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

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Speaker 1: Truly a treat to have my guest today, Bick Jones, producer, songwriter,

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Speaker 1: Mr Foreigner Mick So glad to have you. Hey, good

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Speaker 1: to be here, Bob. Okay, how did you end up

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Speaker 1: producing Van Halen? Did I do that? Yes? Okay, yeah,

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Speaker 1: unforgettable by the way, But really I believe it was

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Speaker 1: sort of put together by John Kalodner. Of course you've

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Speaker 1: been familiar with him, of course, of course, but Kladner

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Speaker 1: at the time was working a Geffen. Oh that Sammy

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Speaker 1: Hagar was with Jeff. Yeah, so I go a long

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Speaker 1: way back with Sammy to the days when he was

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Speaker 1: in a bank called Montrose of course, Ronnie Montrose. And

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Speaker 1: how did you know him then? Because I we toured

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Speaker 1: with him. I was in a band called Spooky Tooth

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Speaker 1: of course. Uh. And I came to the States basically

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Speaker 1: around seventy three, seventy four. I've been before, but to

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Speaker 1: to settle down here right way. And I remember on

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Speaker 1: the drive up to the studio he said, Mike, he said,

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Speaker 1: you and I have been through some pretty wild times,

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Speaker 1: you know, they said, but not like this. He said

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Speaker 1: to get ready, and that was his kind of warning

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Speaker 1: that I was about to enter into this different kind

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Speaker 1: of world. It was it as different as he built it. Um,

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Speaker 1: not really, but you know, I've had I've had quite

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Speaker 1: a lot of experience in the in studios, you know,

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Speaker 1: so I was kind of ready for anything. And it

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Speaker 1: was just I mean, they they had their their repertoire

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Speaker 1: down the songs really, so when you went in there,

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Speaker 1: they had all the songs. Um. Yeah, there were a

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Speaker 1: couple of a couple of like dream dreams, and I

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Speaker 1: worked very intensely with Sammy on that. Vocal performances are

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Speaker 1: my sort of specialty. I can get seemed to be

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Speaker 1: able to get the best out of people and okay,

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Speaker 1: a couple of things. So was it a clotner? Of

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Speaker 1: course Sammy was on Geffen, whose literal idea was to

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Speaker 1: get you involved. Um. Well, I think Sammy was something

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Speaker 1: to do with it. Um. I can't recall having an

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Speaker 1: explanation for it, but it was I think, Um, he

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Speaker 1: felt that I was a good choice as far as

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Speaker 1: you know, um, the vocal performances on the songs, and

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Speaker 1: he I believed in me, I guess as as Okay, well,

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Speaker 1: I guess Ted Templeman had done the David Lee Roth records.

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Speaker 1: This was the first record with Sammy Hagar, so it

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Speaker 1: was a whole new thing. So what was it like?

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Speaker 1: How much input did they let you have? Um? Pretty much,

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Speaker 1: I could say what I wanted. I wasn't restricted or

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Speaker 1: intimidated by anything. Um, it was for me. It was

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Speaker 1: branching out the first kind of major project I've done

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Speaker 1: outside of a foreigner, you know. And there was you know,

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Speaker 1: they had just gone through the departure of David Lee Roth,

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Speaker 1: so there was an air about it that said, we're

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Speaker 1: going to show him kind of thing, you know, and

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Speaker 1: and I picked up on that. Uh. And I've I've

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Speaker 1: met David before, you know, and always got on quite

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Speaker 1: well with him. But uh, Sammy had to fill We'll

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Speaker 1: not fill those shoes. But it had to be you know,

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Speaker 1: pretty rock into you know, to do that first album

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Speaker 1: with him, and I settled in pretty quickly. Again. Um,

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Speaker 1: there was an engineer, Don Landy, who had done most

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Speaker 1: of their hed, done all the engineering with Ted Templement

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Speaker 1: and so I was I realized what I a little

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Speaker 1: bit about what I was, what I was getting into,

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Speaker 1: you know, And there was a little animosity there because

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Speaker 1: they hadn't they were breaking away from Ted, and I

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Speaker 1: believe Don Landy was sort of assumed that he was

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Speaker 1: going to take over the mantel. So that was a

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Speaker 1: tricky little period. But ah, as the project went on,

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Speaker 1: I think we started to develop a respect for each

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Speaker 1: other and we ended up being the best of friends.

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Speaker 1: Wonderful engineer. I was so happy to work with him.

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Speaker 1: You know, he did some classic stuff and he knew

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Speaker 1: what he was doing, and you know, it was very

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Speaker 1: much an analog type album in the studio up at Eddie's,

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Speaker 1: and uh, it was it was I'd say, I heard

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Speaker 1: about their father. I don't want to go too much

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Speaker 1: into the family roots, and he came up to the

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Speaker 1: studio one day and the brothers were kind of fooling

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Speaker 1: around and it turned into a bit more than that,

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Speaker 1: and their father was kind of geeing them on to

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Speaker 1: kind of fetified with each other and kind of like

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Speaker 1: cheering them on and say get him and all that

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Speaker 1: kind of stuff. Really yeah, I mean he seemed to

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Speaker 1: be a perfectly nice guy, you know, I know he

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Speaker 1: was apparently a good musician too. You know, my favorite

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Speaker 1: song on that album and you may not have stories

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Speaker 1: about every song is best of both worlds with the dynamics.

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Speaker 1: Can he tell us anything about that? Um well? Actually,

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Speaker 1: one of my main thing areas I thought could be

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Speaker 1: improved upon was the drum sound, which I had to

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Speaker 1: be careful because I didn't want to change it right,

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Speaker 1: but I wanted to get a better sound that would

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Speaker 1: kind of a nucleus for the others to the playoff.

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Speaker 1: Slightly different approach, you know, I you know, not to

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Speaker 1: concentrate on the on the drums, but they are the

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Speaker 1: foundation of everything, and I felt that I could bring

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Speaker 1: something a little bit extra in that department. And but

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Speaker 1: working with Alex, it was it was an experience. You know,

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Speaker 1: he's a fun, crazy guy really, and I hear he's

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Speaker 1: doing well these days, you know. You know, I know Eddie,

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Speaker 1: I don't know Alex, but I know that Alex is

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Speaker 1: really more of the business guy. I hear he's doing

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Speaker 1: pretty well, but I I don't encounter him. Yeah, but

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Speaker 1: were you talking about making the drums differently or having

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Speaker 1: him played differently, No, not play differently, more more of

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Speaker 1: sound wise, you know, And was he amenable to that

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Speaker 1: or was he like, hey, don't mess with me. Um Well,

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Speaker 1: he didn't hear it, you know, completed until the album

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Speaker 1: was almost complete and the mixing was that was really

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Speaker 1: the moment of truth and he said what he said,

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Speaker 1: drum sounded great, man, Okay, thanks okay, And uh, what's

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Speaker 1: your favorite foreigner song? Mm hmm, Well it sounds corny,

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Speaker 1: but it feels like the first time was the one

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Speaker 1: that started it out. You know. It was the first

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Speaker 1: song I wrote for for for a band which I

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Speaker 1: didn't know anything about, and I when I kind of

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Speaker 1: put the band together, I still didn't know what we

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Speaker 1: were gonna do. Were we gonna do it as you

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Speaker 1: know where We're gonna form a band that was respectable

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Speaker 1: and good and could maybe sell a few, you know, records,

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Speaker 1: And so that was very uh that that I was

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Speaker 1: listening to an album that Lou had done with a

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Speaker 1: bank called Black Sheep back then, and I was listening

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Speaker 1: to the little demo I Don't Have feels like the

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Speaker 1: first time, and I suddenly heard the band. The instrumental

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Speaker 1: track was through you know, channeling him somehow, and I thought, well,

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Speaker 1: he might be the voice that I'm looking for. Okay,

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Speaker 1: so he wasn't in the band when you've written the song,

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Speaker 1: no well, all I remember is I remember hearing that

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Speaker 1: song on the red This is you know, people talk

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Speaker 1: about certain things, one about hearing a record in a radio,

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Speaker 1: record record in a record store and then buying I

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Speaker 1: had that happened once with Genesis, Wind and Wathering in

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Speaker 1: terms of hearing a song on the radio and literally

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Speaker 1: driving to the record store buying the album because I

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Speaker 1: had to hear it over the mead. It only happened

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Speaker 1: with me once, and it was feels like the first time,

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Speaker 1: the first one. I mean I remember where I bought it.

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Speaker 1: I'm music honesty and will sure, but it's now a uh,

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Speaker 1: you know, workout equipment store. But I literally was up

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Speaker 1: on the wall. I had to buy it. And at

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Speaker 1: that point the only people we knew were, you know,

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Speaker 1: the people who ended up not being in the band

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Speaker 1: after a period of time, so it was all new.

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Speaker 1: But the sound of that record, I had a good

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Speaker 1: stereo at that particular time, you could crank it up

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Speaker 1: on the j b LS. You know, I was just unbelievable.

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Speaker 1: I mean this type of did you know it would

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Speaker 1: explode like that? Well? I had an experience. Um I

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Speaker 1: was doing an interview with Scott Muni and um, he said,

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Speaker 1: I'm driving over the tribe of Bridge and I hear

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Speaker 1: this song a man, he said, that's music to roll

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Speaker 1: the window down and floor it. And and there was

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Speaker 1: a there's a big hit on the Tom Toms in

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Speaker 1: the beginning, and it takes the signal at a radio

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Speaker 1: station and it disappears for five seconds ten seconds. But

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Speaker 1: you know, it sounded good, sounded great, and just that

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Speaker 1: moment with Scott, you know, was like, wow, this must

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Speaker 1: have could this be something? You know? And up till

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Speaker 1: then I figured we try and put a band together

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Speaker 1: that wasn't comprised of of journeymen, you know. It was

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Speaker 1: three young Americans, pretty green, and then of course Ian

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Speaker 1: McDonald and Denniss Eliot who did have experience, you know,

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Speaker 1: and and then Lou and then we were off to

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Speaker 1: the races. Okay, let's go back to the beginning. You're

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Speaker 1: from where in the UK? I was born in the

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Speaker 1: West Country. Are you familiar with Let's put this way,

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Speaker 1: I'm familiar, probably a little bit more than most Americans,

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Speaker 1: but that is not much an Americans. We only focus

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Speaker 1: on America, so give us some reference points. It's in

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Speaker 1: the West Country, the kind of the toe down there

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Speaker 1: right underneath Wales. Yeah, so what what would what town

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Speaker 1: was this? Uh? Where I where I was born was Glastonbury,

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Speaker 1: Glastonbury where they at the festival. And then where were

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Speaker 1: you raised? I was raised in moved several times and

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Speaker 1: I was raised basically in South London sorry, which is

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Speaker 1: a a county kind of about ten miles from the

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Speaker 1: center of London. Um. I later found out that Eric

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Speaker 1: Clapton came from town five miles away from me, which

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Speaker 1: I didn't know about at the time. I had a band.

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Speaker 1: I had a little band. But what we did do

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Speaker 1: was open for the stones a few times. It was

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Speaker 1: a place called the Wooden Bridge. It was a pub,

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Speaker 1: I mean, but the stones before they were the Stones okay,

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Speaker 1: the wooden Bridge. And that was in Surrey. In Surry, Okay,

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Speaker 1: what was that? Did you say, oh, this biond has

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Speaker 1: got a future and to say, oh, they're never going

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Speaker 1: to make it. Well, the band that I had was

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Speaker 1: it was kind of a bluesy band with a bit

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Speaker 1: of R and B. It was called hog Snort Rupert.

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Speaker 1: I didn't come over that name, but good musicians and

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Speaker 1: you know, gradually started to feel that hopefully I wasn't

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Speaker 1: just going to do a regular job. You know, I

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Speaker 1: was how were the stones that night? Those two nights

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Speaker 1: they were They were sensational. Long John Bouldry was was

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Speaker 1: in the on the bill. Really, yeah, that's quite a bill. Okay.

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Speaker 1: So you grow up, let's you know. And how many

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Speaker 1: kids in the family? Now there are seven? Now the

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Speaker 1: kids in your family in English? Just my brother? Does

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Speaker 1: your brother older or younger? Younger? And where's he today?

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Speaker 1: He is in New York. He lives actually he lives

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Speaker 1: in Miami. Okay. And you became a musician. What did

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Speaker 1: he do? Um? He he was a great guitar player,

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Speaker 1: but I don't know what it was. I couldn't quite

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Speaker 1: get him out of his shell. He was. He loved music,

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Speaker 1: you know, he had a great taste in music. Used

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Speaker 1: to turn me onto things that I hadn't heard. And

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Speaker 1: very very cool guy working with me on the road

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Speaker 1: quite a lot. And so I up until the age

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Speaker 1: of eleven, I was an only child. Oh he's eleven

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Speaker 1: years younger. So what'd your father do for a living?

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Speaker 1: He was a what he'd call now a but not

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Speaker 1: public relations um. A guy that would interview people for

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Speaker 1: jobs HR, human relations, human resource and what did he

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Speaker 1: do that for what kind of company? The company that's

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Speaker 1: supplied England during the wars with food and beverage, anything

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Speaker 1: to do with that area. So it was renowned for

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Speaker 1: its tea. It was the worst teas worth tea in England.

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Speaker 1: What was the brand name, Oh gosh, back then it

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Speaker 1: may have been PG chips or something. It was home brewed,

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Speaker 1: I think really, and it was my you know, just undrinkable.

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Speaker 1: So you're we're sort of a middle class family, I

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Speaker 1: would say, sort of yeah, okay, and you grow up.

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Speaker 1: Parents have a lot of involvement in your life where

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Speaker 1: you're running around the streets doing whatever. Um. Yeah, to

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Speaker 1: a certain extent, Uh, I lived in this little hamlet,

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Speaker 1: you know, five miles from Glastonbury, so it was really

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Speaker 1: steeped in history where you know, I lived in a

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Speaker 1: little village that was you know, years old, and it

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Speaker 1: was it was pretty desolate. It was you know, on Sunday,

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Speaker 1: I was in the choir so we did that and

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Speaker 1: then um, the rest of the day. It's kind of

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Speaker 1: foggy for me what I used to do. But um,

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Speaker 1: there will be nobody in the streets and I'd be

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Speaker 1: walking around and saying when am I going to get

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Speaker 1: out of here? And I used to go and see

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Speaker 1: my more of you know, my family. They lived in Hampshire,

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Speaker 1: which is down south too, and we used to have

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Speaker 1: all our celebrations Christmas and everything down there with the

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Speaker 1: big family. And I used to I used to get

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Speaker 1: so down and we had to get in that car

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Speaker 1: and drive back to you know, this little place in

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Speaker 1: the middle of nowhere. And did your parents play music

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Speaker 1: in the home. My father was a pianist and he

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Speaker 1: he loved he loved jazz, right. He was a huge

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Speaker 1: Errol Garner fan, so he used to hear a lot

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Speaker 1: of that in the in the house. Um. Otherwise, Um,

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Speaker 1: they were, they were very musical. They were music fans.

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Speaker 1: But Dad had a secret inkling that he wanted to

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Speaker 1: sort of try, and he had a friend who was

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Speaker 1: a professional musician. Um, and I think he he would

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Speaker 1: have taken that shot, you know, if it was just him.

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Speaker 1: But he'd just come back from the war and there

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Speaker 1: was a lot to do to get a life back

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Speaker 1: together at that point. What did he do during the war,

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Speaker 1: same thing, but he was then he joined the Marines,

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Speaker 1: which is kind of like the American Marines a bit

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Speaker 1: tough guys. Yeah, usually they're out there getting killed easily frontline.

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Speaker 1: Did he see action? Yeah. Do you think that affected

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Speaker 1: his life thereafter PTSD that kind of stuff, Yeah, I

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Speaker 1: think so, I think. Um. I mean he was well

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Speaker 1: respected within our family. He was the best educated. Um.

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Speaker 1: He wanted them to give us a life that was

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Speaker 1: comfortable and wanted me to have, you know, a a

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Speaker 1: good education. So he was he was a wise man,

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Speaker 1: you know. So he said he was educated. He went

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Speaker 1: to what you would call university. Um. Yeah, he he

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Speaker 1: went to university and in a city called Portsmouth. And

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Speaker 1: how about yourself? No, I skipped that. So what did

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Speaker 1: he say, the wise man who wanted to provide a

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Speaker 1: better life for his family. Well, he and my mother

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Speaker 1: sat me down one night. They'd seen a couple of

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Speaker 1: gigs I've done with this band. They said, Michael, we

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Speaker 1: have to Michael. They called, uh, we have to have

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Speaker 1: a little chat. You know. We know you love this

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Speaker 1: music and the rock was just coming in, you know

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Speaker 1: and everything, but we don't feel it's a career that

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Speaker 1: has very much lifespan to it. And I thought, oh god, no,

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Speaker 1: they don't believe that I can do it. And I

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Speaker 1: started to believe. I don't know what, but it I

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Speaker 1: took a serious hit too, you know, feeling that they

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Speaker 1: didn't believe in me. But that all changed later. Okay,

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Speaker 1: So when did you start playing a musical instrument when

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Speaker 1: I was the first time was probably when I was

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Speaker 1: about six or seven. My grandparents had a piano um

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Speaker 1: which I used to play every time I went to

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Speaker 1: see them, and I just learned what I My father

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Speaker 1: started me off on anchors away that military background and

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Speaker 1: the holes of Montezuma right right, because you know I

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Speaker 1: had I had an EP that was in second grade

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Speaker 1: that had all four of the military anthem so I

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Speaker 1: know those pretty well. Yeah, that's funny, um. And I

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Speaker 1: just you know, I found my way around the piano

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Speaker 1: a bit, all on the black keys, and that made

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Speaker 1: that made it easier for me. But I remember, and

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Speaker 1: I carried on on those black keys all the way

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Speaker 1: through my my piano career. And I remember when I

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Speaker 1: was working with Billy Billy Joel, he said, how the

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Speaker 1: hell do you play cold as ice in those positions

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Speaker 1: on the black keys? I said, I don't know. That's

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Speaker 1: just the way I started started, and it stuck, you know,

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Speaker 1: what was it like working with Billy Um great. I mean,

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Speaker 1: have a tremendous respect for him. He's consummate musician. He's

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Speaker 1: um very creative. You know, we got on very I

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Speaker 1: had a few little confrontrations with him. From were the

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Speaker 1: confrontations about um, just a couple of songs um what

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Speaker 1: became aim We Didn't Start the Fire started out as

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Speaker 1: a song called Joe Lene, and I thought, just a minute,

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Speaker 1: I know that song and it was a similar kind

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Speaker 1: of feel on it, and I felt it. I had

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Speaker 1: to tell Billy, you know, said I'm scared that this

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Speaker 1: is going to be controversial and you know, plagiaristic. And

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Speaker 1: he looked at me and walked out of the room.

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Speaker 1: And the next thing I know, he's ordered that all

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Speaker 1: the time Life magazine is from nineteen when he was born,

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Speaker 1: which was must have been He's a few years younger

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Speaker 1: than me, I think. And he sat down, set himself

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Speaker 1: in a room, and came out basically three days later

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Speaker 1: with all the lyrics too. We Didn't Start the Fire,

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Speaker 1: which is a chronological order, in chronological order of you know,

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Speaker 1: the events, major events that happened in the world, And

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Speaker 1: did you think that was going to be a monster hit?

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Speaker 1: I knew it was going to be different. He wanted

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Speaker 1: to rock rock up a bit, you know, he wanted

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Speaker 1: to let loose a bit, and that was one of

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Speaker 1: the reasons I think he wanted to work with me,

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Speaker 1: and also the fact that I was a songwriter too.

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Speaker 1: He respected what I had done, and again I had

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Speaker 1: to go into a situation where Phil Ramon had done

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Speaker 1: all his You know, I knew Phil, So how did

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Speaker 1: what was Billy's decision not to use Phil? Um It

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Speaker 1: wasn't really anything to do with me. It was just

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Speaker 1: a choice. We we met up in a Itsunian restaurant,

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Speaker 1: just like the song, and we hit it off of me.

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Speaker 1: We'd we'd seen each other around. You know, I kind

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Speaker 1: of knew him a little bit, but um, yeah, I

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Speaker 1: I I got a few um outside musicians to come in.

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Speaker 1: I think he wanted to break the it's not formula

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Speaker 1: but the style, just as I said to, you know,

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Speaker 1: to make it a bit rock rockier. Okay, let's go

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Speaker 1: back to growing up. So you play on the black keys,

341
00:25:42,840 --> 00:25:44,959
Speaker 1: and when do you you ever have any piano lessons?

342
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Speaker 1: And when do you pick up the guitar or is

343
00:25:47,840 --> 00:25:52,400
Speaker 1: there another instrument in between? Uku lele Uku Lately now

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00:25:52,640 --> 00:25:57,600
Speaker 1: ukul lately, Okay, we're I realized radio was different then

345
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Speaker 1: because you have the BBC and there was a limited

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Speaker 1: amount of stuff, But it wasn't you know skiffle was

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Speaker 1: big then, was it? Were you always into the popular music? Yeah,

348
00:26:09,240 --> 00:26:14,600
Speaker 1: I am. I played a little skiffle band for a while.

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Speaker 1: Lonnie Donegan songs it was it was actually they were

350
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Speaker 1: big here too, Does your chewing gum lose its flavor?

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Speaker 1: And wonderful hits they had. So how did you learn

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00:26:30,040 --> 00:26:34,520
Speaker 1: how to play the ukulele? My dad taught me. Taught

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Speaker 1: me three chords and that was it. Immediately he taught

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Speaker 1: me to play. I remember one of them was Anti sweet,

355
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Speaker 1: just walking down the street and it got me and

356
00:26:54,560 --> 00:26:56,639
Speaker 1: I learned those chords and I played them over and

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Speaker 1: over again. I discovered about how the instrument worked, you know,

358
00:27:04,160 --> 00:27:09,280
Speaker 1: and that was actually a very important move he made

359
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Speaker 1: to give me that and to give me a couple

360
00:27:11,640 --> 00:27:17,439
Speaker 1: of lessons, and that was the first time I felt

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Speaker 1: music really, especially like Buddy Holly Ah, who was my idol.

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Speaker 1: Completely like a lot of English guitar players. I'm sure

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00:27:32,320 --> 00:27:41,600
Speaker 1: you've interviewed, he was, you know, it was it was

364
00:27:41,760 --> 00:27:45,879
Speaker 1: like I'd seen a light, you know, there the awakening

365
00:27:45,920 --> 00:27:53,119
Speaker 1: of it. And I went from there to to playing

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Speaker 1: in a couple of local bands. As I said, you

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Speaker 1: play the ukulele. You were playing ukulele in those people.

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00:27:59,000 --> 00:28:02,680
Speaker 1: Oh no, No, like a Spanish guitar. Okay. So you

369
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Speaker 1: have the ukulele. What's the next guitar you get? It

370
00:28:06,600 --> 00:28:16,560
Speaker 1: was a believe it's called a Hofner Senator. Okay. And

371
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Speaker 1: you know, I had had a a friend at school

372
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Speaker 1: who was a great guitar player. He played with Georgie Fame,

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Speaker 1: and he kind of took me under his wing a

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Speaker 1: bit and gave me a few pointers and lessons and stuff.

375
00:28:36,920 --> 00:28:42,080
Speaker 1: And he played with Buddy not with Buddy Holly, well

376
00:28:42,160 --> 00:28:48,960
Speaker 1: he did, actually, but he played with Jerry Lewis, h

377
00:28:49,360 --> 00:28:54,920
Speaker 1: Eddie Cochrane legends. And he used to take me up

378
00:28:54,960 --> 00:28:58,400
Speaker 1: to London when a tour was starting so I could

379
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Speaker 1: hang out by the bus and see all my idols

380
00:29:01,800 --> 00:29:04,320
Speaker 1: getting on the bus. Hey, listen, that's a thrill when

381
00:29:04,360 --> 00:29:07,960
Speaker 1: you're that age. Oh man, it's a killer. Okay. So

382
00:29:08,400 --> 00:29:11,360
Speaker 1: you had you had the Hofner and then you say

383
00:29:11,400 --> 00:29:16,080
Speaker 1: you're playing Spanish guitar in bands? You know, acoustic guitar. Yeah,

384
00:29:16,200 --> 00:29:18,880
Speaker 1: at that point it was more rhythm stuff, you know,

385
00:29:19,960 --> 00:29:25,160
Speaker 1: because you can't really I you can't really play for

386
00:29:25,280 --> 00:29:31,960
Speaker 1: me right on an acoustic It's difficult. But um, so

387
00:29:34,280 --> 00:29:38,480
Speaker 1: where were we? Okay, so you're playing in uh, you're

388
00:29:38,520 --> 00:29:40,760
Speaker 1: playing you're in high school or whatever the equivalent what

389
00:29:40,760 --> 00:29:42,640
Speaker 1: they're calling that in England. You start in the bands

390
00:29:42,680 --> 00:29:54,080
Speaker 1: with Spanish guitar. When did you get an electrical um?

391
00:29:54,280 --> 00:29:58,280
Speaker 1: Once I had formed a little nucleus of a band,

392
00:29:59,720 --> 00:30:03,520
Speaker 1: which was pretty pretty cool little band actually, and I

393
00:30:03,600 --> 00:30:10,280
Speaker 1: got a burns which looked a little bit like a

394
00:30:10,360 --> 00:30:15,120
Speaker 1: les Paul. Wasn't anywhere near right as good as a spoil,

395
00:30:15,880 --> 00:30:20,800
Speaker 1: but it looked good and it was cut away, and

396
00:30:20,880 --> 00:30:26,280
Speaker 1: so I the first few months I I I played

397
00:30:26,320 --> 00:30:34,880
Speaker 1: with that, and eventually my father bought me a s

398
00:30:34,960 --> 00:30:39,840
Speaker 1: G les Paul s G and that was the beginning

399
00:30:40,720 --> 00:30:43,880
Speaker 1: of hey, this is this is a ship. You know,

400
00:30:45,680 --> 00:30:49,720
Speaker 1: I had the treasure it. My father was playing credit

401
00:30:49,800 --> 00:30:56,160
Speaker 1: for it, you know, on credit um. And then with

402
00:30:56,280 --> 00:31:02,720
Speaker 1: that guitar another year it started off for me and

403
00:31:03,240 --> 00:31:08,800
Speaker 1: I joined a band, a professional band whose name was

404
00:31:09,200 --> 00:31:13,440
Speaker 1: Nero and the Gladiators. I don't know whether you're any

405
00:31:13,480 --> 00:31:16,880
Speaker 1: I don't think I can remember that one. They made

406
00:31:16,920 --> 00:31:22,280
Speaker 1: a name. They were like, um, they made a name

407
00:31:22,320 --> 00:31:27,320
Speaker 1: by taking classical pieces like in the Whole of the

408
00:31:27,400 --> 00:31:32,760
Speaker 1: Mountain King and playing them instrumentally, and they had like

409
00:31:32,880 --> 00:31:37,360
Speaker 1: two number top five hits. Really what year was that?

410
00:31:37,840 --> 00:31:45,960
Speaker 1: Oh gosh, it's got to be sixty, probably even earlier.

411
00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:50,640
Speaker 1: They had already been a band for a while, so

412
00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:57,200
Speaker 1: early sixties. And what did you have for an amplifier? UM?

413
00:31:57,240 --> 00:32:03,200
Speaker 1: I I was advised and I met a guy called

414
00:32:03,240 --> 00:32:10,040
Speaker 1: Peppe in London who used to convert amps and customize them,

415
00:32:10,160 --> 00:32:17,280
Speaker 1: and I got I got one of those. Uh somehow

416
00:32:17,280 --> 00:32:20,560
Speaker 1: it did a deal and I ended up with that.

417
00:32:22,080 --> 00:32:29,920
Speaker 1: Later in my career, I I ended up blending Steve

418
00:32:30,000 --> 00:32:34,600
Speaker 1: Cropper that amp when they were doing the Stacks Motown

419
00:32:34,680 --> 00:32:39,760
Speaker 1: Review and Paris, and I was like, wow, Steve Coffee

420
00:32:40,800 --> 00:32:45,680
Speaker 1: right exactly. He was one of my early idols too.

421
00:32:47,120 --> 00:32:55,160
Speaker 1: And but yeah, and then I bought UM. I've moved

422
00:32:55,200 --> 00:33:00,160
Speaker 1: on from that guitar and eventually bought There was a

423
00:33:00,960 --> 00:33:04,560
Speaker 1: quite a well known session guitar player in England called

424
00:33:04,600 --> 00:33:07,600
Speaker 1: Big Big Jim Sullivan. He used to play on a

425
00:33:07,640 --> 00:33:13,080
Speaker 1: lot of BOT records, and and that was his guitar.

426
00:33:14,080 --> 00:33:17,840
Speaker 1: Later I got it stolen, but so it was literally

427
00:33:17,880 --> 00:33:20,680
Speaker 1: his guitar, the same style. Oh really, what kind of

428
00:33:20,680 --> 00:33:24,479
Speaker 1: guitar was it? It was a Gibson Stereo. And how

429
00:33:24,520 --> 00:33:28,720
Speaker 1: did you get it? Um? I bought it in a

430
00:33:28,800 --> 00:33:34,440
Speaker 1: store in London. Okay, let's go back to school. Are

431
00:33:34,480 --> 00:33:37,280
Speaker 1: you a popular guy or you're the loner? What kind

432
00:33:37,280 --> 00:33:41,520
Speaker 1: of person were you growing up? I think, well, I

433
00:33:41,560 --> 00:33:47,800
Speaker 1: have to say I was pretty popular guy. I got

434
00:33:47,880 --> 00:33:52,920
Speaker 1: chosen kind of to represent them, the weaker, you know,

435
00:33:53,320 --> 00:33:57,800
Speaker 1: side of my class my year when it came to

436
00:33:57,920 --> 00:34:02,240
Speaker 1: fights or put acting them and stuff like that. So

437
00:34:02,320 --> 00:34:05,760
Speaker 1: I took a few hits on that that I wasn't well.

438
00:34:05,800 --> 00:34:12,600
Speaker 1: My grandfather was a boxer, but um yeah, I was

439
00:34:13,960 --> 00:34:18,560
Speaker 1: called upon from time to time just to warm people

440
00:34:18,600 --> 00:34:21,759
Speaker 1: to stay away. Okay, so you play with Nero and

441
00:34:21,800 --> 00:34:27,480
Speaker 1: the glady Eaters and what's the step after that? Um?

442
00:34:27,520 --> 00:34:30,359
Speaker 1: I was with the band for about three months and

443
00:34:32,040 --> 00:34:39,439
Speaker 1: gigging with them, wearing Roman right, No, Nero bore the toga? Oh?

444
00:34:39,600 --> 00:34:41,120
Speaker 1: Is that what it was? What are the gladi Eaters

445
00:34:41,120 --> 00:34:47,279
Speaker 1: were centurion skirts. We had chicks coming up to the

446
00:34:47,320 --> 00:34:50,600
Speaker 1: front of the stage. I remember, you know, all looked

447
00:34:50,800 --> 00:34:58,600
Speaker 1: trying to look under our skirts, and I kind of

448
00:34:58,640 --> 00:35:03,000
Speaker 1: felt kind of weird when I got myself into here.

449
00:35:03,320 --> 00:35:15,640
Speaker 1: And but we we were approached to play about a

450
00:35:15,680 --> 00:35:23,040
Speaker 1: month tour in France and backing a a very well

451
00:35:23,120 --> 00:35:27,040
Speaker 1: known rock singer who we went by the name of

452
00:35:27,120 --> 00:35:32,399
Speaker 1: Dick Rivers from one of the Elvis movies. I think

453
00:35:33,360 --> 00:35:37,840
Speaker 1: a lot of French artists chose American names. You know,

454
00:35:37,880 --> 00:35:47,000
Speaker 1: it's weird. And we set off for France, and before

455
00:35:47,040 --> 00:35:50,120
Speaker 1: I knew it, we were touring around France. I loved

456
00:35:50,160 --> 00:35:53,760
Speaker 1: it because I that front French was my best subject

457
00:35:53,800 --> 00:36:05,360
Speaker 1: at school, and my French teacher would reward his pupils

458
00:36:05,440 --> 00:36:10,000
Speaker 1: by merit if they if they had done well in

459
00:36:10,080 --> 00:36:14,759
Speaker 1: the class, he would give them copies of a magazine

460
00:36:14,800 --> 00:36:23,239
Speaker 1: called Perry Match, probably familiar. And so you're in France

461
00:36:23,680 --> 00:36:28,600
Speaker 1: backing up these people with Deary and the Gladiators. Yeah, okay,

462
00:36:28,640 --> 00:36:30,279
Speaker 1: but then you end up being in France for a

463
00:36:30,320 --> 00:36:34,880
Speaker 1: long time. How does that it come to be? I

464
00:36:34,960 --> 00:36:39,160
Speaker 1: was in France for a long time. I was in

465
00:36:39,160 --> 00:36:44,000
Speaker 1: France for about seven years. Okay. So meanwhile, you know,

466
00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:49,000
Speaker 1: across the channel rock music is going insane. How do

467
00:36:49,000 --> 00:36:55,440
Speaker 1: you feel about being in France? Um, it was a

468
00:36:55,560 --> 00:37:00,960
Speaker 1: chance ready to kind of grow up, cut my teeth,

469
00:37:01,160 --> 00:37:05,719
Speaker 1: you know, kind of thing. Playing in the band wasn't bad.

470
00:37:05,840 --> 00:37:08,879
Speaker 1: That was supporting her. We had a few of her

471
00:37:09,600 --> 00:37:17,120
Speaker 1: musicians in the band. Um, and that's where I started

472
00:37:17,160 --> 00:37:25,880
Speaker 1: to get to experience in the studio. Um. I h

473
00:37:26,960 --> 00:37:30,680
Speaker 1: but I'm just trying to recall. It's a long time ago, Bob. Yeah, right,

474
00:37:30,680 --> 00:37:34,480
Speaker 1: But you ended up working with Johnny Holliday and writing songs.

475
00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:38,600
Speaker 1: How did that all come to be? Um? I had

476
00:37:39,520 --> 00:37:42,000
Speaker 1: a partner, his name was Tommy Brown, who had been

477
00:37:42,040 --> 00:37:46,239
Speaker 1: the drummer with the Dick Rivers part of it, and

478
00:37:48,480 --> 00:37:54,240
Speaker 1: we just somehow started writing together and in French. In French,

479
00:37:54,680 --> 00:37:58,279
Speaker 1: well not in French, there was always a translator, yeah,

480
00:37:59,640 --> 00:38:04,360
Speaker 1: which was very weird too. Every every hit in America

481
00:38:04,640 --> 00:38:11,480
Speaker 1: or England got covered lyrically, and you know, the French

482
00:38:11,960 --> 00:38:18,560
Speaker 1: translator would make like more money than the original writers

483
00:38:18,600 --> 00:38:21,239
Speaker 1: and the song although he had nothing to do with

484
00:38:21,280 --> 00:38:30,239
Speaker 1: it except right the French rics. But yeah, I with

485
00:38:30,320 --> 00:38:35,600
Speaker 1: Johnny we started to he kind of I had been

486
00:38:35,680 --> 00:38:39,680
Speaker 1: with playing with his wife. What was the wife's name,

487
00:38:40,560 --> 00:38:48,040
Speaker 1: Sylvie Batan, and she was the star over there of

488
00:38:48,160 --> 00:38:51,200
Speaker 1: the yea Yea. They called it the yea Yea period.

489
00:38:52,760 --> 00:38:59,319
Speaker 1: It was time of there were riots in France and

490
00:38:59,360 --> 00:39:10,000
Speaker 1: stuff like yuh. And that was that was the introduction

491
00:39:10,040 --> 00:39:14,319
Speaker 1: to his wife, who saw me playing a part in

492
00:39:14,360 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 1: a movie that she was in. She was singing songs

493
00:39:18,680 --> 00:39:22,799
Speaker 1: in it and I was playing and her brother, who

494
00:39:22,840 --> 00:39:25,720
Speaker 1: was the bandleader, came over to me and said, would

495
00:39:25,719 --> 00:39:29,960
Speaker 1: you like to come down and work out with Sylvie

496
00:39:30,400 --> 00:39:36,680
Speaker 1: and some songs? And of course I accepted it. It

497
00:39:36,760 --> 00:39:40,400
Speaker 1: was because I was like broke, I didn't have anything

498
00:39:40,480 --> 00:39:43,520
Speaker 1: I was. I used to spend my afternoons at pinball

499
00:39:44,160 --> 00:39:47,760
Speaker 1: in the cafe, you know, and make a Coca cola

500
00:39:47,880 --> 00:39:52,920
Speaker 1: last for a couple of hours. And so I jumped

501
00:39:52,920 --> 00:39:59,319
Speaker 1: at the opportunity and cut a long story short. I

502
00:39:59,400 --> 00:40:05,000
Speaker 1: started to work with Johnny and he also was part

503
00:40:05,040 --> 00:40:16,000
Speaker 1: of that group that would sing American rock songs in French. Um.

504
00:40:16,160 --> 00:40:19,160
Speaker 1: He was a really exciting front, you know, lead singer.

505
00:40:19,480 --> 00:40:22,319
Speaker 1: Was he already Johnny Holiday sort of speak at that point. Yeah,

506
00:40:24,080 --> 00:40:28,400
Speaker 1: it was kind of like joining Presley for for France

507
00:40:29,400 --> 00:40:32,160
Speaker 1: used to blow me away, you know. His his stage

508
00:40:32,160 --> 00:40:36,280
Speaker 1: act was sensational, you know, he was a real rocker

509
00:40:36,360 --> 00:40:40,400
Speaker 1: at heart. He swear black, leather and and and a

510
00:40:40,560 --> 00:40:46,000
Speaker 1: very powerful voice, not not what we would call a

511
00:40:46,120 --> 00:40:51,080
Speaker 1: voice that would appeal so much in America. Why well,

512
00:40:51,200 --> 00:40:59,000
Speaker 1: he had a um, a little deformation in what do

513
00:40:59,080 --> 00:41:03,680
Speaker 1: they call it in his mouth the palette, I don't know, Yeah,

514
00:41:03,920 --> 00:41:09,120
Speaker 1: something to do with the palette. And unfortunately it was

515
00:41:09,239 --> 00:41:14,359
Speaker 1: the rs that were difficult for him to pronounce. He'd

516
00:41:14,400 --> 00:41:20,879
Speaker 1: seeing it, you know, we were and of course walk

517
00:41:20,920 --> 00:41:26,279
Speaker 1: and wall it was a very important term. So he

518
00:41:26,320 --> 00:41:30,239
Speaker 1: had trouble with that um. But he he worked very

519
00:41:30,239 --> 00:41:34,040
Speaker 1: hard at it, and we started to write Tommy and

520
00:41:34,080 --> 00:41:37,960
Speaker 1: I started to write for him. Decided to then that

521
00:41:38,000 --> 00:41:45,400
Speaker 1: went into producing his his albums, and before I knew it,

522
00:41:45,520 --> 00:41:52,120
Speaker 1: we'd we'd had about five or six top ten records.

523
00:41:52,360 --> 00:41:56,960
Speaker 1: And you know, that was like the first time I

524
00:41:57,000 --> 00:42:04,520
Speaker 1: had seen money, That's the obvious question. And he kind

525
00:42:04,560 --> 00:42:07,720
Speaker 1: of took me under his wing as like a younger brother.

526
00:42:09,040 --> 00:42:13,439
Speaker 1: It was, yeah, it was you know, you could could

527
00:42:13,480 --> 00:42:19,560
Speaker 1: say his lifestyle was James Dean and and Presley, you know,

528
00:42:20,440 --> 00:42:24,600
Speaker 1: so it was kind of like living that little subworld

529
00:42:25,200 --> 00:42:28,319
Speaker 1: under that. And how did you come back to the UK? Well,

530
00:42:28,360 --> 00:42:33,360
Speaker 1: I figured um. I was doing quite well, and I

531
00:42:33,400 --> 00:42:38,560
Speaker 1: remember I was playing golf in a country house in

532
00:42:38,680 --> 00:42:44,239
Speaker 1: Normandy where I had ended up renting a house, which

533
00:42:44,320 --> 00:42:49,440
Speaker 1: was like unbelievable, and I was starting to get come

534
00:42:49,520 --> 00:42:58,520
Speaker 1: a little comfortable financially, and suddenly I felt came over

535
00:42:58,600 --> 00:43:02,560
Speaker 1: and sort of felt weird it. What am I doing?

536
00:43:02,800 --> 00:43:06,920
Speaker 1: You know, one of my I'm here and I'm getting

537
00:43:07,000 --> 00:43:11,560
Speaker 1: quite successful, but I'm not really I'm going to go

538
00:43:11,800 --> 00:43:15,640
Speaker 1: very far off, you know, with this, and I want

539
00:43:15,640 --> 00:43:19,759
Speaker 1: to you know, really get into a band and and

540
00:43:20,080 --> 00:43:25,960
Speaker 1: pursue you know, music that I wanted to do, and

541
00:43:26,440 --> 00:43:28,360
Speaker 1: so I you know that part of that was the

542
00:43:28,400 --> 00:43:34,880
Speaker 1: writing and everything, and I thought, I can't do this anymore,

543
00:43:34,920 --> 00:43:37,640
Speaker 1: you know, I've got to make my way back to

544
00:43:37,760 --> 00:43:42,799
Speaker 1: England and start over. And basically that's what I did.

545
00:43:42,880 --> 00:43:54,080
Speaker 1: I I was playing in Paris and that night it

546
00:43:54,200 --> 00:43:56,719
Speaker 1: was a kind of a bar where musicians used to go,

547
00:43:57,600 --> 00:44:05,040
Speaker 1: called the Rock and Roll Circus, and I was introduced

548
00:44:05,120 --> 00:44:11,880
Speaker 1: to Gary Wright and to Jimmy Miller, who was a

549
00:44:12,000 --> 00:44:16,719
Speaker 1: producer at the time. Did the Stones, did Traffic legendary guy,

550
00:44:17,920 --> 00:44:22,000
Speaker 1: But he did the Stones, He did Traffic jen legendary guy.

551
00:44:22,160 --> 00:44:27,200
Speaker 1: Oh he He was like kind of sort of an

552
00:44:27,239 --> 00:44:34,760
Speaker 1: idol for me. UM and he had worked closely with Gary.

553
00:44:34,920 --> 00:44:43,080
Speaker 1: They were actually school friends, and somehow through that introduction

554
00:44:43,120 --> 00:44:47,080
Speaker 1: we all got on really well, and Gary asked me

555
00:44:47,160 --> 00:44:52,640
Speaker 1: to get in touch with him, and before I knew it,

556
00:44:52,719 --> 00:44:55,480
Speaker 1: I was playing with Gary Wright in a band at

557
00:44:55,840 --> 00:44:59,840
Speaker 1: that time called Wonder Wheel, which was sort of gary

558
00:45:00,719 --> 00:45:09,919
Speaker 1: solo project. Um the and then I joined Spooky Tooth

559
00:45:11,200 --> 00:45:15,759
Speaker 1: and that was that became quite an important part of

560
00:45:15,800 --> 00:45:21,319
Speaker 1: my They were a pretty soulful band. They were progressive,

561
00:45:21,440 --> 00:45:26,279
Speaker 1: but soulful, and they had a groove, you know, they had.

562
00:45:27,760 --> 00:45:32,960
Speaker 1: It was a pretty big prestigious move to be chosen

563
00:45:33,000 --> 00:45:42,239
Speaker 1: to be in that band, and so it was. It

564
00:45:42,320 --> 00:45:45,880
Speaker 1: was a good experience for a couple of years. And

565
00:45:45,920 --> 00:45:51,160
Speaker 1: then UM some relationships within the band had not been

566
00:45:51,239 --> 00:45:56,000
Speaker 1: healed from when they broke up the first time, and

567
00:45:56,640 --> 00:46:01,040
Speaker 1: gradually it's sort of disintegrated and I was left high

568
00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:06,880
Speaker 1: and dry in New York, Um basically relying on money

569
00:46:06,920 --> 00:46:11,080
Speaker 1: that I was getting still from France. What did everybody

570
00:46:11,080 --> 00:46:16,040
Speaker 1: see in France? Like Johnny Holiday when you left? Um,

571
00:46:16,080 --> 00:46:20,600
Speaker 1: he was pretty upset. In fact, a few months ago,

572
00:46:20,719 --> 00:46:27,239
Speaker 1: I before he passed. Yeah, I had dinner with him

573
00:46:27,520 --> 00:46:32,759
Speaker 1: and I kind of asked him. I said, do you

574
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:38,400
Speaker 1: forgive me? And he said, well, I said I didn't

575
00:46:38,440 --> 00:46:41,840
Speaker 1: at the time, but I feel like that. I was

576
00:46:41,880 --> 00:46:47,680
Speaker 1: pretty upset, but I believe you made the right move. Okay,

577
00:46:48,080 --> 00:46:50,319
Speaker 1: there's so many great guitars come out of the UK.

578
00:46:50,760 --> 00:46:57,640
Speaker 1: How good guitars were you in that era? Um? I

579
00:46:57,800 --> 00:47:02,680
Speaker 1: was a little different, you know. I I had developed

580
00:47:02,719 --> 00:47:08,040
Speaker 1: a little bit of a style. UM. I wouldn't rate myself,

581
00:47:08,080 --> 00:47:17,440
Speaker 1: as you know, any kind of particularly gifted guitar player.

582
00:47:18,200 --> 00:47:24,600
Speaker 1: I played like a combination of rhythm and read. That

583
00:47:24,760 --> 00:47:28,680
Speaker 1: was good. I had a good rhythm, but as far

584
00:47:28,760 --> 00:47:33,600
Speaker 1: as um you know, being a prodigy or anything like that,

585
00:47:34,840 --> 00:47:38,799
Speaker 1: had to leave that to Eddie. Tried to teach me

586
00:47:38,840 --> 00:47:42,719
Speaker 1: how to tap? Will you ever get it? Kind of

587
00:47:43,080 --> 00:47:48,520
Speaker 1: we ended up like just you know, laughing and fooling around.

588
00:47:48,560 --> 00:47:52,040
Speaker 1: It was funny. Okay, so you're high, the beat, spooky

589
00:47:52,080 --> 00:47:54,359
Speaker 1: tooth breaks up, You're high and dry. In New York

590
00:47:57,800 --> 00:48:06,680
Speaker 1: that was and then um I can't remember how it started,

591
00:48:06,719 --> 00:48:10,960
Speaker 1: but I was being managed by Bud Braeger. Okay, I

592
00:48:11,040 --> 00:48:15,640
Speaker 1: do Bud. How did you hook up with Bud? Basically? Um?

593
00:48:15,760 --> 00:48:23,040
Speaker 1: He Bud was a partner with Gary Kerry first also

594
00:48:23,120 --> 00:48:31,000
Speaker 1: passed away. Yeah yeah, unfortunately, and they had both together

595
00:48:31,120 --> 00:48:40,200
Speaker 1: managed Mountain and they broke up and somehow Gary ended

596
00:48:40,320 --> 00:48:45,560
Speaker 1: up with Phoenix Popularity, and I mean Bud filled it

597
00:48:45,640 --> 00:48:53,120
Speaker 1: up with Phelix representing him and then Bud represented them Leslie,

598
00:48:53,680 --> 00:48:57,200
Speaker 1: which was a kind of a bizarre sort of way

599
00:48:57,239 --> 00:49:02,800
Speaker 1: to end it. Leslie was much friendier, more friendly with Felix,

600
00:49:05,440 --> 00:49:10,120
Speaker 1: and he didn't really know how to handle Leslie. Okay,

601
00:49:10,120 --> 00:49:12,879
Speaker 1: just so I know, wait I thought, because Bud said

602
00:49:12,880 --> 00:49:15,040
Speaker 1: Felix was his best friend when they broke up, kurf first,

603
00:49:15,080 --> 00:49:19,600
Speaker 1: and uh that Felix went with kur first, okay, and

604
00:49:19,680 --> 00:49:22,480
Speaker 1: Leslie went with Bud. And how did you end up

605
00:49:22,640 --> 00:49:29,520
Speaker 1: with Bud? Um? I joined the Leslie westband. Ah, so

606
00:49:29,840 --> 00:49:32,880
Speaker 1: who was in the band at the same time, just

607
00:49:33,120 --> 00:49:39,720
Speaker 1: really Quirky Lang and the bass player I can't remember

608
00:49:39,760 --> 00:49:45,839
Speaker 1: his name, Quirky Lang with all the iterations. Okay, So

609
00:49:45,880 --> 00:49:49,279
Speaker 1: then how do you then? Okay, so you joined after

610
00:49:49,480 --> 00:49:51,400
Speaker 1: New York, you end up being in the Mountain Band,

611
00:49:52,000 --> 00:49:56,520
Speaker 1: and then what's next for you? Well, we we did

612
00:49:56,520 --> 00:50:00,560
Speaker 1: an album which wasn't wasn't a bad album, chob was

613
00:50:00,600 --> 00:50:06,480
Speaker 1: that it was called the Leslie Westbound. Some decent songs

614
00:50:06,560 --> 00:50:10,920
Speaker 1: I wrote or co wrote most of them, and that

615
00:50:11,080 --> 00:50:16,799
Speaker 1: was another stepping stone, a bit um and working with

616
00:50:16,880 --> 00:50:21,200
Speaker 1: Leslie wants to He's great guitar player. I still admire

617
00:50:21,280 --> 00:50:25,960
Speaker 1: him a lot, and so I picked up a few

618
00:50:26,080 --> 00:50:30,440
Speaker 1: little things from him. I always, you know, I'm I

619
00:50:30,480 --> 00:50:36,920
Speaker 1: am a I like learning. I never feel that I

620
00:50:37,000 --> 00:50:44,040
Speaker 1: know it all, you know, I feel that try and

621
00:50:44,080 --> 00:50:53,879
Speaker 1: stay humble about it anything. But life became unmanageable with

622
00:50:54,400 --> 00:51:02,640
Speaker 1: Leslie at that time, unfortunately, and he was m just

623
00:51:02,960 --> 00:51:07,480
Speaker 1: impossible to heal. Whether he was I don't really want

624
00:51:07,480 --> 00:51:10,760
Speaker 1: to go into what he was doing, but not good.

625
00:51:11,120 --> 00:51:17,640
Speaker 1: And all that started to break down. And one day

626
00:51:17,719 --> 00:51:21,680
Speaker 1: we were stuck somewhere in Florida, and what Lessardy would

627
00:51:21,680 --> 00:51:27,200
Speaker 1: do would be to take the money from the promoter

628
00:51:28,239 --> 00:51:33,200
Speaker 1: and leave us kind of high and dry, and then

629
00:51:33,239 --> 00:51:38,000
Speaker 1: he would steer a guitar from the opening act, jump

630
00:51:38,000 --> 00:51:41,279
Speaker 1: on a plane and go down to Manny's and sell

631
00:51:41,360 --> 00:51:48,000
Speaker 1: it all to support is Trugs. And it became a nightmare.

632
00:51:48,000 --> 00:51:51,360
Speaker 1: And I told I confronted Bud one day and I said,

633
00:51:52,080 --> 00:51:54,359
Speaker 1: what kind of fucking manager do you think you are

634
00:51:55,680 --> 00:52:00,560
Speaker 1: what we've got to do something for for for Leslie,

635
00:52:00,640 --> 00:52:06,239
Speaker 1: you know, he's so um. Bud was kind of a

636
00:52:06,239 --> 00:52:11,040
Speaker 1: bit miffed at that, and I said, look, if you

637
00:52:11,040 --> 00:52:14,560
Speaker 1: you want to be a manager and prove yourself, because

638
00:52:14,600 --> 00:52:19,040
Speaker 1: I don't think you have yet, I'll bet you I

639
00:52:19,080 --> 00:52:23,480
Speaker 1: can put something together within a year with with your help,

640
00:52:23,800 --> 00:52:28,440
Speaker 1: you know, financially helped out. And it became a competition

641
00:52:29,040 --> 00:52:33,640
Speaker 1: as to who could be the most successful, will achieve

642
00:52:33,719 --> 00:52:37,800
Speaker 1: their dream as it were. It was kind of bizarre

643
00:52:37,800 --> 00:52:45,320
Speaker 1: in a way, but it was the motivation. And he said,

644
00:52:45,320 --> 00:52:49,000
Speaker 1: you'd better start writing some songs then, you know, And

645
00:52:49,160 --> 00:52:58,680
Speaker 1: suddenly I'm on the spot and started writing songs and uh,

646
00:52:59,719 --> 00:53:12,120
Speaker 1: basically from there, uh, the song started to come. And

647
00:53:12,400 --> 00:53:15,480
Speaker 1: that's where it all kind of took place, the formation

648
00:53:15,520 --> 00:53:20,319
Speaker 1: of the band. Felix had had a studio up in

649
00:53:20,360 --> 00:53:25,040
Speaker 1: Bud's offices on Broadway, and he had a studio in

650
00:53:25,120 --> 00:53:31,400
Speaker 1: there that he used to record um bands, up and

651
00:53:31,400 --> 00:53:34,920
Speaker 1: coming bands, or you know, just as a rehearsal space.

652
00:53:35,800 --> 00:53:40,560
Speaker 1: And I kind of took that over and Bud was

653
00:53:40,760 --> 00:53:45,680
Speaker 1: next door and so every half an hour he bob

654
00:53:45,719 --> 00:53:53,120
Speaker 1: his head and yeah, it's a funny relationship. But he

655
00:53:53,719 --> 00:53:56,360
Speaker 1: Without him, I don't think I would have had the

656
00:53:56,440 --> 00:54:01,719
Speaker 1: motivation and you know, the moment of well, you have

657
00:54:01,840 --> 00:54:08,560
Speaker 1: to brood yourself here. And so that little pact we

658
00:54:08,719 --> 00:54:16,879
Speaker 1: made became the backbone of our relationship, and the combination

659
00:54:17,000 --> 00:54:22,799
Speaker 1: of his experience and mine somehow seemed to gel and

660
00:54:22,840 --> 00:54:29,000
Speaker 1: we exchanged you know, um stories, and we'd would be

661
00:54:29,040 --> 00:54:32,359
Speaker 1: in the office until ten at night, you know, just

662
00:54:33,000 --> 00:54:35,879
Speaker 1: coming and trying to come up with things that would

663
00:54:35,920 --> 00:54:48,279
Speaker 1: make this thing a special And so he kind of

664
00:54:50,280 --> 00:54:54,800
Speaker 1: how to talk with his wife because we needed money

665
00:54:54,840 --> 00:55:00,839
Speaker 1: to put this together, and he kind of talked her

666
00:55:00,840 --> 00:55:06,880
Speaker 1: into giving us an initial sum of money, which was

667
00:55:06,920 --> 00:55:12,640
Speaker 1: about somewhere like eighty grand at the time, to pay

668
00:55:12,960 --> 00:55:17,720
Speaker 1: all the musicians. You know, it wasn't a great big budget,

669
00:55:17,960 --> 00:55:23,040
Speaker 1: but and everything happened in that little room. So you

670
00:55:23,120 --> 00:55:27,319
Speaker 1: cut the first album in that little rooms, Okay, cut

671
00:55:27,320 --> 00:55:32,760
Speaker 1: the demos, so essentially everything from the first album pretty much.

672
00:55:33,040 --> 00:55:37,760
Speaker 1: We um. When Lou came down and became integrated into

673
00:55:37,800 --> 00:55:44,120
Speaker 1: the picture, I knew that he was a writer too,

674
00:55:45,120 --> 00:55:48,960
Speaker 1: and I invited him to participate in the writing too,

675
00:55:50,200 --> 00:55:54,319
Speaker 1: and that started our sort of writing relationship and how

676
00:55:54,320 --> 00:55:57,960
Speaker 1: did you the rest of the band come together? Um?

677
00:55:58,640 --> 00:56:06,520
Speaker 1: Through m kind of word of mouth Um, Ian McDonald

678
00:56:06,560 --> 00:56:10,440
Speaker 1: I knew already. I had met Dennis Eady at the

679
00:56:10,520 --> 00:56:15,160
Speaker 1: drummer um when I worked a little bit with Ian Hunter,

680
00:56:16,600 --> 00:56:25,440
Speaker 1: and to me, he was perfect fit. And then we

681
00:56:25,480 --> 00:56:27,799
Speaker 1: had a local guy from New York. He had been

682
00:56:27,840 --> 00:56:32,959
Speaker 1: in a sort of an e LP type band and

683
00:56:34,200 --> 00:56:40,120
Speaker 1: he was a really good keyboard player and he also

684
00:56:40,320 --> 00:56:44,280
Speaker 1: was a writer. He later contributed to a few songs.

685
00:56:44,600 --> 00:56:55,360
Speaker 1: Um ah. But that next period, you know, was we

686
00:56:55,360 --> 00:57:01,200
Speaker 1: we made the demo. We uh, I had I had

687
00:57:01,239 --> 00:57:05,880
Speaker 1: no you know, I had an interesting circle of friends.

688
00:57:06,840 --> 00:57:13,279
Speaker 1: I was friendly with Jerry Moss from Yes, we had

689
00:57:13,320 --> 00:57:16,959
Speaker 1: an interesting circle of friends. You knew Jerry Moss. Yeah,

690
00:57:17,040 --> 00:57:21,600
Speaker 1: that whole sort of stable Jerry Moss and the A

691
00:57:21,640 --> 00:57:24,920
Speaker 1: and M Records crew and the left handed trumpet player.

692
00:57:26,440 --> 00:57:36,520
Speaker 1: So people used to you don't know, Yeah, and they

693
00:57:36,560 --> 00:57:38,960
Speaker 1: had a great thing going at A and M and

694
00:57:39,000 --> 00:57:44,800
Speaker 1: that there was a really artist friendly, warm kind of feeling.

695
00:57:46,480 --> 00:57:48,920
Speaker 1: You know, you've felt like you were sort of special.

696
00:57:50,320 --> 00:57:58,560
Speaker 1: And that's who I sent the first demo too. Unfortunately

697
00:57:58,800 --> 00:58:03,200
Speaker 1: Jerry had just left it for the Mediterranean on vacation.

698
00:58:04,440 --> 00:58:09,360
Speaker 1: And he never got the package. He told me later

699
00:58:09,920 --> 00:58:15,840
Speaker 1: and he said, I really said, I kicked myself. I

700
00:58:15,880 --> 00:58:18,960
Speaker 1: would love to have done this with you, and I

701
00:58:19,000 --> 00:58:24,680
Speaker 1: would likewise of like to do it with him. Um,

702
00:58:24,720 --> 00:58:33,040
Speaker 1: so that was one down Clive Davis. I wanted, for

703
00:58:33,080 --> 00:58:37,640
Speaker 1: some reason to test myself because I knew he was

704
00:58:38,400 --> 00:58:41,800
Speaker 1: like a song man and I really kind of wanted

705
00:58:41,840 --> 00:58:48,680
Speaker 1: his um impression of it. And he said, well, he said,

706
00:58:48,720 --> 00:58:50,360
Speaker 1: the only way I can tell you is if you

707
00:58:50,480 --> 00:58:54,240
Speaker 1: come up here with their acoustic guitar and play me

708
00:58:54,320 --> 00:59:00,240
Speaker 1: some of those songs, I'll give you my opinion. And yeah,

709
00:59:02,320 --> 00:59:12,680
Speaker 1: I didn't hear back from now did you sing the songs?

710
00:59:12,760 --> 00:59:15,240
Speaker 1: Did losing the songs? No, we didn't. We didn't do it.

711
00:59:15,480 --> 00:59:20,520
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, just I was a little bit miffed that

712
00:59:20,760 --> 00:59:26,400
Speaker 1: we had to do that. It got my ego a bit,

713
00:59:27,560 --> 00:59:30,360
Speaker 1: But later I became you know, I've become very friendly

714
00:59:30,400 --> 00:59:35,040
Speaker 1: with Clive over the years and I learned quite a

715
00:59:35,040 --> 00:59:44,720
Speaker 1: bit from him. Um. Then we I had always Atlantic

716
00:59:44,760 --> 00:59:49,240
Speaker 1: Records had always been my dream label, you know, right

717
00:59:49,280 --> 00:59:54,000
Speaker 1: from the first time I heard Ray Charles all that period,

718
00:59:54,320 --> 01:00:00,360
Speaker 1: you know, M R and B and H. So we

719
01:00:00,400 --> 01:00:03,280
Speaker 1: sent there was a guy called a and R guy

720
01:00:03,320 --> 01:00:11,400
Speaker 1: called Jim Delahan at Atlantic who got the the demo

721
01:00:11,440 --> 01:00:15,960
Speaker 1: tape and kind of threw it in the bin without

722
01:00:16,000 --> 01:00:21,360
Speaker 1: listening to it. And then John Colodno got hold of

723
01:00:21,400 --> 01:00:27,000
Speaker 1: it somehow and he went bananas. He just he had

724
01:00:27,040 --> 01:00:32,480
Speaker 1: just been appointed ahead of publicity, I think, nothing to

725
01:00:32,520 --> 01:00:37,360
Speaker 1: do with, you know, being a music buff as he was,

726
01:00:38,840 --> 01:00:44,080
Speaker 1: and he kind of took it and ran with it

727
01:00:44,360 --> 01:00:48,440
Speaker 1: and just motivated the whole company. He'd be on their

728
01:00:48,480 --> 01:00:54,360
Speaker 1: ass all the time, you know about champion championing our calls,

729
01:00:55,400 --> 01:00:58,320
Speaker 1: and he piste a lot of people off me. It

730
01:00:58,480 --> 01:01:04,000
Speaker 1: worked and we developed a great relationship eventually with Atlantic,

731
01:01:05,200 --> 01:01:12,800
Speaker 1: and you know, it was a great meeting. Armored became

732
01:01:13,240 --> 01:01:17,280
Speaker 1: friendly with him, and it was my dream, you know.

733
01:01:17,320 --> 01:01:20,000
Speaker 1: I remember as a kid, I went to a party

734
01:01:20,080 --> 01:01:23,080
Speaker 1: on a weekend. I must have been about fourteen or fifteen,

735
01:01:24,080 --> 01:01:27,160
Speaker 1: and one of those parties where you tell your parents

736
01:01:27,320 --> 01:01:31,120
Speaker 1: you're gonna three rounded to friends and you're off to

737
01:01:31,240 --> 01:01:41,560
Speaker 1: London and hitch hiking and lost it. So you're talking

738
01:01:41,600 --> 01:01:45,480
Speaker 1: about this party hearing the Atlantic records and I was

739
01:01:45,960 --> 01:01:49,800
Speaker 1: over by the record player and I saw this black

740
01:01:49,840 --> 01:01:53,960
Speaker 1: and red it was playing. What I say, Ray Charles

741
01:01:54,800 --> 01:01:59,280
Speaker 1: and I saw this um spinning around on the record

742
01:01:59,280 --> 01:02:04,000
Speaker 1: player and saw those colors, and I saw and then

743
01:02:04,040 --> 01:02:07,360
Speaker 1: I listened to what was coming out, and I thought, Wow,

744
01:02:09,000 --> 01:02:15,240
Speaker 1: that's fucking amazing, and what a what a great company,

745
01:02:15,320 --> 01:02:18,880
Speaker 1: you know, what a great roster. You know. By that time,

746
01:02:18,920 --> 01:02:26,480
Speaker 1: they had Zeppelin and The Stones, um, both bands who

747
01:02:26,520 --> 01:02:32,800
Speaker 1: we have eventually ended up setting more than Ah. That

748
01:02:32,920 --> 01:02:38,280
Speaker 1: was another crazy I mean, that was crazy times. The

749
01:02:39,760 --> 01:02:43,640
Speaker 1: I had worked with Jimmy, you know, in London on sessions,

750
01:02:43,800 --> 01:02:47,600
Speaker 1: sessions with Johnny Halliday, John Paul Jones, I'd work with

751
01:02:47,920 --> 01:02:52,680
Speaker 1: and and of course that history of that pub and

752
01:02:53,040 --> 01:02:59,720
Speaker 1: sorry opening for Stones, and and suddenly I'm here with

753
01:03:00,040 --> 01:03:08,200
Speaker 1: it's you know, massive figures and rock, you know, and

754
01:03:08,200 --> 01:03:11,480
Speaker 1: then it kind of became a little surreal at that point.

755
01:03:12,240 --> 01:03:20,640
Speaker 1: I remember he ran Rolling Stone Records and Earl I

756
01:03:21,200 --> 01:03:24,919
Speaker 1: become friendly with through the label kind of thing. And

757
01:03:26,800 --> 01:03:31,960
Speaker 1: he challenged us because our double Vision album came out

758
01:03:31,960 --> 01:03:36,520
Speaker 1: at the same time as some girls, and so we

759
01:03:36,560 --> 01:03:40,800
Speaker 1: had this thing where every Friday or whenever, you know,

760
01:03:40,880 --> 01:03:46,080
Speaker 1: the charts came out. Um, he had come over the

761
01:03:46,120 --> 01:03:49,840
Speaker 1: studio and I either admit that we'd sold more than

762
01:03:50,240 --> 01:03:53,360
Speaker 1: stones or not, and then we'd have to sort of

763
01:03:54,240 --> 01:03:57,880
Speaker 1: but you're accounting that you're not counting this or you know.

764
01:03:58,160 --> 01:04:03,000
Speaker 1: And by was in forwards and we ended up surpassing

765
01:04:03,040 --> 01:04:07,360
Speaker 1: the Stones, you know, and that was mind boggling to me,

766
01:04:07,800 --> 01:04:15,040
Speaker 1: you know, And although we had some statue already, it

767
01:04:15,240 --> 01:04:19,880
Speaker 1: was still mind blowing, you know. Okay. So and in

768
01:04:20,000 --> 01:04:28,160
Speaker 1: that year, by the way, um Foreigner and Rolling Stones,

769
01:04:29,840 --> 01:04:34,160
Speaker 1: it was being talked about that we should unite and

770
01:04:34,240 --> 01:04:40,720
Speaker 1: form our own label. That's how much we're Bud was

771
01:04:40,760 --> 01:04:44,520
Speaker 1: approached by Rupert Lonstein, who you I'm sure you know,

772
01:04:45,880 --> 01:04:50,720
Speaker 1: and he approached Bud and said, we'd like to talk

773
01:04:50,760 --> 01:05:01,120
Speaker 1: about possibly forming a label with you guys, and what

774
01:05:02,720 --> 01:05:07,920
Speaker 1: because we had sold more between us than the whole label,

775
01:05:08,240 --> 01:05:13,680
Speaker 1: right signed. That's that's so just a little aside. I'd

776
01:05:13,760 --> 01:05:18,600
Speaker 1: like to mention that sometimes it didn't happen. Um, I

777
01:05:18,640 --> 01:05:23,120
Speaker 1: don't know. I think we we were riding high. Ah,

778
01:05:24,360 --> 01:05:28,479
Speaker 1: Rupid Loinstein had a bit of a reputation too, And

779
01:05:29,440 --> 01:05:31,479
Speaker 1: what was he The reputation was he was a great

780
01:05:31,520 --> 01:05:36,200
Speaker 1: business guy for the Stones. But if you're weren't the Stones,

781
01:05:36,880 --> 01:05:42,000
Speaker 1: what was his reputation? He's dead too, Yeah, not not

782
01:05:42,120 --> 01:05:46,720
Speaker 1: too sparkling. Okay, let's go back to the getting Colodter

783
01:05:47,040 --> 01:05:49,400
Speaker 1: flipped for it. So how long did it take for

784
01:05:49,400 --> 01:05:55,440
Speaker 1: Foreigner to get signed? Um? Probably about three months? And

785
01:05:55,680 --> 01:06:00,320
Speaker 1: was it already called Foreigner at that point? Um? The

786
01:06:00,360 --> 01:06:09,800
Speaker 1: first name I we had thought of was Trigger, um,

787
01:06:09,840 --> 01:06:16,280
Speaker 1: and then I realized that Trigger was Roy Rogers Horse

788
01:06:18,160 --> 01:06:24,680
Speaker 1: and suddenly I felt Rodgers. There's another Rodgers who's pretty

789
01:06:24,760 --> 01:06:29,480
Speaker 1: damn good singer, you know, and Paul Rodgers of course,

790
01:06:29,960 --> 01:06:35,400
Speaker 1: so I just decided I couldn't go there. And I

791
01:06:35,440 --> 01:06:38,560
Speaker 1: can't remember many other names. Actually, tell you the truth,

792
01:06:39,880 --> 01:06:43,440
Speaker 1: it was hell finding a name. So when you found

793
01:06:43,520 --> 01:06:45,720
Speaker 1: when you just when you come up with Foreigner, did

794
01:06:45,760 --> 01:06:47,320
Speaker 1: you say, oh, this is it? Or do you said,

795
01:06:47,320 --> 01:06:48,680
Speaker 1: wait for a while, so, well, I can't come up

796
01:06:48,680 --> 01:06:53,880
Speaker 1: with something better, so therefore it's Foreigner pretty much. Yeah,

797
01:06:54,240 --> 01:07:00,480
Speaker 1: the important thing with the albums, you know, and the

798
01:07:00,600 --> 01:07:05,439
Speaker 1: recording you know. But Bud told me, you know, face

799
01:07:05,520 --> 01:07:09,560
Speaker 1: to face, that he cut the Scottie Brothers in for

800
01:07:09,600 --> 01:07:13,640
Speaker 1: a point for the complete career. He did, right. They

801
01:07:13,680 --> 01:07:17,600
Speaker 1: were a legendary promotion people. And he was saying that

802
01:07:17,680 --> 01:07:20,720
Speaker 1: certainly helped in the success of Foreigner, that that was

803
01:07:20,920 --> 01:07:27,040
Speaker 1: his major contribution. And you agree that was a good move. Okay,

804
01:07:27,200 --> 01:07:30,320
Speaker 1: So you make the first album and then somewhere along

805
01:07:30,400 --> 01:07:33,520
Speaker 1: the line the band changes. It's you and Lou, but

806
01:07:33,640 --> 01:07:38,640
Speaker 1: everybody else changed. What happened there? Um, are you talking

807
01:07:38,680 --> 01:07:45,280
Speaker 1: about pre the Forum? Yeah? Yeah, I mean McDonald's no

808
01:07:45,360 --> 01:07:50,200
Speaker 1: longer in the band. Well, we were kind of doing

809
01:07:50,240 --> 01:07:56,400
Speaker 1: a growing up in public in a way, and Lew

810
01:07:56,480 --> 01:07:59,360
Speaker 1: and I were sort of the nucleus of the band

811
01:07:59,600 --> 01:08:02,560
Speaker 1: as it were, and I felt that we had to

812
01:08:02,640 --> 01:08:12,480
Speaker 1: consolidate and really create what would be the sound of

813
01:08:12,520 --> 01:08:17,160
Speaker 1: the band and I and I had counted Onto to

814
01:08:17,360 --> 01:08:26,479
Speaker 1: be a man of all kinds of instruments, and it

815
01:08:26,560 --> 01:08:32,720
Speaker 1: didn't sort of pan out that way. And Al Greenwood

816
01:08:35,640 --> 01:08:39,439
Speaker 1: it was a great player. And you know, I've I've

817
01:08:39,479 --> 01:08:44,439
Speaker 1: often regretted about, you know, why we did that, because

818
01:08:47,040 --> 01:08:51,600
Speaker 1: it was, I guess part of my desire to to

819
01:08:51,720 --> 01:08:55,960
Speaker 1: shape the sound, make it live for a long time,

820
01:08:57,360 --> 01:09:00,800
Speaker 1: and create something that would be with acted, you know,

821
01:09:01,080 --> 01:09:06,960
Speaker 1: and I needed to hone in on it. And so

822
01:09:07,040 --> 01:09:09,719
Speaker 1: I was a bit of a taskmaster at that point.

823
01:09:10,200 --> 01:09:12,240
Speaker 1: And how did Rick Wills end up being in the band?

824
01:09:13,400 --> 01:09:18,639
Speaker 1: Rick I had known from Paris when he was playing

825
01:09:18,640 --> 01:09:24,880
Speaker 1: in a club in Paris with with Dave Gilmore and

826
01:09:26,400 --> 01:09:30,080
Speaker 1: they were on subsistence levels, you know, playing in a

827
01:09:30,160 --> 01:09:34,559
Speaker 1: club in Saint Germains. And I used to go by

828
01:09:34,600 --> 01:09:37,160
Speaker 1: and give him a little money. That's what I've just

829
01:09:37,200 --> 01:09:42,120
Speaker 1: been joining. I took him out for breakfast a lot.

830
01:09:42,880 --> 01:09:45,840
Speaker 1: You know. I looked back on it, and I I

831
01:09:45,920 --> 01:09:49,480
Speaker 1: have regrets. I wish we could have kept the band

832
01:09:50,000 --> 01:10:00,760
Speaker 1: intact as it were. It was really a terrible emotional break. Um.

833
01:10:00,760 --> 01:10:03,240
Speaker 1: You know, these guys have been part of that first

834
01:10:03,439 --> 01:10:10,800
Speaker 1: dream thing and then and then they weren't, you know,

835
01:10:11,120 --> 01:10:19,120
Speaker 1: and then um, you know I finally decided to do

836
01:10:19,200 --> 01:10:25,639
Speaker 1: that album and eventually produce it with Mutt Lange. Okay, yeah,

837
01:10:25,640 --> 01:10:27,639
Speaker 1: So how did you decide this is the fourth album

838
01:10:27,640 --> 01:10:30,040
Speaker 1: obviously four or four? How did you decide to make

839
01:10:30,080 --> 01:10:34,960
Speaker 1: the switch and get Mudd involved? To get who get

840
01:10:35,000 --> 01:10:42,080
Speaker 1: Mutt involved? Um? Well, Mutt had already applied for the job, uh,

841
01:10:42,280 --> 01:10:46,240
Speaker 1: and we won't be able to work it out with him.

842
01:10:46,280 --> 01:10:49,840
Speaker 1: So we did an album head Games with Roy Roy

843
01:10:49,960 --> 01:10:57,360
Speaker 1: Thomas Baker Well, Roy Baker Thomas, Where's he today? Was

844
01:10:57,400 --> 01:11:00,519
Speaker 1: that a good or bad experience? It was kind into good?

845
01:11:00,720 --> 01:11:09,280
Speaker 1: It was it was. It was an attempt to go

846
01:11:09,360 --> 01:11:16,000
Speaker 1: a bit more raw, a bit more street kind of thing. Um.

847
01:11:16,040 --> 01:11:18,080
Speaker 1: I don't really know whether it ended up that way,

848
01:11:18,120 --> 01:11:29,680
Speaker 1: but I it's a very powerful stage number. And you know, Um,

849
01:11:30,680 --> 01:11:35,400
Speaker 1: I decided on Matt because he came over to my

850
01:11:35,560 --> 01:11:39,960
Speaker 1: place and I wanted to hear every single idea I had,

851
01:11:40,840 --> 01:11:45,240
Speaker 1: which normally was like a logo area. You know. It

852
01:11:45,360 --> 01:11:55,600
Speaker 1: was very while I was timid, I guess, and he

853
01:11:55,280 --> 01:12:00,320
Speaker 1: he wouldn't leave until he basically literally heard everything, even

854
01:12:00,360 --> 01:12:04,880
Speaker 1: like a ten second clip, and he picked out like

855
01:12:05,000 --> 01:12:10,040
Speaker 1: the intro on urgent ding ding ding dinging. Yeah, yeah,

856
01:12:10,360 --> 01:12:12,920
Speaker 1: what was that? Was just just a piece line around.

857
01:12:15,920 --> 01:12:22,360
Speaker 1: It was almost sounded to me like the shadows. And

858
01:12:22,400 --> 01:12:26,280
Speaker 1: so we we we had it was a little sticky

859
01:12:26,320 --> 01:12:29,519
Speaker 1: at the beginning. We both realized that we were both

860
01:12:29,800 --> 01:12:36,960
Speaker 1: highly opinionated and we're used to, you know, getting what

861
01:12:37,000 --> 01:12:42,639
Speaker 1: we wanted sort of thing. And but over time, over

862
01:12:42,720 --> 01:12:46,320
Speaker 1: the first few months, we had a few runnins, you know,

863
01:12:47,920 --> 01:12:53,920
Speaker 1: and then suddenly like it did with Tom with Don

864
01:12:54,800 --> 01:13:00,320
Speaker 1: Landy and ended up having a quite a healthy aspect

865
01:13:00,320 --> 01:13:02,200
Speaker 1: for each other. How long did it take to make

866
01:13:02,360 --> 01:13:08,719
Speaker 1: for or four nine months? Maybe? A bit more pretty expensive,

867
01:13:08,760 --> 01:13:13,240
Speaker 1: although you were a big seller, yes, and what did

868
01:13:13,320 --> 01:13:22,000
Speaker 1: but contribute? Um? Well, he was Matt was actually more

869
01:13:22,000 --> 01:13:27,719
Speaker 1: coming from more of a pop area. You know. It's um.

870
01:13:27,760 --> 01:13:30,360
Speaker 1: He was as you probably know, he was like a

871
01:13:30,400 --> 01:13:34,519
Speaker 1: session singer in South Africa. Yeah, they used to make

872
01:13:34,520 --> 01:13:36,799
Speaker 1: all the records. They would cover the hits in England.

873
01:13:37,439 --> 01:13:44,400
Speaker 1: That's really hold his chops um. And you know he

874
01:13:44,800 --> 01:13:48,760
Speaker 1: he knew his stuff. He'd been been around, he knew

875
01:13:49,880 --> 01:13:57,000
Speaker 1: his self. Plus I am actually what was that band

876
01:13:57,120 --> 01:14:01,360
Speaker 1: he first been? City Boy? City Boy. That's when that's

877
01:14:01,360 --> 01:14:07,080
Speaker 1: the first time he caught my ear. And you know,

878
01:14:07,120 --> 01:14:10,960
Speaker 1: I knew that he was pretty determined. He was in

879
01:14:11,000 --> 01:14:13,160
Speaker 1: good shape. You know, he'd had a couple of years

880
01:14:13,200 --> 01:14:18,280
Speaker 1: where he had had a couple of shaky years, but

881
01:14:18,800 --> 01:14:22,559
Speaker 1: had come back from that and it was really you know,

882
01:14:22,800 --> 01:14:26,840
Speaker 1: on it. Okay, So how did Junior walk around up

883
01:14:26,880 --> 01:14:33,320
Speaker 1: being on Urgent? Um. We were in the studio and

884
01:14:33,680 --> 01:14:37,080
Speaker 1: I was just playing some of the tracks back and

885
01:14:39,080 --> 01:14:42,000
Speaker 1: I had it was a very early version of Urgent

886
01:14:43,280 --> 01:14:47,519
Speaker 1: And I'm sitting there reading the Village Voice and suddenly

887
01:14:47,560 --> 01:14:52,320
Speaker 1: I see bloone Star Cafe, Junior Walker and the old

888
01:14:52,320 --> 01:14:58,800
Speaker 1: Stars and I'm listening to the track, which was pretty funky,

889
01:14:59,120 --> 01:15:03,240
Speaker 1: and I put two and two together and went down

890
01:15:04,200 --> 01:15:09,800
Speaker 1: to catch him live. And he had no idea who

891
01:15:11,600 --> 01:15:15,800
Speaker 1: but his son I knew who we were, you know,

892
01:15:16,040 --> 01:15:21,479
Speaker 1: and he said, Dad, these guys at the top of

893
01:15:21,560 --> 01:15:27,679
Speaker 1: it charts, they're really great, you know. And he said, well,

894
01:15:28,600 --> 01:15:31,479
Speaker 1: all I know is someone want to wake a record here,

895
01:15:32,400 --> 01:15:35,479
Speaker 1: you know. And up to that point, believe it or not,

896
01:15:35,600 --> 01:15:41,839
Speaker 1: he had never overdubbed anything on any albums or records

897
01:15:41,840 --> 01:15:46,280
Speaker 1: he made. It was all one take. We ended up

898
01:15:46,280 --> 01:15:53,519
Speaker 1: doing ten takes. And we were working with Tom Dalby

899
01:15:54,280 --> 01:16:02,280
Speaker 1: Thomas Dolby at the time, and he was an interesting character,

900
01:16:03,080 --> 01:16:08,360
Speaker 1: had some pretty radical since ideas, you know. I didn't

901
01:16:08,360 --> 01:16:12,720
Speaker 1: want to just use a stock kind of since. So

902
01:16:12,800 --> 01:16:19,640
Speaker 1: I you know, we we contacted him. He was in Paris,

903
01:16:19,960 --> 01:16:26,519
Speaker 1: playing on subway, just singing with who knew him then nobody?

904
01:16:27,240 --> 01:16:30,599
Speaker 1: Glad you find him. I can't remember. I think we

905
01:16:30,600 --> 01:16:34,920
Speaker 1: we looked into who who he was, you know, Mud

906
01:16:34,960 --> 01:16:39,160
Speaker 1: had heard about him, so you had Thomas Dolby in yeah,

907
01:16:39,280 --> 01:16:46,559
Speaker 1: and uh Junior Walker. So we went out for what

908
01:16:46,600 --> 01:16:49,880
Speaker 1: we would do, and we go out for dinner and

909
01:16:49,960 --> 01:16:53,240
Speaker 1: leave Tom in the studio with an engineer and just

910
01:16:53,439 --> 01:16:56,679
Speaker 1: have him just put the tracks down and then sift

911
01:16:56,760 --> 01:17:04,040
Speaker 1: through them and you know, come up with slightly different approaches.

912
01:17:05,120 --> 01:17:13,479
Speaker 1: And Junior started warming up, you know, and we did

913
01:17:13,479 --> 01:17:19,240
Speaker 1: a take and it was nothing like Junior Walker used

914
01:17:19,280 --> 01:17:22,599
Speaker 1: to play right at all. It was soft and mellow.

915
01:17:23,520 --> 01:17:29,719
Speaker 1: So this is my new style. And Matt said, well,

916
01:17:29,880 --> 01:17:34,000
Speaker 1: he said, we don't really want the new style. We

917
01:17:34,040 --> 01:17:37,080
Speaker 1: want we want the real you you know, we want

918
01:17:37,080 --> 01:17:43,760
Speaker 1: the stuff, you know, we want the shotgun. Yes, and

919
01:17:43,760 --> 01:17:48,320
Speaker 1: he said, oh, you mean all that old ship. Yes, oh,

920
01:17:48,439 --> 01:17:53,800
Speaker 1: the old ship. And so he he was she as

921
01:17:53,840 --> 01:17:58,479
Speaker 1: I mentioned, he hadn't done before. We overdubbed him and

922
01:18:00,320 --> 01:18:02,040
Speaker 1: took a bit of getting used to for him. But

923
01:18:03,320 --> 01:18:07,000
Speaker 1: we gave him about twelve tracks. We came back and

924
01:18:07,040 --> 01:18:14,000
Speaker 1: sifted through them, edited them, and I think it took

925
01:18:14,360 --> 01:18:19,439
Speaker 1: two days to really put the final thing together. And

926
01:18:19,479 --> 01:18:22,120
Speaker 1: I and I checked it out with a few Sacks

927
01:18:22,160 --> 01:18:25,679
Speaker 1: players I knew, you know, to see if they spotted

928
01:18:25,680 --> 01:18:31,520
Speaker 1: anything not kosher, you know, But it passed the committee

929
01:18:32,360 --> 01:18:36,880
Speaker 1: and I think it's probably one of the one of

930
01:18:36,920 --> 01:18:41,360
Speaker 1: the best sacks solos on a rock record. I agree there.

931
01:18:41,479 --> 01:18:44,160
Speaker 1: I think most people agree now. Thomas Dolby came up

932
01:18:44,160 --> 01:18:47,439
Speaker 1: with the synth sounds for Waiting for a Girl Like You. Yes,

933
01:18:47,600 --> 01:18:58,800
Speaker 1: partly him and partly Ah Well, our keyboard player at

934
01:18:58,840 --> 01:19:02,679
Speaker 1: the time of Mayo, who used to work with Frampton

935
01:19:02,920 --> 01:19:14,200
Speaker 1: that's right and Larry Fast synergy synergy. Um, he played

936
01:19:14,240 --> 01:19:23,559
Speaker 1: the chords. Who did that? Donna? Okay? Yeah, okay, So

937
01:19:23,760 --> 01:19:25,960
Speaker 1: four and or four comes out? Did you have any

938
01:19:26,040 --> 01:19:27,720
Speaker 1: idea it was going to be as big as it was?

939
01:19:29,760 --> 01:19:33,600
Speaker 1: I had an inkling when we started to when it

940
01:19:33,680 --> 01:19:41,839
Speaker 1: started to come come into shape. Um, I had a feeling.

941
01:19:42,680 --> 01:19:46,760
Speaker 1: I put so much into it. I put everything I

942
01:19:46,800 --> 01:19:50,679
Speaker 1: had into it. It was it was an important album.

943
01:19:50,720 --> 01:19:53,080
Speaker 1: It was to sort of confirm that we weren't just

944
01:19:54,240 --> 01:19:56,559
Speaker 1: you know, we hadn't just made three albums and that

945
01:19:56,760 --> 01:20:00,599
Speaker 1: was the end of everything. He even though it did

946
01:20:00,680 --> 01:20:02,639
Speaker 1: come close to the end of okay, so why did

947
01:20:02,640 --> 01:20:11,720
Speaker 1: you never work with but again we that didn't happen immediately.

948
01:20:11,800 --> 01:20:17,760
Speaker 1: That that kind of happened on at a later date

949
01:20:17,840 --> 01:20:24,680
Speaker 1: as far as I remember. But the reason was that

950
01:20:24,760 --> 01:20:33,200
Speaker 1: we weren't happy about our touring situation. And but it

951
01:20:33,280 --> 01:20:37,080
Speaker 1: was later it was well, it did not do Waiting

952
01:20:37,120 --> 01:20:39,800
Speaker 1: for I want to know what love is? No, I

953
01:20:39,840 --> 01:20:42,760
Speaker 1: didn't think so, so how did I I don't want

954
01:20:42,760 --> 01:20:46,880
Speaker 1: to know what love is? Comes together? I was in London.

955
01:20:47,040 --> 01:20:51,800
Speaker 1: I had an apartment in London and I was living

956
01:20:51,840 --> 01:20:57,880
Speaker 1: there with my fiance at the time, and I was

957
01:20:57,960 --> 01:21:01,080
Speaker 1: working in my little music room mad I had just

958
01:21:01,520 --> 01:21:06,599
Speaker 1: bought a simple synth, so I was writing on that

959
01:21:06,760 --> 01:21:13,760
Speaker 1: and guitar, and suddenly this line comes into my head

960
01:21:14,840 --> 01:21:16,760
Speaker 1: and I'm thinking, I want to know what love is.

961
01:21:18,640 --> 01:21:22,920
Speaker 1: That's that's weird, that's too. I must have heard that

962
01:21:23,000 --> 01:21:29,880
Speaker 1: before somewhere and eventually realized that I hadn't heard that before.

963
01:21:31,080 --> 01:21:37,000
Speaker 1: So um it was before Christmas and we released it

964
01:21:37,200 --> 01:21:41,760
Speaker 1: in Atlantic. Just desperately wanted to release it, and so

965
01:21:41,840 --> 01:21:50,000
Speaker 1: we did, and it was sort of a blessing and

966
01:21:50,000 --> 01:21:55,400
Speaker 1: a curse in a way. The ramifications of what happened

967
01:21:55,439 --> 01:22:01,080
Speaker 1: after that with my relationship with Lou tell us the

968
01:22:01,160 --> 01:22:04,760
Speaker 1: story tell us how it was a blessing in Chris

969
01:22:04,760 --> 01:22:07,040
Speaker 1: obviously huge hit and why did it mess up your

970
01:22:07,080 --> 01:22:14,000
Speaker 1: relationship with little Um. Well, the fact was that we

971
01:22:14,120 --> 01:22:21,719
Speaker 1: had the last, the second hit on the previous album

972
01:22:21,960 --> 01:22:25,160
Speaker 1: and was waiting for gol like so there were two

973
01:22:25,240 --> 01:22:31,240
Speaker 1: consecutive ballads, and Glue took a little exception to it.

974
01:22:31,360 --> 01:22:36,760
Speaker 1: He felt that we were becoming softer, and in a way,

975
01:22:36,840 --> 01:22:40,639
Speaker 1: I guess the fact that those two ballads, but which

976
01:22:40,680 --> 01:22:45,880
Speaker 1: were huge hits, a kind of could have given the

977
01:22:45,920 --> 01:22:50,599
Speaker 1: impression that we were going a bit soft. I didn't

978
01:22:50,640 --> 01:22:55,880
Speaker 1: think we were. I thought it was just passage of time,

979
01:22:56,000 --> 01:23:03,280
Speaker 1: and and so I was kind of taken by surprise

980
01:23:03,360 --> 01:23:06,719
Speaker 1: by that. But then it developed into kind of into

981
01:23:06,760 --> 01:23:15,280
Speaker 1: a rift, which unfortunately started to the band started started

982
01:23:15,320 --> 01:23:24,599
Speaker 1: to self destruct. Um. I also think Lou probably felt

983
01:23:25,720 --> 01:23:30,240
Speaker 1: he wanted to do his own and he wanted to

984
01:23:30,320 --> 01:23:34,599
Speaker 1: do an album that he thought I believed that would

985
01:23:34,640 --> 01:23:42,479
Speaker 1: show me what he wanted to do. And I heard

986
01:23:42,520 --> 01:23:50,920
Speaker 1: the album and it sounded very familiar to me, and

987
01:23:50,960 --> 01:23:54,400
Speaker 1: I got a little upset about that because, you know,

988
01:23:54,520 --> 01:23:59,760
Speaker 1: Lou was the voice of the band and I was

989
01:23:59,840 --> 01:24:04,599
Speaker 1: just so you know, I was a musician, and even

990
01:24:04,640 --> 01:24:07,439
Speaker 1: though I was sort of the leader of the band,

991
01:24:09,520 --> 01:24:12,960
Speaker 1: I had I recalled, you know, the amount of times

992
01:24:13,040 --> 01:24:17,240
Speaker 1: when the lead singers had left bands and the disaster

993
01:24:17,760 --> 01:24:21,760
Speaker 1: it had been, you know, and what it had done

994
01:24:21,800 --> 01:24:29,960
Speaker 1: to the band, basically destroyed the band and using whatever

995
01:24:32,320 --> 01:24:40,600
Speaker 1: knowledge I had. I I tried to keep him in

996
01:24:40,640 --> 01:24:44,479
Speaker 1: the band, but I realized after a while that he

997
01:24:44,520 --> 01:24:48,800
Speaker 1: had made pretty solid sort of commitment to do this.

998
01:24:50,400 --> 01:24:58,400
Speaker 1: And it was a sad time, you know, because the

999
01:24:58,520 --> 01:25:02,080
Speaker 1: song had meant so much to so many people, and

1000
01:25:02,160 --> 01:25:11,400
Speaker 1: even today it still does. And I'll never quite good

1001
01:25:11,400 --> 01:25:19,479
Speaker 1: over that, I don't think, because it's never quite settled.

1002
01:25:20,920 --> 01:25:25,439
Speaker 1: Whether it has for him, I don't know, okay, but

1003
01:25:25,840 --> 01:25:29,760
Speaker 1: you do these Foreigner then and Now shows where he

1004
01:25:29,920 --> 01:25:33,360
Speaker 1: is on the bill. So if it's never quite settled,

1005
01:25:33,400 --> 01:25:40,920
Speaker 1: how did this come back together? Um? It was on

1006
01:25:41,040 --> 01:25:44,960
Speaker 1: the night of the Rock and Phone, I mean not

1007
01:25:45,160 --> 01:25:53,120
Speaker 1: the Songwriters Hall of Fame and Lou and I were

1008
01:25:53,720 --> 01:25:59,960
Speaker 1: being inducted that night and things had mellowed out a bit.

1009
01:26:00,080 --> 01:26:03,559
Speaker 1: I have to say. It wasn't I confrontation or anything

1010
01:26:03,600 --> 01:26:07,799
Speaker 1: like that. We we did pretty well together, right right.

1011
01:26:08,040 --> 01:26:13,599
Speaker 1: Did you have any contact with them, Yeah, because they

1012
01:26:14,160 --> 01:26:17,280
Speaker 1: wanted us to play songs becus him and I, I

1013
01:26:17,320 --> 01:26:19,439
Speaker 1: mean have a prior to that. After he left the band,

1014
01:26:19,439 --> 01:26:23,280
Speaker 1: he did his solo records for the next fifteen twenty years.

1015
01:26:23,280 --> 01:26:26,360
Speaker 1: Did you ever connect with them? Yeah? Okay, so you

1016
01:26:26,400 --> 01:26:31,360
Speaker 1: were somewhat friendly. Yeah, it wasn't it. It was yeah,

1017
01:26:31,400 --> 01:26:37,120
Speaker 1: that stuff at all, you know, under the bridge, and

1018
01:26:39,360 --> 01:26:46,639
Speaker 1: so there we were. We had to performed together. And

1019
01:26:46,720 --> 01:26:50,759
Speaker 1: sometime in that day and in the preparation for the show,

1020
01:26:52,840 --> 01:26:56,839
Speaker 1: it dawned on me, you know, what we had achieved together,

1021
01:26:58,360 --> 01:27:04,759
Speaker 1: and I think it He got that too, and I said,

1022
01:27:04,960 --> 01:27:10,719
Speaker 1: you know, we did pretty good, pretty fucking good. And

1023
01:27:12,360 --> 01:27:16,599
Speaker 1: you know, I'll never regret what we've done together, and

1024
01:27:17,200 --> 01:27:19,920
Speaker 1: it will always be the most important thing in my

1025
01:27:19,960 --> 01:27:26,320
Speaker 1: life and the gratitude I have for it from whatever

1026
01:27:26,360 --> 01:27:31,800
Speaker 1: it took. You know, we we did it. We we

1027
01:27:31,960 --> 01:27:40,320
Speaker 1: made it. So is your anger more that he left

1028
01:27:40,560 --> 01:27:43,160
Speaker 1: or more that you didn't have a chance to make

1029
01:27:43,200 --> 01:27:53,440
Speaker 1: more hit foreigner albums? Well, it was more disappointment than anger. Um.

1030
01:27:53,600 --> 01:28:02,800
Speaker 1: I tried to We did some auditions for other singers, UM,

1031
01:28:02,880 --> 01:28:06,240
Speaker 1: which I sort of got a bit excited about and

1032
01:28:06,280 --> 01:28:13,800
Speaker 1: then realized that maybe it wasn't a great Um. We

1033
01:28:13,920 --> 01:28:23,600
Speaker 1: did some recording the what was that album? Inside Information,

1034
01:28:25,200 --> 01:28:30,679
Speaker 1: and but that was very much Lue coming in daily

1035
01:28:30,720 --> 01:28:34,280
Speaker 1: and doing his bit and leaving not really part of

1036
01:28:34,280 --> 01:28:46,799
Speaker 1: that creative process. But um, yeah, I kind of started

1037
01:28:46,840 --> 01:28:50,520
Speaker 1: to lose hard a bit towards the end of the nineties.

1038
01:28:52,600 --> 01:28:58,080
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that we were getting gradually getting pushed

1039
01:28:58,120 --> 01:29:01,920
Speaker 1: out a bit band of you know, classic rock band

1040
01:29:02,760 --> 01:29:08,080
Speaker 1: grunge was coming in the hair bands, stuff that I

1041
01:29:08,120 --> 01:29:16,720
Speaker 1: didn't really really relate, but gradually I picked up on that,

1042
01:29:16,840 --> 01:29:20,200
Speaker 1: and that funny enough, that was the time when Bud

1043
01:29:21,600 --> 01:29:26,160
Speaker 1: and I split. And why did you too split? Because

1044
01:29:29,600 --> 01:29:34,760
Speaker 1: one day, I think it was in Spokane, Washington, we

1045
01:29:34,760 --> 01:29:38,840
Speaker 1: were playing in a bar and the bar was sort

1046
01:29:38,840 --> 01:29:41,439
Speaker 1: of at the junction of two roads coming in night,

1047
01:29:43,040 --> 01:29:46,040
Speaker 1: and so there was traffic on both sides of stage

1048
01:29:47,080 --> 01:29:49,719
Speaker 1: and the shitty little stage where we couldn't really even

1049
01:29:49,760 --> 01:29:55,360
Speaker 1: set up. I thought, WHOA, what's happening here? You know,

1050
01:29:55,600 --> 01:30:04,400
Speaker 1: is just we down to this playing little shacks. And

1051
01:30:04,439 --> 01:30:09,360
Speaker 1: actually what was happening was the whole business was changing.

1052
01:30:09,600 --> 01:30:17,559
Speaker 1: You know, we um and we were categorized as less

1053
01:30:17,560 --> 01:30:24,880
Speaker 1: than a classic rock band, you know, um whatever. You know,

1054
01:30:25,800 --> 01:30:33,720
Speaker 1: the market was bad, and you know, I didn't know

1055
01:30:33,760 --> 01:30:41,360
Speaker 1: what to do, and then um, oh the bad thing. Yeah,

1056
01:30:41,360 --> 01:30:46,120
Speaker 1: I kind of blamed him for it, blamed blamed him,

1057
01:30:46,160 --> 01:30:49,160
Speaker 1: thinking that it was his fault. We were playing in

1058
01:30:49,200 --> 01:30:55,120
Speaker 1: these ship holes and he said, well, you don't understand

1059
01:30:55,240 --> 01:30:57,960
Speaker 1: these you know, it's not like it used to be.

1060
01:30:59,479 --> 01:31:03,200
Speaker 1: And um, I said no, but it's got to be

1061
01:31:03,200 --> 01:31:11,960
Speaker 1: better than that. And so actually Jason Bonham came up,

1062
01:31:12,000 --> 01:31:17,720
Speaker 1: but he called me along with Phil Carson you probably know,

1063
01:31:17,880 --> 01:31:23,599
Speaker 1: I guess and said, Mickey said, there's people out there.

1064
01:31:24,520 --> 01:31:28,800
Speaker 1: They're just dying to hear your music sounding like it

1065
01:31:28,840 --> 01:31:34,720
Speaker 1: should sound, you know. And gradually I I sort of

1066
01:31:35,800 --> 01:31:43,519
Speaker 1: confidence started to grow and we put this Foreigner Mark

1067
01:31:43,600 --> 01:31:50,080
Speaker 1: two together and from then on it was a slog

1068
01:31:51,120 --> 01:31:55,559
Speaker 1: to get us back to some kind of prestige, you know,

1069
01:31:55,760 --> 01:32:03,439
Speaker 1: some kind of prestigious position. And um, we've the band,

1070
01:32:03,600 --> 01:32:08,000
Speaker 1: this band in its current form, it's been around now

1071
01:32:08,080 --> 01:32:13,519
Speaker 1: for pretty much twelve years. So we're no longer. We've

1072
01:32:13,560 --> 01:32:18,400
Speaker 1: fought the fight and we've we're no one right now.

1073
01:32:18,439 --> 01:32:21,240
Speaker 1: But you don't do every gig right, When do you

1074
01:32:21,280 --> 01:32:25,679
Speaker 1: decide to work? When I'm in good health and good shape.

1075
01:32:25,880 --> 01:32:29,400
Speaker 1: How how is your health? It's it's pretty good. I

1076
01:32:29,439 --> 01:32:39,240
Speaker 1: can't complain feeling great right now, just not anything unusual ealthwise.

1077
01:32:41,120 --> 01:32:46,360
Speaker 1: Several years ago, I did have some heart surgery, but

1078
01:32:46,479 --> 01:32:50,000
Speaker 1: that's all fine, okay. One of my favorite songs is

1079
01:32:50,040 --> 01:32:52,840
Speaker 1: from the movie Still Crazy, which I love the flame

1080
01:32:52,920 --> 01:32:56,760
Speaker 1: still burns. Yeah, what is the story there? Well, it's

1081
01:32:56,800 --> 01:33:00,960
Speaker 1: a it's um, it's really about a. Did you see

1082
01:33:00,960 --> 01:33:02,960
Speaker 1: the movie? Oh yeah, see the movie multiple times. I'd

1083
01:33:02,960 --> 01:33:04,439
Speaker 1: love it. But how did it come together that you

1084
01:33:04,479 --> 01:33:07,599
Speaker 1: wrote the songs for the movie. Well, I had known

1085
01:33:08,720 --> 01:33:14,640
Speaker 1: Brian Gibson, the director, and I also knew here le

1086
01:33:14,800 --> 01:33:22,800
Speaker 1: Freny and Dick and his partner Dick. And I got

1087
01:33:22,800 --> 01:33:26,920
Speaker 1: a call from Brian saying I haven't seen him since

1088
01:33:26,920 --> 01:33:30,160
Speaker 1: we he did the video for I Want to Know

1089
01:33:30,160 --> 01:33:37,880
Speaker 1: What Love Us? And he said yeah, great. Um, he said,

1090
01:33:37,920 --> 01:33:41,200
Speaker 1: I have a little problem I've got I'm finishing this

1091
01:33:41,400 --> 01:33:50,560
Speaker 1: um movie I'm directing, and the songs aren't working. And

1092
01:33:50,600 --> 01:33:57,840
Speaker 1: I said, okay, what's the time frame here? And he said, well,

1093
01:33:59,800 --> 01:34:04,160
Speaker 1: he said, if you could come up with eight songs

1094
01:34:04,240 --> 01:34:10,720
Speaker 1: in week, that would be good. Yeah. I said, yeah,

1095
01:34:10,920 --> 01:34:18,320
Speaker 1: really would be But we managed to cut it down

1096
01:34:18,360 --> 01:34:21,840
Speaker 1: to about six. I think I wrote, well, yeah, I

1097
01:34:22,160 --> 01:34:28,599
Speaker 1: keep going. Um, I mean the film once I started

1098
01:34:28,600 --> 01:34:32,160
Speaker 1: to see the rushes and it was hilarious, you know,

1099
01:34:32,439 --> 01:34:36,200
Speaker 1: and I love that movie. We've we've done some versions

1100
01:34:36,280 --> 01:34:38,559
Speaker 1: of frames steel better, I know, but I will Okay,

1101
01:34:38,560 --> 01:34:40,559
Speaker 1: that's what I because I know you released a version

1102
01:34:40,960 --> 01:34:44,840
Speaker 1: which I've listened to. Because in America anyway, this movie

1103
01:34:44,880 --> 01:34:48,200
Speaker 1: soundtrack never came out, so in the Napster era, I

1104
01:34:48,280 --> 01:34:52,599
Speaker 1: had to download those, okay, and I prefer the version

1105
01:34:52,760 --> 01:34:56,840
Speaker 1: from the movie to the foreigner version. So who is

1106
01:34:56,880 --> 01:35:01,040
Speaker 1: singing on that one? And did you produce it? The

1107
01:35:01,080 --> 01:35:05,120
Speaker 1: one from the movie. Um, it's a guy called Jimmy

1108
01:35:05,200 --> 01:35:11,960
Speaker 1: Nail who was in the movie. So he's singing, yes, okay.

1109
01:35:12,000 --> 01:35:14,400
Speaker 1: And then who produced thing that went to a number

1110
01:35:14,400 --> 01:35:20,000
Speaker 1: one in England? Oh? Really? Yeah? And who produced it? Um?

1111
01:35:20,040 --> 01:35:22,400
Speaker 1: I can't remember who it was. So you weren't involved,

1112
01:35:22,560 --> 01:35:25,680
Speaker 1: not in the mixing, but in the recording. You were

1113
01:35:26,439 --> 01:35:31,960
Speaker 1: well in in I was working at songs same time

1114
01:35:32,000 --> 01:35:35,560
Speaker 1: as we were, you know, basically trying to fit with

1115
01:35:35,600 --> 01:35:39,000
Speaker 1: the lyrics right right, right right, because you had such

1116
01:35:39,040 --> 01:35:44,520
Speaker 1: little time. Okay. Now, your step son is usually successful

1117
01:35:44,520 --> 01:35:47,960
Speaker 1: in music. How did that come together? Do you learn

1118
01:35:47,960 --> 01:35:56,120
Speaker 1: anything from you? Yes? Of course he Actually he credits

1119
01:35:56,160 --> 01:35:59,680
Speaker 1: me quite a lot, which I'm you know, very this

1120
01:35:59,840 --> 01:36:04,200
Speaker 1: is Mark Ronson we're talking. Yeah, yeah, Well, he's always

1121
01:36:04,200 --> 01:36:09,800
Speaker 1: been a huge music buff and you know, in the

1122
01:36:09,840 --> 01:36:14,600
Speaker 1: early hip hop days he was he was you know,

1123
01:36:15,400 --> 01:36:23,880
Speaker 1: completely taken with it, and then he started spinning and

1124
01:36:23,920 --> 01:36:30,559
Speaker 1: then he went into I'm trying to think of the evolution. Yeah,

1125
01:36:30,600 --> 01:36:36,400
Speaker 1: he had a rock band, so his tastes were in

1126
01:36:36,439 --> 01:36:40,400
Speaker 1: a way similar to mine, and everything everything's got something

1127
01:36:40,760 --> 01:36:47,960
Speaker 1: about it. And he's just worked very hard. You know,

1128
01:36:48,040 --> 01:36:52,679
Speaker 1: he's a workaholic, which worries me a bit sometimes. But

1129
01:36:54,920 --> 01:36:59,479
Speaker 1: you know, he's a great kid, great guy, brother, and

1130
01:37:01,439 --> 01:37:07,679
Speaker 1: he's just a really special presidency has about him. And

1131
01:37:10,240 --> 01:37:16,920
Speaker 1: he's a sincere obviously very talented and well did you

1132
01:37:16,960 --> 01:37:20,160
Speaker 1: give him tips either growing up or when he went professional. Well,

1133
01:37:20,240 --> 01:37:22,320
Speaker 1: he used to come to you know, I had a

1134
01:37:22,400 --> 01:37:25,400
Speaker 1: studio in the house, so he'd hang out there quite

1135
01:37:25,400 --> 01:37:32,479
Speaker 1: a bit. Um he came to sessions. Ah, just picked

1136
01:37:32,520 --> 01:37:37,800
Speaker 1: it up that way, I think really And but he

1137
01:37:37,920 --> 01:37:44,679
Speaker 1: was complete music buff and you know that soul period

1138
01:37:44,920 --> 01:37:49,120
Speaker 1: in the early late early seventies, that kind of stuff

1139
01:37:49,160 --> 01:37:55,360
Speaker 1: and the Philly sound. And he's a student. I think

1140
01:37:56,240 --> 01:38:01,280
Speaker 1: The Band is one of his favorite bands. Which band

1141
01:38:01,400 --> 01:38:04,200
Speaker 1: is the band? The Band? Yes, as I said, Eric

1142
01:38:04,200 --> 01:38:07,400
Speaker 1: Clapton wanted to join them. Whenever there's a new movie

1143
01:38:08,120 --> 01:38:13,679
Speaker 1: coming out and Robbie Robertson has a new album. But okay,

1144
01:38:14,000 --> 01:38:18,560
Speaker 1: you divorced his mother and then years later got remarried.

1145
01:38:18,600 --> 01:38:24,280
Speaker 1: What's up with that? What's up? Indeed? Well, I think

1146
01:38:24,360 --> 01:38:34,320
Speaker 1: we had we had never fallen out of love. Um.

1147
01:38:34,400 --> 01:38:38,680
Speaker 1: I think it was I have to take a responsibility

1148
01:38:38,760 --> 01:38:43,160
Speaker 1: for some of it, definitely. Um, I was a little

1149
01:38:43,160 --> 01:38:50,040
Speaker 1: out of control. I had a bit of a drinking problem. Um,

1150
01:38:50,080 --> 01:38:54,200
Speaker 1: but I you know, I I've been working on that

1151
01:38:54,280 --> 01:38:56,560
Speaker 1: for a long time. Do you drink it all? Now?

1152
01:38:58,280 --> 01:39:01,640
Speaker 1: Have you fallen off the wagon since stopped or consistently?

1153
01:39:01,960 --> 01:39:06,680
Speaker 1: What got you to stop? I just think I realized

1154
01:39:06,800 --> 01:39:12,479
Speaker 1: I was hurting myself, not just myself, but my kids,

1155
01:39:13,479 --> 01:39:21,479
Speaker 1: my wife, everybody family. I was that's a different guy,

1156
01:39:23,240 --> 01:39:27,000
Speaker 1: you know this other person that really how long did

1157
01:39:27,000 --> 01:39:30,000
Speaker 1: that go off for? How long were you a different guy? Well?

1158
01:39:31,160 --> 01:39:34,840
Speaker 1: I realized I started drinking, you know, when I was six,

1159
01:39:35,200 --> 01:39:41,240
Speaker 1: of course, right in England beer horrible beer. But then um,

1160
01:39:43,160 --> 01:39:46,080
Speaker 1: when I went to France, I became you know, evity

1161
01:39:46,160 --> 01:39:54,439
Speaker 1: into wine, you know, rich food. Um, but it was

1162
01:39:54,520 --> 01:40:02,200
Speaker 1: alcohol pretty much. And m you know, I look back

1163
01:40:02,240 --> 01:40:05,800
Speaker 1: on it, and I do have to. I've got a

1164
01:40:05,800 --> 01:40:10,960
Speaker 1: lot of gratitude for everybody that kind of stuck in

1165
01:40:11,000 --> 01:40:17,200
Speaker 1: there and stuck by me and have helped me. And

1166
01:40:17,320 --> 01:40:22,599
Speaker 1: I've got a relationship, a very good relationship with my children,

1167
01:40:23,800 --> 01:40:31,799
Speaker 1: and they were at times scared of me and those

1168
01:40:31,960 --> 01:40:35,719
Speaker 1: kind of things. You know, you think I've made them scared?

1169
01:40:37,120 --> 01:40:40,639
Speaker 1: How the hell did I do that? You know? And

1170
01:40:43,760 --> 01:40:49,479
Speaker 1: I've done some soul searching and and try and remember

1171
01:40:49,520 --> 01:40:54,679
Speaker 1: that whenever I do, I can't have a glass of wine.

1172
01:40:54,800 --> 01:40:59,960
Speaker 1: Even so, how did you stop? I went to rehab?

1173
01:41:00,360 --> 01:41:03,479
Speaker 1: But who convinced you to go to rehab? Finally, at

1174
01:41:03,520 --> 01:41:06,240
Speaker 1: the end of the day, it was Eric Clapton really

1175
01:41:06,320 --> 01:41:10,640
Speaker 1: invited me down to cross Roads. Yeah, did he know

1176
01:41:10,760 --> 01:41:12,640
Speaker 1: that you had a drinking problem where people had told you?

1177
01:41:12,800 --> 01:41:15,080
Speaker 1: People had told him? And so you go to rehab?

1178
01:41:15,080 --> 01:41:20,200
Speaker 1: How long do you go? For? Month? Month? And when

1179
01:41:20,240 --> 01:41:24,240
Speaker 1: you come out? Because I stopped drinking myself. This was

1180
01:41:24,600 --> 01:41:27,120
Speaker 1: before it was cool to not drink at a bar,

1181
01:41:28,080 --> 01:41:33,080
Speaker 1: and although I didn't slip, it was very hard for

1182
01:41:33,120 --> 01:41:35,400
Speaker 1: a while not drinking. Like your world life is built

1183
01:41:35,400 --> 01:41:42,599
Speaker 1: around it. So it is. It's a complete readjustment. Okay,

1184
01:41:42,640 --> 01:41:45,360
Speaker 1: just going back one chapter because I discussed this with Bud.

1185
01:41:46,439 --> 01:41:48,240
Speaker 1: What's your favorite? I want to know what love is

1186
01:41:48,280 --> 01:41:55,000
Speaker 1: you're waiting for a girl like you. Um boy, that's

1187
01:41:55,080 --> 01:42:01,880
Speaker 1: a tricky one. Um M. When you for a girl

1188
01:42:02,000 --> 01:42:07,400
Speaker 1: like you had a very emotional pool on me. It

1189
01:42:07,600 --> 01:42:12,760
Speaker 1: was I don't know what it was, but it was

1190
01:42:12,800 --> 01:42:18,120
Speaker 1: a song that I wrote with Luke we basically written

1191
01:42:18,120 --> 01:42:21,960
Speaker 1: in five minutes. I was playing chords I never played

1192
01:42:22,000 --> 01:42:28,080
Speaker 1: before what I was doing, but somehow it worked, you know,

1193
01:42:28,400 --> 01:42:38,080
Speaker 1: and it became such an emotional, emotionally charged song for me.

1194
01:42:38,840 --> 01:42:41,200
Speaker 1: I couldn't even at one point, I couldn't even be

1195
01:42:41,240 --> 01:42:46,840
Speaker 1: in the control room without losing it. And it had

1196
01:42:46,920 --> 01:42:52,439
Speaker 1: a mysterious power. Well that's my favorite too, But was

1197
01:42:52,720 --> 01:42:55,120
Speaker 1: but was more into uh, I want to know what

1198
01:42:55,200 --> 01:42:57,760
Speaker 1: love is? But I used to argue with them, you know,

1199
01:42:57,800 --> 01:43:00,320
Speaker 1: I had by other reasons in that want to know

1200
01:43:00,360 --> 01:43:03,400
Speaker 1: what love is a haunting and I don't know more

1201
01:43:03,400 --> 01:43:05,280
Speaker 1: of a rock field. I mean, I love first of all,

1202
01:43:05,360 --> 01:43:09,160
Speaker 1: came out first, so I knew it so and an event.

1203
01:43:09,200 --> 01:43:11,479
Speaker 1: It's been great having you here, Mick. Thanks for telling

1204
01:43:11,560 --> 01:43:15,400
Speaker 1: us the whole story, okay, and I think you remember

1205
01:43:15,520 --> 01:43:17,960
Speaker 1: quite a lot. So until next time, it's Bob Left

1206
01:43:17,960 --> 01:43:18,240
Speaker 1: says