Speaker 1: Guest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic
Speaker 1: episode was produced by the team at Pandora.
Speaker 2: This is Sugar Steve and on this week's QLs Classic
Speaker 2: Austin Rocker and ax Man. Gary Clark Junior brings blues
Speaker 2: rock center stage in twenty nineteen as he joins Team
Speaker 2: Supreme to talk about his journey from booking gigs at
Speaker 2: fourteen to collaborating with The Rolling Stones and Eric Clapton,
Speaker 2: and his new album This Land, originally released March six,
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3: Sma Supremo Ro Suprema Supremo, Roll Call Suprema Sun Supremo,
Speaker 3: Roll Call Supremo role.
Speaker 1: Calls, loves my name, Yeah, that you can trust. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I love all my friends.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Who don't throw me under the plus.
Speaker 5: Supremo Supremo Roll Call Supremack Supremo.
Speaker 1: Role My name is Fante. Yeah. I don't want no drama. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just here to talk about the night I met
Speaker 1: your mama.
Speaker 3: Supremo Roll Call Suprema Sun Sun Supremo.
Speaker 6: Role call.
Speaker 7: My name is Sugar, Yeah, Sugar Steve for the wind.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Do you hear your training coming?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 1: When your train pulls in.
Speaker 5: Supprimo, Supremo, Supremo, Supremo roll call bill Yeah, not counting Pathos.
Speaker 8: Yeah, should have divorced. Yeah, Jeff Bethos, Supremo, y.
Speaker 4: Supremo, roll call Supremo Supremo roll call.
Speaker 9: It's like em Yeah, that's right. I'm flossing. Yeah, because
Speaker 9: now I know. Yeah, a black man from Austin.
Speaker 5: Roll call Supremo Supremo, roll call, Supremo Supremo roll.
Speaker 6: Call on g c J. Yeah, from the at X, Yeah,
Speaker 6: with Quest and Crew. Yeah, and I don't know what's
Speaker 6: nice roll car.
Speaker 4: Supremo Supremo, roll call, Supremo, Supremo, role called Suprema some
Speaker 4: Supremo role called Suprema son something Supremo role.
Speaker 1: Car nice, Yeah, smooth, witty, nice smooitie man dropped fold
Speaker 1: yeah real nice.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 9: But he's Russian but still not a bad.
Speaker 1: Better than a lot. Yeah. Yeah, he ringed up there.
Speaker 1: You know you did it effortlessly.
Speaker 6: I appreciate that.
Speaker 7: So I did Hendricks Clark mash up.
Speaker 1: Yes, deep cuts, I get it, deep cuts. And we're
Speaker 1: in the house. Of course, I'm gonna sugar work. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the Sugar Network edition. Of course, love supreciate
Speaker 1: where we at se No, run your own show, bro,
Speaker 1: I'm just here for a punch. I'm still under the bus, man,
Speaker 1: I'm still under the bus. You weren't talking about me, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: you don't even know what's going on.
Speaker 7: Well, it's cool this sugar Steve and we're here at
Speaker 7: Electrically Studios.
Speaker 1: That's right. We are anything else, No like for somebody
Speaker 1: who let's move it, okay, living anyway, My role call
Speaker 1: was the ship.
Speaker 8: It was it was It was like it was like
Speaker 8: you were great many let like an onion, many levels.
Speaker 1: Oh wait, we might as well just start now because
Speaker 1: I know I'm gonna play this about twenty eleven times.
Speaker 9: Damns.
Speaker 1: All right, yeah, step mother, is.
Speaker 9: You sound y'all? Sounds so good?
Speaker 1: Oh man, are you background?
Speaker 8: Yeah, that's just a mere plugging on that ship.
Speaker 1: Well done. So that was just me. It sounds great
Speaker 1: when I walked into the room, h unpaid Bill. Yeah,
Speaker 1: when he's not teaching Grover to curse on Sesame Street.
Speaker 1: And you gotta explain to you what was that? I
Speaker 1: think y'all did that on purpose. I heard it both ways, though,
Speaker 1: like I heard what it was supposed to be. It was,
Speaker 1: what was the thing this is the red dress blue? Yeah,
Speaker 1: like whatever that was Willow Yann Yanny Laua, Yeah that
Speaker 1: Yanny verse is Laurel what exactly he was said, I.
Speaker 8: I don't I didn't see it, but I was told
Speaker 8: by my girlfriend who's the boss, that they watched it
Speaker 8: like a hundred times, and and everybody bought the fact
Speaker 8: that he didn't. He did not say what everybody thinks.
Speaker 1: He said, wait, wait, she's literally the boss.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 8: Oh damn ye, my girlfriend she is my boss. She
Speaker 8: is she's the boss. Wow, it's tough, man tough. It
Speaker 8: used to be she wasn't the boss, and then like
Speaker 8: in the last year, she became the boss. And I'm
Speaker 8: not sure how I feel about that. I'm formulating the
Speaker 8: opinions speak.
Speaker 1: It's love on the street. Yeah, love on the street. No,
Speaker 1: but you you were saying that you were about to
Speaker 1: have a get rebar mitzvad Oh.
Speaker 8: So for those that follow on the on the Instagram,
Speaker 8: he is constantly the host of various rap events, US events,
Speaker 8: various events. He's like the m of mcs. And I thought,
Speaker 8: since I'm gonna get bar Missov again that he could
Speaker 8: m see the Barns.
Speaker 1: For the second time, it's like you and is this
Speaker 1: like a recircumcision as well? Yeah, okay, like they're all
Speaker 1: the same things. I gotta read it or okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: I may excuse myself from the circumcision part.
Speaker 8: I understand.
Speaker 1: But but you know, but up until that, up until
Speaker 1: the cutting, I'm there. I'm your guy.
Speaker 8: Tonight, we're enjoying whiskey with each other, and it's wonderful.
Speaker 8: I feel like we don't do this enough.
Speaker 1: We don't. I just want to see how far I
Speaker 1: can get without even introducing our guests. Was trying to
Speaker 1: segue into our guests because I brought in some that
Speaker 1: he liked. He has an intro, but I'm just saying that.
Speaker 1: You know, we usually just wrap a little bit for
Speaker 1: like minutes. The Sugar networks much more organized. I get
Speaker 1: a mess man, you know how I do, especially when
Speaker 1: Boston Building here. Yeah, I know, my feet, my nikes
Speaker 1: are up on the fact. I'm gonna eat some grapes
Speaker 1: right now, all the exactly.
Speaker 9: Usually I'm just cool.
Speaker 1: I'm just where's that boys coming from? There's somebody here.
Speaker 1: I love when Bill's not here so I can just
Speaker 1: violate all the rules. Oh and you brought the ear
Speaker 1: rings back the earrings.
Speaker 9: Don't get me.
Speaker 1: I love the ear rings. A great edit job, bill out,
Speaker 1: Yes he did, he edited, he edited a lot out. Okay,
Speaker 1: roll out this rolls roll them out, Red car, Come on,
Speaker 1: all right, we have a black man from Austin, Texas.
Speaker 1: Time time out. Austin is officially my second favorite place
Speaker 1: on earthly know that, what is it? I just like
Speaker 1: my requirements for city are you know. I don't have
Speaker 1: the same standards that other people do. Okay, Uh, if
Speaker 1: the record shopping is good, the food truck activity is
Speaker 1: good there, that's all I mean.
Speaker 9: If we was legal, but you know, make certain compromises.
Speaker 1: It's about to be coming.
Speaker 8: It's coming out in as.
Speaker 1: We had a good time, you know. And I actually
Speaker 1: believe that perhaps the the idea potus that might get
Speaker 1: the votes for the Democrats, or I believe that you
Speaker 1: think he is from I think he's the figure that
Speaker 1: will do it. Why are you speaking in code? Because
Speaker 1: you know then I don't want to get pinned down
Speaker 1: Jesus exactly. Not, I mean not yet. You know, I'm
Speaker 1: just saying right now, as it's looking there's a strong
Speaker 1: possibility bet speak much more openly anyway, my second is
Speaker 1: my second He's from my second favorite city. Uh in
Speaker 1: the US and the world. He's been doing it to death. Yes,
Speaker 1: deaf d e a f because his guitars allowed uh
Speaker 1: since the age of twelve their bad point of here No, seriously,
Speaker 1: in the tradition of of of the great journeyman bluesman
Speaker 1: such as James Marshall, Hendrix, Buddy Guy, Muddy Waters, all
Speaker 1: the Kings, BB King, Albert King, Freddy King, Uh you
Speaker 1: know Hallan Wolf, Yes, all the Kings, our guests. Gary
Speaker 1: Clark Jr. Has been making believers of the traditional rock
Speaker 1: and roll sound with his major debut U and the
Speaker 1: EP Bright Light TP and the Black and Blue, which
Speaker 1: was released in twenty twelve. I've seen the man myself.
Speaker 1: I've played with him a few times. But you know
Speaker 1: I can attest that, uh, the future of of just
Speaker 1: jaw dropping ax work is definitely good hands. Lady and Joeman,
Speaker 1: please welcome to Quest Love Supreme, the one and knowing
Speaker 1: Gary Clark.
Speaker 6: I appreciate that I might need that as my alarm.
Speaker 1: I'll do so. Tell me about Austin. Were you were?
Speaker 1: You born in Austin, Texas?
Speaker 6: Yeah, born and raised in Austin, Texas.
Speaker 1: All right, now I have this romantic, you know, vision
Speaker 1: of the town and whatnot, like food trucks, food trucks
Speaker 1: and records music. What was it like pre gentrification? What
Speaker 1: was it like? Damn? For those that don't know, Clark
Speaker 1: gave a look. So tell me what's the what's the
Speaker 1: deal with Austin?
Speaker 6: Like?
Speaker 1: What was growing up in Austin like? For me?
Speaker 10: I grew up south side of Austin, a little spot
Speaker 10: called Oakhill neighborhood.
Speaker 6: I guess you called it somewhat of a suburb.
Speaker 1: I guess the south side of the suburb.
Speaker 10: No, I mean yeah, I guess you could say that
Speaker 10: there's a bunch of houses with schools and parks and
Speaker 10: ok uh, but uh, it wasn't directly right in the city,
Speaker 10: you know what I mean? But you know, pretty pretty normal,
Speaker 10: somewhat diverse neighborhood close to you know, uh, fifteen minutes
Speaker 10: away from downtown. But I was it was country, kind
Speaker 10: of a little bit, riding bikes, sports out of the woods,
Speaker 10: doing stuff like that, basketball, nothing too wild.
Speaker 6: Yeah, fairly normal, Yeah, somewhat somewhat normal. I mean it's Texas,
Speaker 6: the south, so there's a little bit of that.
Speaker 1: It's you know, I was going to say the one,
Speaker 1: the one, the one physical trait that you have that's
Speaker 1: the opposite of all the great axemen of history is
Speaker 1: you're tall. Yeah, I'm up here, man, You're very tall.
Speaker 1: Like all the great acts men, I feel like, you know,
Speaker 1: are under five ten and they, you know, I feel
Speaker 1: like maybe that's their entry into you know, this makes.
Speaker 7: Up for well I never heard I never thought about hype.
Speaker 7: But but Hendrix was short.
Speaker 11: I mean it's about I mean, I've heard about having
Speaker 11: big hands where that can.
Speaker 9: Finish it, finish it, finish it be extremely help. Thank you.
Speaker 7: You're supposed to be doing this.
Speaker 11: An advantage, no, I mean probably for other instruments too,
Speaker 11: but having having large hands would make playing an instrument easier.
Speaker 6: I would know. This is all I got.
Speaker 11: I haven't been looking at your hands. I mean, you're
Speaker 11: but he's just a tall person, so his hands are
Speaker 11: probably tall.
Speaker 10: Nice King Albert King six four, he is, he's a
Speaker 10: big Yeah.
Speaker 1: Okay, I didn't yeah, okay.
Speaker 6: In the Kings, but yeah, man, growing up in Austin
Speaker 6: was nothing.
Speaker 1: What was your family situation into I grew up uh.
Speaker 6: In the house with three sisters, mom and pops. Yeah,
Speaker 6: boy right in the middle.
Speaker 1: Oh, okay, the only boy, the only boy. Okay, yeah,
Speaker 1: what did your what did your folks do? Musicians as well?
Speaker 10: Now, well, my pops eat. I love my pops, but yeah,
Speaker 10: he you know, he plays a little bit. I actually, uh,
Speaker 10: you know, when I started realizing what was happening, he
Speaker 10: had some guitars in the house. I ended up kind
Speaker 10: of breaking one. But my dad, my parents just kind
Speaker 10: of normal jobs. My dad sold anything. He sold everything
Speaker 10: from homes to cars, to men's suits, the ladies shoes
Speaker 10: to uh, he did everything. He worked security for concerts
Speaker 10: and you know, he was just he was he was
Speaker 10: doing whatever he had to do to make sure that
Speaker 10: we had what we needed. My mother was an accountant's
Speaker 10: perfect like he hustle.
Speaker 9: She managed.
Speaker 6: It's working out like as of this.
Speaker 9: A little bit.
Speaker 6: Yeah, my mom, she's been helping me out for a
Speaker 6: long time.
Speaker 1: So that's what un But yeah, and none of them
Speaker 1: are in music in the church or none of that stuff.
Speaker 6: Uh no, no, not really.
Speaker 1: It's a unique situation.
Speaker 10: Yeah, but I mean I got family members. I got
Speaker 10: uncles who are musical musicians, you know, writers, and uh,
Speaker 10: somebody used to play with Stevie Ray Vaughan. If you're
Speaker 10: familiar with Austin, Texas and Texas Blue seeing W. C. Clark,
Speaker 10: that's my cousin. Used to play bass with them. Great
Speaker 10: guitar players. Pee Wee Craton used to play with Johnny
Speaker 10: Otis Sugary Otis, right, So, yeah, that's so it.
Speaker 6: Was in my in my family were not right at
Speaker 6: my house, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Also weird enough the house band for they called them
Speaker 1: Blue Records. What's your name? Blow Fly, blow Fly? Yeah,
Speaker 1: clar a lot of this stuff. Well, yeah, like Johnny
Speaker 1: Owais was a part of that. I didn't realize that
Speaker 1: until much later. So how did you get interested in music?
Speaker 1: Like what was the moment that.
Speaker 10: The moment that made me I saw Michael Jackson five okay,
Speaker 10: the Victory Tour or yeah, this is the Bad the
Speaker 10: Bad Tour.
Speaker 6: I was born in eighty four, so this is like
Speaker 6: eighty eight eighty.
Speaker 9: Cheryl Crow, Michael Jackson.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so that's the first time you met Cheryl Crow.
Speaker 6: That was the first time I saw Yeah, that was
Speaker 6: the first time.
Speaker 1: It was crazy, like little did you know? How like
Speaker 1: your connection with her? Then? Would you know?
Speaker 6: I can't stop loving you.
Speaker 10: You know, we had the noose bleed seats, you know
Speaker 10: what I mean, see anything, But yeah, that was that
Speaker 10: was what got me into music. You know, the lights
Speaker 10: showed the energy everything, you know. I got to kindergarten,
Speaker 10: I was like, where's the stage at? Really I just
Speaker 10: wanted to be in that.
Speaker 1: You know, what is this?
Speaker 6: You know what is these vibes?
Speaker 1: So you you chose a path that is rarely chosen,
Speaker 1: especially for like black musicians, especially in growing up in
Speaker 1: the age of when hip hop is really developing and
Speaker 1: and you know, R and B at the time when
Speaker 1: you're coming of age like new jack swing and and
Speaker 1: hip hop are really find their footing. And but yet
Speaker 1: like blues music and the way that you play, you know,
Speaker 1: one of the one of the reasons why I'm really
Speaker 1: excited that you hear is because I really don't know
Speaker 1: your story. But having seen you beforemed at least somewhere
Speaker 1: between ten to twelve times, like already had like your
Speaker 1: story painting out my head that you know you're living
Speaker 1: off of like pork and beans. But that's a compliment,
Speaker 1: you know, that's like a leg he said, nice, Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: I did it. That story work. No, but you you
Speaker 1: you sing with so much conviction and a type of
Speaker 1: I don't know how to describe your voice, like it's
Speaker 1: it's not like a voice I've ever heard singing before.
Speaker 1: But I felt like, you know, like you went through
Speaker 1: things and that sort of thing. I mean that that
Speaker 1: was kind of what the vibe iways lived in. Yeah.
Speaker 8: I think he sings like he plays the guitar. Like
Speaker 8: the guitar and his voice are kind of a similar.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which started first for you? Did you start playing
Speaker 1: first or singing first?
Speaker 6: I started singing first, Yeah, I was.
Speaker 10: My sister started coming home with trophies for singing competitions
Speaker 10: and trophies.
Speaker 1: So what's the age gap between you and your siblings?
Speaker 10: So I'm three and a half years younger than my
Speaker 10: older sister. I got a sister younger than me two years,
Speaker 10: and then I got a baby baby sister who's younger about.
Speaker 1: Like ten years. Okay, cool. Yeah, So the older one,
Speaker 1: she was the one that was singing. She could sing good, she.
Speaker 10: Could sing great. She's you know, you can play piano
Speaker 10: really well, sight read, can you know, do all that?
Speaker 10: All that kind of stuff, And I just I wanted
Speaker 10: some trophies. So I signed up for the choir in
Speaker 10: sixth grade along with basketball. He used to get hell
Speaker 10: all the time for showing up to basketball practice, like,
Speaker 10: what's up singing something?
Speaker 1: Man?
Speaker 6: That was quiet practice.
Speaker 1: That's right. She can't be a music nerd and a
Speaker 1: school John rough Man, so brough we get a ball. No.
Speaker 6: I was like a Dalmatian, great dang PUPPI es tall
Speaker 6: and awkward.
Speaker 10: Tall, you know, got no handles, super tall for no reason,
Speaker 10: got no hops, sad, just a waste.
Speaker 7: But your hands are so big.
Speaker 1: She's a dunkey.
Speaker 6: I got a nice fifteen foota though, in case stop me.
Speaker 1: But his attention with that, Yeah, she told her that
Speaker 1: wrong foot her not injured?
Speaker 9: Niggah, that would be well that yeah, you're right, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 9: thank you, But I'm what.
Speaker 1: Do you anyway? Where were we? Okay? So just from
Speaker 1: seeing your sister win these trophies, that was your inspiration.
Speaker 10: Yeah, that's why I thought I was gonna you know,
Speaker 10: you're talking about being the time of hip hop and
Speaker 10: R and B.
Speaker 6: I thought I was gonna be a singer in an
Speaker 6: R and B group.
Speaker 10: I had a group with this guy Robbie called Young
Speaker 10: Soul and We had dance moves and choreography and.
Speaker 7: Like an SNL skit like Ary Clark, We're in it was.
Speaker 6: It was terrible, but we loved it.
Speaker 1: You know, who were y' all kind of modeling yourself
Speaker 1: after the group?
Speaker 6: You wanted to be boys to man as yet all
Speaker 6: the yeah all for one.
Speaker 9: Man, mister you know wow, all the groups singing blackbery
Speaker 9: in my last.
Speaker 1: That was my joint.
Speaker 6: And I had that guitar in it too, and I
Speaker 6: was like, I was like, this goes together. I could
Speaker 6: do both.
Speaker 1: I could be.
Speaker 9: That was mistering me playing the guitar, played guitar.
Speaker 12: He was acoustic. He was like the knockoff baby Face. Well,
Speaker 12: I mean but the niggas.
Speaker 1: I mean, but the niggas, I thought, big face like
Speaker 1: everybody else. Baby Face started his baby face. Remember he
Speaker 1: said that right now he was on the No, he
Speaker 1: was on the face. He was on He's on as Arista.
Speaker 9: Yeah, supreme rabbit hole Gary in my back.
Speaker 11: Wait wait, so that was literally the video is literally
Speaker 11: the moment when you start to think about picking up
Speaker 11: the guitar too.
Speaker 1: That video you're just referenced, No no.
Speaker 10: No, Tito Jackson watching old videotapes and tr Jackson mayde
Speaker 10: want to play guitar.
Speaker 1: Yeah wait, you said you broke your dad. Uh you
Speaker 1: can tell similar to Tito Jackson, there was no repercussions though, right,
Speaker 1: Uh not like that. Okay, okay, so uh that's singing.
Speaker 1: But when you were so what you were twelve when
Speaker 1: you first started playing guitar or yeah, so what was
Speaker 1: your first what was the first acts that you got?
Speaker 10: I got an ivan as RX twenty like a black
Speaker 10: electric guitar, two humbucker pickups at Maple Neck, and I
Speaker 10: got a little ten watt.
Speaker 6: Guitar amp from Walmart or something and plugged in.
Speaker 1: And everyone starts with the the department story like it
Speaker 1: was like a rock acts or something, I think it
Speaker 1: was the name of it. A little ten watt and
Speaker 1: all your stuff, Like you learned to play, you pretty
Speaker 1: much start yourself, like you know, lessons or anything like that.
Speaker 6: I no, no, not really. I started listening to the
Speaker 6: radio my dad when I first got my guitar.
Speaker 10: My dad said, if you want to play guitar for really,
Speaker 10: you got to listen to Eric Clapton in Santana.
Speaker 6: So he dropped off some records in my room and
Speaker 6: said good luck with that. Do that do your homework too?
Speaker 1: But with that really, So, what were the first records
Speaker 1: that you remember buying? Well, not not for guitar education purposes,
Speaker 1: but just in your life. What was your first album
Speaker 1: do you remember purchasing?
Speaker 6: My first album that I remember purchasing was Immature?
Speaker 1: Wow? Which one right now, dude, yoc? Which which alpum was?
Speaker 1: Which one was it?
Speaker 6: Which the one with I Feel the Funk?
Speaker 1: Feel the Funk? We heard that come out ninety five.
Speaker 1: I don't want to say they sampled us. That was
Speaker 1: the first time we got sampled Mature. Sample one of
Speaker 1: the one of them joints, one of them joints sounds
Speaker 1: from Solid Treatment. Wow. Matter of fact, they did too,
Speaker 1: because the drums was sound Treatment. But they took the
Speaker 1: they did. I had that album somehow.
Speaker 9: I don't know if it was the intention and you
Speaker 9: remember it, so it must have been good.
Speaker 12: Okay, let me be good. Okay, So this is Gary Club, Jim.
Speaker 12: Do you remember do you remember when Immature came back.
Speaker 1: As I am X.
Speaker 9: Yeah? I did what a different member or something?
Speaker 12: No, it was the same three niggas, but it was
Speaker 12: it was like yeah, because they had that jam and
Speaker 12: they did a cover that. She did a cover of
Speaker 12: Love Me in a Special Way on that album that
Speaker 12: was like pretty.
Speaker 1: Good markets straight up, Yeah, that asked, But I had
Speaker 1: that album?
Speaker 6: Had I had that album?
Speaker 1: You're my favorite R and B fan of all time?
Speaker 1: For real? Your R and B knowledge puts me to shame.
Speaker 9: Like Mark, if Markey Houston knew that Gary Clark Jr.
Speaker 9: Like was it? That's just I just don't think he
Speaker 9: would know that. He probably would be off the wall.
Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, that was That was the first record I bought.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's crazy.
Speaker 8: All the men man, you wanted to say like Phoebe King,
Speaker 8: Robert Johnson, He's like nah, no, eat.
Speaker 1: So at what point, at what point do you consider
Speaker 1: the genesis of where you are right now in your career? Like,
Speaker 1: at what point are you who's putting you on to
Speaker 1: uh Electric Lady Land, who's putting you on to the
Speaker 1: first like the Cream albums or Zeppelin or any of
Speaker 1: those things?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 1: So assuming that, assuming that, I mean, I'm assuming that
Speaker 1: you Jimmy von Cat right, that was?
Speaker 10: Yeah, Well that all happened. I lived down the street
Speaker 10: from a girl named Eve Monsei. I met her in
Speaker 10: third grade. White Girl came from Houston. Jewish girl.
Speaker 6: She came out and was like, ah, she came.
Speaker 1: I told her.
Speaker 6: So she was playing guitar like a year before me and.
Speaker 1: And her.
Speaker 10: Her dad worked on video games and he would put
Speaker 10: video games in a in all these different venues around town.
Speaker 10: And so when he was working on him, he had
Speaker 10: him in the garage and they had a basketball go
Speaker 10: so all the kids from the neighborhood would go over
Speaker 10: there and play arcade games, you know, and you start
Speaker 10: hooping or whatever, and then uh, you've had.
Speaker 1: A band and it was like.
Speaker 10: A three piece band, her and a couple of other girlfriends,
Speaker 10: and they would be playing this rock and roll stuff,
Speaker 10: and you know, she had a black stratocaster and a
Speaker 10: Fender twid Hunter white ant well you know, the red
Speaker 10: knobs on it. And I thought it was the coolest
Speaker 10: thing ever, you know what. So I'm playing basketball and
Speaker 10: I'm hearing this. So I ended up getting interested in, like, uh,
Speaker 10: what she was doing. It was just like the coolest
Speaker 10: thing in the neighborhood. So I just I just became
Speaker 10: interested in that.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 10: I've been listening to my boys to men and working
Speaker 10: on my dance steps and writing my you know, my
Speaker 10: R and B hits and then I was like, you know,
Speaker 10: let me see what's happening over here. So that's seeing
Speaker 10: her having a guitar and thinking about Tito Jackson how
Speaker 10: much I love that.
Speaker 1: And you know, uh, it's the first time in which
Speaker 1: you know, someone's making the Jackson's reference with.
Speaker 9: And he really deserves it because people don't be picking
Speaker 9: them up as much as they should.
Speaker 10: Yeah, so it was all that kind of all that
Speaker 10: kind of went together. And I remember that they had
Speaker 10: that Jackson movie, The American dream.
Speaker 12: Man Listen that is a classic watching every all four
Speaker 12: like that one in the Temptations movie Bussy TV exactly.
Speaker 10: So they they had a they had a soundtrack for
Speaker 10: that and at one point they had a live version
Speaker 10: of them doing Who's Loving You?
Speaker 6: Who's Loving You? But they but they did uh Isaac
Speaker 6: Hayes walking by, and so Tito's playing out.
Speaker 1: Jermaine is also, let it be noted, Jermaine is killing
Speaker 1: that baseline. So that's weird. That affected me as a
Speaker 1: as a sampler that was a well known public enemy sample. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's how I got, you know, into that, But
Speaker 1: you just hearing it first generation without even the references.
Speaker 1: That's crazy that you picked up on that.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I was like, man, this is this all goes together.
Speaker 10: I'm gonna start hanging out down the street and you
Speaker 10: figured out how to play this guitar.
Speaker 9: Man.
Speaker 1: Wow. Babyface was also in the audience that night. He
Speaker 1: mentioned that on the show, I'm gonna do a lot
Speaker 1: of references to pass that. Yeah, I'm awn reference center.
Speaker 9: By the way, two short parents were accountants as well.
Speaker 9: I'm just I'm going with the thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, I know, I know that you weren't built
Speaker 1: over night. So how many hours do you recommend it
Speaker 1: took you to really really master I mean, because I
Speaker 1: mean at the rate where Rolling Stones declaring you as
Speaker 1: Operation Next and the future and yes you you definitely
Speaker 1: have the chaps for that ship. Like I was, again,
Speaker 1: jaw drop, like, how what was your practice technique?
Speaker 6: Like my practice technique was I quit going to school hours,
Speaker 6: you know what, I just quit.
Speaker 10: I would show up the first period and someone would
Speaker 10: be like, hey, man, let's go play guitar.
Speaker 6: I got some herb and we just dipped, you know,
Speaker 6: and we would just you know, I was introduced to
Speaker 6: Grateful Dead and and.
Speaker 10: You know, people had Muddy Waters Records, and it was
Speaker 10: just I would just go do that instead of doing
Speaker 10: my school work.
Speaker 1: Austin started changing.
Speaker 10: Okay, so all day. You know, when I got to
Speaker 10: be about fourteen. I played my first gig in ninety eight.
Speaker 10: It was sophomore in high school. I guess, and I mean,
Speaker 10: you know what it is like. You start getting gigs
Speaker 10: and then it becomes you get one gig, two gigs
Speaker 10: three four nights a week, five nights, so that's one
Speaker 10: nights a week, four hours.
Speaker 1: That's where the domino started. That's that's from fourteen on.
Speaker 6: From fourteen on, that was it.
Speaker 9: And your parents was cool.
Speaker 6: They was like, okay, they were okay with it.
Speaker 10: They were okay with it until I started getting phone
Speaker 10: calls from the school true where I.
Speaker 9: Was, because fourteen is the beginning of high school. So
Speaker 9: it's like what you do?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was there, and then I just ghosted wow.
Speaker 1: Or did you like get it?
Speaker 6: I ended up finished.
Speaker 10: I had to do Saturday, I had to do after school,
Speaker 10: I had to go before, I had to do all
Speaker 10: that stuff I had in completing my junior year of
Speaker 10: high school.
Speaker 6: Because I lost it. I was They used to call
Speaker 6: me hot wire.
Speaker 10: I used to take my parents' cars, sneak out in
Speaker 10: the middle of the night, go down to the clubs.
Speaker 1: This is what we want to know. Wait a minute,
Speaker 1: you were hot? Are your parents card?
Speaker 6: They called me how Ward. I just used to have
Speaker 6: the key.
Speaker 1: Put it, put it down the streets. Better nickname than keys. Yeah, yeah, right, yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean having once. You know, shame on me doing
Speaker 1: it twice though. Kick on the bell.
Speaker 10: Now, this happened multiple times. This is three four times
Speaker 10: a week. Get out and go to the club.
Speaker 1: Oh, you would get away with it.
Speaker 6: I would get I would sneak out of the window.
Speaker 6: How about the window, and I would.
Speaker 10: Wait till my post would be sitting He would be
Speaker 10: watching Star Trek or something, and he would start to
Speaker 10: fall out.
Speaker 9: Is it because they were too busy looking at the girls?
Speaker 9: I don't know what he but your sisters I met
Speaker 9: that in that way. Sorry, your sister's like they.
Speaker 1: Say electric blue.
Speaker 7: Or something like that.
Speaker 9: I just meant, how did you get past them?
Speaker 1: But I was just there focusing on the girls. Your sisters.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was always upstairs playing guitar.
Speaker 1: You were good at it.
Speaker 6: I was good.
Speaker 1: I was.
Speaker 9: I was on mind at school.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was moove with it. But you know I
Speaker 6: popped in one time.
Speaker 1: Where would you go?
Speaker 10: I would go to a spotle joe Gan, Eric Ball,
Speaker 10: go to Anton's. I'll go to my friend's houses and
Speaker 10: we would you know, they would have house parties and
Speaker 10: bands would be playing, would be DJs.
Speaker 6: So you know, I might not have been able to go,
Speaker 6: but I made myself able to go.
Speaker 1: I would they normally have given you permission to play
Speaker 1: these parties or was it like okay, no, no, based
Speaker 1: on this is the wrong crowd, or based on like
Speaker 1: are they seeing you and knowing that, oh, he's going
Speaker 1: to be our future. I'm not saying that every son
Speaker 1: has to, you know, do that for his parents, but no.
Speaker 6: Not at all. It was it was a distraction.
Speaker 9: You know.
Speaker 10: I started, you know, I'm sneaking out, I'm leaving the house,
Speaker 10: I'm smoking weed all the time, I'm stealing the car.
Speaker 13: They don't they can't find it in your best life, Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 13: you know what I mean.
Speaker 10: I'm getting calls from the school, I'm not present, you know,
Speaker 10: all this type of stuff. And so now they weren't
Speaker 10: really with it at all, you know, but my mom
Speaker 10: made a compromise with me. She was like, look, I
Speaker 10: can't take this away from me because I know how
Speaker 10: much you love it. But what you can do is
Speaker 10: if you can sneak out and go run around and
Speaker 10: play for all those drunks down in sixth Street, you
Speaker 10: can play for Jesus.
Speaker 1: So you can go play in the church.
Speaker 6: The church.
Speaker 9: I love it.
Speaker 1: But did they let you ask grinding the church or
Speaker 1: were you just doing a straight up gospel? But who knows.
Speaker 1: I mean, the thing is that I would also think
Speaker 1: that Austin, Texas was rather open minded to different experiences.
Speaker 1: I mean I once went to a I want well no,
Speaker 1: I mean I was torn in Austin by ninety four,
Speaker 1: so he's about ten years old. So yeah, in church. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just saying that by this point, like I would
Speaker 1: think that they would have been open to it. I
Speaker 1: once went to a free jazz church. What was that like?
Speaker 1: Imagine like the last the last last era of like
Speaker 1: whole Trane's life for Jesus. Yeah, okay, wow, Yeah, there
Speaker 1: is a go Go church in d C.
Speaker 9: Damn. Yeah yeah, all praise do Chuck Brown?
Speaker 1: Wow, write you know you want to go go?
Speaker 6: You know about to go go?
Speaker 1: I know a little bit.
Speaker 9: Okay, but we know.
Speaker 6: What's up down.
Speaker 1: The man's traveled the world all actually slight slight uh
Speaker 1: detour in this conversation since we're talking about Austin. All Right,
Speaker 1: you gotta you gotta put me down with what are
Speaker 1: your already two? Give me your top five barbecue joys?
Speaker 1: Ye took me in that hour? Does the name Sam's
Speaker 1: Beef mean anything to you? Okay, I'm relieved. Sam's Beef
Speaker 1: is like Austin's version of Freddy's from House of Cards. Okay, Okay,
Speaker 1: got you.
Speaker 7: It's not a chain.
Speaker 1: That's not a chain. Nah. It's just like even as
Speaker 1: even as even as uh slogan, you don't need no
Speaker 1: teeths to eat my beef, my beef, you don't need teeth. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it's like a back porch, no need teeth, you know,
Speaker 1: flies come on and I don't even mind. You know,
Speaker 1: it's just so back. But I didn't know if that
Speaker 1: was super authentic or not, you know, I was I
Speaker 1: would like to think that it was like the authentic.
Speaker 9: Let me just ask the question that you're saying authentic.
Speaker 9: Where does Austin come in the barbecue scheme of things?
Speaker 9: When it comes to city so it's Austin, like the data.
Speaker 1: Man Dallas, I put it in Saint Louis. I think
Speaker 1: in America, Saint Louis is the barbecue rib. You know,
Speaker 1: Saint Louis is hard. It's different Kansas City though, don't well,
Speaker 1: Kansas City got smoke for Saint Louis. I don't know
Speaker 1: K's City barbecue coming from somewhere from North Carolina because
Speaker 1: barbecue is more so it's like like pool port.
Speaker 12: Like when people and run our way when they say
Speaker 12: like barbecue, they specifically mean pull pork, so like, and
Speaker 12: I'm in the eastern side of No Carolina.
Speaker 1: So for our joint, I base it's a vinegar base.
Speaker 1: So then, but when you go to the west side,
Speaker 1: like where the mountains is that they use like a
Speaker 1: tomato bass and we don't fun with them. We be
Speaker 1: like making, We're making, you know, slappy jokes barbecue, so them,
Speaker 1: but the vinegar base is good.
Speaker 6: So like.
Speaker 1: Spot, what's the what's the awesome? Give me your top five?
Speaker 10: Man Sam's Okay, I used to go to SAMs all
Speaker 10: the time. There's a spot called the barbecue that I like, Uh,
Speaker 10: Terry Blacks, Okay, there's another one. If you're going for
Speaker 10: like some fancy barbecue. It's a spot called Lamberts. I
Speaker 10: got a lot of love for them because they fed
Speaker 10: me every Thursday, gave me a couple of drinks.
Speaker 6: Uh what was that for?
Speaker 1: Let me see?
Speaker 6: Let me see, Let me.
Speaker 1: See, because it's any good because I had the Stubs right.
Speaker 6: Because I like Stubbs as a music venue.
Speaker 1: Stuff. That's because I.
Speaker 9: Went like hearing so much and I had it out
Speaker 9: the same make the barbecue sauce.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I get the feeling that you know, Stubs
Speaker 1: and Republic and all those spots are like what for
Speaker 1: Philly cheese steaks?
Speaker 9: Like what.
Speaker 1: Cats? Yeah, like one that two hours in line. That
Speaker 1: was a long story, like two hours in line for
Speaker 1: Republic Barbecue. I thought, Man, there has to be an underground.
Speaker 9: Spot that gymstaks because it's a line. But it's some bullshit.
Speaker 9: Don't go to Philly and eat a gym, you know,
Speaker 9: but you know, you know, you've seen the rats all.
Speaker 8: If you go to Philly, you need the quest Love
Speaker 8: text message. It's like four pages long. It rates all
Speaker 8: the cheese steakery in all the Philadelphia from like from
Speaker 8: like Cobb Beefery to like get old whatever.
Speaker 1: You might get robbed at this place.
Speaker 8: Yeah, but you can only go to this place at
Speaker 8: this time because if now you might die. Like it's
Speaker 8: like that gotsha and if your white, definitely don't go
Speaker 8: to this place like it says this.
Speaker 1: Is what you said.
Speaker 8: Anybody tells you exactly what to order, order it, you
Speaker 8: should that should be your next book.
Speaker 1: I gotta give you know, I gotta keep.
Speaker 6: People safe feeling man, I'm gonna hit.
Speaker 1: You up, yeah, like gold istue peoples. But don't get
Speaker 1: this ship. You feel down, bro, because you are you
Speaker 1: are rock star skinny.
Speaker 9: I don't even think you you would throw down, but
Speaker 9: you might have a fast tabolism And it's like I
Speaker 9: get that it's got big hands.
Speaker 1: Can we At this point? Are you where you said
Speaker 1: you were fourteen? Are you even making demos or recording
Speaker 1: the like what's your songwriting process? Like are you even
Speaker 1: writing songs at this point? Or you're just playing? Like
Speaker 1: what's the music of the day? What is the music
Speaker 1: of the day if you are playing at if you're
Speaker 1: playing in a blues band in Austin, Texas, like, what
Speaker 1: are the what are the go to songs that I
Speaker 1: should know? The blues the whole genre, So everything just one.
Speaker 6: You gotta have. You gotta have a for me. It's
Speaker 6: like you gotta have a slow a slow blues, major blue,
Speaker 6: the slow minor blues.
Speaker 1: You gotta have.
Speaker 6: You gotta show uh.
Speaker 10: Red House, Yeah, Red House is something but or like
Speaker 10: something like BB King three o'clock blues?
Speaker 1: How would where would like? Something like like Pride and
Speaker 1: Enjoy by Stevie Vaughan? Where would that fall?
Speaker 10: Pride and Joy is kind of a it's kind of
Speaker 10: an unspoken rule that if you're in Austin because you
Speaker 10: don't touch.
Speaker 1: It, can can you? Can?
Speaker 9: You?
Speaker 1: Are you able to schools on Stevie at least mean
Speaker 1: personally straight up? I don't I need to know more
Speaker 1: about Stevie Rayvaughn. I know that he's a god. I
Speaker 1: don't know why he's a god or anything like. Are
Speaker 1: you able to explain what makes him god or the ship?
Speaker 10: I've never heard him be described as god. But I
Speaker 10: think the thing that that people love about Stevie Ray
Speaker 10: Vaughan is is there's this there's this kind of Americana
Speaker 10: thing about him. There's this fierce blues thing about him
Speaker 10: that you know he gives props up to Albert King
Speaker 10: and all the grace and then he's got this rock
Speaker 10: and roll fierce a thing about him.
Speaker 6: And if you if you're coming from Texas and you
Speaker 6: play guitar, man.
Speaker 10: For somebody to make it out of Austin, Texas playing guitar,
Speaker 10: it was kind of a big deal.
Speaker 1: And just tone.
Speaker 10: I think the thing that makes him the guy is
Speaker 10: the tones that he got and out of a stratocaster.
Speaker 10: You know, I don't think anybody had heard that powerful,
Speaker 10: that strong of a tone coming from from a guitar
Speaker 10: like that.
Speaker 6: I think it's been.
Speaker 1: It's just tone. I have so many I don't know. Man, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: you're doing good. You're doing good. That's that's the number
Speaker 1: of me.
Speaker 6: Yeah, that's the answer.
Speaker 12: Because I remember me and my son used trying to
Speaker 12: play Pride and enjoy it on guitar Hero.
Speaker 1: We used to suck it up on that.
Speaker 12: I was like, it's to be pretty hard, it's not easy,
Speaker 12: and he was white stayed obviously.
Speaker 1: I guess we should say that. That's what i'n get
Speaker 1: to is Okay. So when I watch when I watched
Speaker 1: cats like bb King and I mean, I'm gonna take
Speaker 1: Hendrix out the equation, we could take Hendricks out, and
Speaker 1: we could probably take in Chicago his daughters Johnny Cooker,
Speaker 1: Yeah not buddy, So all right, taking those two out.
Speaker 1: But as far as blue blues guitar are playing and
Speaker 1: it coming from it leaving the the Mississippi Delta, and
Speaker 1: like who is credited or who is the definitive electric
Speaker 1: blues guitar player? And and how can you tell who's
Speaker 1: the real deal and who's not the real deal? Like
Speaker 1: if I if I were watching BB King, all right?
Speaker 1: For example, when he does a blues he'll stick to
Speaker 1: one note, so he'll play the note, see, but he'll
Speaker 1: play various ways various like you know texters to it. Sure,
Speaker 1: but you know, I know that a lesser expert would
Speaker 1: be more impressed with speed or you know, noise and
Speaker 1: really not So how can you determine who is a
Speaker 1: righteous blues man versus here? All right? And I'm not
Speaker 1: trying to make you God, God, that's an.
Speaker 8: Interesting question because he's kind of both of them. There's
Speaker 8: like the shredder blues man and then the slow hand
Speaker 8: blues man, and I think like there's a difference.
Speaker 1: Right, So what's more important? Like no one as me
Speaker 1: as a drummer. Like you know, I'm not a gospel drummer,
Speaker 1: but people respect my slowness and my pocket right that
Speaker 1: speaks enough. But you can chops with you one, not
Speaker 1: with these bones. But no. But I'm just saying that,
Speaker 1: you know, is there for you? Is it more important
Speaker 1: for slow hand blues or is it like about shredding
Speaker 1: and volume and fullness.
Speaker 10: I think it's it goes down to does it make
Speaker 10: the hair stand up on your arms? Does it give
Speaker 10: you chills? Does it make you feel like you want
Speaker 10: to cry? Does it make you feel like you want
Speaker 10: to scream at the top of your lungs. Does it
Speaker 10: make you feel something? I think you can do both.
Speaker 10: I think you can play, you can shred and do
Speaker 10: all that, and I think you could play to the
Speaker 10: slow hand b be king thing. But when you hit
Speaker 10: it out and you feel it and and you undenially
Speaker 10: your eyes roll back in the back of your head.
Speaker 6: If if something makes me do that, I'm like, that's
Speaker 6: just what it is. That's what music is supposed to do.
Speaker 10: I don't care if you're a guitar player, don't care
Speaker 10: a drummer, don't carry you uh or whatever genre you know,
Speaker 10: if you sing a note and it's like.
Speaker 1: Whoa orgasm? Just for so, just for context, like what
Speaker 1: is so give us an example of somebody that would
Speaker 1: be considered us you said, a slow hand blues player
Speaker 1: versus like a shredder, like with a lot of decks.
Speaker 10: There a slow hand blues player. I would have to
Speaker 10: say somebody like Derek Trucks. There's somebody who plays, you know,
Speaker 10: kind of slide guitar, and he's somebody that I think
Speaker 10: is authentic when it comes down to doing it, do
Speaker 10: what it's supposed to do. On the other on the
Speaker 10: other hand, when it comes down to shred and I
Speaker 10: think Eric Gales can do that, you know, I think
Speaker 10: that he he can shred and you know people freak out,
Speaker 10: you know what I mean, and actually really feel it
Speaker 10: and not are just impressed by that super fast bro.
Speaker 1: Who's an unsung hero in your in your mind? Like,
Speaker 1: who's the guitarist that we need? You know, is a
Speaker 1: maverick but you know it hasn't either gotten a deal
Speaker 1: just wanted to stay local or just kind of behind
Speaker 1: the scenes, Like is there a guitarist that you know
Speaker 1: that's just like.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I would have to go back to Eric Gales.
Speaker 6: He did.
Speaker 10: We did a show together and he opened up for
Speaker 10: us at Austin. I was like, this is a bad idea.
Speaker 1: So is he Is he still alive or is he? Oh?
Speaker 6: Yeah, it was like two weeks ago.
Speaker 1: You know what's weird. I'll say that anytime I've even
Speaker 1: done shows with Eric Gal's on on the bill, it's
Speaker 1: weird because I feel like he has to pay his bills,
Speaker 1: like doing the Sideman stuff. Like I think, uh, wait,
Speaker 1: which is we're talking about Eric Gale, like old jazz
Speaker 1: cat Eric Eric Gils. No, he's he's from Memphis, credit Memphis. Okay,
Speaker 1: there's an Eric Kale. That's I think I'm thinking about
Speaker 1: your Areaale.
Speaker 8: We're talking about a lefty young guy who's not who
Speaker 8: you're thinking about.
Speaker 1: Yeah, No, no Eric Gale, I'm thinking about. Yes, he's
Speaker 1: a shreder. Sometimes when uh Living Color Bassis, Sugar Old Vernon,
Speaker 1: No sugar Hill Bassis. Also Doug Dog. Sometimes if Doug
Speaker 1: Wimbush is on a gig, he'll hire Eric Gils as
Speaker 1: his guitar. So back when Doug was the m D
Speaker 1: for Lauryn Hill. Like again, like I never really got
Speaker 1: to seeing him in his true context, maybe like once
Speaker 1: or twice, but normally when I see Eric Gales, he's
Speaker 1: either like backing up a rap group or doing something
Speaker 1: totally it's like he gotta pay his bills and really
Speaker 1: can't can't get loose with it. But I mean he
Speaker 1: seems happy, so you know what I mean.
Speaker 6: I mean he came through and crust. Like I was
Speaker 6: telling everybody was like, this is a terrible.
Speaker 8: When the opener crushes the headliner. No one needs that ship.
Speaker 1: Do you do you feel do you feel this unspoken
Speaker 1: pressure to live up to the myth of of obviously
Speaker 1: the Jay word, because I'm certain for a lot of people,
Speaker 1: what is it jew.
Speaker 8: Never happened, won't ever happen, You're not gonna You're not
Speaker 8: gonna live up to You're gonna happen.
Speaker 1: You're a fad ass motherfucker. Guys, Guys, Jimmy.
Speaker 9: Jimmy, yes, and when you're his house, shame shame.
Speaker 1: I'm like, you can't even me. My default was I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: guitar black guy, all right, see, let me see he
Speaker 1: rises up to the level of Jimmy. And but the
Speaker 1: thing was, it was like the way the way that
Speaker 1: you did, I just caught you on a fucking excellent
Speaker 1: night because even my guitar player his mouth was open,
Speaker 1: like you did a gig. Okay, so this is right
Speaker 1: when Doyle and show Crow were like, you gotta see
Speaker 1: this guy perform. So you weren't signed just yet. It
Speaker 1: was like a small bar. It was like a small
Speaker 1: out of the way bar in the village that you
Speaker 1: just happened to be at. I think it was valent time,
Speaker 1: so maybe it was like two thousand and nine ten,
Speaker 1: but this is just you in a trio. But it
Speaker 1: was I, you know, and I know him the king
Speaker 1: of you know, hyperbole, and oh my god, it's the
Speaker 1: next thing. But even Rolling Stone, who was with me
Speaker 1: that night, when they reviewed that show, then they were like,
Speaker 1: you know, this guy's next, and to prove it, I mean,
Speaker 1: they gave him the lead review. When I saw that
Speaker 1: the EP got the lead review and Rolling Stone, I
Speaker 1: was like, damn not since when I was ten years old.
Speaker 1: I mean I've been reading Rolling Stone like all my life,
Speaker 1: and I know the power of like the lead review.
Speaker 1: And when Prince an Unknown Prince got the lead review
Speaker 1: for a Dirty Mind four and a half, like I
Speaker 1: was like, wow, this rock magazine, which has no connections
Speaker 1: to like this isn't I want to be your lover
Speaker 1: that you know, this is like an unspoken unproven musician.
Speaker 1: They gave him the lead review, so this must be
Speaker 1: some shit. They gave you the same treatment, So I'm like,
Speaker 1: do you feel is there an unspoken pressure? Now? I
Speaker 1: must like Eric Clapton told me that I was the best,
Speaker 1: you know, modern blues guitarist that he's ever seen, and
Speaker 1: you know, for a lot of us that aren't really
Speaker 1: you know, in the vocabulary of rock music or blues, Like,
Speaker 1: is there do you feel like a pressure to live
Speaker 1: up to that?
Speaker 10: Or I don't feel any pressure. I don't feel any
Speaker 10: pressure to live up to that necessarily, but I think
Speaker 10: about it when it's brought up.
Speaker 1: How many times journalists ask you like.
Speaker 10: These types of questions like yeah, but I think the
Speaker 10: thing for me is is I've always kind of not
Speaker 10: said much about it, but to not sound cocky or
Speaker 10: not to not to sound like I know, I know
Speaker 10: that I got into this thing not to be in
Speaker 10: last place, talk to the.
Speaker 1: Nice.
Speaker 10: So yeah, I put that on myself, and regardless of
Speaker 10: what other people say, you know, I want to I
Speaker 10: want to be I want to be, you know, I
Speaker 10: want to get a chance to jam with you, you know,
Speaker 10: talking about like some real ship. I want to be
Speaker 10: with the motherfuckers doing this shit. And I'm not gonna
Speaker 10: be okay with just being like I didn't get into this.
Speaker 1: You that, okay, That's why I wanted to. I was like, okay,
Speaker 1: you definitely play like that. Then you know, some people
Speaker 1: are like, you know, man sucks, thanks anyway, but you know,
Speaker 1: just the way that you played, and again, it's like
Speaker 1: the way that blues rock has been defined and redefined.
Speaker 1: I mean it's to the point now like where we
Speaker 1: just basically thought like, okay, all guitar grids from now
Speaker 1: on are just going to be white dudes, and if
Speaker 1: a black one comes along, then you know, like oh
Speaker 1: maybe maybe not. But you know, you were definitely the
Speaker 1: real I think there was pressure also in Lenny to
Speaker 1: live up to that.
Speaker 9: When did that come into But the thing is like his.
Speaker 1: Lenny's acts work was never to that level, but because
Speaker 1: he looked the part. You know, I'm sure a lot
Speaker 1: of people expected that, you know, when really it's Craig
Speaker 1: that's the axe men of it.
Speaker 9: But you know it's I missed that on a Lenny
Speaker 9: Kravitz episode.
Speaker 1: I yeah, and plus, you know, especially with black people,
Speaker 1: I feel like a lot of our associations with rock,
Speaker 1: Like one of the one of the main reasons why
Speaker 1: I wanted to do the See with Cody was because
Speaker 1: it was a rock song that wasn't a rock song.
Speaker 1: Because half the time, it's like, you know, rappers be
Speaker 1: thinking about smells like teen Spirit, like some Headbang or
Speaker 1: or like iron Man, like that's our rock experience, and
Speaker 1: there's it's such a it's such a vast, you know,
Speaker 1: vocabulary to it that a lot a lot of the
Speaker 1: world doesn't know because a lot of us just aren't
Speaker 1: in on the playing field anymore. So do you feel
Speaker 1: do you feel see a rock tune? Is that what
Speaker 1: the stuff?
Speaker 9: Yeah?
Speaker 8: I wouldn't, but that's just why I don't know. I mean,
Speaker 8: he literally named it rock and roll.
Speaker 1: I mean, I mean good lyric but what the okay
Speaker 1: for me? For me, it was I didn't want to,
Speaker 1: you know, if we were going to go there. Like
Speaker 1: when Quincy Jones tried to get beat It out of
Speaker 1: Michael Jackson, he literally said, I want you to do
Speaker 1: your version of my Sharona and Michael was like, Okay,
Speaker 1: I'll be back in three days, and then came back
Speaker 1: with beat It, which is you you know, and and
Speaker 1: anything that Mike has done after that, you know, like
Speaker 1: the Dirty Diana like slashes everywhere to me, like I
Speaker 1: you know, I liked I like black and my favorite
Speaker 1: Rolling Stones album is probably their worst review joint, which
Speaker 1: is Black and Blue. You know. It's just like there's
Speaker 1: a certain rock that I like that's not that doesn't
Speaker 1: have twelve exclamation points behind it.
Speaker 6: So I'm a little beast of burden.
Speaker 1: That's some girls. Yeah, the Black and Blue album was
Speaker 1: like that, that was there. Okay, we're going to try
Speaker 1: and get funky a little bit, but it didn't work
Speaker 1: that way. But I like sloppy stuff, so you know,
Speaker 1: I'm a check out. I never got into the Stones
Speaker 1: the catalog like that.
Speaker 9: I know it is and don't make us feel bad
Speaker 9: just teachers, you know, sometimes.
Speaker 1: It don't you don't know, so yes, anyway, now I
Speaker 1: gotta go back to I gotta go back to what
Speaker 1: when did you first start songwriting? What was your like
Speaker 1: the first recording.
Speaker 6: My first recording was a song that I recorded with well,
Speaker 6: my friend Eve.
Speaker 10: It was called barsol blues and uh, it was just
Speaker 10: kind of a shuffle blue shuffle, and it was me, her,
Speaker 10: my cousin Ryan, and I can't remember if it was
Speaker 10: my sister playing drums or not, but play drums. Yeah,
Speaker 10: my little sister plays drums. We got she got a
Speaker 10: drum kit the same year that I got a guitar.
Speaker 10: My cousin Worm got the bass the same year, and
Speaker 10: so we all had the family band. And my sister
Speaker 10: I played keys and did all that too. So my
Speaker 10: pops would try and put us together to perform for
Speaker 10: the family, and we used to call them Joe and yeah,
Speaker 10: it was like a whole thing.
Speaker 1: Was Joe, Joseph.
Speaker 9: Or any of your sisters still involved the music?
Speaker 6: Uh, they're involved in music, but not trying to go
Speaker 6: get it like I was, you know.
Speaker 10: But yeah, So I recorded on a do you remember
Speaker 10: those little karaoke thing like a two yes, like a
Speaker 10: little Singlelodian things. So I used to record that way.
Speaker 10: So we might we put one mic in the room
Speaker 10: like hang it off the you know, the garage hanging
Speaker 10: down in the middle of the room, and so we
Speaker 10: would record and uh, since you couldn't sing it in
Speaker 10: the mic, I would go back and flip it, you know,
Speaker 10: put another tape in and put on the B side
Speaker 10: or whatever, play the thing and then sing the vocal
Speaker 10: over it and go do some overdoves and keep flipping tapes.
Speaker 6: It sounded like shit, but that was how we recorded stuff.
Speaker 1: You know, how did you how did word spread around Austin?
Speaker 1: And it is Austin the only place that you can
Speaker 1: really have reached. Are there surrounding cities in Texas that
Speaker 1: you can also have a good musical fan base? Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's awesome, just the only blue city. No, that's the
Speaker 1: load of questions.
Speaker 6: That was good.
Speaker 10: Yeah, you can go to San Antonio, the San Marcus's
Speaker 10: a couple of places to play.
Speaker 6: I went down to the Valley and played down there.
Speaker 6: Up to Dallas for worth.
Speaker 10: Uh what about Houston or yeah, you go down to Houston.
Speaker 10: The blues community is pretty small down there. So if
Speaker 10: you if there's another blues guy or another blues band
Speaker 10: on the scene, say hey, man, you need book this
Speaker 10: guy down in Texas, and there's like a whole blues
Speaker 10: society and so everyone hooks each other up.
Speaker 6: And so yeah, I would run down to Houston in
Speaker 6: Dallas with my parents and.
Speaker 1: Now, besides those cities that I named the Captain obvious ones, h,
Speaker 1: what is the rest of the Texas environment like city was,
Speaker 1: I don't really mess with it, even to this day
Speaker 1: hasn't established a cigre.
Speaker 10: I mean, you gotta get from point A to point B.
Speaker 10: But there's some places you just don't stop.
Speaker 1: Gad ass ye. I mean for the largest state in
Speaker 1: the United States, it's I don't like to know if
Speaker 1: there's more than seven cities or that are welcoming.
Speaker 9: Or you know.
Speaker 6: Look, man, anytime I'm going out west. Anytime I'm going out.
Speaker 10: West, I get stopped sweet Water, I get stopped going
Speaker 10: out Well, every time I get stopped and pulled out
Speaker 10: a car, it's a whole situation every time. Really, it's
Speaker 10: like that, and you're heading out east towards Louisiana. You
Speaker 10: don't stop. You just keep it moving, get past the bridge.
Speaker 1: Even to this day, when you get in the car,
Speaker 1: the whole goals just just make.
Speaker 6: Sure you got enough gas to get past and you
Speaker 6: just keep it moving right up.
Speaker 1: Niggas need a new green book at it. It's real now.
Speaker 1: When we went to were like like going through Texas
Speaker 1: like we had to.
Speaker 12: We stayed one night and god, rent would I want
Speaker 12: to say it was I can't remember the name, but
Speaker 12: basically it was like a hotel and a Walmart and
Speaker 12: a McDonald's and like, we didn't what.
Speaker 1: Else you need? That's a party. We stayed. We just
Speaker 1: stayed in and like I called my honger. I was like,
Speaker 1: so we in this town. She's like, oh my god.
Speaker 1: She's like no, straight up. She's like, oh no, don't
Speaker 1: suck around out there. I was like, damn, but it's
Speaker 1: still real.
Speaker 9: From somebody from Carolina, that's a big deal.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, it's still real. Wow, Okay, that's what Texas
Speaker 1: they literally.
Speaker 9: Yo, you mentioned your friend Eve. This is the same
Speaker 9: Eve who had the band in the beginning, right, So
Speaker 9: do you guys still make music together or what is
Speaker 9: that with her? Because you mentioned her twice in music references.
Speaker 10: Yeah, we're still we're still cool. Actually we stopped. I
Speaker 10: got fired from her band.
Speaker 4: What you do?
Speaker 1: How she like you now?
Speaker 9: He did something?
Speaker 6: What you do?
Speaker 9: No?
Speaker 6: I didn't.
Speaker 10: I didn't do anything. They just, you know, respectfully. They Yeah,
Speaker 10: they decided that my services were no longer.
Speaker 9: Needed a lot of solo.
Speaker 1: You know, listen, listen, I'm going to ask you, because
Speaker 1: this is what I don't know about you, because at
Speaker 1: one point, at one point the guy that was hosting
Speaker 1: the party kind of looked at me like, okay, let's
Speaker 1: wrap it up.
Speaker 9: What is.
Speaker 1: No Because again I can listen to you do fourteen
Speaker 1: minutes solo?
Speaker 8: How many choruses can you?
Speaker 1: So when we're doing the blues, how long am I
Speaker 1: supposed to run through the format before I do that
Speaker 1: role where I let you know, Okay, Gary, it's time
Speaker 1: to get to the last burst of weekend?
Speaker 9: When is it not said it rude?
Speaker 6: You know what?
Speaker 10: A few years ago, you would have had to stop me,
Speaker 10: You would have had to go do that role, and
Speaker 10: I would have snapped out of it and gone, all right,
Speaker 10: let's get back into the first. A lot of times
Speaker 10: what happens when I do that is I don't know
Speaker 10: what the next verse is. Okay, so I'm just buying timeline.
Speaker 10: I don't remember the worst of my own shit.
Speaker 1: But the thing is like, I feel like you're you're
Speaker 1: not microwave. You're such a slow cook that I'm willing
Speaker 1: to give you six rounds and unspoken six rounds of
Speaker 1: stuff to let you get into it. So I never
Speaker 1: know when you've made your statement, when it's time to
Speaker 1: like in the song, right right, right, Yeah, I.
Speaker 6: Don't know either.
Speaker 10: I always feel like I can keep going. I feel
Speaker 10: like I could keep there's more, there's more, there's more,
Speaker 10: there's more. I could keep going till I pass out.
Speaker 10: But I've become more refined due to UH find and
Speaker 10: police showing up.
Speaker 1: I've come more refined.
Speaker 9: Is it the same drum cue did you give everybody?
Speaker 1: Or is that just there's a certain language that I
Speaker 1: have that the roots instantly know when it's time to
Speaker 1: wrap something up or that sort of thing. But that's
Speaker 1: only us playing together for decades.
Speaker 8: There's also the roots television fill right, which is like
Speaker 8: crank crank.
Speaker 6: I felt like I felt like he gave me one
Speaker 6: of those that the Grammacy.
Speaker 1: Like a plan because the thing was the thing was
Speaker 1: is that? Yes, shout out to Keith McPhee, the most erotic. Yeah,
Speaker 1: his his stopwatches have stopwatches. Key big Fee is the
Speaker 1: guy that right now he's planning like the Grammy jam
Speaker 1: in twenty twenty three years from now. That's that's what
Speaker 1: Keith is. So you know, in his mind, he's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: he did a one hundred and fifteen seconds. Good. You
Speaker 1: know we still got a you know, we got chucked
Speaker 1: you on the side of the stage. You ready to
Speaker 1: run the jewels anybody? And I'm trying to let Keith
Speaker 1: know that, like fine wine takes like just let.
Speaker 9: Them let orgasmo. Yeah, that's what we call it right now.
Speaker 1: But pretty much Keith's one of those guys that like
Speaker 1: lose his mind after like a three minute solo. So
Speaker 1: I have to you know, I kind of got that.
Speaker 6: I was like, all right, I'm pretty sure.
Speaker 10: What's the longest solo you have a dig I think
Speaker 10: I got clocked somewhere around twelve fourteen minutes.
Speaker 1: It's Maggot Brain.
Speaker 6: Yeah, maggot bright rock and roll. I think funk a
Speaker 6: delic is rock.
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course, absolutely true. Indeed I should have put
Speaker 1: that in earlier, but yeah, absolutely good segue.
Speaker 12: How'd you go about in terms of, like, after you're
Speaker 12: playing all these bands and like kind of doing demos
Speaker 12: and stuff, how did you go about getting your first deal?
Speaker 10: I was, I was, I was doing some shows with
Speaker 10: Doyle Bramhall. We've been doing some stuff. He give me
Speaker 10: some work.
Speaker 1: I was kind of How did you hook up with
Speaker 1: Doyle and for the listeners, Doyle bra Doyle Bramhall really,
Speaker 1: I mean, truth be told, Doyle Bramhall was or could
Speaker 1: have been. I could be stepping over my boundaries. He was.
Speaker 1: He could have been the Gary Clark Jr. Of the
Speaker 1: early nineties. He was a guy that like again Eric
Speaker 1: Clapton gave the gave the the endorsement of life, the
Speaker 1: co sign of time for Yeah, for Doyle back and
Speaker 1: like nineteen ninety one said, this guy's amazing blues guitarist,
Speaker 1: can do everything and sing and all those things. This
Speaker 1: guy's the next thing. Doyle and the Roots actually signed
Speaker 1: the gef and at the same time. And Doyle, if
Speaker 1: you're familiar with there's a film called Before the Music
Speaker 1: Dies that you should watch. Doyle's a big part of that.
Speaker 1: The guy that made that movie. The guy that made
Speaker 1: that movie really did it. Because of Doyle's situation. Doyle
Speaker 1: was supposed to be the second coming of blues guitar
Speaker 1: ology and it just didn't work out. He did draft
Speaker 1: after draft with records, and you know, he eventually got
Speaker 1: dropped by his label and then he.
Speaker 12: Had to play pay the bills. So I came mainly
Speaker 12: as a session guy. I never knew his like the mythology.
Speaker 1: Of he should have been a guy like basically it's
Speaker 1: like reverse Jimmy Hendrix. It's like if you started out
Speaker 1: as Jimmy Hendrix and just ended up playing with Little Richard,
Speaker 1: that sort of thing. But you know he he married
Speaker 1: Susannah Melbourne princess, right, So that's how we got to
Speaker 1: know him in the very short lived Edith Funker project
Speaker 1: with Erica and Susannah and Wendy and Lisa and everybody.
Speaker 1: And it was during that time, that Edith Funker period
Speaker 1: that I was asking Doyle like, well, who do you
Speaker 1: know that's like next? And that's when he first told
Speaker 1: me that, you know, kid from Austin, Gary Clark Junior.
Speaker 1: So when I think Sheryl Crow and Doyle they were
Speaker 1: torn together, told me like, you got to come and
Speaker 1: see this guy play. And it was that I think
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Bowl was the first time I seen you Ah play.
Speaker 1: I don't know, was that your own set or was
Speaker 1: that with Doyle or you know what, I don't remember
Speaker 1: how long ago. Yeah, I don't remember how honestly, So
Speaker 1: you were playing with Doyle and then how did that
Speaker 1: go lead to a label situation for you, h I
Speaker 1: was you weren't in Archangels?
Speaker 6: Were you in that band?
Speaker 1: I'm not making a joke, was he?
Speaker 6: No?
Speaker 1: You?
Speaker 9: Oh?
Speaker 1: No?
Speaker 6: I was like I was maybe, Okay, No, I wasn't.
Speaker 6: I wasn't.
Speaker 10: But you know you know about that band of course, Yeah,
Speaker 10: Charlie Sexton, Tommy Shannon, damn.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 6: Yeah, So I was doing this struggling.
Speaker 10: Starving artist thing and I'm sitting there in the house
Speaker 10: full of candles, not by choice.
Speaker 1: Poorking beans in the spoon. Yep, okay there. So so.
Speaker 10: Just so happens like a little bit later, Doug gets
Speaker 10: me a calling and he says, this isn't promised, but
Speaker 10: you know, I've been talking to Clapton and I think
Speaker 10: he wants you to come out to do his Crossroads festival.
Speaker 10: And if you're not familiar, it's a big guitar or thron,
Speaker 10: A lot of guitar solos, a lot of the greats
Speaker 10: come out and they do this big festival thing and
Speaker 10: people jam at the end or whatever. And being a
Speaker 10: guitar player, I watched them, you know, the DVDs. I
Speaker 10: knew what was up, and so I was like really,
Speaker 10: and so next thing, I know, I get a letter
Speaker 10: in the mail. Cool, You're invited to come to clap
Speaker 10: and Crossroads. I get on a plane. I got like
Speaker 10: twenty dollars in my pocket.
Speaker 6: I show up there and like, what year is this?
Speaker 6: This is two thousand and ten.
Speaker 1: Oh wowka, And so.
Speaker 10: I show up, do rehearsal next time, do the show,
Speaker 10: And in the middle of the show, this whole sound
Speaker 10: goes out in Toyota Park, like the whole front of
Speaker 10: the house sound.
Speaker 6: I'm in the middle of my thing. I'm the new guy.
Speaker 6: Nobody knows who the hell I am, and I'm seeing people.
Speaker 10: Booing shit and screaming. I'm just seeing this, and Doyle goes, hey, man,
Speaker 10: the sounds out. Just keep doing anything when it come
Speaker 10: around and do this, uh you know, you come back
Speaker 10: into your verse. We're trying to work this thing out.
Speaker 10: So I'm just freaking out. Im just playing. No one's
Speaker 10: hearing me. I keep seeing this. I'm like, damn, I
Speaker 10: came all the way I hear the Chicago and fucked
Speaker 10: it up. And so it just so happens at the
Speaker 10: end of my solo where I, you know, I started
Speaker 10: wrapping it up, all the sound comes back on everybody
Speaker 10: freaks out. It becomes this huge moment. It becomes like
Speaker 10: one of the most exciting moments of the whole thing.
Speaker 10: It's not because I didn't anything epic. So anyway, I
Speaker 10: got I'm hanging out backstage.
Speaker 6: I'm like, man, this that was terrible.
Speaker 1: Blah blah.
Speaker 10: Tom Wally Andy Oliphant, who used to work at Warner
Speaker 10: at the time, approached me and gave me their business
Speaker 10: cards and said, uh, we're thinking about doing something with
Speaker 10: you know.
Speaker 6: And I did that whole thing and ran around in
Speaker 6: different spots and ended up wrong with them.
Speaker 1: And.
Speaker 6: He's not, the whole thing is different, gotcha.
Speaker 10: But yeah, so that that was that was it just
Speaker 10: being backstage thinging that was terrible And they're like, what
Speaker 10: do you think about rocking the Warner?
Speaker 1: Wow? What was that like? Like, were you apprehensive outsigning the.
Speaker 6: Deal or yeah? Of course I was a lot of vis.
Speaker 1: Did you get to talk to Clapton at all?
Speaker 9: No.
Speaker 10: I walked up to him and I was really excited
Speaker 10: and I said, hey, man, thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 6: You know, you have no idea and just go thanks
Speaker 6: for coming. Walked off in his little boat shoes and
Speaker 6: shorts and.
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah. So when you first started recording your first record.
Speaker 12: Excuse me, what was it like going from I guess
Speaker 12: it's kind of, you know, just kind of just the
Speaker 12: shoe stream, you know, budget shit to actually now what
Speaker 12: we were able to do differently in terms of the sound.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I thought I was, but I was working with
Speaker 10: with people who I won't necessarily name, and I didn't
Speaker 10: like it.
Speaker 6: But these were producers or yeah, and I didn't.
Speaker 13: I didn't for the EP or for Black and Blue.
Speaker 13: For both, I was like real talk shots.
Speaker 10: I mean, no, no, no, it turned out to be
Speaker 10: all right, But I just I was in a place
Speaker 10: where I felt like I was free and creative and
Speaker 10: I wanted to express everything and have all my my.
Speaker 6: All my ideas fully realized. And there was this kind
Speaker 6: of like you, yeah, let's get to it.
Speaker 10: Let's do it like this way, let's get to it,
Speaker 10: you know, And I would present ideas and so that's boring.
Speaker 10: I'm like, well, only played for thirty seconds, man, let
Speaker 10: me let me.
Speaker 6: Get to the change. Yeah, And so I didn't like
Speaker 6: feeling like I couldn't move at my own pace.
Speaker 10: You know, being from Texas. If we get twenty seconds
Speaker 10: on the crosswalk, I'm taking all of them. So that
Speaker 10: was like, that was that was my mentality. But as
Speaker 10: I get older, you know, I understand and I had
Speaker 10: to learn, you know, I hadn't learn, but I was
Speaker 10: uncomfortable at first.
Speaker 1: I didn't like it.
Speaker 10: I didn't like anybody tell me what to do because
Speaker 10: I started playing music because I was the only place
Speaker 10: where nobody could tell me what to do.
Speaker 6: So I was like, well, what the hell am I doing?
Speaker 10: Yeah, music business, But you know it's all good little
Speaker 10: maturity and you know, taking a step back and understanding
Speaker 10: that it's not just about you.
Speaker 6: That was a real reality check.
Speaker 9: You know.
Speaker 1: So was Sonny Slid, the album in which you felt
Speaker 1: that you had your control in your your true voiceover.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 1: Well.
Speaker 10: I just wanted to try it. I wanted to be
Speaker 10: able to have I wanted to be able to make
Speaker 10: an album where I'm like this, I'm.
Speaker 6: Fully responsible whether it works or not.
Speaker 10: I know what my strengths and my weaknesses are, and
Speaker 10: I've never been able to test him, and I want
Speaker 10: to do that. Like I said, I didn't get into
Speaker 10: this to be last place, and I didn't get into
Speaker 10: this to only give a quarter of what I think
Speaker 10: that I can give.
Speaker 1: So that was where that came from? How did because
Speaker 1: that's you, I from not saying that's you playing the
Speaker 1: guitar on the Fire We Make? Uh, how did that
Speaker 1: come about? Delicia Keys and Drake Record? How did that that? Uh?
Speaker 6: That was Miguel I mean not Miguel Maxwell.
Speaker 1: Maxwell. He hooked that he hooked all up or Fire
Speaker 1: We Make was at Max my band? I thought was
Speaker 1: my bad? I meant said, I mean Drake was that
Speaker 1: was the breakable right right?
Speaker 6: I don't know, I didn't I missed that. I remember
Speaker 6: being that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, how did that session come about?
Speaker 6: At least your Keys asked me to do uh an
Speaker 6: event with her, Uh.
Speaker 1: No child Alive? Wait, no child, black child left behind black.
Speaker 6: Black black, but the name of her black child and
Speaker 6: then the black blas.
Speaker 1: That's the party, but keep Alive is the organization organization? Yeah,
Speaker 1: we was all right.
Speaker 10: So we did a version of Wild my guitar gently
Speaker 10: weaves and and so we kind of linked up that way.
Speaker 10: It was pretty cool, and she asked me to be
Speaker 10: a part of this this Uh our record called me
Speaker 10: up and went up to the studio here in New York,
Speaker 10: and uh, do.
Speaker 1: People do when when guests tell you to do their
Speaker 1: record because you're You're on Donald Uh Gambino's album and
Speaker 1: your mom met So.
Speaker 9: I just was laughing at something.
Speaker 1: I'm just saying that he loves Hi Bill. How you doing, Billy? No?
Speaker 1: But is it when guests asked you to appear on
Speaker 1: their albums? Are they are they just like do you
Speaker 1: and do what you do and that's it? Or do
Speaker 1: they have like very specific uh instructions and and and.
Speaker 9: Are you all that specific instruction or do you just
Speaker 9: take the ones.
Speaker 1: To go do you?
Speaker 10: Well, I've done most sessions that I've done has been
Speaker 10: just kind of like do you. But I worked with
Speaker 10: Cody and Gambino and they're both like it goes like this,
Speaker 10: you know, and it's like I kind of put my
Speaker 10: own no, I don't do it goes like.
Speaker 1: This, Okay, yeah, I don't do that.
Speaker 12: So the solo that you played on the on the
Speaker 12: Your Mama joint like that, that's them kind of directing
Speaker 12: or is it well as much as you versus.
Speaker 10: The solo part. The solo part was was all me
Speaker 10: because you can't you can't tell me how to do
Speaker 10: that part. Damn right, that's gotta be just from the heart.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 10: But but as far as like chord changes and things
Speaker 10: like that and a little transition chords, was like.
Speaker 6: Not that one, this one? Yep, that no perfect, you know. Yeah,
Speaker 6: so but it was cool. It's like I respect that is,
Speaker 6: I know what I want, I know what you're capable of.
Speaker 6: Let's do that, all right.
Speaker 12: I was watching your the like I guess the new
Speaker 12: ep K or the promo video that you got for
Speaker 12: the new record This Land, and it was one clip
Speaker 12: where you were playing your solo and you were solo
Speaker 12: and like in the control room, and.
Speaker 1: That's how I cut all my vocals. So I thought
Speaker 1: it was interesting. Is that how you always kind of
Speaker 1: play like just right there in the moment, like you know,
Speaker 1: like right in front of the console.
Speaker 6: Yeah.
Speaker 10: Not, it depends sometimes I will, but sometimes I like
Speaker 10: to be in the room with the band. But for
Speaker 10: that one, I just turned the amp Caesar d is
Speaker 10: one for twelve cabinet Marshall and just turn that up
Speaker 10: and just ran for the two level. God, I still
Speaker 10: want to be in there, you know. And I wanted
Speaker 10: to hear how it translates. I like to hear I
Speaker 10: was going to translate on the speakers.
Speaker 6: You know. Yeah, for the most part.
Speaker 1: With your vocal, it was one the same clip you
Speaker 1: were you were cutting your vocal, you were playing, you
Speaker 1: were singing, and you were singing like you was singing
Speaker 1: through a fifty eight through it. It's just like a
Speaker 1: regular joint. Is that what you cut most of your
Speaker 1: vocals on? Or do you do like the fancy I guess,
Speaker 1: Mike so or whatever.
Speaker 6: I've done all of it.
Speaker 1: I don't really have a preference.
Speaker 6: Is it on check?
Speaker 1: Let's go?
Speaker 9: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Is it on? Okay? Yeah? I didn't know if you
Speaker 1: had a preference for just more that kind of raw
Speaker 1: like live sounded like a you know, a smaller mic.
Speaker 6: No, I don't know the difference. What what do you use?
Speaker 8: What my personally good one?
Speaker 1: Yeah, my personal mic is it's a manly reference. It's yeah,
Speaker 1: it is. I've told you for seventy five years, never
Speaker 1: told you about about the man so mainly, I mean
Speaker 1: they're mainly known for like that outboard gear, but they
Speaker 1: make the mic and so.
Speaker 6: Uh.
Speaker 12: When I was rebuilding my studio in my crib, I
Speaker 12: bought a Norman uh the U A seven, which is
Speaker 12: like the classic mic or whatever, and so I got it,
Speaker 12: and I was just like, yo, man, this ship sound cold.
Speaker 1: This is cold as fuck.
Speaker 6: I don't like this.
Speaker 1: And so my homie, my dealer homie, he was like, well, yo,
Speaker 1: he said. The Normans are generally very cold out the box,
Speaker 1: he said, but over time, as they age, that's when
Speaker 1: they get kind of warm. I was like, nigga, I'm
Speaker 1: trying to got I'm trying to Yeah, I ain't got
Speaker 1: no time of that. I got you need. So he
Speaker 1: was like, yo, but the one you need is the
Speaker 1: manly referenced. I was like whatever, So he let me
Speaker 1: shoot out. I had like a whole like locker ship.
Speaker 12: I have a U eighty seven U sixty seven fuddled
Speaker 12: yeah man, I shout it out against U eighty seven
Speaker 12: U sixty seven.
Speaker 1: I had a ribbon mic like an r c A
Speaker 1: like the old Elvis Mike. I had that one. I
Speaker 1: had the road, which was like my for like years.
Speaker 1: I shout it out against like six seven mics. It
Speaker 1: kicked all their asses for like I mean, and it
Speaker 1: was it was like a thousand dollars cheaper than the
Speaker 1: U eighty seven.
Speaker 6: I might have to give me a manly.
Speaker 1: Reference the truth, man, But what I got I got
Speaker 1: like a little s M. Fifty eight too, like I'll
Speaker 1: cut vocals through that, which is like a shure, is
Speaker 1: just one of those. And I mean that in the
Speaker 1: clip that I saw, like from your album, it looked
Speaker 1: like you were singing in one of those, and I
Speaker 1: used that one too.
Speaker 8: I don't even did Michael Jackson record like Man in
Speaker 8: the Mirror.
Speaker 1: On fifty seven. Yeah, I'm one of those people that
Speaker 1: I've been under Suores. Uh uh what do you call
Speaker 1: it up and endorsement? Sure, for like decades now, but.
Speaker 8: You know that's over now, yeah, said the engineer.
Speaker 1: Wait we don't yeah, wow, when did we end that relationship?
Speaker 8: Can I ask a question?
Speaker 1: Sure?
Speaker 8: Carry Color Jr. You seem to be like the Roots.
Speaker 8: This weird anominally of well yeah, like Peo like fans
Speaker 8: or people playing like black music, but it appeals to
Speaker 8: white audiences and it's a rarity, like you play for
Speaker 8: Bonnarou and you play these festivals for white jam kids.
Speaker 8: That's it doesn't happen that often in the same way
Speaker 8: the Ruts, the fucking Roots played in my college. We've
Speaker 8: talked about this and my college spring fling. When I
Speaker 8: was a graduating.
Speaker 1: I loved it. Let's just go with that.
Speaker 9: Uh.
Speaker 8: But but I don't know what do you attribute that to?
Speaker 8: Because you're I mean, I find I think I have
Speaker 8: an answer, but I was wondering what your answer was.
Speaker 8: I mean, other than it's all great music, which I'm
Speaker 8: sure is an easy answer. But like, do you ever
Speaker 8: think about that?
Speaker 1: I do?
Speaker 6: Oh, well, I'm thinking about it. Certain Chappelle skit.
Speaker 8: Understandable.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, I don't know.
Speaker 8: Just good music is good music? I mean, like it
Speaker 8: is what it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Well, can I ask you I'm not trying what
Speaker 1: I'm gonna add on to it? Is it harder for
Speaker 1: you now? I know that you're going in different or
Speaker 1: we should mention also that this land I forgot that
Speaker 1: much it is out right now? Is it harder for
Speaker 1: you to keep the flame alive? Uh? In which kind
Speaker 1: of the the environment of the musical environment of the
Speaker 1: youth is the kind of the exact opposite of it.
Speaker 1: Whereas you know, traditional rock was the front and center
Speaker 1: rebel music, that was the middle finger to society, where
Speaker 1: now it's almost Uh, it's kind of like a rarity
Speaker 1: where you can find quality, really good tradition on rock music?
Speaker 1: Is that hard and now I know you're going different
Speaker 1: directions with this album as well, but is it is
Speaker 1: it hard defining or or standing by your your your
Speaker 1: queen your acts in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 6: It's hard. Nah, I don't know. I wouldn't know what
Speaker 6: to do without it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I wish you could see it. Hey, let me
Speaker 1: know when you want to do the R and B
Speaker 1: immature album I'm working on.
Speaker 6: I'm working on it right now.
Speaker 1: Man, listen, I'm on in on that. Yeah.
Speaker 8: Hell, Bill, he'll bring his manly reference and everything.
Speaker 9: Bill was the remix to your I don't know if
Speaker 9: this is the remix, but were you kind of asking like,
Speaker 9: do you do you ever feel some type of way
Speaker 9: when you look in the crowd it's not as many
Speaker 9: black people as you as maybe one would like to see.
Speaker 5: Is that like the.
Speaker 1: Question I ask? But I just interest that.
Speaker 8: That always interested me. It's why the rout issue with that.
Speaker 9: But maybe Gary does. It's different for every artist. Well,
Speaker 9: I'm sorry. Black Thought was known as having not an issue,
Speaker 9: but at times he's been known to say the more
Speaker 9: we grew up.
Speaker 1: And we grew up in the hype Williams video era,
Speaker 1: which was like the real record business budgets, and I
Speaker 1: think if you grow up with that and those images
Speaker 1: and whatnot, and you know what you're seeing on the road,
Speaker 1: you know when groupies are chasing me, it's like five
Speaker 1: five dudes at my hotel when wanting to know, like
Speaker 1: what kind of microphone does D'Angelo use? Like what he
Speaker 1: was breaking down. I've had that conversation many a time
Speaker 1: in a hotel.
Speaker 9: Like I've also seen earlier on in the Roots career.
Speaker 9: I've seen the response when you've had like an all
Speaker 9: Black grounds, like, yeah, we had all Black grounds.
Speaker 8: My point was, I've seen I've seen Gary play a
Speaker 8: number of times, and he will freak out white hippie
Speaker 8: kids in the same way he freaks out African American.
Speaker 8: It's like, and that's a rarity. I'm I'm giving that compliment,
Speaker 8: you know what I'm saying, Like, I don't you don't
Speaker 8: you see that enough? In the same way the Roots
Speaker 8: complay to all my audience and and it doesn't matter,
Speaker 8: and that I love and I feel like the ability
Speaker 8: to do that is transcendent. And I don't understand and
Speaker 8: I don't understand it, and that's my that's my question.
Speaker 1: And I was adding, is an endangered species. Do you
Speaker 1: feel some sort of way about it?
Speaker 11: But the answer is simple. Black people gave up on
Speaker 11: rock music after Living Color.
Speaker 1: Sugar Network. Yeah, Steve, you did it. Let's go, here's
Speaker 1: your theme.
Speaker 8: Say something.
Speaker 9: And then they told us Lenny didn't count.
Speaker 1: Lenny is Jewish.
Speaker 9: That's what I.
Speaker 6: Like.
Speaker 9: Lenny grab his way, you know that.
Speaker 1: Living Color and who else do we have? Well? Nothing
Speaker 1: after that. I mean we had Prince. I mean really
Speaker 1: Prince was but but did.
Speaker 7: He just cause the guitar doesn't mean yeah, he was
Speaker 7: R and.
Speaker 6: B for.
Speaker 1: He saw he was black people. The Isisley Brothers.
Speaker 9: Definitely delic So we keep it in the spirit of like.
Speaker 1: By seventy six. By seventy six, Funkadelic basically became Yeah
Speaker 1: because was a Parliament song. Yeah, I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: and GARYT Shatter himself will say that, you know, I
Speaker 1: felt that after when they making One Nation under the
Speaker 1: Groove and suddenly we just sold out and became Parliament.
Speaker 1: So I'm just saying that.
Speaker 9: Doesn't it seem like based on the Rock and Roll
Speaker 9: Hall of Fame and everything else, It depends. It depends
Speaker 9: on who you're asking what rock and roll is. Because
Speaker 9: I mean, there's a whole very derivative situation and then
Speaker 9: I don't know, it's just weird to me.
Speaker 11: The funk lineage is like outside of rock, like Princess
Speaker 11: funk and pop, you know, but more than rock.
Speaker 1: But he he's rock. I never grew printing in rock.
Speaker 1: It was probably the reason why Rolling Stone had left
Speaker 1: him off the one hundred Greatest Guitar Players, Like but
Speaker 1: in the Rock and Roll that right there, Yeah whoa, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 9: Unfair is the best?
Speaker 1: Yes, like they Rolling Stone literally forgot to list Prince
Speaker 1: in one of the the one hundred you know what saying.
Speaker 1: And thus when Prince did the my guitar gently weeps
Speaker 1: guitar solo at the that was his revenge, Like that
Speaker 1: was his like motherfuckers like.
Speaker 6: You.
Speaker 12: But I think with him though, I mean this is
Speaker 12: just I think with him, with artists like that that
Speaker 12: are just so big and just so known for so
Speaker 12: many hit records, it's hard to imagine what gets overlooked
Speaker 12: is just the musicianship.
Speaker 1: So even like with Michael Jackson, like Michael.
Speaker 12: Would say, like he would talk about Prince, he would say, well,
Speaker 12: people look at Princes as an artist, but they just
Speaker 12: look at me on the dance, dude.
Speaker 1: But Mike used to saying, it's god damn face off,
Speaker 1: you know.
Speaker 9: What I mean?
Speaker 1: Sometimes I forget that Mike is an excellent saying an
Speaker 1: extracy right, because you just see the white sox and
Speaker 1: the dances and shit that you forget that this is
Speaker 1: some real fucking musicianship going on. I feel as though
Speaker 1: Prince really took the space that the Isisley brothers had
Speaker 1: in the seventies. I can rap you on that. And
Speaker 1: it's so natural for Ernie Eisley to do a solo
Speaker 1: in the seventies, you know that, you just you never said, oh,
Speaker 1: this is not rock and roll, this is you know,
Speaker 1: it's that sort of thing.
Speaker 9: Somehow, somewhere it became harder, harder for black dozey caught
Speaker 9: and roll.
Speaker 1: Well, gar.
Speaker 9: Gary, I mean, we are older.
Speaker 13: All the time, don't worry about are not.
Speaker 6: The baby here at the kids table in my own
Speaker 6: damn house.
Speaker 1: I still Gary. So I have a somewhat relevant question.
Speaker 8: I think he was asking about his hands again.
Speaker 11: So is it is it a blessing or a curse
Speaker 11: to be grouped as a certain genre, specifically blues or
Speaker 11: blues rock.
Speaker 1: Let's say in your case, is that.
Speaker 11: Is that something that you hold up as a as
Speaker 11: a sign of pride or is that something that's that's pigeonholing?
Speaker 10: You know, I feel I feel a couple of ways
Speaker 10: of about that. When I was a kid, all I
Speaker 10: wanted to do was be a blues man. My first
Speaker 10: when I first got a guitar, I saw Steve Steve
Speaker 10: rayvonn Tribute was Eric Clapton, Buddy got bb King, Robert Cray,
Speaker 10: Bonnie Ray, a few others, and I said, I want
Speaker 10: to be a part of that thing. And so in
Speaker 10: twenty ten, when I got to be on stage with
Speaker 10: all them at the same time, I was like, it
Speaker 10: feels great to be a part of this, but it's
Speaker 10: also that other things like well I got I love
Speaker 10: being a part of this thing, but I love other
Speaker 10: stuff too, and I'd like to do all of that.
Speaker 6: So I just I just do what I do and
Speaker 6: try not to think about it. And I'm thirty four
Speaker 6: years old.
Speaker 9: Man, I got out of this, Thank you. It was
Speaker 9: getting tired.
Speaker 1: We come with this land though it ain't always true,
Speaker 1: and you're going going in different directions, like do you
Speaker 1: now feel as though I mean the way that that
Speaker 1: the times are defined now is just to be fluid,
Speaker 1: like non defined. And the new records, yeah, graduation.
Speaker 10: Yeah, I think that that I've always wanted to kind
Speaker 10: of do that. I mean, Quincy Jones is idle than me.
Speaker 6: Been trying to get rid of the genres and all
Speaker 6: that for a long time.
Speaker 10: And and uh, when I heard Wu Tang spitting over
Speaker 10: Albert Kinglis, I was like, I can do whatever I want.
Speaker 12: Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that because you
Speaker 12: talked about in your in the promo for the new record,
Speaker 12: you talk about like your hip hop influences, Like what
Speaker 12: was this?
Speaker 1: What was some of the hip hop stuff you listened to?
Speaker 10: I mean when I was I guess nine, ten, eleven, twelve,
Speaker 10: I wasn't allowed to listen to hip hop, but my
Speaker 10: buddy Grant would make me tapes put different titles.
Speaker 1: On it, and your parents, yes, why did exactly?
Speaker 10: So I was listening to uh like d MX Snoop
Speaker 10: Warren g Uh, bone thugs in Harmony.
Speaker 1: Bone Thugs in Harmony, never singing harmony. He's right, they
Speaker 1: are both totally correct.
Speaker 6: I never thought about that the US cross.
Speaker 1: There were no harm totally right, totally right. I never
Speaker 1: thought about that play.
Speaker 9: Did you have you have?
Speaker 6: Y'all?
Speaker 9: I saw I was just reading something where you did
Speaker 9: something with bun Be. But have your text is like
Speaker 9: the MCS kind of embraced you in that way from yeah,
Speaker 9: because I'm thinking about I'm thinking about Scarface. I don't
Speaker 9: want to say Austin, so I think, yeah.
Speaker 1: Guitar lessons. Yet I forgot about his guitar.
Speaker 6: I saw him. I went to go see him in
Speaker 6: d C. And I didn't know he played guitar. So
Speaker 6: he came on with a guitar.
Speaker 9: What Oh, DC will let him play whatever he wants to.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so but yeah, so yeah ghetto, Yeah, switch your house,
Speaker 6: you know.
Speaker 1: So.
Speaker 6: I spent a lot of time listening to that.
Speaker 10: But I love the production stuff, you know, the production
Speaker 10: side of it, you know from Swiss and Dre and
Speaker 10: you know the whole you know. I mean, I'm sitting
Speaker 10: here what you got, But I got to give it
Speaker 10: up to the roots for production and musicality.
Speaker 6: In that, you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: Like that.
Speaker 6: That made it to me. It's like this all goes together,
Speaker 6: you know what I mean?
Speaker 1: And I can.
Speaker 6: I want to be a part of that too. I
Speaker 6: want to do that too. I love being a blues man,
Speaker 6: but like this ship is tight, you know what I mean?
Speaker 6: Like I want to get into this too and figure
Speaker 6: it all out.
Speaker 10: So I want to put the n PC underneath everything
Speaker 10: and put the guitars and live instrumentation on top of.
Speaker 6: It, and and use all the colors, you know what
Speaker 6: I mean. Do you like jazz?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 6: I love jazz. I listened to a good amount of it.
Speaker 6: Never try to touch it really.
Speaker 1: Though, So what what is what is your go to listening?
Speaker 6: So what's on my playlist?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 1: Sir?
Speaker 10: I guess yeah? Yeah, John Battis's latest one, Yeah, lm A.
Speaker 10: Have been listening to.
Speaker 9: Up Yeah, don't do All because the second tripping sound
Speaker 9: like boot Up Okay.
Speaker 6: And I've been listening to Sammy Davis Jr.
Speaker 1: One right, there's another Sammy Davis Jr.
Speaker 9: There's a younger person that named himself Sam David Junior.
Speaker 9: So I'm just trying to make sure I wasn't confused.
Speaker 1: Well, you're talking about the candy Man the can.
Speaker 7: That would be, but some is it because for the
Speaker 7: junior thing like the connection.
Speaker 6: Anywhere, But I was I came across a performance of him.
Speaker 10: Doing mister bo Jangles and uh and my son really
Speaker 10: loved it and so he started singing it around the
Speaker 10: house and I was like, well, let's just get into
Speaker 10: Sammy Davis Junior together.
Speaker 6: So that's been our musical.
Speaker 1: That is the Beauty Discovery.
Speaker 6: Yeah, so that's what happened.
Speaker 9: I need to movies to get into those episodes on
Speaker 9: the Coxtables. I can't even say the show.
Speaker 1: No more on the.
Speaker 9: Okay, on The Cosby Show because Sammy Davis Junior had
Speaker 9: some really great cameos.
Speaker 1: But I doubt you will find that anywhere. Yeah.
Speaker 9: Yeah, Tap he was really good in the movie Tap
Speaker 9: Tap was hard Ship with Gregory High.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 9: The JT song that the title.
Speaker 1: Song, will take It was j T and Regina Bell
Speaker 1: and it was not make it like it was, but
Speaker 1: it was sorry. Yeah. Yeah, JT's back cooling game.
Speaker 9: So that see Gary, this is when forty celebrated.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is this nigga. We're falling. The eyes is back.
Speaker 8: I'm with it, Okay, Gary Clark has James and he's fine.
Speaker 1: So yeah, I'm also wrapping. I understand, I gotta wrap
Speaker 1: this up to bed.
Speaker 8: Yeah, who's not going to I'm going to go to bed.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I do too, Billy Steve gotta go to bed.
Speaker 6: Sounds like a movie Washington.
Speaker 8: In the early early morning.
Speaker 1: Yeah, anyway, Bill and Steve could have been to do anyway.
Speaker 8: My second bar Mitzvah hosted book and what is uh
Speaker 8: your your?
Speaker 1: What are you playing on the rest of your year?
Speaker 1: Being in twenty nineteen?
Speaker 6: The rest of twenty nineteen is tour forever.
Speaker 1: That's a good thing. I'm trying to work like you man,
Speaker 1: that's yes, that's a good thing. That's an awesome thing.
Speaker 12: Yeah, it's a blessed How do you balance it out
Speaker 12: with your with your boys and your know what?
Speaker 1: What the kids?
Speaker 6: A boy girl, boy girl. Okay, I'm just gonna awfully
Speaker 6: you just bring them out with me with you.
Speaker 1: That's dope.
Speaker 6: I'm trying to get to that.
Speaker 11: You know.
Speaker 6: It's a family. So yeah, that's what. We'll just be
Speaker 6: out there everywhere.
Speaker 1: Cool. Well, we thank you for coming on the show, sir.
Speaker 12: Yes, man, I'm so happy to learn that your R
Speaker 12: and B dude like like R and B arm like greasy.
Speaker 1: R and B, like your R and B record. I
Speaker 1: want to on it like, let's do like some divince dope.
Speaker 1: Garrett Clark, I might have to get it. You gotta
Speaker 1: standing there.
Speaker 9: Make sure you caught the land first land. That was
Speaker 9: Jamison that hit me with them.
Speaker 6: Isn't it beautiful?
Speaker 1: Anyway? On behalf of Unpaid Bill and Sugar Steve of
Speaker 1: the Sugar Steve Network, aren't jazz guitarist? And Boss Bill
Speaker 1: is getting angry? Bill? We love you man, Sorry, look
Speaker 1: with love. What your bathroom?
Speaker 9: Now?
Speaker 1: You're gonna be a nigga doing renovations?
Speaker 8: Finished, Matt finished, Gary.
Speaker 1: We thank you for coming on the sales, coming on.
Speaker 1: Let's see you all in the next round. Of course,
Speaker 1: loved Supreme, see all later, coust Love Supreme. It's a
Speaker 1: production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the
Speaker 1: team at Mandora. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit
Speaker 1: the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or where whever you
Speaker 1: listen to your favorite shows.