WEBVTT - Joe Boyd 0:00:15.476 --> 0:00:22.716 Pushkin. Joe Boyd spent more than six decades as a producer, 0:00:22.916 --> 0:00:26.916 label executive and writer whose influence extents far beyond the studio. 0:00:27.476 --> 0:00:30.276 From producing Nick Drake's luminous folk albums to working with 0:00:30.316 --> 0:00:34.316 Fairport Convention, Pink Floyd, and Ram, Boyd has shaped some 0:00:34.356 --> 0:00:37.916 of the most enduring recordings in modern music history. But 0:00:38.036 --> 0:00:40.596 Joe Boyd isn't just a behind the scenes architect of sound. 0:00:40.916 --> 0:00:43.916 He's also a chronicler of the music he loves. In 0:00:43.916 --> 0:00:46.636 a two thousand and seven memoir, White Bicycles Making Music 0:00:46.676 --> 0:00:49.876 in the nineteen Sixties, he offered an insider's perspective on 0:00:49.956 --> 0:00:53.596 that transformative era of nineteen sixties British music that was 0:00:53.636 --> 0:00:56.076 so well received readers were clamoring for him to write 0:00:56.076 --> 0:00:59.276 a follow up about the nineteen seventies. He wrestled with 0:00:59.316 --> 0:01:01.396 that idea for a little bit, and then pivoted to 0:01:01.476 --> 0:01:03.956 the voluminous new book and The Roots of Rhythm Remain, 0:01:04.116 --> 0:01:08.316 a journey through global music, published just last year. This 0:01:08.436 --> 0:01:11.876 tom takes across continents in search of the traditions that 0:01:11.956 --> 0:01:16.556 continue to shape contemporary sound. From Cuba Tomali, from Brazil 0:01:16.676 --> 0:01:20.596 to Bulgaria, Boyd traces the connections that bind global music 0:01:20.596 --> 0:01:23.796 together and celebrates the artists who keep these traditions alive. 0:01:24.756 --> 0:01:27.076 On today's episode, I talked to Joe Boyd about working 0:01:27.076 --> 0:01:30.356 with famed Warner Brothers CEO Moostin in the sixties. He 0:01:30.396 --> 0:01:32.836 also talks about the exhaustive research he did in writing 0:01:32.876 --> 0:01:35.436 his latest book and why he decided to pinpoint three 0:01:35.476 --> 0:01:38.916 specific global regions as the genesis for all popular music, 0:01:39.756 --> 0:01:42.276 and Joe recalls how he came to produce the Seminole 0:01:42.356 --> 0:01:45.276 nineteen seventy three documentary on Jimi Hendrix, one of my 0:01:45.396 --> 0:01:51.796 personal favorite films of all time. This is broken record, 0:01:52.196 --> 0:02:01.836 real musicians, real conversations. Here's my conversation with Joe Boyd. 0:02:03.156 --> 0:02:06.396 There were a number of Americans to get out to 0:02:06.556 --> 0:02:09.436 London in the sixties that you weren't alone in that, 0:02:09.636 --> 0:02:11.796 but it does seem to one of the rare ones 0:02:11.796 --> 0:02:15.396 that stayed as long as he did not seem to 0:02:15.396 --> 0:02:17.196 come back. Did you ever move back to the States? 0:02:17.476 --> 0:02:20.796 Yeah, yeah, I lived in la for a few years 0:02:20.836 --> 0:02:23.596 in the early seventies. I was back and forth La 0:02:23.676 --> 0:02:27.476 to London for another few years, and then I was 0:02:27.556 --> 0:02:30.036 back and forth to New York for a bit In 0:02:30.116 --> 0:02:35.316 the nineties and the noughties. But I've always I mean, 0:02:35.356 --> 0:02:38.076 basically except for a couple of years when I was 0:02:38.076 --> 0:02:40.956 working for Warner Brothers in la in the early seventies. 0:02:41.556 --> 0:02:45.796 I've always had a flat in London since nineteen sixty five. 0:02:46.676 --> 0:02:50.396 I want to kind of toggle between your career, not 0:02:51.436 --> 0:02:53.276 as a writer, not as part of the book, also 0:02:53.316 --> 0:02:55.796 the book. So the theme of the book, because you mentioned 0:02:55.796 --> 0:02:58.956 Warner Brothers, can you tell me about that mo austin 0:02:59.156 --> 0:03:03.196 early seventies, Warner Brothers culture and how you got involved. 0:03:03.876 --> 0:03:08.276 One day in nineteen sixty eight, I guess it was 0:03:08.516 --> 0:03:15.076 early sixth on a kind of willful impulse, I called 0:03:15.116 --> 0:03:17.956 up Bill Graham and I said I wanted to come 0:03:17.996 --> 0:03:21.076 see him, and he said okay, and gave me a 0:03:21.156 --> 0:03:23.396 time and a date, and I jumped on a plane, 0:03:23.756 --> 0:03:26.876 went to San Francisco and booked the Incredible String Band 0:03:27.156 --> 0:03:29.916 to open for the Jefferson Airplane because I thought they 0:03:29.916 --> 0:03:32.556 shouldn't be in folk clubs, they should be opening for 0:03:32.596 --> 0:03:36.996 the Jefferson Airplane. And while I was there, I met 0:03:37.396 --> 0:03:40.916 a guy called Andy Wickham. And Andy Wickham was an 0:03:40.916 --> 0:03:46.516 Englishman who had once worked for Andrew Luke Oldham I think, 0:03:47.076 --> 0:03:51.076 and he'd somehow migrated to California around the time of 0:03:51.116 --> 0:03:56.716 the Monterey Pop Festival, and he was now working at 0:03:56.756 --> 0:04:01.196 Warner Brothers. And we hung out and we spent some 0:04:01.236 --> 0:04:04.156 time together in San Francisco, and he said, you got 0:04:04.156 --> 0:04:07.596 to come to Burbank and meet Moe. And so I 0:04:07.676 --> 0:04:13.116 flew down to burber Bank. I met Mo and we 0:04:13.236 --> 0:04:17.356 just got along great. And Joe Smith and and Andy Wickham, 0:04:17.716 --> 0:04:25.036 who passed away recently, ended up being a questionable guy. 0:04:26.236 --> 0:04:28.716 I mean, he was one of those people who revealed 0:04:28.796 --> 0:04:34.316 him his sort of slightly racist and slightly aristocratic and 0:04:34.476 --> 0:04:39.756 snobbish sides as he grew older. But at that time 0:04:40.436 --> 0:04:45.236 he was the one who introduced Moe. And Moe and Joe, 0:04:45.316 --> 0:04:50.676 you know, came from Sinatra, from Top forty Radio, from 0:04:51.196 --> 0:04:55.756 these other worlds. And Andy introduced them to the Grateful Dead, 0:04:55.836 --> 0:04:58.356 He introduced them to Joni Mitchell, he introduced them to 0:04:58.436 --> 0:05:04.276 Van Morrison, and he opened those doors for them somehow. 0:05:04.396 --> 0:05:08.916 Moe just, you know, the same charm that worked with 0:05:09.196 --> 0:05:15.116 Natra's wise guys, worked with the Laurel Canyon guys. And 0:05:15.356 --> 0:05:17.916 Moe was just a sweet guy. I mean, he was 0:05:18.116 --> 0:05:22.396 tough and He didn't always reveal how tough he was 0:05:24.036 --> 0:05:28.196 unless he was pushed. But his charm was such and 0:05:28.236 --> 0:05:31.836 he had that wisdom to let you know. He surrounded 0:05:31.916 --> 0:05:37.756 himself with Lenny Warrenker and Russ Titlement and you know, 0:05:37.836 --> 0:05:40.356 all this this kind of a and R team Van 0:05:40.436 --> 0:05:44.876 Dyke Parks, and he let them be the ones who 0:05:44.956 --> 0:05:49.236 judged the music. The record company existed in a kind 0:05:49.276 --> 0:05:53.996 of old warehouse across the street from the studio, and 0:05:54.036 --> 0:05:58.236 they kept adding people and adding offices, and so it 0:05:58.316 --> 0:06:02.796 was completely crowded. It was like you had three feet 0:06:02.876 --> 0:06:04.876 and then there was the next office with a little 0:06:04.876 --> 0:06:08.236 divider and you went to go have a pee, and 0:06:08.276 --> 0:06:10.596 you're standing next to Moe or Joe or the head 0:06:10.596 --> 0:06:12.796 of sales or the head of you know. And so 0:06:12.876 --> 0:06:16.636 there was there was so much communication. Everybody talked to 0:06:16.676 --> 0:06:20.956 everybody else all the time. And then of course, you know, 0:06:20.956 --> 0:06:24.676 they ended up selling ten million Neil Young records and 0:06:24.876 --> 0:06:29.956 ten million Joni Mitchell records and got so much money 0:06:30.036 --> 0:06:33.196 that they said, oh, let's build a new headquarters. And 0:06:33.276 --> 0:06:36.556 I think by seventy seven or seventy six or something 0:06:36.596 --> 0:06:40.396 like that, they built that new building down the street 0:06:41.156 --> 0:06:45.236 and everybody was like thirty yards from each other, with 0:06:45.436 --> 0:06:50.276 padded carpets, deep pile carpets in between, and the atmosphere 0:06:50.316 --> 0:06:52.076 was never the same, and the record company I don't 0:06:52.076 --> 0:06:55.516 think was ever the same again. You know, I got 0:06:55.676 --> 0:06:58.436 I started doing some stuff. I produced a Jeff and 0:06:58.516 --> 0:07:02.356 Maria Muldor record I produced. I sold them of John 0:07:02.436 --> 0:07:06.796 and Beverly Martin record, neither of which sold. But for 0:07:06.836 --> 0:07:09.796 some reason they liked me, and I think there was 0:07:09.836 --> 0:07:12.996 also it's a complicated story, but they didn't have a 0:07:13.036 --> 0:07:16.796 European operation, and so they decided the way that they 0:07:16.836 --> 0:07:21.596 would enter Europe was by buying Island Records. And I 0:07:21.756 --> 0:07:25.876 helped introduce them to Chris Blackwell because I was working 0:07:25.916 --> 0:07:31.116 with Chris in London, and Chris, in his inimitable casual 0:07:31.236 --> 0:07:37.196 Caribbean way, kind of fucked them around. I mean, he 0:07:37.756 --> 0:07:41.876 just didn't take it all very seriously, and they did, 0:07:42.036 --> 0:07:44.076 and they went out on a limb to make him 0:07:44.076 --> 0:07:49.196 a very serious offer, and he never really responded, and 0:07:49.276 --> 0:07:57.156 so they got furious and they offered Chrysalis, who was 0:07:57.156 --> 0:07:59.796 making records for Ireland. They offered them a label deal 0:08:00.716 --> 0:08:03.676 to move to Warner Brothers, and they went out to 0:08:03.676 --> 0:08:07.116 get revenge. This was most tough side and he went 0:08:07.156 --> 0:08:10.956 out to get revenge to take stuff away from Blackwell 0:08:11.876 --> 0:08:17.316 from Ireland, and later they became great friends again. So 0:08:17.396 --> 0:08:21.396 this was a brief period of vengefulness and part of 0:08:21.436 --> 0:08:25.636 that was to steal me. And so they offered me 0:08:26.396 --> 0:08:31.916 the job of music director for the film company. And 0:08:32.036 --> 0:08:35.676 I was burnt out, you know. I had been struggling 0:08:35.716 --> 0:08:39.476 so much to keep Witch Season afloat, and we never 0:08:39.516 --> 0:08:41.876 sold enough records, and I was just getting more and 0:08:41.916 --> 0:08:44.956 more in debt. And they offered me a big salary. 0:08:45.476 --> 0:08:50.476 And Chris may have sensed the edge in this offer, 0:08:51.276 --> 0:08:53.716 but he couldn't have been nicer. He said, it's a 0:08:53.756 --> 0:08:58.116 great opportunity. You'll kick yourself if you don't take it. 0:08:58.716 --> 0:09:02.156 I'll pay off your debts and look after your artists 0:09:02.196 --> 0:09:06.716 and all that, and so go with my blessings. And 0:09:06.796 --> 0:09:09.756 so I went to California in nineteen sid one and 0:09:10.836 --> 0:09:15.556 became the so called director of music services for Warner 0:09:15.596 --> 0:09:16.396 Brothers Films. 0:09:17.076 --> 0:09:20.076 And so you was sort of in that role the 0:09:20.156 --> 0:09:23.916 liaise between the music and the film, so Warner Brothers 0:09:24.236 --> 0:09:26.596 music would end up in Warner Brothers films. 0:09:27.036 --> 0:09:30.036 That was one of the jobs. I discovered that my 0:09:30.196 --> 0:09:33.316 main job, as far as most of the directors and 0:09:33.356 --> 0:09:36.516 producers were concerned, they'd call me up and say get 0:09:36.556 --> 0:09:41.436 me John Williams, and you know, so it got kind 0:09:41.476 --> 0:09:46.156 of tedious, but I had some fun, you know, Stanley Kubrick. 0:09:46.436 --> 0:09:51.396 I'd worked on Clockwork Orange, I worked on Deliverance, the 0:09:51.796 --> 0:09:57.556 banjo saying with dueling banjo's that was me? And who 0:09:57.596 --> 0:09:58.196 played that again? 0:09:58.236 --> 0:09:59.356 Who played that banjo part? 0:09:59.956 --> 0:10:05.596 Eric Weisberg, because it should have been Bill Keith. Bill 0:10:05.716 --> 0:10:09.236 Keith was the guy. He was the city billy guy 0:10:09.796 --> 0:10:13.316 who'd played with Bill Monroe. I knew him from Harvard 0:10:13.356 --> 0:10:20.276 Square the best. And what John Boorman wanted was doling banjos, 0:10:20.316 --> 0:10:24.876 but he wanted it slow, fast, minor key, major key 0:10:25.316 --> 0:10:29.116 as a soundtrack, as a score, and Bill Keith would 0:10:29.116 --> 0:10:32.756 have been perfect. But Keith was on tour. He'd met 0:10:32.796 --> 0:10:35.956 a girl. He wanted to go hang out with her 0:10:35.996 --> 0:10:38.236 in Ireland. He said, how much are you paying? I 0:10:38.236 --> 0:10:42.316 said two thousand bucks. He said, get Weisberg, and so 0:10:42.436 --> 0:10:47.276 I got Weisburg and Weisberg made a fortune, you know, basically, 0:10:47.356 --> 0:10:50.556 and then But what happened then was that I sort 0:10:50.596 --> 0:10:54.556 of maneuvered my way into producing a Jimmy Hendrix documentary 0:10:55.076 --> 0:10:57.516 called Jimmy Hendrix, who came out in seventy three, And 0:10:58.916 --> 0:11:01.796 when that began to be really a full time thing, 0:11:03.116 --> 0:11:05.676 I said to Warner Brothers, I said, listen, let me 0:11:05.716 --> 0:11:10.196 find you a successor. And I went on. I thought 0:11:10.236 --> 0:11:12.756 that making the Jimi Hendrix film made me a film producer, 0:11:13.436 --> 0:11:15.156 but that was delusional. 0:11:16.796 --> 0:11:19.316 I think any Hendrix fan, that's the thing that they 0:11:19.356 --> 0:11:21.316 need to see. If there's anything that they need to see, 0:11:21.356 --> 0:11:23.796 that is the thing that they should see. 0:11:24.356 --> 0:11:27.796 You know, it's not available online. You can't stream it. 0:11:28.196 --> 0:11:32.676 I think there's secondhand DVDs available on Amazon, but nothing else. 0:11:33.236 --> 0:11:37.436 And I've screened it during my last trip to America 0:11:37.476 --> 0:11:40.676 to promote the book and the Roots of Them Remain, 0:11:41.556 --> 0:11:44.836 I did an event up the Hudson River Valley and 0:11:44.956 --> 0:11:50.196 Sagerates and the local cinema. The night before my event, 0:11:50.396 --> 0:11:53.076 they showed the Jimi Hendrix film and it got me 0:11:53.156 --> 0:11:55.716 to introduce it and that was great. 0:11:56.316 --> 0:11:59.036 It's amazing, by the way, how Fay I can't remember 0:11:59.036 --> 0:12:02.316 her last name, but his friend face. She's like completely 0:12:02.356 --> 0:12:06.676 just the same Faine prigeon Faine prigein Thank You she 0:12:06.756 --> 0:12:07.396 passed recently. 0:12:07.476 --> 0:12:10.116 Yeah, she passed recently. She was fantastic. 0:12:10.236 --> 0:12:14.596 She is just so vibranting in that thing. It's it's unbelievable. 0:12:14.756 --> 0:12:17.076 She's almost as charismatic as Jimmy in the movie, you know. 0:12:17.116 --> 0:12:21.076 Yeah, yeah, and you know she had I don't know enough. 0:12:21.196 --> 0:12:24.276 I mean, somebody, it's really a shame. I don't know 0:12:24.276 --> 0:12:27.756 what's happened to it, but somebody I heard of somebody 0:12:27.796 --> 0:12:31.796 doing interviews with her to do a kind of biography. 0:12:32.756 --> 0:12:36.756 And evidently she was, you know, a friend or a 0:12:36.876 --> 0:12:41.636 girlfriend of like ten of the top musicians of the 0:12:41.676 --> 0:12:47.036 seventies and eighties. You know, she knew everybody, and everybody 0:12:47.076 --> 0:12:51.676 adored her because she never and she never jibed anybody. 0:12:51.716 --> 0:12:56.156 She told it like it was she was. And no, 0:12:56.196 --> 0:12:59.156 I mean, there's so much in her interview. There was 0:12:59.196 --> 0:13:01.396 a moment, my fa One of my favorite moments in 0:13:01.436 --> 0:13:05.196 the movie was her describing when she and Jimmy were 0:13:05.196 --> 0:13:08.436 living in a cold water flat like fifth floor and 0:13:08.516 --> 0:13:12.436 Harlem fit for a walk up and she gives him 0:13:12.476 --> 0:13:15.116 some money to go out and get some groceries or something, 0:13:15.156 --> 0:13:18.756 and he disappears and he comes back and he hadn't 0:13:18.756 --> 0:13:22.516 got any groceries, he's got an LP and she tries 0:13:22.556 --> 0:13:25.156 to get the LP and finally she grabs it and says, 0:13:26.036 --> 0:13:29.076 Bob Dylan, Who the fuck is Bob Vilan? 0:13:32.556 --> 0:13:35.116 So good? What was the process of making that? 0:13:36.316 --> 0:13:41.836 It was so weird because basically, all during Jimmy's life, 0:13:42.236 --> 0:13:44.276 over the last few years of his life when he 0:13:44.316 --> 0:13:48.236 was famous, everybody wanted to film him, and people were 0:13:48.236 --> 0:13:51.516 constantly coming up and wanting to film him. And Mike Jeffries, 0:13:51.516 --> 0:13:55.596 who was his manager, who was kind of thuggish guy 0:13:55.716 --> 0:14:00.636 from Newcastle, former club owner in Newcastle, he would say, yeah, sure, 0:14:00.676 --> 0:14:03.036 here he wants some lights. Here's where you plug in 0:14:03.036 --> 0:14:06.476 the sound. Here's you want an electrical extension corved you 0:14:06.516 --> 0:14:09.596 know you want if all areas pass here work out. 0:14:10.236 --> 0:14:12.236 And then they kept saying, well, you know, we have 0:14:12.276 --> 0:14:14.596 this release form that we need you to sign. Oh, 0:14:14.676 --> 0:14:18.596 we'll talk about that later. And then when they'd filmed Jimmy, 0:14:18.956 --> 0:14:20.556 they would come to him and try to get him 0:14:20.556 --> 0:14:22.516 to sign the release and he said, now I've got 0:14:22.516 --> 0:14:26.236 my own form, and he would give him give them 0:14:26.276 --> 0:14:29.796 the form which gave him fifty one percent ownership of 0:14:29.796 --> 0:14:33.316 the film, and so nobody would sign it, and so 0:14:33.476 --> 0:14:39.636 all this footage never got released during Jimmy's lifetime. After 0:14:39.796 --> 0:14:45.876 his father appointed this wonderful guy called Leo Branton, who 0:14:45.956 --> 0:14:51.276 was an attorney, LA attorney who represented Miles Davis, nat 0:14:51.356 --> 0:14:55.476 Cole Dorothy Dandridge. You know, he was an African American, 0:14:55.556 --> 0:15:00.316 but he was also civil rights attorney. He defended Angela Davis. 0:15:00.956 --> 0:15:05.076 And in fact, we were making the film during the 0:15:05.196 --> 0:15:09.836 trial of Angela Davis up in the Bay Area, and 0:15:09.876 --> 0:15:13.876 they had every Friday off at the trial. The trial 0:15:13.916 --> 0:15:17.276 would go Monday, Tuesday, munch a Thursday, and Leo would 0:15:17.356 --> 0:15:23.756 fly back from Oakland to Burbank and would come straight 0:15:23.916 --> 0:15:27.196 to Warner Brothers to see what we had done in 0:15:27.236 --> 0:15:30.476 the previous seven days with the film, and we'd show 0:15:30.556 --> 0:15:33.716 him a new scene or whatever, and he would he 0:15:33.836 --> 0:15:36.156 wasn't that interested in Jimmy's music. He was a Miles 0:15:36.276 --> 0:15:41.756 Davis guy. And he would then do his imitation of 0:15:42.556 --> 0:15:48.556 the judge, the prosecutor Angela Davis in the trial. And 0:15:48.596 --> 0:15:51.876 we spent the whole time just sitting there listening to 0:15:51.996 --> 0:15:54.996 him to tell us the inside story of the trial. 0:15:56.436 --> 0:16:00.756 And I went to Thanksgiving dinner at his house and 0:16:00.796 --> 0:16:05.796 sat next to Angela Davis, and you know, that was 0:16:05.836 --> 0:16:09.116 what was going on sort of the background, because because 0:16:09.276 --> 0:16:12.436 what happened was that when he got the job to 0:16:12.516 --> 0:16:16.116 represent the estate, he discovered there was all this footage 0:16:16.116 --> 0:16:20.036 that had never been seen. And Jefferies was now powerless 0:16:20.116 --> 0:16:26.356 because he'd represented Jimmy, who was deceased. Now was a 0:16:26.396 --> 0:16:29.836 family the heirs could appoint wherever they wanted, and they 0:16:29.836 --> 0:16:35.396 appointed Leo, and he came to see Mo because Jimmy 0:16:35.436 --> 0:16:38.316 was signed to Warner Prize at the time in America. 0:16:39.076 --> 0:16:41.276 And then Mo took and walked him across the street 0:16:41.356 --> 0:16:43.836 to see me and Ted Ashley, who was the head 0:16:43.836 --> 0:16:48.356 of the film company. And out of that meeting came 0:16:48.516 --> 0:16:52.516 the idea, well, at the first originally, just Joe, why 0:16:52.556 --> 0:16:56.676 don't you have a look at all this footage and 0:16:57.076 --> 0:16:58.676 see what you think of it and see if you 0:16:58.676 --> 0:16:59.756 think there's a film there? 0:17:00.756 --> 0:17:01.556 So he's asking you. 0:17:02.036 --> 0:17:03.836 Yeah, so he asked me. That was my job, you know, 0:17:03.916 --> 0:17:07.076 I was the liaison between the two sides of the street. 0:17:07.796 --> 0:17:11.036 And so I said, yeah, and we could film interviews 0:17:11.036 --> 0:17:12.716 with this and this and this, and we could put 0:17:12.716 --> 0:17:14.796 this together, and they okay, you do it. 0:17:14.876 --> 0:17:19.996 Joe. Did Moe have much of a relationship with Hendrix. 0:17:20.036 --> 0:17:21.916 I mean did I mean, I know they met backstage 0:17:21.916 --> 0:17:23.596 at Monterey I believe right when. 0:17:23.996 --> 0:17:27.876 Yeah, I don't think there was much Jimmy, you know, 0:17:28.276 --> 0:17:33.036 his relationship. I think Mike Jeffries worked very hard to 0:17:33.236 --> 0:17:37.556 keep Jimmy away from MO. You know, he wanted everything 0:17:37.596 --> 0:17:43.756 to go through him. And also initially the deal was 0:17:43.836 --> 0:17:49.316 through Track Records in England, and so it was like 0:17:49.436 --> 0:17:52.156 he signed to Track for the world and then Track 0:17:52.276 --> 0:17:55.676 licensed it to and then at a certain point they paid 0:17:55.676 --> 0:17:57.556 some money to get Track out of the middle. 0:17:58.036 --> 0:18:02.756 Yeah, and the roots of Rhythm remain is It's an 0:18:02.756 --> 0:18:07.876 astounding book. I have to imagine this idea came to 0:18:07.916 --> 0:18:09.996 you many decades ago. 0:18:11.676 --> 0:18:14.436 You know, I always liked to write. I mean I 0:18:14.996 --> 0:18:18.316 always wrote the press releases for Hannibal Records, and I 0:18:19.156 --> 0:18:23.676 wrote some articles, and then I started doing some book 0:18:23.756 --> 0:18:28.836 reviews in the early two thousands, and I just thought, yeah, 0:18:28.876 --> 0:18:34.116 I'll write a book. I started writing a biography, and 0:18:34.156 --> 0:18:37.276 I thought, you know, like when I was born and 0:18:37.996 --> 0:18:42.316 please stop. Oh no, no, that's not right. It can't 0:18:42.316 --> 0:18:44.876 be about me. It's got to be about the sixties. 0:18:45.996 --> 0:18:50.316 And so I wrote My Bicycles. You know, focused on 0:18:51.276 --> 0:18:54.556 this decade because I felt I had something to say 0:18:54.596 --> 0:18:57.036 about the decade. And you know, I've been around for 0:18:57.076 --> 0:19:00.596 a lot of important moments in the decade, and I 0:19:00.716 --> 0:19:03.716 enjoyed doing it a lot. And then, you know, I 0:19:03.756 --> 0:19:08.196 started going out and doing interviews and book readings and stuff, 0:19:08.196 --> 0:19:10.276 and people will come up to me and say, so, 0:19:11.316 --> 0:19:13.356 when are you going to do the book about the seventies, 0:19:13.996 --> 0:19:17.956 And I said, you must be joking. You know, the 0:19:17.996 --> 0:19:21.196 seventies was not fun for me. I didn't have a 0:19:21.236 --> 0:19:25.436 good seventies. I don't have anything interesting to say about it. 0:19:25.716 --> 0:19:29.916 But I liked riding my bicycles, and I liked I 0:19:30.036 --> 0:19:32.276 liked the fact that I was no longer was I 0:19:32.356 --> 0:19:35.876 looking after the career of musicians who rarely did what 0:19:35.956 --> 0:19:39.556 I wanted them to. But I was looking after somebody 0:19:39.596 --> 0:19:42.996 who did everything I wanted him to me, you know. 0:19:43.356 --> 0:19:45.916 And I thought, yeah, I'll write another book. That's what 0:19:45.956 --> 0:19:50.076 I'll do. I'll write another book. And very quickly it 0:19:50.116 --> 0:19:53.276 came to me what I would do. I guess there 0:19:53.276 --> 0:19:58.996 were a couple of kernels of ideas that had been 0:19:59.076 --> 0:20:03.076 festering in my brain a little bit, and I would say, 0:20:03.076 --> 0:20:06.876 there's three that really pushed me off the edge of 0:20:06.876 --> 0:20:10.316 that ski jump so that I had no choice but 0:20:10.396 --> 0:20:14.436 to keep going. One was what I put in the 0:20:14.556 --> 0:20:19.916 preface to the book, which is the realization of how 0:20:19.996 --> 0:20:27.596 different Cuban and American rhythmic sensibilities are and try to 0:20:27.636 --> 0:20:31.556 get to the bottom of that, because I knew enough 0:20:31.636 --> 0:20:33.836 to know that it had something to do with history 0:20:34.396 --> 0:20:37.996 and with slavery, but it was worth digging into. And 0:20:38.076 --> 0:20:41.876 I had also read Ned Sublett's book by that time, 0:20:42.316 --> 0:20:45.876 Cuba and Its Music, which is a great book, and 0:20:45.916 --> 0:20:50.996 it really kind of opened my eyes to the depth 0:20:51.156 --> 0:20:54.756 of what you could discover when you dug into a 0:20:54.836 --> 0:20:59.036 musical culture like Cuba. And then also at the time, 0:20:59.156 --> 0:21:03.516 I'm way back in the late eighties when Graceland was 0:21:03.556 --> 0:21:08.396 so popular, everybody thought there was a controversy about Paul Simon, 0:21:10.076 --> 0:21:13.436 you know, not respecting the boycott. And I know a 0:21:13.476 --> 0:21:15.796 lot about South Africa. I've been there a couple of times. 0:21:16.476 --> 0:21:18.316 I hadn't spent a lot of time there, but I'd 0:21:18.316 --> 0:21:21.716 worked with a lot of South African musicians. I produced 0:21:21.716 --> 0:21:25.196 to play a kind of anti apartape musical and so 0:21:25.276 --> 0:21:28.556 I knew a lot about South Africa. I read a 0:21:28.596 --> 0:21:32.516 lot about South Africa, and I knew that what people 0:21:32.636 --> 0:21:36.516 thought was the controversy wasn't really the controversy. And I 0:21:36.556 --> 0:21:41.876 saw all these Paul Simon fans buying Lady Smith Black 0:21:41.916 --> 0:21:46.436 Mambaza records and buying Machlatini and the Machatella Queens records, 0:21:47.636 --> 0:21:49.956 which was great. I mean, because it's great music, it's 0:21:49.956 --> 0:21:53.596 worth those records are very much worth buying. But everybody 0:21:53.636 --> 0:21:58.676 felt virtuous about buying them and that they were somehow 0:21:58.756 --> 0:22:04.596 supporting Mandela by buying them. And I knew that they 0:22:04.636 --> 0:22:07.756 were Zulus, and the Zulus were kind of the enemy 0:22:07.796 --> 0:22:13.396 of Mandela, that supporting Zulu culture was not the same 0:22:13.476 --> 0:22:16.196 as supporting the anc In fact, it was quite different 0:22:17.436 --> 0:22:22.276 and even opposed. And I thought, well, that's something that 0:22:22.316 --> 0:22:26.676 people don't know that I could tell them. And then 0:22:27.316 --> 0:22:31.756 I also thought about my time working in Bulgaria, and 0:22:33.076 --> 0:22:35.796 you know, I'd love those choir records, you know, the 0:22:35.836 --> 0:22:40.236 Mysterio a bulgar and the Kutev Ensemble. And I was 0:22:40.276 --> 0:22:45.596 always a bit head scratching, you know that those Bulgarian 0:22:45.876 --> 0:22:51.396 national ensembles were so great, and the rest of the 0:22:51.436 --> 0:22:55.876 Eastern European state ensembles were a kitsch and kind of 0:22:55.916 --> 0:23:01.756 weird and boring and you know, like acrobatic and what's 0:23:01.796 --> 0:23:05.396 that all about? And then I had I talked to 0:23:05.996 --> 0:23:09.676 Philip Kutev's daughter, who told me how much the Russians 0:23:09.796 --> 0:23:14.196 hated her father and why they hated him because of 0:23:14.476 --> 0:23:18.996 he used the authentic peasant voice in the choir and 0:23:19.076 --> 0:23:22.996 how Stalin was trying to get the you know, completely 0:23:23.036 --> 0:23:28.236 obliterate pleasant culture. And I thought, well, that's interesting too. 0:23:29.356 --> 0:23:34.396 So these three things, these three ideas, the Cuban rhythms, 0:23:35.036 --> 0:23:42.916 South African Zulu versus a NC, and Russians hating Bulgarian choirs. 0:23:43.716 --> 0:23:48.516 There's stories in here that I would have fun telling people. 0:23:49.436 --> 0:23:52.996 And I figured if these stories exist in Eastern Europe 0:23:53.036 --> 0:23:57.356 and Cuba and South Africa, they probably exist. And I 0:23:57.436 --> 0:24:01.156 knew enough about other cultures to know that there was 0:24:01.316 --> 0:24:05.716 probably some more fun stuff to dig up there. And 0:24:05.756 --> 0:24:08.796 so I just got started. And that took me seventeen years, 0:24:09.156 --> 0:24:10.556 and realize it's going to take that long. 0:24:11.916 --> 0:24:14.116 We'll be back with more from Joe Boyd. After the 0:24:14.156 --> 0:24:21.596 break in the history of the nineteenth and twentieth century 0:24:21.676 --> 0:24:24.756 kind of does seem to be region to region, this 0:24:24.876 --> 0:24:31.076 sort of repression and this sort of cultural movement bubbling 0:24:31.196 --> 0:24:37.916 up from people to to counter state repression with art, 0:24:38.516 --> 0:24:42.276 and your book really wonderfully tells that story. I wasn't 0:24:42.316 --> 0:24:44.636 expecting that to be narratively done so well in your book. 0:24:45.236 --> 0:24:48.916 But then there's also the way in which these cultures 0:24:48.916 --> 0:24:51.756 then shared. You know, all of the all of the 0:24:52.276 --> 0:24:56.996 music moved around the globe and then back again. And 0:24:57.076 --> 0:24:59.516 so music from Africa would go to the Caribbean and 0:24:59.516 --> 0:25:01.356 then back to Africa and then come to the States. 0:25:01.356 --> 0:25:05.836 And there's this cultural exchange happening amongst cultures and countries 0:25:05.876 --> 0:25:10.636 and various forms of music that we don't often think about. 0:25:12.356 --> 0:25:16.916 Yeah, everything, I mean the take one of the takeaways 0:25:17.196 --> 0:25:20.316 I hope people would get from the book is there 0:25:20.396 --> 0:25:23.316 is no pure culture. There is no pure musical culture. 0:25:23.396 --> 0:25:30.796 For sure, it's all mixed. It's all a blend. As 0:25:30.836 --> 0:25:36.076 you said, it bubbles up from underneath, and underneath in 0:25:36.116 --> 0:25:43.836 a way are two groups, Africans and Roma. I just 0:25:43.876 --> 0:25:47.796 sort of realized, and I've realized almost more after I 0:25:47.876 --> 0:25:51.196 finished the book and I've been touring and talking about 0:25:51.236 --> 0:25:54.116 it and doing Q and a's and things like that. 0:25:55.156 --> 0:25:57.956 One of the things I've realized is and I mentioned 0:25:58.036 --> 0:26:01.196 in the book, but maybe I might have if I 0:26:01.236 --> 0:26:03.156 went back and rewrote the book, I might make more 0:26:03.156 --> 0:26:06.716 of a theme of it is the fact that going 0:26:06.836 --> 0:26:09.956 way back, certainly to the beginning of that night eighteenth century, 0:26:11.436 --> 0:26:17.316 what defines modernity is how African it is or how 0:26:17.436 --> 0:26:23.356 Roma it is. You know, by the late nineteenth century, Cakewalk, 0:26:24.236 --> 0:26:30.276 the Grizzly Bear, you know, the Charleston all that became 0:26:31.516 --> 0:26:35.516 the dominant force of young for young people to dance to. 0:26:36.436 --> 0:26:40.036 And if you weren't dancing to that sort of rhythm, 0:26:40.716 --> 0:26:44.636 you were square. And if you go back a little 0:26:44.636 --> 0:26:48.356 further to Gerta and the Romantics, who was the big 0:26:48.476 --> 0:26:52.836 musical revolutionary list, you know, he was this matinee Idol 0:26:52.876 --> 0:26:57.476 who toured across Europe with fainting females, and he modeled 0:26:57.476 --> 0:27:00.476 his whole performance style on a roma musician that he 0:27:00.596 --> 0:27:03.476 saw that was famous in Hungary when he was a kid. 0:27:04.516 --> 0:27:08.596