Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing.
Speaker 1: Get deep each day, so satisfyed on my my way,
Speaker 1: take a straight and strong AGAs to the corner of
Speaker 1: make no white Queen road so fast, she hasn't got
Speaker 1: time to make you win. There are many words that
Speaker 1: can be used to describe singer songwriter John Anderson, Cautious
Speaker 1: is not one of them. Born in England in nine,
Speaker 1: he began singing on his brother's daily route as a
Speaker 1: milkman before falling in love with rock and roll. Adventurous,
Speaker 1: scrappy and spiritual. He formed an instant bond with bassist
Speaker 1: Chris Squire in nineteen sixty eight, and after a short
Speaker 1: stint with another band, the two formed Yes. Like Anderson himself,
Speaker 1: their music was otherworldly, bucking convention in both structure and sound.
Speaker 1: Their songs were a dynamic mix of jazz and rock
Speaker 1: that could last for as long as twenty minutes, and
Speaker 1: their concerts sold out stadiums worldwide. By the nineteen eighties,
Speaker 1: the band had produced more than eleven critically acclaimed albums.
Speaker 1: Their music ushered in what's known today as progressive rock,
Speaker 1: paving the way for bands like Radiohead and the English
Speaker 1: native is still testing the boundaries of music, just like
Speaker 1: he did as a kid. You know, I started singing
Speaker 1: when I was at school in the choir and I
Speaker 1: was told to shut up Anderson not so loud, and
Speaker 1: that kind of calmed down a bit because I used
Speaker 1: to love shouting and singing, you know choir, you know
Speaker 1: when they do that. And then me and my brother Tony,
Speaker 1: we used to sing all the Everly Brothers songs and
Speaker 1: I was the high harmony and I just love singing.
Speaker 1: And then we started a band called the Warriors in
Speaker 1: sixty three. And in April sixty three my brother had
Speaker 1: a motorbike and he drove me and him went to Southport,
Speaker 1: which is just north of Liverpool to see this band
Speaker 1: called the Beatles, and they just released Love Me Do
Speaker 1: sixty three April. And from then on I wanted with
Speaker 1: Paul McCartney, of course, and he started singing and in
Speaker 1: a band. And basically when you start off with a band,
Speaker 1: you have to sing all different kinds of songs from
Speaker 1: jaw text to Nina Simon songs, coverage, you know, and
Speaker 1: your voice you singing it actually, remember remember I used
Speaker 1: to sing gold Finger, It was a big hit then
Speaker 1: by Shirley Bassie s Wales. The review was we found
Speaker 1: the Shirley Bassie of rock and roll. That's gonna be
Speaker 1: our tweets freaked me out. Listen to the of my
Speaker 1: interview with the Shirley Bassie of rock and roll, and uh,
Speaker 1: I just kept singing and enjoined singing and went through
Speaker 1: the sixties with the band, and then went to London,
Speaker 1: eventually meeting up with Chris. And I knew that I
Speaker 1: could sing, and I was very interested in songwriter, and
Speaker 1: I've never written any songs, maybe written wanted to terrible songs.
Speaker 1: But with Chris, I could sort of sit there and
Speaker 1: just work work ideas out with him and singing with yes.
Speaker 1: When it first started, I didn't move. I was very
Speaker 1: still on stage and stoned of course, and uh, just
Speaker 1: happy doing it. Didn't realize until I recorded that I
Speaker 1: had such a bad voice. What you said, well, you
Speaker 1: start listening to yourself for the first time through the
Speaker 1: speakers and everything, recording recording the first hour, but you know,
Speaker 1: and I think, oh my gosh, sort of pretty boring.
Speaker 1: But that's interesting for people who don't know that. When
Speaker 1: you're doing club work and you're performing lives. Yeah, everybody's
Speaker 1: jumping up, they're all drunks or what it mean? You
Speaker 1: sound great? Yeah? Then and then you get into a
Speaker 1: studio and things change. And what I'm also curious about
Speaker 1: is when you're singing covers and you're a very signature
Speaker 1: voice which pitches high, is singing these other songs, where
Speaker 1: does that music come from? Which so unique? You know,
Speaker 1: we weren't from the same town the band itself. It
Speaker 1: was from different towns in England. Normally like the Hollies,
Speaker 1: the Beatles, all the bands, the Animals, they came from Newcastle.
Speaker 1: The Hollies were from Manchester, the Beatles from Liverpool. Everybody
Speaker 1: a little tight group of friends, you know. Well we weren't.
Speaker 1: We were in London and Bill Bruford was from seven
Speaker 1: Oaks down the road. He was he actually he left
Speaker 1: the band after months. He wanted to go. His parents
Speaker 1: said he had to be a lawyer. So we've been
Speaker 1: rehearsing as a band for a month and Bill said
Speaker 1: I'm leaving. I said, wait a minute, We've just started.
Speaker 1: So the strange story was that Bill went to Leeds
Speaker 1: University and two months later we played there and he
Speaker 1: sat he stood in the in the audience, looking sort
Speaker 1: of eyes eyes at the band, thinking this is really
Speaker 1: a great band. What am I doing here at university?
Speaker 1: And within two weeks he was back in the band.
Speaker 1: But the idea is that, you know, you started when
Speaker 1: I met Chris. It was like, I've got to learn
Speaker 1: about writing songs. So I started playing. You had not
Speaker 1: been writing songs? No, No, you didn't know how to
Speaker 1: read music. No. No. The great thing was because both
Speaker 1: Tony Kay in the early days, they were very interested
Speaker 1: in what I had to say, and so I just thought,
Speaker 1: you know, all these ideas, musical ideas. I'd say, Okay,
Speaker 1: some somebody I think it was Peter Banks. He was
Speaker 1: playing on his guitar, just messing around. You know, that's it.
Speaker 1: We're going to do America. So we did a version
Speaker 1: of America that day from story Can't beat It, you know,
Speaker 1: and very popular about yeah, and you take it on
Speaker 1: stage and it gets the audience scoring, you know. So
Speaker 1: in those early days, it was like, well, what should
Speaker 1: we do next? John, Um, Well, I've got this idea.
Speaker 1: I really like Stravinsky, you know, you know, and I'd
Speaker 1: start coming up with ideas on the guitar that you know,
Speaker 1: Peter Banks would say you can't play that chord, and
Speaker 1: I say, well, I just did and it sounds pretty
Speaker 1: good whatever. You know, So you was a non guitar
Speaker 1: player really to take risks that they that they studied
Speaker 1: guitar players were saying to you, you you can't do that, yeah,
Speaker 1: because like you know, it's just one of those things.
Speaker 1: You do it and then you start realizing you go
Speaker 1: home and start trying other idea. How long did it
Speaker 1: take you to learning to teach yourself the guitar. I'm
Speaker 1: still learning. It's just ongoing, and I don't know what
Speaker 1: I'm playing. You know, I'm playing chords the other day.
Speaker 1: I'm going, oh, this is a beautiful chord. I wish
Speaker 1: I knew what it was, but it sounds really good.
Speaker 1: I can remember that I do. I take everything and
Speaker 1: we remember, in fact, you started doing music that maybe
Speaker 1: five ten years ago. You find a cassette and go, oh, yeah,
Speaker 1: I never finished that. I'll try that now, you know.
Speaker 1: Maybe I wasn't ready then now I am, you know.
Speaker 1: And so an the Leap we got Steve Howe in
Speaker 1: the band, which is like, man, it was amazing because
Speaker 1: this guy could play classical music. On guitar as well
Speaker 1: as Yeah, great rock and roll, you know, and we
Speaker 1: started writing songs together and the well generally, um, I'd
Speaker 1: listened to what they were doing when rehearsal, making a
Speaker 1: lot of noise in the studio recording, and I'd hear
Speaker 1: Steve playing something and I quickly recorded, and then we
Speaker 1: just stopping and said, listen, you played this line, dud,
Speaker 1: what is that? And he said, I don't know, I
Speaker 1: was just jamming. Said no, can you play it again? Okay,
Speaker 1: and then we're going to that. They'll keep going there,
Speaker 1: bringing up again new kid modulate, you know. So my
Speaker 1: my position in the band was waving man's around all
Speaker 1: that and hoping they would understand what was conducting. And then,
Speaker 1: you know, as time moved along, Wakeman came into the
Speaker 1: band and it was like so incredible. Who was the
Speaker 1: most accomplished musically in terms of reading music, writing music?
Speaker 1: Rick was the one who wrote music ridiculous. And the
Speaker 1: neat thing was that you were saying, why the music
Speaker 1: came is because Bill Bruford was a jazz player jazz
Speaker 1: rock and him and Chris together, you know, those early tapes,
Speaker 1: those early recordings are just fantastic the BBC recordings and
Speaker 1: you hear him and Chris rocking away, you know, but
Speaker 1: it's slightly different than just pol pies going on with
Speaker 1: his with his shoulders Bill, you know, is he's going around,
Speaker 1: you know. And so when when would sort of put
Speaker 1: together a song, I feel like I think there's something
Speaker 1: else to happen, you know, maybe Bill and Chris just
Speaker 1: do a groove thing, you know, and then we'll steve
Speaker 1: if you can do, like get your slide guitar. You know,
Speaker 1: what's the first song you record? Probably yesterday and today
Speaker 1: I heard it. Well, it's you know with the album
Speaker 1: didn't The second album just about didn't do well either,
Speaker 1: and the third album we all went to. Uh. I
Speaker 1: wanted to get away from London, so I said, why
Speaker 1: don't we get a farm down in Devon, you know.
Speaker 1: So we rented a farm in Devon, a farmhouse and
Speaker 1: got all the equipment there instead there for a month
Speaker 1: six weeks and that's when Yours Is No Disgrace came
Speaker 1: and event really fragile. But it was like it's very
Speaker 1: important to sort of isolate ourselves away from the Getting
Speaker 1: to rehearsals in a big city can take forever. You know,
Speaker 1: so living together and being together sort of created a harmony.
Speaker 1: And one of the things I've learned is that with
Speaker 1: with harmony, and you notice in acting, if you have
Speaker 1: perfect harmony, anything can happen. It's incredible, you can get there.
Speaker 1: It's beautiful. Yeah, I feel so good too. Yeah. And
Speaker 1: it's rare. It's it's not something that happens all the time.
Speaker 1: Here's like a clue to why I think Yes worked
Speaker 1: in so many ways. It's that up until then, the
Speaker 1: bands would go on stage sing a song, and the
Speaker 1: solo guitar player of the solo, and then the chorus again,
Speaker 1: and then a solo and just finished. I just didn't
Speaker 1: like that because you never know how good you're going
Speaker 1: to be as a solo guitar player if you've had
Speaker 1: too many drinks. You know, so you're great one night,
Speaker 1: and then the next night, what the hell are they thinking?
Speaker 1: You know? So? I said to Steve, especially if he
Speaker 1: was very willing to understand that if you create a
Speaker 1: solo in rehearsal, record it, learn it, then your solo
Speaker 1: will always be the same, and then you can bounce
Speaker 1: and dance around it. And the same with everybody who
Speaker 1: played in the band. You know, I'd say, let's get it.
Speaker 1: It's called its structuring, structure the music. Make sure you
Speaker 1: know exactly what you're gonna play. And the interesting thing
Speaker 1: is Chris bless him was the main guy who stuck
Speaker 1: to that. He was a beautiful bass player. Listen to
Speaker 1: his bass work, incredible and generally um. When you learn
Speaker 1: the art of the structure, you take that on stage
Speaker 1: and it can be eleven minutes long, ten minutes longer.
Speaker 1: You can stretch it a couple of minutes, but take
Speaker 1: for granted what you've already created and know that it worked.
Speaker 1: Stick with it. But you listen to your music. I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean I closed my eyes and then I roll
Speaker 1: your music in my head, and it's so complicated compare
Speaker 1: to everything else that was coming. I mean there was
Speaker 1: the Beatles deep in their work, and you listen to
Speaker 1: your music, you talk about yours is no disgration. It's
Speaker 1: like all those fractions and all that done, done done.
Speaker 1: This is so dramatic. Yes, these surges is like water
Speaker 1: splashing against the sea wall. It's so violent. Sometimes, whose
Speaker 1: concept was this of music? Who said this is what
Speaker 1: we're gonna do? What were you smoking? I was a
Speaker 1: lot of stuff. Man, You know, no, I agree. In
Speaker 1: some ways, it's like you create this music and you
Speaker 1: go on stage and perform it and and it takes over.
Speaker 1: It's as though we've created something that's a little bit
Speaker 1: unique and we've got to make sure he's good. I
Speaker 1: remember the first time we performed Close to the Edge.
Speaker 1: It seem like about an hour eighteen minutes minutes because
Speaker 1: the orders was so quiet. What's going on? What's going on?
Speaker 1: And it was at a game, you know. Elton John
Speaker 1: was for the bill, my vision orchestra and us and
Speaker 1: we did class the Edge. It was like you could
Speaker 1: hear the crickets. So it's already. But when you do that,
Speaker 1: is it hard to replicate it you go out there
Speaker 1: or it wasn't hard to replicate because you know what
Speaker 1: you've got to do. It took months for it to
Speaker 1: kick in. So by the time we came to tour America,
Speaker 1: we're close to the Edge as a song. We'd already
Speaker 1: played it twenty times. But did you need sheet music
Speaker 1: on stage to play it? How did the band remember
Speaker 1: eighteen minutes of all those changes? I don't know. They
Speaker 1: were just into it. Well, I think you know, musicians
Speaker 1: in the last you know, fifty years of concentrating on
Speaker 1: this new exercise of a brain stemrio. You know, I'm
Speaker 1: always amazed. You know, Trevor Raymond are guitar player. He
Speaker 1: can do scores and you can hear all the music.
Speaker 1: It's like I'm adas, you know, it's like it freaks
Speaker 1: me out because I'd love to be well. Yeah, when
Speaker 1: you would perform live, was there a process you had
Speaker 1: about your voice? Was there some kind of technique you
Speaker 1: had in terms of you didn't smoke and you didn't
Speaker 1: eat certain kinds of food. You know, we went vegetarian
Speaker 1: very early on, and you know before they were in
Speaker 1: vegetary restaurants in America, so we'd find one in New
Speaker 1: York maybe, and one in Boston and one in Seattle,
Speaker 1: and we kind of restricted ourselves from doing the norm,
Speaker 1: which is just you know, going for the burghers and stuff.
Speaker 1: I just on stage and say you should all stop
Speaker 1: eating McDonald's, right, So for you that you didn't feel
Speaker 1: because your your your voice is so I mean it
Speaker 1: really sounds like an instrument amount of saying that there
Speaker 1: was no special thing you had to do. You just
Speaker 1: blew it out and it was there in your pocket
Speaker 1: every time you needed it. I just felt very blessed
Speaker 1: that I could sing, and I was actually going through
Speaker 1: this incredible journey. You know, there's not many people get
Speaker 1: the chance to be successful in their work. You know,
Speaker 1: what's your first big date. We all lived in this
Speaker 1: little house, all at the different floor of the house.
Speaker 1: Peterbanks lived in Barnett, which is North London. I've got
Speaker 1: a phone call from a friend. He said, can you
Speaker 1: do a show tonight at Speakeasy, most famous club in town? Yeah? Yeah,
Speaker 1: what time? We're gonna be there at ten o'clock? Why
Speaker 1: because you've got to be there man, Okay, So I
Speaker 1: called Peter, come on, we've got to go and do
Speaker 1: a gig. Get everything to get the drums again and
Speaker 1: getting the van. Come on, let's go. So we went
Speaker 1: to the speak HEAs and we started setting up, and
Speaker 1: then we found out the reason we were there is
Speaker 1: because Sly in the family store had got stopped in
Speaker 1: New Jersey and he couldn't get on the plane whatever
Speaker 1: for whatever he's you know. And I was working at
Speaker 1: that time in a bar above the Marquee Club, a
Speaker 1: very famous club in London. So I kept bumping into
Speaker 1: Keith Emerson because he was playing in nice and I
Speaker 1: kept actually bumped into two or three other Pete Town's
Speaker 1: end and that kind of thing. I never said alone.
Speaker 1: And uh so there were setting up microphones and they
Speaker 1: started walking in. You know, there's Keith Hi, Keith, Oh, John,
Speaker 1: what are you doing? So we're we're doing a show.
Speaker 1: What does it look like? You know? Well, what's happened
Speaker 1: to slice here? And I started passing a joint resident
Speaker 1: have a smoke, calm down. So by the time we
Speaker 1: went on, everybody was happily drunk and stone or whatever.
Speaker 1: And there's I think there was I think Paul and
Speaker 1: Corner was that. I'm not sure, but there's wanted to.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of very famous people there, and we
Speaker 1: put on the show of our life. You know, we'ven't
Speaker 1: have been together for two months. They came expecting sly
Speaker 1: and you came here and you won them over. We
Speaker 1: did it? Come on, guys? What rock and roll? You know? Twiston? Yeah,
Speaker 1: and you came off the stage and yeah. Well the
Speaker 1: manager of the club said, I want to manage you,
Speaker 1: and within a month he got us a gig opening
Speaker 1: for the Cream Farewell concert. So we opened it Rory
Speaker 1: Rory Gallagher the Albert Hall, so Rory Gallagher was on
Speaker 1: second and the cream came on at the end. It
Speaker 1: was like, oh god. You know. The funny thing going
Speaker 1: back to Bill Brufer was in Leeds University and we
Speaker 1: found it we were going to play this gig at
Speaker 1: the Albert Hall. So I said, Bill, you wanted to
Speaker 1: rejoin the Bandy said yeah, yeah, well in two weeks
Speaker 1: we're playing at the Albert Hall. Be there and he was.
Speaker 1: Life is like Scrange, isn't it. And then when the
Speaker 1: recording contract was with who you signed that Urgan? God
Speaker 1: bless him and he found you where in London? He
Speaker 1: came to see us. We did a lunchtime half an
Speaker 1: hour for it. He had almost like audition and what
Speaker 1: year was this, early sixty nine maybe Our manager at
Speaker 1: that time was the speakeas and manager, the sweetest guy
Speaker 1: in the world, but he just you know, he enjoyed
Speaker 1: a drink and he was drunk. And it was one
Speaker 1: o'clock in the afternoon, you know, And so we we
Speaker 1: did our little sort of audition and I thought I
Speaker 1: gotta go the toilet, So went to the toilet and
Speaker 1: Roy comes in stands next to we around a pay,
Speaker 1: you know, and he says, I'm going to get this past,
Speaker 1: to this American past. I'm going to make sure you've
Speaker 1: got the best contract ever ever in the world. And
Speaker 1: at that moment the toilet flush. Did he get you?
Speaker 1: Did he get you the best contract from this American bostard?
Speaker 1: He signed as for ten years, for ten years like
Speaker 1: two points. You know. It was very cool because you know,
Speaker 1: the second album didn't do too well. The third album
Speaker 1: was the Yes album was Okay Stragle and then fourth
Speaker 1: album was from But when you signed with Ernigan, you
Speaker 1: had not been recording for anybody else. This was the
Speaker 1: beginning of your recording. Show track you do album number one, man,
Speaker 1: you do album number two, number three maybe, and then
Speaker 1: four hits, four hits, Well, the thing was roundabout was
Speaker 1: eight minutes long. That it was a stage song. The idea,
Speaker 1: I think one of the things I've always been interested
Speaker 1: in is putting on a show, probably comes from my
Speaker 1: dad because he was a showman in the in the
Speaker 1: army in time. What did he do? All I can
Speaker 1: remember I was in a stroller and he was on
Speaker 1: stage in a kilt is Scottish. He was on stage
Speaker 1: when in a kilt and Hitler mustache, telling jokes and
Speaker 1: I think he played the harmonica. He is a Scottish
Speaker 1: Nazi harmonica player. Man, that's I'm sorry. I were you
Speaker 1: close with him? Yeah, sort of got He got very ill,
Speaker 1: very early on in his life. He died when he
Speaker 1: was how old and you were? How old? You got
Speaker 1: me there at four? My dad died when I was
Speaker 1: twenty six. My dad died down. I was able to
Speaker 1: see him at the end to give him a good
Speaker 1: hug and said thanks. Or either of your siblings musical?
Speaker 1: Oh gosh, yeah, my brother Tony, because we started off
Speaker 1: as the brothers of Accrington. So he's a performer. No,
Speaker 1: he's a he's a preacher actually, so he's a performer.
Speaker 1: I'm curious about for people who you know, don't completely
Speaker 1: understand this, like myself. You do an album Errigan signed you,
Speaker 1: and the first album doesn't work, and the second album
Speaker 1: doesn't work. In the third up, maybe they're all growing
Speaker 1: and he sees something, because how do you get to
Speaker 1: do the eight minute round about his on Fragile before
Speaker 1: the album? So when you say to Ergan we're going
Speaker 1: to do an eight minute piece, did he see you down?
Speaker 1: To go Fellas Fellas Fellas. He said, you haven't earn
Speaker 1: the right to do it. He said. Somebody, and I
Speaker 1: remember very vividly it was Gosh, I can't remember his name,
Speaker 1: very famous producer, came to London. We're we're doing Do
Speaker 1: Do Do Do Do Do, and the guys they're sitting
Speaker 1: there and saying, why don't you put a funky BASSI
Speaker 1: I said, no, it's possible, and that's what it is.
Speaker 1: Is your move actually was yeah, of course your move
Speaker 1: he said boom boom, yeah, your guitar on stage that one. No,
Speaker 1: we just didn't do it. We just said I said,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, I like you very much, but I don't
Speaker 1: want it to be that way. It's round about the
Speaker 1: first hit, Yeah, because somebody got some scissors out and
Speaker 1: didn't tell us. I know, with it in your contract
Speaker 1: that they could do that. Of course they could. They
Speaker 1: could get our sport right, So so they cut round
Speaker 1: about from what to what. Well, they just took out
Speaker 1: the whole middle section, so it goes from the end
Speaker 1: of the second, third verse or third core, second chorus
Speaker 1: whatever straining in the solo. And we were driving around
Speaker 1: Pittsburgh to a gig and it would turn on the
Speaker 1: radio and it's round about it, round of bus on
Speaker 1: our on the on the radio. We couldn't believe it.
Speaker 1: And then it went straight into the solo. We'll charged
Speaker 1: the view. I mean, I mean, I know, I'm kind
Speaker 1: of getting carried away here with you because I'm so
Speaker 1: excited actually talking to you. But you know, Yes Songs
Speaker 1: is really one of the greatest live albums ever. I mean,
Speaker 1: if you if you're a Yes fan and you dig
Speaker 1: that music, you guys just crushed it, you know, did
Speaker 1: you did you know that when you recorded? Really? You know,
Speaker 1: I just knew we were sort of getting into the
Speaker 1: pocket when I learned later the pocket is when it
Speaker 1: just happens and music takes over. And that was one
Speaker 1: of those shows. I think we did about four in
Speaker 1: a row when we've Cordy one of them, and I
Speaker 1: don't know, I going back to George Martin, you know,
Speaker 1: and listen to what he did before tracks. I wonder
Speaker 1: why we're not as something when when when you hear
Speaker 1: us playing live, what what's what's wrong? I've always been
Speaker 1: like that. I'm terrible critical for you self critical? Did
Speaker 1: you drive the other band members crazy with your criticism?
Speaker 1: They called me the poem they did, yes, the quiet.
Speaker 1: Do you agree that the band needs an external source
Speaker 1: of management in order to really function or did you
Speaker 1: kind of function as a manager of your own. We
Speaker 1: stopped we stopped using a producer after the third album,
Speaker 1: so we were producing ourselves with a very good engineer
Speaker 1: called Offord, who was brilliant. How did that work for
Speaker 1: you with your self producing brilliant? You think so? It's
Speaker 1: a great photograph of everybody on the Leavers, we've got
Speaker 1: their own sets. Yes, I think we should do this. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's just the idea of uh have trusting. You know,
Speaker 1: trust is everything in music. You got to trust everybody
Speaker 1: to want the same thing, even though we're not quite
Speaker 1: sure what it is yet. Did you feel you were
Speaker 1: in charge? Yeah? Well I wasn't. I used to say
Speaker 1: to Chris, because Chris always to look at me and say,
Speaker 1: I just want to make you happy. John said, yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm not trying to bust everybody around. I just want
Speaker 1: to make it work. And somebody's got to come up.
Speaker 1: If you come up with if somebody, if you come
Speaker 1: up with ideas, I'll follow it through. But it tends
Speaker 1: to happen somebody tends to be more of an idea
Speaker 1: person and I was into that, you know, like with
Speaker 1: reading Herman Hess and thinking I really want to do
Speaker 1: something a little bit more experimental and long form. Steve,
Speaker 1: come here, man, can you play some cords like this
Speaker 1: and plan them? I said, okay, and he say, I've
Speaker 1: got this. I've got this thing. It goes close to
Speaker 1: the edge, run by the corner and I seen down
Speaker 1: at the end, run by the river. What do you
Speaker 1: they sees bad by I'm gonna go. I get a card.
Speaker 1: It's like I need I need some chords there, you know,
Speaker 1: and Steve here you talking through and then when you
Speaker 1: listen to the music, it's like something in a church. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and this is you know, it's it's like subconsciously, I'll
Speaker 1: be chords. And he played perfect chords and I said,
Speaker 1: that's it. Recorded. Next part? Did you interact with Wakeman
Speaker 1: the same way? Did he go with you? Because Rick
Speaker 1: was very fast, just coming up with stuff I didn't
Speaker 1: really not know. And again I hear something that's you
Speaker 1: just played something I need that please? And what is
Speaker 1: this one that? Oh? Yeah, I need that a little
Speaker 1: differenever it was and you know, you you go through
Speaker 1: these emotions in the studio of really listening to everybody
Speaker 1: and making sure that they are in a good place
Speaker 1: to perform. Well, you know, it's it's part of the
Speaker 1: routine of being buddies, musical brothers. If you like you,
Speaker 1: I see the cold listen and watched the news, roll
Speaker 1: outside I learned, and every single day inside outside way
Speaker 1: the song the Cold Stone and moving to the door
Speaker 1: I watch, and every single the inside out outside coming up.
Speaker 1: John Anderson explains why Paul McCartney was his inspiration for
Speaker 1: taking drugs. While Yes was rocking the UK, the self
Speaker 1: described cussing Christian behind Grand Funk Railroad was lighting up
Speaker 1: America the word from the Atlanta Pop Festival. You know,
Speaker 1: we opened noon the first day. They liked us so
Speaker 1: well they moved us to seven o'clock the second day,
Speaker 1: and then the third day we were on at eleven
Speaker 1: o'clock under the lights. They're the people that they're waiting for. Now.
Speaker 1: To hear more about Mark Farner's story, go to Here's
Speaker 1: the Thing dot org. This is Alec Baldwin and you
Speaker 1: were listening to Here's the Thing. Nicknamed Napoleon. English singer
Speaker 1: songwriter John Anderson constantly pushed his bandmates to experiment further,
Speaker 1: considering that Yes sold more than fifty million albums in
Speaker 1: his time with them. It worked, but although Anderson's adventurous
Speaker 1: spirit played a role in propelling them forward, there were
Speaker 1: other factors too, namely competition. We did Close to the Edge,
Speaker 1: and if there was ever a rival band that I
Speaker 1: kind of watched and listen to was a Bang Cooking
Speaker 1: Crimson because I had heard about them, and me and
Speaker 1: Chris went to see them Speak Easy. This is like
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy I think maybe late sixty nine, and they
Speaker 1: performed the whole first album and it was it was
Speaker 1: just so incredibly good. They performed at vocals. It was
Speaker 1: in the court of the Crimson King, and I looked
Speaker 1: at Christ and said, we've got to practice more. Guys,
Speaker 1: you're very competitive, So we did I know. Then we
Speaker 1: went to Close to the Edge and I thought we'd
Speaker 1: opened this door. Musically speaking, we found this is um.
Speaker 1: It's a yes is um. It's something that every note
Speaker 1: is known to the band. We know every in you
Speaker 1: there and to perform it was going to be amazing.
Speaker 1: And then Bill said I'm leaving the band. About two
Speaker 1: weeks after we finished it, of course to the edge.
Speaker 1: You know why he wanted to join King Crimson really did,
Speaker 1: really and it broke my heart. And what what was
Speaker 1: that like for you? Well, I thought, you guys are
Speaker 1: with the quest of the way you've just done this
Speaker 1: piece of music. That meant we are now free to
Speaker 1: do and create what we want. We're just as good
Speaker 1: as King Crimson. Oh yeah, But when you feel you're
Speaker 1: just as good as Crimson, you're different. Is that what
Speaker 1: he wanted was different? He just said making the album
Speaker 1: was great, John, But I'm just not comfortable with Chris
Speaker 1: wanting this and me wanting that. And we'll see. I
Speaker 1: I used to say, I always think the beat starts
Speaker 1: with the bass, drum, bass, and everything evolves from Derek.
Speaker 1: Chris was said, no, the base is the beat. So
Speaker 1: there's that argument going on with Bill and basically he
Speaker 1: went to Crimson and I actually saw their first gig.
Speaker 1: There was a bandy changed their name to Discipline or
Speaker 1: is an album called Discipline with King Crimson and it
Speaker 1: was remarkable to watch because he had Bill Bruford on
Speaker 1: stage with a little kid right at the front of
Speaker 1: the stage. Guitar player I forgot his name for now,
Speaker 1: keyboard player, another guitar player, and this guy called Jamie
Speaker 1: Muir who was like a percussionist, and he looked like
Speaker 1: a wild man from born. You had a long black
Speaker 1: hair and he had this sort of black wooly shoulder thing.
Speaker 1: Man him look a very skinny ape and what he
Speaker 1: would do, which was kind of interesting. He had sort
Speaker 1: of gongs in his hand and he banged him on
Speaker 1: the floor and your microphones. So he had this band
Speaker 1: and this guy was jumping up against pieces of metal,
Speaker 1: large scale pieces of metal to me, the microphones on there.
Speaker 1: So there's incredible company of energy going around the band,
Speaker 1: which is very tight, right, And I couldn't be leaving.
Speaker 1: And I went to Bill Brufford's wedding and there was
Speaker 1: Jamie Muller and I said, Jamie, what do you what?
Speaker 1: What what do you? What are you doing? And he
Speaker 1: said wait there and he went off and he came
Speaker 1: back with a book and it was the Autobiography of
Speaker 1: a Yogi by Yogananda, and he just gave it to me.
Speaker 1: He didn't say anything else, and that changed my life.
Speaker 1: How So, it's a very clear understanding that all religions
Speaker 1: are the same, and all rivers go to the same
Speaker 1: motion and divine, divine energies all around us all the time.
Speaker 1: After Close to the finished, Closely and Close the Edge
Speaker 1: was like to me a very concept album in itself.
Speaker 1: And you and I, you finished Close to the Edge,
Speaker 1: Brufford leaves, You go to his wedding, You meet Jamie,
Speaker 1: he gives you the autobiography of a Yogi, and and
Speaker 1: and and who replaced Brufford at that remedia at that time.
Speaker 1: So the next album, after Course of the Edges, then
Speaker 1: we went into toto graphic world of craziness. You know,
Speaker 1: because why do you say that? Because well, it's it's
Speaker 1: such a you know, what's the word, It's such an
Speaker 1: incredible moment in my life. Anyway, Why well, because, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, some joker in a newspaper said close to
Speaker 1: the as, Yeah, the next thing they're going to do
Speaker 1: is the Bible to Music, And I thought, yeah, So
Speaker 1: I got the book, and I was on a trip
Speaker 1: to Japan with the band with Alan and everything, and
Speaker 1: Steve and I read in the bottom of the book
Speaker 1: these four energies that create almost everything is the revealing
Speaker 1: of everything, the remembering of everything, the ancient and the
Speaker 1: ritual of life. You know, and I thought, that's it
Speaker 1: with the four movements, you know, so I sort of
Speaker 1: jump tones Steve. It was perfect for it, you know,
Speaker 1: and why because he's very receptive, very he was ready
Speaker 1: to go with you. You're very quick to read the book,
Speaker 1: do you know? I don't know. Did you give all
Speaker 1: of them the book and say this is required reading?
Speaker 1: Before he started the album, I just knew that if
Speaker 1: you're going to go anywhere, why don't you just jump
Speaker 1: in the deep end, you know, so when you get it,
Speaker 1: when you head towards tales, when you go to as
Speaker 1: you were saying this topographic madness, how were they changing
Speaker 1: the other ones in the band you? Since are they
Speaker 1: all on this journey and kind of getting into with
Speaker 1: you and getting high with you? Or some of them
Speaker 1: sitting there looking at there, watching on how much more
Speaker 1: of this revealing science of God? And and wait a second,
Speaker 1: is this cat really going to do the Bible next?
Speaker 1: Where are we going with this guy? Was it all
Speaker 1: kind of cool? Or most of the time me Steve
Speaker 1: and Alan and then Chris on on a level, we're
Speaker 1: very there. Rick was finding his own sort of passway.
Speaker 1: He started writing some music about King Arthur or every
Speaker 1: the eighth and stuff and that, and that was sort
Speaker 1: of sense. When he came in, he was he was
Speaker 1: thinking of other stuff. So it was like lovely guy,
Speaker 1: but still a young guy. It was so young. It
Speaker 1: was very who when he joined them, and so I
Speaker 1: was sort of headlong into this thing. Nobody can dissuade
Speaker 1: me at all. We're going there. That's all there is
Speaker 1: to it. It's going to be great. What is it
Speaker 1: about you that makes you so driven that way? I mean,
Speaker 1: you see, you have an almost a hab like quest
Speaker 1: to synthesize what you're thinking, feeling, dreaming, believing into the
Speaker 1: music you're doing, regardless of the cost. Do you know
Speaker 1: why you're so self examining? I would think, why, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm just so grateful. I suppose you just enjoy the journey. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm so thankful. There's a certain point in time when
Speaker 1: I was very lost on heavy drugs and stuff in
Speaker 1: earlier smith at that publicly, I don't remember. Did you
Speaker 1: do that? Because it was for free and for fun
Speaker 1: and silly and funny, and then it got to be
Speaker 1: it makes it makes you sick kind of And then
Speaker 1: how do you see it now? In perspective? What's that
Speaker 1: your drug experience was it was, it was and abashed
Speaker 1: endorsements de Limera front page. Paul McCartney took ascid. I said,
Speaker 1: that's it. That was my key. He didn't pay the
Speaker 1: guy that things love me do my god, all you
Speaker 1: need is love Christman. So tails comes out. No, no, no, no.
Speaker 1: Fragile is a hit and close to the edges and
Speaker 1: you guys are really rolling and see me, And what
Speaker 1: is the tourist situation like now your big stadium's big places?
Speaker 1: No not not? You know I think we did three
Speaker 1: nights for Madison Square and you know, did you enjoy them? Yeah?
Speaker 1: It was like very dream sequence sort of looking back,
Speaker 1: you just remember it as being, Wow, I gotta get
Speaker 1: on stage. I gotta I don't know what I'm doing.
Speaker 1: Don't worry about it. Look for the furthest people away
Speaker 1: and wave to them, because you don't want to just
Speaker 1: play to the twenty people in front row. You gotta
Speaker 1: pay Mark, you gotta play, You gotta play to everybody,
Speaker 1: you know, you gotta. Mark Farner told to see tours
Speaker 1: close off because one of the people in the back
Speaker 1: road and pay attention to him. He ripped down to
Speaker 1: It was like a little speed up from Grand Funk Railroad. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but but when you also were doing this and regardless
Speaker 1: of the size, but I'm assuming, particularly where there's the
Speaker 1: size and the amount of money available to the to
Speaker 1: the promoters, does the stage tableau change what's happening on
Speaker 1: his lighting and graphics say we're lucky, you see, because
Speaker 1: your music lends itself to something spectacular. Yeah, it's an
Speaker 1: interesting story that the first road we have was Mike Tate,
Speaker 1: and Mike Tate is now Take Tower is one of
Speaker 1: the biggest touring companies in America for sure. And we
Speaker 1: were doing a show up in north of England in
Speaker 1: a small pub and he was driving us and obviously
Speaker 1: a stripper would come on most nights in the pub
Speaker 1: that we're doing our show, and there's all these little
Speaker 1: sort of switches on the side of the the wall
Speaker 1: and he was up and down with all colors, was
Speaker 1: like that, with little switches like that, and I thought, oh,
Speaker 1: that's really cool. So we drove down to London and
Speaker 1: Mike said, I'm going back to Australia. I said no, no, no,
Speaker 1: he kind of ahead. You're gonna be our lighting guys.
Speaker 1: I said, what do you mean? I said, what do
Speaker 1: you need because I just saw you didn't know it yet.
Speaker 1: So we've we've we've got some money and he got
Speaker 1: he made these Genie towers which came out of a
Speaker 1: box in one of them, and the car light car lights.
Speaker 1: He had a little little thing coin and but you
Speaker 1: didn't have any screens and images that came topographic time
Speaker 1: we started projection, we were first first band and what
Speaker 1: the band? What are the other bandmates feel about you
Speaker 1: bringing that ettlement out of the stage. You talked to
Speaker 1: me about so much about it. Just think I think
Speaker 1: Roger Dean had done the artwork. Him and his brother
Speaker 1: started doing the staging, and the best staging that they
Speaker 1: did for us was the Relayer tour. Get some delirium
Speaker 1: with a three headed sort of thing. How did you
Speaker 1: meet for Chard Dean? Tell people how did you meet him?
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think Steve said, yes, right, no,
Speaker 1: I had seen this album covered a bang called OSSI
Speaker 1: visa in London and it was just fantastic. And I
Speaker 1: looked at Von Roger Deane and Steve said, I think
Speaker 1: I know some really knows him. I said, we'll get
Speaker 1: him getting to come over, you know in fragile. We're
Speaker 1: working on fragile, and I just said, Rogier, how are
Speaker 1: you all met? And just put you know, it makes
Speaker 1: some very fragile Hafan kar. So he came back with
Speaker 1: this little world and I said, that's perfect, you know,
Speaker 1: And from then on, you know, we just kept working
Speaker 1: with him so he would be involved in staging. Mike
Speaker 1: Tait was the lighting guy, and that was the way
Speaker 1: we worked in the seventies. Explained to me because I
Speaker 1: don't understand this either, I really don't, and I'm always
Speaker 1: fascinated by this. When you're exploring your music, it's so
Speaker 1: dynamic and it's so spiritual and rock at the same time.
Speaker 1: It's everything. It's jazz. It means it's its own planet
Speaker 1: if you will. I mean, I really believe that. But
Speaker 1: at any point do you feel that the vocals need uh?
Speaker 1: Does it ever cross your mind, like we've got to
Speaker 1: get a girl in here? Is there ever a discussion
Speaker 1: of a woman joining the mayor? Is that never come out?
Speaker 1: Do we need a feminine voice? Never? The music is
Speaker 1: always put through the prism of John's the singer, and
Speaker 1: you get into that zone of well, I'm writing the
Speaker 1: lyrics as well. Because I like writing lyrics, and me
Speaker 1: and Steve would write lyrics with each other, Me and
Speaker 1: Chris would write lyrics with each other. But I just
Speaker 1: tend to write a lot and think a lot, and
Speaker 1: drive a lot, and come on up the mountain, people,
Speaker 1: Come on. We got to do this because who else
Speaker 1: is going to help us? Who else is going to
Speaker 1: help Nobody else is going to help us, because we're
Speaker 1: going this way. And we went on that journey and
Speaker 1: it went right through the seventies to that point where
Speaker 1: it couldn't go any further because the House of Cards
Speaker 1: fell down. We really talk about that in a minute.
Speaker 1: But when you get when you when typographic comes out,
Speaker 1: how does that do well? It's it's It's well documented
Speaker 1: that it was heavily criticized and very confused used atmosphere
Speaker 1: around it because Rick hated it. He hated that it
Speaker 1: was too much for him because he was already half
Speaker 1: into something else. I think he wanted to be somewhere else.
Speaker 1: I think so. Yeah. And when he said he hated it,
Speaker 1: he was on the record at the time or while
Speaker 1: you were. He said, it's too it's too much. It's
Speaker 1: too much music for people. It's too much music for them,
Speaker 1: And of course I was what did you mean by
Speaker 1: too much music? It was like you're trying to make
Speaker 1: people eat a whole cake at once. You should do
Speaker 1: it in pieces were too long. It was the structure
Speaker 1: of the album was not right for twenty minute pieces,
Speaker 1: because that's all you could fit on an album. Right.
Speaker 1: I can just see you, I can see you awaking.
Speaker 1: I have this image of you waking up. I'm in
Speaker 1: bed and you pick up like how many? How many
Speaker 1: minutes fit on an album? Again is great? I've got
Speaker 1: four twenty minute first songs pieces, the revealing, the remembering, ritual,
Speaker 1: ancient and you think there's got to be a meaning
Speaker 1: to you stopped believing in in the structure of Yes' music. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he just felt that it wasn't going to work. And
Speaker 1: a lot of people agree with that. And was he
Speaker 1: gone after topographic? And did you feel about that? I
Speaker 1: was sort of beaten up because in terms of musicianship,
Speaker 1: you could never find anybody who was his Again, he's
Speaker 1: one of the greatest history. Ridiculous. You know, you go
Speaker 1: through that feeling like I think I went I went
Speaker 1: amid the wrong I went down the wrong road. I
Speaker 1: should have thought because all all the time we were
Speaker 1: doing close to the age. You know, why are you
Speaker 1: doing cross the edge? Why don't you do another roundabout?
Speaker 1: What's the matter with you? You want to make We
Speaker 1: can make so much money now, just one and another,
Speaker 1: one another, one another that I said, No, I'm not interested.
Speaker 1: I want to hold your hands right your version. You
Speaker 1: wanted me to sing a thousand that one for the
Speaker 1: Night has a thousand dies and a thousand dies? You
Speaker 1: want me to do that? Don't please don't tell me
Speaker 1: when was yes songs recorded in between, which I think
Speaker 1: it was just after Fragile. I think you think Fragile
Speaker 1: close to the jest songs typographic you got it. But
Speaker 1: the idea is that everybody, you know, Steve and Alan
Speaker 1: and Chris put so much into topographic, you know, and
Speaker 1: it was it was it was magic to perform and
Speaker 1: to hold an audience for twenty minutes. You can hear
Speaker 1: a pin drop every now, you know, every It's amazing.
Speaker 1: How are the audiences when you perform that? It was
Speaker 1: amazing because our own car was close to the edge,
Speaker 1: so it was like we were living this new new
Speaker 1: world of music, which is kind of crazy thinking, but
Speaker 1: I felt we'd found this big cloud that we could
Speaker 1: sail around the world on, you know, and we were
Speaker 1: playing this music that was you know, and then as
Speaker 1: time went along, you realized that one part of the
Speaker 1: puzzle rag he wasn't enjoying it, and it sounded like
Speaker 1: he wasn't enjoying it. And he was caught once with um,
Speaker 1: was it some Indian food underneath this keyboard? He were
Speaker 1: doing the show and he has some Indian currier underneath
Speaker 1: this keyboard, so that that broke the back. But help
Speaker 1: me with this because of the thing I've learned from
Speaker 1: people who are these immensely successful and people are just
Speaker 1: eating your music up alive and they love it. It's
Speaker 1: so fresh and so new and so brilliant. And you
Speaker 1: guys are going along and then one cylinder and the
Speaker 1: engine decides to pop out. What are the other guys?
Speaker 1: How do they feel? Oh, we gotta get a new guitar.
Speaker 1: Where's a new keyboard player? That was the first, you know,
Speaker 1: I thought he the silliest story ever. I started thinking,
Speaker 1: and I just heard about this guy called Vane Pat
Speaker 1: who lived in Paris, and I've seen a photograph of
Speaker 1: him using laser beams. So we got laser beams and
Speaker 1: I went to meet Van Gelis and I loved his
Speaker 1: first album. It's called Creation Dumont. I used to play
Speaker 1: it before Yes Show. So when audiences are coming in
Speaker 1: there here in this cosmic music by bank Ellis. You know.
Speaker 1: So um, I won't tell you the story meeting and everything,
Speaker 1: but he nearly joined the band. I invited him to
Speaker 1: London to join the band soon as Rick went on,
Speaker 1: why do you want to tell the story of beating him? Why, Well,
Speaker 1: it's silly, you know, It's like, well, okay, So I
Speaker 1: get to Paris, I find his phone number, I got
Speaker 1: his call him up. Hello, Hello Van Ellis. Yes, Oh,
Speaker 1: my name is John Anderson. I sing in a band
Speaker 1: called Yes Watch. Yes, I don't know, Yes, it's a band,
Speaker 1: you know, a band I'm singer. Oh oh, John Johnny, Oh,
Speaker 1: come over. So I went over to his apartment right
Speaker 1: and I opened the door and he's standing there, tall
Speaker 1: guy with a long sort of kaftan, you know, big
Speaker 1: beard and everything. And he has a big bone arrow
Speaker 1: over his shoulder like a long ball. You know. Hey, Johnny,
Speaker 1: come and can get home. You know. So he was
Speaker 1: in the middle of an archery session he said he
Speaker 1: had a very long hallway. All the way down the
Speaker 1: bottom of the hallway was a target he's shooting and
Speaker 1: he said, what's this John? And he takes a born
Speaker 1: arrow and it went right through the window and hit
Speaker 1: the postman. Hey. I just laughed because it was just
Speaker 1: so beautiful. And I went around his house was sets everywhere. Oh,
Speaker 1: listen to this, I have this music. Listen to this.
Speaker 1: And then he started playing with his big fat fingers,
Speaker 1: the most gorgeous music I've ever heard. When you see
Speaker 1: he almost joined the band. What was that about? Well?
Speaker 1: I asked him to come over to England and joined
Speaker 1: the band, and Stephen Chris thought I was crazy. Who
Speaker 1: is this guy? You know? I said, let's try it
Speaker 1: and shoot arrows at us. Yeah, I know, so we
Speaker 1: we we We started rehearsing and Steve's got his guitar
Speaker 1: tuning up and perhaps and mindedly Van Gelly said, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, little guitar, not a real instrument, you know,
Speaker 1: because it was one of those crazy Greek I said,
Speaker 1: we're trying to make friends here. Vane didn't work so
Speaker 1: he was good, and then I became friends with angels.
Speaker 1: Of course, how do you find your next keyboardist. Where
Speaker 1: so Patrick Raz came along to my my house and
Speaker 1: started playing the piano. He was brilliant. He was in London,
Speaker 1: he's from Switzerland band he was in a band called Refugee,
Speaker 1: but he wanted to join the band. And as soon
Speaker 1: as he played the piano, I said, you're you're You're good.
Speaker 1: You're very good. And I was overjoyed that we found
Speaker 1: somebody equally as exciting and possibly talented as Rick. So
Speaker 1: we started rehearsing and we did the relay our album.
Speaker 1: One song we did was called Gates of Delirium, which
Speaker 1: is a long form piece of music, and it was
Speaker 1: the first one that I actually, strangely enough, I've been
Speaker 1: playing the piano a lot. I took to the band
Speaker 1: me playing it Do Do Do Do Do Do Do?
Speaker 1: But uh, you know, and I went through it with
Speaker 1: that I'd learned four parts, you know. And if I
Speaker 1: can't believe that they understood me, because that was terrible.
Speaker 1: That was terrible. Yeah, he did layer. Chris was on
Speaker 1: top of that case of delivering. Was fantastic to perform.
Speaker 1: It was like, it's wild warlike tendency. Why why humans
Speaker 1: or why we're all into war? And now when you
Speaker 1: say the house of cards falls, what happens if the
Speaker 1: relayer comes out? Are there more changes? And get no,
Speaker 1: it gets it gets a bit strange because Pat Patrick,
Speaker 1: bless him, starts to wander off and finds himself in
Speaker 1: Brazil and he got married and things like that, and
Speaker 1: we lost contact and we decided Patrick Mora, Yeah, we
Speaker 1: decided we wanted to start recording. And some somebody said, well,
Speaker 1: why do we record with the Queen? Have been recording
Speaker 1: in montro They've got a studio there. It's lovely there
Speaker 1: in Switzerland, and we wanted to pay taxes that year
Speaker 1: and like kind of crap. And so we all go
Speaker 1: to Switzerland and Montroy is beautiful, and you know, I'm
Speaker 1: there and writing and dust was gathering on his keyboards.
Speaker 1: Is that kind of strange feeling? Where is he? And
Speaker 1: so we carried on racing ideas and stuff, and you know,
Speaker 1: I actually bumped into Steve how at a holiday in
Speaker 1: near Detroit about four months earlier. Had gone past his
Speaker 1: room and the smoke coming out from under the door
Speaker 1: and he was playing this rift down, don't don't die?
Speaker 1: Are you? Are you? That sort of thing, and I thought,
Speaker 1: that's kind of nice, and I said, I Steve John
Speaker 1: and I went to have breakfast. I came back. He's
Speaker 1: still playing it. I said, why don't you change key down?
Speaker 1: Don don don't. So I walked in and sing the
Speaker 1: main line of Awaken, which is the first verse, or
Speaker 1: that kind of thing, and then I said, Steve, how
Speaker 1: many chords can you play without repeating? And he started
Speaker 1: playing all these chords. I said, keep playing them and
Speaker 1: repeat for do do do do do workings and man
Speaker 1: said to play out historical life real again in the
Speaker 1: flower of the Fruit of History, and he just popped up.
Speaker 1: And I was actually in that space of saying, let's
Speaker 1: just do that. That would be the second stanza, and
Speaker 1: then there'll be another stanza and then I'm going to
Speaker 1: do a harp thing. And Steve said, why because I'm
Speaker 1: playing the harp every day I'm on tour, at which
Speaker 1: I did. You know, But that was great making that
Speaker 1: album and the Waken. It's so beautiful to create and perform,
Speaker 1: and we'd still perform it. Just now, what's music in
Speaker 1: your life that's not your music? Are you? Do? You
Speaker 1: listen to a lot of music? I know it's terrible.
Speaker 1: What's your favorite I just listened to the seventh three
Speaker 1: times yesterday before I came here. I was driving around
Speaker 1: shopping for some reason. Oh my god, yeah, I love
Speaker 1: the real sonorous and movie Russian Russians were on top
Speaker 1: of them. He was pissed. You know, so classical is
Speaker 1: big in your life? Well, I think yeah, I think.
Speaker 1: Well I was very big in to wrest On Rollan Kirk.
Speaker 1: I thought he was just amazing. What about contemporary music, now,
Speaker 1: are you do you? Well, there's always a great song
Speaker 1: here and there every week another song, Oh my god, yeah,
Speaker 1: And there's a lot of great music out there that
Speaker 1: most people are not going to hear on radio anyway.
Speaker 1: So the only way you can do it here music
Speaker 1: is going to like somebody sent me a link and
Speaker 1: it was this band doing an insurance song using pipes
Speaker 1: and things on a on a on a table, and
Speaker 1: who was the most glorious work of art these people
Speaker 1: singing in his song but doing these kind of spoons
Speaker 1: and and singing and beautiful harmony, and the very famous
Speaker 1: man actually five million people watch that. There are people,
Speaker 1: I mean, I hope this comes out the right way.
Speaker 1: There are people who write music. I'm not saying this
Speaker 1: with any judgment of them. And the music is pretty simple.
Speaker 1: It means it's it's it's rock music, and it's exciting
Speaker 1: and and and and it's I love you and you
Speaker 1: don't love me? And why don't you love me? And
Speaker 1: your music is very nugety and very dense and very rich.
Speaker 1: And I'm assuming that the making of that music would
Speaker 1: probably set you up for even a worst case what
Speaker 1: people suffered of their personal lives. And did you find
Speaker 1: that the music that you were writing and the work
Speaker 1: you were doing was so intense that it negatively impacted
Speaker 1: your personal life? And what didn't You were married, You
Speaker 1: weren't married to your music totally, so you were polygamous.
Speaker 1: You were married to your wife and your music totally. Okay, Now,
Speaker 1: my second wife, Jane, we've been to twenty five years,
Speaker 1: so it's amazing she is. You didn't find that that
Speaker 1: to be a challenge to balance your home life and
Speaker 1: your work. Obviously, you know you're growing up and you're
Speaker 1: getting older, and you're trusting accountants to take every finances
Speaker 1: and things like that, and just keep saying you've got
Speaker 1: to buy more stuff. You've got to buy more stuff
Speaker 1: because there's so much money and to buy more stuff,
Speaker 1: and you think, why you know I'm not interested in stuff.
Speaker 1: To be honest, I don't come from that. I come
Speaker 1: from a very um simple background from Accrington. I used
Speaker 1: to be I used to be the ball boy for
Speaker 1: Acklington Stanley, one of the first teams in the First
Speaker 1: League that ever was soccer. You know, my core values
Speaker 1: are very very simple, very clear that I can't believe
Speaker 1: I'm doing what I'm doing. I'm so grateful to be
Speaker 1: here speaking with you because I've seen you work and
Speaker 1: I know you're great. And it's just the idea that
Speaker 1: I can't wait until tomorrow because I know the great
Speaker 1: music is coming. I know some great stuff is happening.
Speaker 1: When you perform, now, do you need to adjust the
Speaker 1: key and the way you sing? Do you do down
Speaker 1: a ton or half a ton? You know, I listened
Speaker 1: to my stuff. I was done. I was singing on
Speaker 1: helium half of it. But it's so I didn't realize.
Speaker 1: It's incredible when you look back on the amazing, amazing
Speaker 1: work you did in the amazing music you made, and
Speaker 1: I thank you, I thank you, But when you look back,
Speaker 1: was there anything you would have done differently? I can't
Speaker 1: believe where I am now. You know we're just going
Speaker 1: to go into the Hall of Fame. Well, when you
Speaker 1: do something you wanted, you know it was something to
Speaker 1: do with this manager twenty years ago. I said, I'm
Speaker 1: going to get you in the Hall of Fame. I said,
Speaker 1: I don't care. It will happen when it happens. And
Speaker 1: that's my mantra. Things will happen when they happen. Don't
Speaker 1: tell me. I'm going to be in the Hall of Fame.
Speaker 1: All my heroes are there, and there's nothing you would
Speaker 1: do differently. I can't know. I can't think. There's obviously
Speaker 1: things I should have done differently. Yes, seasons say this
Speaker 1: is just In an interview last August with Classic Rock,
Speaker 1: Anderson said, quote for me, yes was about the adventure
Speaker 1: of music, not making a living. The adventure itself will
Speaker 1: create great things. Unquote. Indeed it has. This is Alec
Speaker 1: Baldwin and you're listening to here's the thing