02,600
Speaker 1: that if you keep struggling and don't have give yourself

2519
02:44:02,680 --> 02:44:07,000
Speaker 1: some kind of release from it, some humor. You know. Um,

2520
02:44:07,080 --> 02:44:09,800
Speaker 1: I think you I don't know if it's arrogant or

2521
02:44:09,959 --> 02:44:13,480
Speaker 1: just futile, and you to the outside world, you won't

2522
02:44:13,480 --> 02:44:15,680
Speaker 1: look very nice, you know, what I'm saying. I know

2523
02:44:15,760 --> 02:44:19,160
Speaker 1: exactly what you're saying. You know, you have to survive.

2524
02:44:19,440 --> 02:44:22,360
Speaker 1: There can't be the person that people expect you to be.

2525
02:44:22,480 --> 02:44:26,440
Speaker 1: For every day. People go through changes, they become somebody different,

2526
02:44:26,480 --> 02:44:29,520
Speaker 1: they learn things, they're a different person. I mean, it's

2527
02:44:29,520 --> 02:44:31,800
Speaker 1: like Bob Dylan says when they talk about the songs

2528
02:44:31,840 --> 02:44:34,040
Speaker 1: of the at Least six, he says, I can't do

2529
02:44:34,120 --> 02:44:36,120
Speaker 1: that anymore. He says, you know, I have to do

2530
02:44:36,200 --> 02:44:40,040
Speaker 1: something different. You kind of covered it, so there you go. Right, Okay,

2531
02:44:40,280 --> 02:44:42,160
Speaker 1: we can talk for days. We want to talk more

2532
02:44:42,600 --> 02:44:45,320
Speaker 1: about credence and the songs, etcetera. But once again, thanks

2533
02:44:45,320 --> 02:44:48,040
Speaker 1: for taking the time. All right, Bob, thank you enjoying

2534
02:44:48,040 --> 02:44:51,080
Speaker 1: this very nut. You bet me too. Until next time.

2535
02:44:51,360 --> 02:44:52,680
Speaker 1: This is Bob left six