Speaker 1: Now here's a highlight from Coast to Coast AM on iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And welcome back to Coast to Coast. We are back
Speaker 2: with Harvey Kuberneck, author of many books including Turn Up
Speaker 2: the Radio, Canyon of Dreams, Docs, Dot Rock, Jimmy Hendrix,
Speaker 2: Voodoo Child, and a number of others. He is an
Speaker 2: expert on the music world and is back with us
Speaker 2: on Coast to Coast. Hey, Harvey, how you.
Speaker 3: Been doing great? Just always delighted to be invited to
Speaker 3: your program, and I know your listeners occasionally like to
Speaker 3: take a little departure from area fifty one to Harvey
Speaker 3: fifty one.
Speaker 2: Exactly, and we're going to do that. You're still out
Speaker 2: there on the West Coast.
Speaker 3: I sure am.
Speaker 2: I'm in Saint Louis. But had I been back in
Speaker 2: Los Angeles, we would have had you physically in the studio.
Speaker 3: Well, you know, I sort of. I spent a lot
Speaker 3: of time going by your studio in Sherman Oaks, California.
Speaker 3: We'll do it in the future.
Speaker 2: We will do that. Indeed, how did you get so
Speaker 2: involved in music? Harvey?
Speaker 3: You know, it's the question I'm asked a lot. A
Speaker 3: part of it is geographically, you know, I'm a native
Speaker 3: of Los Angeles. I'm born in I'm born literally in
Speaker 3: East Hollywood on the corner of like Sunset and Alvarado,
Speaker 3: overlooking the Hollywood One on one Freeway at the Queen
Speaker 3: of Angels Hospital, and I start the journey there. And
Speaker 3: at the time Los Angeles, and I don't think people
Speaker 3: really realized that, although I certainly detail it in my
Speaker 3: book Turn Up the Radio. You know, there were many
Speaker 3: R and B radio stations in LA in the fifties,
Speaker 3: way into the sixties. There were jazz radio stations. There
Speaker 3: was so much music. It was a thriving, vibrant community.
Speaker 3: You know, sorry, folks, it all wasn't New York City
Speaker 3: and Chicago. And you're just inundated with even before the
Speaker 3: transistor radio arrived. It's just blaring in front of you.
Speaker 3: And then, you know, with my parents and my brother Kenneth,
Speaker 3: I end up, you know, leaving like downtown Los Angeles
Speaker 3: and Coliseum Street Elementary School and Crenshaw Village and Merk Park,
Speaker 3: and I end up in Culver City right near MGM Studios,
Speaker 3: and somehow end up in West Hollywood going to high
Speaker 3: school all through the late sixties. So it's so in
Speaker 3: front of me, and you know, maybe I've become this
Speaker 3: messenger and I mirror it out to other people as well.
Speaker 3: It's just been part of my DNA.
Speaker 2: Good for you. Did you ever know our old friend
Speaker 2: who's passed away, our Gary Patterson?
Speaker 3: No, I know we have a mutual friend in the
Speaker 3: late Russ Reagan, but I didn't know the other guy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was good. He did a great job. You
Speaker 2: reminded me of you and just so excitable about the
Speaker 2: music scene in the world and stuff like that.
Speaker 3: Well, it's been my salvation, you know, you know, we
Speaker 3: turned to music, you know, in happiness and decision making
Speaker 3: situations just following you know, the Beach Boys. God only knows,
Speaker 3: you know, I've been privileged to know Brian Wilson for
Speaker 3: half a century. He must have done twelve interviews with him,
Speaker 3: and I even, I mean, I've been fortunate. I was
Speaker 3: able to say, Brian, what is it about? God only knows?
Speaker 3: What is it? Why does it still impact fifty seven
Speaker 3: years after you did it? And he'd say something like,
Speaker 3: when I first did it, I was wondering would radio
Speaker 3: ever play a song that had God in the title?
Speaker 3: And then here I am being greeted or following the
Speaker 3: declaration as you're using it as interstitial music. But think
Speaker 3: about him, you know, having concerns almost two thirds of
Speaker 3: a century ago about a song title, as well as
Speaker 3: concerns about would the record label actually let the word
Speaker 3: God be you know, in the package, artwork and everything.
Speaker 3: We've come a long.
Speaker 2: Way, I think, yeah, we sure have. Well, let's have
Speaker 2: some fun talking about music. We'll take calls next hour
Speaker 2: as well, Harvey. And you know, I'm a product of Detroit.
Speaker 2: I'm a Motown guy. I've seen it all in Motown
Speaker 2: and they continued to do a great job. Barry Gordy
Speaker 2: still kick him.
Speaker 3: Oh. I was just at a Motown event a week
Speaker 3: ago and they honored Marvin Gay in the fifty third
Speaker 3: anniversary of his album Let's Get It On. Robinson was
Speaker 3: on the panel at the Grammy Museum in LA And
Speaker 3: I spent some time with Smokey. I was just filmed
Speaker 3: for a documentary with Smokey, but I spent some time
Speaker 3: with him, and it became even more clear to me
Speaker 3: what the city of Detroit gave to all of us.
Speaker 3: Sure we know about general motors, and I mean people
Speaker 3: like you, you know about the Detroit Tigers or al
Speaker 3: Kayline or you know what.
Speaker 2: I'm sure in all that world, but the music scene
Speaker 2: look out well.
Speaker 3: Even Smokey said on the panel about Detroit and especially Motown,
Speaker 3: it could never happen again. I'm sure it's a brand now.
Speaker 3: And Barry Gordy, who's ninety two or ninety three, he's
Speaker 3: still involved. It's still He's still involved emotionally and fiscally.
Speaker 3: But the music still continues, whether it be TV shows
Speaker 3: or soundtracks. And I mean for somebody like you who
Speaker 3: was there with Casey case and we're hearing it like
Speaker 3: with the DJ's name was like Robin Seymour back there,
Speaker 3: you know, yeah, I mean you were ground floor watching
Speaker 3: something that's really informed the world and brought us all
Speaker 3: closer together. And the music it just even in streaming
Speaker 3: platforms or even you know, when you hear it, even
Speaker 3: in elevators or something. Every time you hear a Motown recording,
Speaker 3: you discover something different about it. And it was our
Speaker 3: friend Russ Reagan who worked for Motown and Joe Batten
Speaker 3: and it was involved with, you know, bringing Motown to
Speaker 3: the West Coast. He was a promo man and worked
Speaker 3: with Barry Gordy sixty to sixty three. He introduced the
Speaker 3: world to like Please Mister Postman by the Marvelette. Russ
Speaker 3: said he learned one thing from Barry. You can always
Speaker 3: smell the opening of a motown record by the hooks
Speaker 3: you you get brought into it still connects.
Speaker 2: It really does. We had Smokey Robinson on the show
Speaker 2: The Coast The Coast program several months ago Harvey, and
Speaker 2: he was just wonderful.
Speaker 3: Well, what was that like for you? That's oh, that
Speaker 3: was as that's your soul. Brother.
Speaker 2: I try not to get so excitable like a kid,
Speaker 2: but deep down inside it's there.
Speaker 3: I mean, I mean, listen, I've done interviews with him.
Speaker 3: I just did a documentary, I was filmed with him.
Speaker 3: I've seen him in markets. I then I said, smoke
Speaker 3: I need about thirty seconds with you. I've got to
Speaker 3: ask you a question. He said, no, what do you need, man?
Speaker 3: What do you need? And I just said, that song
Speaker 3: Tears of a Clown yep. And I just said when
Speaker 3: I heard that, when I was I don't know, seventeen
Speaker 3: or eighteen, I never heard somebody reference and use the
Speaker 3: term pagliachi in the song lyric. You know, clown and
Speaker 3: he just laughed and he said, well, why didn't you
Speaker 3: get a thesaurus and look it up?
Speaker 1: Hew?
Speaker 2: You was classic. And he's touring now.
Speaker 3: He's playing He had COVID a while ago, but he's
Speaker 3: rebooked a bunch of dates and he's working until next year.
Speaker 3: And he's featured in a wonderful documentary that's currently broadcast
Speaker 3: on Showtime TV called Hitsville The Making of Motown, And
Speaker 3: it's just so fantastic to hear him discuss songs and songwritings.
Speaker 3: And I mean, I know, you know, Barry always said
Speaker 3: Smokey is the guy, because Barry started as a songwriter.
Speaker 3: But Smokey the wisdom of the songs, the direction you
Speaker 3: take from the lyrics. And he had a lot of
Speaker 3: co writers and people who worked with him. But I mean,
Speaker 3: you were their ground floor, hearing shop around and hearing
Speaker 3: these these seminal audiosnic gems that changed the world. But
Speaker 3: you in Detroit, who you know sings and understands music.
Speaker 3: It must be amazing for you as you see how
Speaker 3: Motown expanded globally because to somebody like you, it's something
Speaker 3: on what w K L, c W or whatever that
Speaker 3: that station was over there. Look how it spread.
Speaker 2: Yes, Bob was the one who had played the Beatles
Speaker 2: first song.
Speaker 3: Right, and was Georgie Woods a disc jockey over there?
Speaker 3: I think it was more Philadelphia. But what a network
Speaker 3: of disc jockeys that ushered the music to us?
Speaker 2: Oh my god. Absolutely, We've got a couple of great
Speaker 2: artists who listened to Coast as often as they can.
Speaker 2: Billy Gibbons from zz Top and John Fogerty and great guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and their very roots, you know, driven, you know,
Speaker 3: artists and performers, and they their lives began, you know,
Speaker 3: on the AM radio dial as kids and his fans.
Speaker 3: And look how they were ushered into the world too.
Speaker 2: Absolutely. Let's talk about some artists that are not with
Speaker 2: us right now. Johnny Cash, what's happening there?
Speaker 3: Well, it's September third, mark the twentyth anniversary of Johnny
Speaker 3: Cash's physical passing. It's been twenty years that long already. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I have a bond with Johnny partially because we share
Speaker 3: a February twenty sixth, you know, day at date of birth,
Speaker 3: and maybe I saw him in June twenty five thirty
Speaker 3: times over, you know, forty or fifty years. But Johnny Cash,
Speaker 3: there's a book coming out in November, a Life in Lyrics,
Speaker 3: and starting very soon and going into next year, there's
Speaker 3: a very there's an estate authorized touring exhibition of Johnny Cash,
Speaker 3: like the Johnny Cash Concert Experience, which his son, John
Speaker 3: Carter Cash is very involved in. That's touring all over
Speaker 3: the United States where you hear Johnny's music. There are
Speaker 3: excerpts from his television program and so it's not an
Speaker 3: oldies but goodies kind of show. It's more of an
Speaker 3: event and a tribute and a salute to Johnny. But
Speaker 3: he's actually involved as far as you know, products and
Speaker 3: recordings and in videotapes. So Johnny continues, the records keep going.
Speaker 3: His impact is still there, and you know it's to
Speaker 3: me he was always like a voice of America. It
Speaker 3: still resonates to me.
Speaker 2: I will always remember when he was at fulsome Prison.
Speaker 3: What I have three different configurations of the life from
Speaker 3: Fulsome Prison album. And you know, you start seeing people
Speaker 3: like Johnny Cash, you know, initially they're on TV or
Speaker 3: you see them touring, and then there's documentaries or in
Speaker 3: the case of Johnny Cash, there's you know, walk the
Speaker 3: Line theatrical movies, just like Elvis. All of a sudden,
Speaker 3: there's biopics on Elvis. You know, you're seeing the growth
Speaker 3: of this Southern music much like Detroit that reached global ears.
Speaker 2: Well, that is so true. It is so true. And
Speaker 2: I'll always remember Johnny Cash coming out going Hello, everybody,
Speaker 2: I'm Johnny Cash.
Speaker 3: That's how it all started.
Speaker 2: What a talent, I mean, what's beautiful? What caught him on?
Speaker 2: Because initially when you first hear him, you know, he's
Speaker 2: kind of laid back, He's not like an Elvis, but
Speaker 2: he caught on what sparked his career.
Speaker 3: You know, he had such drive and determination to get
Speaker 3: his music out there, and he was also guided by
Speaker 3: maybe some of the right people, initially Sam Phillips at
Speaker 3: Sun Records and then ending up at Columbia Records and
Speaker 3: working with the producer Don Law and he you know
Speaker 3: what I always find interesting about Johnny Cash, and I've
Speaker 3: written a lot about him. There's a big article I've
Speaker 3: just posted on him on a Kavehollywood dot com. I
Speaker 3: don't think people realize from like late nineteen fifty nine
Speaker 3: or sixty to nineteen sixty six, Johnny Cash was based
Speaker 3: in southern California, kind of living in the Ventura area,
Speaker 3: even had an office on Hollywood Boulevard. You don't really
Speaker 3: realize he did six years in southern California. It wasn't
Speaker 3: always you know, Memphis or Nashville. And so he was
Speaker 3: again he's coming in the heart of Hollywood or making
Speaker 3: records when he's living out here, and he was always
Speaker 3: like fighting for the underdog and having concerns about Native
Speaker 3: American rights. I mean, he's just part of the fabric
Speaker 3: of our world.
Speaker 2: That is truly remarkable. I do the first Sunday of
Speaker 2: every month on Coast to Coast Harvey, and I end
Speaker 2: the program with Disturbed with David the Diamond, the singer
Speaker 2: Yes of singing sounds of Silence, and that is so haunting.
Speaker 2: It gives me goosebumps every time I hear it.
Speaker 3: And when we hear Johnny Cash, you know, it might
Speaker 3: be I walk the Line, or it might be a
Speaker 3: boy named Sue or some of the other things. You
Speaker 3: actually stop for a minute when you are confronted hearing
Speaker 3: the voice because there's this like a he's sort of
Speaker 3: like this guide. I don't know, I guess for me,
Speaker 3: you know, when I'm six, seven or eight, and Johnny
Speaker 3: Cash is in the newspaper and I and I realized,
Speaker 3: you know, they used to listen to people's day to
Speaker 3: birth or where they lived or sometimes there's street addresses
Speaker 3: in the old newspapers. And when I realized that he
Speaker 3: had the same birthdays as me, oh, Fat's Domino. You know,
Speaker 3: guy said, wow, you know who's Fats Domino. I got
Speaker 3: to invest in Johnny Cash. We we're like February people.
Speaker 3: I even said that the Smokey Robinson he said, hey, man,
Speaker 3: I said, both born in February, and he'd go nineteenth
Speaker 3: and I'll go twenty six. I know, it's sort of
Speaker 3: a comical bond we have, but it brings people together.
Speaker 3: And so Johnny this twenty years since he left, it
Speaker 3: kind of shows you how quick life goes as well.
Speaker 2: Absolutely, it's truly remarkable. One of my favorite Johnny Cash
Speaker 2: songs is it Ain't Me Babe. That's one of his classics.
Speaker 3: Well, he did that at the Newport Folk Festival. It
Speaker 3: was a cover of a Bob Dylan song, singing out
Speaker 3: with June right yes and kind. I saw him do
Speaker 3: it the Troubater one time in West Hollywood and he
Speaker 3: brought a lot of people's songs forward. You know, he
Speaker 3: kind of exposed people like Chris Christofferson and popularized Bob Dylan.
Speaker 3: Plus he was a very early supporter of Bob Dylan
Speaker 3: at Columbia Records when Bob Dylan was first on the
Speaker 3: label and his debut album didn't do very well, and
Speaker 3: Johnny really lobbied for the executives and the promotional people
Speaker 3: to really stick with this guy. And when Cash had
Speaker 3: his you know, Johnny cash TV show on ABC between
Speaker 3: sixty nine and seventy one, Bob Dylan was the first
Speaker 3: guest on his TV series. And that stuff's all available
Speaker 3: like on a double DVD. I encourage people to check
Speaker 3: out that the Johnny Cashow DVD is just wonderful to
Speaker 3: see the kind of people that Johnny put on a show,
Speaker 3: from the Monkeys to Ray Charles. I mean, just think
Speaker 3: about him and Buffy, Saint Marie. I mean, just giving
Speaker 3: forum to these kind of people. This is a nineteen
Speaker 3: sixty nine a year. This is a pre cable TV world.
Speaker 3: There's only three like networks happening. Ronnie brought people to
Speaker 3: our attention.
Speaker 2: You're going to get a kick out of this. I
Speaker 2: met a couple months ago Paul Anka, Well.
Speaker 3: Where do you want to start? From Diana on down?
Speaker 2: I mean plus my way. He wrote that for Frank Sinatra.
Speaker 3: Who did He is beyond a survivor. I think he's
Speaker 3: also overlooked in history. I've had some conversations years ago
Speaker 3: with him because people forget what a businessman he has been,
Speaker 3: whether it be artist management or starting as a teenager
Speaker 3: from Canada, and you know, and I also think maybe,
Speaker 3: I mean I wasn't present, but when you're coming from
Speaker 3: Canada and in your Lebanese right with Elevenese, I think yes,
Speaker 3: I mean, I'm not going to say they were inherent,
Speaker 3: you know, odds against him, but he comes to like
Speaker 3: Culver City or his first record label as a teenager,
Speaker 3: and he ends up being the songwriter. He's a teen
Speaker 3: idol initially with these wonderful puts your head on my shoulder,
Speaker 3: and then he becomes this Vegas icon and he's still
Speaker 3: out there touring and you realize, you know what, the
Speaker 3: guy has had a sixty five year old career. You know,
Speaker 3: when he started in the fifties, people always sort of
Speaker 3: looked at rock and roll and said, oh, it's a
Speaker 3: two or three year career. Maybe go back to college,
Speaker 3: get a day job, and look at him two thirds
Speaker 3: of a century later, just out there in doing it.
Speaker 3: And he has a very devoted fan base.
Speaker 2: Oh absolutely, And he's a class guy and a nice
Speaker 2: guy too, Harvey. Yes, when we come back after the break,
Speaker 2: let's talk a little bit about Wayne Newton and how
Speaker 2: old is Mick Jagger? Eighty eighty years old and he's
Speaker 2: still singing. They're coming out with a new album in
Speaker 2: another month or two, aren't they.
Speaker 3: In late October and today they issued a single from
Speaker 3: this album. Rock and roll isn't just for kids anymore.
Speaker 3: There are grandfathers on stage performing.
Speaker 1: Listen to more Coast to Coast AM every weeknight at
Speaker 1: one am Eastern, and go to Coast to coastam dot
Speaker 1: com for more