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Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sutch podcast.

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Speaker 1: My guest today is the one and only legendary Mitch Wider,

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Speaker 1: who has a brand new album with Love produced by

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Speaker 1: Don Was. Mitch. How did this album come to be?

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Speaker 1: I called Don and he agreed.

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Speaker 2: As a result of I signed a new recording contract

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Speaker 2: with a German label, which we'll get into probably a

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Speaker 2: little bit deeper as we talk. But I signed the

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Speaker 2: contract and I had choice of producer.

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Speaker 1: So when did you meet Don?

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Speaker 2: Oh? Gosh, I want to say seventy eight. He hired

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Speaker 2: me to do a voice for something and then we

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Speaker 2: established a relationship and I ended up being a guest

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Speaker 2: on one of his albums called Was and that Was

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Speaker 2: and then we cut a dance single and then I

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Speaker 2: did two tracks for one of my German albums with

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Speaker 2: him as producing. So we're entrenched in LA and recorded

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Speaker 2: a really nice album out there called The Promise.

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Speaker 1: Okay, what makes Don the producer he is? How is

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Speaker 1: he different from the other people you've worked with.

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Speaker 2: We have the same sensibilities regional with regard to music

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Speaker 2: and our exposure to him and the cultural differences inside

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Speaker 2: the community. And I mean the guy he's produced the

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Speaker 2: Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan. He got Grammys for for People.

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Speaker 2: He's just very, very talented man.

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Speaker 1: So on this album, you wrote all the songs. Did

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Speaker 1: you write them for the album or did you have

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Speaker 1: them ready?

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Speaker 2: I wrote them for the album, and it's kind of

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Speaker 2: either autobiographical because of the actual experience or the observation,

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Speaker 2: but it is what it's about, is my life really,

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Speaker 2: and segments of it little visual you can imagine you

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Speaker 2: know what they were by the lyrics. But I love it.

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Speaker 2: I love it. I think it's a beautiful album, and

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Speaker 2: I'm very proud of it. I think it's really really

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Speaker 2: high on my chart of expectations for myself as a

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Speaker 2: writer and a singer.

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Speaker 1: Now we're doing this podcast, but we live in an

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Speaker 1: internet world. It's hard to get the message out to people.

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Speaker 1: What are you doing to make people aware of the record?

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Speaker 2: Pretty much leaving that up to the record company. It's

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Speaker 2: their responsibility. I put out quite a few albums on

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Speaker 2: my own label, but I never did have the funding

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Speaker 2: or the budget to go out and do it the

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Speaker 2: way it's supposed to be done today. And that was

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Speaker 2: frustrating because there was some remarkable music that went unnoticed.

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Speaker 2: So I'm doing what I can. I'm doing every interview

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Speaker 2: I can get, and I'm honored to be on your show.

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Speaker 2: But that's what we're doing, and we're doing just interviews, interviews,

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Speaker 2: and we're making Last night we were we got home

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Speaker 2: about four o'clock am. We had done a shoot, a

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Speaker 2: video shoot for the the existing album, the new one,

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Speaker 2: and we've got a couple more of those planned. We've

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Speaker 2: already released two, so we're doing that the right way.

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Speaker 2: But you can't really there's a whole bunch of issues

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Speaker 2: that would explain why we're having a problem breaking through.

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Speaker 2: And since you're the guy with the questions, I'll just

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Speaker 2: wait for you to ask the right one.

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Speaker 1: Who is the record company Roof Records RUF? But do

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Speaker 1: you tell me more about them? It's a small label,

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Speaker 1: but not the smallest I've ever signed to, but they're very,

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Speaker 1: very good at well, here's what they did with my

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Speaker 1: live recording with double Vinyl that debut at number three,

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Speaker 1: I believe, on the Billboard charts, on the Blues charts,

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Speaker 1: and the existing album, the one we're promoting now, that debuted

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Speaker 1: at number one. So he clearly knows his business with

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Speaker 1: regards to the Billboard Blues charts. What I need is

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Speaker 1: to make that transfer over into the we used to

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Speaker 1: call the hot one hundred if you remember that, of course,

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Speaker 1: And you know what was beautiful about that.

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Speaker 2: You really had a microscopic picture of the nation's needs

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Speaker 2: for music and what made them feel good. Because the

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Speaker 2: way they formulated it was they would take every week

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Speaker 2: the existing amount of radio play rotations and sales numbers,

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Speaker 2: combine them and you end up with a top ten

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Speaker 2: where you could have a country Western song be number one,

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Speaker 2: a polk on number nine, and Mitch Ryer is somewhere

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Speaker 2: in the middle there. And that was a reflection based

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Speaker 2: on that week's activities in the business. But we don't

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Speaker 2: have that today. We have a million different categories.

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Speaker 1: Well, the other difference is you knew every song in

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Speaker 1: the top ten, whether you liked it or not, because

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Speaker 1: you were listening to the radio and you heard it.

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Speaker 2: Oh, you could turn volume down if you wanted to,

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Speaker 2: you know.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, better than the news, the monitor news on NBC.

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Speaker 1: My father would want to listen to that in the car.

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Speaker 1: So what kind of budget did they give you for

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Speaker 1: the record?

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Speaker 2: I don't know that there was a contract developed between

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Speaker 2: Don Was and Thomas Roof, the owner of the Roof

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Speaker 2: Record Company. So I'm not privy to that.

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Speaker 1: Okay, you talk about Don Was also being from Michigan.

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Speaker 1: Does everybody in Michigan in the music business know each other?

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Speaker 2: We know enough to not step on each other's toes.

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Speaker 2: You know, this is an interesting musical city, Detroit, and

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Speaker 2: the talent comes from all over Michigan. Really, when you

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Speaker 2: think about it, I'm not sure why it's that way,

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Speaker 2: but I know that there are a few cities that,

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Speaker 2: over the decades have established themselves in one way or

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Speaker 2: another for being a musical city. I don't know if

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Speaker 2: you remember the Chicago blues wave, or if you remember

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Speaker 2: the Boston the music that came out of Boston for

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Speaker 2: a while, or the music that came out of Atlanta

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Speaker 2: in New Orleans that goes way back to New Orleans thing,

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Speaker 2: and you know, it's it's like example, the group Nirvana,

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Speaker 2: I mean they brought to life Seattle. You know, it's

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Speaker 2: and once that happens, once somebody breaks through in any city,

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Speaker 2: the record companies, it's like watching a carcass on the

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Speaker 2: desert floor being descended upon by all the creatures that

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Speaker 2: are to eat it. They just milk it dry, sign

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Speaker 2: up everything that can move or pluck a string, and

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Speaker 2: then go on to the next fortune. De choice less

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Speaker 2: because we had Motown, which was just a hit factory,

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Speaker 2: and we had it that way, but we were frustrated

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Speaker 2: as young white rock and rollers. There was no outlet

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Speaker 2: for us. Nobody had broken through nationally. It was just

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Speaker 2: totally controlled by Motown. But my personal experience in music

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Speaker 2: never went into that rock and roll cave. I kind

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Speaker 2: of nurtured myself, fed myself and gave myself what I

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Speaker 2: loved and needed out of the black community, sort of

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Speaker 2: an urban setting. At at a very young age, I started

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Speaker 2: to transporting myself down into the forbidden areas of Detroit,

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Speaker 2: working a lot of places I wasn't supposed to be.

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Speaker 2: In fact, I was even hitchhiking down. I wasn't old

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Speaker 2: enough to drive when I started going downtown. Yeah, it's beautiful,

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Speaker 2: that experience. I wouldn't. I wouldn't. I couldn't trade anything

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Speaker 2: for it. It has too much value. It's priceless. It

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Speaker 2: formed what I learned about music. Originally, I had a

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Speaker 2: vocal instructor in high school and he was putting me

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Speaker 2: in classical tournaments at Tri County competitions, and I was

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Speaker 2: winning a lot, and he was very sad. And in fact,

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Speaker 2: he's still alive. His name is Dell Towers. He's about

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Speaker 2: ninety four. I just speak to him every once in

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Speaker 2: a while on the phone because I love what he

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Speaker 2: taught me. He taught me how to read and write music,

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Speaker 2: and he helped me develop my singing. But when I

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Speaker 2: broke away from the classical the journey that he was

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Speaker 2: leading me on and started. It was a real slow

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Speaker 2: sort of transition in the beginning, because then I fell

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Speaker 2: in love with the voice of Johnny Mathis. But after

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Speaker 2: that I began looking for something with a little more energy.

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Speaker 2: And it occurred to me one day. I was listening

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Speaker 2: to the radio, of course, and I hear Pat Boone

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Speaker 2: white shoelaces or something like that. I'm not sure he

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Speaker 2: did white shoelaces, but it was some sort of moody, mellow,

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Speaker 2: really milky, watered down thing. And right after that they

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Speaker 2: put on a little Richard and I just about lost

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Speaker 2: my mind. I mean the energy, uh yeah, the energy

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Speaker 2: and the attack and the and the little Richard saying

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Speaker 2: I want to be here. I am here. You know,

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Speaker 2: I am the best, and he would say things. It

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Speaker 2: was like a young Muhammad Ali, you know, whom I

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Speaker 2: had the good fortune of getting to know over the years.

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Speaker 2: So it was easy for me then to make that

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Speaker 2: transition from classical into rhythm and blues. I had the

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Speaker 2: ability to do it. And it's just simple. It's basically,

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Speaker 2: as a singer, what you're doing is less breathing from

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Speaker 2: the stomach and more meddling with the vocal cords. It's

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Speaker 2: not a sound, it's just it gives you a better

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Speaker 2: command over the over the words in my mind.

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Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back a step. When did you first

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Speaker 1: become aware of botown?

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Speaker 2: Jeez, I don't think I was. I might have been

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Speaker 2: a freshman in high school. But Smokey Robinson was the

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Speaker 2: very first one I heard. Or no, I'm sorry, Jackie

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Speaker 2: Wilson did reap Petite before he signed with the label

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Speaker 2: he signed with in New Jersey. But Smokey came out

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Speaker 2: with a a song called way over There and that

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Speaker 2: was the first motown record I heard. And his voice

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Speaker 2: was so beautiful. You know, there's I identify other artists

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Speaker 2: by they become timeless to me, not for what words

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Speaker 2: they sang, but their voices. I fall in love with

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Speaker 2: that immediately. First. You can go a lot of places

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Speaker 2: in the world and you know you'll be hearing the

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Speaker 2: Wreatha Franklin. It's the same as listening to Nat King Cole.

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Speaker 2: Those are very distinctive voices. They they have longevity, they're

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Speaker 2: they're different from other voices. It's frustrating because a lot

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Speaker 2: of the young new singers that try to get to

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Speaker 2: where Aretha was, they may have the talent, but it

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Speaker 2: doesn't seem like they have the passion for it. So

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Speaker 2: you know, you run into that. You hear that as

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Speaker 2: you listen. And I listen to everything. I love all

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Speaker 2: kinds of music, and I've made a career out of

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Speaker 2: cherry picking. If I go to write music for an album,

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Speaker 2: I really do explore. I want to touch everything I

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Speaker 2: ever heard, and I want to own it for a

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Speaker 2: little while, and then I want to move on to

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Speaker 2: something different, something new. It's just an amazing world. This

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Speaker 2: lifetime dedication to music, what it's done to me, I'm thankful.

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Speaker 2: I'm very thankful for it.

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Speaker 1: So you know, those of us who did not grow

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Speaker 1: up in that area, there was the Motown House and

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Speaker 1: there were all these acts. Were they accessible? Was out

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Speaker 1: someplace you would drive by, or they were people you

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Speaker 1: just saw on stage and hurt on the radio.

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Speaker 2: No, I worked with him. I worked on the stage

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Speaker 2: with a lot of them.

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Speaker 1: But when you first before you became a star, or

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Speaker 1: did you work with them before you became a star?

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Speaker 2: Yeah? Yeah. There was a dance hall near Detroit, and

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Speaker 2: that's where the kids would come to to really party

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Speaker 2: and dance. And what it was was all the lonely people.

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Speaker 2: They sat against the wall in this big circle, and

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Speaker 2: then the dance floor, of course, was in the middle,

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Speaker 2: and you'd make that long sort of journey very slowly

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Speaker 2: to the other side and asked a lady or a

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Speaker 2: man if they wanted to dance. And that's how it was.

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Speaker 2: But we had developed a show. We are jumping ahead

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Speaker 2: of my career at this point.

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Speaker 1: Let's not jump ahead, let's go back.

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Speaker 2: Okay. Well, I started recording when I was sixteen, but

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Speaker 2: my first single out.

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Speaker 1: Let's go back even before that. So who were your parents?

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Speaker 1: Where did they come from? My dad was an only

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Speaker 1: child and he sang on the radio. That's back in

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Speaker 1: the day, you know, right before the war. The second

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Speaker 1: World War, big band music was the thing even through

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Speaker 1: the war. It was the bit of the thing, and

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Speaker 1: you had all these all and he sang and the

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Speaker 1: band was hired by the radio station to back the performers.

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Speaker 1: And he told me stories about like Danny Thomas before

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Speaker 1: he was Danny Thomas. He came through and he sang

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Speaker 1: at that studio was in downtown Detroit, and so that

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Speaker 1: was what he was going for. He was going to

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Speaker 1: be a singer. And then the my mom, she was

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Speaker 1: from Tennessee. She made the journey up to Detroit near

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Speaker 1: the end of the depression, right, you know, when the

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Speaker 1: war was starting, and because she needed they needed work,

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Speaker 1: they needed to live, and there were jobs of plenty

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Speaker 1: up here, you know, in the arsenal of democracy. In fact,

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Speaker 1: we grew up by a tank plant where they manufactured tanks.

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Speaker 1: And my mom heard him on the radio and she

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Speaker 1: wondered what face was attached to that that voice that

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Speaker 1: she was attracted to. So her and one of her

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Speaker 1: girlfriends went down to the studio to be in the

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Speaker 1: audience one night, and that's how they met a little bit.

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Speaker 1: Do you know the story, Specifically, she's in the audience,

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Speaker 1: he's on stage, how did they actually meet.

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Speaker 2: Well, nobody's ever told me, but it was in the studio.

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Speaker 2: That's the place where they met. I don't know what

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Speaker 2: kind of communications they were and what kind of what

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Speaker 2: kind of pickup lines she might have had her he

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Speaker 2: might have had. You know, that's even too old for me.

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Speaker 2: I mean, the earliest part of my life that I remember.

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Speaker 2: One of the things that's really funny was when Dwight

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Speaker 2: Eisenhoer was running for president, they gave out swag and

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Speaker 2: he was given out lucky strikes which had the red

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Speaker 2: circle in the white riding, but the package itself was

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Speaker 2: military green, and that was a promotional item for his

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Speaker 2: election campaign. And my father was like bringing stuff like

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Speaker 2: that home. Stuff. Anyway, she had to leave the South

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Speaker 2: to get a job. But before she left the South,

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Speaker 2: it was only her and my uncle Paul at that point,

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Speaker 2: and she had to put school in the sixth grade

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Speaker 2: to go pick cotton to help the family because my

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Speaker 2: grandfather was just a drunk and he was a horse trader.

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Speaker 2: That's what he did for a living. When they finally

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Speaker 2: moved up to Detroit, he became an automobile salesman. I

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Speaker 2: guess it's the same kind of deal, you know. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: it was. It was rough for her because she had

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Speaker 2: to witness her original mom died right in front of

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Speaker 2: her eyes and my uncle's eyes. She got caught on

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Speaker 2: fire from this weird stove they had down there, and

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Speaker 2: nobody could help her put it out. She was a

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Speaker 2: frail lady, and that had to be tough. And when

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Speaker 2: I think about my mom and what I know about

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Speaker 2: her history, it wasn't pretty at all. You know. There's

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Speaker 2: a lot of poverty, a lot of tragic accidents. And

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Speaker 2: then finally my drunk grandpa remarried, had two more children,

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Speaker 2: or three actually, and then the whole bunch of them

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Speaker 2: were living now in Detroit, I think on Third Avenue,

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Speaker 2: and I went I went there to visit a couple

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Speaker 2: of times, and it was a time when they let

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Speaker 2: you behind your apartments or your whatever you were living,

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Speaker 2: and you were able to burn leaves. They allowed you

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Speaker 2: to do that, so they even provided you with little

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Speaker 2: ovens to do that. I'm trying to remember because I

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Speaker 2: was young, there were so many images that were flashing

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Speaker 2: in front of me, like my uncle George, who ended

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Speaker 2: up marrying a woman from Germany when he was in

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Speaker 2: the military. During the Korean War. He was an MP

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Speaker 2: and she was a farm girl and they met and

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Speaker 2: married and brought her back to America, and it was

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Speaker 2: my first dose of German, you know, I guess you

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Speaker 2: can put it that way. And she was sort of

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Speaker 2: a little bit timid and shy, because of course you

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Speaker 2: and I both would be if it was a foreign

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Speaker 2: country for the first time. If not shy, I'm afraid

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Speaker 2: at least really amazed. You're going to have to help

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Speaker 2: me walk through this.

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Speaker 1: Okay, Okay, you're telling such great stories. I don't want

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Speaker 1: to interrupt you.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, but they're not connected to you.

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Speaker 1: Know, they are connected in my brain. We're starting the meeting.

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Speaker 1: So your parents get married, Then when does your father

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Speaker 1: stop singing?

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Speaker 2: When he got drafted? And when he got drafted. They're

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Speaker 2: out in Lincoln, Nebraska at an airfield there, and he

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Speaker 2: was his assignment at that time, was a tail gunner

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Speaker 2: and they be twenty sevens seven it sounds right to me.

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00:22:04,160 --> 00:22:08,680
Speaker 2: And he was feeding his machine gun and it tore

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Speaker 2: off two of his fingers and so it was bye bye.

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Speaker 2: You know. He had no more military career, but he

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Speaker 2: thought he could get back into the radio thing and

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Speaker 2: Unfortunately this country moves so fast, always has that wasn't

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Speaker 2: available anymore. That wasn't what was necessary, that wasn't what

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Speaker 2: was rock and roll. Was just starting to kick his heels.

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Speaker 2: You could feel it down south and you could hear

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Speaker 2: it up north. Yeah, so for him it became really

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Speaker 2: really crazy and frustrating because he knew then that he couldn't,

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Speaker 2: especially with the physical missing two fingers. He felt a

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Speaker 2: little bad about that, but he's it was a beautiful singer.

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Speaker 2: You would keep us little kids awake at nights, singing

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Speaker 2: love songs to my mom in bed. Yeah. He didn't

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Speaker 2: want to give it up, you know, but he did

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Speaker 2: eventually when I succeeded, he started living vicariously through me.

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Speaker 2: So I had done what he started to do. What

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Speaker 2: did he do for a living? How did he provide

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Speaker 2: a tool and die maker? Working over time whenever he

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Speaker 2: could get it? Never really home. I remember many occasions

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Speaker 2: where there was they had called Grandma so we'd get

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Speaker 2: the lights turned back on. It wasn't enough. I mean,

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Speaker 2: we ended up having eight kids in that family. So

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Speaker 2: you know, it's a challenge for sure, especially if you're

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Speaker 2: Catholic and you don't want to if you're deep into it,

327
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Speaker 2: you know the Catholic Church has changed. I'm kind of

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Speaker 2: excited about this new pope from Chicago.

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Speaker 1: So with area of Detroit did to grow up in?

330
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Speaker 2: Well? I was born in ham Trammick, which is a

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Speaker 2: Polish enclave almost one hundred percent so not today it's

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Speaker 2: heavily populated by a lot of different ethnic cultures, but

333
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Speaker 2: back then it was totally Polish. And it's curiously enough,

334
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Speaker 2: it's one of the popes visited there. All the places

335
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Speaker 2: in America you could go to, he went to ham Trammick, Michigan.

336
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Speaker 2: I have no idea it was okay, but we were

337
00:24:51,800 --> 00:24:55,680
Speaker 2: Italian and we were surrounded by Polish people, so we

338
00:24:55,760 --> 00:25:02,159
Speaker 2: moved pretty quick. After I was born. I pretty much

339
00:25:02,200 --> 00:25:05,480
Speaker 2: think that's when that doctor made that mistake with my circumcision.

340
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Speaker 2: That was a joke.

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Speaker 1: I wasn't sure. You never know, but yeah, not till

342
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Speaker 1: you look. So you're going to school, What was school like.

343
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Speaker 2: School? Well, I tested out my wings early. When I

344
00:25:28,080 --> 00:25:31,600
Speaker 2: was three years old. I ran away from home on

345
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Speaker 2: my tricycle. I remember going past the tank plant and

346
00:25:39,040 --> 00:25:40,960
Speaker 2: I got about a mile away from home and a

347
00:25:40,960 --> 00:25:45,200
Speaker 2: cop car pulled up and took my tricycle and put

348
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Speaker 2: it in a trunk and discorded me back to my

349
00:25:47,480 --> 00:25:52,640
Speaker 2: crying mother, who was desperate to know why things were

350
00:25:52,680 --> 00:25:54,840
Speaker 2: so miserable that I had to run away at three.

351
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Speaker 2: So I waited a while, and then when I was

352
00:25:58,040 --> 00:26:02,040
Speaker 2: in kindergarten, I did it again. I just started walking home,

353
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Speaker 2: remembering the route the bus had taken as best I could,

354
00:26:08,000 --> 00:26:13,639
Speaker 2: and my uncle Bobby Joe come scouting for me and

355
00:26:13,680 --> 00:26:15,880
Speaker 2: found me and then took me home and I had

356
00:26:15,920 --> 00:26:22,080
Speaker 2: to face my crying mother again. Tried to enlist in

357
00:26:22,080 --> 00:26:26,240
Speaker 2: the Marines twice before I was seventeen. That didn't work

358
00:26:26,280 --> 00:26:30,560
Speaker 2: because my Actually it was funny for me to watch.

359
00:26:30,680 --> 00:26:35,479
Speaker 2: But in the beginning they called me to tell me

360
00:26:35,520 --> 00:26:40,320
Speaker 2: when to report to Fort Wayne for induction in the

361
00:26:40,320 --> 00:26:45,520
Speaker 2: morning to sign up. And he said, who are you calling?

362
00:26:45,560 --> 00:26:49,720
Speaker 2: And they said WILLIAMS Levice. Is that you? He said yes,

363
00:26:51,000 --> 00:26:52,960
Speaker 2: and then he stops for saying, looks at me. He

364
00:26:52,960 --> 00:26:57,160
Speaker 2: says yeah. He said that's also my son's name, and

365
00:26:57,240 --> 00:27:00,960
Speaker 2: so he had figured out that I had the Marines

366
00:27:01,440 --> 00:27:04,640
Speaker 2: were calling for. He said, I fought in a way

367
00:27:04,760 --> 00:27:06,880
Speaker 2: he needs to say it fought. He said, I served

368
00:27:07,520 --> 00:27:10,760
Speaker 2: and I was discharged with honorable discharge, and I think

369
00:27:10,800 --> 00:27:14,399
Speaker 2: I know what's going on here, and so I was grounded.

370
00:27:14,600 --> 00:27:16,840
Speaker 2: You know, I couldn't go anywhere because I tried to

371
00:27:16,920 --> 00:27:22,440
Speaker 2: run away from home again, just how it was, and

372
00:27:24,480 --> 00:27:28,440
Speaker 2: it was never I never felt fear out of running away.

373
00:27:30,480 --> 00:27:35,399
Speaker 2: It was more like an adventure. But I have to

374
00:27:35,400 --> 00:27:42,879
Speaker 2: say my parents, they weren't the most intelligent people in

375
00:27:42,920 --> 00:27:46,200
Speaker 2: the world. They were smart. My mom was smart enough

376
00:27:46,200 --> 00:27:49,480
Speaker 2: to teach me some things that I should never never forget,

377
00:27:50,640 --> 00:27:56,639
Speaker 2: and one is, do not talk about politics, do not

378
00:27:56,720 --> 00:27:59,919
Speaker 2: talk about religion, and you'll get along fine.

379
00:28:00,520 --> 00:28:02,560
Speaker 1: Okay. What kind of kid were you growing up? Were

380
00:28:02,600 --> 00:28:05,000
Speaker 1: you good in school? Did you play sports? Did you

381
00:28:05,040 --> 00:28:06,320
Speaker 1: have friends?

382
00:28:07,760 --> 00:28:11,440
Speaker 2: At the age of four, I had rheumatic fever, which

383
00:28:11,600 --> 00:28:15,240
Speaker 2: left me with a heart murmur for the rest of

384
00:28:15,240 --> 00:28:21,240
Speaker 2: my life, even today I have it. So in the

385
00:28:21,320 --> 00:28:28,560
Speaker 2: early grades one, two, and three, they wouldn't allow me

386
00:28:28,640 --> 00:28:33,360
Speaker 2: to play sports with the boys because of the heart thing,

387
00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:40,800
Speaker 2: and I ended up learning how to play jacks and

388
00:28:40,960 --> 00:28:45,160
Speaker 2: babble about nothing forever, just sitting with the girls, you know,

389
00:28:45,480 --> 00:28:50,080
Speaker 2: and trying to understand what they were talking about, why

390
00:28:50,120 --> 00:28:55,040
Speaker 2: they were talking about it. And so I had a

391
00:28:57,360 --> 00:29:04,480
Speaker 2: preview of what makes little girls turned into women. You know,

392
00:29:04,960 --> 00:29:13,800
Speaker 2: I'm talking about personality wise, and yeah, I'm not trying

393
00:29:13,800 --> 00:29:21,680
Speaker 2: to describe women is anything less than we certainly were equal,

394
00:29:22,120 --> 00:29:28,320
Speaker 2: especially when it came to marbles. So that went on

395
00:29:28,400 --> 00:29:31,120
Speaker 2: for some years and then the doctor finally said, okay,

396
00:29:31,200 --> 00:29:34,560
Speaker 2: you can play sports. And when I got to high school,

397
00:29:34,600 --> 00:29:39,920
Speaker 2: that's exactly what I did. I tried football, but I

398
00:29:40,040 --> 00:29:46,240
Speaker 2: was skinny and I was My assignment was the running back,

399
00:29:48,360 --> 00:29:50,560
Speaker 2: so they hand the hand off the ball to me

400
00:29:50,920 --> 00:29:52,760
Speaker 2: and I tried to cut through the slot that was

401
00:29:52,760 --> 00:29:58,040
Speaker 2: supposed to have been open for me, and I came

402
00:29:58,120 --> 00:30:01,760
Speaker 2: through in my pants, swear on it anymore. I was

403
00:30:01,960 --> 00:30:04,720
Speaker 2: standing there in the football field in my jock strap

404
00:30:04,760 --> 00:30:09,720
Speaker 2: and no cheerleaders are going what you So I chose

405
00:30:09,800 --> 00:30:13,880
Speaker 2: track and field and that was my pursuit. But I

406
00:30:13,920 --> 00:30:16,720
Speaker 2: didn't really excel at anything. I did get a medal

407
00:30:16,760 --> 00:30:25,160
Speaker 2: for cross country, but my love. The things I gravitated

408
00:30:25,160 --> 00:30:29,560
Speaker 2: to in high school were essentially music, and thank god

409
00:30:29,600 --> 00:30:34,360
Speaker 2: we had a music program and art. Mister van Zant

410
00:30:34,440 --> 00:30:36,840
Speaker 2: was my art teacher in Dell Towers. As I mentioned

411
00:30:36,840 --> 00:30:43,480
Speaker 2: in the opening, he was the music teacher and I

412
00:30:43,560 --> 00:30:48,000
Speaker 2: was like a straight a student in those I guess

413
00:30:48,080 --> 00:30:56,719
Speaker 2: my next best thing that I did was grammar. I

414
00:30:56,840 --> 00:31:01,320
Speaker 2: love the written word. I'm very very passionate about it.

415
00:31:01,440 --> 00:31:08,760
Speaker 2: And when I write songs, it's so tempting to play,

416
00:31:11,360 --> 00:31:14,280
Speaker 2: to play with the words, to look for the ambiguities,

417
00:31:14,360 --> 00:31:17,240
Speaker 2: to look at how many ways can you use this language?

418
00:31:17,880 --> 00:31:23,800
Speaker 2: But that didn't. That disappeared just recently because I have

419
00:31:23,920 --> 00:31:29,280
Speaker 2: learned this as well. When you start speaking legal language,

420
00:31:29,920 --> 00:31:34,200
Speaker 2: you don't you just stop trusting the English language. You

421
00:31:34,360 --> 00:31:38,560
Speaker 2: absolutely lose your trust for it. And you've got all

422
00:31:38,560 --> 00:31:41,840
Speaker 2: these right boys that went to schools to learn how

423
00:31:41,840 --> 00:31:46,680
Speaker 2: to twist words. And in a way, I guess we're similar.

424
00:31:46,720 --> 00:31:51,640
Speaker 2: But I don't lie, and I'm not calling attorney's liars.

425
00:31:51,680 --> 00:31:56,000
Speaker 2: I'm just saying it. You know, if you come to

426
00:31:56,080 --> 00:31:59,880
Speaker 2: a signpost and it shows I got three under my

427
00:32:00,240 --> 00:32:02,480
Speaker 2: this way one hundred and fifty, if you go that way,

428
00:32:02,640 --> 00:32:08,320
Speaker 2: you know, they just parse words and just clog up

429
00:32:08,360 --> 00:32:12,320
Speaker 2: the court system and get it's like getting away with murder.

430
00:32:13,200 --> 00:32:16,600
Speaker 2: And you know you need them. You certainly need them

431
00:32:16,600 --> 00:32:21,920
Speaker 2: when you need to be defended. And things are changing,

432
00:32:22,000 --> 00:32:26,760
Speaker 2: Bob so quickly that I really don't have time to

433
00:32:26,840 --> 00:32:29,960
Speaker 2: ponder on that. What I do is I continue to

434
00:32:30,040 --> 00:32:32,840
Speaker 2: dream about tomorrow and what I want to do tomorrow,

435
00:32:33,560 --> 00:32:38,560
Speaker 2: what I want to create new things that I've not

436
00:32:38,760 --> 00:32:46,560
Speaker 2: experienced yet. And I've done this. I've completed in my home.

437
00:32:47,240 --> 00:32:50,600
Speaker 2: I have a completed album that's never been released. I

438
00:32:50,640 --> 00:32:54,800
Speaker 2: have two books that have been authored by me and

439
00:32:55,200 --> 00:33:00,120
Speaker 2: never been published. I have a musical stage play and

440
00:33:00,160 --> 00:33:07,520
Speaker 2: I have to find right now. I'm looking for an accomplice,

441
00:33:07,520 --> 00:33:11,360
Speaker 2: if you will, to help me set this for the stage,

442
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:14,400
Speaker 2: because not like the movies where you can get a

443
00:33:14,400 --> 00:33:19,720
Speaker 2: different image every two seconds and still understand what's going on.

444
00:33:19,720 --> 00:33:23,480
Speaker 2: On live stages, you have to have sets and you

445
00:33:23,520 --> 00:33:26,360
Speaker 2: can only have so many set changes in a play.

446
00:33:27,040 --> 00:33:29,360
Speaker 2: And it's things like that that I'm not used to

447
00:33:29,400 --> 00:33:36,760
Speaker 2: because I didn't take drama. And I'm looking for an accomplice.

448
00:33:37,120 --> 00:33:40,360
Speaker 2: I'll call them an accomplice. At this point, we don't

449
00:33:40,480 --> 00:33:41,760
Speaker 2: know what we're capable of.

450
00:33:50,440 --> 00:33:52,280
Speaker 1: Let's go back to school. Did you graduate?

451
00:33:53,320 --> 00:33:57,560
Speaker 2: Yeah? Of course. It was really cool because the principals

452
00:33:57,960 --> 00:34:00,320
Speaker 2: pull me when you're handed me in my diploma. He

453
00:34:00,360 --> 00:34:02,360
Speaker 2: pulled me close to him and whispered in my ear.

454
00:34:02,840 --> 00:34:05,000
Speaker 2: The only reason you're getting this is because I don't

455
00:34:05,000 --> 00:34:09,480
Speaker 2: want to see you here and this that's what he

456
00:34:09,560 --> 00:34:13,640
Speaker 2: told me. I took him to heart, you know.

457
00:34:14,360 --> 00:34:18,239
Speaker 1: Okay, so when did you start going to clubs and

458
00:34:18,239 --> 00:34:21,200
Speaker 1: when did you start performing in clubs?

459
00:34:21,600 --> 00:34:24,359
Speaker 2: In clubs at fifteen years old?

460
00:34:25,040 --> 00:34:26,920
Speaker 1: Didn't tell me how that ended up happening.

461
00:34:29,920 --> 00:34:33,359
Speaker 2: Well, I kind of did. It was the radio. I

462
00:34:33,400 --> 00:34:37,520
Speaker 2: wanted to go where that music was emanating from, and

463
00:34:37,520 --> 00:34:39,640
Speaker 2: of course I couldn't go to New York at the

464
00:34:39,880 --> 00:34:44,840
Speaker 2: time anyway, and so I just sought out Detroit. That

465
00:34:45,000 --> 00:34:48,200
Speaker 2: was where the music that I loved was. And I

466
00:34:48,320 --> 00:34:50,759
Speaker 2: ended up making a lot of friends. And I was

467
00:34:50,800 --> 00:35:00,400
Speaker 2: surprised because I never felt racially intimidated by by my

468
00:35:00,520 --> 00:35:05,520
Speaker 2: black friends. They just didn't do that. And I remember

469
00:35:05,800 --> 00:35:10,240
Speaker 2: also as well, neither of my parents ever said anything

470
00:35:10,280 --> 00:35:13,319
Speaker 2: that would come close to being bigoted or racist at

471
00:35:13,360 --> 00:35:16,719
Speaker 2: all at our home, and so there was no foundation

472
00:35:16,920 --> 00:35:20,040
Speaker 2: for preconceived notions of what the urban life was like.

473
00:35:20,920 --> 00:35:25,279
Speaker 2: I walked in, people greeted me, I made friends, we

474
00:35:25,320 --> 00:35:29,640
Speaker 2: started working together, and it was like just living everyday life.

475
00:35:29,680 --> 00:35:32,600
Speaker 2: There was nothing about skin and that's another thing that

476
00:35:32,960 --> 00:35:37,400
Speaker 2: I loved music about. There aren't really color barriers there.

477
00:35:38,040 --> 00:35:42,680
Speaker 2: It's all about the music. And I think the world

478
00:35:42,840 --> 00:35:45,759
Speaker 2: cannot live without music. In fact, I'm sure of it.

479
00:35:46,840 --> 00:35:51,560
Speaker 2: But I would be interested in me witnessing what the

480
00:35:51,600 --> 00:35:56,520
Speaker 2: first drummer used. I would like and I'd like to

481
00:35:56,520 --> 00:35:59,239
Speaker 2: know what he was beating it on. You know.

482
00:36:00,920 --> 00:36:06,680
Speaker 1: So when you started performing, what were the circumstances did

483
00:36:06,719 --> 00:36:09,160
Speaker 1: you form a band? Were you singing soul music?

484
00:36:10,160 --> 00:36:16,880
Speaker 2: I was solo and my father wasn't in some ways

485
00:36:16,920 --> 00:36:22,760
Speaker 2: trying to still tried to make a comeback. I remember

486
00:36:23,080 --> 00:36:27,680
Speaker 2: him there was a casting call in Detroit for a showboat,

487
00:36:29,160 --> 00:36:32,800
Speaker 2: and he got dressed up and went downtown and auditioned

488
00:36:32,800 --> 00:36:36,359
Speaker 2: for it. But he didn't make it. But he had

489
00:36:36,360 --> 00:36:39,320
Speaker 2: a friend at his tool and die factory where he worked,

490
00:36:40,520 --> 00:36:44,240
Speaker 2: a black gentleman whose wife played keyboard and a choir

491
00:36:44,480 --> 00:36:48,239
Speaker 2: at this black church. And the church was run by

492
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:53,240
Speaker 2: the reverend James Hendricks, and he owned a record label

493
00:36:53,280 --> 00:36:57,759
Speaker 2: called Kerrie and my father wanted to get signed to

494
00:36:57,880 --> 00:37:08,719
Speaker 2: that label. But I'll be darn I stole I tole

495
00:37:08,880 --> 00:37:13,600
Speaker 2: his I stole his job away from Kelly. I just

496
00:37:13,960 --> 00:37:19,040
Speaker 2: thought of it that way. Yeah, the reverend wanted he

497
00:37:19,160 --> 00:37:21,440
Speaker 2: looked around him and saw what was happening in the

498
00:37:21,560 --> 00:37:25,400
Speaker 2: music world and figured with a Okay, I got a

499
00:37:25,440 --> 00:37:27,920
Speaker 2: white kid here, but if you listen to him, he

500
00:37:28,000 --> 00:37:31,320
Speaker 2: doesn't sound white. I think I better sign this kid.

501
00:37:32,040 --> 00:37:36,399
Speaker 2: And he did, you know, And and we put out

502
00:37:36,400 --> 00:37:42,040
Speaker 2: that first single, but it was a nickel and dime operation.

503
00:37:43,120 --> 00:37:44,320
Speaker 1: How successful was that?

504
00:37:45,200 --> 00:37:50,440
Speaker 2: How successful was it? I lost my interest in it

505
00:37:50,480 --> 00:37:54,560
Speaker 2: because it was my very first time into a radio station.

506
00:37:56,040 --> 00:38:00,759
Speaker 2: And as we were leaving and this jockey, I think

507
00:38:00,760 --> 00:38:07,480
Speaker 2: it was popcornwile it was his name, he took the record,

508
00:38:07,800 --> 00:38:09,799
Speaker 2: said turn on the radio when you get in the car,

509
00:38:09,880 --> 00:38:12,040
Speaker 2: I want to be playing it. And then when they

510
00:38:12,040 --> 00:38:15,400
Speaker 2: shook hands, I just happened to see the palming of

511
00:38:15,400 --> 00:38:20,240
Speaker 2: the money, and every bit of joy I was feeling

512
00:38:20,840 --> 00:38:26,000
Speaker 2: fell to the floor into a muddle of tears. I

513
00:38:26,000 --> 00:38:33,240
Speaker 2: guess because I so new to that that industry, seeing

514
00:38:33,360 --> 00:38:35,839
Speaker 2: that happened that you had to pay somebody to play

515
00:38:36,360 --> 00:38:42,719
Speaker 2: your record. But it didn't stop me, because you know,

516
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:48,200
Speaker 2: the sun will come up tomorrow. And so I'm working

517
00:38:48,200 --> 00:38:52,520
Speaker 2: at the village it was called on Woodward Avenue in Alexandria,

518
00:38:54,719 --> 00:39:00,279
Speaker 2: and I'm performing with acapella with the PEPs the black

519
00:39:00,320 --> 00:39:05,880
Speaker 2: group I was a part member of. And every week

520
00:39:06,280 --> 00:39:15,280
Speaker 2: the Glands Brothers owned the building and they would hire

521
00:39:15,920 --> 00:39:19,800
Speaker 2: a house band. You would audition to be a houseman,

522
00:39:21,760 --> 00:39:26,480
Speaker 2: and so it was difficult because you got new guys

523
00:39:26,480 --> 00:39:29,160
Speaker 2: coming in. They have to learn your songs and they

524
00:39:29,200 --> 00:39:32,840
Speaker 2: have to learn them in like a day, two days,

525
00:39:32,880 --> 00:39:36,440
Speaker 2: so you could get ready for the shows. And what

526
00:39:36,520 --> 00:39:39,239
Speaker 2: they would do the Glands Brothers would then tell the

527
00:39:39,280 --> 00:39:42,719
Speaker 2: band after the week's performance, nah, we don't think you're

528
00:39:42,760 --> 00:39:46,759
Speaker 2: what we need, because nobody paid them to audition, right,

529
00:39:46,800 --> 00:39:48,759
Speaker 2: And that's how they would get their bands in there.

530
00:39:48,800 --> 00:39:52,120
Speaker 2: They just would keep rejecting people and having auditions for

531
00:39:52,239 --> 00:39:59,520
Speaker 2: new ones. And so on one given weekend, these three

532
00:39:59,560 --> 00:40:06,640
Speaker 2: young white boys come in and they consisted of Earl Elliott,

533
00:40:06,719 --> 00:40:14,040
Speaker 2: Jimmy McCarty and Johnny Badangic extremely talented guys for sure.

534
00:40:17,680 --> 00:40:23,760
Speaker 2: So they backed me and we liked what we heard

535
00:40:24,200 --> 00:40:27,080
Speaker 2: because they're like they were like a rock and roll

536
00:40:27,120 --> 00:40:34,279
Speaker 2: group and that's what they did best. And I was

537
00:40:34,440 --> 00:40:40,200
Speaker 2: strictly into the rhythm and blues thing. And we found

538
00:40:40,200 --> 00:40:45,239
Speaker 2: out that when we put those two together on our

539
00:40:45,360 --> 00:40:48,280
Speaker 2: song list, it was a new it was a different sound.

540
00:40:48,400 --> 00:40:55,759
Speaker 2: It wasn't what was out there, and we were right,

541
00:40:56,400 --> 00:40:58,839
Speaker 2: but we didn't know it yet. So we put out

542
00:40:58,880 --> 00:41:03,880
Speaker 2: a single in the Detroit area on Hireland Records and

543
00:41:04,200 --> 00:41:06,960
Speaker 2: we were called Billy Lee and the Rivieras, and it

544
00:41:07,040 --> 00:41:11,400
Speaker 2: didn't really do anything except for our live performances were

545
00:41:11,600 --> 00:41:17,000
Speaker 2: so so crazy. At that time, you had the beginning

546
00:41:17,000 --> 00:41:21,359
Speaker 2: of the British invasion. And this one radio station paid

547
00:41:21,400 --> 00:41:23,799
Speaker 2: a lot of money to hire this dic jockey just

548
00:41:23,840 --> 00:41:30,160
Speaker 2: because he had an English accent. I thought that was stupid.

549
00:41:31,920 --> 00:41:34,360
Speaker 2: But this this jockey that was there, his name was

550
00:41:34,480 --> 00:41:37,960
Speaker 2: Dave Prince. He said, you know, you guys are different.

551
00:41:38,160 --> 00:41:41,839
Speaker 2: And I got a friend in New York and would

552
00:41:41,840 --> 00:41:44,080
Speaker 2: you make it like a tape? Can you guys make

553
00:41:44,120 --> 00:41:47,239
Speaker 2: a little tape that I can play for him, you know,

554
00:41:48,239 --> 00:41:51,319
Speaker 2: so he can hear the band? And we did, and

555
00:41:51,440 --> 00:41:55,399
Speaker 2: he took it to New York and a producer named

556
00:41:55,440 --> 00:42:00,480
Speaker 2: Bob Crewe, who is most famous, I guess, doing the

557
00:42:00,480 --> 00:42:07,239
Speaker 2: Four Seasons songs. He loved it and they called us

558
00:42:07,320 --> 00:42:12,680
Speaker 2: to New York and we took a really cheap hotel

559
00:42:12,760 --> 00:42:17,680
Speaker 2: there called the Colisseum House. I had the occasion to

560
00:42:17,680 --> 00:42:21,239
Speaker 2: be there a few years ago and revisit. It's not.

561
00:42:22,320 --> 00:42:25,800
Speaker 2: The structure is still there, but it's it doesn't have

562
00:42:25,840 --> 00:42:29,600
Speaker 2: any more cockroaches, cleaned up and you know, it's been

563
00:42:30,680 --> 00:42:37,319
Speaker 2: sanitized and gentrified. And so that's where we stayed. And

564
00:42:37,719 --> 00:42:40,680
Speaker 2: there were only two bedrooms and there were five of us,

565
00:42:40,719 --> 00:42:44,480
Speaker 2: so somebody had to sleep on the couch and we

566
00:42:44,600 --> 00:42:50,800
Speaker 2: take turns doing that. It was really boring is waiting

567
00:42:50,840 --> 00:42:55,560
Speaker 2: around for the producer to get his himself in a

568
00:42:55,560 --> 00:42:58,920
Speaker 2: position where we could go in and record. So we

569
00:42:59,000 --> 00:43:01,839
Speaker 2: started working at some of the local clubs in Manhattan.

570
00:43:01,920 --> 00:43:08,080
Speaker 2: In the village, there was a joint called Trudy Heller's,

571
00:43:08,120 --> 00:43:11,439
Speaker 2: which wasn't a folk club, but we did work some

572
00:43:11,480 --> 00:43:14,880
Speaker 2: folk clubs too, and didn't go over too well with

573
00:43:14,960 --> 00:43:21,200
Speaker 2: the folkies. That you know, hard electric pounding beat. That

574
00:43:21,360 --> 00:43:27,560
Speaker 2: rhythm we were using. We spent our time doing that

575
00:43:27,960 --> 00:43:34,000
Speaker 2: and guy came in one night and he came to

576
00:43:34,040 --> 00:43:38,319
Speaker 2: me because at that point I had been married and

577
00:43:39,800 --> 00:43:42,799
Speaker 2: left my pregnant wife in Detroit while I ventured out

578
00:43:42,840 --> 00:43:47,880
Speaker 2: into New York to await my fate. And he comes

579
00:43:47,960 --> 00:43:51,920
Speaker 2: up to me and says, hey, do you want to

580
00:43:51,920 --> 00:43:55,400
Speaker 2: make fifty bucks? I said, well, yeah, of course, he

581
00:43:55,440 --> 00:43:59,280
Speaker 2: said Okay, can you play hobn Neguila. I said, yeah,

582
00:43:59,440 --> 00:44:03,120
Speaker 2: I need to do that because my first wife was

583
00:44:03,440 --> 00:44:12,560
Speaker 2: Jewish and so our children were Jewish as well. Oh man,

584
00:44:12,600 --> 00:44:16,319
Speaker 2: this just popped into my mind. My legal name is

585
00:44:16,400 --> 00:44:19,640
Speaker 2: Levice L E V I S E. But Nay Briath

586
00:44:19,719 --> 00:44:23,120
Speaker 2: didn't think so they thought my name was Levine. So

587
00:44:23,320 --> 00:44:28,440
Speaker 2: I started getting all these male for contributions to all

588
00:44:28,480 --> 00:44:33,720
Speaker 2: these different causes. And so the kids were going to school,

589
00:44:33,800 --> 00:44:37,560
Speaker 2: I was learning Hebrew, I was wearing the Azusa. I

590
00:44:37,680 --> 00:44:47,520
Speaker 2: was thinking of converting. And then it happened success, And

591
00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:52,520
Speaker 2: it happened in a very strange way. The producer when

592
00:44:52,520 --> 00:44:55,200
Speaker 2: we all arrived in New York. First of all, nobody

593
00:44:56,680 --> 00:44:58,600
Speaker 2: was old enough to sign. Our parents had to sign

594
00:44:58,640 --> 00:45:06,160
Speaker 2: our contracts for us. And we sense that Bob Crue

595
00:45:06,640 --> 00:45:10,520
Speaker 2: didn't want to accept the whole group because the very

596
00:45:10,600 --> 00:45:14,160
Speaker 2: first single that he put out was one of me

597
00:45:14,480 --> 00:45:17,440
Speaker 2: alone singing an R and B, a very good R

598
00:45:17,480 --> 00:45:21,400
Speaker 2: and B classic, but you know, it appeared on the

599
00:45:21,520 --> 00:45:27,120
Speaker 2: Rhythm and Blues charts, but nowhere else, and he had

600
00:45:27,960 --> 00:45:31,000
Speaker 2: a failure with it using studio musicians. So he said, okay,

601
00:45:31,360 --> 00:45:33,600
Speaker 2: get the band together. We're going in the studio. I

602
00:45:33,640 --> 00:45:37,759
Speaker 2: want you to play every song you know. So he

603
00:45:37,800 --> 00:45:40,719
Speaker 2: had also at that very same time acquired the publishing

604
00:45:40,840 --> 00:45:49,359
Speaker 2: rights for the Rolling Stones catalog, and so subsequently we're

605
00:45:49,400 --> 00:45:54,319
Speaker 2: doing this session, one of only three studio sessions we

606
00:45:54,440 --> 00:45:57,560
Speaker 2: ever did for him. He called all of the music

607
00:45:57,600 --> 00:46:00,080
Speaker 2: for all the five albums he put out on me

608
00:46:00,520 --> 00:46:03,719
Speaker 2: from those two sessions except for what Now I Love

609
00:46:03,840 --> 00:46:09,560
Speaker 2: album and two of the Rolling Stones, and they were hot.

610
00:46:09,760 --> 00:46:13,200
Speaker 2: They had made it already. We hadn't. They were in

611
00:46:13,239 --> 00:46:19,120
Speaker 2: the studio because they they love music too. And I

612
00:46:19,160 --> 00:46:23,200
Speaker 2: think Keith told Bob Crue, if you want a hit

613
00:46:23,400 --> 00:46:26,600
Speaker 2: out of what you've got going on out there, you

614
00:46:26,680 --> 00:46:28,920
Speaker 2: might want to bet on that, Jenny take a ride,

615
00:46:30,080 --> 00:46:33,760
Speaker 2: And when he did, you didn't have the dismal failure

616
00:46:33,800 --> 00:46:36,200
Speaker 2: of that single by Mitch Wrider, but you had a

617
00:46:36,280 --> 00:46:40,000
Speaker 2: hare record by Mitchwriter and Detroit Wheels, which was full

618
00:46:40,040 --> 00:46:45,360
Speaker 2: of energy and that special sound I tried to describe

619
00:46:45,400 --> 00:46:50,520
Speaker 2: to you earlier, that sort of cocktail, that rhythm and

620
00:46:50,560 --> 00:46:54,840
Speaker 2: blues mixed with rock and roll. At that point in time,

621
00:46:55,120 --> 00:46:59,560
Speaker 2: it was different. It was very different. I kind of

622
00:46:59,640 --> 00:47:05,879
Speaker 2: have an understanding of why people liked it. I heard

623
00:47:05,920 --> 00:47:10,719
Speaker 2: it really hurt it because we had an alarm clock

624
00:47:10,760 --> 00:47:15,239
Speaker 2: that would wake you up with music and Darren, it

625
00:47:15,360 --> 00:47:18,359
Speaker 2: goes off and they're playing Jenny Take a Ride, and

626
00:47:18,400 --> 00:47:20,880
Speaker 2: I'm listening to it laid in bed like it's foreign

627
00:47:20,920 --> 00:47:22,600
Speaker 2: to me, like I heard it for the first time.

628
00:47:23,200 --> 00:47:27,080
Speaker 2: I'm saying, damn, that's a really good song. You know.

629
00:47:27,120 --> 00:47:29,799
Speaker 2: It was churchy. It had a gospel feel to it,

630
00:47:29,840 --> 00:47:33,920
Speaker 2: but it had those hard electric guitars going, kind of

631
00:47:33,960 --> 00:47:38,440
Speaker 2: like drunken people that staggered musicians that stagger into a

632
00:47:38,480 --> 00:47:47,000
Speaker 2: Salvation Army band. But it was cool. And that's you know,

633
00:47:47,120 --> 00:47:51,400
Speaker 2: We're in Messina, New York, working a club six days

634
00:47:51,400 --> 00:47:57,359
Speaker 2: a week, three shows a day, seventy five minutes, and

635
00:47:57,400 --> 00:47:59,480
Speaker 2: we're just waiting and waiting and waiting, and we get

636
00:47:59,480 --> 00:48:03,600
Speaker 2: a phone call and said to simply, all right, you guys,

637
00:48:03,680 --> 00:48:06,000
Speaker 2: you're all done there, pack up your bag. You're going

638
00:48:06,040 --> 00:48:10,840
Speaker 2: on tour tomorrow. And that's exactly what happened. And the

639
00:48:10,920 --> 00:48:14,479
Speaker 2: money we were making for an entire week, we made

640
00:48:14,560 --> 00:48:18,760
Speaker 2: double that in one show for fifteen to twenty minutes.

641
00:48:19,719 --> 00:48:23,040
Speaker 2: And we worked all those weeks to get that money.

642
00:48:23,560 --> 00:48:30,000
Speaker 2: So that's how quickly things change, how they can change.

643
00:48:37,440 --> 00:48:41,320
Speaker 1: So they put out Jenny takes a ride. You have success,

644
00:48:42,840 --> 00:48:46,160
Speaker 1: stay on the road. How long until there's another record?

645
00:48:47,080 --> 00:48:50,960
Speaker 2: Wow? Everything was done within a two and a half

646
00:48:51,080 --> 00:48:56,520
Speaker 2: year period, everything the recording, as far as recordings go.

647
00:48:57,360 --> 00:49:01,000
Speaker 2: And then you had the lack of their what now

648
00:49:01,080 --> 00:49:05,840
Speaker 2: my love, which I sang on because I was contracted to.

649
00:49:06,280 --> 00:49:12,080
Speaker 2: You know, I came from an age where my parents

650
00:49:12,080 --> 00:49:15,680
Speaker 2: were good parents. You know, they did teach me right

651
00:49:15,719 --> 00:49:19,600
Speaker 2: from wrong. But at that time in our American history,

652
00:49:19,800 --> 00:49:22,399
Speaker 2: if you got a girl pregnant, he had to marry her.

653
00:49:23,600 --> 00:49:26,239
Speaker 2: You know, you didn't have say in it if you

654
00:49:26,280 --> 00:49:34,560
Speaker 2: were a righteous kid. But that's one of the tragedies

655
00:49:34,600 --> 00:49:40,760
Speaker 2: of my first marriage because the kids were wonderful success

656
00:49:40,880 --> 00:49:43,600
Speaker 2: coming at that very moment when I'm needed to be

657
00:49:43,640 --> 00:49:50,560
Speaker 2: a father and you can't say enough about that. I

658
00:49:50,640 --> 00:49:52,600
Speaker 2: know what it was like to not know my dad

659
00:49:52,640 --> 00:49:57,680
Speaker 2: because he had to work so hard, and I just

660
00:49:57,760 --> 00:50:00,920
Speaker 2: didn't want that to be for my kids. So I

661
00:50:00,960 --> 00:50:07,880
Speaker 2: had a pretty hard choice to make. But we didn't

662
00:50:07,920 --> 00:50:10,040
Speaker 2: get you know, we got married when we were eighteen,

663
00:50:10,200 --> 00:50:15,400
Speaker 2: so we didn't know what love was. I mean, the

664
00:50:15,520 --> 00:50:17,759
Speaker 2: underpinning is what it really took to be in love,

665
00:50:19,440 --> 00:50:22,279
Speaker 2: and that's one of the reasons the marriage didn't work out.

666
00:50:22,440 --> 00:50:25,360
Speaker 2: We were just and so much was happening so fast,

667
00:50:25,400 --> 00:50:28,600
Speaker 2: and the demand of my time and that machine that

668
00:50:28,719 --> 00:50:32,799
Speaker 2: wanted to make as much money as it could. They

669
00:50:32,800 --> 00:50:35,000
Speaker 2: didn't leave me a second to spare. I was lucky

670
00:50:35,040 --> 00:50:41,359
Speaker 2: to get home and see my kids. I was if

671
00:50:41,360 --> 00:50:47,280
Speaker 2: you're going to be a musician, think about it deeply,

672
00:50:47,320 --> 00:50:50,280
Speaker 2: if you want to have a family as well, because

673
00:50:50,600 --> 00:50:53,360
Speaker 2: I've seen it cause wreckage wherever it goes.

674
00:50:56,080 --> 00:51:00,960
Speaker 1: So how did it end with your first marriage?

675
00:51:02,280 --> 00:51:05,279
Speaker 2: Well, she was a very good woman. She allowed me

676
00:51:05,480 --> 00:51:08,799
Speaker 2: to be with my kids and have my kids with

677
00:51:08,840 --> 00:51:13,640
Speaker 2: me when I wanted them, because I hardly got home

678
00:51:13,680 --> 00:51:16,520
Speaker 2: anyway at all. I mean one year, we did two

679
00:51:16,600 --> 00:51:22,359
Speaker 2: hundred and eighty nine performances and I ended up being sick.

680
00:51:22,400 --> 00:51:24,040
Speaker 2: I had to go to hospital. After that, I was

681
00:51:24,120 --> 00:51:29,720
Speaker 2: just playing more out. I was working for Premier Talent

682
00:51:30,200 --> 00:51:33,799
Speaker 2: in New York, ran by Frank Barcelona, and they were

683
00:51:33,840 --> 00:51:38,279
Speaker 2: just starting to bring over English acts to help the

684
00:51:38,280 --> 00:51:41,719
Speaker 2: English breakthrough. The Beatles had already done that, so had

685
00:51:41,719 --> 00:51:44,400
Speaker 2: the Rolling Stones, but there were a million others to follow,

686
00:51:44,920 --> 00:51:47,759
Speaker 2: like the Dave Clark five and anybody you can name

687
00:51:47,840 --> 00:51:52,480
Speaker 2: that was from that sixties period that were British. A

688
00:51:52,520 --> 00:51:57,280
Speaker 2: lot of great groups, but in the beginning, for almost

689
00:51:57,320 --> 00:52:02,760
Speaker 2: every one of them, they did cover songs of black

690
00:52:03,080 --> 00:52:07,520
Speaker 2: urban music. Listened to their early stuff by the Stones

691
00:52:07,600 --> 00:52:10,399
Speaker 2: or anybody else for that matter that wanted to break through.

692
00:52:10,480 --> 00:52:14,280
Speaker 2: Early on, they were cover songs of black American artists.

693
00:52:15,520 --> 00:52:20,920
Speaker 2: And I was a headliner at that point. We had

694
00:52:20,920 --> 00:52:25,080
Speaker 2: already had a couple gold records of the top tens,

695
00:52:25,320 --> 00:52:31,040
Speaker 2: and I was headlining a theater. And because I was

696
00:52:31,040 --> 00:52:34,040
Speaker 2: a headliner, my contract said that I could pick the

697
00:52:34,160 --> 00:52:37,640
Speaker 2: artists that were on the show. So I picked the

698
00:52:37,719 --> 00:52:41,960
Speaker 2: Who and the Cream, and damn if I didn't cut

699
00:52:41,960 --> 00:52:48,320
Speaker 2: my own throat. They are amazing. But Peter Town said,

700
00:52:50,280 --> 00:52:52,920
Speaker 2: when I went to England for the first time to

701
00:52:52,920 --> 00:52:57,600
Speaker 2: be introduced socially and publicly as an artist, he sponsored me.

702
00:53:00,080 --> 00:53:04,080
Speaker 2: The British were obsessed with this notion and they just

703
00:53:04,719 --> 00:53:07,320
Speaker 2: almost everyone to a man came up with the same question,

704
00:53:08,640 --> 00:53:13,880
Speaker 2: how do you sound so black? And I was offended

705
00:53:13,920 --> 00:53:18,839
Speaker 2: by it. I almost lost it on one I just

706
00:53:19,239 --> 00:53:23,000
Speaker 2: wanted to call them an ignorant asshole, but I didn't,

707
00:53:23,520 --> 00:53:28,239
Speaker 2: and I mean their view see that's how you go

708
00:53:28,320 --> 00:53:34,640
Speaker 2: about colonizing a world. You don't care. You know, they're

709
00:53:34,760 --> 00:53:38,000
Speaker 2: nothing if they're not white and bright, they're not shiny

710
00:53:38,040 --> 00:53:41,320
Speaker 2: and fun to be with. That's why it was easy

711
00:53:41,360 --> 00:53:44,600
Speaker 2: for the Brits to conquer the world. They just simply

712
00:53:44,600 --> 00:53:49,600
Speaker 2: didn't care. But they were the only colonials expansionist country.

713
00:53:51,840 --> 00:53:53,600
Speaker 2: You know what. The history of the world is just

714
00:53:53,680 --> 00:53:57,320
Speaker 2: like I do, and it's cyclical, and it just keeps

715
00:53:57,400 --> 00:54:04,080
Speaker 2: repeating itself. I think currently we're headed for another Gilded Age,

716
00:54:04,520 --> 00:54:08,440
Speaker 2: only one hundred million times worse in terms of the

717
00:54:08,560 --> 00:54:10,480
Speaker 2: divide between they have and have not.

718
00:54:12,480 --> 00:54:14,600
Speaker 1: So tell me about Bob Crue.

719
00:54:14,880 --> 00:54:21,200
Speaker 2: Okay, he was overtly gay. He didn't mind that at all.

720
00:54:22,640 --> 00:54:26,960
Speaker 2: And he was a showman, he was a seller. He

721
00:54:27,120 --> 00:54:32,879
Speaker 2: was a star in his mind. And what he had

722
00:54:32,920 --> 00:54:38,279
Speaker 2: in mind for me, though, is different from what was

723
00:54:38,320 --> 00:54:44,960
Speaker 2: going on in America at that time. He thought that

724
00:54:46,520 --> 00:54:53,080
Speaker 2: working seven months stays at a Las Vegas hotel was

725
00:54:53,360 --> 00:54:58,719
Speaker 2: the top of the world. Went all around me, It wasn't.

726
00:55:00,120 --> 00:55:04,360
Speaker 2: All the other artists were trying to conquer the entire country.

727
00:55:04,440 --> 00:55:07,320
Speaker 2: And he's trying to get me to get us stay

728
00:55:07,360 --> 00:55:13,279
Speaker 2: in Vegas for God, knows how long, and it wasn't

729
00:55:13,280 --> 00:55:15,480
Speaker 2: going to work, so I sued to break the management

730
00:55:15,560 --> 00:55:24,359
Speaker 2: contract and he sold my contract to Paramount, which wasn't

731
00:55:24,440 --> 00:55:26,719
Speaker 2: so bad in the beginning because we had artists like

732
00:55:26,760 --> 00:55:30,680
Speaker 2: Billy Joel was at that time on Paramount before he

733
00:55:30,760 --> 00:55:34,239
Speaker 2: made his moves. He also stole my drummer. People keep

734
00:55:34,280 --> 00:55:37,480
Speaker 2: stealing my drummers. It's crazy. They just offer them a

735
00:55:37,480 --> 00:55:41,160
Speaker 2: little more, you know what, I can't pay them. They'll

736
00:55:41,200 --> 00:55:43,200
Speaker 2: just pay them a little more. And then these guys

737
00:55:43,239 --> 00:55:46,279
Speaker 2: go and they go with my blessing because they gave

738
00:55:46,320 --> 00:55:49,279
Speaker 2: me what they had when they were with me and I.

739
00:55:52,040 --> 00:55:53,880
Speaker 2: It gets complicated, Bob.

740
00:55:56,840 --> 00:55:59,960
Speaker 1: Well, that seems there's a story there. It gets complicated.

741
00:56:00,200 --> 00:56:05,359
Speaker 1: To tell me a little bit more about that. Well,

742
00:56:05,400 --> 00:56:09,760
Speaker 1: which aspect of it, Well, you're saying keeping a band together,

743
00:56:09,880 --> 00:56:12,839
Speaker 1: that must be a really hard effort.

744
00:56:14,120 --> 00:56:16,719
Speaker 2: Not if you're having hits. Because I've seen bands that

745
00:56:16,840 --> 00:56:20,399
Speaker 2: actually hate each other. They'll perform. They don't even talk

746
00:56:20,440 --> 00:56:23,080
Speaker 2: to each other off stage, but they'll perform. Because that's

747
00:56:23,800 --> 00:56:27,440
Speaker 2: it's all about money. That's if we wanted to, you know,

748
00:56:27,520 --> 00:56:30,000
Speaker 2: say good night, that's all we have to say. It's

749
00:56:30,080 --> 00:56:35,960
Speaker 2: all about money. So that's in everything we do.

750
00:56:36,520 --> 00:56:40,640
Speaker 1: When do you realize the hits have dried up and

751
00:56:40,719 --> 00:56:42,360
Speaker 1: it's not going to be so easy to have a

752
00:56:42,440 --> 00:56:43,000
Speaker 1: new one.

753
00:56:45,440 --> 00:56:49,400
Speaker 2: When he put out the What Now My Love? Album,

754
00:56:49,600 --> 00:56:52,319
Speaker 2: I was calling radio stations asking him not to play

755
00:56:52,360 --> 00:56:57,799
Speaker 2: it because I just didn't believe in it. It wasn't

756
00:56:58,800 --> 00:57:01,319
Speaker 2: I did it because I had to contractually, but I

757
00:57:01,320 --> 00:57:07,560
Speaker 2: didn't like it. And well, Dell Towers, the guy I

758
00:57:07,640 --> 00:57:11,320
Speaker 2: was telling you about Taughty Classical, he loves. He loves

759
00:57:11,400 --> 00:57:17,200
Speaker 2: that album. It's like a bunch of French ballads like

760
00:57:17,320 --> 00:57:19,800
Speaker 2: what Now My Love? I don't know if it's French

761
00:57:19,920 --> 00:57:28,400
Speaker 2: of it strings. Utch Davies was the musical director. I

762
00:57:28,440 --> 00:57:33,440
Speaker 2: don't know if you know Hutch, but he did a

763
00:57:33,480 --> 00:57:38,520
Speaker 2: marvelous job with those string arrangements. I can see where

764
00:57:38,640 --> 00:57:41,280
Speaker 2: a certain part. Well the record got. The single got

765
00:57:41,320 --> 00:57:44,840
Speaker 2: to number thirty seven, which would be hard to believe

766
00:57:45,040 --> 00:57:50,840
Speaker 2: if you were a hardcore Mitch writer Detroit Wheel fan fan.

767
00:57:54,680 --> 00:57:59,280
Speaker 2: And yet it's just a very uncomfortable place to be

768
00:57:59,280 --> 00:58:02,680
Speaker 2: because no, that's not what I wanted. I loved the

769
00:58:02,720 --> 00:58:09,240
Speaker 2: idea of a big band, but you know, Bob Cruise

770
00:58:09,320 --> 00:58:12,800
Speaker 2: mission was to separate me immediately. With that first record,

771
00:58:12,840 --> 00:58:16,479
Speaker 2: we spoke of from the group and make me into

772
00:58:16,520 --> 00:58:19,120
Speaker 2: a soul entity. Each of us had our own individual

773
00:58:19,160 --> 00:58:25,640
Speaker 2: contracts What Now My Love? And then the pursuant lawsuit

774
00:58:25,680 --> 00:58:30,960
Speaker 2: that I filed to break my management was the a

775
00:58:31,040 --> 00:58:39,200
Speaker 2: downward spin for me. But Pure Amount knew how much,

776
00:58:39,400 --> 00:58:41,800
Speaker 2: the exorbitant amount of money they had paid for my

777
00:58:41,960 --> 00:58:46,600
Speaker 2: contract because at that time, when you count them all up,

778
00:58:47,800 --> 00:58:52,040
Speaker 2: we've had like seventeen or eighteen songs totally in the

779
00:58:52,080 --> 00:58:57,200
Speaker 2: top one hundred, I guess four and top ten, and

780
00:58:57,240 --> 00:59:00,720
Speaker 2: then you go to five, you go the top twenty,

781
00:59:00,760 --> 00:59:04,800
Speaker 2: you get another five, and so it was well in

782
00:59:04,880 --> 00:59:07,320
Speaker 2: such a short period of time because it's from those

783
00:59:07,400 --> 00:59:11,400
Speaker 2: three sessions. Play everything you know, Bob cru said, and

784
00:59:11,440 --> 00:59:15,880
Speaker 2: we did, and he taped everything we knew, and that's

785
00:59:15,880 --> 00:59:19,600
Speaker 2: where he do. Look, you had all the Great Hits

786
00:59:19,640 --> 00:59:22,240
Speaker 2: by Mitch Ryder, which was just a repeat of everything

787
00:59:22,280 --> 00:59:25,560
Speaker 2: that was a hit. You have Mitch Wrider Sings the Hits.

788
00:59:25,640 --> 00:59:27,920
Speaker 2: That was another album he put out, which was the

789
00:59:28,000 --> 00:59:33,360
Speaker 2: same material with different packaging. You had the What Now

790
00:59:33,400 --> 00:59:35,320
Speaker 2: My Love? Album, and you had Genny Take a Ride,

791
00:59:35,320 --> 00:59:39,040
Speaker 2: and you had Breakout, and you had Socker to Me baby,

792
00:59:39,920 --> 00:59:45,680
Speaker 2: which was incredible because I'm with my wife, still married

793
00:59:45,720 --> 00:59:50,720
Speaker 2: to my little Jewish princess, and we're shopping and we

794
00:59:50,840 --> 00:59:54,160
Speaker 2: go buy this cart and they're selling little Mitch Ryder dolls.

795
00:59:55,680 --> 00:59:59,880
Speaker 2: Who has bro is selling Mitch writer dolls right next

796
01:00:00,120 --> 01:00:06,840
Speaker 2: the mamas and the papas and crazy crazy stuff. I didn't.

797
01:00:07,600 --> 01:00:10,680
Speaker 2: I guess my wife bought a couple and stuck them

798
01:00:10,680 --> 01:00:14,280
Speaker 2: away because my daughter still has hers. But I went

799
01:00:14,360 --> 01:00:19,200
Speaker 2: looking for him one day, and not too long ago,

800
01:00:19,240 --> 01:00:23,200
Speaker 2: I maybe five years ago, and I found one. But

801
01:00:24,400 --> 01:00:26,840
Speaker 2: they wanted a lot of money, and they had taken

802
01:00:26,880 --> 01:00:29,200
Speaker 2: this stage costume off the doll. It was just a

803
01:00:29,320 --> 01:00:34,080
Speaker 2: nude little doll, and and and in my private parts

804
01:00:34,080 --> 01:00:36,520
Speaker 2: it was just plastic. And I had a lot of

805
01:00:36,920 --> 01:00:40,520
Speaker 2: mental problems over that. For a while, I didn't know

806
01:00:40,600 --> 01:00:44,240
Speaker 2: what what gender I was, you know, I was a

807
01:00:44,240 --> 01:00:45,760
Speaker 2: little confused.

808
01:00:46,160 --> 01:00:50,640
Speaker 1: So emotionally, how do you cope when you realize, man,

809
01:00:50,720 --> 01:00:52,040
Speaker 1: the hits are no longer coming.

810
01:00:53,800 --> 01:00:56,680
Speaker 2: Oh that wasn't a problem because I was always just

811
01:00:56,720 --> 01:01:02,480
Speaker 2: about being able to sing and write. It didn't bother me.

812
01:01:02,520 --> 01:01:04,720
Speaker 2: But you're asking how did you stay alive?

813
01:01:04,840 --> 01:01:06,920
Speaker 1: I think well that too. I was going to go

814
01:01:06,920 --> 01:01:08,040
Speaker 1: there next Yeah.

815
01:01:08,680 --> 01:01:13,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, Well I took whatever they gave me. I

816
01:01:13,520 --> 01:01:17,520
Speaker 2: didn't have a manager, I didn't have a br association.

817
01:01:18,560 --> 01:01:21,479
Speaker 2: I didn't have at that time, they didn't have such

818
01:01:21,480 --> 01:01:26,760
Speaker 2: a thing as influencers. You know. It was a different

819
01:01:26,840 --> 01:01:32,000
Speaker 2: time and it was hard, and I went through so

820
01:01:32,120 --> 01:01:34,840
Speaker 2: many different booking people that promised me they could get

821
01:01:34,880 --> 01:01:39,680
Speaker 2: me work and stuff, and I ended up with one

822
01:01:40,600 --> 01:01:44,240
Speaker 2: group that got me worked for a while. When I

823
01:01:44,240 --> 01:01:47,720
Speaker 2: say work, I'm talking about good work. It was middle

824
01:01:47,760 --> 01:01:57,320
Speaker 2: class at least. And then they started putting me on

825
01:01:57,400 --> 01:02:03,000
Speaker 2: these package tours, which were lucrative for the promoters because

826
01:02:03,040 --> 01:02:05,440
Speaker 2: you had all these stars with all these hits. But

827
01:02:05,480 --> 01:02:07,080
Speaker 2: that's all they do is come out and sing the

828
01:02:07,160 --> 01:02:10,680
Speaker 2: hits and nothing else. They wouldn't do a show. So

829
01:02:10,760 --> 01:02:13,720
Speaker 2: I was tied up in that for well over a decade,

830
01:02:14,520 --> 01:02:19,960
Speaker 2: maybe two. But every year that passed and you're getting

831
01:02:20,000 --> 01:02:23,720
Speaker 2: further and further from your core audience and there was

832
01:02:23,760 --> 01:02:28,440
Speaker 2: no new music being made. But Polygrim did manage to

833
01:02:28,480 --> 01:02:32,280
Speaker 2: get me a dream come true, and they arrange it

834
01:02:32,320 --> 01:02:34,880
Speaker 2: so I could make a record called the Detroit Memphis

835
01:02:34,920 --> 01:02:38,400
Speaker 2: Experiment with Burger T and the MGS, with the original

836
01:02:38,480 --> 01:02:43,520
Speaker 2: band and the Memphis Horns, and that was thrilling in

837
01:02:43,560 --> 01:02:50,360
Speaker 2: so many ways. Started a relationship and knowledge of Otis Redding,

838
01:02:50,440 --> 01:02:57,200
Speaker 2: for example, was one of their stars. Interesting label. There's

839
01:02:57,480 --> 01:03:00,680
Speaker 2: some stuff on TV I saw about it, how they

840
01:03:00,680 --> 01:03:03,440
Speaker 2: got ripped off by Atlantic Records and so on and

841
01:03:03,480 --> 01:03:09,479
Speaker 2: so forth. I'm not saying anything liable. I'm just telling

842
01:03:09,520 --> 01:03:16,400
Speaker 2: you what I saw on TV. Gosh, that was fun.

843
01:03:16,440 --> 01:03:21,240
Speaker 2: That was fun. But after that I got a new manager.

844
01:03:22,120 --> 01:03:24,520
Speaker 2: I wanted to take another chance at a manager. And

845
01:03:24,560 --> 01:03:27,800
Speaker 2: his name was Barry Kramer, and he had created a

846
01:03:27,840 --> 01:03:31,880
Speaker 2: magazine out of Detroit called Cream Magazine, which he wholly

847
01:03:31,960 --> 01:03:35,280
Speaker 2: intended to go head to head and compete against Rolling Stone,

848
01:03:36,680 --> 01:03:39,880
Speaker 2: and he signed a deal with Curtis Publishing in New York,

849
01:03:40,080 --> 01:03:44,080
Speaker 2: which brought up is you can find his book everywhere

850
01:03:44,120 --> 01:03:48,840
Speaker 2: because prior to that, we were taking his magazines on

851
01:03:48,920 --> 01:03:52,880
Speaker 2: tour with us in big black garbage bags and dumping

852
01:03:52,920 --> 01:03:57,200
Speaker 2: them off at different bookstores and newsstands that he said

853
01:03:57,200 --> 01:03:59,960
Speaker 2: were important to do that. So we were kind of

854
01:04:00,200 --> 01:04:04,000
Speaker 2: like doing our tour and selling his publication at the

855
01:04:04,000 --> 01:04:09,960
Speaker 2: same time. So Barry became my manager, and he drafted

856
01:04:09,960 --> 01:04:16,000
Speaker 2: a new contract with Paramount and we birthed the album

857
01:04:16,080 --> 01:04:20,200
Speaker 2: called Detroit, which was produced by Bob Ezrin out of Toronto.

858
01:04:23,080 --> 01:04:24,840
Speaker 2: For those of you who don't know too much of

859
01:04:24,880 --> 01:04:35,600
Speaker 2: his work, he was, uh, the group, well, the guy

860
01:04:35,640 --> 01:04:38,760
Speaker 2: that did taking care of business, for example, the guitar player.

861
01:04:39,480 --> 01:04:44,439
Speaker 2: I'm trying to remember his names with Burton coming, Yeah,

862
01:04:44,560 --> 01:04:48,880
Speaker 2: Randy and then Burton was a singer and.

863
01:04:51,600 --> 01:04:55,000
Speaker 1: Golly we did Alice Cooper, Pink Floyd the Wall.

864
01:04:58,400 --> 01:05:03,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, he's a I don't know what he's doing now.

865
01:05:05,000 --> 01:05:09,040
Speaker 1: He's living back in Toronto. He's producing records, produced Fish record,

866
01:05:09,320 --> 01:05:11,680
Speaker 1: Andrea Bocelli still working.

867
01:05:13,360 --> 01:05:16,880
Speaker 2: Good good. I wonder if he still has the same

868
01:05:16,920 --> 01:05:18,880
Speaker 2: publishing company Nimbus nine.

869
01:05:19,920 --> 01:05:23,840
Speaker 1: Nimbus nine. I think Nimbus nine was Jack Richardson's. He

870
01:05:23,960 --> 01:05:27,440
Speaker 1: used to work for Jack Richardson in New York, that's right,

871
01:05:27,640 --> 01:05:31,480
Speaker 1: I mean in Toronto. I don't know who owns Nimbus sign.

872
01:05:33,480 --> 01:05:38,160
Speaker 2: Well, they own some of my songs. I can tell

873
01:05:38,200 --> 01:05:38,600
Speaker 2: you that.

874
01:05:46,400 --> 01:05:49,720
Speaker 1: Well, let's okay, you sit at home now this lead date.

875
01:05:50,240 --> 01:05:52,320
Speaker 1: You get any royalties.

876
01:05:53,840 --> 01:05:56,960
Speaker 2: We're having to fight that very issue as we speak.

877
01:05:57,280 --> 01:06:05,200
Speaker 2: We're getting some today. I got three different checks from

878
01:06:05,280 --> 01:06:12,480
Speaker 2: three different collection agencies, so it helped, but those weren't ours.

879
01:06:13,240 --> 01:06:18,480
Speaker 2: In the beginning. Crew never intended to paying anybody anything.

880
01:06:19,520 --> 01:06:23,200
Speaker 2: In fact, he bragged publicly. I don't know how high

881
01:06:23,280 --> 01:06:25,920
Speaker 2: he had to be able to say this, but he

882
01:06:26,040 --> 01:06:30,160
Speaker 2: bragged about spending about seven million dollars just on cocaine,

883
01:06:31,240 --> 01:06:39,160
Speaker 2: and it made us wonder why we weren't getting any royalties. Kelly,

884
01:06:39,240 --> 01:06:46,800
Speaker 2: you know, it's really hard, Bob, because when you people say, Okay, yeah,

885
01:06:47,120 --> 01:06:49,280
Speaker 2: you got screwed, but that was how they did the

886
01:06:49,360 --> 01:06:52,800
Speaker 2: business back then. You were lucky if you didn't get screwed,

887
01:06:56,760 --> 01:07:04,400
Speaker 2: and we just you can't complain too much because at

888
01:07:04,400 --> 01:07:07,760
Speaker 2: some point, if it wasn't for Bob Crue, there wouldn't

889
01:07:07,760 --> 01:07:13,640
Speaker 2: be a Mitch Rider. So I can respect that, but

890
01:07:13,760 --> 01:07:16,760
Speaker 2: I can tell you this as well. I'm sure it

891
01:07:16,800 --> 01:07:19,880
Speaker 2: would be under a different name, but I still would

892
01:07:19,880 --> 01:07:24,959
Speaker 2: have made it because I was determined to become a star,

893
01:07:25,720 --> 01:07:32,000
Speaker 2: and whatever circumstances I found myself in, I'm absolutely certain

894
01:07:32,120 --> 01:07:35,000
Speaker 2: I would have done that. That was the easy part.

895
01:07:35,400 --> 01:07:38,200
Speaker 2: That's not the hard part of my struggle. The hard

896
01:07:38,240 --> 01:07:43,439
Speaker 2: part of my struggle is to establish myself and keep

897
01:07:43,520 --> 01:07:48,440
Speaker 2: chasing the dream. I love all these kinds of music,

898
01:07:48,680 --> 01:07:53,880
Speaker 2: but I want to go deeper into them and bring

899
01:07:53,880 --> 01:07:58,160
Speaker 2: more of myself into it. The new album that we're

900
01:07:58,160 --> 01:08:04,080
Speaker 2: creating to be recorded next year is probably as close

901
01:08:04,160 --> 01:08:07,520
Speaker 2: to my inner self as I've ever allowed myself to be.

902
01:08:09,640 --> 01:08:12,360
Speaker 2: This one the latest Woman we're promoting now. It's a

903
01:08:12,400 --> 01:08:19,040
Speaker 2: good album, but we're striving for something a little different

904
01:08:19,080 --> 01:08:23,679
Speaker 2: than that, and new and a new experience and some

905
01:08:24,000 --> 01:08:27,080
Speaker 2: you know, beautiful music. And when I say beautiful, I

906
01:08:27,080 --> 01:08:30,639
Speaker 2: mean stuff that you just want to listen to over

907
01:08:30,680 --> 01:08:40,160
Speaker 2: and over again. And last night we did a shoot

908
01:08:40,240 --> 01:08:43,760
Speaker 2: for a music video for the new album, and I

909
01:08:43,880 --> 01:08:46,160
Speaker 2: mentioned it to Josh. Anyway, we were up till four

910
01:08:46,160 --> 01:08:53,920
Speaker 2: a m. This morning, and we're deeply involved in it.

911
01:08:54,040 --> 01:09:01,120
Speaker 2: You know. At some point, I want to talk about

912
01:09:05,560 --> 01:09:13,280
Speaker 2: why we feel a need to sort of cast raise

913
01:09:13,320 --> 01:09:17,519
Speaker 2: an eyebrow when we ask ourselves, how are we going

914
01:09:17,600 --> 01:09:19,920
Speaker 2: to deal with our aging population, How are we going

915
01:09:20,000 --> 01:09:24,040
Speaker 2: to deal with our elders? How are we treating them

916
01:09:24,080 --> 01:09:26,519
Speaker 2: in this country? And I'm here to tell you that

917
01:09:26,520 --> 01:09:30,360
Speaker 2: it's a big difference in cultures. It is not this

918
01:09:30,439 --> 01:09:34,439
Speaker 2: way around the world, the way we treat older people here.

919
01:09:34,479 --> 01:09:37,519
Speaker 2: But I want to table that for a minute to

920
01:09:37,600 --> 01:09:40,639
Speaker 2: try to keep this trade on, to make every stop

921
01:09:40,680 --> 01:09:41,360
Speaker 2: that we can make.

922
01:09:41,479 --> 01:09:43,639
Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, no, you no. Tell me, tell

923
01:09:43,680 --> 01:09:46,400
Speaker 1: me more about the aging people, the aging population.

924
01:09:48,920 --> 01:09:50,599
Speaker 2: Well, it's a lot of ways to look at it,

925
01:09:50,680 --> 01:09:56,240
Speaker 2: Like if you can afford to put mom in a home,

926
01:09:56,520 --> 01:09:59,400
Speaker 2: you know, it really depends on what kind she needs.

927
01:10:02,720 --> 01:10:09,080
Speaker 2: Do you need assisted living? That happens sometimes they just

928
01:10:09,120 --> 01:10:14,680
Speaker 2: send them to like a morphine house, where when they

929
01:10:14,720 --> 01:10:20,080
Speaker 2: decide they can't handle it anymore, they just they're allowed,

930
01:10:23,040 --> 01:10:26,720
Speaker 2: without much discovery, to in their lives the way they

931
01:10:26,760 --> 01:10:30,000
Speaker 2: want to. And I think they should be allowed to

932
01:10:30,080 --> 01:10:35,040
Speaker 2: do that. They've spent their whole life. You know, life

933
01:10:35,080 --> 01:10:37,120
Speaker 2: is not easy. That's the first thing you want to

934
01:10:37,160 --> 01:10:39,200
Speaker 2: teach your kids. It's not going to be easy, kid,

935
01:10:39,720 --> 01:10:46,280
Speaker 2: but you know you'll end up loving it. So what

936
01:10:46,360 --> 01:10:48,760
Speaker 2: do you do in a family that doesn't have the

937
01:10:48,800 --> 01:10:51,800
Speaker 2: money to put mom in assisted living or into a

938
01:10:51,840 --> 01:10:57,240
Speaker 2: morphine house or take care of her? You know, then

939
01:10:57,280 --> 01:10:59,880
Speaker 2: you take on We used to have in this gun

940
01:11:00,640 --> 01:11:05,280
Speaker 2: what we call generational homes. Nobody can I don't know

941
01:11:05,280 --> 01:11:08,920
Speaker 2: if they can't afford to have a generational home. Because

942
01:11:09,000 --> 01:11:13,920
Speaker 2: both of the principal, the daughter and son of this

943
01:11:14,080 --> 01:11:17,519
Speaker 2: woman or man. They both have to work. There's so

944
01:11:17,600 --> 01:11:22,840
Speaker 2: many different interchangeable parts in the financial situation that it

945
01:11:23,080 --> 01:11:26,439
Speaker 2: directs you to what your choices can be and what

946
01:11:26,520 --> 01:11:34,040
Speaker 2: they will be. I don't know. If you start taking

947
01:11:34,040 --> 01:11:39,439
Speaker 2: away safety nets, then that raises another problem because you've

948
01:11:39,479 --> 01:11:45,280
Speaker 2: got people now, not now, but gosh, fifty years ago

949
01:11:46,040 --> 01:11:49,960
Speaker 2: started learning how to game the system, you know, and

950
01:11:50,120 --> 01:11:54,080
Speaker 2: raise families on government money instead of doing work for

951
01:11:54,200 --> 01:11:57,720
Speaker 2: it if there was a job to be had. And

952
01:11:57,760 --> 01:12:01,000
Speaker 2: that's what's so frustrating about everything is happening today. But

953
01:12:01,080 --> 01:12:05,760
Speaker 2: you know what, it's cyclical. It's been done before. It's

954
01:12:05,800 --> 01:12:08,800
Speaker 2: coming back again, only this time it feels like it's

955
01:12:08,840 --> 01:12:11,479
Speaker 2: coming back a little harder. But we're all going to

956
01:12:11,560 --> 01:12:15,639
Speaker 2: live through it, you know, unless something, Unless God wants

957
01:12:15,680 --> 01:12:21,160
Speaker 2: to call you in. So I wouldn't be afraid of

958
01:12:21,200 --> 01:12:26,160
Speaker 2: what's happening now. I know that's easy to say because

959
01:12:26,200 --> 01:12:30,080
Speaker 2: I'm still being productive. I'm still hiring lighting people and

960
01:12:30,200 --> 01:12:36,240
Speaker 2: audio people and gaffers and humpers and putting people to

961
01:12:36,320 --> 01:12:42,200
Speaker 2: work contributing to society paying taxes. So I'm still viable.

962
01:12:42,920 --> 01:12:45,479
Speaker 2: But what do you do with people that can't and

963
01:12:45,520 --> 01:12:47,920
Speaker 2: they're suffering a lot of them are suffering. They can't

964
01:12:48,000 --> 01:12:52,040
Speaker 2: they can't work because they can't physically do it. They'd

965
01:12:52,120 --> 01:12:56,559
Speaker 2: love to work if they could. And eighty years old

966
01:12:56,680 --> 01:12:59,160
Speaker 2: or whatever age you want to put it at, where

967
01:12:59,200 --> 01:13:02,599
Speaker 2: you think they're they're no good for society. You need

968
01:13:02,640 --> 01:13:07,280
Speaker 2: to relook at that and see where you can find

969
01:13:07,280 --> 01:13:10,240
Speaker 2: the value that these people are still willing to give

970
01:13:12,760 --> 01:13:17,120
Speaker 2: but have no opportunity to do it. So, you know,

971
01:13:17,960 --> 01:13:21,360
Speaker 2: it's messy. It's messy to describe. It's messy for me

972
01:13:21,439 --> 01:13:25,360
Speaker 2: to even dissect it in front of you because there's

973
01:13:25,360 --> 01:13:28,840
Speaker 2: so much emotion involved in it. But I do know

974
01:13:28,920 --> 01:13:34,080
Speaker 2: that if you've done done it the right way and

975
01:13:34,600 --> 01:13:37,760
Speaker 2: you played by the rules and you did what you

976
01:13:37,880 --> 01:13:41,120
Speaker 2: thought was right, only to find out that it didn't

977
01:13:41,160 --> 01:13:45,800
Speaker 2: matter one bit what you were doing right or wrong,

978
01:13:45,960 --> 01:13:52,839
Speaker 2: because in the end, there's so much greed in business,

979
01:13:53,800 --> 01:13:58,479
Speaker 2: in capitalism, there's so much greed tied up there to

980
01:13:59,360 --> 01:14:06,240
Speaker 2: very few that you can't really it's hard to fight

981
01:14:06,280 --> 01:14:10,880
Speaker 2: the machine. And what do we do. We're living through,

982
01:14:10,920 --> 01:14:15,559
Speaker 2: like I said, another Gilded Age, which was interesting following

983
01:14:15,640 --> 01:14:23,600
Speaker 2: the reconstruction period in the American history, and that fell apart,

984
01:14:24,520 --> 01:14:27,880
Speaker 2: and then you go, you know, into the roaring twenties,

985
01:14:28,560 --> 01:14:36,479
Speaker 2: all this while the Industrial Revolution is just making itself

986
01:14:36,600 --> 01:14:41,679
Speaker 2: more viable and more and more and buying up things

987
01:14:41,760 --> 01:14:46,680
Speaker 2: and consolidating and looking for a bigger check for everybody

988
01:14:46,840 --> 01:14:51,280
Speaker 2: that's lucky enough to be employed by them. And I'm

989
01:14:51,280 --> 01:14:54,439
Speaker 2: sitting here wondering about what happens if they start to

990
01:14:54,439 --> 01:14:59,840
Speaker 2: privatize our social security? And what happens when they hook

991
01:14:59,880 --> 01:15:06,000
Speaker 2: you ira and you're for ones? What if they hook

992
01:15:06,040 --> 01:15:08,800
Speaker 2: them irrevocably to the stock market? I mean, is that

993
01:15:08,840 --> 01:15:12,040
Speaker 2: how it's going to turn out? Who knows? Seems like

994
01:15:12,160 --> 01:15:14,799
Speaker 2: right now we're capable of doing anything.

995
01:15:16,720 --> 01:15:21,639
Speaker 1: So how's your financial situation? And what's your plan going forward?

996
01:15:21,720 --> 01:15:24,559
Speaker 1: Assuming you know, let's say you live another ten twenty years.

997
01:15:26,479 --> 01:15:31,559
Speaker 2: Wouldn't that be something to witness? I can't. Even when

998
01:15:31,560 --> 01:15:36,320
Speaker 2: I close my eyes, I can still see it. Anyway,

999
01:15:39,320 --> 01:15:41,280
Speaker 2: I'll tell you when it's too late. If you're a

1000
01:15:41,320 --> 01:15:46,920
Speaker 2: man is loose skin, if you sit down on a toilet,

1001
01:15:47,200 --> 01:15:55,080
Speaker 2: your gonads are floating, you've got problems anyway, you know

1002
01:15:55,680 --> 01:16:02,639
Speaker 2: what the heck? My financial situation right now, we're rolling

1003
01:16:02,680 --> 01:16:07,840
Speaker 2: with the wind. It's not easy because there's very little

1004
01:16:07,880 --> 01:16:11,559
Speaker 2: work in America. For me at this moment, and that's

1005
01:16:11,600 --> 01:16:15,760
Speaker 2: what we're trying to do with this latest recording. We

1006
01:16:15,800 --> 01:16:18,559
Speaker 2: feel it's a worthy record. It needs to be heard.

1007
01:16:20,200 --> 01:16:24,160
Speaker 2: You know, when I was passionate, not as passionate as

1008
01:16:24,160 --> 01:16:26,799
Speaker 2: I am now, but when I started really liking music,

1009
01:16:27,720 --> 01:16:31,479
Speaker 2: I just when I heard something on the radio and

1010
01:16:31,560 --> 01:16:34,280
Speaker 2: it sounded good, and I like the way it sounded,

1011
01:16:35,040 --> 01:16:38,120
Speaker 2: I didn't care. I didn't think about age, I didn't

1012
01:16:38,160 --> 01:16:42,040
Speaker 2: think about color, I didn't think about those things. I've

1013
01:16:42,040 --> 01:16:47,200
Speaker 2: thought about how much I liked that song, and I

1014
01:16:47,240 --> 01:16:51,440
Speaker 2: don't know. I think maybe that's some kind of mentality

1015
01:16:51,479 --> 01:16:54,040
Speaker 2: we should at least give another chance to because there's

1016
01:16:54,080 --> 01:16:58,760
Speaker 2: a lot of people, elders that are quite capable of

1017
01:16:58,800 --> 01:17:04,800
Speaker 2: still contributing valuable and entertaining things into our culture, but

1018
01:17:04,880 --> 01:17:08,120
Speaker 2: we don't do that. We're like a fast food restaurant,

1019
01:17:08,840 --> 01:17:10,960
Speaker 2: you know, give me the next thing that's going to sell.

1020
01:17:12,840 --> 01:17:15,519
Speaker 2: And I had a conversation a couple of years ago

1021
01:17:15,640 --> 01:17:17,960
Speaker 2: with a record company and they were quite honest with

1022
01:17:18,040 --> 01:17:21,400
Speaker 2: me that we love you, we love your music, we

1023
01:17:21,520 --> 01:17:24,400
Speaker 2: love the music we just heard that you did. But

1024
01:17:24,640 --> 01:17:28,879
Speaker 2: it would cost us, starting at half a million dollars

1025
01:17:29,760 --> 01:17:35,920
Speaker 2: to re establish you in the in the consciousness of

1026
01:17:35,960 --> 01:17:39,400
Speaker 2: the of the country, to to to get that much

1027
01:17:39,439 --> 01:17:42,320
Speaker 2: information out there, to get you set up on social media,

1028
01:17:42,400 --> 01:17:45,320
Speaker 2: to get you all the things you're going to need

1029
01:17:45,360 --> 01:17:47,559
Speaker 2: to return as a star. I said, well, what about

1030
01:17:47,560 --> 01:17:49,400
Speaker 2: if I don't want to be a star. I just

1031
01:17:49,479 --> 01:17:55,680
Speaker 2: want my records to be played, you know. That's that's

1032
01:17:55,800 --> 01:17:58,080
Speaker 2: kind of what we're facing right now. We've got a

1033
01:17:58,200 --> 01:18:03,360
Speaker 2: great record. I love it so much, and I'm just

1034
01:18:03,400 --> 01:18:07,280
Speaker 2: trying to come home. I've been recording in foreign countries

1035
01:18:07,320 --> 01:18:10,680
Speaker 2: for so long now that and people don't even know

1036
01:18:10,760 --> 01:18:15,679
Speaker 2: I'm alive. I mean, I've had nothing for them to hear.

1037
01:18:17,000 --> 01:18:19,920
Speaker 2: But it's not because I wasn't producing. It's not because

1038
01:18:19,960 --> 01:18:24,240
Speaker 2: I wasn't creating. It's because I never had the power

1039
01:18:24,920 --> 01:18:29,200
Speaker 2: or the push to open the doors I needed to open.

1040
01:18:30,439 --> 01:18:33,840
Speaker 2: I did have a very interesting management agreement with a

1041
01:18:33,920 --> 01:18:37,320
Speaker 2: wonderful man. His name is Brett Steele. He's a manager,

1042
01:18:39,040 --> 01:18:46,599
Speaker 2: and unfortunately that had to fall apart. I think for

1043
01:18:46,680 --> 01:18:50,040
Speaker 2: a couple of reasons, but it doesn't matter. He's talented.

1044
01:18:51,000 --> 01:18:54,760
Speaker 2: I thought the roster was a little too full. I

1045
01:18:54,800 --> 01:18:58,680
Speaker 2: felt like I needed somebody to give most of their

1046
01:18:58,720 --> 01:19:03,120
Speaker 2: attention to trying to resurrect me, and so when you

1047
01:19:03,240 --> 01:19:07,840
Speaker 2: had a larger roster as he did, it was difficult

1048
01:19:07,840 --> 01:19:10,120
Speaker 2: to want to stay with him. And besides, it was

1049
01:19:10,160 --> 01:19:14,759
Speaker 2: one of those situations where, you know, we talked about

1050
01:19:14,800 --> 01:19:18,759
Speaker 2: management contracts and he said a handshake will do well.

1051
01:19:19,240 --> 01:19:22,880
Speaker 2: I don't know about a handshake doing because you know,

1052
01:19:22,920 --> 01:19:25,960
Speaker 2: I've gotten stabbed that way before, not that he would

1053
01:19:26,000 --> 01:19:30,840
Speaker 2: do it. He's a marvelous guy, and I'm happy for

1054
01:19:31,000 --> 01:19:34,120
Speaker 2: the artist that he does manage, but I can't give

1055
01:19:34,240 --> 01:19:38,280
Speaker 2: up the power that I'm going to need to reintroduce

1056
01:19:38,400 --> 01:19:42,400
Speaker 2: me and somebody say, hey, you know your home kid,

1057
01:19:43,080 --> 01:19:46,200
Speaker 2: you did all that stuff, you know, whatever the heck

1058
01:19:46,360 --> 01:19:48,240
Speaker 2: way you were doing over there because we didn't hear it,

1059
01:19:48,280 --> 01:19:53,080
Speaker 2: but you're home now, and that would make a nice

1060
01:19:53,160 --> 01:19:56,120
Speaker 2: ending to that day, and then they you know, then

1061
01:19:56,160 --> 01:19:58,280
Speaker 2: you can rest easy when you look forward to what

1062
01:19:58,280 --> 01:20:01,880
Speaker 2: are you going to do tomorrow? And my idea what

1063
01:20:01,920 --> 01:20:06,440
Speaker 2: I'm going to do tomorrow is continue to write and records.

1064
01:20:06,439 --> 01:20:09,439
Speaker 2: That's what I want to do. It's getting harder to

1065
01:20:09,520 --> 01:20:19,760
Speaker 2: play because I have severe spinal stenosis with scoliosis, and

1066
01:20:20,400 --> 01:20:27,080
Speaker 2: so walking is difficult. And get this is I don't

1067
01:20:27,080 --> 01:20:29,160
Speaker 2: know where this woman came from, but I'm going to

1068
01:20:29,240 --> 01:20:33,599
Speaker 2: describe it to you now. We were performing on a

1069
01:20:33,640 --> 01:20:38,400
Speaker 2: cruise ship and I'm walking around with a cane because

1070
01:20:38,439 --> 01:20:41,559
Speaker 2: i have to at this moment. I can walk, but

1071
01:20:41,680 --> 01:20:43,680
Speaker 2: I can't. I can walk without a cane, but I

1072
01:20:43,720 --> 01:20:48,639
Speaker 2: can't walk far and I can't walk long times. So

1073
01:20:48,840 --> 01:20:51,800
Speaker 2: we're out there, we're enjoying the music with all these

1074
01:20:51,880 --> 01:20:55,679
Speaker 2: hundreds of other people on the ship, and we leave

1075
01:20:55,720 --> 01:21:01,120
Speaker 2: the area where everybody's congregated, and we're going past some

1076
01:21:01,400 --> 01:21:05,920
Speaker 2: open hallways, empty hallways, and we turn a corner to

1077
01:21:06,040 --> 01:21:09,639
Speaker 2: go around, and there's this woman and I'm struggling at

1078
01:21:09,640 --> 01:21:12,519
Speaker 2: this point because I've been in the sun for hours

1079
01:21:12,520 --> 01:21:18,280
Speaker 2: in the standing and I'm struggling to walk. And this

1080
01:21:18,360 --> 01:21:22,240
Speaker 2: woman just ambushed us, jumped out from behind a pillar

1081
01:21:22,360 --> 01:21:28,439
Speaker 2: and started videotaping my struggle to walk. And I'm wondering

1082
01:21:28,439 --> 01:21:33,599
Speaker 2: to myself, well, why would you do that? Why would

1083
01:21:33,640 --> 01:21:37,200
Speaker 2: you want to have that on tape? You know, what

1084
01:21:37,560 --> 01:21:39,879
Speaker 2: is that going to do for you in your social

1085
01:21:39,960 --> 01:21:46,800
Speaker 2: media world, showing somebody having a struggle. So maybe she's like,

1086
01:21:47,920 --> 01:21:51,400
Speaker 2: maybe she likes those national geographic snuff films where you

1087
01:21:51,800 --> 01:21:58,559
Speaker 2: watch the animals kill each other. You know, I don't know.

1088
01:21:58,640 --> 01:22:00,000
Speaker 2: It's a funny world.

1089
01:22:07,840 --> 01:22:11,360
Speaker 1: Tell me about your world in Europe and your career

1090
01:22:11,360 --> 01:22:11,879
Speaker 1: in Europe.

1091
01:22:13,320 --> 01:22:20,479
Speaker 2: Very different, very different. I was this coming year will

1092
01:22:20,520 --> 01:22:24,400
Speaker 2: be forty eight years of non stop touring every year

1093
01:22:24,439 --> 01:22:28,840
Speaker 2: in Europe, with the exception of one COVID year where

1094
01:22:28,880 --> 01:22:33,719
Speaker 2: they wouldn't allow us to travel there. It's a market

1095
01:22:33,720 --> 01:22:38,880
Speaker 2: that I built over a long time. The first seventeen

1096
01:22:39,000 --> 01:22:44,200
Speaker 2: years were in West Germany before the wall came down,

1097
01:22:45,520 --> 01:22:49,080
Speaker 2: and then we slowly got invited by the government in

1098
01:22:49,120 --> 01:22:56,040
Speaker 2: the East to perform. And I did a performance on

1099
01:22:56,080 --> 01:22:59,720
Speaker 2: a show called The Rock Palace, which was sent out

1100
01:22:59,760 --> 01:23:02,320
Speaker 2: to one hundred and thirty million. At that point in

1101
01:23:02,360 --> 01:23:04,320
Speaker 2: the morning, they said there was one hundred and thirty

1102
01:23:04,360 --> 01:23:09,000
Speaker 2: million people probably watching. I was on a bill with

1103
01:23:09,600 --> 01:23:18,880
Speaker 2: Nil's laughkra and Southside Johnny, and they had those sons

1104
01:23:18,880 --> 01:23:24,799
Speaker 2: of guns. Nobody had told anybody what time the headlining

1105
01:23:24,920 --> 01:23:27,200
Speaker 2: was going to go on. I wasn't headlighting, I was opening,

1106
01:23:28,479 --> 01:23:32,360
Speaker 2: and nobody had told me that. When Southside found out

1107
01:23:32,880 --> 01:23:35,240
Speaker 2: and Neil's found out that the headlining would be going

1108
01:23:35,280 --> 01:23:38,000
Speaker 2: on at two in the morning, all of a sudden

1109
01:23:38,080 --> 01:23:41,840
Speaker 2: they wanted to Hey, Mitch, listen, man, we love you.

1110
01:23:42,560 --> 01:23:45,280
Speaker 2: Would you like to close the show? And I'm going

1111
01:23:45,479 --> 01:23:49,519
Speaker 2: what headline the show over you guys? Of course I would,

1112
01:23:52,200 --> 01:23:55,920
Speaker 2: and it's because I didn't know about the time. So

1113
01:23:56,520 --> 01:24:00,439
Speaker 2: we were going to open. So we were having in

1114
01:24:00,479 --> 01:24:04,080
Speaker 2: the early afternoon. We were having a few drinks and

1115
01:24:04,160 --> 01:24:06,360
Speaker 2: we thought we'd be going on pretty soon. It wouldn't

1116
01:24:06,360 --> 01:24:09,679
Speaker 2: be long. Well, then nobody told us about the change.

1117
01:24:10,200 --> 01:24:11,920
Speaker 2: You know, they told me that I would be headlined,

1118
01:24:11,920 --> 01:24:14,559
Speaker 2: but nobody told us about the time. So as we're

1119
01:24:14,560 --> 01:24:18,360
Speaker 2: sitting there waiting, we're continuing to drink and by the

1120
01:24:18,400 --> 01:24:24,880
Speaker 2: time it comes me to be on stage. They had

1121
01:24:24,920 --> 01:24:28,280
Speaker 2: a pre interview where the other bands had their interviews

1122
01:24:28,320 --> 01:24:30,960
Speaker 2: after their performance. They had a pre interview with a

1123
01:24:31,040 --> 01:24:35,000
Speaker 2: drunk who hadn't gotten a chance to put his music

1124
01:24:35,040 --> 01:24:39,400
Speaker 2: out there yet. Well, by the way, I haven't had

1125
01:24:39,400 --> 01:24:43,280
Speaker 2: anything to drink for over twenty years now, and same

1126
01:24:43,320 --> 01:24:50,120
Speaker 2: thing with the dope. What messes it up for me

1127
01:24:50,360 --> 01:24:54,639
Speaker 2: with my back is they screwed up to begin with

1128
01:24:54,640 --> 01:24:57,479
Speaker 2: with the cervical. They fused the cervical and the medal

1129
01:24:58,080 --> 01:25:01,840
Speaker 2: wasn't quite right. Now I kind of see everything from

1130
01:25:01,880 --> 01:25:05,720
Speaker 2: my dog's perspective. Whatever, it's on the sidewalk in front

1131
01:25:05,760 --> 01:25:10,680
Speaker 2: of me, that's what I'll look at. This show is

1132
01:25:10,720 --> 01:25:14,760
Speaker 2: called the Rock Palace. So we go on. In the interview,

1133
01:25:16,439 --> 01:25:21,880
Speaker 2: I said some things that the government didn't like, and

1134
01:25:21,960 --> 01:25:24,800
Speaker 2: my record company didn't like, and my manager didn't like.

1135
01:25:24,880 --> 01:25:29,280
Speaker 2: But the kids loved it. And during the show, my

1136
01:25:29,360 --> 01:25:33,160
Speaker 2: show wasn't like anybody else's show. I got off the stage,

1137
01:25:33,200 --> 01:25:35,680
Speaker 2: I went down into the audience. I sat next to

1138
01:25:35,720 --> 01:25:42,200
Speaker 2: the to the attendees, and I talked to him. I

1139
01:25:42,320 --> 01:25:45,800
Speaker 2: sang with him, and I was moving all around, and

1140
01:25:45,880 --> 01:25:50,719
Speaker 2: the band was just roaring, and we did this remarkable show,

1141
01:25:51,439 --> 01:25:56,040
Speaker 2: which they're calling the best that they've ever seen. For

1142
01:25:56,160 --> 01:26:01,479
Speaker 2: that for marketing purposes, maybe, but that drew my fan base,

1143
01:26:02,040 --> 01:26:04,800
Speaker 2: and that's what allowed me to continue to go over

1144
01:26:04,880 --> 01:26:10,800
Speaker 2: to Germany for all these decades. In the beginning of

1145
01:26:10,840 --> 01:26:14,000
Speaker 2: the transition from West to East, where we started going

1146
01:26:14,000 --> 01:26:20,120
Speaker 2: into a whole Germany, I continued to bring American players

1147
01:26:20,160 --> 01:26:24,519
Speaker 2: over because of the lack of knowledge of not blues

1148
01:26:24,560 --> 01:26:31,080
Speaker 2: but sort of rock and roll stylings. Because the East

1149
01:26:31,120 --> 01:26:35,439
Speaker 2: Germans were heavy into blues scene. I would too if

1150
01:26:35,479 --> 01:26:42,000
Speaker 2: I was, you know, I would be very bluesy in

1151
01:26:42,040 --> 01:26:50,160
Speaker 2: a communist country, and we worked it. We worked it,

1152
01:26:50,280 --> 01:26:53,600
Speaker 2: we made it into something. We molded it. We dedicated

1153
01:26:53,600 --> 01:26:58,160
Speaker 2: our lives to it and did so many great shows,

1154
01:26:58,640 --> 01:27:03,320
Speaker 2: but never once having to do any of the American hits,

1155
01:27:04,360 --> 01:27:08,559
Speaker 2: and no requests for him wow, doing two hour shows

1156
01:27:08,680 --> 01:27:13,559
Speaker 2: with no intermissions, no opening acts, all material that I

1157
01:27:13,600 --> 01:27:16,000
Speaker 2: created in Germany or France.

1158
01:27:17,600 --> 01:27:20,240
Speaker 1: Tell me about East Germany before the wall came down.

1159
01:27:21,320 --> 01:27:23,759
Speaker 2: Well, we happened to go over. There was no neon

1160
01:27:24,520 --> 01:27:28,599
Speaker 2: that was immediate once you went through checkpoint Charlie. There

1161
01:27:28,680 --> 01:27:35,639
Speaker 2: was no neon at all. And we asked our guide

1162
01:27:35,920 --> 01:27:39,000
Speaker 2: we wanted to go to a bar. He said, well,

1163
01:27:39,080 --> 01:27:41,120
Speaker 2: let's just keep walking. I said, well, do you know

1164
01:27:41,160 --> 01:27:43,240
Speaker 2: where you're going? He said, no, we will. I said,

1165
01:27:43,240 --> 01:27:46,040
Speaker 2: what do you mean we will? He said, when we

1166
01:27:46,120 --> 01:27:48,640
Speaker 2: come to the door where you hear music, that's going

1167
01:27:48,680 --> 01:27:52,640
Speaker 2: to be a club, Let's just walk in. There was

1168
01:27:52,720 --> 01:27:57,200
Speaker 2: no out signage outside or anything. It was all like

1169
01:27:57,600 --> 01:28:03,320
Speaker 2: known to the locals, you know what was happening. And

1170
01:28:04,040 --> 01:28:07,360
Speaker 2: so I got invited over a couple of times before

1171
01:28:07,400 --> 01:28:12,599
Speaker 2: the wall came down. I recorded over there same studio

1172
01:28:12,720 --> 01:28:20,080
Speaker 2: that you two and David Boy used beautiful studio. In

1173
01:28:20,120 --> 01:28:22,840
Speaker 2: the middle of the studio was an old ballroom where

1174
01:28:22,880 --> 01:28:30,000
Speaker 2: the Nazis would have their ballroom dances. But I'm straying,

1175
01:28:30,840 --> 01:28:36,560
Speaker 2: as I have been for the whole interview. So we

1176
01:28:36,720 --> 01:28:39,559
Speaker 2: do this thing and we get invited to play a

1177
01:28:39,680 --> 01:28:43,599
Speaker 2: soccer field. Okay, when's the last time I saw a

1178
01:28:43,600 --> 01:28:49,639
Speaker 2: soccer field in America? So considering, you know, my last

1179
01:28:49,640 --> 01:28:53,679
Speaker 2: big hit was like sixty nine, and now we're deep

1180
01:28:53,720 --> 01:28:56,280
Speaker 2: into the eighties, not deep into the eighties, but we're

1181
01:28:56,280 --> 01:29:01,240
Speaker 2: in the eighties and all those years. But things did

1182
01:29:01,280 --> 01:29:03,600
Speaker 2: happen in America for me. But let me set that

1183
01:29:03,680 --> 01:29:06,240
Speaker 2: aside for a moment and finished this East German story

1184
01:29:06,280 --> 01:29:11,600
Speaker 2: because it's cute. They would didn't. They didn't want to

1185
01:29:11,600 --> 01:29:17,479
Speaker 2: pay us in the East German marks because of the embarrassment, uh,

1186
01:29:18,000 --> 01:29:22,559
Speaker 2: the valuation and they so they wouldn't pay us. I

1187
01:29:22,600 --> 01:29:25,760
Speaker 2: remember the marks were green colored to a sort of

1188
01:29:25,920 --> 01:29:31,160
Speaker 2: light blimey green. So they paid us in hardware. We

1189
01:29:31,200 --> 01:29:36,320
Speaker 2: got two grand pianos. We got a Trebbe, their little

1190
01:29:36,400 --> 01:29:41,360
Speaker 2: national car, the East German car. I got a generous tent,

1191
01:29:43,320 --> 01:29:46,880
Speaker 2: had like four different rooms to it, a huge tent.

1192
01:29:47,720 --> 01:29:50,920
Speaker 2: And so what did we do with this stuff, you know. Well,

1193
01:29:50,960 --> 01:29:54,200
Speaker 2: what we did was we took it back and we

1194
01:29:54,280 --> 01:29:57,679
Speaker 2: sold it in the West and made our money that way.

1195
01:29:59,240 --> 01:30:03,080
Speaker 2: But what we discovered as well is when you're traveling

1196
01:30:03,160 --> 01:30:06,759
Speaker 2: between those two borders, they'd make you get off the bus,

1197
01:30:07,040 --> 01:30:09,559
Speaker 2: leave all your belongings on the bus, go inside for

1198
01:30:09,640 --> 01:30:12,720
Speaker 2: your paperwork, and then say all right, get on the

1199
01:30:12,760 --> 01:30:16,120
Speaker 2: bus and leave. And so you did, only to discover

1200
01:30:16,240 --> 01:30:20,519
Speaker 2: that your cassettes were gone, your radios were gone, your

1201
01:30:20,560 --> 01:30:24,759
Speaker 2: instruments were gone, you know, I mean, they just outright

1202
01:30:24,920 --> 01:30:28,360
Speaker 2: stole from you. So it was the culture in East

1203
01:30:28,360 --> 01:30:32,880
Speaker 2: Germany was certainly different from West Germany. And that's why

1204
01:30:32,880 --> 01:30:38,840
Speaker 2: I was so shocking for the West. When the wall

1205
01:30:38,920 --> 01:30:43,000
Speaker 2: did come down. There was a lot of traffic heading

1206
01:30:43,120 --> 01:30:47,160
Speaker 2: to the west, a lot of traffic, but the only

1207
01:30:47,200 --> 01:30:49,000
Speaker 2: people head into the West that I knew of at

1208
01:30:49,000 --> 01:30:53,760
Speaker 2: that time were the banks, and they were going to rebuild.

1209
01:30:54,120 --> 01:30:59,759
Speaker 2: The Soviets never gave anything, They just took, took, took.

1210
01:31:01,280 --> 01:31:05,040
Speaker 2: So when the wall came down, these cities, famous cities,

1211
01:31:05,560 --> 01:31:10,080
Speaker 2: big cities in the East had to be rebuilt, from

1212
01:31:10,120 --> 01:31:17,120
Speaker 2: the sewers to the streets, the electrical grids, to everything

1213
01:31:17,400 --> 01:31:19,920
Speaker 2: that you could think of that you need to run

1214
01:31:20,080 --> 01:31:23,960
Speaker 2: a functioning city, had to be replaced by Western tax

1215
01:31:24,040 --> 01:31:29,160
Speaker 2: dollars in Germany, and so that's where that resentment came from.

1216
01:31:30,160 --> 01:31:37,760
Speaker 1: Okay, you're a saft spoken, thoughtful, intelligent, educated guy. What

1217
01:31:37,920 --> 01:31:43,080
Speaker 1: was the twenty something Mitch Ryder like? Same or different?

1218
01:31:45,640 --> 01:31:53,400
Speaker 2: I was just watching an interview at some New York club,

1219
01:31:53,479 --> 01:31:59,680
Speaker 2: New York City, when I was hot, okay, and I

1220
01:31:59,800 --> 01:32:04,799
Speaker 2: was I was polite and respectful. I don't think I

1221
01:32:04,880 --> 01:32:09,759
Speaker 2: carried myself. Only later on after I started getting mad,

1222
01:32:11,160 --> 01:32:15,880
Speaker 2: angry at myself for choices I had made that sabotaged

1223
01:32:16,120 --> 01:32:24,639
Speaker 2: my career. So I started drinking heavily. Only then did

1224
01:32:24,680 --> 01:32:30,800
Speaker 2: I realize what a fool I had been. But in

1225
01:32:30,840 --> 01:32:36,120
Speaker 2: my twenties, I was, you know, pretty reserved guy. I mean,

1226
01:32:36,160 --> 01:32:39,160
Speaker 2: the American Heart Association made me Prince of Hearts for

1227
01:32:39,200 --> 01:32:44,560
Speaker 2: a year. Just tons of stuff like that, charitable causes

1228
01:32:46,200 --> 01:32:50,400
Speaker 2: doing everything I had learned, you know, being a Catholic.

1229
01:32:51,760 --> 01:32:54,680
Speaker 2: Not that they don't teach in goodness anywhere else, but

1230
01:32:54,720 --> 01:32:59,240
Speaker 2: the Catholic Church is famous for it. If you can't

1231
01:32:59,320 --> 01:33:01,080
Speaker 2: understand them, whip it into you.

1232
01:33:03,360 --> 01:33:06,040
Speaker 1: So tell me about getting angry and feeling like a fool.

1233
01:33:08,040 --> 01:33:09,760
Speaker 2: You don't know what your age, what that's like.

1234
01:33:10,760 --> 01:33:14,920
Speaker 1: Well, I know, but my light history is different from yours.

1235
01:33:15,400 --> 01:33:18,719
Speaker 1: You know, I didn't have this ubiquitous fame. I wasn't

1236
01:33:18,800 --> 01:33:22,519
Speaker 1: ripped off for all this money. I didn't hit a

1237
01:33:22,640 --> 01:33:25,520
Speaker 1: peak and then, you know, have a hard time reclaiming

1238
01:33:25,560 --> 01:33:26,080
Speaker 1: that peak.

1239
01:33:27,040 --> 01:33:33,559
Speaker 2: You're absolutely right one point. So which part do you

1240
01:33:33,560 --> 01:33:43,519
Speaker 2: want to hear? All of it? All right? My wife's

1241
01:33:43,520 --> 01:33:47,360
Speaker 2: turned to poison me, I'm sure of it. The water

1242
01:33:47,479 --> 01:33:58,720
Speaker 2: is different today. Well, as I said, the most regrettable

1243
01:33:58,760 --> 01:34:01,880
Speaker 2: part of my career is, uh, how I managed to

1244
01:34:03,439 --> 01:34:11,120
Speaker 2: hurt myself career wise. I'm simply a dreamer and I

1245
01:34:11,680 --> 01:34:18,200
Speaker 2: need leadership that's not going to try to hurt me.

1246
01:34:21,040 --> 01:34:24,080
Speaker 2: What would do me, what would serve me best right

1247
01:34:24,120 --> 01:34:28,559
Speaker 2: now would be probably a six year old billionaire with

1248
01:34:28,640 --> 01:34:37,200
Speaker 2: a devil make air attitude. I just, uh, I think

1249
01:34:37,240 --> 01:34:41,800
Speaker 2: what could look? I'm going to end up happy when

1250
01:34:42,160 --> 01:34:45,320
Speaker 2: when the end finally comes anyway, because I'm happy. Now.

1251
01:34:46,840 --> 01:34:51,680
Speaker 2: We're talking about things that are uncomfortable, but I am

1252
01:34:51,720 --> 01:34:55,000
Speaker 2: a happy guy, and I do expect the sun to

1253
01:34:55,040 --> 01:35:00,000
Speaker 2: come up tomorrow and I'm working on new projects. Complete

1254
01:35:00,080 --> 01:35:06,320
Speaker 2: needed many projects that aren't for sale yet, and I'm

1255
01:35:06,320 --> 01:35:12,639
Speaker 2: still ambitious that way. It's not comfortable being disabled slightly,

1256
01:35:12,760 --> 01:35:16,160
Speaker 2: But you know, they don't come to see me dance,

1257
01:35:16,600 --> 01:35:20,759
Speaker 2: they come to hear me sing. So it's simple.

1258
01:35:21,040 --> 01:35:23,160
Speaker 1: Well, how long did it take you to get all

1259
01:35:23,160 --> 01:35:24,639
Speaker 1: over being ripped off?

1260
01:35:28,680 --> 01:35:35,040
Speaker 2: I think when the Appellate Court in New York State

1261
01:35:36,720 --> 01:35:41,760
Speaker 2: ruled against me in my lawsuit, there was a finality

1262
01:35:41,840 --> 01:35:47,000
Speaker 2: to that. I didn't feel like appealing to the Supreme

1263
01:35:47,040 --> 01:35:52,720
Speaker 2: Court in New York State. And so one of the

1264
01:35:52,920 --> 01:35:56,519
Speaker 2: curious things, do you mind if I continue to call

1265
01:35:56,520 --> 01:35:56,920
Speaker 2: you Bob?

1266
01:35:57,080 --> 01:35:58,280
Speaker 1: No, that's cool, that's my name.

1267
01:35:59,120 --> 01:36:05,760
Speaker 2: Okay, okay, So Bob Crewe, like I said, was from

1268
01:36:05,760 --> 01:36:09,479
Speaker 2: an earlier age. I told you the Vegas thing, which

1269
01:36:09,560 --> 01:36:13,479
Speaker 2: was an example. But he also had his own little

1270
01:36:13,520 --> 01:36:18,280
Speaker 2: tin panelley right in his offices, and you would go

1271
01:36:18,360 --> 01:36:22,320
Speaker 2: in there and he owned everything. You know. He just

1272
01:36:22,320 --> 01:36:25,280
Speaker 2: simply hired people to write songs for him and they

1273
01:36:25,320 --> 01:36:27,840
Speaker 2: would get credit and a small royalty. And when I

1274
01:36:27,840 --> 01:36:30,120
Speaker 2: say small, we're talking about one or two cents a

1275
01:36:30,280 --> 01:36:33,479
Speaker 2: record five cents at the most if you're a really

1276
01:36:33,560 --> 01:36:38,000
Speaker 2: big deal. So he dissuaded us at a time. See

1277
01:36:38,600 --> 01:36:41,160
Speaker 2: I wrote my first record, I wrote my second record.

1278
01:36:41,240 --> 01:36:44,519
Speaker 2: All before I went to New York. My mom used

1279
01:36:44,560 --> 01:36:46,880
Speaker 2: to sing around the house all the time. My mom

1280
01:36:47,000 --> 01:36:50,800
Speaker 2: used to write music. She'd take me a little preschooler,

1281
01:36:50,960 --> 01:36:53,920
Speaker 2: and she'd read and sing her songs to me and

1282
01:36:54,000 --> 01:36:59,519
Speaker 2: asked me for my opinion. She valued my talent that much,

1283
01:36:59,560 --> 01:37:08,200
Speaker 2: I guess. But it's always been about for me that

1284
01:37:08,439 --> 01:37:18,160
Speaker 2: that creative progress, the evolution. I started out being a writer,

1285
01:37:18,439 --> 01:37:20,360
Speaker 2: and that's what I wanted to be, and I wanted

1286
01:37:20,400 --> 01:37:23,240
Speaker 2: to be a singer, which of course I'm good at.

1287
01:37:24,160 --> 01:37:28,559
Speaker 2: But at a time when everybody around us, their managers

1288
01:37:28,640 --> 01:37:34,200
Speaker 2: were pressing them hard, especially the Brits, to write your

1289
01:37:34,240 --> 01:37:40,960
Speaker 2: own music so we can establish a catalog. Bob Crew

1290
01:37:41,080 --> 01:37:43,280
Speaker 2: was saying that, no, no, no, no, no no no, don't

1291
01:37:43,280 --> 01:37:45,360
Speaker 2: you worry about the music. I've got music for you.

1292
01:37:46,120 --> 01:37:48,160
Speaker 2: And that's what we ended up doing, or a lot

1293
01:37:48,200 --> 01:37:54,920
Speaker 2: of covers. So you know, I wanted to, after that experience,

1294
01:37:57,360 --> 01:38:05,040
Speaker 2: at least for myself, get to a position that reflected

1295
01:38:05,360 --> 01:38:11,719
Speaker 2: who I really am as a person. And how different

1296
01:38:11,760 --> 01:38:16,599
Speaker 2: is that from anybody? If it's different at all, it's

1297
01:38:16,680 --> 01:38:19,559
Speaker 2: just part of the discovery process, you know, And to

1298
01:38:19,600 --> 01:38:25,280
Speaker 2: become a better writer. And that's been I've been chasing

1299
01:38:25,320 --> 01:38:29,360
Speaker 2: that forever and I'll be chasing it tomorrow. I want

1300
01:38:29,360 --> 01:38:32,240
Speaker 2: to make another new album, you know. I want to

1301
01:38:32,280 --> 01:38:37,080
Speaker 2: write better songs. I've been told that I've written great songs,

1302
01:38:37,160 --> 01:38:40,920
Speaker 2: but I have no proof of it because I never

1303
01:38:41,880 --> 01:38:44,799
Speaker 2: I haven't been with the machine for a long time.

1304
01:38:46,680 --> 01:38:50,080
Speaker 2: Contracts I sign in Europe, multiple contracts are usually with

1305
01:38:50,960 --> 01:38:54,599
Speaker 2: smaller companies, have no power, have no push, have no connection.

1306
01:38:56,160 --> 01:38:59,120
Speaker 2: At least roof Records is getting me on the American charts,

1307
01:38:59,360 --> 01:39:03,280
Speaker 2: but it's just a little glimpse of me, you know.

1308
01:39:03,520 --> 01:39:09,920
Speaker 2: So our if we want to be heard, we need

1309
01:39:09,960 --> 01:39:15,320
Speaker 2: to What I need is a benefactor, I think, and

1310
01:39:15,400 --> 01:39:21,120
Speaker 2: I can together with somebody that's intelligent, that's self made,

1311
01:39:21,680 --> 01:39:25,840
Speaker 2: that's comfortable in their lives and wants to dally and

1312
01:39:26,000 --> 01:39:30,080
Speaker 2: prove a point about aging Americans and what their value

1313
01:39:30,160 --> 01:39:32,960
Speaker 2: is to us. Give me a call, you know, and

1314
01:39:33,000 --> 01:39:35,280
Speaker 2: we will make it happen. We'll turn the world upside

1315
01:39:35,280 --> 01:39:38,400
Speaker 2: down on his head and say, hey, you know, I'm

1316
01:39:38,439 --> 01:39:40,920
Speaker 2: eighty years old and I'm doing music. It's just as

1317
01:39:40,920 --> 01:39:45,200
Speaker 2: good as what you're doing. So let's take that argument

1318
01:39:45,280 --> 01:39:49,720
Speaker 2: there instead of sending our seniors off to places where

1319
01:39:49,800 --> 01:39:53,400
Speaker 2: we'll never see them again, you know, and the ones

1320
01:39:53,439 --> 01:39:56,960
Speaker 2: that are suffering, there's no need for that.

1321
01:39:58,439 --> 01:40:02,440
Speaker 1: Let's talk about life experience. You've been married three times.

1322
01:40:02,760 --> 01:40:04,840
Speaker 1: What did you learn and what advice do you have?

1323
01:40:07,840 --> 01:40:11,240
Speaker 2: Well, if you're a musician, don't get married. That's what

1324
01:40:11,400 --> 01:40:20,160
Speaker 2: I learned. My children are from my first wife. My

1325
01:40:20,280 --> 01:40:25,240
Speaker 2: second wife, I woke up one morning with a very

1326
01:40:25,240 --> 01:40:30,040
Speaker 2: bad headache, only to come fully conscious and realize that

1327
01:40:30,240 --> 01:40:38,880
Speaker 2: she had a loaded handgun pressing against my forehead, and

1328
01:40:38,920 --> 01:40:43,240
Speaker 2: it did disturb me a little bit. I talked her

1329
01:40:43,240 --> 01:40:49,360
Speaker 2: down by offering her some more drugs, which I didn't have,

1330
01:40:49,520 --> 01:40:51,559
Speaker 2: but it was long enough to get that gun out

1331
01:40:51,560 --> 01:40:55,840
Speaker 2: of her hand. And then I filed for divorce, and

1332
01:40:55,960 --> 01:41:01,040
Speaker 2: I thought I had substantial cause she ended up dying,

1333
01:41:01,120 --> 01:41:05,080
Speaker 2: unfortunately as a result of her drug use. And then

1334
01:41:05,120 --> 01:41:08,840
Speaker 2: I met my wife, my current wife, who is just

1335
01:41:09,280 --> 01:41:18,960
Speaker 2: absolutely my savior. Yeah, she's an incredible woman. I've never

1336
01:41:19,080 --> 01:41:23,320
Speaker 2: known a woman like that. When I met her, I

1337
01:41:23,439 --> 01:41:25,960
Speaker 2: was still I was coming off the heels of the

1338
01:41:26,080 --> 01:41:30,840
Speaker 2: John Mellencamp produced album Never Kick a Sleeping Dog, and

1339
01:41:30,880 --> 01:41:34,800
Speaker 2: so I was in Detroit anyway, reborn as a star,

1340
01:41:35,400 --> 01:41:40,120
Speaker 2: and not that you would know, but that song we covered,

1341
01:41:40,120 --> 01:41:43,360
Speaker 2: the Prince Song, did chart, and it was the first

1342
01:41:43,400 --> 01:41:44,120
Speaker 2: time I was.

1343
01:41:44,920 --> 01:41:47,040
Speaker 1: That's my favorite song on that album. When you did

1344
01:41:47,040 --> 01:41:50,320
Speaker 1: a cover, I woke right up and said, wow, And

1345
01:41:50,360 --> 01:41:51,120
Speaker 1: it was a great cover.

1346
01:41:52,240 --> 01:41:54,880
Speaker 2: I'm glad to hear that. Yeah, I saw it in

1347
01:41:54,880 --> 01:42:00,559
Speaker 2: a movie called Hot Dog or something, A bunch of skiers, right, yeah,

1348
01:42:00,560 --> 01:42:03,880
Speaker 2: a nice, nice groove and you know, a great experience.

1349
01:42:03,920 --> 01:42:08,960
Speaker 2: And then thanks to John believing in me. So I've

1350
01:42:08,960 --> 01:42:10,360
Speaker 2: had help along the way.

1351
01:42:10,720 --> 01:42:13,479
Speaker 1: But you were telling me about meeting your third wife.

1352
01:42:14,280 --> 01:42:20,160
Speaker 2: Yes, so I'm hot again. And the higher the record

1353
01:42:20,200 --> 01:42:23,879
Speaker 2: goes in the charts, the prettier the girls get every week. Okay,

1354
01:42:24,200 --> 01:42:33,439
Speaker 2: it's just a fact. She was different because I was

1355
01:42:34,840 --> 01:42:39,960
Speaker 2: getting divorced and she had been divorced, and she had

1356
01:42:40,320 --> 01:42:43,920
Speaker 2: two little kids in a shopping cart and we're in

1357
01:42:44,000 --> 01:42:47,200
Speaker 2: Kmart and we both end up at the flower shop

1358
01:42:47,280 --> 01:42:50,519
Speaker 2: together and I'm looking for roses, and I asked, do

1359
01:42:50,560 --> 01:42:54,479
Speaker 2: you know anything about roses, kind of offhandedly because I

1360
01:42:54,520 --> 01:42:56,800
Speaker 2: saw the kids and I wasn't really ready to mess

1361
01:42:56,840 --> 01:43:01,400
Speaker 2: with any of that, And she said, yeah, in fact,

1362
01:43:01,439 --> 01:43:05,160
Speaker 2: I'm looking for some stuff from my garden as well.

1363
01:43:06,120 --> 01:43:08,759
Speaker 2: I think what you're looking for is over there and whatever.

1364
01:43:08,800 --> 01:43:14,240
Speaker 2: But anyway, it sparked a conversation, but not too many

1365
01:43:14,280 --> 01:43:23,880
Speaker 2: details were forthcoming from her, and she we ended up

1366
01:43:23,880 --> 01:43:30,280
Speaker 2: in line together, and they pushed my stuff through. She's

1367
01:43:30,320 --> 01:43:35,000
Speaker 2: behind me, and the lady sees her stuff on the

1368
01:43:35,000 --> 01:43:37,439
Speaker 2: counter and thinks her together and starts pushing her stuff

1369
01:43:37,479 --> 01:43:42,439
Speaker 2: through as well. And she stops the lady and said, no, no, no, no, no,

1370
01:43:42,479 --> 01:43:50,000
Speaker 2: that's that's not his. Those are my belongings. And I said, well,

1371
01:43:50,280 --> 01:43:58,479
Speaker 2: you know, hey, I'm sorry she did that. If you want,

1372
01:43:58,880 --> 01:44:02,240
Speaker 2: you know, I can help help you. Because she didn't

1373
01:44:02,280 --> 01:44:07,320
Speaker 2: look like she had much money. In fact, she didn't,

1374
01:44:09,120 --> 01:44:15,760
Speaker 2: so she wasn't enjoining, she wasn't getting into that. She

1375
01:44:15,800 --> 01:44:17,960
Speaker 2: didn't like to pick up line, she didn't like any

1376
01:44:18,040 --> 01:44:22,200
Speaker 2: of that stuff. But one thing I realized about her was,

1377
01:44:23,240 --> 01:44:27,240
Speaker 2: and I swear to you this is the truth as

1378
01:44:27,320 --> 01:44:32,960
Speaker 2: I know it, I did not want She's beautiful. She's

1379
01:44:33,000 --> 01:44:41,559
Speaker 2: a beautiful woman physically, intellectually, morally, she's industrious, intelligent, as

1380
01:44:41,560 --> 01:44:50,320
Speaker 2: they say down south, she cleans up well. She if

1381
01:44:50,320 --> 01:44:52,880
Speaker 2: it had been any other woman, Because I was out

1382
01:44:52,920 --> 01:44:57,920
Speaker 2: of that marriage and I just would have wanted to

1383
01:44:57,960 --> 01:44:59,840
Speaker 2: take her to bed, but I didn't want to touch

1384
01:44:59,840 --> 01:45:05,080
Speaker 2: the woman. We corresponded, We telephone called, We went on

1385
01:45:05,200 --> 01:45:08,840
Speaker 2: dates for a year and a half before the thought

1386
01:45:09,040 --> 01:45:12,680
Speaker 2: sex even came into my mind. I mean that was

1387
01:45:13,000 --> 01:45:22,040
Speaker 2: something absolutely I had never experienced before. No, she was

1388
01:45:23,760 --> 01:45:37,400
Speaker 2: this woman so whole, uh and and honest and industrious

1389
01:45:37,479 --> 01:45:40,960
Speaker 2: and you know, I mean she put she changes electrical

1390
01:45:41,040 --> 01:45:44,960
Speaker 2: sockets around the house, she runs wiring, and she she

1391
01:45:45,080 --> 01:45:48,479
Speaker 2: does all the technical stuff and then she has these

1392
01:45:48,520 --> 01:45:53,360
Speaker 2: beautiful gardens. She she makes and designs, and she loves

1393
01:45:53,360 --> 01:45:56,880
Speaker 2: a clean house. And she's uh, she plays pickleball every

1394
01:45:56,960 --> 01:46:02,680
Speaker 2: day she can, and she's really good, you know. And

1395
01:46:02,720 --> 01:46:12,519
Speaker 2: she's see she is seventy seven years old, or not

1396
01:46:12,680 --> 01:46:18,280
Speaker 2: seventy seven, sixty seven years old. I'm eighty. So you know,

1397
01:46:18,439 --> 01:46:22,800
Speaker 2: the big big drama here is I'm going to be

1398
01:46:22,880 --> 01:46:27,439
Speaker 2: leaving probably if things go according to the plan before

1399
01:46:27,479 --> 01:46:35,439
Speaker 2: she does. And it's it's brought some deep feelings between us.

1400
01:46:36,520 --> 01:46:41,200
Speaker 2: We bonded, I think even closer than we thought was possible.

1401
01:46:41,560 --> 01:46:47,679
Speaker 2: And here's the woman that we did get divorced after

1402
01:46:47,760 --> 01:46:54,040
Speaker 2: three years, and we took those three years to understand

1403
01:46:54,080 --> 01:47:00,400
Speaker 2: that there was nothing out there that satisfying the two

1404
01:47:00,439 --> 01:47:06,240
Speaker 2: of us as much as we satisfied ourselves on all

1405
01:47:06,360 --> 01:47:14,160
Speaker 2: levels of thought and action. The trick about sex is

1406
01:47:14,240 --> 01:47:16,880
Speaker 2: that's usually the first thing that people use as an

1407
01:47:16,920 --> 01:47:21,479
Speaker 2: introduction card, and that's no basis for a relationship at all.

1408
01:47:22,120 --> 01:47:25,599
Speaker 2: So I think we did it the right way. We

1409
01:47:26,120 --> 01:47:31,400
Speaker 2: studied each other for that year and a half before

1410
01:47:31,439 --> 01:47:35,479
Speaker 2: I married her, and the divorce came and we realized

1411
01:47:35,520 --> 01:47:40,040
Speaker 2: that we couldn't do it without each other, and we

1412
01:47:40,120 --> 01:47:45,800
Speaker 2: wanted to be back together. And we've had some hard times,

1413
01:47:48,880 --> 01:47:51,599
Speaker 2: but we've had some grand times. And I took her

1414
01:47:51,960 --> 01:47:54,599
Speaker 2: to see the world that she wouldn't have been capable

1415
01:47:54,640 --> 01:47:58,880
Speaker 2: of seeing. She's got friends all over the country. She's

1416
01:47:58,920 --> 01:48:02,479
Speaker 2: been to eighteen year nineteen different countries, and she's got

1417
01:48:02,520 --> 01:48:07,280
Speaker 2: friends in all of them. This is a beautiful woman.

1418
01:48:07,880 --> 01:48:09,280
Speaker 2: Her name's Megan.

1419
01:48:16,960 --> 01:48:18,160
Speaker 1: So tell me about fame.

1420
01:48:19,680 --> 01:48:23,280
Speaker 2: Oh, it's one of the most destruct It's one of

1421
01:48:23,360 --> 01:48:29,880
Speaker 2: the most misunderstood aspects of American culture. It changes people,

1422
01:48:30,320 --> 01:48:34,560
Speaker 2: so normally it changes you know. I had this discussion

1423
01:48:34,600 --> 01:48:37,000
Speaker 2: with a high school buddy of mine who's still alive.

1424
01:48:41,120 --> 01:48:46,800
Speaker 2: I don't think I changed. I became just something for

1425
01:48:47,600 --> 01:48:52,400
Speaker 2: all these different people that needed different work and different jobs,

1426
01:48:53,000 --> 01:48:55,320
Speaker 2: a new piece of meat to hang your hat on

1427
01:48:55,520 --> 01:49:01,000
Speaker 2: and make some money. And I was following directions and

1428
01:49:01,120 --> 01:49:05,519
Speaker 2: orders and stuff, and their perception of me. Well, he's

1429
01:49:05,560 --> 01:49:12,160
Speaker 2: a star now he You know, he's got to have changed. No, No,

1430
01:49:13,240 --> 01:49:20,240
Speaker 2: if anything, No, my buddy's and kids from high school,

1431
01:49:20,800 --> 01:49:24,320
Speaker 2: they've changed with their regard to their attitude towards me.

1432
01:49:26,360 --> 01:49:29,000
Speaker 2: I know this because I've sat and talked to the

1433
01:49:29,040 --> 01:49:33,400
Speaker 2: old buddy I was telling you about, and his idea

1434
01:49:33,439 --> 01:49:36,120
Speaker 2: of what's happened in my life is way different from

1435
01:49:36,160 --> 01:49:44,120
Speaker 2: the reality I'm living through. So famous, it was harder

1436
01:49:44,160 --> 01:49:51,320
Speaker 2: to get back when I was looking for it. I

1437
01:49:51,479 --> 01:49:55,240
Speaker 2: just it's not that I don't understand what's happening now.

1438
01:49:55,320 --> 01:49:55,680
Speaker 1: I do.

1439
01:49:56,400 --> 01:49:58,840
Speaker 2: I simply am not in a position of power to

1440
01:49:58,960 --> 01:50:01,400
Speaker 2: make the moves that have to be made.

1441
01:50:02,479 --> 01:50:06,120
Speaker 1: But is it an advantage or a disadvantage of both

1442
01:50:06,240 --> 01:50:08,760
Speaker 1: being famous? I mean, if you go out to the

1443
01:50:08,800 --> 01:50:12,160
Speaker 1: grocery store, you go people to people recognize you. Do

1444
01:50:12,200 --> 01:50:14,439
Speaker 1: you ever trade on your name and say I can't

1445
01:50:14,439 --> 01:50:16,960
Speaker 1: get a reservation, but tell them I'm Mitch Ryder stuff

1446
01:50:17,000 --> 01:50:17,280
Speaker 1: like that.

1447
01:50:17,360 --> 01:50:21,599
Speaker 2: Well, these days, yeah, that still works in Detroit because

1448
01:50:21,840 --> 01:50:27,120
Speaker 2: I'm a Detroit boy. I remember they did a special

1449
01:50:27,160 --> 01:50:29,679
Speaker 2: on me with one of the local TV channels and

1450
01:50:29,720 --> 01:50:32,759
Speaker 2: they put us in Washington, d C. And they asked

1451
01:50:32,800 --> 01:50:35,120
Speaker 2: ten people on the street, have you ever heard of

1452
01:50:35,160 --> 01:50:38,120
Speaker 2: Mitch Ryder? And only one person said yes out of

1453
01:50:38,120 --> 01:50:43,040
Speaker 2: the ten. So you know, but in Detroit, everybody knows

1454
01:50:43,080 --> 01:50:48,320
Speaker 2: the name. If not, they can ask their grandma. She'll

1455
01:50:48,400 --> 01:50:57,200
Speaker 2: tell them. It's famous. Corruptive, you know, if you're not careful,

1456
01:50:57,520 --> 01:51:00,400
Speaker 2: it can lead you into believing that you're something you're not,

1457
01:51:00,680 --> 01:51:09,439
Speaker 2: other than a human. I don't put cabinets together. I

1458
01:51:09,479 --> 01:51:13,559
Speaker 2: couldn't build you a chair. I couldn't There's a lot

1459
01:51:13,560 --> 01:51:16,000
Speaker 2: of things I can't do. But I do know music

1460
01:51:16,040 --> 01:51:18,360
Speaker 2: because it's been the only pursuit I've had.

1461
01:51:20,680 --> 01:51:21,120
Speaker 1: And to.

1462
01:51:25,040 --> 01:51:28,600
Speaker 2: Understand that these other people I'm talking about, with the

1463
01:51:28,640 --> 01:51:31,960
Speaker 2: different occupations, they're no different from me. They're going to

1464
01:51:32,000 --> 01:51:37,040
Speaker 2: have success or failure too. And I think essentially all

1465
01:51:37,080 --> 01:51:39,200
Speaker 2: a man wants in this world is to be able

1466
01:51:39,240 --> 01:51:42,000
Speaker 2: to have his dignity and be able to feed his

1467
01:51:42,040 --> 01:51:46,519
Speaker 2: family and keep him in shelter and keep him healthy.

1468
01:51:47,040 --> 01:51:49,760
Speaker 2: That's all anybody wants all over the world. But there's

1469
01:51:49,760 --> 01:51:53,400
Speaker 2: so many greedy assholes out there that are just making

1470
01:51:53,439 --> 01:52:00,000
Speaker 2: it difficult for people to get even a living way.

1471
01:52:01,400 --> 01:52:05,960
Speaker 2: And I just like I said in the beginning, this

1472
01:52:06,040 --> 01:52:08,360
Speaker 2: is the first time this has happened in our history.

1473
01:52:08,360 --> 01:52:12,160
Speaker 2: It won't be the last, But what you're seeing is

1474
01:52:12,439 --> 01:52:17,800
Speaker 2: an erosion. The only people I believe when they swear

1475
01:52:17,840 --> 01:52:23,280
Speaker 2: an oath to the Constitution are the soldiers, the frontline infantry,

1476
01:52:23,320 --> 01:52:25,400
Speaker 2: people of the men and women that are willing to

1477
01:52:25,439 --> 01:52:28,519
Speaker 2: give up their lives. I'll believe them when they swear

1478
01:52:28,600 --> 01:52:31,280
Speaker 2: to the Constitution. But it seems to me like there's

1479
01:52:31,320 --> 01:52:33,519
Speaker 2: a lot of people lying about it right now.

1480
01:52:35,920 --> 01:52:38,920
Speaker 1: So in your regular life, are you Bill or you Mitch?

1481
01:52:40,680 --> 01:52:43,120
Speaker 2: It really depends on how long we get to know

1482
01:52:43,200 --> 01:52:43,639
Speaker 2: each other.

1483
01:52:46,080 --> 01:52:47,280
Speaker 1: Well, what does your wife call you.

1484
01:52:49,600 --> 01:52:50,040
Speaker 2: Idiot?

1485
01:52:54,439 --> 01:52:58,240
Speaker 1: When she's happier with you? Does she use Bill or Mitch?

1486
01:53:00,360 --> 01:53:00,719
Speaker 2: Billy?

1487
01:53:02,080 --> 01:53:04,439
Speaker 1: And on your passport, what does it say.

1488
01:53:05,840 --> 01:53:09,439
Speaker 2: William s Leviice jor And let me ask you a question.

1489
01:53:10,280 --> 01:53:13,640
Speaker 2: If you're a junior and your dad dies, are you

1490
01:53:13,720 --> 01:53:14,759
Speaker 2: no longer a junior?

1491
01:53:18,200 --> 01:53:22,960
Speaker 1: That's an interesting Okay, So did you contemplate naming your

1492
01:53:23,040 --> 01:53:23,920
Speaker 1: child the third?

1493
01:53:25,200 --> 01:53:27,640
Speaker 2: No? But you know one of the original names they

1494
01:53:27,680 --> 01:53:29,679
Speaker 2: wanted for me in New York when they were searching

1495
01:53:29,760 --> 01:53:36,519
Speaker 2: for one was Michael Rothschild. At least you be rich, right,

1496
01:53:37,120 --> 01:53:40,880
Speaker 2: like I'm gonna like, you know, I'm going to diss

1497
01:53:40,920 --> 01:53:47,320
Speaker 2: a whole financial establishment in Europe. That was crazy, vincent.

1498
01:53:47,640 --> 01:53:49,160
Speaker 1: How did it end up being Mitch Ryder?

1499
01:53:49,920 --> 01:53:52,759
Speaker 2: H A finger fell on a name in the phone book,

1500
01:53:52,840 --> 01:53:55,439
Speaker 2: and there were five of them, And I felt so

1501
01:53:55,600 --> 01:53:58,599
Speaker 2: bad about it that I literally called all those people

1502
01:53:58,640 --> 01:54:03,040
Speaker 2: and apologized to him for whatever problems I had brought

1503
01:54:03,080 --> 01:54:05,560
Speaker 2: into their life.

1504
01:54:05,880 --> 01:54:09,080
Speaker 1: Wow, So there there were five people named Mitch Ryder.

1505
01:54:09,840 --> 01:54:14,600
Speaker 2: No, there was like an m writer, there was a miswriter,

1506
01:54:14,840 --> 01:54:18,800
Speaker 2: there was a Mitch writer. One Mitch writer. And did

1507
01:54:18,840 --> 01:54:21,759
Speaker 2: you know that? There was a rest but he died recently.

1508
01:54:21,920 --> 01:54:25,280
Speaker 2: He called himself Mitch Writer too, because he appeared on

1509
01:54:25,320 --> 01:54:29,160
Speaker 2: Google once when I punched in my name.

1510
01:54:30,880 --> 01:54:34,520
Speaker 1: Okay, Billy, you dropped a lot of wisdom on us.

1511
01:54:34,560 --> 01:54:37,600
Speaker 1: It's great to hear that you're so optimistic and driven

1512
01:54:37,680 --> 01:54:41,320
Speaker 1: for the future, still dreaming. Too many people get up

1513
01:54:41,320 --> 01:54:43,360
Speaker 1: the dreams. I wish you luck, and I wish a

1514
01:54:43,360 --> 01:54:44,680
Speaker 1: benefactor find show.

1515
01:54:46,400 --> 01:54:50,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's not so important. It would be helpful but

1516
01:54:50,840 --> 01:54:54,000
Speaker 2: you know, you know how life is.

1517
01:54:55,400 --> 01:54:57,560
Speaker 1: I can't believe that you have a smile on your fee.

1518
01:54:57,560 --> 01:55:00,680
Speaker 1: You've been through a lot and not all positive, and

1519
01:55:00,760 --> 01:55:03,680
Speaker 1: the fact that you have a positive attitude is really

1520
01:55:04,120 --> 01:55:06,560
Speaker 1: pretty enlightening and a beacon for those of us who

1521
01:55:06,640 --> 01:55:08,200
Speaker 1: can't always stay so positive.

1522
01:55:09,640 --> 01:55:12,920
Speaker 2: But you know what, look at what choices we have.

1523
01:55:13,720 --> 01:55:17,880
Speaker 2: You only have two choices. Why would anybody want to

1524
01:55:17,960 --> 01:55:25,760
Speaker 2: waste their life regretting the experience? We all knew this

1525
01:55:25,800 --> 01:55:29,000
Speaker 2: is how it worked. You start dying from the day

1526
01:55:29,000 --> 01:55:35,960
Speaker 2: you're born. So life is not easy. And believe me,

1527
01:55:36,120 --> 01:55:40,320
Speaker 2: this is not anything to be ashamed of or feel

1528
01:55:40,560 --> 01:55:43,120
Speaker 2: sorrow about. Yeah, you don't want to leave the people

1529
01:55:43,160 --> 01:55:46,680
Speaker 2: you love, but if you're in a place where you're

1530
01:55:46,800 --> 01:55:55,240
Speaker 2: not having a life that is enjoyable and you're suffering,

1531
01:55:56,880 --> 01:56:02,720
Speaker 2: there's really why do you want to be here? Why

1532
01:56:02,760 --> 01:56:04,360
Speaker 2: do you want to stay in a place where you're

1533
01:56:04,400 --> 01:56:09,200
Speaker 2: suffering and you cannot get rid of the suffering? And

1534
01:56:09,240 --> 01:56:13,080
Speaker 2: they you know, I've asked myself that question, but fortunately

1535
01:56:14,000 --> 01:56:17,520
Speaker 2: there is an answer. You look forward to waking up

1536
01:56:17,560 --> 01:56:20,200
Speaker 2: and seeing that sun the next day, and that's all

1537
01:56:20,240 --> 01:56:23,480
Speaker 2: you need to know that you can carry on. You

1538
01:56:23,520 --> 01:56:26,760
Speaker 2: can realize whatever dream it was that you haven't found,

1539
01:56:26,760 --> 01:56:28,720
Speaker 2: and you now found a way to look for it,

1540
01:56:29,400 --> 01:56:34,160
Speaker 2: Go for it, you know, just do the positive stuff

1541
01:56:34,200 --> 01:56:38,360
Speaker 2: and forget all that. I could talk to you for

1542
01:56:38,520 --> 01:56:42,560
Speaker 2: hours about it, but my wife warned me in the beginning.

1543
01:56:43,480 --> 01:56:51,280
Speaker 2: No politics, no religion, and those are just like a

1544
01:56:51,400 --> 01:56:57,280
Speaker 2: tinder box waiting to be lit. We could expand this

1545
01:56:57,360 --> 01:57:04,760
Speaker 2: conversation into some deep intellectual, thoughtful properties and meanings and things,

1546
01:57:04,840 --> 01:57:10,800
Speaker 2: but I don't choose to do that. That's not what

1547
01:57:10,880 --> 01:57:14,800
Speaker 2: I do. You know, I don't ask myself when my

1548
01:57:14,880 --> 01:57:18,840
Speaker 2: audience walks into a venue to see me. I don't

1549
01:57:18,880 --> 01:57:24,840
Speaker 2: ask if they're a Republican or Democrat. That's irrelevant. They

1550
01:57:24,920 --> 01:57:27,680
Speaker 2: came to hear music that they love or they wouldn't

1551
01:57:27,680 --> 01:57:31,800
Speaker 2: be paying, and so why why muddy the waters with

1552
01:57:32,040 --> 01:57:36,520
Speaker 2: something that they didn't want. If I feel like grand standing,

1553
01:57:37,000 --> 01:57:39,760
Speaker 2: I'll take it off the show stage and put it

1554
01:57:39,800 --> 01:57:44,680
Speaker 2: on a street corner. Look at the problem that Bruce

1555
01:57:44,680 --> 01:57:49,840
Speaker 2: Springsteen's going to have now when he comes home. Do

1556
01:57:49,880 --> 01:57:51,600
Speaker 2: you understand what I'm talking about?

1557
01:57:51,720 --> 01:57:55,720
Speaker 1: I do, But he's in a slightly different financial and

1558
01:57:55,800 --> 01:57:57,040
Speaker 1: career spot than you are.

1559
01:57:58,040 --> 01:58:00,920
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, true enough, and you.

1560
01:58:00,840 --> 01:58:05,720
Speaker 1: Know, listen, I could go on about this forever myself,

1561
01:58:06,480 --> 01:58:11,040
Speaker 1: but if you're trying to please everybody, no one can

1562
01:58:11,120 --> 01:58:13,360
Speaker 1: do that. Even if you get on stage and you

1563
01:58:13,520 --> 01:58:15,480
Speaker 1: just do your music, they're going to be people who

1564
01:58:15,840 --> 01:58:19,200
Speaker 1: dislike you or dislike that style of music. You're right,

1565
01:58:19,240 --> 01:58:22,800
Speaker 1: so you make choices. And the artists that we became

1566
01:58:22,960 --> 01:58:26,760
Speaker 1: enamored of when you were so successful was because they

1567
01:58:26,760 --> 01:58:29,640
Speaker 1: took a stand, whatever that stand might be, and they

1568
01:58:29,640 --> 01:58:32,960
Speaker 1: were speaking their truth through the music. It was different

1569
01:58:33,000 --> 01:58:35,880
Speaker 1: from you know, as you put it, Tin Pan Alley,

1570
01:58:36,760 --> 01:58:40,120
Speaker 1: But you know, I think that's also a difference between

1571
01:58:40,200 --> 01:58:41,440
Speaker 1: yesterday and today.

1572
01:58:41,880 --> 01:58:45,160
Speaker 2: You know, one of my heroes is I have very

1573
01:58:45,160 --> 01:58:48,879
Speaker 2: few of them. I have the greatest love and affection

1574
01:58:49,040 --> 01:58:49,880
Speaker 2: for Bob Dylan.

1575
01:58:50,960 --> 01:58:58,680
Speaker 1: Tell me why he is not.

1576
01:58:58,720 --> 01:59:11,800
Speaker 2: Afraid to talk about any subject. He's just simply and

1577
01:59:11,840 --> 01:59:15,600
Speaker 2: he does it with such ambiguity that it's it's clever

1578
01:59:15,760 --> 01:59:19,680
Speaker 2: because you you, three different people could listen to a

1579
01:59:19,720 --> 01:59:22,160
Speaker 2: line from one of his songs and come out with

1580
01:59:22,200 --> 01:59:29,400
Speaker 2: three different meanings. You know, That's why he's so damn cool.

1581
01:59:32,480 --> 01:59:35,000
Speaker 2: Is he still working? It's something somebody, I mean.

1582
01:59:34,880 --> 01:59:39,120
Speaker 1: He's been working. I respect I respect Dylan for everything

1583
01:59:39,360 --> 01:59:41,760
Speaker 1: he did in his work. But one thing I respect

1584
01:59:41,840 --> 01:59:44,480
Speaker 1: him for is he goes on the road and makes

1585
01:59:44,480 --> 01:59:47,120
Speaker 1: it interesting to him. I don't want to go see it.

1586
01:59:47,560 --> 01:59:50,880
Speaker 1: I have seen it. But you go to see Dylan,

1587
01:59:51,280 --> 01:59:56,000
Speaker 1: he rearranges all the songs to the point of unrecognizability.

1588
01:59:57,040 --> 01:59:59,240
Speaker 2: I know what you're talking about because we went through

1589
01:59:59,280 --> 02:00:02,840
Speaker 2: that experience. It's my wife and I three years ago,

1590
02:00:03,720 --> 02:00:06,800
Speaker 2: I believe. And he had been on the road so

1591
02:00:07,000 --> 02:00:10,160
Speaker 2: long that first of all, the first thing you noticed

1592
02:00:10,280 --> 02:00:13,720
Speaker 2: was that he had lost his voice. Okay, everything was

1593
02:00:13,800 --> 02:00:22,600
Speaker 2: like a growl. And then suddenly you'll put put in

1594
02:00:22,680 --> 02:00:26,760
Speaker 2: the name of the song right right where you can

1595
02:00:26,800 --> 02:00:31,600
Speaker 2: tell what song it was. But in spite of that,

1596
02:00:32,040 --> 02:00:35,120
Speaker 2: he did write those wonderful, wonderful.

1597
02:00:34,840 --> 02:00:38,080
Speaker 1: Song No listen, I could quote that stuff ad infinitum.

1598
02:00:38,920 --> 02:00:41,080
Speaker 2: Who were your favorites when you were a teenager? Who

1599
02:00:41,080 --> 02:00:41,560
Speaker 2: did you like?

1600
02:00:41,680 --> 02:00:45,120
Speaker 1: Oh, come on, okay, I mean, if you want to start,

1601
02:00:45,440 --> 02:00:48,080
Speaker 1: you know, I'm younger. I'm ten years not ten, but

1602
02:00:48,200 --> 02:00:51,080
Speaker 1: eight years younger than you. So the first stuff you heard,

1603
02:00:51,120 --> 02:00:55,320
Speaker 1: all that Beatles stuff whatever, I mean, all the eldest

1604
02:00:55,320 --> 02:00:59,400
Speaker 1: stuff was really before my time. And then Babying and

1605
02:00:59,480 --> 02:01:03,240
Speaker 1: Bobby were aware of the first stuff that resonated in

1606
02:01:03,320 --> 02:01:06,480
Speaker 1: the other than the novelty tracks were the Beach Boys

1607
02:01:06,520 --> 02:01:09,520
Speaker 1: in the Four Seasons, and then of course the Beatles

1608
02:01:09,600 --> 02:01:11,880
Speaker 1: hit and that was everything. And you live in the

1609
02:01:11,920 --> 02:01:16,320
Speaker 1: New York market and you had all the FM radio,

1610
02:01:16,560 --> 02:01:18,760
Speaker 1: so you know Quem Hendrix, I could go on to

1611
02:01:18,840 --> 02:01:20,040
Speaker 1: who all that stuff.

1612
02:01:20,680 --> 02:01:23,440
Speaker 2: I knew all those guys. That's crazy.

1613
02:01:23,720 --> 02:01:28,200
Speaker 3: And you know what people don't realize is it was

1614
02:01:28,360 --> 02:01:31,400
Speaker 3: different if you wanted to know what was going on,

1615
02:01:31,520 --> 02:01:33,840
Speaker 3: if you were younger, you turned on the radio. Not

1616
02:01:33,920 --> 02:01:36,520
Speaker 3: only did you get the songs, you got news, it

1617
02:01:36,560 --> 02:01:40,600
Speaker 3: applied to you, et cetera. And there's always been music.

1618
02:01:41,120 --> 02:01:44,760
Speaker 3: There was music before the Beatles. But just like with tech,

1619
02:01:44,960 --> 02:01:48,680
Speaker 3: from like nineteen ninety five to like five years ago,

1620
02:01:49,080 --> 02:01:52,680
Speaker 3: we were all focused on it. That's what it was

1621
02:01:52,800 --> 02:01:56,680
Speaker 3: like with music. It drove everything, just like today it's

1622
02:01:56,880 --> 02:02:00,680
Speaker 3: like politics. You opened the paper every day and you

1623
02:02:00,760 --> 02:02:05,160
Speaker 3: see a story that causes an emotion, whether you disagree, whatever,

1624
02:02:05,560 --> 02:02:09,480
Speaker 3: there's a passion That is not what we're getting from music.

1625
02:02:09,600 --> 02:02:14,320
Speaker 3: Music now is more entertainment, more commerce. And I'm talking

1626
02:02:14,360 --> 02:02:18,840
Speaker 3: in generalities because there's thousands of acts doing all kinds

1627
02:02:18,880 --> 02:02:21,560
Speaker 3: of music. But as you were talking earlier about the

1628
02:02:21,560 --> 02:02:26,840
Speaker 3: Hot one hundred, you know, we know those songs by heart.

1629
02:02:27,240 --> 02:02:30,880
Speaker 3: And the other thing was, yeah, they talked about turntable

1630
02:02:30,960 --> 02:02:33,480
Speaker 3: hits with the reality was it had to be really

1631
02:02:33,560 --> 02:02:35,920
Speaker 3: fucking great in order to make it.

1632
02:02:36,320 --> 02:02:39,120
Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, Barry Gordy said, it's what's in the

1633
02:02:39,160 --> 02:02:41,600
Speaker 2: grooves that comes absolutely.

1634
02:02:42,040 --> 02:02:45,000
Speaker 1: And you know, the other good thing is that you know,

1635
02:02:45,040 --> 02:02:47,720
Speaker 1: for a while there it was how you looked and whatever.

1636
02:02:47,840 --> 02:02:50,480
Speaker 1: Now it's you know, because you know now it's based

1637
02:02:50,560 --> 02:02:52,640
Speaker 1: back to the record. Yeah, people want to be able

1638
02:02:52,680 --> 02:02:54,920
Speaker 1: to see what you look whatever, but that's not the

1639
02:02:55,120 --> 02:02:58,200
Speaker 1: number one thing you're selling. One more question for you, though,

1640
02:02:58,200 --> 02:03:02,760
Speaker 1: because what did you think when you found out Springsteen

1641
02:03:02,880 --> 02:03:05,160
Speaker 1: was doing a medley of your songs?

1642
02:03:06,440 --> 02:03:09,160
Speaker 2: Well, he invited me and we did perform them together

1643
02:03:09,160 --> 02:03:12,480
Speaker 2: here in Detroit, But when was the first one. There

1644
02:03:12,520 --> 02:03:14,680
Speaker 2: was a funny part to that though, because I got

1645
02:03:14,720 --> 02:03:19,720
Speaker 2: so involved in the show. You know, I hadn't played

1646
02:03:19,760 --> 02:03:22,960
Speaker 2: a venue like Cobo Hall where he was in such

1647
02:03:22,960 --> 02:03:27,120
Speaker 2: a long time that I was very excited and we

1648
02:03:27,160 --> 02:03:33,160
Speaker 2: started doing my songs and I actually just it's so

1649
02:03:33,200 --> 02:03:37,440
Speaker 2: insane and embarrassing to talk about Bruce laughed about it,

1650
02:03:37,480 --> 02:03:40,840
Speaker 2: but I was so into the show. I turned around

1651
02:03:40,880 --> 02:03:44,320
Speaker 2: to Max, the drummer, and I signaled him to turn down,

1652
02:03:45,200 --> 02:03:48,360
Speaker 2: and he just he looked at me with these like

1653
02:03:48,400 --> 02:03:51,400
Speaker 2: a deer caught in headlights, and then looked at the

1654
02:03:51,440 --> 02:03:53,160
Speaker 2: boss and you want to know, what do I do?

1655
02:03:53,280 --> 02:03:57,880
Speaker 2: What I do? Oh? You know, it was fun. There was,

1656
02:03:57,920 --> 02:03:59,480
Speaker 2: you know, a kick ass performance.

1657
02:04:00,120 --> 02:04:02,240
Speaker 1: But when was the first time if you remember, you

1658
02:04:02,240 --> 02:04:04,520
Speaker 1: were aware that he was doing that medley.

1659
02:04:07,960 --> 02:04:10,839
Speaker 2: When he called me to come and rehearse it. Really,

1660
02:04:11,280 --> 02:04:14,160
Speaker 2: we went in a day early and he said, I'm

1661
02:04:14,200 --> 02:04:18,000
Speaker 2: coming to Detroit, and I wondered if you'd be kind

1662
02:04:18,120 --> 02:04:22,640
Speaker 2: enough to come up and sing your songs. I said, well,

1663
02:04:23,360 --> 02:04:26,000
Speaker 2: not all of them. He said, well, no, just too

1664
02:04:26,000 --> 02:04:26,720
Speaker 2: in particular.

1665
02:04:30,320 --> 02:04:33,440
Speaker 1: Okay, of all of the people you know in your book,

1666
02:04:33,440 --> 02:04:37,440
Speaker 1: you list all the musicians you've met, tell me one

1667
02:04:37,520 --> 02:04:40,040
Speaker 1: or two that lived up to the image, because they

1668
02:04:40,120 --> 02:04:41,320
Speaker 1: usually don't.

1669
02:04:43,480 --> 02:04:46,160
Speaker 2: Lived up to the image as projected by them or

1670
02:04:46,320 --> 02:04:47,839
Speaker 2: as perceived by the public.

1671
02:04:48,800 --> 02:04:51,920
Speaker 1: I would say, it's really a combination of both, but

1672
02:04:52,000 --> 02:04:54,560
Speaker 1: it's what in your mind they represented.

1673
02:04:57,320 --> 02:05:06,800
Speaker 2: Wow. Well, first of all, one of the most heart

1674
02:05:07,000 --> 02:05:12,240
Speaker 2: rendering voices I got fell in love with was Otis reading.

1675
02:05:14,440 --> 02:05:17,480
Speaker 2: Did you ever hear cigarettes and coffee by him? I

1676
02:05:17,520 --> 02:05:20,120
Speaker 2: don't remember it at the top of my head. No, no, okay,

1677
02:05:20,160 --> 02:05:24,400
Speaker 2: but okay. He was very emotive. It was very very

1678
02:05:24,440 --> 02:05:28,280
Speaker 2: capable of making you hear him cry if he was crying.

1679
02:05:31,440 --> 02:05:37,400
Speaker 2: Just a good natural connect with that voice. And I

1680
02:05:37,440 --> 02:05:41,960
Speaker 2: remember doing this TV show. It occurred like the night

1681
02:05:42,040 --> 02:05:45,000
Speaker 2: before he flew out of Cleveland and died in Lake, Michigan.

1682
02:05:48,120 --> 02:05:52,320
Speaker 2: He was a tall man and at the end, while

1683
02:05:52,320 --> 02:05:55,520
Speaker 2: they're rolling the credits, we were closing the show, he

1684
02:05:55,640 --> 02:05:57,720
Speaker 2: put his arm around my right shoulder, and he's a

1685
02:05:57,800 --> 02:06:01,400
Speaker 2: much taller man than myself, and he started rocking, and

1686
02:06:01,440 --> 02:06:03,440
Speaker 2: every time he rocked to the left, my whole right

1687
02:06:03,520 --> 02:06:06,960
Speaker 2: leg would come up off the crowd. So I was like,

1688
02:06:07,040 --> 02:06:11,000
Speaker 2: it was like he was a puppeteer, you know. I

1689
02:06:11,080 --> 02:06:14,480
Speaker 2: just I enjoyed meeting all of these people, hundreds and

1690
02:06:14,560 --> 02:06:17,280
Speaker 2: hundreds and hundreds of all these people that are stars

1691
02:06:18,120 --> 02:06:26,720
Speaker 2: that made it. I've spent time with him, I've you know, shared. Yeah, Yeah,

1692
02:06:26,760 --> 02:06:30,360
Speaker 2: it's been wonderful. It's been a remarkable experience.

1693
02:06:30,400 --> 02:06:33,160
Speaker 1: To what degreed did you wrestle with imposter syndrome?

1694
02:06:36,440 --> 02:06:38,800
Speaker 2: Imposter syndrome where you say.

1695
02:06:38,640 --> 02:06:41,640
Speaker 1: I'm not worthy. They're on a different level. I don't

1696
02:06:41,680 --> 02:06:44,360
Speaker 1: deserve the success. Maybe you didn't wrestle with that at all,

1697
02:06:44,840 --> 02:06:49,640
Speaker 1: but a lot of people do.

1698
02:06:49,120 --> 02:06:55,240
Speaker 2: I'm honored that people think that way. Are you talking

1699
02:06:55,240 --> 02:06:57,480
Speaker 2: about people giving me accolades and stuff.

1700
02:06:57,840 --> 02:07:03,240
Speaker 1: No, it's like being on stage with another ract and saying, Oh,

1701
02:07:03,280 --> 02:07:06,920
Speaker 1: do I deserve to be here? Do I deserve the

1702
02:07:06,960 --> 02:07:08,560
Speaker 1: way people are looking at me?

1703
02:07:12,320 --> 02:07:15,000
Speaker 2: If I was invited up on that stage by the headliner,

1704
02:07:15,040 --> 02:07:19,880
Speaker 2: I'd have to say yes. Why else would you put

1705
02:07:19,920 --> 02:07:24,080
Speaker 2: them up there to embarrass him? No?

1706
02:07:24,080 --> 02:07:26,800
Speaker 1: No, it's good you have that confidence. Okay, we're gonna

1707
02:07:26,880 --> 02:07:30,400
Speaker 1: leave it here. It's been great talking to Mitch Ryder.

1708
02:07:31,200 --> 02:07:33,800
Speaker 1: Till next time. This is Bob Left said's