WEBVTT - Buffy Sainte-Marie 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:14.560 Pushkin. Buffy Saint Marie was never a household name in 0:00:14.560 --> 0:00:17.160 the US, but if you ask her peers, she probably 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:19.400 should have been. She was a pioneering artist in the 0:00:19.440 --> 0:00:22.880 Greenwich Village folk scene, playing alongside people like Bob Dylan. 0:00:23.280 --> 0:00:26.319 She even helped give Joni Mitchell her start. But in 0:00:26.320 --> 0:00:28.600 the early days of Vietnam, when Buffy was singing protest 0:00:28.680 --> 0:00:31.760 songs about the casualties of war, she was blacklisted by 0:00:31.760 --> 0:00:35.280 the US government. Her music was barely played on radio, 0:00:35.640 --> 0:00:38.519 but she still found an audience. Her classic songs like 0:00:38.680 --> 0:00:42.560 Universal Soldier have been covered by Elvis Presley, Barbara streisand 0:00:42.760 --> 0:00:46.640 Courtney Love Morrissey, and she was the first Native woman 0:00:46.680 --> 0:00:50.080 to win an Academy Award, though she's probably best remembered 0:00:50.080 --> 0:00:53.920 by Americans for her controversial stint on Sesame Street, where 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:56.720 she taught the cast about her indigenous heritage and Big 0:00:56.760 --> 0:01:00.760 Bird about breastfeeding. Today, at seventy nine year old, Buffy 0:01:00.920 --> 0:01:04.679 still active. She had a robust touring schedule until, of course, 0:01:04.720 --> 0:01:07.640 this year. Now she's just at home in Hawaii, where 0:01:07.680 --> 0:01:10.240 she met up with the Rick Rubin. They talk about 0:01:10.240 --> 0:01:12.759 her blacklisting and why she wrote a song about coding 0:01:13.120 --> 0:01:20.280 long before any Southern rapper ever did. This is broken 0:01:20.280 --> 0:01:23.480 record liner notes for the digital age. I'm justin Richmond. 0:01:28.360 --> 0:01:31.720 Here's Rick Rubin and Buffy Saint Marie. I want to 0:01:31.720 --> 0:01:35.399 start by talking about what the world was like when 0:01:35.440 --> 0:01:38.800 you started making music. What was the original motivation, what 0:01:38.880 --> 0:01:40.960 maybe you start doing this? What was the culture like? 0:01:41.080 --> 0:01:44.480 I had no choice. I was living in an adoptive 0:01:44.560 --> 0:01:49.320 family in Maine and Massachusetts. You were born in Canada, Yes, 0:01:49.880 --> 0:01:52.480 maybe I think I was, but I was adopted, so 0:01:52.600 --> 0:01:56.240 you don't really know. So you don't you don't think 0:01:56.280 --> 0:01:59.600 of yourself as Canadian. I think of myself as indigenous 0:01:59.680 --> 0:02:04.120 North American, and indigenous people in North we predate those borders. 0:02:04.120 --> 0:02:07.320 Those borders haven't been around very long. And although most 0:02:07.320 --> 0:02:10.160 Americans would not know, probably a lot of Canadians would 0:02:10.240 --> 0:02:12.560 know about the Jay Treaty, for instance, which means that 0:02:12.600 --> 0:02:13.959 you know, we can just go back and forth, that 0:02:14.480 --> 0:02:18.080 we don't need no passport. But most of the guys 0:02:18.080 --> 0:02:21.720 at the porter don't know that. So as as as 0:02:21.760 --> 0:02:25.720 an indigenous person in the Americas, you not only have 0:02:25.919 --> 0:02:27.799 the world be the way that it is, which is 0:02:27.840 --> 0:02:30.240 tough for everybody, but also you get another little set 0:02:30.240 --> 0:02:32.600 of challenges in that most of the other people don't 0:02:32.720 --> 0:02:37.760 know about you yourself. You're such a small minority. I mean, 0:02:37.760 --> 0:02:42.520 there are so few people of Native American background in 0:02:42.680 --> 0:02:45.240 show business. I mean there's you know, like Burt Reynolds is, oh, well, 0:02:45.240 --> 0:02:47.799 I'm one eighth Cherokee, and my you know, some other 0:02:47.800 --> 0:02:51.280 celebrities like oah, my grandmother was a Cherokee princess, blah blah. 0:02:51.280 --> 0:02:53.359 But when it comes to real Native American people who 0:02:53.400 --> 0:02:58.280 have no choice and just there's no alternative to being 0:02:59.200 --> 0:03:02.360 an Indian. However you call us, and by the way, 0:03:02.560 --> 0:03:06.360 we all say Indian, Native American, indigenous week most of 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:09.639 us use it interchangeably. How old we when you were adopted? 0:03:10.840 --> 0:03:15.600 That baby? They don't tell you. Adoptive children have a 0:03:15.600 --> 0:03:17.680 lot of problems that most people have never thought about. 0:03:17.720 --> 0:03:19.880 You don't get a horoscope, you don't know when you 0:03:19.919 --> 0:03:22.040 were born, you don't know where you were born. You 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:24.960 have a birthday assigned by the court, so you never 0:03:25.040 --> 0:03:29.160 really know who you are. You know, in the cases 0:03:29.200 --> 0:03:32.480 of most marginalized kids come from a marginalized community, you 0:03:32.520 --> 0:03:38.240 don't really know. So I was about three and my 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:41.560 family got a piano and a great piano, So that 0:03:41.600 --> 0:03:44.040 became like my toy. That's what I did instead of 0:03:44.080 --> 0:03:46.280 sports and Barbie dolls and things. And what was the 0:03:46.360 --> 0:03:49.960 music going on at that time, Like what were you hearing? Well, 0:03:50.000 --> 0:03:52.200 anything that my parents would have on the radio or 0:03:52.240 --> 0:03:57.240 records that they were had around. So somewhere along the line, 0:03:57.280 --> 0:04:02.160 I discovered Tchaikovsky and I loved that. I used to 0:04:02.200 --> 0:04:06.160 listen to Swan Lake and Nutcracker Swede and this thing 0:04:06.280 --> 0:04:09.480 called in a Persian Market and whenever would come on 0:04:09.480 --> 0:04:12.440 the radio, and I just taught myself how to play 0:04:12.600 --> 0:04:16.440 and just because it was so much fun. And I 0:04:16.520 --> 0:04:19.679 never could learn how to read music. So it's taken 0:04:19.680 --> 0:04:21.720 me all these years. And just a few years ago 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:25.279 I found out I'm actually dyslexic in music, which I 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:28.080 had never heard of. Yea, yeah, so there are a 0:04:28.120 --> 0:04:29.880 lot of There are a lot of people who come 0:04:29.920 --> 0:04:36.440 to music not through the path of music teachers. Yeah. Yeah. 0:04:36.960 --> 0:04:39.159 What's the first time you ever played in front of people? 0:04:39.640 --> 0:04:41.840 In the summertime, I used to go over to a 0:04:41.920 --> 0:04:44.880 state park and I used to sit around a campfire 0:04:44.880 --> 0:04:47.800 with everybody else and play songs that I'd written, and 0:04:48.520 --> 0:04:51.120 you know, Everly Brothers hits and you know, Fast Domino. 0:04:51.800 --> 0:04:54.960 This was in the fifties, so you asked about, you know, 0:04:55.000 --> 0:04:58.159 what kind of music influenced me. That's what it was. 0:04:59.160 --> 0:05:02.040 I heard CLA six as a child or whatever happened 0:05:02.040 --> 0:05:03.920 to be on the radio, which was, you know, kind 0:05:03.920 --> 0:05:11.120 of Frank Sinandre era. And then when I really fell 0:05:11.160 --> 0:05:14.120 in love with music was when I was about I 0:05:14.200 --> 0:05:16.520 must have been eleven or twelve or thirteen, and I 0:05:16.640 --> 0:05:18.840 used to go down in the basement and I was 0:05:18.839 --> 0:05:23.280 supposed to be ironing my school clothes, but I discovered 0:05:24.400 --> 0:05:29.720 I discovered rockabilly music on the radio. So Kyle Perkins, 0:05:30.520 --> 0:05:34.240 Scottie Moore, they were just my heroes. And I was 0:05:34.279 --> 0:05:38.600 also lucky enough. I was living in Maine and Massachusetts, 0:05:38.600 --> 0:05:41.880 and I used to get on a train and go 0:05:42.000 --> 0:05:44.440 to New York. I had a friend that I had 0:05:44.480 --> 0:05:48.800 met in Maine at a state park, and he would 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:54.760 he invited me to his house, and you know, all 0:05:54.760 --> 0:05:58.400 our mother's in agreement. It was those days, and we 0:05:58.480 --> 0:06:00.000 used to go to Allen Freed rock and Roll Show. 0:06:00.480 --> 0:06:02.320 And then the Allen Freed rock and Roll Show started 0:06:02.320 --> 0:06:04.320 coming to Boston as well, so I went there, so 0:06:04.560 --> 0:06:07.200 I used to see people like Joanne Campbell. Nobody's ever 0:06:07.279 --> 0:06:10.039 heard of Joanne Campbell. Oh, shame on you. Oh man, 0:06:10.240 --> 0:06:14.640 she was hot. I mean she was. She and the 0:06:14.680 --> 0:06:18.000 Platters I think were the only women. You know, the 0:06:18.080 --> 0:06:21.040 Platters there was one woman. Oh and Laverne Baker. They 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:26.440 were the only women. But it was Jerry Lee Lewis, 0:06:26.520 --> 0:06:30.880 Fats Domino, the Everly Brothers and Frankie Lyman. He just 0:06:30.920 --> 0:06:33.800 play a handful of songs. Yes you got it. Yeah, 0:06:34.200 --> 0:06:37.240 they play maybe two or three songs and then next 0:06:37.440 --> 0:06:41.159 Oh my god, it was great. It was just such 0:06:41.160 --> 0:06:44.279 a thrill. I knew that that's where I wanted to 0:06:44.360 --> 0:06:47.520 be in the audience, on the stage, backstage. I didn't 0:06:47.520 --> 0:06:50.720 carry just wanted to be around the music. Would you 0:06:50.720 --> 0:06:52.880 say at that time, we're all kids into it? Or 0:06:53.000 --> 0:06:57.160 was it? No? So what again? Like more like what 0:06:57.200 --> 0:06:59.520 was the world? What was the world like? Then? Like? Um? 0:07:00.680 --> 0:07:04.440 Were would you? Would you say you were unusual for 0:07:04.560 --> 0:07:07.520 being in that group of people. I wasn't in a 0:07:07.560 --> 0:07:11.600 group of people, which was pretty standard for me because, 0:07:11.640 --> 0:07:13.360 like I said, I lived in two different places. I 0:07:13.400 --> 0:07:16.480 lived in maineand Massachusetts, so um, I didn't really have 0:07:16.840 --> 0:07:20.240 tight social groups. I had trouble at home. There were 0:07:20.240 --> 0:07:23.160 pedophiles in the neighborhood and in the house. So I 0:07:23.280 --> 0:07:26.080 was kind of a loner kid. And so the music 0:07:26.240 --> 0:07:28.360 that I was hearing, I was I was with that 0:07:28.600 --> 0:07:31.400 Dominomo than I was with the other kids. And in 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:36.520 high school now I'm maybe fifteen sixteen, yeah, and I'm 0:07:36.560 --> 0:07:43.440 hearing these doo wop and rockabillyum you know, um Buddy Holly, 0:07:43.800 --> 0:07:47.440 Elvis Presley. But it wasn't But just so we understand, 0:07:48.040 --> 0:07:51.040 it wasn't all the kids listening to. It wasn't any 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:54.320 like subculture music. It was subculture music, but it was 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:57.800 it was it was described the grown ups would have 0:07:57.840 --> 0:08:00.560 thinked it would have thought, oh, it's just cheap, you know, 0:08:00.600 --> 0:08:04.560 that's um uh. They they either would have associated with 0:08:04.640 --> 0:08:09.080 black people in very ugly terms, or poor people or 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:12.200 not us anyway, you know, it was. It was something 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:15.880 that was a little um risque. It's just so interesting 0:08:15.920 --> 0:08:19.600 because looking you know, looking back, we think of both 0:08:19.600 --> 0:08:22.040 the music of the fifties and the sixties as so 0:08:22.280 --> 0:08:27.440 ubiquitous and so mainstream was not so it was the 0:08:27.560 --> 0:08:31.560 underground music of the day, and good girls didn't listen 0:08:31.560 --> 0:08:35.319 to that kind of music interesting. Yeah, bad boys did. Um, 0:08:35.920 --> 0:08:39.640 so I went through different social thing. I think I 0:08:39.679 --> 0:08:43.240 went through social demotion because of the music that I liked. 0:08:43.240 --> 0:08:46.800 I didn't care. Yeah, because that's what I wanted to do. Anywhoys, 0:08:46.800 --> 0:08:49.320 go home and listen to my records and you felt 0:08:49.320 --> 0:08:50.800 it in your heart? It was it was not a 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:54.600 It made sense to you. It didn't have to make 0:08:54.640 --> 0:08:56.800 sense to everyone else. Do you think the other people 0:08:56.800 --> 0:09:01.360 didn't feel it? Think of my own situation, you know, 0:09:01.400 --> 0:09:04.040 the handful of kids hung out with I think they looked. 0:09:04.080 --> 0:09:06.960 I think they thought it was sinful. They wouldn't have 0:09:07.040 --> 0:09:09.440 used that word, and they weren't really churchy, but they 0:09:09.440 --> 0:09:12.439 were definitely you know, it was just like looked at 0:09:12.480 --> 0:09:15.559 beneath them. They would think it was beneath them, think 0:09:15.559 --> 0:09:17.680 that it would they be ashamed to listen to it. 0:09:17.720 --> 0:09:22.040 Do you think I think they hadn't discovered it. Tell 0:09:22.040 --> 0:09:27.040 me your first experience of folk music. Oh gosh, let's see, 0:09:27.440 --> 0:09:29.240 I guess I was in college. I went to the 0:09:29.360 --> 0:09:32.760 University of Massachusetts and I got a degree in teaching 0:09:32.760 --> 0:09:35.240 and a degree in oriental philosophy. By the way, you 0:09:35.360 --> 0:09:38.480 started out in philosophy, I heard ye see, I've always 0:09:38.520 --> 0:09:42.160 considered myself very fortunate in that I came along into 0:09:42.200 --> 0:09:46.120 show business kind of by accident. I didn't really, you know, 0:09:46.160 --> 0:09:50.080 I just surprising that I was there at all. But 0:09:50.200 --> 0:09:52.440 I was called a folk singer because that's what they 0:09:52.440 --> 0:09:55.600 were trying to sell. So I came to Greenwich Village 0:09:55.600 --> 0:09:59.640 straight from college. But here I was in New York 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:02.880 City for the first time, and I was a songwriter. 0:10:03.440 --> 0:10:05.000 But you weren't supposed to be one yet, and the 0:10:05.000 --> 0:10:10.400 folk police could get after you, and if it was 0:10:10.440 --> 0:10:13.480 it acknowledged at that time that folk music was really 0:10:14.320 --> 0:10:17.760 an old form being brought back. So it was everyone 0:10:17.840 --> 0:10:20.400 knew that this is old music. I think. So we 0:10:20.480 --> 0:10:28.280 think of the sixties as when folk music started. Really yeah, okay, yeah, 0:10:28.320 --> 0:10:31.640 so's it's interesting that it actually even then it was 0:10:31.720 --> 0:10:35.439 old music. Yeah, it was just a new wave of 0:10:35.480 --> 0:10:39.240 this old music. It was interesting in these old forms 0:10:39.240 --> 0:10:41.199 of music. And like I said, I felt as though 0:10:41.240 --> 0:10:43.480 I was very fortunate to come along when I did. 0:10:43.520 --> 0:10:45.880 In the first place. The window to show business was 0:10:46.040 --> 0:10:48.240 just the left opened by accident. I think, you know, 0:10:48.280 --> 0:10:51.280 we were coming out of the Eisenhower generation, and it 0:10:51.360 --> 0:10:54.280 was like Frank Sinatra and you know that kind of 0:10:54.520 --> 0:11:01.960 um loungy big bands was still around. But I was 0:11:02.080 --> 0:11:05.120 very lucky because I didn't know any think about folk music. 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:07.360 I was. I was just giving over my degree in 0:11:07.400 --> 0:11:12.319 orial plosity, and I stepped on stage and I sang 0:11:12.400 --> 0:11:14.800 these songs. Now, I was lucky enough to be around 0:11:14.840 --> 0:11:18.520 real folk singers like Pete Seeger New and McCall jon Bias, 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:21.360 who sang songs that were four or five hundred years old. 0:11:22.400 --> 0:11:25.200 They were real folk songs. And see that really thrills 0:11:25.200 --> 0:11:27.560 me as a person who doesn't read music. And I 0:11:27.600 --> 0:11:30.520 don't come from any kind of formal music background, including 0:11:30.559 --> 0:11:32.880 the Paul Simon kind of music background where you grow 0:11:32.960 --> 0:11:35.120 up in New York. Your uncle's in the business, your 0:11:35.120 --> 0:11:37.160 other uncle's a lawyer, and somebody else, you know what 0:11:37.200 --> 0:11:40.360 I mean. I don't come from that and marginalized people. 0:11:40.440 --> 0:11:42.720 I think would I think it would be very surprising 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:45.760 to most of you guys who are really solid in 0:11:45.800 --> 0:11:49.240 the record business and have not really experienced what it's 0:11:49.320 --> 0:11:54.040 like to be really marginalized and not know anybody, not 0:11:54.200 --> 0:11:57.760 have a rolodex, not not have an addressed book, not 0:11:57.960 --> 0:12:01.840 know how it's done. Who does it? I mean we 0:12:01.880 --> 0:12:04.160 don't even know where the door is. There's no way 0:12:04.200 --> 0:12:06.760 for Native American people to get into show business. There 0:12:06.800 --> 0:12:10.600 just isn't and it's very rare anyway. I think for 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:13.960 anybody in show business to hold the door open for 0:12:14.000 --> 0:12:17.680 anyone else, it's just like, I'm here, how do you 0:12:17.760 --> 0:12:20.319 like me? Now? You know? But I didn't feel like that. 0:12:20.400 --> 0:12:23.040 I mean, I carried Joni Mitchell's tape around in my 0:12:23.080 --> 0:12:26.280 purse for long time, long months and months, and I 0:12:26.320 --> 0:12:28.920 played it for all kinds of people in the music business. 0:12:28.920 --> 0:12:32.000 How did you first run into Jonie? Well, she was 0:12:32.000 --> 0:12:35.960 a fan of mine, and I don't know where it was. 0:12:35.960 --> 0:12:38.480 It could have been a Saskatchewan and Minneapolis or somewhere. 0:12:38.480 --> 0:12:41.520 We were both on the road and I heard about 0:12:41.520 --> 0:12:43.400 her and I heard her musing. I just thought she 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:47.480 was just great. I thought, oh, she's great, she's beautiful, 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:51.640 she's smart, she's got she wants to she wants to 0:12:51.679 --> 0:12:55.240 do this. Nobody wanted to hear it. So finally I 0:12:56.600 --> 0:12:59.199 played her stuff for Elliott Roberts and told him to 0:12:59.240 --> 0:13:02.400 go down to the where, I don't know, the Black 0:13:02.440 --> 0:13:05.320 Cat Cafe or one of those little clubs in the village, 0:13:05.600 --> 0:13:08.520 and they made a great career together, but it was very, 0:13:08.640 --> 0:13:12.240 very hard. People who really are connoisseurs of folk music 0:13:12.280 --> 0:13:14.760 would realize the folk music comes from everywhere. It's just 0:13:14.880 --> 0:13:17.240 music made by folks. It's not just music made by 0:13:17.720 --> 0:13:21.440 the chosen few who are making the music business some money. 0:13:21.600 --> 0:13:23.880 We're going to invest in this, We're going to keep 0:13:23.920 --> 0:13:27.040 the public thinking that it's very folky, but really we're 0:13:27.320 --> 0:13:29.880 pumping dollars out of it. I mean, so many people 0:13:29.920 --> 0:13:32.520 made money on what he got three and well even 0:13:32.559 --> 0:13:34.760 Bob Marley later, right, I mean, you and I are 0:13:34.800 --> 0:13:38.120 in the music business. We know where it's at. There's 0:13:38.120 --> 0:13:41.040 always been people who are in the business to make money, 0:13:41.080 --> 0:13:43.360 and they've always been people in the business to make 0:13:43.440 --> 0:13:47.840 great art. It just there's both paths, Yes, there are. 0:13:48.360 --> 0:13:52.640 And I think most most non musicians, just most listeners 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:57.880 wouldn't realize that. And I think that most new artists 0:13:58.400 --> 0:14:01.400 don't know that. And I think the record business has 0:14:01.440 --> 0:14:05.680 been terribly complicit in keeping try to keep them ignorant. Yeah, 0:14:05.760 --> 0:14:08.960 and it's a business of sharks, yes it is. I 0:14:09.000 --> 0:14:12.200 mean I was so green. I had never met a lawyer, 0:14:12.720 --> 0:14:15.400 I had never had a conversation with the businessman ever, 0:14:15.640 --> 0:14:18.000 I remember when I first went to New York, I 0:14:18.080 --> 0:14:21.640 was running around in my little heels and mini dresses 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:24.200 and things. And I remember I went into the Musician 0:14:24.360 --> 0:14:26.360 Union for the first time, which is kind of like 0:14:26.600 --> 0:14:31.600 walking into the lobby of the Sopranos. I mean, I 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:34.280 grew I grew up around Italian American you know, semi 0:14:34.280 --> 0:14:39.200 mafia people you know in Maine, Massachusetts, idea that and 0:14:40.000 --> 0:14:42.480 I look upon it very kindly, like people in the 0:14:42.520 --> 0:14:45.280 Sopranos would, because I was seeing the family side of that, 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:49.360 but the business side of that, wherever it's coming from, 0:14:49.400 --> 0:14:53.520 whether it's people whose roots are in this part of 0:14:53.520 --> 0:14:56.880 Europe or some other part of Europe. Show business was 0:14:56.920 --> 0:15:03.440 developed in Europe through vaudeville by h by people who 0:15:03.520 --> 0:15:06.440 were not only concerned with the show, they were also 0:15:06.840 --> 0:15:11.120 concerned with sustaining the business. I mean, that's not necessarily 0:15:11.320 --> 0:15:14.960 greed and I'm going to rip off artists, but of 0:15:14.960 --> 0:15:17.800 course the part that we object to is exactly about that, 0:15:17.880 --> 0:15:21.160 and they've been artists ripped off forever and ever. So 0:15:21.280 --> 0:15:24.400 I had never met a lawyer or a businessman. I 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:26.480 remember when I first went into Vanguard Records and they 0:15:26.520 --> 0:15:28.160 asked me who my lawyer was, and I said I 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:30.400 didn't want I didn't have one, and they said that's okay, 0:15:30.400 --> 0:15:33.240 you can use ours. So I signed a seven year deal. 0:15:34.280 --> 0:15:35.960 How did you know to go to Vanguard? How did 0:15:36.000 --> 0:15:41.520 you How did you know? I was just stupid? Blue 0:15:41.560 --> 0:15:46.560 Note also wanted to sign me. So Vanguard was very big. 0:15:48.280 --> 0:15:51.160 Yes she was. Yeah, Joan Byers was already on Vanguard 0:15:51.200 --> 0:15:54.400 and having a fantastic career. Yeah, yeah, so she was. 0:15:54.680 --> 0:15:59.200 She was already signed her first album. I guess was 0:15:59.240 --> 0:16:04.520 just about time that I showed up and they wanted 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:08.320 to sign me, and I said, yeah, I get Depending 0:16:08.400 --> 0:16:10.720 on how you look at it, I kind of either 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:15.840 fell into or lucked into having a career. My first album, 0:16:15.880 --> 0:16:18.200 all of a sudden, I was Billboard's Best New Artist. 0:16:18.400 --> 0:16:22.360 What just singing these songs that I'd been writing all 0:16:22.440 --> 0:16:26.600 this time, and they were about everything, and I didn't 0:16:26.600 --> 0:16:30.000 think it was going to do anything because people were 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:34.560 pretty suspect of songwriters anyway. And my first album is 0:16:34.600 --> 0:16:36.560 called It's My Way. I think they just put it 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:39.200 into outer space or something, or into the Library of Congress. 0:16:39.240 --> 0:16:41.480 I don't know. It just got some big honor. I 0:16:41.480 --> 0:16:44.320 thought it was awful. But everybody else I thought it 0:16:44.440 --> 0:16:46.840 was awful, oh that it was included, or you thought 0:16:46.840 --> 0:16:48.640 it was awful that the albums oh no, I thought 0:16:48.640 --> 0:16:51.640 the album itself was awful. Oh no, the songs are wonderful, 0:16:51.680 --> 0:16:55.040 but I just think they took the wrong takes. And 0:16:55.200 --> 0:16:59.200 of course an artist had no say in those days, 0:16:59.400 --> 0:17:01.120 like when did you getting into the music business? Just 0:17:01.200 --> 0:17:08.760 to put me in the date song? Um, ninety mid eighties, okay, okay, okay, 0:17:09.040 --> 0:17:11.760 it was the early days of hip hop music. That's right, 0:17:12.720 --> 0:17:16.760 so nice, so nice. Yeah, so it was. It was. 0:17:17.000 --> 0:17:21.480 It was a scene where at first it was very 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:26.040 naive and it was like, yes, students are in the streets, 0:17:26.200 --> 0:17:28.479 we have discovered our brains. We're not going to your 0:17:28.560 --> 0:17:34.440 freaking warm And there was a lot of protests bubbling under. 0:17:34.800 --> 0:17:38.199 I had written Universal Soldier, although everybody, you know, everybody 0:17:38.240 --> 0:17:40.159 thought Donovan wrote it. And I still have people come 0:17:40.240 --> 0:17:43.280 up to me today and argue that Donovan wrote Universal 0:17:43.359 --> 0:17:46.680 Soldier in Codine. And see, Donovan was a person of 0:17:46.760 --> 0:17:49.080 conscience who wrote all of his own songs except for 0:17:49.160 --> 0:17:52.840 two songs, and those two songs were Universal Soldier in Codine, 0:17:52.920 --> 0:17:55.680 So he got credit for writing those as well, and 0:17:56.080 --> 0:17:57.920 I don't think he ever took credit for it, but 0:17:58.200 --> 0:18:02.520 his management never pointed out that it hadn't written them. Who, 0:18:02.880 --> 0:18:08.960 how and why did you write codine? Codine? You know, 0:18:09.080 --> 0:18:12.040 for years, until very recently, people wouldn't understand this, but 0:18:12.160 --> 0:18:16.240 now people would. I was addicted to codeine by a 0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:20.080 doctor in Florida. I had been playing at Freddy Neil's 0:18:20.200 --> 0:18:22.560 place in Coconut Grove, you know that little club that 0:18:22.640 --> 0:18:25.320 he used to have. I don't know. I went to 0:18:25.400 --> 0:18:27.600 a doctor who said that I had bronchitis. I've been 0:18:27.640 --> 0:18:29.880 coughing and things. I think I was probably just exhausted 0:18:29.920 --> 0:18:31.680 from being on the road all the time and practically 0:18:31.760 --> 0:18:34.480 lived in a bus. And he addicted me to codine. 0:18:34.680 --> 0:18:37.719 And he apparently had addicted many young ladies to codine 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:41.159 and turned them out. And so people who are addicted 0:18:41.240 --> 0:18:46.480 through their doctors to an opiate, and codeine seats an opiate, 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:49.800 I mean codeine. It sounds oh silly, triket tweet kids stuff. 0:18:50.359 --> 0:18:53.080 Codeine is as much of an opiate as heroin is. 0:18:53.480 --> 0:18:56.280 It's an opiate. And just like all the doctor drugs, 0:18:56.320 --> 0:19:00.439 the synthetic drugs now like percocet, and you know all 0:19:00.480 --> 0:19:06.200 of the oxy what's you know oxyconton all of them there, Yes, 0:19:06.440 --> 0:19:11.320 they're all synthetic opiates. If you it's my belief, now 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:13.800 you might disagreement. It's my belief that if a person 0:19:13.880 --> 0:19:18.760 gets into drugs through social reasons, they're very likely to 0:19:18.840 --> 0:19:23.159 get addicted in a kind of a different, almost more 0:19:23.240 --> 0:19:26.320 difficult way. You know, they're in and it's fun and 0:19:26.400 --> 0:19:28.840 it's wonderful, and you know they haven't fun with their friends. 0:19:29.400 --> 0:19:33.480 But if if a doctor addicts you and all of 0:19:33.520 --> 0:19:36.760 a sudden, you have to leave town. That's what happened 0:19:36.760 --> 0:19:40.119 to me. I had to leave Florida and we were 0:19:40.200 --> 0:19:43.080 driving through Georgia and I was just feeling horrible, no 0:19:43.280 --> 0:19:45.040 idea what was wrong with me, and went to a 0:19:45.119 --> 0:19:48.480 pharmacist to refill a Florida prescription. I didn't know you 0:19:48.560 --> 0:19:50.920 couldn't do that, and the guys that I can't feel 0:19:50.960 --> 0:19:53.280 that it's from a different state, But how long have 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:55.640 you've been taking it? And heap the pharmacists pointed out 0:19:55.680 --> 0:19:58.080 to me that I was addicted to an opiate. I 0:19:58.200 --> 0:20:00.399 had no idea. I had just been going to the 0:20:00.480 --> 0:20:03.200 doctor for my shots and for my pills. So I 0:20:03.320 --> 0:20:07.879 went through withdraw cold turkey. But it wasn't like I 0:20:08.000 --> 0:20:11.720 ever had any fun on it. So it's kind of 0:20:11.800 --> 0:20:14.520 a kind of a really interesting that I would have 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:16.760 I would have guessed had I not known the story 0:20:17.480 --> 0:20:25.400 that there was a long blues tradition of songs about drugs, cocaine, blues, cocaine, 0:20:25.880 --> 0:20:28.960 like those kind of things. Yeah, I would think, Oh, 0:20:29.240 --> 0:20:31.520 you're doing one of those kind of songs. I would 0:20:31.560 --> 0:20:33.840 have never guessed it was a personal issue. Oh yeah, 0:20:33.880 --> 0:20:37.119 it's amazing, Yeah, because you know, I didn't really have 0:20:37.280 --> 0:20:41.000 that personal I will see at the time maybe twenty two. Yeah, 0:20:41.560 --> 0:20:43.600 and see, I don't drink. I still don't drink. I 0:20:43.720 --> 0:20:46.199 just zero alcohol all my life, just because I never 0:20:46.359 --> 0:20:50.600 never did. Um. And I I was a girl by myself, 0:20:50.640 --> 0:20:52.639 and I looked a certain way, right, I mean I 0:20:53.280 --> 0:20:54.920 looked a certain way. I didn't run around with some 0:20:55.040 --> 0:20:59.600 granny dress. I was either smart enough or stupid enough 0:21:00.160 --> 0:21:02.440 to get my first show business dress from the Frederick's 0:21:02.480 --> 0:21:05.399 catalog and the Fredericks catalog. You even know what that 0:21:05.560 --> 0:21:07.680 is now, But it used to be this thing. You'd 0:21:07.720 --> 0:21:10.600 see it advertised in the back of movie magazines when 0:21:10.680 --> 0:21:13.480 I was twelve, right, and it was sexy clothes for women, 0:21:13.880 --> 0:21:17.080 and it was drawn. They weren't photos, they were drawn, 0:21:17.280 --> 0:21:20.800 so they were really they were really pretty. And so 0:21:21.000 --> 0:21:23.119 I ordered this dress and I over dubbed Donald. I 0:21:23.200 --> 0:21:25.720 made it ever A ragged him, and I mean like 0:21:25.800 --> 0:21:29.680 a v him. And I showed up in my high 0:21:29.720 --> 0:21:31.639 heels and think you know, there were people people around, 0:21:31.680 --> 0:21:36.560 like Judy Collins and others in not very flamboyant clothes. 0:21:36.840 --> 0:21:39.280 So I was also making that mistake. So here I 0:21:39.359 --> 0:21:41.760 showed up. I wasn't singing folk songs. I didn't know 0:21:41.840 --> 0:21:45.960 how to read music. I didn't had never met a lawyer. 0:21:46.000 --> 0:21:47.960 I mean, I was really mean, and I was wearing 0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:54.240 the wrong thing. And you know, looking back on it, 0:21:54.640 --> 0:21:56.520 all I can say is, you know, be yourself and 0:21:56.640 --> 0:21:58.359 be who you are, because I had an awful lot 0:21:58.359 --> 0:22:00.639 of fun even though I was doing everything wrong. I 0:22:01.000 --> 0:22:03.520 didn't soar to the top. I didn't become, you know, 0:22:03.600 --> 0:22:06.560 the equivalent of Madonna and Michael Jackson. But there were 0:22:06.640 --> 0:22:10.560 reasons why, and it had nothing to do with lack 0:22:10.640 --> 0:22:13.119 of talent. But those of us, like you and me, 0:22:13.200 --> 0:22:15.520 who are in show business, we know all the things 0:22:15.600 --> 0:22:18.840 that it takes to make an artist and it's not 0:22:19.080 --> 0:22:23.760 all good, and it's very tricky for anyone to negotiate 0:22:23.840 --> 0:22:26.480 as long as it lasts in that kind of center. 0:22:27.040 --> 0:22:30.560 I had no idea that there was anybody standing in 0:22:30.640 --> 0:22:34.760 opposition to me or trying to trip me up. I 0:22:35.400 --> 0:22:37.600 just thought I was lucky to be there and to 0:22:37.720 --> 0:22:40.280 get to make one record, you know, and you were. 0:22:40.480 --> 0:22:42.119 I mean, the other side of it is, we did 0:22:42.200 --> 0:22:44.399 get to do it. I did get to do it, 0:22:44.480 --> 0:22:47.840 and I got to do it for my reasons, not 0:22:47.920 --> 0:22:50.399 so much for show business reasons. And it took I 0:22:50.520 --> 0:22:55.000 didn't find out for twenty years about I didn't know 0:22:55.080 --> 0:22:57.040 that there was any such thing as blacklisting, none of 0:22:57.119 --> 0:23:00.760