Speaker 1: Off the Record is a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to another bonus episode of Off the Record.
Speaker 1: I'm your host, Jordan Runt Talk. Thanks so much for listening.
Speaker 1: We're taking a brief pause from our story this week.
Speaker 1: We'll be back with our final chapter on David Bowie
Speaker 1: next Monday, May three. But today we have something very
Speaker 1: special in store, a conversation with the mighty Carlos Alomar,
Speaker 1: a funk guitar icon and one of David's most crucial
Speaker 1: musical collaborators. They first came together in New York in
Speaker 1: four when David was producing songs for the British singer Lulu.
Speaker 1: Carlos was working as a session guitarist at the time
Speaker 1: and was called into play on the recording dates. The
Speaker 1: two got to talking about soul and R and B,
Speaker 1: which was something that well, you could say, Carlos knew
Speaker 1: a thing or two about. He cut his teeth as
Speaker 1: one of the youngest players ever in the Apollo Theater's
Speaker 1: house band, leading the stints backing James Brown, Chuck Berry
Speaker 1: and Wilson Pickett Oh while still in his teens. Carlos's
Speaker 1: influence helped inspire David to take his famous trip to
Speaker 1: Philadelphia to record the soul Steve to Young Americans record.
Speaker 1: To get the sound, David tapped Carlos, who in turn
Speaker 1: assembled a group of players that included his wife, singer
Speaker 1: Robin Clark, and also his old school friend Luther Vandros.
Speaker 1: So began a musical partnership that would last nearly thirty
Speaker 1: years and a friendship that would last until David's death.
Speaker 1: Carlos played on eleven of David's albums, more than any
Speaker 1: other musician aside from pianist Mike Garson. These include classics
Speaker 1: like Station a Station, Scary Monsters, and the Berlin Trilogy.
Speaker 1: He was a member of the so called Damn Trio,
Speaker 1: the rhythm section that gave a funk edge to David's
Speaker 1: electro experimentations with Brian Eno. Carlos also accompanied David on
Speaker 1: numerous world tours, often acting as musical director. He even
Speaker 1: co wrote Bowie's first number one, Fame, along with David
Speaker 1: and a guy called John Lennon. His list of non
Speaker 1: Bowie accomplishments is formidable. He's played on something like thirty
Speaker 1: two gold or platinum records by the likes of Paul McCartney,
Speaker 1: Mick Jagger, Carly Simon, Mark Ronson, and Alicia Keys. Though
Speaker 1: insanely busy, he was gracious enough to take time out
Speaker 1: of his weekend to speak with me and gonna reflect
Speaker 1: on his music and memories with David. I hope you
Speaker 1: enjoy before we dive into all your history with David
Speaker 1: and everything. What is your your Desert Island number one guitar?
Speaker 1: I gotta ask. Yeah, Uh yeah, I only played with
Speaker 1: Bowie and I've only used it with Bowie, so it
Speaker 1: goes from the beginning to the end. So I'll probably
Speaker 1: do very in the same way, untouched by other hands
Speaker 1: other than Bowie. One of my my small ship gets
Speaker 1: to the man, you know, personal do you? Yeah? You
Speaker 1: still keep it in a special place in your house
Speaker 1: and no, it's deep deep in the in the in
Speaker 1: the cave here in my place, all insured, and the
Speaker 1: appreciation is going up and up and up. And leave
Speaker 1: it to my daughter one day. It's a great little guitar.
Speaker 1: I use it for songwriting and composition. It just has
Speaker 1: because it was made for me. My hand just slips
Speaker 1: into it and uh, you know, you have one of
Speaker 1: those guitars that you can just twank, you know, around
Speaker 1: in the house and it just feels right and it
Speaker 1: fits your fingers and everything is right there, and so
Speaker 1: sometimes you kind of feel like I feel a little
Speaker 1: sad today. Let me take out my old Olympic and
Speaker 1: just it mavered a little bit. It's you know, it's
Speaker 1: kind of friendly in its home, and I don't have
Speaker 1: to record with it. I just kind of use it
Speaker 1: sometimes to inspire just for you. Yeah, that's the best.
Speaker 1: That's the best, precious. There's certain esoterics, like for my students,
Speaker 1: I actually asked them to please give their guitar and name.
Speaker 1: And there's something about when you cherish something that you
Speaker 1: actually want to. I mean, you have a cat who
Speaker 1: won't give you the time of day, but you will
Speaker 1: give it a name, and you know you cherish that cat,
Speaker 1: even if it scratches you. Really just give a ship.
Speaker 1: He doesn't even know your name, but that's just the
Speaker 1: nature of the animal. I think that once my students
Speaker 1: start giving their instruments names, then they go to them
Speaker 1: a little bit more. That's necessary. So tell me how
Speaker 1: did this journey start for you? How did the son
Speaker 1: of a Pentecostal minister wind up playing with with the
Speaker 1: chuck Berry and James Brown and Wilson picking not to
Speaker 1: mention David. Well, after all these years, you have to
Speaker 1: kind of turn it around, and it's kind of critical
Speaker 1: think and say what was it like for them working
Speaker 1: with me? So then I have to kind of look
Speaker 1: back and say, well, look, I kind of started this
Speaker 1: this guitar thing because I only know a few chords,
Speaker 1: and so I started developing this way of playing that
Speaker 1: allowed me to play chords. But Jimmy Hendrix inspired me
Speaker 1: by saying, do you know how much damage I could
Speaker 1: do with one loose finger? And so I realized, although
Speaker 1: I'm playing a cord, I got a loose finger. So
Speaker 1: I started like playing rhythm lead, and it got me
Speaker 1: interested in a lot of different things. Just look, my
Speaker 1: father died when I was fourteen, so it was a
Speaker 1: little difficult, and the only thing that I had was
Speaker 1: the guitar. So I continued playing the church, but I
Speaker 1: wanted to get more chords, and once I got Malbay
Speaker 1: Guitar Dictionary, that was it. And then my music started
Speaker 1: getting a little bit funky, and how I used to
Speaker 1: get put in discipline where the ladies would say, hey,
Speaker 1: that's not Christian music. You know, that doesn't sound like
Speaker 1: and I'm like, uh, it sounds good to me. And
Speaker 1: then and so I started getting that kind of religious
Speaker 1: thing about are you playing like God's chords? Are you
Speaker 1: playing somebody else's? And that totally just said, you know
Speaker 1: what I'm in for the music with all do this.
Speaker 1: And from then on my father gave me his blessing
Speaker 1: and to let music. Do you know what? I followed,
Speaker 1: And so you can understand what it's like to have
Speaker 1: a kid that has an instrument and he gets his
Speaker 1: instrument and he starts training for the long of it,
Speaker 1: and they noticed him and he's really dedicated. So I
Speaker 1: went down to the Apollo Theater when it was my
Speaker 1: father died, and that's when I got I joined this
Speaker 1: troop of uh you know, singers that were being trained
Speaker 1: in the basement of the Apollo Theater by the Apollo management.
Speaker 1: Little did I know that it was the beginning of
Speaker 1: my training. And I was encouraged by all the people
Speaker 1: that came to the power. So I kept playing my
Speaker 1: guitar and I got in and then the guy that
Speaker 1: was the battlely that he heard me, He's like, hey,
Speaker 1: you're pretty good. Then he went I'm playing for the
Speaker 1: amateur hour, come on and I'll have you playing. I'm
Speaker 1: like I was seventeen and they used to hide me
Speaker 1: in the basement. But I didn't have a I didn't
Speaker 1: have a union call, and uh and to that I
Speaker 1: was able to kind of rise up. And then I
Speaker 1: played in the house band, and then you know, people
Speaker 1: would come to play as the Phillips and all the
Speaker 1: grace of the Apollo Theater. Who's playing in the background Collins,
Speaker 1: you know? And uh, you know, we recently did a
Speaker 1: documentary called by Whatever Means Necessary for the Epics channel,
Speaker 1: and it kind of highlights you, Robert and I as
Speaker 1: young kids, you know, at the Apollo in the sixties.
Speaker 1: And basically I started getting calls. You know, his kid
Speaker 1: is really good. And I started playing after our joints
Speaker 1: with the with the same guy, George Stuffs that was
Speaker 1: the bandleader for the little for the band that we
Speaker 1: had down there. And the once I started playing, my
Speaker 1: name just started going around. Yeah. I started getting some
Speaker 1: gigs and studios and jingle houses, and the next thing
Speaker 1: I knew, I was with the band called the main Ingredient.
Speaker 1: Everybody Plays. The Fool was the hit song we had
Speaker 1: a nineteen seventy Team seventy seventy one around there, and
Speaker 1: I went on and I went on the road with them.
Speaker 1: You know, we've got all those kind of like the
Speaker 1: Soul reviews and here about you remember those like the
Speaker 1: main Ingredient, the o Js, the Spinners, the Detroit Dunrods,
Speaker 1: like all of the bands, you know, all the bands
Speaker 1: used to work. So you know, I started playing around
Speaker 1: there and I got my gad my name that throwing
Speaker 1: around a lot. Somebody calls me have hey, chunk Barry
Speaker 1: And he's a guitar player. You know, he's playing at
Speaker 1: uh what was it right, Playland in up New York?
Speaker 1: Can you get sure? Get there with him? Can you?
Speaker 1: You know? He tells us what I when I swim
Speaker 1: my guitar sideways, you stopped. When I swim my guitar
Speaker 1: up and down, you start. Okay, here we go boys,
Speaker 1: And I'm like, are you gonna rehearse? He turns around
Speaker 1: and he says, you don't rehearse rock and roll sound.
Speaker 1: And you know I fashioned my guitar style. If you notice,
Speaker 1: you know, when I want my band to stop, I'll
Speaker 1: take that headstock and just up and down would stop.
Speaker 1: And when I want them to do a cut out,
Speaker 1: go sideways. So a lot of the conducting that I
Speaker 1: do is based on getting hit with that truth, unadulterated
Speaker 1: fact given to you by Chuck Berry. You don't rehearse
Speaker 1: rock and roll sudden. You know, if you stopping, you
Speaker 1: go that's it and uh and that's it. My name
Speaker 1: got passed around. One day, I got a phone call
Speaker 1: from our CIA that they needed a guitar player for
Speaker 1: the tracks from this girl named Lulu that they were
Speaker 1: doing it. And I knew who Lulu was because I
Speaker 1: swept to show we loved with Sydney Portier and I
Speaker 1: was like, Wow, she's really a really good blue out
Speaker 1: Suns and I love to work with her. But come
Speaker 1: to find out, it wasn't her at all. It was
Speaker 1: a resal tracks for the session and that was me
Speaker 1: and the producer, David Bowie. So, as you can see,
Speaker 1: meeting these people for me has just been like somebody
Speaker 1: calls I don't know anybody's cellphone number, you know, somebody
Speaker 1: calls me up there, somebody get my numb Hey you
Speaker 1: free for it, blah blah blah blah, yeah, sure, yeah, okay,
Speaker 1: who's that? I don't know? Some personut for the BGS,
Speaker 1: some group. Who's that Carly Simon, I don't know, Peter, Paula, Mary.
Speaker 1: And so you get phone calls and you always say yes,
Speaker 1: and that's how you become called as it's all it's
Speaker 1: all continuum. Well, I've been blessed, and so what do
Speaker 1: I know? M blessed with an incredible man talent. I
Speaker 1: should add, well that that's a given as it's If
Speaker 1: I look at it as a god given talent, then
Speaker 1: I don't recognize it as being anything other than what
Speaker 1: I do. And the fact that it joins so well
Speaker 1: with other people need Oh my god, if I could
Speaker 1: get that all my life. Oh wait a minute, I
Speaker 1: do get that all my life. Do you see what
Speaker 1: I mean? Open to it? Yeah, there is a certain
Speaker 1: amount of graciousness that you have to have and looking
Speaker 1: at everything that really is good for you. I mean,
Speaker 1: obviously could a few bad things in there, and my
Speaker 1: speech to my concept would probably be a worse. But
Speaker 1: I don't really look at that. I kind of just
Speaker 1: look at Wow, that was cool, And so that registers
Speaker 1: on a good part. And that's the way I look
Speaker 1: at life, just a good part. When when David first
Speaker 1: walked in and you first met him. What were your
Speaker 1: first first impressions of him? Were you aware of his
Speaker 1: music at all? Yeah, I think I've seen something maybe
Speaker 1: like one of those Wolfman was a Wolfman? Yeah, one
Speaker 1: of the Midnight special where you saw him in that ziggy.
Speaker 1: I think that that was about the first recollection of
Speaker 1: anything from Bowie. But it was nothing. I mean I
Speaker 1: was doing James Brown and the main e Greed and
Speaker 1: the children Circuits. Well, you know, I saw it, but
Speaker 1: I guess it didn't register. I mean, did it register
Speaker 1: at anybody. No, he was just this guy from London
Speaker 1: who dredged up in funny clothes. What was what's the
Speaker 1: spider from ours? What was your your initial point of
Speaker 1: musical connection between the two of you? When did you
Speaker 1: actually really meet on like a spiritual level? Oh? Well,
Speaker 1: you know, he asked me to work with him after
Speaker 1: we did those tracks, and I was already working with
Speaker 1: the main ingredients, so, I mean he wasn't paying any money.
Speaker 1: He's he was poor then, and uh, I kept working
Speaker 1: with the main ingredient and uh, but we hung out
Speaker 1: and I said, listen, why don't you come to Hallo
Speaker 1: oh man? Listen. He did an interview once, so he
Speaker 1: said something like, ah, you know, I really like some music.
Speaker 1: I met this black guy named Carlos, just Carlos, you know,
Speaker 1: he's really funky and you know, and I want that
Speaker 1: kind of music, you know. And this is David Bowie.
Speaker 1: When we had first first first met um, so we
Speaker 1: kind of hung out with sing through the Apollo Theater.
Speaker 1: He met Richard Pryor who cursed him out and told
Speaker 1: him to get the funk out of his room, which
Speaker 1: David was really happy about being kicked out by Richard
Speaker 1: Pryor Um. And then we just hung out and then
Speaker 1: he asked me to do Diamond Dogs. Couldn't do that,
Speaker 1: but we still hung out, you know. Then he came
Speaker 1: back and he was doing the Tower Theater and all
Speaker 1: that stuff, and at that point I was really like, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the nast guy. I really want to work
Speaker 1: with him. So you know why he went to Philadelphia.
Speaker 1: He was going to get the Sound of Philadelphia to
Speaker 1: work with him, and they turned them down. And that's
Speaker 1: when he said, man, I don't know what to do
Speaker 1: and they turned me down and I don't have a band,
Speaker 1: and I was like, dude, I got a band, That's
Speaker 1: all I do all day along. Yeah, and that's what
Speaker 1: I was able to bring an amer Kassan and uh
Speaker 1: lose the Van drass, my wife, Robin, Diane Sumner, Anthony
Speaker 1: Hinton Um later on amer Kissan and Dennis Davis. So
Speaker 1: you know, I kind of brought in my whole R
Speaker 1: and B trip and that's when the magic started happening.
Speaker 1: Instead of taking uns as the spiders from Mars might
Speaker 1: do when you know they bring their families, they have
Speaker 1: a budget from the record company. They're working their stuff out. Nah,
Speaker 1: we were season musicians. We kicked out the first We
Speaker 1: must have done that album in two weeks. David had
Speaker 1: to struggle to have some kind of inspiration and the
Speaker 1: song two Songs a day boom boom boom. So David
Speaker 1: was scuffling to just like write those words any thought
Speaker 1: that he had, you know, holding holding I want to
Speaker 1: put these thoughts down, and everybody would take a nap,
Speaker 1: a cat nap, like four hours. The time he's at
Speaker 1: two o'clock in the morning, He's ready for you to
Speaker 1: do something. Oh hold on him and at least splash
Speaker 1: the water on my face and in doing it at
Speaker 1: that breaknext speed Young Americans was achieved and then a
Speaker 1: little later, with a little studio magic, the two songs
Speaker 1: and the sessions side of Electric Lady came about. And
Speaker 1: so that was the basic premiss of the young Americans.
Speaker 1: Was there ever a sense of with you or everyone
Speaker 1: you're working with with with with Luther and Robert, was
Speaker 1: there a sense of skepticism for David? Like, Hey, I've
Speaker 1: I've worked with James Brown, I've worked with Chuck Berry.
Speaker 1: Who's this guy from England who can just thinks he
Speaker 1: can come here and pull off doing you know that
Speaker 1: the Soul record. Was there ever a sense of kind
Speaker 1: of like I don't know skepticism the right word, but
Speaker 1: but kind of wondering if if he could pull the
Speaker 1: sound off um regretively, and I would take a certain
Speaker 1: amount of ego which you can't really happen you're doing
Speaker 1: this kind of business. If you're a lead singer, I
Speaker 1: can understand a competitive nature granting you that, But when
Speaker 1: you're background singers and support cruise and rhythm sections, Man,
Speaker 1: you go in there and if it takes me to
Speaker 1: give you fifteen different versions of what you said you wanted,
Speaker 1: I'll keep switching until we achieved something that neither of
Speaker 1: us alone could ever have achieved. When the rhythm section
Speaker 1: goes into work, your one harmonious unit and you have
Speaker 1: act accordity, the first thing you have to do is
Speaker 1: self must be gotten out of the picture, and you
Speaker 1: have to open up your ears. And then when you
Speaker 1: hear yourself inside the music, then play your instrument. Did
Speaker 1: David know what he wanted to hear? Or did he
Speaker 1: kind of pick and choose? Did you play Okay, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna try it like this. Okay, No, that's not it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna try it a little differently. I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: this riff. I'm gonna try it with this syncopated rhythm.
Speaker 1: And then he would go, oh, that's it, that's it.
Speaker 1: Or did he kind of did he have a general
Speaker 1: there's a lot of there's a lot of different methodologies
Speaker 1: that are used depending on what confidence you have and
Speaker 1: what you've built. In the beginning, there was just young Americans.
Speaker 1: So here's a little groove. Can you do anything with that? Boom? Done? Next?
Speaker 1: Give me you know that a little groovy thing? Give
Speaker 1: me that call? Like a Chinese men, you walk from
Speaker 1: column may choofing company and you put them together and
Speaker 1: then he has the rights look right now, you have
Speaker 1: these kids that have these drum machines, and they have
Speaker 1: all these loops and all these groups. If you have
Speaker 1: three or four groups and you put them together, there's
Speaker 1: your song. But you didn't have that in nineteen seventy four.
Speaker 1: Which you did have is a rhythm section that is
Speaker 1: primed to be able to lock in a group and
Speaker 1: leave holes. You see, unlike a band with session musicians,
Speaker 1: we know how to leave a hole for the next part.
Speaker 1: Other people they just grab whatever. They every look they
Speaker 1: ever played, They're gonna play it in every song they
Speaker 1: ever play everything they've ever played. They put all their
Speaker 1: crap that they play on your song. No professional musicians
Speaker 1: listen and they know and they got it. And you
Speaker 1: know what happens when we nail it. We all bust
Speaker 1: out laughing. Just expression of spontaneous expression of all there
Speaker 1: is so as far as that David have this, that
Speaker 1: David have that, everything is a work in progress. The
Speaker 1: minute you hit the first note, there is no look.
Speaker 1: You start something. Do you want to telp me? What's
Speaker 1: going to be at the end? Impossible? You hear this.
Speaker 1: Look when you were playing it, you played boom boom, boom,
Speaker 1: boom boom boom boom boom. But this base player you
Speaker 1: hired place boom don't to be doom doom do Are
Speaker 1: you gonna you just hired Jimmy Hendricks to play on
Speaker 1: your record. You're gonna tell him what to play? Do
Speaker 1: you understand that? No, you just sit back and let
Speaker 1: the magic happen. David was smart enough to just shut
Speaker 1: the hell up and let that magic happen right in front,
Speaker 1: and then get your ass moving and get some lyrics
Speaker 1: that means something. And you gotta catch up because all
Speaker 1: the keys are higher than you expected. Now you you
Speaker 1: have to reach for everything. You gotta. You gotta big
Speaker 1: because nothing is comfortable. Listen to the range of Young Americans,
Speaker 1: and you'll never hear any album that he shows that depth,
Speaker 1: in that height of range. Wow, I mean yeah, I
Speaker 1: just thinking about now in a song like you know
Speaker 1: right or something too. I mean you can hear it
Speaker 1: comes through too. I mean that he's pushing it. Somebody,
Speaker 1: somebody up there likes me. Listen to that song and
Speaker 1: you stop from the bottom knowing you go to the bottom,
Speaker 1: and he goes, do do do do do do do?
Speaker 1: He has got Anthony Newly to Eddie Kendricks up there
Speaker 1: in the house. Yeah. So anyway, so much been young
Speaker 1: Americans and how how people? How do I get to
Speaker 1: be with those people? You mentioned the the elect Electric
Speaker 1: Ladies sessions. Am I correct in saying that the the
Speaker 1: first song that that you ever credited for on on
Speaker 1: record is also a co write with not only David
Speaker 1: Bowie but John Lennon. Uh yeah, but uh no, let's
Speaker 1: put it the first commercial hit, hey, because I did
Speaker 1: write some other songs with other people that didn't do anything.
Speaker 1: Let's get credit are credit is due. But it's the
Speaker 1: first commercial hit and for a young kids, you know what,
Speaker 1: I think maybe twenty one or some twenty two that
Speaker 1: was amazing. And look, let's understand there there are some
Speaker 1: inherent problems with being a Puerto Rican guy with an afro.
Speaker 1: And that is the minute I started hearing all the press.
Speaker 1: I kept hearing Fame written by John Leonard and David Bowie.
Speaker 1: Favor written by John Leonard and David Bowie. And you
Speaker 1: can understand how that feels. Until finally, you know who
Speaker 1: came up and stepped up to the plate. David No, no, no,
Speaker 1: Carlos came up with that riff and Carlos was responsible
Speaker 1: for that. No no, we just did this. No no,
Speaker 1: Carlos did all that. No, no no. And so that
Speaker 1: was as always He's always been a champion for righteousness,
Speaker 1: and so to that end, he stepped up to the
Speaker 1: plate and made that correction. But it wasn't like it
Speaker 1: wasn't you know. Yes, it was a wonderful thing to
Speaker 1: have that honor, but then again, to feel that immediate,
Speaker 1: immediate a kickback, it's just like hello, Hello, I'm here,
Speaker 1: I can hear you. Hello. That's bad. They've been rough
Speaker 1: for a minute. And then I started getting checks every day.
Speaker 1: Ship fair fair. I mean, what was John like? Well,
Speaker 1: I mean just being in a studio with him, I
Speaker 1: can't even imagine what was it like being being around
Speaker 1: him watching him work. You know, you don't get very
Speaker 1: much recollections from they. Celebrities have a tendency to a
Speaker 1: kind of uh what is it called, so they kind
Speaker 1: of eliminate their faces. The John comes in as a
Speaker 1: very good, garious, funny guy who has no problem making
Speaker 1: jokes and being funny in order to alleviate his own
Speaker 1: super presence in the room, and so his congeniality kind
Speaker 1: of makes it hard for you to get anything out
Speaker 1: of here, because it's just hey, guys, how are you doing?
Speaker 1: All right? Hey buddy? Wow, wow, great? Hey. You know,
Speaker 1: there's nothing to grab onto it the fact that, oh
Speaker 1: my god, he's a celebrity. What is he supposed to do,
Speaker 1: like walking like he has a cloak on or something.
Speaker 1: And so we're working and so he's like, hey, John,
Speaker 1: how you doing? Call us cool? That's the way we
Speaker 1: are in the studio. Dude, I know what you did.
Speaker 1: But I hear you play a guitar. Let's play some guitar,
Speaker 1: you know. So he stepped in there, he plays a
Speaker 1: little something something on it. You know, it's all right,
Speaker 1: but we can only use the beginning, and even the
Speaker 1: beginning is inverted, so it comes in back chords. So
Speaker 1: when you hear a fear, you hear the suction kind
Speaker 1: of piano. That's that's it. It's a guitar turned backwards.
Speaker 1: After that, there's very little that you hear of it. Wow.
Speaker 1: I didn't do that, yeah, but then you do. Here.
Speaker 1: Every once in a while when he was in the studio,
Speaker 1: he would put his chin down on his guitar and
Speaker 1: as he breathe out, m h there it is and such. Uh.
Speaker 1: David was like, you fame man, and I'm like, dude,
Speaker 1: I don't know what you've been smoking. I hear whatever
Speaker 1: you say. And uh, you know, I think that that's
Speaker 1: the way that reference was made to Fame and John
Speaker 1: and all that. But again, you know, this is the
Speaker 1: folklore that's created by David, which I totally love. I
Speaker 1: could certainly back up most of that. But whether it
Speaker 1: inspired the name or whether that was his participatient that
Speaker 1: gave it his credit, these are all things that we
Speaker 1: do remember. It was very anxious to me and work
Speaker 1: with John, so having his name associated with John was
Speaker 1: the initial intent and to that and by whatever means necessary. Truly,
Speaker 1: it must have been special just hearing it back all
Speaker 1: complete for the first time, just all you all. It
Speaker 1: was for them, yes, for them me. I was just
Speaker 1: playing funk like I always do. They heard and they
Speaker 1: were like, oh my god, I can't believe you turn
Speaker 1: that into that. I'm like, yeah, that's what I do. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And they was like glaateful that was this guitar. It's done,
Speaker 1: And I was like cool. How did you notice this
Speaker 1: method of songwriting change from from young Americans to to
Speaker 1: something like station to station or especially low because it
Speaker 1: sounds like it went from coming in with relatively full,
Speaker 1: complete songs to more sort of building it up in
Speaker 1: the studio. Well it appears that way, but if you
Speaker 1: go a song by song, if you look at station
Speaker 1: in the station, station and stations three categories, it's still
Speaker 1: young Americans. I mean, while there's the wind and word
Speaker 1: on a wing, I mean, are those about as soulful
Speaker 1: as you can get? Aren't they? They really are an
Speaker 1: extension of young Americans. And then when you want to
Speaker 1: go pop Golden Years and TVC Won five, I mean,
Speaker 1: what is that? It's just like you know, Golden Years was.
Speaker 1: It's like people he wanted to you know this song
Speaker 1: called on Broadway, you know, an old do ops, Well
Speaker 1: that was later on, but it was old do op
Speaker 1: song first, but it had the same car changes still
Speaker 1: but he you say less, it's the same as they
Speaker 1: say the New York less right abroad, the same card changes.
Speaker 1: So we changed it up a little bit, but again
Speaker 1: the references made only to indicate that was really part
Speaker 1: of young Americans. And then to have those two pop
Speaker 1: songs in there, you know, they're all right, but they
Speaker 1: certainly the mark a new direction. But now you look
Speaker 1: at Stay well, stay is John, I'm only dancing, but
Speaker 1: you can you can't really hear it because you don't
Speaker 1: hear them back to back. But if you sing John,
Speaker 1: I'm on the dance of the stage in the same song,
Speaker 1: even the music is the same progressions. People just don't realize.
Speaker 1: He said, look, hey, call us, that was a great song.
Speaker 1: Can you do a new arrangement on that song for me? Oh? Yes, sure, David,
Speaker 1: So I do a new erangement on a song. He
Speaker 1: doesn't change the lyrics. He's got his whole new song.
Speaker 1: I mean, these are techniques. If you're asking about techniques
Speaker 1: at people are not awera um. And then you have
Speaker 1: the big one stations, the station Well stations, the station
Speaker 1: we I just found out that in disco music they'll
Speaker 1: pay you extra money if your song is longer than
Speaker 1: three minutes. And I think that single was like three
Speaker 1: minutes and twenty seconds. Like if you got three minutes
Speaker 1: and forty seconds or four minutes and twenty seconds, you
Speaker 1: get paid double. And so when we found that out,
Speaker 1: they was like really, I said, yeah. So the introduction
Speaker 1: that was let me make an mistration bast be for
Speaker 1: you the introduction to stay, to stay from the station,
Speaker 1: that must be like four minutes more boom, more money,
Speaker 1: more money, more money, which is kind of cool you
Speaker 1: think about it. That's why on that album, I think,
Speaker 1: what do you get like six songs or seven songs
Speaker 1: because they're all like you think it to be wrong.
Speaker 1: Can you tell me how the Damn Trio came together? Well,
Speaker 1: Damn Trio started after after Young Americans, I started doing
Speaker 1: Broadway and I was on the Rocky Hardor Picture Show.
Speaker 1: And so by doing the Rocky Horror Pictures Show, I
Speaker 1: was already into rock and roll before David asked me
Speaker 1: the two stations the station. So when we got together,
Speaker 1: I had already had Denis Davis um because we had
Speaker 1: worked together on some of the stuff in Um Electric Lady,
Speaker 1: and so Dennis was working with another catch, George Murray,
Speaker 1: and so we actually to work together. So when we
Speaker 1: had a chance that George Murray was brought in to
Speaker 1: replace Amir Cassan, another friends of mine, and so ma'am,
Speaker 1: when we got together, it was like George Murray was
Speaker 1: like the lead guitar player, but he played bass, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean, So he instead of holding down
Speaker 1: the bottom by playing one note. He would walk with
Speaker 1: the bass like a black guitar player playing riffs, and
Speaker 1: so that kind of opened this thing up to have
Speaker 1: this very mechanical lockdown groove that was still funky but
Speaker 1: created all this movement. While David was elated because in
Speaker 1: essence he wanted to replicate at the electronic essence of
Speaker 1: craft work and have that mechanical thing, but he wanted
Speaker 1: it done by a funk rhythm section. So here is
Speaker 1: the the anomaly that no one even looks at. Here
Speaker 1: is a super super white bread with orange hair being
Speaker 1: backed by all black ridalm sections for all these years,
Speaker 1: don't you find it amazing that they're still talking about
Speaker 1: the spiders from ours? And yeah, they never talked about
Speaker 1: the Damn Trio, who is responsible for so many amazing
Speaker 1: transformations from station to station to low scary ones and
Speaker 1: all that amazing stuff was driven by them, Damn Trio.
Speaker 1: And so you know, during that time, David had all
Speaker 1: these other bands, you know, the Tin Machines, and to
Speaker 1: us it was is that other type of either rock,
Speaker 1: industrial rock or just noise rock. And so the Damn
Speaker 1: Trio had a totally different brand for David. So whenever
Speaker 1: David left the Damn Trio, that's when he went back
Speaker 1: to being the other David that wasn't the funky soul
Speaker 1: for David. So that is the legacy of the Damn Trio,
Speaker 1: the the trio that back David through all of those periods.
Speaker 1: Mind you, all the time the credit was actually being
Speaker 1: given to the you know, to the brian Enos and
Speaker 1: to the Robert Shrimps, and to the Asian Blues and
Speaker 1: to the all the other people that would come as
Speaker 1: invited soloists and all that stuff. But as a rhythm section,
Speaker 1: the people that locked down David Bowie during all those
Speaker 1: years was Dennis Davis, Paulos Alamar and George Murray, the
Speaker 1: Damn Trio. And you think of the work that you
Speaker 1: mentioned low a moment ago. I mean just the sound
Speaker 1: on that is so unique, so groundbreaking. What what were
Speaker 1: those sessions like for you? Was that were they relatively
Speaker 1: similar to to Station the Station and and what the
Speaker 1: work you've done with them prior or was it completely different? Well,
Speaker 1: let's understand that is the interview is about my perspective,
Speaker 1: So let's understand what was going on during these periods.
Speaker 1: Remember when I told you before I even this station.
Speaker 1: In the station, I was already doing rock and Roll
Speaker 1: on Broadway with Tim Curry and Meat Love and everything,
Speaker 1: doing the Rocky Horror Picture Shop. It just so happens
Speaker 1: that when David is asking me to go on tour
Speaker 1: for Station and Station and create all these thoughts, I
Speaker 1: wanted to bring studio quality equipment onto the road. I
Speaker 1: don't want to use for all pedals. I don't want
Speaker 1: to use stomp boxes, and so I devised a totally
Speaker 1: stereo system that used rack mounted units from the studio,
Speaker 1: and I brought those rack mounted nineteenis units to touring
Speaker 1: with David Bowie. Now, mind you, this is all during
Speaker 1: the time of Frank Zappa and Jerry Garcia and all
Speaker 1: these American monsters doing the same thing. But the one
Speaker 1: that was doing it first was me. And while I
Speaker 1: was doing that, when the eighties first came up, I
Speaker 1: started working with the synthesizer guitars, you know, before they
Speaker 1: started coming out with the Mode guitar and all those
Speaker 1: other things. So me and these summers a few other
Speaker 1: people were working in those areas. So this technological thing
Speaker 1: that happened wasn't foreign to me. Look, even when I
Speaker 1: met Bowie in the seventies. When he first met me,
Speaker 1: I already showed him that I could play all of
Speaker 1: Jimmy Hendrix. Are you experiens? Igin Henderson went crazy. I
Speaker 1: am really learned all the parts. When I met David Bowie,
Speaker 1: not only did you know I could play with James
Speaker 1: Brown all that stuff, but when he darted me playing
Speaker 1: Jimmy Hendrix, he was like, holy shit, who are you dude?
Speaker 1: And so the electronic thing for me was a major explosion.
Speaker 1: When the Macintosh Plus came out, I took it on
Speaker 1: the road and created a guitar. I sent deside of
Speaker 1: the album with a mac Plus when the first came out.
Speaker 1: So this issue of technology was always into it man.
Speaker 1: Always the same way that they talked to to Tony
Speaker 1: Visconti about bringing pedals and doing that, I was doing
Speaker 1: exactly the same thing, you know, stringing three and four
Speaker 1: amplifiers all in a row, each with a different effect,
Speaker 1: and then putting a microphone in the middle and seeing
Speaker 1: what it sounds like. I mean, we had time to
Speaker 1: do all kind of experiments like that, Visconti and I
Speaker 1: and even you know, so going into the studio to
Speaker 1: do low was just another way for us to finally
Speaker 1: let ourselves just fly. But it was a little different
Speaker 1: than everything else because of the methodologies that Brian, you know, Boyd,
Speaker 1: brought with him. How was it working with him? Was it? Uh?
Speaker 1: Was it a challenge? I know in some interviews have
Speaker 1: given you said that he was like, you're working with
Speaker 1: a professor. Yes, it was a challenge because the challenge
Speaker 1: is what you want. You don't want a problem, so
Speaker 1: I make it taxes you to use everything you have
Speaker 1: to try to get out of that situation. For instance,
Speaker 1: we know that we have certain methodologies. Let's call him
Speaker 1: again like this, Hey, I like the verse of the
Speaker 1: chorus once the car is gonna happen? Is there a
Speaker 1: bridge in this song? Hey? Where's the introduction? How you
Speaker 1: never asked how long is the classical song? That's true.
Speaker 1: You don't wait for a chorus to repeat itself in
Speaker 1: a classical song, do you. So? You see you're already
Speaker 1: stepping into an arena where you're thinking a verse a chorus. Hey,
Speaker 1: a bridge would be nice here. Hey, you should go
Speaker 1: to the four just I love the blues songs go.
Speaker 1: These things are inherently finding your brain when you walk
Speaker 1: into a session. What happens if it's a classical section?
Speaker 1: What use is my rock and roll? Nonzen is gonna
Speaker 1: do me there? Or flamenco. Oh my god, let's say
Speaker 1: it's a waltz. I am so screwed. So here Brian,
Speaker 1: you know, lays out all these things that are more linear.
Speaker 1: They go on for a while. In fact, they go
Speaker 1: around for a while, so much that you can't actually
Speaker 1: hear a beat. A wait a minute, just like classical music,
Speaker 1: there is no tempo, and so all you hear is one, two,
Speaker 1: three for this constant person calling numbers. And you know,
Speaker 1: Brian says, hey, Carlos, when you get to fifty seven,
Speaker 1: can you play a little something? Follow me until you
Speaker 1: get to like seventy five, And you're going, what Because
Speaker 1: all he let you here was like two instruments, just
Speaker 1: enough so you can get some kind of key. You're
Speaker 1: not even hearing all forty two tracks of whatever the
Speaker 1: hell you guys hitten from you. So you play along
Speaker 1: with it and you try to do its best you can,
Speaker 1: you know why, You're pretty sidify with it. But so
Speaker 1: he presses that button, then all the other tracks, but
Speaker 1: I mean, you, holy ship, where what the hell is that. Wow,
Speaker 1: that is so cool and so limiting what you hear
Speaker 1: so that you can get the maximum out of somebody
Speaker 1: is a different methodology than letting them hear everything and
Speaker 1: then letting them just shoot all over everything that you
Speaker 1: just put down, you know, mess up all your wholes
Speaker 1: is everything? They have a practice just throw it on
Speaker 1: your You know that thanks a certain finesse to not
Speaker 1: get in the way, and the best way of doing
Speaker 1: it is usually methodologies that they're right used to. That's
Speaker 1: all putting things in their mind. How about it? He says. Listen, listen, Carlos,
Speaker 1: like you know something I want you to You know,
Speaker 1: sometimes you can some wrong notes. I need for you
Speaker 1: to accent the wrong notes. Accent the wrong notes. What
Speaker 1: the hell? The kind of instructions are those? First of all,
Speaker 1: I wasn't playing any wrong notes. Now I gotta make
Speaker 1: some wrong notes. Can you see how you're messing with
Speaker 1: somebody's mindful they even touch the instrument. This is the
Speaker 1: type of logic and reason and strategies that you use
Speaker 1: when you're trying to use Brian, you know strategies and
Speaker 1: that grown to get accustomed to them because they allow
Speaker 1: you to look through things like through a prison. There's
Speaker 1: no one particular way. All you gotta do is move
Speaker 1: slightly to the left or just slightly askew, and you
Speaker 1: seem through a different prison and everything just changes. So
Speaker 1: these are kind of chameleon lessons you learned from Bowie.
Speaker 1: They get traded off. Sometimes you learn the same thing
Speaker 1: from people like Pop. You know you work with him.
Speaker 1: What's saying, Hey, if I right more than twenty three
Speaker 1: words is a horrible song. Um, he'll say things like, look,
Speaker 1: if you're gonna be wrong, be loud and wrong. I mean,
Speaker 1: these are fucking great things they just conveiled in these people.
Speaker 1: Was there a childlike sense to him? Yeah, but there's
Speaker 1: also an adult that will come chomping down on you
Speaker 1: if you cross the line. Ye have those figures around
Speaker 1: him in when he was working or no, no, no,
Speaker 1: Your personal space and your personal solitude. Look, when you're
Speaker 1: a piece for yourself, you find that pieces exactly what
Speaker 1: you want and what happens If somebody steps into your
Speaker 1: space and disturbs your peace, will you allow it or
Speaker 1: will you ask them to step out of your space?
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. You see that takes power, but it doesn't
Speaker 1: mean that you have to brand it as being powerful.
Speaker 1: You can be keenly by nature, but not by by
Speaker 1: title or by truth, you know. So he tries to
Speaker 1: act as royal as he can, and try to, but
Speaker 1: he always maintains I'm David Bowie and you see me
Speaker 1: is David Bowie. Should I digress and turn myself into
Speaker 1: David Jones, then the mystery of David Bowie's gone. And
Speaker 1: I don't want you to meet David Jones. That's none
Speaker 1: of your damn business. So you protected, you protected with whimsey.
Speaker 1: You protected with humor. John Lennon did it artfully by
Speaker 1: making himself humorous and everybody else at ease. I mean
Speaker 1: a lot of people do it a lot of ways
Speaker 1: until you get to know them. And when you get
Speaker 1: to know them and you realize, wow, he's really heavy,
Speaker 1: you know what sounds like he's playing around. Now, ask
Speaker 1: on the right question you'll get some seriousness out of him.
Speaker 1: And look, quite honestly, you know, very very very well.
Speaker 1: We can talk about all the whimsy, we can talk
Speaker 1: about all the you know, the curiosity and the funniness,
Speaker 1: but damnit, David Bowie was a serious person who will
Speaker 1: be taken seriously by all means, and he has no
Speaker 1: regrets to over putting you in your place, whether it
Speaker 1: has to do with black music, black people, rock and roll,
Speaker 1: you're genre, your yen, your your gayness, your boldness, your anything.
Speaker 1: You know full well he was well voiced, an opinionated
Speaker 1: so Yang and Yang man Yan Yang. Was there a
Speaker 1: time that you knew him that he seemed the most
Speaker 1: at peace? Uh, it's a moving target. Man. Everything looks
Speaker 1: at peace until you find out the ship at the
Speaker 1: family year later, and then he had a gold record
Speaker 1: and everything seems a piece again, and then you find
Speaker 1: out that, come on, there are certain Look, I know
Speaker 1: I was at peace when he got married. I was
Speaker 1: at peace for him, if that's any way of telling
Speaker 1: you whether I felt he was at peace. That's the
Speaker 1: only time I felt that he was at piece that
Speaker 1: I know. I felt that he was at peace when
Speaker 1: he married Iman. I was just like the way of
Speaker 1: the world was off my shoulders. I don't have to
Speaker 1: protect him from anybody. That's a beautiful failing for a friend.
Speaker 1: That must have been just really nice to to feel that,
Speaker 1: because it seems like peace was something that was was
Speaker 1: hard one for him. It seemed like you have to
Speaker 1: refine the right person. It's not an issue of finding somebody. Look,
Speaker 1: maybe could drop a dime and marry anybody. It's somebody
Speaker 1: that would actually want you and you want them and
Speaker 1: knowing you might not you don't you know what it
Speaker 1: feels like. Don't mess it up, man, don't mess it up.
Speaker 1: Don't show too much of the David. Don't close off
Speaker 1: too much of the David. Don't put that wall down
Speaker 1: and say I'm David Bowie. This is another world, man,
Speaker 1: This is the area of love, this stuff that songs
Speaker 1: are written about. So yeah, I felt very much. If
Speaker 1: he's when he got married, that's beautiful there. Hey, I
Speaker 1: meant to say happy happy anniversary to you and Robin
Speaker 1: by the way, and I missed a few months. I'm sorry,
Speaker 1: but congratulations. We go on, are you kidding? Every day?
Speaker 1: We look? If you want to say, marthon sixty year
Speaker 1: is you got to treat that woman right, and that
Speaker 1: woman better treat you right. And the secret is just
Speaker 1: say yes to everything like they don't hold that to anything.
Speaker 1: And always buy flowers when you screw up, and then
Speaker 1: give them for her so that she can give them
Speaker 1: back to you. That was work, y'all, I'm telling you
Speaker 1: don't get any and don't bring up sour subjects. Yeah,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, you gott she will you see you gotta
Speaker 1: know what the game and went to take? Oh man,
Speaker 1: I mean I guess, I mean, I know this is
Speaker 1: probably a question that maybe sounds corny, but I mean,
Speaker 1: is there what's the most important thing that you feel
Speaker 1: you you learned from your your time with David like that?
Speaker 1: How did you grow? Mm hmm. Well there's a lot.
Speaker 1: So it's not easy because growth takes moments and stored memories.
Speaker 1: So climbing up that ladder, it gets hard to find
Speaker 1: out which wrong was the one. I think the consistency
Speaker 1: of our relationship of mutual dependency and respect, I think
Speaker 1: is what takes a business relationship into a personal relationship
Speaker 1: into a friendship. Again, there's a lot of people that
Speaker 1: say he's my friend. Hey, Hey, I met call us
Speaker 1: in seventy four. I had a drink with him. I've
Speaker 1: known him for fifty years. He's my friend. I mean,
Speaker 1: he doesn't even know my middle name. I've never invited
Speaker 1: him to to do anything, but so you get I mean,
Speaker 1: I get callbacks. David wants me to come back for
Speaker 1: the second album. Oh wow, I'm thrilled. I never expected it. Hey,
Speaker 1: because we got for a fourth album. Oh my god,
Speaker 1: I'm thrilled. I didn't expect it. Never expecting it and
Speaker 1: always getting it. It's a wonderful feeling because you never
Speaker 1: let down. So never let me down. It's a perfect
Speaker 1: song to to culminate what our relationship was. We never ever,
Speaker 1: ever let ourselves down to each other. When my wife
Speaker 1: got shick and I had to finally say goodbye to David,
Speaker 1: David said, what are you waiting for? You know? It
Speaker 1: was like there was no letdown ever about anything. And
Speaker 1: so that's uh, that's basically that song probably says it all.
Speaker 1: Just appreciating one another. Yeah, that's it. Marriages that it
Speaker 1: comes to many different forms. We had a good marriage
Speaker 1: and look, we didn't even get that. We didn't even
Speaker 1: get divorced. We just had suffer. And I'm for example,
Speaker 1: I'm a creative person who wants to share with people.
Speaker 1: And I'm sure there's a lot of people listening right
Speaker 1: now to this that that feel the same way. What
Speaker 1: do you think David would say to us people who
Speaker 1: are are creative and are you know, searching for their
Speaker 1: voice and and are are are working towards that with
Speaker 1: sharing that mm hmm, let goal be dragged mm hmmmm.
Speaker 1: I really believe that change is so important that if
Speaker 1: you know David, then you maybe you know thirteen different David's.
Speaker 1: If you could understand that, then you could understand that
Speaker 1: we're not meant to stay in one place. We can change.
Speaker 1: Even when we thought that we were solid and who
Speaker 1: we were and we were all powerful, you can still change.
Speaker 1: I mean, he took change to the ultimate you know,
Speaker 1: forms that of somewhat of the phoenix, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean, so transformational form, you know, just constantly evolving.
Speaker 1: What can I say? That's the nature of davorite changes.
Speaker 1: Off the Record is a production of I Heart Radio.
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