WEBVTT - Jimmy Webb

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<v Speaker 1>Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.

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<v Speaker 1>My guest today is but one and only Jimmy Webb. Jimmy,

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<v Speaker 1>you've been playing live. Someone who comes to your show,

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<v Speaker 1>what might they expect?

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<v Speaker 2>Well, they shouldn't expect an orchestra, because it's just me

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<v Speaker 2>and my you know, trustee piano. But I think they

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<v Speaker 2>will get a sort of a lightly polished show, not

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<v Speaker 2>not a not a slick show at all. It's anecdotal.

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<v Speaker 2>It's quite quite a lot of it is funny, and

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<v Speaker 2>then it's interspersed with some hit songs, some that are

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<v Speaker 2>not quite so well known, and it's just kind of

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<v Speaker 2>a you know, my father was a Baptist preacher. It's

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<v Speaker 2>just kind of my version of a revival meeting. And

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<v Speaker 2>occasionally I go off on a diatribe about uh, streaming

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<v Speaker 2>and all that political stuff, but I'm not going there today.

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<v Speaker 1>Well we could go there. When you say streaming and

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<v Speaker 1>political stuff if you're talking about music business, are also

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<v Speaker 1>political stuff in the naty.

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<v Speaker 2>Oh no no no, not not the presidential race. I'm

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<v Speaker 2>really talking about the kind of shoddy treatment that I

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<v Speaker 2>feel that songwriters are still getting after decades and decades

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<v Speaker 2>and decades of sort of being on the bottom of

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<v Speaker 2>the totem pole where we I think some of us

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<v Speaker 2>had anticipated that the whole digital revolution would end up

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<v Speaker 2>being well, let me tell you a small anecdote. Doug

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<v Speaker 2>would and I, who sit on the ASCAT board before

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<v Speaker 2>this whole thing started, there was a small company here

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<v Speaker 2>in New York that claimed that they had a program

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<v Speaker 2>that would recognize any song. It would recognize any song

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<v Speaker 2>in any record within x seconds. And I said, Doug,

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<v Speaker 2>that sounds great. You know, if we had that every

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<v Speaker 2>we could really follow every performance out there, so we

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<v Speaker 2>would be getting rich. And I said, so this is

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<v Speaker 2>a good thing. Let's go tell the board if it

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<v Speaker 2>works right. If it works well, the damn thing worked,

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<v Speaker 2>it could tell you. It would pop up and say

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<v Speaker 2>Evergreen by Andy Williams, and so it could hear the

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<v Speaker 2>music and identify it, which I saw as a pretty

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<v Speaker 2>good long run, because we as songwriters always felt maybe

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<v Speaker 2>the count wasn't right, maybe something was amiss somewhere along

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<v Speaker 2>the way in getting paid, and this would cure all.

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<v Speaker 2>But when the deals were made, a lot of them

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<v Speaker 2>were made without us being at the table, and sadly,

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<v Speaker 2>you know, we end up The only statistic I have

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<v Speaker 2>that I know, at least once it was accurate, is

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<v Speaker 2>that we were making point zero or zero seven to

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<v Speaker 2>eight cents per stream. And that's when Adele did her

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<v Speaker 2>famous kind of publicisty shot where she came out and

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<v Speaker 2>said she had had the largest selling album in history,

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<v Speaker 2>and she got a check for twenty thousand make that

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<v Speaker 2>single the largest selling single in history. And I think

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<v Speaker 2>she got about twenty thousand dollars, so that that is

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<v Speaker 2>not even on a par with what I was getting

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<v Speaker 2>in nineteen sixty seven when I was a journeyman beginning songwriter.

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<v Speaker 2>So in that realm, I'm kind of an activist. I

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<v Speaker 2>get a little angry about it sometimes that the song,

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<v Speaker 2>which is really the basic building block of all entertainment enterprise,

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<v Speaker 2>depends on these songs, and yet we're sort of taken

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<v Speaker 2>for granted a lot of times. Specifically, now we're being

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<v Speaker 2>sampled a lot without our permission. There's something that we

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<v Speaker 2>have to watch every day. I mean, I could tell

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<v Speaker 2>that's what I mean. That's where I didn't want to go.

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<v Speaker 1>No no, no, no no. People are definitely interested in this.

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<v Speaker 1>So pre internet, post Internet, how has that affected your

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<v Speaker 1>songwriting royalties.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, they're down a little bit, for sure. They haven't.

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<v Speaker 2>It hasn't been the bonanza that you know, Doug and

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<v Speaker 2>I were fantasizing about, Oh wow, now all our problems

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<v Speaker 2>are solved. You know, it's streaming doesn't pay us, pay

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<v Speaker 2>us enough. And I think that you would see most

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<v Speaker 2>people in my position, young or old, agreeing with the

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<v Speaker 2>fact that we've in terms of the way it's affected us.

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<v Speaker 2>The sort of fallout has been that I feel like

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<v Speaker 2>I have to play live to augment my income and

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<v Speaker 2>make sure that, you know, the big house gets built

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<v Speaker 2>and that I can take care of my children. I

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<v Speaker 2>have five boys and a girl, and they're spread all

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<v Speaker 2>over the world, so I never know when I get

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<v Speaker 2>the midnight phone call, you know that. So there's some

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<v Speaker 2>dire thing that needs to be addressed. We really are

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<v Speaker 2>depending on live performance, and that's one of the reasons

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<v Speaker 2>I'm out there and I'm embarking on this. This is

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<v Speaker 2>kind of a you know, there's a colorful expression I

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<v Speaker 2>could use, but let's just say this is going to

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<v Speaker 2>be a really tough tour. I'm seventy seven. I'll be

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<v Speaker 2>seventy eight on August fifteenth, and I don't know how

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<v Speaker 2>much longer I can tour the way I'm touring, So

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<v Speaker 2>I think it's affected us all that way.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, this brings up a lot of issues. Ay, who

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<v Speaker 1>owns your songs?

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<v Speaker 2>Well, I I own first of all. You know that

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<v Speaker 2>the ownership of a copyright is split in two, so

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<v Speaker 2>it's the publishing half and it's the songwriter half. So

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<v Speaker 2>on a lot of my songs in my company Jimmy

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<v Speaker 2>Webb Music, or the newer songs, I own them outright.

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<v Speaker 2>A lot of my songs are being returned as a

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<v Speaker 2>result of this copyright window that was provided by the

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<v Speaker 2>Copyright Office for US. Teenagers basically were then who signed

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<v Speaker 2>contracts without a lawyer present, which I was doing all

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<v Speaker 2>the time. I was always I'd sign anything to get

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<v Speaker 2>into a studio for an hour. I'd sign my life

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<v Speaker 2>away because studios. It's hard to explain the zeitgeist of

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<v Speaker 2>all of this, really, but the studio used to be

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<v Speaker 2>the holy of holies. It was like a temple where

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<v Speaker 2>you sort of wanted to have the password to gain entry,

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<v Speaker 2>the aberkadab or to get into that room and record,

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<v Speaker 2>because they were special rooms and not everybody had one.

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<v Speaker 2>So I ended up trading a lot of publishing for

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<v Speaker 2>studio time. That sort of an arrangement.

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<v Speaker 1>You have this incredible catalog. I'm sure you've been approached

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<v Speaker 1>by the third party company's primary wave hypnosis about purchasing

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<v Speaker 1>your catalog. Would you ever do that?

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<v Speaker 2>Do it? I? You know, I'm aware that it looks

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<v Speaker 2>like easy money, so why not let's get, you know,

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<v Speaker 2>on the money train. On the other hand, I sort

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<v Speaker 2>of come from the the the the well the methodist

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<v Speaker 2>side of the record business, where holding up onto your

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<v Speaker 2>public publishing as a kin to a religion. It's it's

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<v Speaker 2>been drummed into me to hold on in my publishing.

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<v Speaker 2>And the only publishing I relinquish I was was because

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<v Speaker 2>of events beyond my control. But for now I'm happy

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<v Speaker 2>to hang on to it. I I don't need the money,

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<v Speaker 2>so I yeah, I don't know. I can. You know,

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<v Speaker 2>there are some publishers out there who are offering some

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<v Speaker 2>very interesting deals where they're coming in and saying, well,

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<v Speaker 2>what we'll do is we'll advance X dollars to you

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<v Speaker 2>the you know, the this is the bait that's wiggling

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<v Speaker 2>on the hook, and maybe we'd do this, and maybe

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<v Speaker 2>we'll do that and you know, maybe I'll give you

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<v Speaker 2>my rare Southsea shell collection. They're offering a lot of

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<v Speaker 2>different things to different people and really trying to appeal

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<v Speaker 2>to individuals on that basis. And the deal would be

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<v Speaker 2>that you become partners with the publisher and now you're

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<v Speaker 2>both owners of the publishing company, and the theory behind

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<v Speaker 2>that being that the publishing company has a vested interest

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<v Speaker 2>then in promoting your catalog and seeking out sync rights

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<v Speaker 2>and what have you, and that their heart is more

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<v Speaker 2>in the game, their dog is more in the fight

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<v Speaker 2>if they have a partnership with you as opposed to

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<v Speaker 2>an administration deal. Now, you know, I can see that,

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<v Speaker 2>I can see that in theory that ought of work.

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<v Speaker 2>But things are changing so fast I cannot believe. In

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<v Speaker 2>the twenty for twenty three years that I've been on

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<v Speaker 2>the ASCAT board, we went from Napster to Spotify, and

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<v Speaker 2>there was all kinds of there were there were little

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<v Speaker 2>there were little conflicts ongoing throughout. Some of them were

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<v Speaker 2>pretty strange where we had I know that one of

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<v Speaker 2>them was that I'm a major I'm not talking, I'm

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<v Speaker 2>talking a giant company was sitting on the board and

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<v Speaker 2>taking the position that Napster was illegal, and at the

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<v Speaker 2>same time they were investing in Napster, and so that

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<v Speaker 2>at one point they ended up in court suing themselves.

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<v Speaker 2>So it's been so fused that I'm wary. I'm I'm

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<v Speaker 2>standing off. I want to see where this is going

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<v Speaker 2>and what's happening. I have an obligation to my family

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<v Speaker 2>and uh, I believe in the copyrights. I believe there's

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<v Speaker 2>special there's a special catalog, and I would, you know,

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<v Speaker 2>want special treatment for that for those songs.

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<v Speaker 1>Let's go back to the ASCAP board. In ASCAP, With

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<v Speaker 1>the Internet, satellite radio, other means of distribution, there are

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<v Speaker 1>more ways for performing rights organizations to collect. Have you

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<v Speaker 1>seen your performing rights royalties go up down steady?

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<v Speaker 2>Well, uh, I think that. Uh without revealing information that

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<v Speaker 2>I'm just that I'm not permitted to reveal. But uh,

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<v Speaker 2>I can say that, I can say that ASCAP's never

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<v Speaker 2>been doing any better than they are. So it hasn't effected.

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<v Speaker 2>It hasn't effected the gross it's in a negative way.

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<v Speaker 2>It's been It's the volume is so tremendous that the

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<v Speaker 2>overall effect is positive. If you look at the at

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<v Speaker 2>the end of the year, and the money that's left

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<v Speaker 2>to distribute. So the overfall all effect is positive, positive,

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<v Speaker 2>But for guys like me who had their biggest hits

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<v Speaker 2>years ago and are not like, you know, a red

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<v Speaker 2>hot Rapper act or something, clearly the the line share

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<v Speaker 2>is going to the to the top, uh to the

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<v Speaker 2>top artists, the artists of the week. Uh So, And

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<v Speaker 2>that's internal stuff that you know, I'm not really at

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<v Speaker 2>liberty to discuss, but yeah, it's ironic. Overall, I think

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<v Speaker 2>that we're doing better, but it's not trickling down to

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<v Speaker 2>the to the what I would call the standards.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, so nineteen ninety eight, nineteen ninety nine, prior to Napster,

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<v Speaker 1>your publishing income today, what percent is your published income

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<v Speaker 1>to that? Leaving out just we're talking mechanicals. Let's not

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<v Speaker 1>talk performing rights, which is its own thing unto itself.

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<v Speaker 2>Well, mechanicals are they've been through a particularly critical period

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<v Speaker 2>because there are no more or mechanicals. By definition, there

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<v Speaker 2>aren't any records, There aren't any CDs. Sheet music is

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<v Speaker 2>not a big deal anymore. Folios, things of that nature.

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<v Speaker 2>Any physical objects are like out there, they're you know,

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<v Speaker 2>if you're holding a CD in your hand, that's the

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<v Speaker 2>last physical object you're ever going to have that has

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<v Speaker 2>music on it for sale. We're I. I had envisioned

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<v Speaker 2>at world where there would be an intermediary between the

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<v Speaker 2>CD and the and the cloud. But it looks like

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<v Speaker 2>that we skipped over that one, and there's an acceleration

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<v Speaker 2>in work here. I don't know that, frankly makes me nervous,

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<v Speaker 2>But could we go back to the gist of that question.

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<v Speaker 1>Okay, let let me let me put it a different way.

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<v Speaker 2>Okay.

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<v Speaker 1>In the old days of physical there were acts that

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<v Speaker 1>were not hit, acts that were selling product generating royalties.

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<v Speaker 1>What many people forget is a lot of those acts

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<v Speaker 1>were in upside down positions with their labels in it,

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<v Speaker 1>so they never got royalties beyond the advance. And today

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<v Speaker 1>anybody can make music and put it up on Spotify.

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<v Speaker 1>So we have a number of people on the losing

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<v Speaker 1>end of Spotify and the other streaming outlets. We have

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<v Speaker 1>people who were propped up by the record industry of

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<v Speaker 1>your and now they're competing with all these wannabes that

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<v Speaker 1>they didn't used to have to compete with. A lot

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<v Speaker 1>of these acts sold x number of physical records, generating income, etc.

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<v Speaker 1>Now we are in the streaming world. The streaming world

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<v Speaker 1>is one of consumption as opposed to sale.

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<v Speaker 2>What do we know?

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<v Speaker 1>The song writers got screwed on streaming in terms of

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<v Speaker 1>the overall percentage they get. If there's one hundred pennies

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<v Speaker 1>in let's just you know, there literally is no per

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<v Speaker 1>stream rate. It's a division, etc. Changes And of course

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<v Speaker 1>there are different rates for on demand as opposed to radio,

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<v Speaker 1>but approximately sixty cents on the dollar goes to the recording,

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<v Speaker 1>and the song should get more. But the records were

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<v Speaker 1>needed by Spotify at all, and they ended up making

0:17:36.560 --> 0:17:39.000
<v Speaker 1>deals where the songwriters did not get as much.

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<v Speaker 2>They made their deals with the artists first. It was

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<v Speaker 2>a very shrewd tactical move on their part. Is that

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<v Speaker 2>the songwriter deals were already in place, and in my

0:17:53.560 --> 0:18:00.680
<v Speaker 2>mind I feel that those were And again these aren't figures,

0:18:00.720 --> 0:18:05.080
<v Speaker 2>but I believe that the song that the the actual

0:18:05.280 --> 0:18:09.720
<v Speaker 2>artists who and by the way, who only recently in

0:18:11.080 --> 0:18:16.280
<v Speaker 2>cosmic time recently gained the right of royalty over the

0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:22.520
<v Speaker 2>performance on the record, and they slipped in there and

0:18:23.000 --> 0:18:29.360
<v Speaker 2>negotiated their deal, their streaming deal with Spotify. Specifically, before

0:18:29.480 --> 0:18:34.320
<v Speaker 2>we we were kind of left. We didn't have a

0:18:34.320 --> 0:18:38.560
<v Speaker 2>seat at that table. So they're roughly where they were before.

0:18:38.680 --> 0:18:43.080
<v Speaker 2>They're in the seven seven to eight territory of the

0:18:43.400 --> 0:18:51.320
<v Speaker 2>of the gross and we we ended up I think

0:18:51.359 --> 0:18:53.800
<v Speaker 2>a little worse than we were before.

0:18:54.800 --> 0:18:56.439
<v Speaker 1>I agree with that, but let me get to my

0:18:56.560 --> 0:19:03.399
<v Speaker 1>ultimate point. Okay, in streaming, it's winners and losers. Yes,

0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:07.040
<v Speaker 1>the Taylor swifts the weekends, there's a ton of money

0:19:07.119 --> 0:19:11.280
<v Speaker 1>generated there. A lot of people who used to rely

0:19:11.480 --> 0:19:15.879
<v Speaker 1>on physical sale income are not doing well on streaming. However,

0:19:16.640 --> 0:19:21.280
<v Speaker 1>you are not like many people in that. You know,

0:19:21.280 --> 0:19:22.800
<v Speaker 1>there are a lot of people saying, well, I had

0:19:22.840 --> 0:19:26.040
<v Speaker 1>an album, there weren't really hits on it. You have

0:19:26.359 --> 0:19:33.359
<v Speaker 1>written standards, household name standards. So at this late date,

0:19:34.080 --> 0:19:41.159
<v Speaker 1>ten odd years into streaming, do those standards to what

0:19:41.359 --> 0:19:45.760
<v Speaker 1>degree do they generate income for you as opposed to

0:19:45.840 --> 0:19:46.920
<v Speaker 1>the physical era.

0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:52.920
<v Speaker 2>You know, look, I think we've all taken a hit.

0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:59.600
<v Speaker 2>We've all taken a hit, and you know, I feel

0:19:59.640 --> 0:20:05.520
<v Speaker 2>a little self conscious about revealing, you know, exact figures,

0:20:06.040 --> 0:20:09.439
<v Speaker 2>but I think I may as well say it. And

0:20:09.720 --> 0:20:14.280
<v Speaker 2>I'll say I'll say it because regardless of any regardless

0:20:14.280 --> 0:20:18.760
<v Speaker 2>of the way it may affect the way people perceive me,

0:20:19.119 --> 0:20:26.320
<v Speaker 2>or my or my my standing in the ranks, my

0:20:26.520 --> 0:20:32.560
<v Speaker 2>level of success. I'm disregarding that for a moment. I

0:20:32.600 --> 0:20:36.280
<v Speaker 2>would say that it's I'm getting about half of what

0:20:36.400 --> 0:20:38.120
<v Speaker 2>I used to get on my standards.

0:20:39.000 --> 0:20:43.040
<v Speaker 1>Okay, that's what I wanted to know before we leave ASCAP. Well,

0:20:43.040 --> 0:20:45.439
<v Speaker 1>do let one other thing. You said you're going on

0:20:45.520 --> 0:20:48.600
<v Speaker 1>the road to pay your bills. Is that a figure

0:20:48.600 --> 0:20:52.280
<v Speaker 1>a speech or economically do you literally have to go

0:20:52.400 --> 0:20:52.960
<v Speaker 1>on the road.

0:20:53.720 --> 0:20:59.640
<v Speaker 2>Well, you know, if I if I want to retire

0:20:59.800 --> 0:21:03.800
<v Speaker 2>right now and button everything up and and and have

0:21:03.880 --> 0:21:10.399
<v Speaker 2>no expenses, you know, the road is expensive. Devote myself

0:21:10.520 --> 0:21:15.719
<v Speaker 2>to you know, maybe some other musical projects that uh

0:21:17.080 --> 0:21:22.760
<v Speaker 2>with with less chance of success. Uh and and sort

0:21:22.760 --> 0:21:25.479
<v Speaker 2>of work out of my house. And and I have

0:21:25.560 --> 0:21:29.600
<v Speaker 2>a very nice house. Uh, I drive a very nice

0:21:29.600 --> 0:21:32.040
<v Speaker 2>automobile in my lifestyle. I'm sure it would be the

0:21:32.119 --> 0:21:34.320
<v Speaker 2>envy but a lot of people. So I'm not gonna

0:21:34.520 --> 0:21:37.919
<v Speaker 2>I'm not gonna equivocate about that. And I and I

0:21:37.920 --> 0:21:43.560
<v Speaker 2>can maintain that. But I can't dream. I can't I

0:21:43.600 --> 0:21:47.240
<v Speaker 2>can't dream of of having a ranch in Montana, or

0:21:48.040 --> 0:21:53.680
<v Speaker 2>I can't dream of building a recording studio in in Mexico,

0:21:53.920 --> 0:22:02.320
<v Speaker 2>and and in other words, I'm the road to advancement

0:22:02.400 --> 0:22:04.440
<v Speaker 2>in terms of the money I can make is now

0:22:04.480 --> 0:22:08.720
<v Speaker 2>pretty much dictated by what I can make on the road.

0:22:09.800 --> 0:22:13.000
<v Speaker 2>That's the money that I would use to invest in

0:22:13.040 --> 0:22:17.679
<v Speaker 2>a recording studio, or invest in a label, or or

0:22:17.720 --> 0:22:21.439
<v Speaker 2>in a maybe select a young artist and say this

0:22:21.520 --> 0:22:23.720
<v Speaker 2>is this kid is going to be tremendous. I'm gonna

0:22:23.800 --> 0:22:30.880
<v Speaker 2>invest some money here. So it's about it's about it's

0:22:30.880 --> 0:22:36.359
<v Speaker 2>a it's not just about a comfort level. It's it's about, uh,

0:22:36.600 --> 0:22:40.760
<v Speaker 2>in a world where you know, I mean, it's silly

0:22:40.840 --> 0:22:47.080
<v Speaker 2>how much money there is. And I would like to

0:22:47.200 --> 0:22:49.720
<v Speaker 2>have some of that because I think I could use

0:22:49.760 --> 0:22:56.840
<v Speaker 2>it in a very positive way. I I'm not know,

0:22:57.160 --> 0:23:00.280
<v Speaker 2>I'm not so desperate that I have to go out

0:23:00.280 --> 0:23:03.280
<v Speaker 2>on the road and play. I play because I enjoy

0:23:03.440 --> 0:23:07.240
<v Speaker 2>the audience. I get a lot of energy. It's making

0:23:07.320 --> 0:23:12.240
<v Speaker 2>me live longer, I'm sure of it. Uh I. It's

0:23:12.280 --> 0:23:16.960
<v Speaker 2>a very joyful experience for me. Even though I've never really,

0:23:17.160 --> 0:23:21.280
<v Speaker 2>you know, quote made it big as a performer. I

0:23:21.359 --> 0:23:23.800
<v Speaker 2>have a following. I have people who will show up

0:23:23.880 --> 0:23:27.040
<v Speaker 2>every damn time. I you know, every time I go

0:23:27.080 --> 0:23:31.280
<v Speaker 2>to that venue, they're there, uh, and I'm doing I'm

0:23:31.280 --> 0:23:34.359
<v Speaker 2>doing very very well at it. And so suddenly to

0:23:34.400 --> 0:23:39.920
<v Speaker 2>be doing well at performing is really ironic at this

0:23:39.960 --> 0:23:45.320
<v Speaker 2>point after cutting ten albums that you know haven't been

0:23:45.920 --> 0:23:49.200
<v Speaker 2>well let's see, not top of the pops.

0:23:48.840 --> 0:23:49.000
<v Speaker 3>But.

0:23:51.400 --> 0:23:55.640
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, I mean there's a mixed emotions. I uh, it's

0:23:55.680 --> 0:23:58.920
<v Speaker 2>it's ready cash and it's tempting to go out there

0:23:59.000 --> 0:24:02.720
<v Speaker 2>and get it. You know. I think that the people

0:24:02.760 --> 0:24:07.879
<v Speaker 2>that are that have been really hardest hit, sadly enough,

0:24:07.920 --> 0:24:12.159
<v Speaker 2>are the are the people who are who are older

0:24:12.600 --> 0:24:20.120
<v Speaker 2>or have physical impediments. Sudden, sudden things occur. Let's say,

0:24:20.680 --> 0:24:24.640
<v Speaker 2>just for instance, Parkinson's sets in and you lose your

0:24:24.720 --> 0:24:29.159
<v Speaker 2>voice and you can't perform anymore. Now you're now you

0:24:29.320 --> 0:24:33.840
<v Speaker 2>really have to depend on those royalties. You can't you

0:24:33.880 --> 0:24:39.679
<v Speaker 2>can't augment who doesn't want to augment their income? Bob,

0:24:39.880 --> 0:24:41.680
<v Speaker 2>you know in some way.

0:24:41.800 --> 0:24:46.840
<v Speaker 1>Okay, you say that your live business is on the

0:24:46.920 --> 0:24:51.040
<v Speaker 1>upswing without a hit album in the past. What do

0:24:51.080 --> 0:24:52.920
<v Speaker 1>you think is driving that upsling?

0:24:57.960 --> 0:25:00.359
<v Speaker 2>I don't know. Maybe there's a bit, maybe there's a

0:25:00.359 --> 0:25:08.160
<v Speaker 2>healthy curiosity, or maybe there's a I don't know, maybe

0:25:08.200 --> 0:25:14.480
<v Speaker 2>there's there maybe I have achieved that, I don't know,

0:25:14.680 --> 0:25:18.439
<v Speaker 2>elevator music status, where you know, it's a name that

0:25:18.480 --> 0:25:22.879
<v Speaker 2>people finally, after all these years, they recognize and they

0:25:23.440 --> 0:25:26.640
<v Speaker 2>they say, this guy can't be he can't be doing

0:25:26.680 --> 0:25:30.160
<v Speaker 2>a very good show. Let's go see. The first time

0:25:30.200 --> 0:25:33.000
<v Speaker 2>I went to see Elvis, I was a cynic. I

0:25:33.040 --> 0:25:34.800
<v Speaker 2>was like twenty years old, and I went up to

0:25:34.920 --> 0:25:38.119
<v Speaker 2>Vegas to see Elvis, and it was like sort of shown.

0:25:38.280 --> 0:25:41.520
<v Speaker 2>I was shown for it. I sort of wanted to

0:25:41.520 --> 0:25:44.840
<v Speaker 2>see him paul on his butt, and instead I became

0:25:45.000 --> 0:25:48.359
<v Speaker 2>like number one Elvis fan in the world. So I

0:25:48.359 --> 0:25:51.400
<v Speaker 2>think maybe some people come out of curiosity and they say,

0:25:51.400 --> 0:25:55.800
<v Speaker 2>you know what, this guy seems pretty good. He's been improving,

0:25:57.560 --> 0:26:03.040
<v Speaker 2>and I give them insight into the workings of the

0:26:03.080 --> 0:26:06.720
<v Speaker 2>song and the meaning of the song and the way

0:26:06.800 --> 0:26:11.880
<v Speaker 2>the craft of songwriting works, which is something that I'm

0:26:11.920 --> 0:26:15.840
<v Speaker 2>really concerned about because I don't think that that's being

0:26:16.000 --> 0:26:20.720
<v Speaker 2>passed down, it's not being mentored down sufficiently to this

0:26:20.960 --> 0:26:27.640
<v Speaker 2>coming generation or these generations now that are on our heels.

0:26:28.080 --> 0:26:31.040
<v Speaker 2>I think that a lot of these young writers don't

0:26:31.800 --> 0:26:38.000
<v Speaker 2>pay much attention to, for instance, the Great American Songbook

0:26:38.119 --> 0:26:45.160
<v Speaker 2>and the classic methodology of songwriting. So that's why we

0:26:45.280 --> 0:26:52.439
<v Speaker 2>have We have like a monotonous, almost dreary like repetition

0:26:52.560 --> 0:26:56.919
<v Speaker 2>of the same little melodic phrases over and over again,

0:26:57.160 --> 0:27:02.320
<v Speaker 2>and almost everything is the same tempo. Forget dynamics. There's

0:27:02.320 --> 0:27:05.879
<v Speaker 2>no loud, there's no soft. It's not you've lost that

0:27:05.960 --> 0:27:11.520
<v Speaker 2>loving feeling, which is majestic masterpiece of the sixties Barry Man,

0:27:11.640 --> 0:27:18.679
<v Speaker 2>isn't the a while and there doesn't. I don't know.

0:27:18.840 --> 0:27:25.359
<v Speaker 2>I think we may have failed in not taking more

0:27:25.400 --> 0:27:30.320
<v Speaker 2>of these young people under our wing and saying, you know,

0:27:30.480 --> 0:27:32.600
<v Speaker 2>here's here's how to write it, here's how to write

0:27:32.600 --> 0:27:35.160
<v Speaker 2>a verse, here's a verse, here's the chorus, here's a bridge,

0:27:35.240 --> 0:27:37.639
<v Speaker 2>you know, here's a lead in, here's a you know,

0:27:37.760 --> 0:27:39.639
<v Speaker 2>on the fade. You want to work on the fade.

0:27:39.680 --> 0:27:41.520
<v Speaker 2>You know. We used to work harder on the fade

0:27:41.560 --> 0:27:44.399
<v Speaker 2>than we did on any part of the record. That's

0:27:44.440 --> 0:27:47.760
<v Speaker 2>out the window. We don't we don't really have fades anymore.

0:27:48.440 --> 0:27:50.199
<v Speaker 2>You just go to the next record like this.

0:27:53.560 --> 0:27:54.600
<v Speaker 1>So it's.

0:27:56.119 --> 0:28:01.159
<v Speaker 2>It's a big it's it's there is going to be

0:28:01.640 --> 0:28:04.840
<v Speaker 2>a tremendous change in the next ten years, and I

0:28:04.880 --> 0:28:08.000
<v Speaker 2>hope that I'm around just because I want to see

0:28:08.040 --> 0:28:13.600
<v Speaker 2>what happens. I really want to see if the digital

0:28:13.680 --> 0:28:17.920
<v Speaker 2>promise is fulfilled, which is that it would benefit all

0:28:17.960 --> 0:28:24.080
<v Speaker 2>of us, that we would all benefit from this technology,

0:28:25.440 --> 0:28:29.360
<v Speaker 2>and I would like to see if that dream comes true.

0:28:29.640 --> 0:28:37.919
<v Speaker 2>I'm very, very curious, and in the meantime, I'm sitting

0:28:37.960 --> 0:28:42.800
<v Speaker 2>on my standards, and it may be my children that

0:28:42.840 --> 0:28:46.360
<v Speaker 2>make the final decision on what happens to the catalog.

0:28:53.560 --> 0:28:55.960
<v Speaker 1>Well, one thing I want to say, you've all progressed

0:28:56.000 --> 0:28:59.600
<v Speaker 1>their losses. It used to be prior to the lead

0:28:59.680 --> 0:29:02.960
<v Speaker 1>six these little later than that every car didn't come

0:29:02.960 --> 0:29:07.040
<v Speaker 1>with air conditioning, had a vent window. Vent windows were great.

0:29:07.480 --> 0:29:10.440
<v Speaker 1>Now all cars come with air conditioning, which is even better,

0:29:10.800 --> 0:29:13.400
<v Speaker 1>but there are no more vent windows. But you mentioned

0:29:13.400 --> 0:29:15.520
<v Speaker 1>a ton of stuff I want to get into. How

0:29:15.520 --> 0:29:19.640
<v Speaker 1>do you feel, being on the ASCAP board, that these

0:29:19.760 --> 0:29:25.360
<v Speaker 1>other performing rights agencies have changed into for profit models?

0:29:26.400 --> 0:29:34.400
<v Speaker 2>Well, certainly I think that when this idea first sort

0:29:34.400 --> 0:29:41.280
<v Speaker 2>of surfaced, you know, like a from the murky depths

0:29:41.520 --> 0:29:48.960
<v Speaker 2>of the South. When this being my thing hit the news,

0:29:49.240 --> 0:29:51.600
<v Speaker 2>I had a moment of panic because I thought, well,

0:29:51.880 --> 0:29:55.280
<v Speaker 2>it's over, this is it. We're going to be taken

0:29:55.600 --> 0:30:01.680
<v Speaker 2>it's all going to be like this, But ASCAP is

0:30:01.680 --> 0:30:03.880
<v Speaker 2>never going to be that. In fact, I think you're

0:30:03.880 --> 0:30:08.520
<v Speaker 2>probably aware of the fact that we've we've we've consolidated,

0:30:09.080 --> 0:30:19.040
<v Speaker 2>consolidated our position really on supporting human songwriters, uh and

0:30:19.200 --> 0:30:25.920
<v Speaker 2>protecting legacy catalogs and and things of that nature. I

0:30:26.000 --> 0:30:28.040
<v Speaker 2>know that a lot of B and my writers are

0:30:28.240 --> 0:30:34.920
<v Speaker 2>very very nervous, uh, that that situation is still teetering.

0:30:35.120 --> 0:30:38.320
<v Speaker 2>In my opinion, I don't think that that all the

0:30:38.360 --> 0:30:42.880
<v Speaker 2>shoes have hit the floor over there, and I don't

0:30:42.920 --> 0:30:45.720
<v Speaker 2>think that there's ever been a I might be wrong,

0:30:45.920 --> 0:30:50.080
<v Speaker 2>and and you know, I don't mind being called out

0:30:50.160 --> 0:30:54.040
<v Speaker 2>if I'm wrong, but I think that this is the

0:30:54.080 --> 0:30:58.600
<v Speaker 2>first time that a p r O has been being

0:30:59.760 --> 0:31:06.160
<v Speaker 2>has been owned by moneymen, I'll just put it that way,

0:31:06.240 --> 0:31:17.040
<v Speaker 2>by hedge funds, by banks, by cartels investors. We know

0:31:17.200 --> 0:31:20.920
<v Speaker 2>at ASCAP that we don't want those people sitting on

0:31:20.920 --> 0:31:25.280
<v Speaker 2>our board because they don't know anything about music, and

0:31:25.320 --> 0:31:28.880
<v Speaker 2>they don't we don't know that they love songs the

0:31:28.920 --> 0:31:32.040
<v Speaker 2>way we love songs. You know. This is this is

0:31:32.640 --> 0:31:36.160
<v Speaker 2>the part of it that is so hard to express

0:31:36.240 --> 0:31:43.280
<v Speaker 2>because it's not in our modern vernacular to talk in

0:31:43.280 --> 0:31:47.520
<v Speaker 2>a romantic way or a sentimental way about anything. You know,

0:31:47.600 --> 0:31:54.880
<v Speaker 2>we're so hard nosed, but I think that ASCAP we're

0:31:54.920 --> 0:31:59.040
<v Speaker 2>still rather sentimental about our songs. They mean a lot

0:31:59.160 --> 0:32:03.800
<v Speaker 2>to us. The songs of Harold Arland mean a lot

0:32:03.920 --> 0:32:10.560
<v Speaker 2>of Richard Rodgers and Larry Hart. I mean, when I

0:32:10.600 --> 0:32:16.200
<v Speaker 2>hear the name David Rason, my head reverberates with Laura.

0:32:16.520 --> 0:32:16.600
<v Speaker 1>Now.

0:32:16.600 --> 0:32:19.160
<v Speaker 2>I remember the little story that David told me about

0:32:19.160 --> 0:32:22.400
<v Speaker 2>how he wrote it, and I'm not going to tell

0:32:22.440 --> 0:32:30.440
<v Speaker 2>the story. But we are much more personally at ASCAP,

0:32:30.520 --> 0:32:34.560
<v Speaker 2>which is a fraternal organization, We are much more concerned

0:32:34.800 --> 0:32:39.800
<v Speaker 2>with the actual preservation of the music and the dignity

0:32:40.000 --> 0:32:49.360
<v Speaker 2>of the music, which just as maybe as a slight digression,

0:32:50.840 --> 0:32:54.000
<v Speaker 2>you know. The use of these standards now in these

0:32:54.200 --> 0:33:00.680
<v Speaker 2>rap records is something that everybody's watching very keenly, and

0:33:01.040 --> 0:33:09.719
<v Speaker 2>I have had unbelievable requests come in to use. Well,

0:33:11.320 --> 0:33:13.520
<v Speaker 2>I'm not gonna I'm not gonna name the song because

0:33:13.520 --> 0:33:18.200
<v Speaker 2>I don't want to identify any particular individuals. But if

0:33:18.240 --> 0:33:24.560
<v Speaker 2>I was approached, let's say, by a rapper who wants

0:33:24.680 --> 0:33:28.120
<v Speaker 2>to just play the first verse of Up Up in

0:33:28.200 --> 0:33:32.120
<v Speaker 2>a way, just the way it was in nineteen sixty seven,

0:33:33.160 --> 0:33:36.520
<v Speaker 2>and then except speed it up a little bit because

0:33:36.560 --> 0:33:40.240
<v Speaker 2>it's not in the tempo that he wants it, so

0:33:40.280 --> 0:33:41.840
<v Speaker 2>you have to speed it up, and it kind of

0:33:41.840 --> 0:33:46.280
<v Speaker 2>makes the fifty minutes mention sound like chipmunks. But you

0:33:46.360 --> 0:33:51.600
<v Speaker 2>put a whole verse of that before his record starts.

0:33:52.960 --> 0:33:59.719
<v Speaker 2>Now that's a substantial that's a substantial use of a

0:33:59.720 --> 0:34:05.120
<v Speaker 2>cop be right. That's that's akin to making it a

0:34:06.240 --> 0:34:09.040
<v Speaker 2>closing titles in a film. It's it's really on the

0:34:09.080 --> 0:34:16.760
<v Speaker 2>same basis. So the uses we're only beginning to see

0:34:17.000 --> 0:34:20.160
<v Speaker 2>how they they And I don't want to say how

0:34:20.280 --> 0:34:24.960
<v Speaker 2>we are going to use these standards and what links

0:34:25.000 --> 0:34:29.680
<v Speaker 2>we're going to go to to exploit something that is

0:34:29.719 --> 0:34:32.440
<v Speaker 2>so much a part of the American psyche that we

0:34:32.520 --> 0:34:36.600
<v Speaker 2>automatically respond to it because it's buried so deeply in

0:34:36.719 --> 0:34:41.280
<v Speaker 2>us that the advertisers now and it's clear, it's as

0:34:41.320 --> 0:34:44.759
<v Speaker 2>clear as the nose on your face, have explored the

0:34:44.840 --> 0:34:50.160
<v Speaker 2>idea of not using pop hits from the sixties, seventies

0:34:51.120 --> 0:34:58.000
<v Speaker 2>and even before, and they've they've tried doing commercials without

0:34:58.040 --> 0:35:01.040
<v Speaker 2>those songs and they don't work. So now they're going

0:35:01.200 --> 0:35:04.160
<v Speaker 2>back to the sixties. They're going back and they love

0:35:04.280 --> 0:35:07.600
<v Speaker 2>to get their hands on a Jackson Brown song. Uh,

0:35:09.280 --> 0:35:12.080
<v Speaker 2>some of them are are just they're out of reach.

0:35:12.800 --> 0:35:15.680
<v Speaker 2>Sometimes they don't bother to ask for your permission, by

0:35:15.760 --> 0:35:20.880
<v Speaker 2>the way, and the use they they put, they put

0:35:21.400 --> 0:35:24.799
<v Speaker 2>let's say, a two or three bar phrase in a

0:35:24.880 --> 0:35:28.239
<v Speaker 2>record and put a lot of echo in it, and

0:35:28.239 --> 0:35:32.000
<v Speaker 2>it's just an orchestral thing, and it goes on and

0:35:32.040 --> 0:35:36.680
<v Speaker 2>on and on and on. So essentially, about three or

0:35:36.760 --> 0:35:41.080
<v Speaker 2>four bars of one of my songs is being repeated

0:35:41.120 --> 0:35:45.160
<v Speaker 2>in deep echo over and over and over and over again,

0:35:47.800 --> 0:35:51.200
<v Speaker 2>and that and and and the gentleman wraps on top

0:35:51.280 --> 0:35:55.240
<v Speaker 2>of that. So I'm his, I'm his, I'm his rhythm track,

0:35:56.160 --> 0:36:01.440
<v Speaker 2>you know, like piece of something that I've done. Yet

0:36:02.160 --> 0:36:05.520
<v Speaker 2>they don't want to list us as creative contributors to that.

0:36:06.080 --> 0:36:10.360
<v Speaker 2>We're not eligible for Song of the Year over NARS

0:36:11.280 --> 0:36:17.000
<v Speaker 2>because we because in my song do what you Gotta Do,

0:36:17.080 --> 0:36:22.120
<v Speaker 2>which Kanye West did called it famous, but musicologists said

0:36:22.200 --> 0:36:24.520
<v Speaker 2>sixty percent of it was do what you Gotta Do.

0:36:25.800 --> 0:36:28.200
<v Speaker 2>And we came to an agreement because they had already

0:36:28.200 --> 0:36:32.880
<v Speaker 2>put it out. It was number one, and when it

0:36:32.960 --> 0:36:35.600
<v Speaker 2>went to Nares. It was nominated for Song of the Year,

0:36:36.160 --> 0:36:41.800
<v Speaker 2>and they listed thirteen writers as eligible for Grammy Award

0:36:41.880 --> 0:36:45.640
<v Speaker 2>for Song of the Year. There were thirteen writers nominated

0:36:45.680 --> 0:36:53.439
<v Speaker 2>for Song of the Year, and I was omitted they're

0:36:53.440 --> 0:36:56.080
<v Speaker 2>going to use our music. I think they should give

0:36:56.160 --> 0:37:01.160
<v Speaker 2>us credit. I mean, that's just to just say, you know, look,

0:37:02.480 --> 0:37:05.759
<v Speaker 2>songs aren't like it's not like doing a collage out

0:37:05.760 --> 0:37:08.200
<v Speaker 2>of a bunch of old people magazines with a pair

0:37:08.200 --> 0:37:12.400
<v Speaker 2>of scissors. It shouldn't be. It shouldn't be that way.

0:37:13.080 --> 0:37:18.359
<v Speaker 2>And so I think we're waiting. Wait. You know, look,

0:37:18.400 --> 0:37:22.360
<v Speaker 2>a lot of people are really depending on sync rights

0:37:23.040 --> 0:37:27.520
<v Speaker 2>and sampling rights. That is the hot sector right now

0:37:27.600 --> 0:37:32.800
<v Speaker 2>in publishing is to get these old songs rehabilitated somehow.

0:37:33.480 --> 0:37:37.880
<v Speaker 2>And one way that you can do that is to

0:37:37.920 --> 0:37:40.279
<v Speaker 2>put them in a commercial or put them on a

0:37:40.320 --> 0:37:45.000
<v Speaker 2>wrap record. So it's really strange because that's become the

0:37:45.040 --> 0:37:50.320
<v Speaker 2>way we promote our music is by sort of allowing

0:37:50.400 --> 0:37:53.080
<v Speaker 2>it to be infringed on.

0:37:54.000 --> 0:37:57.759
<v Speaker 1>Now you talk about all these opportunities, you talk about ripoffs.

0:37:58.480 --> 0:38:01.759
<v Speaker 1>Who is managing this? Do you have a manager? Do

0:38:01.800 --> 0:38:04.640
<v Speaker 1>you have an attorney? Or is your phone ringing off

0:38:04.680 --> 0:38:06.960
<v Speaker 1>the hook or is your email coming in? Who's on

0:38:07.080 --> 0:38:07.520
<v Speaker 1>top of.

0:38:07.480 --> 0:38:10.520
<v Speaker 2>This for you? Well, I have a guy, uh and

0:38:10.560 --> 0:38:13.080
<v Speaker 2>I'll mention him because he's a lovely guy, John Leno,

0:38:14.160 --> 0:38:20.160
<v Speaker 2>who's handled all my returns, my returns on my copyrights,

0:38:20.880 --> 0:38:27.319
<v Speaker 2>which is a byzantine process. It is so complicated and

0:38:27.360 --> 0:38:30.720
<v Speaker 2>you have to be so determined to stay the course

0:38:30.760 --> 0:38:34.200
<v Speaker 2>and fill out the forms and make the windows. If

0:38:34.239 --> 0:38:36.960
<v Speaker 2>you miss your window too bad, you don't get your

0:38:37.280 --> 0:38:40.239
<v Speaker 2>you don't you don't get your publishing back. So you

0:38:40.280 --> 0:38:43.400
<v Speaker 2>do need someone at the controls. And we we we

0:38:43.520 --> 0:38:47.760
<v Speaker 2>have a good a good guy there. Uh. My wife

0:38:47.920 --> 0:38:56.000
<v Speaker 2>Laura is ex officio, you know, manages me because nobody

0:38:56.000 --> 0:39:02.440
<v Speaker 2>else could take nobody else can stand me. Uh, but yeah,

0:39:02.600 --> 0:39:06.600
<v Speaker 2>I have the phone is ringing. In fact, yesterday we

0:39:06.680 --> 0:39:11.840
<v Speaker 2>had two requests for I don't know what it calls

0:39:11.880 --> 0:39:15.960
<v Speaker 2>these sampling, sampling or sync because one of the requests

0:39:16.040 --> 0:39:20.520
<v Speaker 2>was to use a complete verse of a record, I

0:39:20.520 --> 0:39:26.160
<v Speaker 2>mean just cold a verse of another record and then

0:39:26.239 --> 0:39:31.680
<v Speaker 2>the rap song starts, so this standard becomes the intro

0:39:31.880 --> 0:39:34.560
<v Speaker 2>to this rap. I don't know how I feel about that.

0:39:35.600 --> 0:39:41.399
<v Speaker 2>Is that devaluing my copyright or is that promoting my copyright?

0:39:42.160 --> 0:39:42.680
<v Speaker 3>And and.

0:39:44.880 --> 0:39:47.799
<v Speaker 2>Do I know? Do I know the answer to the question. No,

0:39:47.880 --> 0:39:51.920
<v Speaker 2>I don't, so I'm kind of like standing there with

0:39:52.000 --> 0:39:55.440
<v Speaker 2>my sucking on my thumb, going h I wonder you

0:39:55.440 --> 0:40:00.680
<v Speaker 2>know is that is it? Will? Will I one day

0:40:00.840 --> 0:40:06.640
<v Speaker 2>regret not taking advantage of more of these opportunities to

0:40:06.800 --> 0:40:10.600
<v Speaker 2>let these songs be heard, even in sometimes not the

0:40:10.640 --> 0:40:15.360
<v Speaker 2>most flattering surroundings, but at least the melodies are getting

0:40:15.360 --> 0:40:17.759
<v Speaker 2>out there and a sense of what the record was.

0:40:18.320 --> 0:40:21.440
<v Speaker 2>And does that over time inspire some sort of curiosity

0:40:21.520 --> 0:40:25.480
<v Speaker 2>about the song that lies deeply buried behind all of

0:40:25.560 --> 0:40:31.120
<v Speaker 2>that rapping, And I'm not sure that it does. I

0:40:31.120 --> 0:40:35.560
<v Speaker 2>think there's an argument that it could devalue that sync

0:40:35.680 --> 0:40:40.560
<v Speaker 2>rites could in the long run, devalue a song, except

0:40:40.880 --> 0:40:43.240
<v Speaker 2>when they're used in movies. When they're used in movies,

0:40:43.280 --> 0:40:47.759
<v Speaker 2>I see that as a clear when when some of

0:40:47.800 --> 0:40:51.680
<v Speaker 2>the sampling stuff, it still worries me. I'm not sure

0:40:51.680 --> 0:40:55.360
<v Speaker 2>what role it plays in the future of the copyright.

0:40:55.840 --> 0:41:00.800
<v Speaker 1>You talk about younger generations in their ability or lack thereof,

0:41:00.800 --> 0:41:05.240
<v Speaker 1>to write songs. When you do live shows, do younger

0:41:05.320 --> 0:41:09.600
<v Speaker 1>generations come and to what degree are you approached or

0:41:09.719 --> 0:41:12.360
<v Speaker 1>interact with younger generations about songwriting.

0:41:13.200 --> 0:41:17.279
<v Speaker 2>Well, I have an intern wonderful young guy named Pete

0:41:17.360 --> 0:41:22.279
<v Speaker 2>Mancini who's one of the best songwriters, young songwriters I've

0:41:22.280 --> 0:41:27.799
<v Speaker 2>ever heard. And he's he's he's under my wing. I

0:41:27.840 --> 0:41:30.040
<v Speaker 2>can't take care of the whole world, but this kid

0:41:30.160 --> 0:41:33.160
<v Speaker 2>is talented, and I take him out with me and

0:41:33.200 --> 0:41:39.160
<v Speaker 2>I let him open for me, do his songs, which

0:41:39.160 --> 0:41:42.480
<v Speaker 2>are good. He always the audience always laps it up.

0:41:42.640 --> 0:41:48.040
<v Speaker 2>He's very good looking, which I'm not. He he's young.

0:41:49.560 --> 0:41:54.320
<v Speaker 2>He loves the old music. He loves the old tracks.

0:41:54.440 --> 0:41:58.799
<v Speaker 2>You know, did you ever hear you know, like Royal Scam?

0:41:59.160 --> 0:42:04.520
<v Speaker 2>You know, you know, we talk about it and it's like, yeah, now, yeah,

0:42:04.719 --> 0:42:07.400
<v Speaker 2>I knew Jeff Carroll, Oh you knew Jeff Pi, Carol

0:42:07.520 --> 0:42:08.080
<v Speaker 2>oh Man.

0:42:08.400 --> 0:42:08.640
<v Speaker 4>You know.

0:42:09.560 --> 0:42:14.040
<v Speaker 2>So there's a group out there who are all over this.

0:42:14.480 --> 0:42:18.600
<v Speaker 2>I mean it's a small it's right now, it's a

0:42:18.600 --> 0:42:21.480
<v Speaker 2>small group. But I believe it's growing. I believe the

0:42:21.600 --> 0:42:29.400
<v Speaker 2>interest in the sixties and seventies catalogs to some degree

0:42:29.920 --> 0:42:35.440
<v Speaker 2>is growing. I think less there's less less growth in

0:42:36.120 --> 0:42:38.879
<v Speaker 2>the in the Great American Songbook. I see the Great

0:42:38.880 --> 0:42:44.600
<v Speaker 2>American Songbook to me fading from public memory now I've

0:42:44.640 --> 0:42:47.360
<v Speaker 2>lived long enough to see these things, which scares me.

0:42:47.480 --> 0:42:51.160
<v Speaker 2>It scares me to death that I have actually seen

0:42:51.960 --> 0:42:58.120
<v Speaker 2>these things happen. But I know that if I went

0:42:58.160 --> 0:43:02.359
<v Speaker 2>outside here and I had a remote unit of some kind,

0:43:02.400 --> 0:43:05.440
<v Speaker 2>and I stopped a fifteen year old girl outside and

0:43:05.520 --> 0:43:07.279
<v Speaker 2>I said, I'm going to sing this song and tell you,

0:43:07.360 --> 0:43:13.760
<v Speaker 2>tell me you have a song, my funny Valentine, sweet

0:43:13.880 --> 0:43:18.400
<v Speaker 2>comic Valentine. What does that mean you? I don't know.

0:43:20.320 --> 0:43:25.600
<v Speaker 2>You know, it doesn't mean anything to her. And so

0:43:25.760 --> 0:43:29.160
<v Speaker 2>we're I think that when the boomers go down, and

0:43:29.200 --> 0:43:33.879
<v Speaker 2>we're going down making no mistake and very swiftly, there's

0:43:34.200 --> 0:43:40.759
<v Speaker 2>a change of scenery and cast members on the entertainment

0:43:40.800 --> 0:43:44.520
<v Speaker 2>stage is taking place. Even as we speak. Each day,

0:43:45.880 --> 0:43:49.560
<v Speaker 2>one of our brethren, one of our colleagues, most of

0:43:49.600 --> 0:43:55.359
<v Speaker 2>them beloved and irreplaceable in our mind, passes the bar,

0:43:57.000 --> 0:44:03.840
<v Speaker 2>and I feel that maybe some of the respect and

0:44:04.000 --> 0:44:07.200
<v Speaker 2>love that we have for the Great American Songbook may

0:44:07.239 --> 0:44:13.319
<v Speaker 2>go with us. So I don't know what sort of

0:44:13.360 --> 0:44:15.600
<v Speaker 2>I would love to have a peek into the future

0:44:16.000 --> 0:44:19.520
<v Speaker 2>if I had, like if I could go like Boom

0:44:19.520 --> 0:44:22.120
<v Speaker 2>fifty years fifty years in the future. I just want

0:44:22.120 --> 0:44:24.600
<v Speaker 2>to listen to the radio. Just take me somewhere and

0:44:24.680 --> 0:44:26.839
<v Speaker 2>let me listen to the radio. Well, we don't have

0:44:27.080 --> 0:44:31.680
<v Speaker 2>radio anymore. It's all implanted in your skull, and we

0:44:31.800 --> 0:44:34.520
<v Speaker 2>sort of play what we play, what we want you

0:44:34.600 --> 0:44:40.000
<v Speaker 2>to hear. You know. Sometimes I kind of feel like

0:44:40.080 --> 0:44:42.719
<v Speaker 2>that's what they're doing. They're playing what they want us

0:44:42.760 --> 0:44:50.480
<v Speaker 2>to hear at, you know. And I think that record

0:44:50.560 --> 0:44:55.120
<v Speaker 2>it shook it. It's really shaken up record promotion. I'm very,

0:44:55.320 --> 0:45:00.600
<v Speaker 2>very very concerned that this great American art form has

0:45:00.640 --> 0:45:09.279
<v Speaker 2>been our number one export for decades, American music. I've

0:45:09.400 --> 0:45:13.360
<v Speaker 2>traveled all over the world. They are listening to American

0:45:13.480 --> 0:45:20.920
<v Speaker 2>music in Copenhagen and Hamburg. In Santiago and Waynas areas

0:45:21.640 --> 0:45:27.680
<v Speaker 2>they're listening to American music. And Moscow right now in

0:45:27.840 --> 0:45:31.840
<v Speaker 2>China they're listening. They're watching without paying royalties. Of course,

0:45:32.360 --> 0:45:36.560
<v Speaker 2>they're watching American movies and listening to our music. It's

0:45:36.680 --> 0:45:43.040
<v Speaker 2>still so profoundly influential that it ranks as one of

0:45:43.080 --> 0:45:48.239
<v Speaker 2>our more significant exports, and I think, much more significant

0:45:48.280 --> 0:45:55.400
<v Speaker 2>than our missiles and our howitzers and our grenades. I

0:45:55.480 --> 0:45:58.560
<v Speaker 2>sort of feel like Billy Joel when he went over

0:45:58.640 --> 0:46:02.560
<v Speaker 2>and toured the Union. I think he kind of brought up,

0:46:02.640 --> 0:46:07.160
<v Speaker 2>brought last knows, you know, to its full majority there.

0:46:10.040 --> 0:46:15.479
<v Speaker 2>And some people say that Levi's won the Cold War

0:46:16.680 --> 0:46:24.520
<v Speaker 2>because the Russians wanted Levi's so badly. But American music

0:46:24.719 --> 0:46:32.239
<v Speaker 2>is a treasure, that's being that's not being careful, carefully

0:46:32.520 --> 0:46:39.719
<v Speaker 2>husband husband did or cultivated right now, right now, in

0:46:39.719 --> 0:46:44.120
<v Speaker 2>this particular moment, with the exception of a few major

0:46:44.239 --> 0:46:48.200
<v Speaker 2>artists at the very top who have the influence, like

0:46:48.280 --> 0:46:54.000
<v Speaker 2>a Taylor Swift, for instance, when she was fourteen years old.

0:46:54.040 --> 0:46:56.800
<v Speaker 2>Fifteen years old, I heard her and I heard her songs,

0:46:56.840 --> 0:46:59.080
<v Speaker 2>and I said, you know, she's going to be successful.

0:46:59.160 --> 0:47:02.680
<v Speaker 2>She knows how to do all the parts. She knows

0:47:02.680 --> 0:47:07.480
<v Speaker 2>like the intro, she knows the verses, she knows the

0:47:07.520 --> 0:47:11.359
<v Speaker 2>bridge that Nashville training. You know, in Nashville is the

0:47:11.400 --> 0:47:19.239
<v Speaker 2>citadel of songwriting. It's the last you know, It's Ford Apache,

0:47:19.280 --> 0:47:22.000
<v Speaker 2>It's you know, It's where you make your last stand.

0:47:22.040 --> 0:47:27.080
<v Speaker 2>I guess as a songwriter. But it's been disturbing recently

0:47:28.480 --> 0:47:34.239
<v Speaker 2>to see people like Don Schlitz, who wrote The Gambler,

0:47:34.560 --> 0:47:41.560
<v Speaker 2>which is in my view, a veritable perfect song. People

0:47:41.560 --> 0:47:44.279
<v Speaker 2>are always talking about the perfect song. Well, there are

0:47:44.280 --> 0:47:48.160
<v Speaker 2>a lot of perfect songs, but certainly the Gambler and

0:47:48.200 --> 0:47:51.600
<v Speaker 2>the way that story is told, and that o Henry

0:47:52.160 --> 0:47:57.840
<v Speaker 2>has twist at the end, and just the brilliance of

0:47:57.880 --> 0:47:59.880
<v Speaker 2>that chorus. You got to know when to hold them, no,

0:48:00.080 --> 0:48:02.360
<v Speaker 2>when to fold them, no, when to walk away, no

0:48:02.440 --> 0:48:06.360
<v Speaker 2>one to run And the fact that this is happening

0:48:06.440 --> 0:48:11.759
<v Speaker 2>on a darkened train. There's such drama in this. And

0:48:12.160 --> 0:48:15.359
<v Speaker 2>the man who wrote that, who I Knew is kind

0:48:15.360 --> 0:48:18.440
<v Speaker 2>of a good time. You're out there down you know,

0:48:18.520 --> 0:48:22.000
<v Speaker 2>I love you, you know, as a guy who had

0:48:22.160 --> 0:48:28.200
<v Speaker 2>entirely too much fun all the time. He last time

0:48:28.239 --> 0:48:32.480
<v Speaker 2>I met him face to face that I'm done. He said,

0:48:32.520 --> 0:48:34.960
<v Speaker 2>I don't see any point in writing anymore.

0:48:43.120 --> 0:48:45.200
<v Speaker 1>Let's go back to Taylor Swift, since you seem to

0:48:45.480 --> 0:48:48.799
<v Speaker 1>pay attention to the scene. The country albums were co

0:48:48.840 --> 0:48:53.200
<v Speaker 1>written with Liz Rose. Then she moved into a pop sphere,

0:48:53.520 --> 0:48:55.640
<v Speaker 1>tends to work with the a level town in the

0:48:55.640 --> 0:48:59.080
<v Speaker 1>pops sphere. Do you have any thoughts about her modern.

0:48:58.760 --> 0:49:08.560
<v Speaker 2>Work, You know only that it's you know, extremely well produced,

0:49:09.160 --> 0:49:17.840
<v Speaker 2>and and there's there's a there's there. There are there

0:49:17.880 --> 0:49:23.640
<v Speaker 2>are a few songs that I that I that I like, I,

0:49:23.640 --> 0:49:25.880
<v Speaker 2>I still haven't heard you've lost that love and feeling.

0:49:26.239 --> 0:49:30.440
<v Speaker 2>I you know, I think that might be a forlorn

0:49:30.640 --> 0:49:36.759
<v Speaker 2>hope at this point. But I you know, I I

0:49:36.800 --> 0:49:43.879
<v Speaker 2>thought I think that Adele, Lady Gaga, Taylor. I think

0:49:43.880 --> 0:49:46.800
<v Speaker 2>they're trying. I really think they're trying to write songs,

0:49:46.840 --> 0:49:55.680
<v Speaker 2>and that's encouraging. That's encouraging, whether anyone would I I've

0:49:55.719 --> 0:49:59.640
<v Speaker 2>actually heard melody creeping back into some of this hip

0:49:59.680 --> 0:50:05.440
<v Speaker 2>hop music. H And I remember Paul Simon saying to me.

0:50:06.160 --> 0:50:11.120
<v Speaker 2>We were talking one day and I said, you know, Paul,

0:50:11.280 --> 0:50:15.360
<v Speaker 2>it's just really disturbing, like chords are disappearing. You know,

0:50:15.440 --> 0:50:18.960
<v Speaker 2>there's I don't and I love. I love chords. You know,

0:50:19.080 --> 0:50:56.160
<v Speaker 2>chords are anyway, that's that's life to me, that's life,

0:50:56.480 --> 0:51:00.600
<v Speaker 2>that's that nurtures my soul. So I said, Paul, I

0:51:00.600 --> 0:51:04.560
<v Speaker 2>think we're losing chords. He said, Jimmy, he said, we're

0:51:04.560 --> 0:51:09.120
<v Speaker 2>going to lose melody. I said, Paul, I said, you

0:51:09.200 --> 0:51:14.480
<v Speaker 2>must be wrong. You can't be right about that. He said,

0:51:14.920 --> 0:51:16.719
<v Speaker 2>he says we're going to lose it. We're going to

0:51:16.760 --> 0:51:21.759
<v Speaker 2>lose it all. And this is ten, this is ten

0:51:21.880 --> 0:51:22.799
<v Speaker 2>or twelve years ago.

0:51:23.000 --> 0:51:24.839
<v Speaker 1>Well that way, he was very pressured because a lot

0:51:24.880 --> 0:51:27.960
<v Speaker 1>of modern songs don't have melody. Let's go back to

0:51:28.000 --> 0:51:30.680
<v Speaker 1>the beginning to Oklahoma. You know, we used to talk

0:51:30.719 --> 0:51:33.719
<v Speaker 1>about flyover country in the sixties and seventies. There is

0:51:33.760 --> 0:51:38.520
<v Speaker 1>no flyover country. Everybody has the Internet, everybody has mobile phones,

0:51:38.600 --> 0:51:42.680
<v Speaker 1>cable TV. What was it like growing up in Oklahoma

0:51:42.680 --> 0:51:44.719
<v Speaker 1>in the forties and fifties.

0:51:46.080 --> 0:51:53.239
<v Speaker 2>It was pretty stark. I lived in western Texas and

0:51:53.400 --> 0:52:01.000
<v Speaker 2>western Oklahoma, which you know, you don't you don't to

0:52:01.040 --> 0:52:03.600
<v Speaker 2>see any difference when you cross that sign it says

0:52:03.640 --> 0:52:07.719
<v Speaker 2>welcome to Texas. Texas doesn't look any different than Oklahoma.

0:52:07.960 --> 0:52:12.840
<v Speaker 2>It's all the same. It's flat. And they had little

0:52:12.920 --> 0:52:15.080
<v Speaker 2>hills out there in the old timers, and say, you know,

0:52:15.160 --> 0:52:17.000
<v Speaker 2>if you go out there and stand on top of

0:52:17.040 --> 0:52:20.320
<v Speaker 2>that hill, you could see New Mexico from here fifty

0:52:20.360 --> 0:52:25.200
<v Speaker 2>miles and I tried it, and by golly, they were

0:52:25.239 --> 0:52:28.920
<v Speaker 2>pretty close to the truth. And that's kind of the

0:52:29.000 --> 0:52:31.719
<v Speaker 2>landscape that I grew up in. My father was a

0:52:31.760 --> 0:52:37.279
<v Speaker 2>Baptist minister. He was also an ex marine. It was

0:52:37.320 --> 0:52:44.120
<v Speaker 2>a strict Protestant upbringing that put us as children. That

0:52:44.160 --> 0:52:47.560
<v Speaker 2>were five of us. My siblings, my brother Tommy, and

0:52:47.640 --> 0:52:53.439
<v Speaker 2>my three sisters, Janice, Susan, and Sylvia, and it put

0:52:53.560 --> 0:52:57.160
<v Speaker 2>us constantly in the public eye. So I grew up

0:52:57.280 --> 0:53:02.080
<v Speaker 2>knowing that I was being watched, that every action was

0:53:02.120 --> 0:53:06.680
<v Speaker 2>going to be reported back to my dad. And my

0:53:06.760 --> 0:53:09.400
<v Speaker 2>dad hated rock and roll. He had the crazy idea

0:53:09.480 --> 0:53:12.200
<v Speaker 2>somewhere along the way that rock and roll was about sex.

0:53:12.400 --> 0:53:14.640
<v Speaker 2>I mean, I don't know who gave him that idea,

0:53:16.239 --> 0:53:19.000
<v Speaker 2>but he got his stuck in his head and I

0:53:19.040 --> 0:53:24.080
<v Speaker 2>couldn't get it out, and so I was climbing out

0:53:24.120 --> 0:53:26.600
<v Speaker 2>the rear window and sneaking out to go to dances,

0:53:26.680 --> 0:53:32.600
<v Speaker 2>and dancing is not allowed in the in the Southern

0:53:32.640 --> 0:53:36.319
<v Speaker 2>Baptist religion. And I used to look at my sisters

0:53:36.360 --> 0:53:39.440
<v Speaker 2>with this deep sense of pity as they would sit

0:53:39.520 --> 0:53:42.080
<v Speaker 2>on the front porch and listen to the music coming

0:53:42.080 --> 0:53:46.200
<v Speaker 2>from teen Town and imagine what's going through their heads

0:53:46.239 --> 0:53:49.920
<v Speaker 2>because they can't go there and fraternize and be with

0:53:50.760 --> 0:53:53.560
<v Speaker 2>So I think that that Southern Baptist made a tremendous

0:53:53.600 --> 0:54:00.759
<v Speaker 2>mistake when they disallowed when we went to camp, we

0:54:00.880 --> 0:54:04.080
<v Speaker 2>had to swim separately from the from the girls. There

0:54:04.200 --> 0:54:13.600
<v Speaker 2>was this sort of just non proportional response to the

0:54:13.640 --> 0:54:20.239
<v Speaker 2>sexual question that emphasized the difference that sort of I

0:54:20.320 --> 0:54:27.640
<v Speaker 2>think titillated the whole idea of maybe being naughty, whereas

0:54:27.760 --> 0:54:32.480
<v Speaker 2>the Methodists, who I always envied, could go to dances

0:54:33.719 --> 0:54:36.759
<v Speaker 2>and they had a much more relaxed And I think

0:54:36.880 --> 0:54:40.680
<v Speaker 2>later in life that it affects relationships. I really do.

0:54:40.760 --> 0:54:45.440
<v Speaker 2>I know it for fact, it sets up some psychological

0:54:45.600 --> 0:54:49.240
<v Speaker 2>barriers that are never going to be taken down. So anyway,

0:54:49.400 --> 0:54:52.799
<v Speaker 2>get off of that subject. But I was church pianist,

0:54:53.640 --> 0:54:59.760
<v Speaker 2>and I learned pretty early to improvise on Hymn's one

0:55:00.080 --> 0:55:04.920
<v Speaker 2>Suitisan Goddard was a wonderful teacher in Oklahoma City, and

0:55:06.120 --> 0:55:14.520
<v Speaker 2>she would teach me well what Leonard Bernstein called transformational elements,

0:55:14.560 --> 0:55:17.520
<v Speaker 2>and she just called piano arranging. But it would be

0:55:17.680 --> 0:55:27.560
<v Speaker 2>like playing playing amazing grace like this, Let me try

0:55:27.600 --> 0:56:05.719
<v Speaker 2>that again, you know something in that vein. So I

0:56:05.800 --> 0:56:09.800
<v Speaker 2>learned like a lot of improvisation. Dad played a little guitar,

0:56:10.080 --> 0:56:13.520
<v Speaker 2>my mom played a little accordion. We would do our

0:56:13.640 --> 0:56:19.040
<v Speaker 2>family thing at church on Sunday, sing parts. I grew

0:56:19.120 --> 0:56:24.879
<v Speaker 2>up singing three parts. Dad always wanted me to sing tenor,

0:56:24.920 --> 0:56:30.080
<v Speaker 2>and I really ended up being a baritone, but eventually

0:56:30.120 --> 0:56:32.840
<v Speaker 2>I made it to church pianist, which my mother thought

0:56:32.880 --> 0:56:36.439
<v Speaker 2>was the pinnacle of show business. You couldn't like get

0:56:36.480 --> 0:56:41.839
<v Speaker 2>me higher than that. And then alas we lost her

0:56:43.200 --> 0:56:50.360
<v Speaker 2>and it was my senior year in high school. I

0:56:50.520 --> 0:56:57.040
<v Speaker 2>was sixteen, she was thirty six, and that sort of

0:56:57.080 --> 0:57:03.400
<v Speaker 2>dropped a nuclear bomb on us as a family. I

0:57:03.440 --> 0:57:05.800
<v Speaker 2>don't think my father ever got over it. It affected

0:57:05.880 --> 0:57:10.880
<v Speaker 2>his relationship whatever that was, with God, which is a

0:57:11.080 --> 0:57:16.680
<v Speaker 2>very weighty subject. But you have to believe in what

0:57:16.840 --> 0:57:20.680
<v Speaker 2>you're preaching. You can't, just like you have to believe

0:57:20.720 --> 0:57:23.880
<v Speaker 2>in what you're performing. It has to be coming from

0:57:23.960 --> 0:57:29.400
<v Speaker 2>somewhere because people know when it's not. They know they

0:57:30.960 --> 0:57:36.160
<v Speaker 2>they can detect that thin nasal wine of the of

0:57:36.320 --> 0:57:44.600
<v Speaker 2>the not completely sure of himself performer, just as they

0:57:44.720 --> 0:57:47.960
<v Speaker 2>can a Baptist preacher who he told me one night,

0:57:48.000 --> 0:57:50.280
<v Speaker 2>he says, Jimmy, I don't believe anything that's coming out

0:57:50.320 --> 0:57:53.240
<v Speaker 2>of my mouth. So I put him to work in

0:57:53.320 --> 0:57:58.040
<v Speaker 2>the record business and he did very well. Discovered a

0:57:58.160 --> 0:58:01.360
<v Speaker 2>group called Five Man Electrical Band and had a hit

0:58:01.480 --> 0:58:05.439
<v Speaker 2>record and went to work for Mike Curve for a while.

0:58:09.000 --> 0:58:11.600
<v Speaker 2>So it all turned out it all turned out in

0:58:11.680 --> 0:58:18.520
<v Speaker 2>the end. But I lived in an agrarian environment. I

0:58:18.840 --> 0:58:25.840
<v Speaker 2>got these hands dirty picking cotton, poe and cotton doing

0:58:26.240 --> 0:58:31.520
<v Speaker 2>essentially it's you know, look, I don't want to get

0:58:31.560 --> 0:58:37.360
<v Speaker 2>into anything cultural here, but my grandfather did not use

0:58:37.600 --> 0:58:43.160
<v Speaker 2>migrant labor. There were enough cousins and uncles and aunts

0:58:43.720 --> 0:58:46.960
<v Speaker 2>in our family that we could go out like a

0:58:47.080 --> 0:58:50.960
<v Speaker 2>swarm of locusts and clear up, you know, forty acres

0:58:51.040 --> 0:58:56.200
<v Speaker 2>of cotton in a couple of days, three days. I

0:58:56.320 --> 0:58:59.600
<v Speaker 2>remember one day, my father pulled five hundred pounds of

0:58:59.680 --> 0:59:05.120
<v Speaker 2>cotton that day. And uh, that's uh, that's a lot

0:59:05.200 --> 0:59:09.439
<v Speaker 2>of cotton. Because cotton doesn't weigh very much, so five

0:59:09.520 --> 0:59:13.160
<v Speaker 2>hundred pounds of it would probably fill this this room

0:59:13.280 --> 0:59:18.360
<v Speaker 2>pretty much. Uh. I always admired him. He was a

0:59:20.560 --> 0:59:28.120
<v Speaker 2>he was a magnetic tall, very handsome. As an orator,

0:59:28.400 --> 0:59:38.360
<v Speaker 2>he was you know, he was persuasive. Uh, he was difficult.

0:59:38.920 --> 0:59:42.800
<v Speaker 2>He believed in corporal punishment. We got whacked around a

0:59:42.880 --> 0:59:47.280
<v Speaker 2>lot with good cause. With good cause, you know, I

0:59:47.360 --> 0:59:50.800
<v Speaker 2>mean it wasn't nice to turn the heat off in

0:59:50.920 --> 0:59:53.960
<v Speaker 2>the babistery so that the back water in the babistery

0:59:54.080 --> 0:59:58.640
<v Speaker 2>was ice cold, so that when the When the portly

0:59:58.840 --> 1:00:02.439
<v Speaker 2>lady started coming down the steps into the babistry, She's going,

1:00:02.920 --> 1:00:07.600
<v Speaker 2>oh my God, oh Jesus, oh oh. Everybody thought she's

1:00:07.680 --> 1:00:11.560
<v Speaker 2>having a transcendental experience. But the water in the babbisty

1:00:11.680 --> 1:00:18.640
<v Speaker 2>is below zero, you know, so fun in games. The

1:00:20.480 --> 1:00:24.520
<v Speaker 2>the thing I remember most about growing up was always

1:00:26.280 --> 1:00:30.840
<v Speaker 2>feeling as though I was on the outside looking in.

1:00:32.440 --> 1:00:36.600
<v Speaker 2>I was not sports minded, particularly even though I went out.

1:00:36.600 --> 1:00:39.960
<v Speaker 2>I played football because my dad wanted me to the

1:00:40.160 --> 1:00:43.080
<v Speaker 2>violence I didn't like. But I played and played hard.

1:00:44.200 --> 1:00:46.600
<v Speaker 2>But I was a second stringer. I was in the band,

1:00:50.320 --> 1:00:52.200
<v Speaker 2>so I grew, so I got a little bit of

1:00:55.040 --> 1:01:01.600
<v Speaker 2>experience on other instruments, and I floated on the outside

1:01:01.800 --> 1:01:06.120
<v Speaker 2>edge of every party I ever was ever attended. I

1:01:06.160 --> 1:01:09.000
<v Speaker 2>would be I would be in a corner somewhere, leaned up,

1:01:09.600 --> 1:01:14.000
<v Speaker 2>hopefully where I couldn't be seen, just watching, just watching

1:01:14.240 --> 1:01:19.000
<v Speaker 2>and feeling clumsy. And at one point my act and

1:01:19.080 --> 1:01:22.920
<v Speaker 2>he was out of control, and I just I just

1:01:23.000 --> 1:01:28.439
<v Speaker 2>had that awful teenage, teenage angst that you go through

1:01:28.520 --> 1:01:33.320
<v Speaker 2>when you're just ugly. You just there's just a time

1:01:33.400 --> 1:01:35.960
<v Speaker 2>in your life when you're ugly. You look in the

1:01:36.000 --> 1:01:41.880
<v Speaker 2>mirror and you go, I'm ugly, you know, and you

1:01:42.040 --> 1:01:44.000
<v Speaker 2>get through it. You get through it. And then I

1:01:44.080 --> 1:01:50.400
<v Speaker 2>got through it by writing songs, by h doing my

1:01:50.520 --> 1:01:56.280
<v Speaker 2>own therapy and exercising my demons, you know, at the piano,

1:01:56.360 --> 1:01:59.320
<v Speaker 2>and particularly when I when I finally got the podium

1:02:00.560 --> 1:02:06.240
<v Speaker 2>and I was writing, and I I wrote, Uh, I wrote,

1:02:06.360 --> 1:02:11.160
<v Speaker 2>I wrote a song called good Evening, mister critic. And

1:02:11.360 --> 1:02:14.440
<v Speaker 2>it was for some reason I had it in. I

1:02:14.560 --> 1:02:18.400
<v Speaker 2>had it in for critics. It turns out that critics

1:02:18.480 --> 1:02:21.920
<v Speaker 2>have been my best friends in this life. They have

1:02:22.200 --> 1:02:26.160
<v Speaker 2>literally literally been my best friends. Stephen Holden was one

1:02:26.200 --> 1:02:27.080
<v Speaker 2>of my best friends.

1:02:28.840 --> 1:02:28.960
<v Speaker 3>Uh.

1:02:29.520 --> 1:02:33.200
<v Speaker 2>But my very first concert at Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, I

1:02:33.280 --> 1:02:35.240
<v Speaker 2>went out and I sung about the critics, you know,

1:02:35.480 --> 1:02:42.200
<v Speaker 2>and it was a very very taunting you know, how

1:02:42.240 --> 1:02:45.200
<v Speaker 2>many how many shows did you close all by yourself,

1:02:45.320 --> 1:02:52.400
<v Speaker 2>mister critic? Uh? It castigated the critics, it really uh.

1:02:53.000 --> 1:02:56.800
<v Speaker 2>And this is what I chose to open my first

1:02:56.920 --> 1:03:02.840
<v Speaker 2>concert with. So one can only imagine what followed. Leonard Feather,

1:03:04.040 --> 1:03:12.200
<v Speaker 2>who was an eloquent writer, music critic for the La

1:03:12.400 --> 1:03:19.240
<v Speaker 2>Times and well known in the jazz world, wrote mister

1:03:19.400 --> 1:03:29.040
<v Speaker 2>Webb's theory that songs are best heard when performed by

1:03:29.600 --> 1:03:40.680
<v Speaker 2>the writer. Was definitively unproven. Last night, that's a Dorothy

1:03:40.840 --> 1:03:45.200
<v Speaker 2>cha in pavilion. And for years, for years, he raked

1:03:45.240 --> 1:03:49.080
<v Speaker 2>me over the colds. But the truth is that by

1:03:49.240 --> 1:03:52.720
<v Speaker 2>and large, if you look at the critical response to

1:03:52.840 --> 1:03:57.960
<v Speaker 2>my albums, my second album all I Know, excuse me.

1:03:58.160 --> 1:03:59.600
<v Speaker 2>Second second album.

1:03:59.480 --> 1:04:01.000
<v Speaker 4>Was and so on.

1:04:03.520 --> 1:04:06.919
<v Speaker 2>Was selected by Stereo Review magazine, which in those days

1:04:07.000 --> 1:04:10.720
<v Speaker 2>was a pretty big deal. Stereo Review that was for

1:04:10.840 --> 1:04:15.200
<v Speaker 2>the high fid nuts. They gave me Album of the Year.

1:04:16.280 --> 1:04:21.720
<v Speaker 2>You know, I probably sold like for forty five fifty records,

1:04:23.120 --> 1:04:26.480
<v Speaker 2>and they gave me their Album of the Year award

1:04:26.640 --> 1:04:32.360
<v Speaker 2>for outstanding recording achievement, and they printed the full color

1:04:32.880 --> 1:04:39.120
<v Speaker 2>cover inside magazine. It was a very prestigious, but could

1:04:39.200 --> 1:04:43.800
<v Speaker 2>never It's interesting because now I can look at it

1:04:43.840 --> 1:04:48.240
<v Speaker 2>and I can say I spent my whole life pounding

1:04:48.360 --> 1:04:53.960
<v Speaker 2>my head up against that wall. Maybe it's time to stop.

1:04:55.760 --> 1:04:59.360
<v Speaker 2>But I think I'm going to do one more album.

1:05:00.000 --> 1:05:02.439
<v Speaker 2>I think I have a few songs that I would

1:05:02.600 --> 1:05:08.520
<v Speaker 2>like to leave before I leave the room. I'd like

1:05:08.600 --> 1:05:13.360
<v Speaker 2>to play a few more songs. And I've had fantastic

1:05:13.560 --> 1:05:18.440
<v Speaker 2>luck with other artists covering my songs on my albums.

1:05:19.000 --> 1:05:23.160
<v Speaker 2>For instance, Judy Collins picking up the Moon as a

1:05:23.240 --> 1:05:28.000
<v Speaker 2>Harsh Mistress in my minor standard recorded by a lot

1:05:28.040 --> 1:05:33.360
<v Speaker 2>of people. Highwayman was on one of my albums. It

1:05:33.480 --> 1:05:35.720
<v Speaker 2>was actually the album that I did with George Martin.

1:05:35.960 --> 1:05:37.680
<v Speaker 2>I've done an album with everybody.

1:05:38.400 --> 1:05:40.080
<v Speaker 1>I was on all.

1:05:41.680 --> 1:05:45.640
<v Speaker 2>All the Warner Late I was all the time Warner Labels,

1:05:45.680 --> 1:05:48.880
<v Speaker 2>I was on them, I was on Reprise, I was

1:05:49.000 --> 1:05:52.280
<v Speaker 2>on Warner Brothers, and then they kicked me over to

1:05:54.560 --> 1:06:00.000
<v Speaker 2>Asylum and then I made an album. Linda Ronstat produced

1:06:00.080 --> 1:06:02.560
<v Speaker 2>me and we made an album with Jack Holtzman at

1:06:02.800 --> 1:06:07.800
<v Speaker 2>Elektra and uh I'm at Ergon used to come to

1:06:08.200 --> 1:06:14.480
<v Speaker 2>well not every every studio, but every every session. He

1:06:14.520 --> 1:06:18.040
<v Speaker 2>would come to sessions quite often. He would come in

1:06:18.200 --> 1:06:21.120
<v Speaker 2>with his with his gold tip cane, and he come

1:06:21.160 --> 1:06:24.400
<v Speaker 2>in with the dapper little goatee, and he was a

1:06:24.480 --> 1:06:28.960
<v Speaker 2>wonderful cat. And he walked in and and he listened

1:06:29.000 --> 1:06:32.200
<v Speaker 2>to me and he'd go, you know, kid, he said,

1:06:32.640 --> 1:06:35.360
<v Speaker 2>it's part. He said, you've got the heart, you know,

1:06:37.520 --> 1:06:41.080
<v Speaker 2>and so I that's I don't know when you've got

1:06:41.240 --> 1:06:44.120
<v Speaker 2>that kind of backing and you can't somehow pull up,

1:06:44.280 --> 1:06:48.800
<v Speaker 2>pull up, you know, some kind of a record out

1:06:48.840 --> 1:06:50.520
<v Speaker 2>of it. I don't. I don't know what kind of

1:06:50.560 --> 1:06:54.240
<v Speaker 2>a curse is on you. But I did pray at

1:06:54.320 --> 1:06:57.919
<v Speaker 2>one point when I was young, and I prayed to God,

1:06:58.120 --> 1:07:00.920
<v Speaker 2>please let me grow up, and please let me write

1:07:00.920 --> 1:07:04.240
<v Speaker 2>a song for Glenn Campbell, because I loved Glenn Campbell.

1:07:04.600 --> 1:07:07.520
<v Speaker 2>He had a record because turn around, look at me,

1:07:22.240 --> 1:07:31.960
<v Speaker 2>turn it around, looking at me. Oh, I've wait, but

1:07:32.280 --> 1:07:42.000
<v Speaker 2>I'll wait for uh. And it was a it was

1:07:42.080 --> 1:07:44.520
<v Speaker 2>a regional hit, and I heard this beautiful voice, and

1:07:44.520 --> 1:07:46.960
<v Speaker 2>I just want to write songs for him. So when

1:07:47.040 --> 1:07:49.200
<v Speaker 2>I met him, finally I met him in the flesh,

1:07:49.600 --> 1:07:51.920
<v Speaker 2>I actually had a bunch of songs that i'd written

1:07:52.000 --> 1:07:57.240
<v Speaker 2>form Uh. It's it's like a cinderellative story. Really, a

1:07:57.320 --> 1:08:03.840
<v Speaker 2>lot of it is so fantastic that people don't believe

1:08:03.880 --> 1:08:06.160
<v Speaker 2>me when I tell them what happened to me. I mean,

1:08:06.760 --> 1:08:08.280
<v Speaker 2>all my dreams came true.

1:08:08.400 --> 1:08:08.560
<v Speaker 4>Man.

1:08:09.040 --> 1:08:20.600
<v Speaker 1>You know, Okay, you talk about being in Oklahoma but

1:08:20.720 --> 1:08:25.680
<v Speaker 1>being a teenager feeling like you're outside. Did you continue

1:08:25.760 --> 1:08:29.160
<v Speaker 1>to feel that in your life to this day that

1:08:29.200 --> 1:08:33.280
<v Speaker 1>you were outside observing or alienated or did that change?

1:08:34.560 --> 1:08:40.240
<v Speaker 2>No? I'm exactly the same kid, I'm exactly the same guy,

1:08:40.600 --> 1:08:45.479
<v Speaker 2>and I just transferred, you know, the alienation that I

1:08:45.560 --> 1:08:50.639
<v Speaker 2>felt in the classroom, I transferred it to Hollywood because

1:08:50.880 --> 1:08:54.280
<v Speaker 2>I couldn't. I felt like I was being banished from

1:08:54.439 --> 1:08:59.320
<v Speaker 2>rock and roll and put with the old people, old

1:08:59.520 --> 1:09:05.879
<v Speaker 2>people who were like forty, people like mister Sinatra, Tony Bennett.

1:09:09.520 --> 1:09:11.839
<v Speaker 2>You know, I actually wrote a song for Rosemary Clooney.

1:09:14.439 --> 1:09:19.760
<v Speaker 2>So in the middle of the road, the middle of

1:09:19.800 --> 1:09:24.320
<v Speaker 2>the road, which was Glenn in the fifth dimension and

1:09:24.920 --> 1:09:29.360
<v Speaker 2>Richard Harris. People could not comprehend Richard Harris at all,

1:09:31.000 --> 1:09:35.080
<v Speaker 2>and so there was a lot of confusion about where

1:09:35.120 --> 1:09:40.439
<v Speaker 2>the pigeon, where my pigeon hole was. And I already

1:09:40.560 --> 1:09:44.360
<v Speaker 2>knew that there wasn't a hole for me. I learned

1:09:44.400 --> 1:09:48.719
<v Speaker 2>that in school, so I knew there wasn't already made

1:09:49.400 --> 1:09:52.559
<v Speaker 2>slot for me to slip into because I know I'm

1:09:52.640 --> 1:10:00.080
<v Speaker 2>too egocentric and eccentric and eclectic, if you will, if

1:10:00.080 --> 1:10:02.679
<v Speaker 2>you could put all those in one word, that would

1:10:02.720 --> 1:10:06.360
<v Speaker 2>be me. And I know there's no real home for

1:10:06.520 --> 1:10:10.000
<v Speaker 2>me in this business. But I yearn I yearned to be,

1:10:11.000 --> 1:10:14.320
<v Speaker 2>you know, to have dinner with Paul Simon, and Ardie

1:10:14.360 --> 1:10:18.200
<v Speaker 2>Garfunkland eventually already asked me for a song, which was

1:10:18.280 --> 1:10:57.080
<v Speaker 2>all I know and answer, oh oh, anyway, uh. When

1:10:57.120 --> 1:10:59.600
<v Speaker 2>I after I worked with Artie and we that was

1:10:59.720 --> 1:11:04.400
<v Speaker 2>his first record coming back from the split with Paul Simon,

1:11:05.439 --> 1:11:08.400
<v Speaker 2>which I'm not going to go into that drama because

1:11:08.439 --> 1:11:12.320
<v Speaker 2>I think people know a lot about that, and if

1:11:12.360 --> 1:11:15.720
<v Speaker 2>you don't know, you can find out easily. But you know,

1:11:15.840 --> 1:11:19.160
<v Speaker 2>they were in the first grade together, and it's been

1:11:20.160 --> 1:11:23.920
<v Speaker 2>a rough relationship all the way for them. I've seen

1:11:24.000 --> 1:11:26.760
<v Speaker 2>a lot of it because I've known already now since

1:11:26.880 --> 1:11:32.640
<v Speaker 2>nineteen seventy one, and I've been through several ups and

1:11:32.800 --> 1:11:40.519
<v Speaker 2>downs between him and Paul. But I did eventually, you know,

1:11:40.680 --> 1:11:42.519
<v Speaker 2>sit down and have dinner with him, and then I

1:11:42.680 --> 1:11:50.040
<v Speaker 2>was invited to kind of hang out with Crosby, Dave

1:11:50.160 --> 1:11:53.120
<v Speaker 2>Crosby and Graham Nash. We got to be pretty good friends.

1:11:53.800 --> 1:11:56.719
<v Speaker 2>And then a very good friend of mine was Joni Mitchell,

1:11:56.840 --> 1:12:00.800
<v Speaker 2>and she changed the way I write songs. I would

1:12:00.840 --> 1:12:05.080
<v Speaker 2>say she was one of the she was one of

1:12:05.160 --> 1:12:07.760
<v Speaker 2>the epiphanes that I when I When I was I

1:12:07.920 --> 1:12:10.679
<v Speaker 2>was cruising along there, I was making pretty good money

1:12:10.720 --> 1:12:13.320
<v Speaker 2>and I thought, damn I know everything there is to

1:12:13.439 --> 1:12:17.080
<v Speaker 2>know about this. I can write one of these anytime.

1:12:18.479 --> 1:12:24.760
<v Speaker 2>And I ran across Joni's work saw actually saw live

1:12:25.280 --> 1:12:29.560
<v Speaker 2>at the Troubadour one night, sent her a letter and

1:12:29.640 --> 1:12:32.640
<v Speaker 2>said I want to take you out for tea and

1:12:33.000 --> 1:12:35.320
<v Speaker 2>I said, you were you know, you're a golden child.

1:12:35.560 --> 1:12:40.880
<v Speaker 2>And I loved what she did and everything. She found

1:12:40.960 --> 1:12:47.040
<v Speaker 2>the letter like fifteen seventeen years later, it was behind

1:12:47.080 --> 1:12:53.600
<v Speaker 2>her couch. She never opened it. It's true story. But

1:12:53.800 --> 1:12:58.320
<v Speaker 2>she and I became pretty really pretty close friends, and

1:12:58.920 --> 1:13:03.360
<v Speaker 2>I watched her a lot, and she would I loved

1:13:03.439 --> 1:13:06.040
<v Speaker 2>her voicings on the guitar. I love these kind of

1:13:08.640 --> 1:13:43.439
<v Speaker 2>just kind of to me, that's that's her world. It's

1:13:43.560 --> 1:13:46.840
<v Speaker 2>kind of a it's a D tuning or you know

1:13:46.960 --> 1:13:49.680
<v Speaker 2>these used to call it a lot of times, called

1:13:49.720 --> 1:13:53.719
<v Speaker 2>it the Joni Mitchell tooning. And I played on guitar

1:13:53.840 --> 1:13:55.640
<v Speaker 2>for a while. I wrote a couple of songs on that,

1:13:57.080 --> 1:14:01.679
<v Speaker 2>and but her conversational style all really changed my riding.

1:14:02.439 --> 1:14:04.400
<v Speaker 2>There was no more Witch Tall Lineman. There was no

1:14:04.560 --> 1:14:12.639
<v Speaker 2>more I was riding. You know, I was writing put

1:14:12.680 --> 1:14:16.400
<v Speaker 2>it down here right. It's kind of early for vocalizability.

1:14:17.360 --> 1:14:26.400
<v Speaker 5>See her how she flopped old and sail across this

1:14:26.680 --> 1:14:39.400
<v Speaker 5>guy lose enough to tell about that airful if future,

1:14:43.680 --> 1:14:45.920
<v Speaker 5>Oh ship looks as warm as go.

1:14:50.479 --> 1:14:54.719
<v Speaker 2>Uh it just it became I think deeper and more

1:14:56.360 --> 1:15:01.360
<v Speaker 2>uh uh Joan. She was the first to open her

1:15:01.840 --> 1:15:06.920
<v Speaker 2>chest up completely and say, okay, look, this is really

1:15:07.120 --> 1:15:11.560
<v Speaker 2>what's going on here? I am not happy sometimes and

1:15:12.000 --> 1:15:17.760
<v Speaker 2>and she would expose things that entertainment has always been.

1:15:17.920 --> 1:15:21.680
<v Speaker 2>Yet aren't we all happy? And they we're gonna go

1:15:21.920 --> 1:15:29.360
<v Speaker 2>home now? Yeah? And here here, suddenly is is a

1:15:29.560 --> 1:15:33.559
<v Speaker 2>voice that is profound up in the sterilized room where

1:15:33.600 --> 1:15:43.000
<v Speaker 2>they let you be lazy. You know, stories about Freudian

1:15:43.120 --> 1:15:51.200
<v Speaker 2>with Freudian overtones, and some of them so inspirational that

1:15:51.280 --> 1:15:52.720
<v Speaker 2>I would cry listening to them.

1:15:52.880 --> 1:15:58.200
<v Speaker 1>Like m.

1:16:01.240 --> 1:16:08.000
<v Speaker 2>Just before you, just before our love got lost, you said,

1:16:09.160 --> 1:16:10.599
<v Speaker 2>my love is constant.

1:16:11.200 --> 1:16:13.920
<v Speaker 1>You told me it was constant. Is I love was constant?

1:16:14.000 --> 1:16:14.880
<v Speaker 1>Is a northern star?

1:16:15.600 --> 1:16:16.559
<v Speaker 2>Yeah? Where's that at?

1:16:16.960 --> 1:16:17.840
<v Speaker 1>I'll meet you in the bar.

1:16:18.800 --> 1:16:22.120
<v Speaker 2>Yeah, if you want me, I'll be in the bar. Well.

1:16:22.240 --> 1:16:24.920
<v Speaker 2>She had me there, She had me. It was like,

1:16:25.640 --> 1:16:28.720
<v Speaker 2>I don't know how to write like that. She's I

1:16:28.880 --> 1:16:33.760
<v Speaker 2>call it conversational tone. And another guy who does it

1:16:33.840 --> 1:16:36.400
<v Speaker 2>and does it in a very humorous ways, randing him.

1:16:39.360 --> 1:16:44.320
<v Speaker 2>The lines aren't so formalized as Moon, June and Spoon.

1:16:44.520 --> 1:16:48.080
<v Speaker 2>You know, there are things that people might actually say.

1:16:48.640 --> 1:16:50.719
<v Speaker 2>So I thought, well, this is the wave of the future,

1:16:51.240 --> 1:16:56.000
<v Speaker 2>and my songs became more elaborate. I wrote a song

1:16:56.080 --> 1:16:58.799
<v Speaker 2>called Paul Gogan in the South Seas that was almost

1:16:58.880 --> 1:17:03.360
<v Speaker 2>impossible to form. It was like the Surf's Up. You know,

1:17:03.520 --> 1:17:06.760
<v Speaker 2>nobody could cover Surfs Up because nobody could play it.

1:17:08.160 --> 1:17:12.719
<v Speaker 1>But let's go back. You talk about being feeling separate,

1:17:13.439 --> 1:17:17.640
<v Speaker 1>feeling alienated. You talk about opening your concert with the

1:17:17.680 --> 1:17:21.759
<v Speaker 1>critic songs of the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. To what degree

1:17:22.280 --> 1:17:25.600
<v Speaker 1>are you angry? I think he's got a bad connotation,

1:17:25.880 --> 1:17:29.400
<v Speaker 1>but you know, a frustration of feeling that you're not

1:17:29.560 --> 1:17:33.040
<v Speaker 1>a member of the group, You're not part of the center.

1:17:33.560 --> 1:17:35.120
<v Speaker 1>There's somewhere you want to be.

1:17:35.439 --> 1:17:40.080
<v Speaker 2>Was that an element, Well, it would have been until recently.

1:17:40.240 --> 1:17:44.200
<v Speaker 2>But I'm at peace with where I am, who I am,

1:17:44.560 --> 1:17:49.640
<v Speaker 2>what I am. When I step back and look at it,

1:17:51.040 --> 1:17:55.720
<v Speaker 2>it's an unbelievable story. I mean, in anybody's book, it's

1:17:55.800 --> 1:18:04.400
<v Speaker 2>a fantastic Horatio Alger story. If you will rags for riches.

1:18:06.080 --> 1:18:08.639
<v Speaker 2>On the surface, it's that simple, but in a more

1:18:09.920 --> 1:18:15.960
<v Speaker 2>profound sense, it was a journey into into the art

1:18:16.040 --> 1:18:20.439
<v Speaker 2>of songwriting and to come to be influenced by this

1:18:20.960 --> 1:18:24.880
<v Speaker 2>wonderful group of people who eventually really did embrace me.

1:18:25.400 --> 1:18:31.599
<v Speaker 2>The rock and roll crowd. You know, Guns and Roses

1:18:31.720 --> 1:18:35.479
<v Speaker 2>are playing which tall Lineman every night on the show.

1:18:35.720 --> 1:18:41.000
<v Speaker 2>So and I think I got when I got invited

1:18:41.120 --> 1:18:44.080
<v Speaker 2>to play MacArthur Park at the Rainforest, Well, when James

1:18:44.160 --> 1:18:48.559
<v Speaker 2>Taylor cut which tall Linman? He covered which Tall Liman,

1:18:49.120 --> 1:18:51.439
<v Speaker 2>and I thought, I think I'm going to put some

1:18:51.600 --> 1:18:55.720
<v Speaker 2>of this to bed. I don't think there's a conspiracy.

1:18:55.800 --> 1:19:00.360
<v Speaker 2>I don't think they're out to get me anymore. You know,

1:19:00.520 --> 1:19:02.400
<v Speaker 2>there may may have been a time when there were

1:19:02.600 --> 1:19:05.600
<v Speaker 2>when when I was looked on with some degree of suspicion,

1:19:07.240 --> 1:19:10.839
<v Speaker 2>But frankly I laugh at that now because I shouldn't

1:19:10.840 --> 1:19:13.840
<v Speaker 2>have cared about that. I should have been here on

1:19:13.960 --> 1:19:19.600
<v Speaker 2>the piano doing doing what God, exercising the gift that

1:19:19.680 --> 1:19:24.120
<v Speaker 2>he gave me, uh and not not being so self conscious.

1:19:24.320 --> 1:19:27.639
<v Speaker 2>But again I go back to being the bat babbitist,

1:19:28.080 --> 1:19:31.880
<v Speaker 2>the Baptist preacher's kid, and being watched all the time,

1:19:32.080 --> 1:19:39.200
<v Speaker 2>and having and being rejected a lot, uh, being called

1:19:39.320 --> 1:19:43.000
<v Speaker 2>four eyes, being called preach, having four or five kids

1:19:43.120 --> 1:19:44.920
<v Speaker 2>just jump on me and beat the crap out of

1:19:44.960 --> 1:19:48.880
<v Speaker 2>me after school. You know, because I work glasses and

1:19:49.040 --> 1:19:53.759
<v Speaker 2>I it has it has. Yes, I have an anger

1:19:54.040 --> 1:19:58.920
<v Speaker 2>in me. My anger is is for the bullies of

1:19:59.040 --> 1:20:04.760
<v Speaker 2>this world. It's it's it's for the the unfair, the

1:20:05.000 --> 1:20:12.200
<v Speaker 2>unfairly treated. Uh majority of people in the world who

1:20:12.360 --> 1:20:18.639
<v Speaker 2>lived in some abject poverty and terror. Sometimes while another

1:20:18.760 --> 1:20:23.120
<v Speaker 2>segment of society lives on Mount Olympus and wear golden

1:20:23.240 --> 1:20:28.679
<v Speaker 2>crowns and float around in togas making decisions that affect

1:20:28.760 --> 1:20:32.920
<v Speaker 2>the lives of that cause cause or do not cause

1:20:33.120 --> 1:20:36.720
<v Speaker 2>wars and things of that nature to occur in other

1:20:36.800 --> 1:20:40.120
<v Speaker 2>people's country. That kind of stuff makes me angry. I

1:20:40.320 --> 1:20:44.679
<v Speaker 2>was incredibly angry about Vietnam. I knew in my gut

1:20:45.600 --> 1:20:48.840
<v Speaker 2>that the Gulf of Tonkin incident was a false flag.

1:20:49.040 --> 1:20:53.040
<v Speaker 2>I knew it. I knew we need I knew I

1:20:53.240 --> 1:20:59.840
<v Speaker 2>knew that. I just feel it, and I think that

1:21:02.200 --> 1:21:04.880
<v Speaker 2>they're gonna have it's going to become harder and harder

1:21:05.160 --> 1:21:09.080
<v Speaker 2>for administrations to put through these mil to go on

1:21:09.200 --> 1:21:15.760
<v Speaker 2>these military adventures after after our generation and after Vietnam. Uh.

1:21:16.320 --> 1:21:20.519
<v Speaker 2>Now it hasn't dissuaded them because they've been now wherever

1:21:20.600 --> 1:21:25.519
<v Speaker 2>they've been to the Gulf War uh uh they've went,

1:21:25.640 --> 1:21:30.519
<v Speaker 2>They've been to they've gone over and erecked Iraq, and

1:21:30.720 --> 1:21:34.880
<v Speaker 2>they've wrecked Afghanistan. I mean, what, what are what actually

1:21:35.000 --> 1:21:39.719
<v Speaker 2>are we doing as a country to make life better

1:21:40.360 --> 1:21:45.160
<v Speaker 2>on this world for more people, for our own people

1:21:46.000 --> 1:21:50.120
<v Speaker 2>when we don't have elder care for even a half

1:21:51.400 --> 1:21:53.720
<v Speaker 2>of the of the people who need it in this country. So,

1:21:53.960 --> 1:21:57.680
<v Speaker 2>you know, yeah, those things. I'm I'm an activist. I'm

1:21:57.720 --> 1:22:00.479
<v Speaker 2>a leftist if you want, you want to all me that.

1:22:02.680 --> 1:22:12.080
<v Speaker 2>I've always been aligned politically with with with a liberal society.

1:22:13.040 --> 1:22:16.120
<v Speaker 2>And I don't see anything wrong with national health. They

1:22:16.200 --> 1:22:19.400
<v Speaker 2>have it in Australia, they have it in England, and

1:22:19.479 --> 1:22:21.200
<v Speaker 2>it takes care of a lot of people who would

1:22:21.200 --> 1:22:24.719
<v Speaker 2>normally if they only if they only had to depend

1:22:24.800 --> 1:22:28.479
<v Speaker 2>on money, they wouldn't get medical care. And I think

1:22:29.280 --> 1:22:33.200
<v Speaker 2>when you keep seriously injured people sitting in the waiting

1:22:33.320 --> 1:22:37.320
<v Speaker 2>room while people with the money are like going past

1:22:37.400 --> 1:22:39.600
<v Speaker 2>them and going to get care. So you know what,

1:22:39.680 --> 1:22:42.960
<v Speaker 2>I'm saying I think there's a lot of injustice. I'm

1:22:43.040 --> 1:22:52.320
<v Speaker 2>angry about that. I'm angry about people causing other people's deaths, uh,

1:22:53.439 --> 1:22:59.880
<v Speaker 2>needlessly spending human lives in pursuit of some I don't know,

1:23:00.680 --> 1:23:10.280
<v Speaker 2>some reactionary, borderline fascist like dream of a society. Well,

1:23:10.439 --> 1:23:15.360
<v Speaker 2>in our case, I'm very nervous because I was raised

1:23:15.640 --> 1:23:26.000
<v Speaker 2>and rigorous religious framework, where if you got outside across

1:23:26.080 --> 1:23:28.640
<v Speaker 2>the laser beam, a buzzer sounded, and you got an

1:23:28.720 --> 1:23:38.639
<v Speaker 2>electric shop. I'm afraid of religion being too close to government.

1:23:39.360 --> 1:23:41.920
<v Speaker 2>I think that the founding fathers knew exactly what they

1:23:41.960 --> 1:23:46.519
<v Speaker 2>were doing when they separated church in state, and the

1:23:46.720 --> 1:23:49.280
<v Speaker 2>idea that well, no, I was a long time ago,

1:23:49.479 --> 1:23:52.280
<v Speaker 2>and now we need to we need to get them

1:23:52.360 --> 1:23:57.000
<v Speaker 2>closer together, you know, to get America back on its path.

1:24:00.200 --> 1:24:08.479
<v Speaker 2>I'm not persuaded that religion ever did anything to help government.

1:24:16.640 --> 1:24:21.800
<v Speaker 1>Let's go back to Oklahoma, your Baptist minister's son. How

1:24:21.880 --> 1:24:26.120
<v Speaker 1>do you hear rock and roll? How do you hear Elvis?

1:24:26.920 --> 1:24:29.120
<v Speaker 1>To what degree does it change you? To what degree

1:24:29.120 --> 1:24:29.800
<v Speaker 1>does it affect you?

1:24:31.479 --> 1:24:38.800
<v Speaker 2>Well, my father made a critical mistake at one point

1:24:38.880 --> 1:24:42.400
<v Speaker 2>because he was also kind of left minded, believe it

1:24:42.520 --> 1:24:46.160
<v Speaker 2>or not. And during the Civil rights movement, he would

1:24:46.280 --> 1:24:50.040
<v Speaker 2>have black congregations come to our church. And when they came,

1:24:50.160 --> 1:24:53.680
<v Speaker 2>they brought their drums and their electric guitars, and they,

1:24:56.120 --> 1:25:00.240
<v Speaker 2>you know, sang the gospel. And Elvis was up to

1:25:00.320 --> 1:25:01.920
<v Speaker 2>his neck in the gospel music.

1:25:03.160 --> 1:25:06.160
<v Speaker 6>So he was.

1:25:06.439 --> 1:25:09.920
<v Speaker 2>And so my father was really I was proud of

1:25:10.000 --> 1:25:14.320
<v Speaker 2>his stand. He let he he was inclusive. He he

1:25:14.400 --> 1:25:19.160
<v Speaker 2>knew perfectly well there were two gay guys who came

1:25:19.240 --> 1:25:25.120
<v Speaker 2>to service, and they were there every Sunday, and he

1:25:27.240 --> 1:25:29.680
<v Speaker 2>never said a word about it until his deacons came

1:25:29.720 --> 1:25:32.080
<v Speaker 2>in and said, you've got to stop those guys from coming,

1:25:32.120 --> 1:25:36.679
<v Speaker 2>because you know that's not in the Bibles. And he said, well,

1:25:36.880 --> 1:25:40.639
<v Speaker 2>he said, I'm not going to say anything to them,

1:25:41.800 --> 1:25:46.240
<v Speaker 2>but you're no longer my deacons. So he fired the deacons.

1:25:47.080 --> 1:25:55.840
<v Speaker 2>His stand was impeccable. And I don't know, I don't know,

1:25:56.000 --> 1:25:58.519
<v Speaker 2>I honestly, Bob, I don't know where I was leading

1:25:58.640 --> 1:25:58.840
<v Speaker 2>with that.

1:25:59.120 --> 1:26:02.880
<v Speaker 1>But well, tell me about hearing rock music curing Elvis.

1:26:03.680 --> 1:26:07.960
<v Speaker 2>Well, when these when these black congregations would come in

1:26:08.080 --> 1:26:11.720
<v Speaker 2>and play service, we the gospel was like a rock

1:26:11.800 --> 1:26:14.920
<v Speaker 2>and roll. There was drums, they had drums up there,

1:26:15.000 --> 1:26:18.920
<v Speaker 2>you know, in the front of the church. I would

1:26:19.439 --> 1:26:23.000
<v Speaker 2>as I as I said, I would sometimes absent myself

1:26:23.040 --> 1:26:26.880
<v Speaker 2>from the house to go to various functions where people

1:26:27.000 --> 1:26:34.519
<v Speaker 2>work dancing. You know. Glenn Campbell said, you know why

1:26:34.680 --> 1:26:39.280
<v Speaker 2>Southern Baptists don't make love standing up? And I said, no, Glenn,

1:26:39.360 --> 1:26:42.479
<v Speaker 2>why not? He said, because people will think they're dancing.

1:26:46.520 --> 1:26:46.640
<v Speaker 3>Uh.

1:26:48.000 --> 1:26:51.519
<v Speaker 2>He used to control the radio, and you know, so

1:26:52.200 --> 1:26:54.240
<v Speaker 2>we would like try to get on a station where

1:26:54.280 --> 1:26:58.320
<v Speaker 2>we could hear Elvis or you know, Buddy Holly or

1:26:58.400 --> 1:27:02.760
<v Speaker 2>somebody else, and he would like slap our hands, you know,

1:27:03.680 --> 1:27:08.000
<v Speaker 2>he'd get back on that. All those preachers who used

1:27:08.000 --> 1:27:13.880
<v Speaker 2>to preach out of Del Rio, Texas. I don't know.

1:27:14.160 --> 1:27:18.519
<v Speaker 2>I found my when my mother passed. As I said,

1:27:18.680 --> 1:27:22.360
<v Speaker 2>I was a senior in high school, so I was

1:27:23.120 --> 1:27:27.280
<v Speaker 2>out from under the family umbrella very early on my

1:27:27.520 --> 1:27:31.200
<v Speaker 2>own in Los Angeles, sleeping on an air mattress with

1:27:31.280 --> 1:27:33.760
<v Speaker 2>some girls I knew who had like they let me

1:27:33.880 --> 1:27:39.960
<v Speaker 2>use their dining room. And I had a little portfolio

1:27:40.000 --> 1:27:43.000
<v Speaker 2>of songs. And I was an independent human being and

1:27:43.080 --> 1:27:45.760
<v Speaker 2>I've never been so happy in my life. And I

1:27:45.920 --> 1:27:52.960
<v Speaker 2>had nothing. I had nothing, and I walked around Hollywood

1:27:53.040 --> 1:27:55.479
<v Speaker 2>with my songs, and if somebody asked me what I did,

1:27:55.720 --> 1:27:58.160
<v Speaker 2>I'd say, I'm a songwriter and I was proud of it.

1:27:59.240 --> 1:28:05.679
<v Speaker 2>And I got a couple of everly brother cuts. Everly

1:28:05.760 --> 1:28:07.080
<v Speaker 2>brothers always worship.

1:28:07.600 --> 1:28:09.479
<v Speaker 1>Well, l wait, wait, wait, let's slow down a little bit.

1:28:10.040 --> 1:28:13.120
<v Speaker 1>At what point and how and why do you side

1:28:13.520 --> 1:28:15.599
<v Speaker 1>I'm going to be a songwriter as a profession.

1:28:20.120 --> 1:28:24.400
<v Speaker 2>Well, I'm at sam Bernardino of Ali College, and I'm wait, wait, wait.

1:28:24.320 --> 1:28:26.280
<v Speaker 1>Before you go there? How did the family end up

1:28:26.360 --> 1:28:28.520
<v Speaker 1>moving from Oklahoma to California?

1:28:29.000 --> 1:28:30.960
<v Speaker 2>That was always my father's dream.

1:28:31.720 --> 1:28:32.040
<v Speaker 6>He was.

1:28:33.600 --> 1:28:35.519
<v Speaker 2>He was always going to go there. It was just

1:28:35.640 --> 1:28:39.120
<v Speaker 2>a matter of times. So when he got a call

1:28:39.600 --> 1:28:45.200
<v Speaker 2>from this church in Colton, which is famous mostly for Wyatt,

1:28:45.280 --> 1:28:51.040
<v Speaker 2>for roy Erp. Wyatt's brother was buried there. So that's

1:28:52.000 --> 1:28:54.120
<v Speaker 2>that was one of the That was the tourist attraction.

1:28:54.280 --> 1:29:00.560
<v Speaker 2>It was roy ERP's gravestone, it was he you know.

1:29:00.800 --> 1:29:05.720
<v Speaker 2>So we're in California, which was a complete makeover for

1:29:05.920 --> 1:29:08.120
<v Speaker 2>me in terms of one of the first thing I

1:29:08.320 --> 1:29:13.880
<v Speaker 2>heard that summer that we moved in u there was

1:29:13.960 --> 1:29:21.840
<v Speaker 2>a there was a consciousness, a consciousness changing event, and

1:29:22.000 --> 1:29:26.800
<v Speaker 2>it was the Beach Boys singing on the radio station

1:29:27.000 --> 1:29:33.320
<v Speaker 2>The Look. I came in, k me in and they

1:29:33.360 --> 1:29:36.600
<v Speaker 2>were they were singing in my room. And I was

1:29:37.040 --> 1:29:39.880
<v Speaker 2>moving into my new bedroom in California, and all the

1:29:39.960 --> 1:29:44.400
<v Speaker 2>windows were up, and I hear the same song on

1:29:44.520 --> 1:29:48.559
<v Speaker 2>all the radios, all two or three different houses. They're

1:29:48.600 --> 1:29:51.240
<v Speaker 2>all tuned in to. Came in and they're listening to

1:29:51.320 --> 1:29:55.280
<v Speaker 2>the Beach Boys. And all this bogun villa's dripping down

1:29:55.439 --> 1:30:01.120
<v Speaker 2>and it's warm and everything is green. And I see

1:30:01.200 --> 1:30:07.439
<v Speaker 2>this kid in his backyard abutting our property and he's

1:30:07.520 --> 1:30:10.000
<v Speaker 2>got on a Volkswagen bus and he's got a surfboard

1:30:10.120 --> 1:30:12.719
<v Speaker 2>up on top of it and he's washing it all down.

1:30:12.920 --> 1:30:15.040
<v Speaker 2>He's come back, he just got back from the beach.

1:30:15.200 --> 1:30:19.840
<v Speaker 2>He's washing his rig down. I looked over there and

1:30:20.680 --> 1:30:24.479
<v Speaker 2>I said, what's that? He said, what's what? I said,

1:30:24.520 --> 1:30:26.160
<v Speaker 2>That is thing on top of your car. He says,

1:30:26.200 --> 1:30:31.519
<v Speaker 2>that's my surfboard. Man, Hey dude, you know. I said, well,

1:30:31.560 --> 1:30:34.360
<v Speaker 2>what's that music you're playing? You know in my room?

1:30:35.479 --> 1:30:38.960
<v Speaker 2>He said, hey, dude, he said, you don't know who

1:30:39.040 --> 1:30:42.680
<v Speaker 2>the Beach Boys are. I said, well, I sort of

1:30:42.920 --> 1:30:45.920
<v Speaker 2>like I know. I heard Jan and Dean record about

1:30:46.040 --> 1:30:49.360
<v Speaker 2>Surf City, but I don't know much about it. He said,

1:30:49.400 --> 1:30:52.200
<v Speaker 2>come in here, and I went into his room and

1:30:52.360 --> 1:30:57.200
<v Speaker 2>he played me everything the beach boys had done up

1:30:57.320 --> 1:31:02.360
<v Speaker 2>until then. And I walked that and I felt like

1:31:02.439 --> 1:31:05.960
<v Speaker 2>a changed person that I can't explain the vibration of

1:31:06.080 --> 1:31:12.280
<v Speaker 2>it was so strong that I was that I was

1:31:12.479 --> 1:31:22.479
<v Speaker 2>now in a different environment, uh, emotionally. And it was

1:31:22.560 --> 1:31:27.920
<v Speaker 2>shortly after that my mother passed. She she uh, she

1:31:28.080 --> 1:31:30.160
<v Speaker 2>tripped over a piece of furniture in the living room

1:31:30.200 --> 1:31:37.000
<v Speaker 2>one afternoon, and five weeks later she died of a

1:31:37.040 --> 1:31:37.679
<v Speaker 2>brain tumor.

1:31:40.240 --> 1:31:40.360
<v Speaker 3>Uh.

1:31:42.920 --> 1:31:46.400
<v Speaker 2>So I was, I was free, I was I was broken,

1:31:47.000 --> 1:31:50.640
<v Speaker 2>and my father was destroyed. So all the rules we

1:31:50.720 --> 1:31:54.280
<v Speaker 2>had no rules now. All my whole life had been

1:31:54.320 --> 1:31:58.200
<v Speaker 2>about rules, and now all of a sudden, there's no rules.

1:31:58.280 --> 1:32:01.439
<v Speaker 2>And walking into the house at one or two in

1:32:01.479 --> 1:32:06.160
<v Speaker 2>the morning, drunk as a skunk and stepping over my

1:32:06.360 --> 1:32:09.040
<v Speaker 2>father who's already passed out on the living room floor.

1:32:10.040 --> 1:32:14.600
<v Speaker 2>That's when I found out that Native American blood is

1:32:14.680 --> 1:32:22.160
<v Speaker 2>susceptible to alcohol. Because I'm a sixteenth and my father

1:32:22.360 --> 1:32:26.719
<v Speaker 2>was an eighth. And once he stopped preaching and started drinking,

1:32:26.880 --> 1:32:32.880
<v Speaker 2>he he sort of proved that he was you know,

1:32:33.000 --> 1:32:37.400
<v Speaker 2>he could, he could, he could, uh, he could drink

1:32:37.479 --> 1:32:41.439
<v Speaker 2>with the best of them, and he had a lot

1:32:41.479 --> 1:32:49.640
<v Speaker 2>of girlfriends. The whole temperature changed there pretty soon. He

1:32:49.920 --> 1:32:52.360
<v Speaker 2>was he was he was fed up and wanted to

1:32:52.439 --> 1:32:56.920
<v Speaker 2>go back to Oklahoma. So they went and I stayed,

1:32:58.439 --> 1:33:02.400
<v Speaker 2>and I was trying to go to sam Rindino Valley

1:33:02.479 --> 1:33:05.599
<v Speaker 2>College and I'm not a very good student, and I'm

1:33:05.640 --> 1:33:09.639
<v Speaker 2>skipping classes and I'm going. In the den of music

1:33:09.760 --> 1:33:13.920
<v Speaker 2>was a guy named Russell C. Baldwin, you know, fantastic,

1:33:14.920 --> 1:33:20.479
<v Speaker 2>a concert pianist who had damaged one of his hands

1:33:20.560 --> 1:33:23.479
<v Speaker 2>in a car wreck and it had cost him his career.

1:33:23.640 --> 1:33:28.000
<v Speaker 2>So now he's teaching. He wasn't bitter, but my favorite

1:33:28.040 --> 1:33:32.040
<v Speaker 2>parts of the class would be when he would say,

1:33:32.200 --> 1:33:35.600
<v Speaker 2>I think today I'm just going to play some Beethoven

1:33:35.680 --> 1:33:38.720
<v Speaker 2>piano sonatus for your kids. And he would sit there

1:33:38.720 --> 1:33:44.600
<v Speaker 2>and he would play Beethoven, just spellbinding, and then he

1:33:44.640 --> 1:33:47.880
<v Speaker 2>would say, okay, now for your semester final we're going

1:33:47.960 --> 1:33:51.120
<v Speaker 2>to do We're gonna set He said, you each pick

1:33:51.160 --> 1:33:54.680
<v Speaker 2>a poem, and you and you write a choral arrangement

1:33:55.400 --> 1:33:58.800
<v Speaker 2>and a piano accompaniment. And he said that'll be your

1:33:58.840 --> 1:34:03.120
<v Speaker 2>final grade. So I went in, and I'd been to

1:34:03.240 --> 1:34:09.320
<v Speaker 2>class about three times. I wrote this arrangement for choir,

1:34:10.880 --> 1:34:14.360
<v Speaker 2>and I think the text was when I am old

1:34:14.439 --> 1:34:17.200
<v Speaker 2>and gray, and when you were old and gray and

1:34:17.320 --> 1:34:19.599
<v Speaker 2>full of sleep and sitting by the fire, take down

1:34:19.640 --> 1:34:25.559
<v Speaker 2>this book, slowly read and dream, John Keats. I think

1:34:25.600 --> 1:34:29.640
<v Speaker 2>that's what it was. And he called me into his

1:34:29.800 --> 1:34:33.439
<v Speaker 2>office that afternoon and I went, uh, oh, you know Russell,

1:34:35.479 --> 1:34:38.160
<v Speaker 2>the dean of music. And I walked in and he said,

1:34:38.240 --> 1:34:41.960
<v Speaker 2>sit down, mister Webb, and he said, I see this

1:34:42.160 --> 1:34:46.679
<v Speaker 2>morning that you were late for class. You were recalcitrant. Again.

1:34:46.840 --> 1:34:50.559
<v Speaker 2>I didn't even know what recalcitrant meant, but he said

1:34:50.600 --> 1:34:55.679
<v Speaker 2>I was recalcitrant. And he said, you know, he said,

1:34:56.160 --> 1:34:58.200
<v Speaker 2>I know that you spend most of your time down

1:34:58.280 --> 1:35:03.120
<v Speaker 2>in the practice rooms writing. I don't know how he

1:35:03.280 --> 1:35:07.519
<v Speaker 2>knew that, but he said, you know something, He said,

1:35:07.600 --> 1:35:11.200
<v Speaker 2>we here at the college, we don't enjoy having you

1:35:11.360 --> 1:35:17.040
<v Speaker 2>here any more than you enjoy being here. So he said,

1:35:17.840 --> 1:35:21.120
<v Speaker 2>if you want to be a songwriter, why don't you

1:35:21.240 --> 1:35:26.960
<v Speaker 2>go to Los Angeles and be a goddamn songwriter And

1:35:27.200 --> 1:35:30.800
<v Speaker 2>kicked me out of his office. And it was like

1:35:31.760 --> 1:35:37.559
<v Speaker 2>an epiphody. It was like God spoke to me through

1:35:37.640 --> 1:35:42.040
<v Speaker 2>my you know, through my dean of music. And when

1:35:42.080 --> 1:35:46.160
<v Speaker 2>I think back on it, that was probably the thing

1:35:46.320 --> 1:35:49.920
<v Speaker 2>that propelled me out of that mindset that I had

1:35:49.960 --> 1:35:54.040
<v Speaker 2>to somehow get this musical education. He said, you know

1:35:54.320 --> 1:35:59.840
<v Speaker 2>everything he handed He handed me my my test score,

1:36:00.000 --> 1:36:04.600
<v Speaker 2>and I had an A plus on my original composition

1:36:05.080 --> 1:36:09.000
<v Speaker 2>and my arranging. And I had an F for the

1:36:09.120 --> 1:36:18.920
<v Speaker 2>class because of incomplete assignments and absenteeism. So I had

1:36:18.920 --> 1:36:22.000
<v Speaker 2>an eight plus in the music, but I failed the

1:36:22.560 --> 1:36:31.439
<v Speaker 2>mechanical demands of being a student. So I was out

1:36:31.520 --> 1:36:36.760
<v Speaker 2>of there, and I borrowed some money from friends in

1:36:37.000 --> 1:36:41.240
<v Speaker 2>Newport Beach who had a little extra, bought a Volkswagen

1:36:42.800 --> 1:36:47.160
<v Speaker 2>and went up to Hollywood and started walking around with

1:36:47.280 --> 1:36:52.400
<v Speaker 2>a battered portfolio of these songs that I've been writing

1:36:52.520 --> 1:36:57.759
<v Speaker 2>since age twelve, certainly since I heard that wonderful Jerry

1:36:57.880 --> 1:37:02.200
<v Speaker 2>k Parts song around look at Me with Glenn Campbell,

1:37:03.240 --> 1:37:07.120
<v Speaker 2>And I'm looking at Hollywood, and I'm thinking, somewhere in

1:37:07.320 --> 1:37:13.240
<v Speaker 2>Hollywood Glenn Campbell is right now. I could probably see him.

1:37:13.320 --> 1:37:16.479
<v Speaker 2>I just knew which building he's in. I could go

1:37:16.640 --> 1:37:19.760
<v Speaker 2>to it and I could walk in and I would

1:37:19.880 --> 1:37:23.600
<v Speaker 2>see Glenn Campbell and there was a magic to that.

1:37:25.240 --> 1:37:28.760
<v Speaker 2>And so I went everywhere, and like I said, I

1:37:28.840 --> 1:37:32.680
<v Speaker 2>went over to Warner Brothers Music and actually got a

1:37:32.720 --> 1:37:37.160
<v Speaker 2>couple of cuts with the Everly Brothers through a guy

1:37:37.240 --> 1:37:41.040
<v Speaker 2>named Dick Blasser. And I thought, well, I'm I'm gonna,

1:37:41.560 --> 1:37:45.000
<v Speaker 2>I'm gonna, you know, tear this place to pieces. Man,

1:37:46.000 --> 1:37:49.000
<v Speaker 2>I'm on my way. And then it was weeks and

1:37:49.120 --> 1:37:53.799
<v Speaker 2>weeks and weeks and weeks and weeks where nothing happened.

1:37:53.800 --> 1:37:56.800
<v Speaker 2>And finally a friend of mine, Jimmy Stotler, who was

1:37:56.840 --> 1:38:00.559
<v Speaker 2>a drummer, he said, you know, he said, his label

1:38:00.600 --> 1:38:03.760
<v Speaker 2>in America. I said, what he says, it's Motown. He said,

1:38:03.880 --> 1:38:06.519
<v Speaker 2>why don't you go over to Motown? I said, well,

1:38:07.160 --> 1:38:11.360
<v Speaker 2>Motown is it's he says.

1:38:11.520 --> 1:38:11.760
<v Speaker 3>I know.

1:38:12.200 --> 1:38:16.080
<v Speaker 2>I know, he said, but you've done everything else. He said,

1:38:17.479 --> 1:38:21.439
<v Speaker 2>try it. So I went over there. I went over

1:38:21.520 --> 1:38:25.320
<v Speaker 2>to Motown, went into the office, these two big doors opened,

1:38:25.800 --> 1:38:29.080
<v Speaker 2>very fancy office. I sat down with this kind of

1:38:29.240 --> 1:38:33.400
<v Speaker 2>ratty sort of it was almost like a paper bag

1:38:33.560 --> 1:38:38.519
<v Speaker 2>full of songs, and talked to the receptionist for a while,

1:38:38.600 --> 1:38:41.080
<v Speaker 2>and I said, I'd really like to have somebody to

1:38:41.200 --> 1:38:47.280
<v Speaker 2>get listen to one of my songs. And she's just

1:38:47.400 --> 1:38:49.920
<v Speaker 2>having lunch, and it was Vicky. She and I got

1:38:49.960 --> 1:38:53.639
<v Speaker 2>to be really close, and she said, why you poor

1:38:53.760 --> 1:38:57.040
<v Speaker 2>little sprawling things. She said, We're gonna have to fatten

1:38:57.080 --> 1:39:00.160
<v Speaker 2>you up. Said, are you going to fade away? She

1:39:00.320 --> 1:39:03.400
<v Speaker 2>talked to me for a while, and then she said listen.

1:39:03.520 --> 1:39:06.080
<v Speaker 2>She said, you got a song you really like. I said, yeah,

1:39:07.120 --> 1:39:13.400
<v Speaker 2>I had one call this time last summer and I said,

1:39:13.600 --> 1:39:16.519
<v Speaker 2>this one right here, and I had it on a cassette.

1:39:16.840 --> 1:39:19.120
<v Speaker 2>I actually I had it on a rough reel to reel.

1:39:19.560 --> 1:39:23.120
<v Speaker 2>We used to have real to reel then. And she

1:39:23.320 --> 1:39:26.400
<v Speaker 2>went into the office, this big door. She went the

1:39:26.520 --> 1:39:30.960
<v Speaker 2>inner office. She came right back out and closed the door.

1:39:31.400 --> 1:39:34.559
<v Speaker 2>A few beats passed, and I hear.

1:39:37.280 --> 1:39:47.400
<v Speaker 3>This this time less ceremony you need bet the sky

1:39:47.600 --> 1:39:48.880
<v Speaker 3>would events blue.

1:39:50.720 --> 1:39:54.600
<v Speaker 2>And I hear my song coming through the door. And

1:39:54.680 --> 1:39:57.360
<v Speaker 2>then there's a pause, and then the door opens and

1:39:57.439 --> 1:40:00.919
<v Speaker 2>I see this angelic face. It was a guy, Frank Wilson,

1:40:01.000 --> 1:40:04.280
<v Speaker 2>and people who are familiar with the town will know

1:40:04.360 --> 1:40:06.960
<v Speaker 2>who he is. He had a very soft voice and

1:40:07.040 --> 1:40:11.040
<v Speaker 2>he said which I said, what he said, Well, you

1:40:11.160 --> 1:40:13.960
<v Speaker 2>come in here please, and I said, I said I'm sorry.

1:40:14.080 --> 1:40:19.720
<v Speaker 2>He said, would you come in here please? And I

1:40:19.880 --> 1:40:24.800
<v Speaker 2>said okay, And that was it. The door opened and

1:40:24.960 --> 1:40:29.040
<v Speaker 2>I walked in and life. Life was never the same

1:40:29.120 --> 1:40:32.920
<v Speaker 2>after that. I worked there. I was under contract for

1:40:33.040 --> 1:40:36.840
<v Speaker 2>two years. I got a cut on a Supremes album.

1:40:36.920 --> 1:40:41.440
<v Speaker 2>It was a Christmas album called Merry Christmas from the Supremes.

1:40:43.240 --> 1:40:52.360
<v Speaker 2>I worked with Brenda Holloway, I worked with Tony Martin.

1:40:52.439 --> 1:40:54.240
<v Speaker 2>They had signed they would they would send all the

1:40:54.360 --> 1:40:57.080
<v Speaker 2>white artists to me, and I have to tell you,

1:40:57.200 --> 1:41:00.680
<v Speaker 2>they treated me like a prince. They really gave me

1:41:00.760 --> 1:41:02.840
<v Speaker 2>the keys to the kingdom there. They gave me the

1:41:03.200 --> 1:41:07.439
<v Speaker 2>education that I really needed. I got it motown. I

1:41:07.600 --> 1:41:11.200
<v Speaker 2>learned to work a board, I learned the parts of

1:41:11.280 --> 1:41:17.360
<v Speaker 2>the song that were important, the hook, and they were

1:41:17.520 --> 1:41:22.160
<v Speaker 2>endlessly patient with me. And I wrote a lot of

1:41:22.240 --> 1:41:25.280
<v Speaker 2>songs there. I walked out. When I left two years later,

1:41:26.280 --> 1:41:29.519
<v Speaker 2>they said, listen, you've tried hard here, but we don't

1:41:29.520 --> 1:41:31.759
<v Speaker 2>think we're ever going to be able to use these songs.

1:41:31.760 --> 1:41:34.679
<v Speaker 2>And I said, here, take this song up, up and away.

1:41:34.800 --> 1:41:37.760
<v Speaker 2>We're not going to use that. They said, take this.

1:41:37.920 --> 1:41:40.040
<v Speaker 2>By the time we get to Phoenix. I'd written for

1:41:40.240 --> 1:41:44.240
<v Speaker 2>Paul Peterson, who's like a kid who appeared on the

1:41:44.360 --> 1:41:49.000
<v Speaker 2>Donner Egio, but apparently he didn't like it, so they

1:41:49.120 --> 1:41:51.720
<v Speaker 2>gave me Up, Up and Away. By the time I

1:41:51.760 --> 1:41:59.599
<v Speaker 2>get to Phoenix Galveston, didn't we all the early songs,

1:42:00.240 --> 1:42:04.880
<v Speaker 2>not Wichita because I wrote that for Glant. So I

1:42:05.000 --> 1:42:08.240
<v Speaker 2>walked out of there with four or five hit records

1:42:08.240 --> 1:42:12.439
<v Speaker 2>in my knapsack, didn't know it at the time, and

1:42:12.600 --> 1:42:14.679
<v Speaker 2>went to work for Johnny Rivers Music.

1:42:22.479 --> 1:42:24.120
<v Speaker 1>How'd you meet Johnny Rivers.

1:42:25.520 --> 1:42:28.760
<v Speaker 2>Through Mark Gordon who was the president of Motown at

1:42:28.800 --> 1:42:30.519
<v Speaker 2>that time, and he knew I was looking for a

1:42:30.640 --> 1:42:42.360
<v Speaker 2>gig and he bought out my contract. You know, it's

1:42:42.479 --> 1:42:47.800
<v Speaker 2>crazy they he bought those songs. I was just telling

1:42:47.880 --> 1:42:51.040
<v Speaker 2>you about all those hits. He bought those songs. There

1:42:51.040 --> 1:42:55.120
<v Speaker 2>were about ten of them, and he bought my contract

1:42:55.240 --> 1:43:00.920
<v Speaker 2>for fifteen thousand dollars. And the fifteenth thousand dollars I

1:43:01.120 --> 1:43:06.080
<v Speaker 2>had to pay back out of my royalties, and the first,

1:43:06.760 --> 1:43:09.719
<v Speaker 2>the first hit I ever had, was Up, Up and Away,

1:43:10.520 --> 1:43:13.719
<v Speaker 2>and my royalties paid back. I paid back my fifteen

1:43:13.800 --> 1:43:18.360
<v Speaker 2>thousand dollars and I bought a grand piano and that

1:43:18.640 --> 1:43:23.040
<v Speaker 2>was my furniture. I had a little house in Laurel Canyon.

1:43:23.120 --> 1:43:26.240
<v Speaker 2>Now there's a lot of to do about Laurel Canyon,

1:43:26.320 --> 1:43:28.479
<v Speaker 2>and this one was there, and this one lived there,

1:43:28.479 --> 1:43:31.160
<v Speaker 2>and I lived there too. I mean quietly. I'm not

1:43:31.280 --> 1:43:33.400
<v Speaker 2>in the documentary, I'm not in the book. I'm not

1:43:33.640 --> 1:43:35.720
<v Speaker 2>the thing. But I used to walk down to the

1:43:35.800 --> 1:43:38.559
<v Speaker 2>country store, get my groceries and walk back up there,

1:43:39.439 --> 1:43:43.200
<v Speaker 2>wrote things like I wrote MacArthur Park there and the

1:43:43.320 --> 1:43:46.080
<v Speaker 2>only furniture I had was a bunch of mind you

1:43:46.200 --> 1:43:50.800
<v Speaker 2>we were hippies. But I had a bunch of cushions,

1:43:51.160 --> 1:43:54.840
<v Speaker 2>different sized cushions pushed up underneath the piano, and I

1:43:55.000 --> 1:43:58.759
<v Speaker 2>slept under there. So I was sleeping under my piano.

1:43:58.880 --> 1:44:02.080
<v Speaker 2>And I just roll out in the morning, sometimes take

1:44:02.120 --> 1:44:05.280
<v Speaker 2>a shower, and sit down and start writing music.

1:44:05.520 --> 1:44:05.920
<v Speaker 1>And I was.

1:44:07.520 --> 1:44:11.400
<v Speaker 2>I was probably writing at least I'm gonna say I

1:44:11.439 --> 1:44:13.800
<v Speaker 2>would say three songs a week, but I'll say two

1:44:13.880 --> 1:44:17.400
<v Speaker 2>to three. At least two or three songs a week

1:44:17.720 --> 1:44:21.840
<v Speaker 2>I would write. And they weren't written for anybody. They

1:44:21.880 --> 1:44:26.839
<v Speaker 2>had no destination. They were just it was just pouring

1:44:26.960 --> 1:44:30.560
<v Speaker 2>out my feelings for this girl or that girl. I

1:44:30.680 --> 1:44:34.160
<v Speaker 2>had all these tragic romances, that whole row of them.

1:44:35.240 --> 1:44:40.560
<v Speaker 2>And it was a very very you know, like a

1:44:40.720 --> 1:44:44.759
<v Speaker 2>difficult relationship or a disappointing relationship is a gold mine

1:44:45.680 --> 1:44:49.680
<v Speaker 2>for a songwriter. They'll all tell you, you know, you

1:44:49.760 --> 1:44:52.360
<v Speaker 2>don't you're not gonna make it until some chick really

1:44:52.600 --> 1:44:56.320
<v Speaker 2>busts you up, man, and then then you're gonna then

1:44:56.400 --> 1:44:59.360
<v Speaker 2>you're gonna be fine, you know. But you know, you

1:44:59.479 --> 1:45:05.479
<v Speaker 2>got some you gotta do some living. So Johnny and

1:45:05.600 --> 1:45:08.720
<v Speaker 2>I I moved into his house and stayed in the

1:45:08.800 --> 1:45:12.560
<v Speaker 2>back room, and we used to get on his motorcycle

1:45:12.560 --> 1:45:16.000
<v Speaker 2>and go down to the Whiskey of Go Go and, uh,

1:45:17.600 --> 1:45:23.759
<v Speaker 2>listen to John Lee Hooker listened to Smoky Smokey Robinson

1:45:23.760 --> 1:45:26.120
<v Speaker 2>and the Miracles. Can you imagine that in the Whiskey

1:45:26.200 --> 1:45:29.599
<v Speaker 2>of Go Go, it's probably about as big as this studio.

1:45:30.840 --> 1:45:34.080
<v Speaker 2>And uh, there they were, you know, and with all

1:45:34.200 --> 1:45:36.960
<v Speaker 2>the moves and the you know, all the motown stuff

1:45:37.040 --> 1:45:41.320
<v Speaker 2>and the and the outfits and and uh the go

1:45:41.479 --> 1:45:44.840
<v Speaker 2>go go girls in the Cages, which were really originated

1:45:45.120 --> 1:45:48.320
<v Speaker 2>at Whisky at the Whiskey, That's where that came from.

1:45:49.040 --> 1:45:53.120
<v Speaker 2>The Girls in the Cages and psychedelic light shows all

1:45:53.160 --> 1:45:58.400
<v Speaker 2>over the wall and stuff, and uh, we we've got

1:45:58.479 --> 1:46:04.360
<v Speaker 2>we've got to be good friends. And uh he had

1:46:04.479 --> 1:46:08.879
<v Speaker 2>me working with this group, Fifth Dimension, And Johnny Rivers

1:46:10.960 --> 1:46:14.680
<v Speaker 2>remembered a relationship he had with Glenn Campbell. They had

1:46:14.760 --> 1:46:19.959
<v Speaker 2>done an album called The Long Black Veil for Mercury Records,

1:46:20.640 --> 1:46:22.880
<v Speaker 2>and he remembered that Glenn was such a great guy,

1:46:23.120 --> 1:46:26.840
<v Speaker 2>such beautiful person, and such an accomplished musician. He said,

1:46:26.880 --> 1:46:29.479
<v Speaker 2>you should have a hit record, and Glenn said, I

1:46:29.600 --> 1:46:33.960
<v Speaker 2>just can't find the right song. And Johnny, after he

1:46:34.080 --> 1:46:37.240
<v Speaker 2>signed me, one of the first things he did is

1:46:37.280 --> 1:46:39.880
<v Speaker 2>cut by the time I get to Phoenix. And he

1:46:40.160 --> 1:46:44.880
<v Speaker 2>called Glenn, and Glenn and Al Delorie came over to

1:46:45.040 --> 1:46:51.040
<v Speaker 2>his house and heard his that they used to call it.

1:46:53.040 --> 1:46:55.120
<v Speaker 2>It was a it was a rough master, is what

1:46:55.240 --> 1:46:55.600
<v Speaker 2>it was.

1:46:55.800 --> 1:46:56.000
<v Speaker 1>It was.

1:46:56.200 --> 1:46:59.679
<v Speaker 2>It was a it was a record. It was a record.

1:46:59.720 --> 1:47:02.640
<v Speaker 2>You know, you put it. So he put it on there, Uh,

1:47:03.120 --> 1:47:07.080
<v Speaker 2>test pressing, and he put it on the thing and

1:47:07.200 --> 1:47:09.519
<v Speaker 2>he and third song image like by the time we

1:47:09.600 --> 1:47:11.519
<v Speaker 2>get to Phoenix. He lined it up and played it

1:47:12.160 --> 1:47:14.000
<v Speaker 2>and that both of them just sat there with their

1:47:14.080 --> 1:47:17.720
<v Speaker 2>mouths open. And this is the way the story was

1:47:17.800 --> 1:47:20.240
<v Speaker 2>told me that Al de Laurie said, I don't get it.

1:47:20.320 --> 1:47:23.240
<v Speaker 2>He says, you know you've got a hit. You know,

1:47:23.400 --> 1:47:29.840
<v Speaker 2>Johnny had this. Can you tell me how much you

1:47:30.000 --> 1:47:36.360
<v Speaker 2>missed me? Beautiful, beautiful thing, poor side of Town? And

1:47:36.680 --> 1:47:39.840
<v Speaker 2>I think it was number one? And Ali said, I

1:47:39.920 --> 1:47:42.600
<v Speaker 2>don't get it. He said, you know this is a hit.

1:47:42.720 --> 1:47:44.880
<v Speaker 2>He said, this is a hit, isn't it?

1:47:45.120 --> 1:47:45.320
<v Speaker 4>You know?

1:47:46.400 --> 1:47:51.080
<v Speaker 2>And Glenn said yeah. He said, it feels pretty good.

1:47:51.120 --> 1:47:57.679
<v Speaker 2>But why are you giving it to us? And he said, guys,

1:47:57.920 --> 1:48:01.080
<v Speaker 2>He said, you can only have one number one record

1:48:01.120 --> 1:48:04.759
<v Speaker 2>at a time. He said, but what he was really

1:48:04.920 --> 1:48:10.160
<v Speaker 2>doing was doing something for me. He was doing doing

1:48:10.240 --> 1:48:13.120
<v Speaker 2>it well. Of course he's helping himself as well, but

1:48:13.320 --> 1:48:17.240
<v Speaker 2>he did care about me, and he put me in

1:48:17.400 --> 1:48:20.040
<v Speaker 2>charge of the fifth dimension. He put me in charge

1:48:20.080 --> 1:48:28.840
<v Speaker 2>of kind of their day to day rehearsing. And it

1:48:28.960 --> 1:48:31.280
<v Speaker 2>turned out that they recorded up up in a week.

1:48:31.400 --> 1:48:33.960
<v Speaker 2>Glenn recorded by the time we get to Phoenix, all

1:48:34.000 --> 1:48:39.280
<v Speaker 2>of this happened really fast. And so in nineteen sixty seven,

1:48:39.400 --> 1:48:43.879
<v Speaker 2>that's all you heard. And we went to the Monterey

1:48:43.960 --> 1:48:46.200
<v Speaker 2>Pop Festival and we played up there. I played up

1:48:46.200 --> 1:48:50.960
<v Speaker 2>there with a wrecking crew. Hal Blaine, Larry Necktel Joe Osborne,

1:48:54.040 --> 1:48:56.639
<v Speaker 2>and there was very little. It's not you know, Johnny

1:48:56.760 --> 1:48:59.519
<v Speaker 2>wasn't even in the film, and he put up twenty

1:48:59.560 --> 1:49:03.040
<v Speaker 2>five percent of the money and he kind of got

1:49:03.120 --> 1:49:09.439
<v Speaker 2>screwed on that deal. But I was I was just

1:49:09.840 --> 1:49:15.840
<v Speaker 2>coming back from the Monterey Pop Festival and hearing two

1:49:16.360 --> 1:49:19.800
<v Speaker 2>of my songs on the radio at you know, in

1:49:20.000 --> 1:49:25.320
<v Speaker 2>constant rotation all the time. They were both nominated for

1:49:25.479 --> 1:49:31.200
<v Speaker 2>Song of the Year by the NARIS Board, and I thought, well,

1:49:32.120 --> 1:49:36.080
<v Speaker 2>that's unbelievable. First of all, is heart stopping. I mean,

1:49:36.160 --> 1:49:39.519
<v Speaker 2>I was moving so fast that I was, I was

1:49:39.600 --> 1:49:42.439
<v Speaker 2>out in front of my airstream. I felt I was

1:49:42.560 --> 1:49:46.240
<v Speaker 2>like lightheaded, like I could couldn't breathe because I was moving.

1:49:46.880 --> 1:49:52.600
<v Speaker 2>My career was moving faster than I was, and so

1:49:53.160 --> 1:49:56.439
<v Speaker 2>I didn't fully grasp what was going on. But I thought,

1:49:57.280 --> 1:50:01.519
<v Speaker 2>if I'm nominated twice the same category for Song of

1:50:01.600 --> 1:50:07.000
<v Speaker 2>the Year, I'm gonna lose because the competition was general

1:50:07.080 --> 1:50:11.880
<v Speaker 2>on my mind by Glenn Campbell that John Hartford song,

1:50:11.920 --> 1:50:16.040
<v Speaker 2>which is a poem, which is an absolute masterpiece. I

1:50:16.080 --> 1:50:24.400
<v Speaker 2>would have stole that song a second so and owed

1:50:24.520 --> 1:50:29.800
<v Speaker 2>to Billy Joe, which was the Jimmy Haskell Spooky String

1:50:29.960 --> 1:50:33.400
<v Speaker 2>Arrangement and what did Billy Joe McAllister throw off the

1:50:33.479 --> 1:50:40.200
<v Speaker 2>Tallahassee Bridge, Remember that? And so Bobby was pretty hot.

1:50:40.479 --> 1:50:45.759
<v Speaker 2>I thought she was that that was a very original record,

1:50:46.680 --> 1:50:48.919
<v Speaker 2>and I think he got a Grammy for that arrangement.

1:50:49.160 --> 1:50:56.280
<v Speaker 2>He should have. So I figured one of those songs

1:50:56.320 --> 1:50:59.639
<v Speaker 2>will win. Half of my people are going to vote

1:50:59.640 --> 1:51:01.439
<v Speaker 2>for a up in a way, half of my people

1:51:01.479 --> 1:51:04.839
<v Speaker 2>are going to vote for Glenn. It's clearly two different

1:51:05.320 --> 1:51:11.320
<v Speaker 2>groups of people, and so I won't win, but I'm

1:51:11.320 --> 1:51:13.840
<v Speaker 2>going to go to the ceremony anyway because all my

1:51:13.920 --> 1:51:19.320
<v Speaker 2>friends are going. And I put on my blue Knahru

1:51:19.520 --> 1:51:24.880
<v Speaker 2>jacket with a silk with a Irish lace shirt underneath

1:51:25.720 --> 1:51:28.400
<v Speaker 2>and went down there like I was gonna win a

1:51:28.479 --> 1:51:31.519
<v Speaker 2>Grammy Award, but really didn't think I was. And I

1:51:31.600 --> 1:51:35.960
<v Speaker 2>kind of leaned up on the back of the auditorium

1:51:36.200 --> 1:51:39.120
<v Speaker 2>that's where you'll usually find me, like on the fringe,

1:51:40.320 --> 1:51:42.719
<v Speaker 2>leaned up on the back wall, and just watch things

1:51:42.800 --> 1:51:47.800
<v Speaker 2>going around, watch what people were doing, and all of

1:51:47.840 --> 1:51:54.680
<v Speaker 2>a sudden, the Fifth Dimension starts winning Grammy Awards. They

1:51:54.760 --> 1:51:58.920
<v Speaker 2>won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist Record of

1:51:59.000 --> 1:52:08.240
<v Speaker 2>the Year Album of the Year, Best Album Cover, Best

1:52:08.360 --> 1:52:11.800
<v Speaker 2>Choral Arrangement for a Group, on and on and on,

1:52:14.080 --> 1:52:17.880
<v Speaker 2>and I thought, well, God, bless them, you know, I

1:52:17.960 --> 1:52:21.360
<v Speaker 2>mean we worked there, I mean we worked hard together

1:52:22.120 --> 1:52:27.639
<v Speaker 2>to get that, to get that album done. And then

1:52:27.840 --> 1:52:33.080
<v Speaker 2>also Glenn won a Grammy for Best Male Vocal Performance

1:52:33.200 --> 1:52:37.880
<v Speaker 2>for By the time we get to Phoenix and I'm going, wow,

1:52:37.960 --> 1:52:39.960
<v Speaker 2>this is shit going to be a pretty good night,

1:52:40.160 --> 1:52:43.439
<v Speaker 2>even if. But now I'm starting to feel a little

1:52:43.520 --> 1:52:47.040
<v Speaker 2>left out because everybody has a Grammy except me. And

1:52:47.160 --> 1:52:52.120
<v Speaker 2>the woman lady stepped up to the microphone and said,

1:52:54.280 --> 1:52:56.360
<v Speaker 2>and now she said for Song of the Year, which

1:52:56.479 --> 1:53:01.599
<v Speaker 2>was one of the big awards. She said, Jimmy Webb

1:53:01.760 --> 1:53:04.800
<v Speaker 2>for Up, Up and Away, And the place just went

1:53:05.160 --> 1:53:13.439
<v Speaker 2>crazy and I was drunk and Larry nectl hal Blaine

1:53:14.080 --> 1:53:16.680
<v Speaker 2>both had a hold of me and they escorted me

1:53:16.840 --> 1:53:19.840
<v Speaker 2>up to the stage, thank god. And I got up

1:53:19.920 --> 1:53:23.439
<v Speaker 2>there and I got worded, I'm looking around and the

1:53:23.600 --> 1:53:30.080
<v Speaker 2>flash bulbs are popping it. I mean, I finally got

1:53:30.160 --> 1:53:38.800
<v Speaker 2>off and on my way back to my ideo, I

1:53:38.960 --> 1:53:46.760
<v Speaker 2>passed Glenn's table quite by accident. He reached up and

1:53:47.000 --> 1:53:51.639
<v Speaker 2>grabbed my hand. That was the first time that i'd

1:53:51.680 --> 1:53:57.280
<v Speaker 2>ever seen him face to face. It was like the

1:53:57.439 --> 1:54:02.679
<v Speaker 2>Panhandle of Oklahoma, like like just passed before my eyes,

1:54:03.640 --> 1:54:07.320
<v Speaker 2>you know, the tractor I was driving that day when

1:54:07.360 --> 1:54:10.560
<v Speaker 2>I heard that Glenn Campbell's song, and it was like,

1:54:10.760 --> 1:54:16.160
<v Speaker 2>how could this be happening? How could this actually be happening,

1:54:17.960 --> 1:54:23.840
<v Speaker 2>because it's something that I only imagined could. I thought

1:54:23.960 --> 1:54:27.160
<v Speaker 2>maybe I would get a couple of songs recorded, you know,

1:54:27.439 --> 1:54:31.200
<v Speaker 2>I thought some of them were pretty good, But all

1:54:31.240 --> 1:54:33.360
<v Speaker 2>of a sudden they were They were giving me the

1:54:33.480 --> 1:54:44.240
<v Speaker 2>keys to Hollywood, and it was it was heady, overpowering experience,

1:54:44.320 --> 1:54:48.400
<v Speaker 2>and and I lost over the fun. In the following

1:54:48.480 --> 1:54:50.520
<v Speaker 2>months and years for a while, I think I may

1:54:50.560 --> 1:54:56.280
<v Speaker 2>have lost some of my equilibrium. I I remember being

1:54:57.080 --> 1:55:09.040
<v Speaker 2>just outraged that I wasn't sort of recognized as a

1:55:09.160 --> 1:55:14.040
<v Speaker 2>California songwriter like Jerry Beckley and Dewy Ban all in America,

1:55:14.720 --> 1:55:20.840
<v Speaker 2>like the Eagles, like like all those guys who you

1:55:20.960 --> 1:55:26.640
<v Speaker 2>know live we all lived in the same place. That's

1:55:27.160 --> 1:55:29.680
<v Speaker 2>that's that's that's where the anger came from that I

1:55:30.120 --> 1:55:36.040
<v Speaker 2>was talking about earlier. But I certainly wasn't ashamed of

1:55:36.120 --> 1:55:41.120
<v Speaker 2>my association with Glenn or the Fifth Dimension still hold

1:55:41.200 --> 1:55:44.920
<v Speaker 2>him in the highest regard of probably the top one

1:55:45.040 --> 1:55:50.000
<v Speaker 2>percent performers that I ever worked with. But I almost

1:55:50.080 --> 1:56:00.360
<v Speaker 2>immediately had access to mister Satra, and you know, country

1:56:00.400 --> 1:56:06.240
<v Speaker 2>boy makes good. I moved into the Philippine Embassy, which

1:56:06.400 --> 1:56:10.800
<v Speaker 2>was temporarily vacant. It was on a street called Comino

1:56:10.880 --> 1:56:14.400
<v Speaker 2>Paul Merrow, and it's a huge mansion. I never even

1:56:14.640 --> 1:56:18.440
<v Speaker 2>seen a mansion like this, but it was for rent

1:56:18.520 --> 1:56:20.600
<v Speaker 2>and I rented it, and I had a bunch of people,

1:56:20.720 --> 1:56:24.200
<v Speaker 2>a bunch of friends, and so there were a lot

1:56:24.280 --> 1:56:26.280
<v Speaker 2>of rooms in there, and I think I had about

1:56:26.360 --> 1:56:30.720
<v Speaker 2>twenty twenty five people living with me because I embraced

1:56:30.800 --> 1:56:38.760
<v Speaker 2>the whole hippie the whole ideology of love is all

1:56:38.840 --> 1:56:42.880
<v Speaker 2>we need. All we need is love, as proposed by

1:56:43.440 --> 1:56:49.480
<v Speaker 2>mister Lennan McCartney. It turned out that we didn't need

1:56:49.520 --> 1:56:53.840
<v Speaker 2>a few other things besides love. But at that time

1:56:54.200 --> 1:56:56.440
<v Speaker 2>I was spreading the wealth and I had a lot

1:56:56.480 --> 1:56:59.040
<v Speaker 2>of friends. I've gone to college, I'd been to choir

1:57:00.040 --> 1:57:09.280
<v Speaker 2>and inquire with and some resolved set in that I

1:57:09.400 --> 1:57:11.720
<v Speaker 2>was gonna and I wasn't going to leave any of

1:57:11.800 --> 1:57:16.000
<v Speaker 2>these people behind. I was going to bring them along.

1:57:16.200 --> 1:57:18.720
<v Speaker 2>I didn't know where I was going, but wherever I

1:57:18.920 --> 1:57:20.720
<v Speaker 2>was going, I was going to bring them with me.

1:57:22.000 --> 1:57:25.920
<v Speaker 2>So I had them all in this big mansion and

1:57:26.040 --> 1:57:30.640
<v Speaker 2>I'm doing my best to get them record deals, get

1:57:30.680 --> 1:57:34.360
<v Speaker 2>them signed. I signed some of them to my own label.

1:57:35.720 --> 1:57:38.400
<v Speaker 2>I actually put out a Christmas record with the choir,

1:57:38.800 --> 1:57:42.880
<v Speaker 2>but the San Bernino Valley College Choir, and I just

1:57:43.040 --> 1:57:48.920
<v Speaker 2>had this feeling that I should bring everyone else along,

1:57:49.720 --> 1:57:53.800
<v Speaker 2>like the closest thing to it is we all live

1:57:53.880 --> 1:57:59.680
<v Speaker 2>in the yellow submarine and yellows submarine submarine, all my

1:57:59.800 --> 1:58:10.600
<v Speaker 2>friend friends will be aboard. And it didn't work. I couldn't.

1:58:10.720 --> 1:58:15.960
<v Speaker 2>I couldn't do it. I was able to do get

1:58:16.000 --> 1:58:18.600
<v Speaker 2>some records out for people. I got a couple of

1:58:18.680 --> 1:58:24.080
<v Speaker 2>people signed, and I maintained some of the friendships that

1:58:25.200 --> 1:58:26.120
<v Speaker 2>that I made there.

1:58:26.320 --> 1:58:26.520
<v Speaker 1>I was.

1:58:26.680 --> 1:58:30.840
<v Speaker 2>I was instrumental in getting Freddie Tackett started in LA

1:58:31.440 --> 1:58:34.520
<v Speaker 2>who eventually joined Little Feet, still still in a little fat.

1:58:36.480 --> 1:58:41.440
<v Speaker 2>I was able to do some things, but at some

1:58:41.720 --> 1:58:46.879
<v Speaker 2>point I began to feel I suppose, well, I don't suppose,

1:58:46.960 --> 1:58:50.720
<v Speaker 2>I know, I know that I felt guilty about my success.

1:58:52.360 --> 1:58:55.600
<v Speaker 2>I felt there's a lot of people out there who,

1:58:57.120 --> 1:58:59.800
<v Speaker 2>you know, really did go ahead and get their degrees

1:59:00.080 --> 1:59:05.640
<v Speaker 2>and music, and there's people who can play piano better

1:59:05.720 --> 1:59:09.120
<v Speaker 2>than me and can sing better than me, and there's

1:59:09.160 --> 1:59:13.120
<v Speaker 2>people who write songs better than me. And it was

1:59:13.280 --> 1:59:16.080
<v Speaker 2>just my turn. It was just somehow or other money.

1:59:16.600 --> 1:59:23.760
<v Speaker 2>My number came up, and I think I'm I think

1:59:23.840 --> 1:59:28.080
<v Speaker 2>I'm all. I had enough adversity in my life that

1:59:28.240 --> 1:59:31.760
<v Speaker 2>I think I'm over the feeling guilty about it part.

1:59:39.840 --> 1:59:42.680
<v Speaker 1>Okay, you have this incredible success.

1:59:43.680 --> 1:59:52.040
<v Speaker 2>What about writing thereafter? You inhibited? Well, not particularly. I

1:59:52.120 --> 1:59:58.720
<v Speaker 2>wrote to MacArthur Park afterwards, and I wrote it at

1:59:58.760 --> 2:00:07.400
<v Speaker 2>the behest of Bones, how who was a legend and

2:00:08.000 --> 2:00:11.040
<v Speaker 2>as the best tape cutter in Hollywood. That's why they

2:00:11.080 --> 2:00:14.360
<v Speaker 2>call him Bones. He's a really good producer as well,

2:00:16.200 --> 2:00:19.720
<v Speaker 2>and he was producing the Association. They were on my

2:00:20.520 --> 2:00:25.080
<v Speaker 2>list of favorite bands because of they were they they

2:00:25.320 --> 2:00:34.120
<v Speaker 2>like chords. I have this thing about chords, he said,

2:00:34.880 --> 2:00:37.520
<v Speaker 2>Do you think called me? He said, do you think

2:00:37.600 --> 2:00:41.840
<v Speaker 2>that you could do like something like with a classical bent?

2:00:42.000 --> 2:00:42.160
<v Speaker 6>You know?

2:00:42.240 --> 2:00:44.240
<v Speaker 2>He said, I want it to be rock and roll.

2:00:45.080 --> 2:00:47.800
<v Speaker 2>I want it to be contemporary, but I wanted to

2:00:47.880 --> 2:00:50.920
<v Speaker 2>have movements like a symphony, you know, like slow fast, slow,

2:00:52.560 --> 2:00:56.160
<v Speaker 2>He says, and I really wanted to build like a

2:00:56.720 --> 2:01:06.040
<v Speaker 2>like a symphony again. And I just laughed and I said, doctor,

2:01:06.200 --> 2:01:09.000
<v Speaker 2>you came to the right place. I said, I'm the

2:01:09.080 --> 2:01:15.080
<v Speaker 2>guy who can do this. And I wrote it on

2:01:15.240 --> 2:01:19.000
<v Speaker 2>that on that piano that I bought with with the

2:01:19.560 --> 2:01:23.520
<v Speaker 2>up up and away royalties, and I still have it,

2:01:23.640 --> 2:01:25.640
<v Speaker 2>by the way. It's in storage right now, but I

2:01:25.760 --> 2:01:31.360
<v Speaker 2>have that act and I uh. I sat there for

2:01:31.440 --> 2:01:33.760
<v Speaker 2>about two or three days working on MacArthur Park.

2:01:35.480 --> 2:01:35.720
<v Speaker 6>I was.

2:01:35.880 --> 2:01:37.560
<v Speaker 2>I was really kind of proud of it.

2:01:38.320 --> 2:01:38.640
<v Speaker 6>Mm hm.

2:01:40.120 --> 2:01:44.640
<v Speaker 2>And I took it down at the studio to play

2:01:44.680 --> 2:01:48.160
<v Speaker 2>it for the association and I go and I spread

2:01:48.200 --> 2:01:50.680
<v Speaker 2>it out and it looks like it's it looks like

2:01:50.960 --> 2:01:55.040
<v Speaker 2>an albatross. This music is like all over this big

2:01:55.720 --> 2:02:00.600
<v Speaker 2>sheet with wings and they're going, oh who and I

2:02:01.320 --> 2:02:04.520
<v Speaker 2>and I sat down to start playing this thing. When

2:02:04.560 --> 2:02:09.280
<v Speaker 2>I did, my clothes were wretched, the clothes I had.

2:02:11.800 --> 2:02:14.920
<v Speaker 2>When I sat down, I ripped the bottom out of

2:02:15.000 --> 2:02:18.280
<v Speaker 2>my jeans and you could hear it. It was like

2:02:18.400 --> 2:02:22.360
<v Speaker 2>Douglas Fairbanks sticking a dagger into a sail and then

2:02:22.520 --> 2:02:30.040
<v Speaker 2>sliding down the sail. It was this long, ripping, embarrassing sound.

2:02:30.320 --> 2:02:33.520
<v Speaker 2>And they all cracked it up and laughed and then

2:02:33.560 --> 2:02:48.200
<v Speaker 2>I started playing it and I sang, I recall the

2:02:48.360 --> 2:02:54.960
<v Speaker 2>yellow cotton dress. It was phoning like a way on

2:02:55.160 --> 2:03:06.120
<v Speaker 2>the ground round and they turned me down. They turned

2:03:06.160 --> 2:03:12.280
<v Speaker 2>it down. One reason they turned me down is I

2:03:12.360 --> 2:03:14.919
<v Speaker 2>think it was just too much for them to grasp

2:03:15.440 --> 2:03:19.960
<v Speaker 2>as to learn it in one bite, that it was

2:03:20.040 --> 2:03:22.560
<v Speaker 2>going to take. They were at the end of an album,

2:03:22.680 --> 2:03:25.240
<v Speaker 2>not the beginning. They were at the end. They just

2:03:25.360 --> 2:03:28.080
<v Speaker 2>needed a song to nail down the end of this album.

2:03:28.600 --> 2:03:31.240
<v Speaker 2>And Boone's house said that you guys ought to cut it.

2:03:31.960 --> 2:03:36.200
<v Speaker 2>He said, well, you don't think so, and they did

2:03:36.280 --> 2:03:42.920
<v Speaker 2>something else. And the story, which this is a true story,

2:03:43.000 --> 2:03:47.000
<v Speaker 2>he told them. He said, the day that MacArthur Park

2:03:47.440 --> 2:03:50.880
<v Speaker 2>goes into the top ten, he said, I'm resigning as

2:03:50.960 --> 2:03:54.880
<v Speaker 2>your producer. Now, this is not a made up story.

2:03:55.560 --> 2:04:01.000
<v Speaker 2>This is what he told the band. And months went

2:04:01.120 --> 2:04:07.280
<v Speaker 2>by and somehow there's you know, stories endless. But I

2:04:07.560 --> 2:04:10.800
<v Speaker 2>hooked up with this crazy Irish actor and Richard Eiris

2:04:11.840 --> 2:04:20.840
<v Speaker 2>who taught me Olympic class professional drinking, and invited me

2:04:20.960 --> 2:04:22.360
<v Speaker 2>over to London and said.

2:04:22.280 --> 2:04:25.880
<v Speaker 6>Oh, I'll make a record. We'll make a record and

2:04:26.360 --> 2:04:30.720
<v Speaker 6>it'll be a hit and I'll be a rock star, you.

2:04:30.760 --> 2:04:33.680
<v Speaker 2>Know, And I'm going, yeah, right, But I don't care.

2:04:34.120 --> 2:04:37.840
<v Speaker 2>I love the guy. He's a he's a blast to

2:04:37.920 --> 2:04:42.440
<v Speaker 2>be around. We're always in a Phantom five that he

2:04:42.560 --> 2:04:46.360
<v Speaker 2>bought from Princess Margaret. And he's still got the emblems

2:04:46.440 --> 2:04:49.200
<v Speaker 2>on the Royal of the Royal Household on the radiator.

2:04:49.680 --> 2:04:53.480
<v Speaker 2>So every gate opens everywhere we go. They just opened

2:04:53.520 --> 2:04:58.360
<v Speaker 2>the gate, you know, it's and so it was hysterical

2:04:58.520 --> 2:05:02.960
<v Speaker 2>fun for a long time. We went to Ireland to

2:05:03.120 --> 2:05:11.680
<v Speaker 2>kill Key Limerick, which is his own hometown, and meanwhile,

2:05:11.840 --> 2:05:17.720
<v Speaker 2>as a hobby, were working on this record. And I remember.

2:05:17.800 --> 2:05:20.400
<v Speaker 2>The interesting thing about Richard was that when we first

2:05:20.480 --> 2:05:25.800
<v Speaker 2>started out, we'd bring Roughs in from the studio and

2:05:25.960 --> 2:05:27.920
<v Speaker 2>we'd be listening and he'd say, haw.

2:05:27.920 --> 2:05:33.400
<v Speaker 6>Tom, see, I think the voice is too loud. It's

2:05:33.440 --> 2:05:36.240
<v Speaker 6>too loud. We need to turn up the orchestra.

2:05:36.800 --> 2:05:42.080
<v Speaker 2>And this was because he was insecure about his voice. Obviously,

2:05:42.600 --> 2:05:47.800
<v Speaker 2>even though you just start in Camelot, that Alan J.

2:05:47.960 --> 2:05:52.680
<v Speaker 2>Lerner score, he got through that pretty well, I thought.

2:05:54.160 --> 2:06:00.920
<v Speaker 2>And then as the record progressed, his personality became to change,

2:06:02.280 --> 2:06:04.240
<v Speaker 2>and finally towards the end he was saying.

2:06:04.280 --> 2:06:07.360
<v Speaker 4>Ah, Jimmy Webb, he said, you've done it again. You've

2:06:07.400 --> 2:06:10.840
<v Speaker 4>got the orchestra too loud. He said, you're covering up

2:06:10.920 --> 2:06:14.680
<v Speaker 4>my voice. He said, why are you covering up my voice? Said,

2:06:14.720 --> 2:06:17.000
<v Speaker 4>I'm not I'm not covering up your voice. I'm just

2:06:17.240 --> 2:06:20.920
<v Speaker 4>mixing the record. He said, well, my voice, you know,

2:06:21.280 --> 2:06:25.120
<v Speaker 4>my mighty voice. It needs to be louder, you know,

2:06:25.320 --> 2:06:26.640
<v Speaker 4>if I'm going to be a pop star.

2:06:28.360 --> 2:06:35.120
<v Speaker 2>So he went from no confidence to way too much confidence.

2:06:36.120 --> 2:06:39.840
<v Speaker 2>And I'm doing the record kind of tongue in cheek

2:06:39.920 --> 2:06:43.040
<v Speaker 2>and thinking, well, this is going to be a fun

2:06:43.600 --> 2:06:46.720
<v Speaker 2>thing to do, and then I'll get back to Hollywood

2:06:46.720 --> 2:06:50.520
<v Speaker 2>and I'll get back to the real, to the real

2:06:50.640 --> 2:06:55.680
<v Speaker 2>thing that I do. And I'm telling you, when that

2:06:55.920 --> 2:07:00.520
<v Speaker 2>thing came out, it was like a UFO, nobody doing

2:07:00.600 --> 2:07:03.560
<v Speaker 2>what to think about it. But we back in those days,

2:07:03.720 --> 2:07:07.760
<v Speaker 2>we had and I'm sure you'll remember what we called

2:07:07.960 --> 2:07:13.720
<v Speaker 2>underground radio or FM radio sometimes and they would play anything.

2:07:14.000 --> 2:07:17.560
<v Speaker 2>They didn't care. I mean they the disc jockeys actually

2:07:18.480 --> 2:07:22.800
<v Speaker 2>could play what they wanted. This was before the playlist

2:07:23.000 --> 2:07:28.600
<v Speaker 2>became iron bound, you know, law that you couldn't break,

2:07:28.680 --> 2:07:32.240
<v Speaker 2>you couldn't put any you couldn't you know how it

2:07:33.200 --> 2:07:36.440
<v Speaker 2>came to be that disc jockeys could no longer play

2:07:36.520 --> 2:07:39.120
<v Speaker 2>the records they wanted to play. They had to play

2:07:39.200 --> 2:07:42.760
<v Speaker 2>the list. Well, that's what they were doing. They were

2:07:42.760 --> 2:07:46.480
<v Speaker 2>playing the list and they weren't going to play MacArthur Park.

2:07:46.560 --> 2:07:50.240
<v Speaker 2>But underground they were playing it because they were playing

2:07:50.280 --> 2:07:52.840
<v Speaker 2>the Long Doors version of Light My Fire, and they

2:07:52.880 --> 2:07:56.560
<v Speaker 2>were playing the long Bob Dylan version of All Along

2:07:56.680 --> 2:07:58.840
<v Speaker 2>the watch Tower. And there were several records out there

2:07:58.880 --> 2:08:04.680
<v Speaker 2>that were six and it's sixties touching seven, and so

2:08:04.840 --> 2:08:11.800
<v Speaker 2>they decide they'll play MacArthur Park. And some somewhere up

2:08:12.040 --> 2:08:16.600
<v Speaker 2>somewhere in heaven, somebody punched a button and a station

2:08:16.760 --> 2:08:19.360
<v Speaker 2>in the Midwest went on it in the in the

2:08:19.520 --> 2:08:23.800
<v Speaker 2>afternoon and played a played the whole record in the

2:08:24.240 --> 2:08:28.840
<v Speaker 2>switchboard lit up. People said, what was that? Play that again?

2:08:30.400 --> 2:08:32.440
<v Speaker 2>And the next thing, you know, you have you know

2:08:32.800 --> 2:08:36.760
<v Speaker 2>we used to call a breakout where you have it

2:08:36.880 --> 2:08:40.960
<v Speaker 2>goes viral, like stations are picking it up. They're beginning

2:08:41.040 --> 2:08:44.120
<v Speaker 2>to pick it up. It's fine, it's not it's not

2:08:44.280 --> 2:08:47.360
<v Speaker 2>a sure thing, but it's like, well this is interesting.

2:08:48.040 --> 2:08:52.720
<v Speaker 2>We've got like five top forty stations in the Midwest

2:08:52.840 --> 2:08:57.960
<v Speaker 2>on MacArthur park the whole version, and they're altering their

2:08:58.880 --> 2:09:02.280
<v Speaker 2>commercial schedule and they're changing all kinds of stuff that

2:09:03.640 --> 2:09:07.520
<v Speaker 2>these stations don't do this. They don't they don't change

2:09:07.600 --> 2:09:12.640
<v Speaker 2>their whole way of playing records. But it was seven

2:09:12.760 --> 2:09:20.040
<v Speaker 2>minutes twenty one seconds long the original. Now you could

2:09:20.120 --> 2:09:24.800
<v Speaker 2>not predict what was going to happen next because I'll

2:09:24.920 --> 2:09:27.520
<v Speaker 2>just jump to the day that Ron Jacobs, who used

2:09:27.520 --> 2:09:30.240
<v Speaker 2>to be a director, came in in sam Rendino, where

2:09:30.280 --> 2:09:34.000
<v Speaker 2>I went to college. When Ron Jacobs called me at

2:09:34.080 --> 2:09:39.720
<v Speaker 2>home instead, Hey, Jimmy, he said, we've got this MacArthur

2:09:39.840 --> 2:09:42.200
<v Speaker 2>Parker record over here, and he said we'd like to

2:09:42.280 --> 2:09:44.240
<v Speaker 2>go on it. And I said, well, have you got

2:09:45.320 --> 2:09:50.680
<v Speaker 2>cag J was the hottest top forty radio station in

2:09:50.840 --> 2:10:01.160
<v Speaker 2>the country, and the real Don Steele was their top

2:10:01.280 --> 2:10:07.960
<v Speaker 2>jock over there. And they said, the only thing is

2:10:08.320 --> 2:10:10.680
<v Speaker 2>we want you to edit it because we can't play

2:10:10.760 --> 2:10:13.880
<v Speaker 2>seven minutes twenty We can't play seven minutes and twenty

2:10:13.960 --> 2:10:18.520
<v Speaker 2>one seconds on cage J. We can't do it. You know,

2:10:18.640 --> 2:10:22.080
<v Speaker 2>they won't let us do it. Bill Drake won't let

2:10:22.200 --> 2:10:24.560
<v Speaker 2>us do it. Bill Drake was like doing all the

2:10:24.640 --> 2:10:34.360
<v Speaker 2>playlist and Bill Drake was was programming fifteen hundred radio stations.

2:10:35.520 --> 2:10:41.320
<v Speaker 2>The fifteen hundred radio stations were playing his list, and

2:10:41.520 --> 2:10:44.520
<v Speaker 2>so I said, well, I'll have to think about it. Ron,

2:10:44.600 --> 2:10:48.800
<v Speaker 2>and I talked to my partner in crime, his fellow

2:10:48.880 --> 2:10:52.840
<v Speaker 2>name William F. Williams, and I said, what do you

2:10:52.880 --> 2:10:57.920
<v Speaker 2>think I ought to do? And he said a four

2:10:58.120 --> 2:11:05.360
<v Speaker 2>letter expletive. Expedit them. They can like play it like

2:11:05.480 --> 2:11:14.440
<v Speaker 2>it is or piss off. Right. So when Ron called back,

2:11:14.480 --> 2:11:18.160
<v Speaker 2>I said, Ron, I've thought about it, and for artistic reasons,

2:11:18.200 --> 2:11:20.240
<v Speaker 2>and I said, it would be nice to have the

2:11:20.320 --> 2:11:22.400
<v Speaker 2>record on cag J, but I can't. I'm not going

2:11:22.480 --> 2:11:24.680
<v Speaker 2>to edit it. I said, I don't think it makes

2:11:24.720 --> 2:11:28.480
<v Speaker 2>any sense when you edit it. It doesn't. It only

2:11:28.760 --> 2:11:31.440
<v Speaker 2>sounds like something when it's all put together the way

2:11:31.480 --> 2:11:34.800
<v Speaker 2>it's supposed to be put together. Otherwise it's just it's

2:11:34.920 --> 2:11:38.120
<v Speaker 2>fragmentary and you don't know what you're listening. He said, okay, okay, okay,

2:11:40.120 --> 2:11:42.200
<v Speaker 2>he said all right, He said, I'll get back to you.

2:11:42.320 --> 2:11:45.320
<v Speaker 2>The next day. Case J went on MacArthur Park the

2:11:45.480 --> 2:11:48.640
<v Speaker 2>full length version, and from then on d it was

2:11:50.000 --> 2:11:53.720
<v Speaker 2>it was a stone cold hit. It went to number

2:11:53.760 --> 2:11:57.880
<v Speaker 2>two in America, went to number one in the United

2:11:58.000 --> 2:12:01.080
<v Speaker 2>Kingdom twice. In other words, it went up to number one,

2:12:01.960 --> 2:12:07.240
<v Speaker 2>came down, then went back up to number one, and

2:12:08.160 --> 2:12:13.480
<v Speaker 2>roughly ten years later was number one in the United

2:12:13.480 --> 2:12:21.600
<v Speaker 2>States with Donna Summers disco version, and so the the

2:12:21.840 --> 2:12:26.760
<v Speaker 2>you know, this little, this unlikely project with this eye,

2:12:26.840 --> 2:12:28.920
<v Speaker 2>and he had a big career off of that. He

2:12:29.080 --> 2:12:35.240
<v Speaker 2>played everywhere, He made several albums, he he did Okay

2:12:35.520 --> 2:12:35.960
<v Speaker 2>behind it.

2:12:37.920 --> 2:12:40.360
<v Speaker 1>Tell us the story of wichital alignment.

2:12:43.040 --> 2:12:52.520
<v Speaker 2>Well, which till i'mann came fairly fairly in close proximity

2:12:52.720 --> 2:12:57.000
<v Speaker 2>to the other events that I've been describing. But like

2:12:57.160 --> 2:13:04.320
<v Speaker 2>I said, it was all happening so fast. Glenn called

2:13:04.480 --> 2:13:09.360
<v Speaker 2>me one day at home and said, you know, I

2:13:09.480 --> 2:13:11.120
<v Speaker 2>need to follow up for by the time I get

2:13:11.160 --> 2:13:13.440
<v Speaker 2>to Phoenix. Now, I don't know, there may be people

2:13:13.520 --> 2:13:16.160
<v Speaker 2>out there who don't know what a follow up is,

2:13:16.280 --> 2:13:19.520
<v Speaker 2>but I think you know what one is, and uh,

2:13:21.760 --> 2:13:24.560
<v Speaker 2>just in case there are there are those out there

2:13:24.560 --> 2:13:26.640
<v Speaker 2>who don't realize the way the record business used to

2:13:26.720 --> 2:13:29.720
<v Speaker 2>be is if you had a hit record, you would

2:13:29.920 --> 2:13:36.720
<v Speaker 2>put out another one that had a similar orchestration, similar characteristics,

2:13:37.920 --> 2:13:42.360
<v Speaker 2>same artist, and it wasn't supposed to be the same song,

2:13:42.520 --> 2:13:47.720
<v Speaker 2>but it was supposed to evoke the first song, so

2:13:47.880 --> 2:13:53.120
<v Speaker 2>that you were borrowing from the popularity of the first record,

2:13:53.200 --> 2:13:55.520
<v Speaker 2>and some of it was supposed to rub off on

2:13:55.640 --> 2:14:00.720
<v Speaker 2>the second record, but it had to be a different thing. Uh,

2:14:01.360 --> 2:14:04.640
<v Speaker 2>but similarities built in, and that's what a follow up was.

2:14:06.160 --> 2:14:06.800
<v Speaker 3>And uh.

2:14:07.200 --> 2:14:09.280
<v Speaker 2>In fact, when I was learning to write songs, so

2:14:09.400 --> 2:14:11.800
<v Speaker 2>that's all I listened to was follow ups because I

2:14:12.000 --> 2:14:15.600
<v Speaker 2>was comparing my follow ups to theirs, And at one

2:14:15.680 --> 2:14:18.040
<v Speaker 2>point I decided my follow ups were as good as

2:14:18.120 --> 2:14:23.080
<v Speaker 2>theirs are better, and so I really, they don't do

2:14:23.280 --> 2:14:26.200
<v Speaker 2>that anymore. I don't think. I don't think it per

2:14:26.360 --> 2:14:30.240
<v Speaker 2>se that they do that anymore. But then they they did.

2:14:30.480 --> 2:14:33.720
<v Speaker 2>And Glenn said, I really need this follow up. He said,

2:14:33.760 --> 2:14:38.520
<v Speaker 2>can you write me something about a town? And I'm thinking, oh, Lord,

2:14:39.120 --> 2:14:41.080
<v Speaker 2>and I and I and I said, Glenn, I said,

2:14:41.080 --> 2:14:44.680
<v Speaker 2>I think I think I'm just about finishing with my

2:14:44.840 --> 2:14:49.920
<v Speaker 2>rand McNally phase. I'm you know, drowning in towns over here.

2:14:50.000 --> 2:14:54.560
<v Speaker 2>And I he said, oh, well, that's too bad. He said, well,

2:14:56.520 --> 2:15:00.480
<v Speaker 2>he said, how about could you make it geographical? And

2:15:01.800 --> 2:15:04.720
<v Speaker 2>I said, well, I guess yeah. Let me think about

2:15:04.720 --> 2:15:08.240
<v Speaker 2>that for a minute, hung up the phone, sat there,

2:15:08.320 --> 2:15:11.280
<v Speaker 2>and all of a sudden, I know you'll think I'm

2:15:11.320 --> 2:15:17.800
<v Speaker 2>making this up, But West Texas and Oklahoma, Panana drifts

2:15:17.880 --> 2:15:24.240
<v Speaker 2>in front of my eyes, that big flat slab of prairie,

2:15:26.040 --> 2:15:32.040
<v Speaker 2>and the fact that you could drive for fifty miles

2:15:32.160 --> 2:15:36.400
<v Speaker 2>over into Mexico, New Mexico and not see anything. Maybe

2:15:36.480 --> 2:15:39.960
<v Speaker 2>a pig farm here, pig farm there, but nothing, not

2:15:40.120 --> 2:15:45.120
<v Speaker 2>a business. Some old, maybe ramshackle farmhouses that were already

2:15:45.280 --> 2:15:53.120
<v Speaker 2>laying down, very in a way desolate. But I loved it.

2:15:53.880 --> 2:15:57.760
<v Speaker 2>I loved it. I love it still, especially the at

2:15:57.920 --> 2:16:03.040
<v Speaker 2>night the stars. But I'm driving along in my mind

2:16:03.280 --> 2:16:05.400
<v Speaker 2>and I see the man up on the telephone pole

2:16:05.520 --> 2:16:08.880
<v Speaker 2>on the phone, and I thought that guy there was

2:16:08.960 --> 2:16:11.320
<v Speaker 2>always a guy up there talking on the phone. Who

2:16:11.440 --> 2:16:15.640
<v Speaker 2>was he talking to? And I remember our dad. You

2:16:15.920 --> 2:16:18.040
<v Speaker 2>stopped the car and say now, because it was real

2:16:18.240 --> 2:16:21.680
<v Speaker 2>quiet out there, there was nobody else out there. And

2:16:21.880 --> 2:16:24.600
<v Speaker 2>Dad would say, okay, now, but he still he says,

2:16:24.600 --> 2:16:26.800
<v Speaker 2>we're going to walk up on these telephone wires and

2:16:26.800 --> 2:16:30.040
<v Speaker 2>I want you to listen. And we'd walk up close

2:16:30.080 --> 2:16:33.800
<v Speaker 2>to the to the pole and just being really quiet

2:16:33.840 --> 2:16:37.200
<v Speaker 2>and listening and you could hear the wire, you could

2:16:37.240 --> 2:16:47.320
<v Speaker 2>hear the wires. You could hear them like you could

2:16:47.360 --> 2:16:57.680
<v Speaker 2>hear them doing that. Hence the line, I hear you

2:16:57.800 --> 2:17:04.760
<v Speaker 2>singing in the wires. So I thought, I'm going to

2:17:04.800 --> 2:17:08.400
<v Speaker 2>write it about the man on the pole because I

2:17:08.560 --> 2:17:12.760
<v Speaker 2>wanted to write her out blue collar heroes. They were

2:17:12.840 --> 2:17:18.520
<v Speaker 2>my heroes, like in Galveston. He's why is he from Galveston? Well,

2:17:18.560 --> 2:17:22.800
<v Speaker 2>he's from Galveston because it's a damn hard town to

2:17:22.840 --> 2:17:28.080
<v Speaker 2>grow up in. It was no Riviera, and I wanted

2:17:28.080 --> 2:17:32.200
<v Speaker 2>an ordinary guy. And so here's an ordinary guy up

2:17:32.240 --> 2:17:36.600
<v Speaker 2>on a telephone pole and what is he thinking. He's

2:17:36.680 --> 2:17:44.160
<v Speaker 2>thinking that he's in love with this girl, and it

2:17:44.400 --> 2:18:06.200
<v Speaker 2>just began to unroll. I got the melody and a

2:18:06.320 --> 2:18:18.760
<v Speaker 2>few chords. I start off on this, you know, journey.

2:18:18.920 --> 2:18:22.600
<v Speaker 2>Every song is a journey. It's taking you somewhere. Sometimes

2:18:23.080 --> 2:18:24.680
<v Speaker 2>it takes you to the end of the road where

2:18:24.720 --> 2:18:30.480
<v Speaker 2>all the burnout cars aren't. You got a bummer. But

2:18:30.640 --> 2:18:34.040
<v Speaker 2>this one wanted to be written. So when a song

2:18:34.120 --> 2:18:36.680
<v Speaker 2>wants to be written, it will help you. It will

2:18:36.720 --> 2:18:40.720
<v Speaker 2>help you. It will write with you and not against you.

2:18:44.120 --> 2:18:48.480
<v Speaker 2>And that's that's what I call being connected. And for

2:18:48.600 --> 2:18:52.800
<v Speaker 2>those unbelievers out there, you know, who feel sorry for me,

2:18:53.360 --> 2:18:55.600
<v Speaker 2>I feel just as sorry for you. But I know

2:18:56.720 --> 2:18:59.640
<v Speaker 2>that there is this connection. I know it because I've

2:19:01.120 --> 2:19:04.680
<v Speaker 2>used it in many, many, many times in my life

2:19:04.840 --> 2:19:07.119
<v Speaker 2>when I was in trouble, when I needed help, when

2:19:07.120 --> 2:19:10.040
<v Speaker 2>I was unhappy. When I was writing a song and

2:19:10.080 --> 2:19:13.280
<v Speaker 2>I said, please God, you know, give me a give

2:19:13.320 --> 2:19:15.520
<v Speaker 2>me an idea, he give me a line, give me

2:19:15.640 --> 2:19:21.440
<v Speaker 2>something I gotta So I wrote these two verses, and

2:19:22.640 --> 2:19:25.880
<v Speaker 2>he was calling me like every five minutes from western

2:19:26.000 --> 2:19:30.080
<v Speaker 2>three and saying is it done yet? Is it done yet?

2:19:31.360 --> 2:19:33.320
<v Speaker 2>And what I wanted to say was that go on,

2:19:33.440 --> 2:19:36.240
<v Speaker 2>you know, if you guys would stop calling me up here,

2:19:36.400 --> 2:19:40.640
<v Speaker 2>you know I got this thing done, you know. So

2:19:41.080 --> 2:19:44.400
<v Speaker 2>from like eleven in the morning to like about five

2:19:44.640 --> 2:19:47.840
<v Speaker 2>five point thirty took me to like bang out a

2:19:47.920 --> 2:19:51.600
<v Speaker 2>couple of verses pretty much what you know when you

2:19:51.879 --> 2:19:56.480
<v Speaker 2>when you think of the song. But I was wondering

2:19:56.760 --> 2:20:00.440
<v Speaker 2>at the time, is this enough? See where getting to

2:20:00.560 --> 2:21:01.840
<v Speaker 2>the it's the first verse, I'm gonta do it again. Okay,

2:21:02.000 --> 2:21:07.080
<v Speaker 2>so two verses. Now I'm as a songwriter and a

2:21:07.400 --> 2:21:10.520
<v Speaker 2>professional songwriter, I'm sitting I'm going to Okay, now do

2:21:10.680 --> 2:21:12.800
<v Speaker 2>I need to now do? And I need to go?

2:21:16.920 --> 2:21:25.760
<v Speaker 2>You know I need to go. Why don't you come

2:21:25.800 --> 2:21:53.720
<v Speaker 2>along with me? So I'm gonna bridge and go back

2:21:53.800 --> 2:21:59.960
<v Speaker 2>into that melody or or do I And then I'm

2:22:00.120 --> 2:22:03.279
<v Speaker 2>gonna have to write a last verse, you know. I exhausted.

2:22:03.360 --> 2:22:06.879
<v Speaker 2>I put it in a Manila envelope and I put

2:22:06.920 --> 2:22:09.600
<v Speaker 2>my cassette in there, and I wrote a note, dear Glenn,

2:22:12.840 --> 2:22:16.200
<v Speaker 2>this song isn't finished. But I thought I would run

2:22:16.240 --> 2:22:18.800
<v Speaker 2>it past you guys, and if you want me to

2:22:18.920 --> 2:22:21.960
<v Speaker 2>keep right and all right, if you don't want it,

2:22:22.120 --> 2:22:27.040
<v Speaker 2>let me know, and put a smiley face on it,

2:22:27.360 --> 2:22:30.040
<v Speaker 2>and called a messenger and sent it down to Western Three.

2:22:30.720 --> 2:22:35.240
<v Speaker 2>Didn't hear anything about it for a long time. It

2:22:35.360 --> 2:22:38.360
<v Speaker 2>was probably three weeks later. I'd say that I walked

2:22:38.400 --> 2:22:44.960
<v Speaker 2>into Armnsteiner's sound recorders and Glenn was there with the

2:22:45.120 --> 2:22:51.120
<v Speaker 2>boys with the with the gang and working. Apparently he

2:22:51.280 --> 2:22:54.199
<v Speaker 2>was because he was still sitting in with the recon crew,

2:22:55.360 --> 2:22:58.080
<v Speaker 2>even though he was becoming a star. He was sitting

2:22:58.120 --> 2:23:02.040
<v Speaker 2>in with the record group. And I walked in and

2:23:02.200 --> 2:23:04.959
<v Speaker 2>I said, so, how you doing. Go ahead, I'm doing fine,

2:23:05.400 --> 2:23:09.000
<v Speaker 2>said well, I said, you know, listen, I don't want

2:23:09.000 --> 2:23:11.960
<v Speaker 2>you to feel bad about that tune I wrote. I said,

2:23:12.000 --> 2:23:13.440
<v Speaker 2>you know, I wrote it in kind of a hurry,

2:23:13.520 --> 2:23:18.959
<v Speaker 2>and I realized it's it's kind of outside and I said,

2:23:19.040 --> 2:23:22.120
<v Speaker 2>you know, don't worry about it, because I'm really used

2:23:22.200 --> 2:23:29.360
<v Speaker 2>to rejection, you know, because writing songs is ninety percent rejection.

2:23:31.280 --> 2:23:37.320
<v Speaker 2>So we get unless unless if you don't, if you

2:23:37.440 --> 2:23:45.160
<v Speaker 2>can't digest rejection and judgment, sometimes a false judgment, but

2:23:46.560 --> 2:23:50.640
<v Speaker 2>a harsh judgment from somebody else, you should get in

2:23:50.720 --> 2:23:52.800
<v Speaker 2>another line of work because you're going to have a

2:23:52.879 --> 2:23:57.879
<v Speaker 2>steady diet of disappointment and rejection. So I was hardened

2:23:58.920 --> 2:24:02.840
<v Speaker 2>by then. I'd been to my town, I'd done my thing,

2:24:03.720 --> 2:24:06.680
<v Speaker 2>and I said, you know, I'll write another one. He says,

2:24:07.400 --> 2:24:11.320
<v Speaker 2>you're talking about which to lineman and I said yeah,

2:24:11.400 --> 2:24:17.040
<v Speaker 2>and he said we cut that And I said, well,

2:24:17.360 --> 2:24:19.800
<v Speaker 2>didn't you see the note. Didn't you see where it

2:24:19.920 --> 2:24:26.360
<v Speaker 2>said this is not finished. Call me in let me

2:24:26.480 --> 2:24:30.959
<v Speaker 2>know what you think. He said. I said, because Glenn,

2:24:31.000 --> 2:24:35.160
<v Speaker 2>it really wasn't finished. And he said it is now,

2:24:39.400 --> 2:24:44.960
<v Speaker 2>and they played it for me and it was beautiful.

2:24:45.200 --> 2:24:50.560
<v Speaker 2>It was beautiful, and I ended up overdubbing an Oregon

2:24:50.680 --> 2:24:53.039
<v Speaker 2>on it. I had a church organ in my house,

2:24:54.120 --> 2:24:59.800
<v Speaker 2>gul Branson Series seven hundred, and we didn't have synthesizers,

2:25:01.280 --> 2:25:03.920
<v Speaker 2>but church organs had a lot of bells and whistles

2:25:03.959 --> 2:25:05.240
<v Speaker 2>on them. They had a lot of different kind of

2:25:05.360 --> 2:25:11.080
<v Speaker 2>sounds ethereal angelic kind of things on them. And if

2:25:11.120 --> 2:25:14.040
<v Speaker 2>you listen to the very beginning of the records, you

2:25:14.120 --> 2:25:17.120
<v Speaker 2>can hear it clearly. I'm playing these little forests and

2:25:17.200 --> 2:25:26.720
<v Speaker 2>fist going, but it's in heavy sustain and the organ's going.

2:25:27.160 --> 2:25:33.120
<v Speaker 2>It's tremologus and it sounds like a satellite. You sort

2:25:33.160 --> 2:25:34.760
<v Speaker 2>of hear it on the beginning, then you hear it

2:25:36.959 --> 2:25:40.560
<v Speaker 2>prominently on the fade. So that was my contribution to

2:25:40.720 --> 2:25:41.160
<v Speaker 2>the record.

2:25:42.240 --> 2:25:44.640
<v Speaker 1>So how did you feel when the hits dried up?

2:25:47.879 --> 2:25:52.760
<v Speaker 2>Well, I don't know. I knew that it was inevitable

2:25:53.400 --> 2:25:58.160
<v Speaker 2>in a sense, but there was I was always being covered,

2:25:59.440 --> 2:26:06.280
<v Speaker 2>even when, even when I didn't have hit songs per

2:26:06.360 --> 2:26:10.800
<v Speaker 2>se on the charts. Was I was getting covers off

2:26:10.879 --> 2:26:21.160
<v Speaker 2>my own albums of different things. And like I said,

2:26:21.280 --> 2:26:24.160
<v Speaker 2>in seventy eight, Donna Summer had a number one with

2:26:24.280 --> 2:26:30.040
<v Speaker 2>MacArthur Park again, and in eighty six ten years later

2:26:30.440 --> 2:26:35.000
<v Speaker 2>I had Highwaymen with Willie Neilson Whale and Jenny's christ Consasson,

2:26:35.480 --> 2:26:40.200
<v Speaker 2>Chris Christofferson Johnny Cash, which went to number one, which

2:26:40.280 --> 2:26:44.160
<v Speaker 2>was a country music video of the Year, and then

2:26:44.240 --> 2:26:47.160
<v Speaker 2>they named the group The Highwayman, the Highwayman, and they

2:26:47.200 --> 2:26:51.200
<v Speaker 2>went on the road, and that song is still being covered.

2:26:51.200 --> 2:26:54.200
<v Speaker 2>The last time it was covered was with Amanda McBride

2:26:54.320 --> 2:26:59.160
<v Speaker 2>and her the ladies that call themselves the high Women,

2:27:00.600 --> 2:27:03.440
<v Speaker 2>who I told them just to go write their own

2:27:03.480 --> 2:27:09.000
<v Speaker 2>words for it. But in that sense, I never I

2:27:09.120 --> 2:27:13.160
<v Speaker 2>never felt that I wasn't getting things done or that

2:27:13.640 --> 2:27:22.120
<v Speaker 2>good things weren't happening for me. And I don't know.

2:27:22.360 --> 2:27:29.080
<v Speaker 2>I I think that you look at everybody in this business,

2:27:29.840 --> 2:27:34.200
<v Speaker 2>and not only that, but the business that I'm in,

2:27:34.360 --> 2:27:36.680
<v Speaker 2>and in the business that Cole Porter was in, and

2:27:36.760 --> 2:27:40.080
<v Speaker 2>then before him, the business that Jerome Kern was in,

2:27:43.040 --> 2:27:48.720
<v Speaker 2>and you realize that it happens to everybody. It happens

2:27:48.800 --> 2:27:53.000
<v Speaker 2>to everybody. There's a there's an arc, it goes up,

2:27:54.760 --> 2:27:59.640
<v Speaker 2>it levels off for a while, and inevitably it begins

2:27:59.760 --> 2:28:04.640
<v Speaker 2>to client. Unless you do something about that, Unless you

2:28:04.800 --> 2:28:09.000
<v Speaker 2>do something to change that trajectory. The only thing I

2:28:09.080 --> 2:28:11.920
<v Speaker 2>could think of doing was cutting a hit album as

2:28:11.959 --> 2:28:15.800
<v Speaker 2>a singer songwriter. I thought that would change. I thought

2:28:15.840 --> 2:28:19.720
<v Speaker 2>that would that would be back on the charts, back

2:28:20.160 --> 2:28:24.520
<v Speaker 2>back at the very center of things. And uh and

2:28:24.800 --> 2:28:27.240
<v Speaker 2>and that's when I began butting my head against that

2:28:27.360 --> 2:28:34.200
<v Speaker 2>brick wall. And I made an album. The first one

2:28:34.240 --> 2:28:37.760
<v Speaker 2>I produced by myself. The second one I cut at

2:28:37.840 --> 2:28:44.320
<v Speaker 2>my home studio, which is out Ensino. And I stress

2:28:44.400 --> 2:28:48.000
<v Speaker 2>that I I didn't stop making money because I didn't

2:28:48.040 --> 2:28:52.040
<v Speaker 2>have records on the charts. I was still you know,

2:28:52.240 --> 2:28:55.680
<v Speaker 2>my my annual income was pretty much the same, you

2:28:55.760 --> 2:28:59.480
<v Speaker 2>know it was. It was steady, so there. So there

2:28:59.600 --> 2:29:04.000
<v Speaker 2>was still a lot of play in those tunes, and

2:29:04.040 --> 2:29:06.119
<v Speaker 2>there were a lot of sync riots and different things

2:29:06.200 --> 2:29:10.400
<v Speaker 2>going on. Tried my hand at scoring a couple of films.

2:29:10.440 --> 2:29:14.920
<v Speaker 2>I didn't really feel like, I I don't know, it

2:29:15.040 --> 2:29:20.840
<v Speaker 2>didn't click. I made an album with George Martin. I

2:29:20.959 --> 2:29:26.160
<v Speaker 2>thought that might cure me. We made a lovely album.

2:29:27.800 --> 2:29:36.680
<v Speaker 2>Not much happened. The album, probably the best album that

2:29:36.760 --> 2:29:40.000
<v Speaker 2>I ever cut a solo artist, was Suspending Disbelief that

2:29:40.959 --> 2:29:46.039
<v Speaker 2>I did with Linda Ronstatt and George Messenberg. And another

2:29:46.160 --> 2:29:49.400
<v Speaker 2>little album called ten Easy Pieces, which is a cult

2:29:49.560 --> 2:29:53.680
<v Speaker 2>hit that I cut in a basement up in Toronto.

2:29:53.840 --> 2:29:56.120
<v Speaker 2>Was the first time I ever sung any of those

2:29:56.200 --> 2:30:02.360
<v Speaker 2>hit songs. And people can call me right now. As

2:30:02.400 --> 2:30:04.600
<v Speaker 2>soon as and when I get home, there'll be messages

2:30:04.680 --> 2:30:06.920
<v Speaker 2>for people call me and saying can I get that album?

2:30:07.959 --> 2:30:10.720
<v Speaker 2>And the fact is that it's not being manufactured anymore,

2:30:10.840 --> 2:30:14.480
<v Speaker 2>so I'm gonna have to It's a different world. I'm

2:30:14.520 --> 2:30:16.800
<v Speaker 2>gonna have to trade. I'm gonna have to find that

2:30:17.920 --> 2:30:22.320
<v Speaker 2>those masters and either get permission from those people to

2:30:25.280 --> 2:30:28.440
<v Speaker 2>get them to press some records for me to sell.

2:30:30.080 --> 2:30:34.280
<v Speaker 2>Because we make a lot of money on merchandise as well.

2:30:34.320 --> 2:30:39.320
<v Speaker 2>I mean, that's where we are today, recording all recording artists, everybody.

2:30:39.959 --> 2:30:46.600
<v Speaker 2>It's merchandise and live gigs and that's real money that

2:30:46.720 --> 2:30:50.200
<v Speaker 2>you can and it's substantial if you. I mean this

2:30:50.360 --> 2:30:55.800
<v Speaker 2>tour I'm doing just to give you, give you some idea.

2:30:58.040 --> 2:31:02.600
<v Speaker 2>This isn't all of it that I'm I'm starting in

2:31:03.040 --> 2:31:07.039
<v Speaker 2>except September through December. I'm doing what twenty shows. I'm

2:31:07.080 --> 2:31:12.000
<v Speaker 2>doing Paramount Hudson Valley. I'm doing the Old Town School

2:31:12.080 --> 2:31:15.800
<v Speaker 2>of Folk in Chicago. I'm doing the Coach House in

2:31:15.920 --> 2:31:19.160
<v Speaker 2>San Juan Capistrano, which I said last time I was there,

2:31:19.240 --> 2:31:21.720
<v Speaker 2>I sold it out. They wanted to do two nights.

2:31:22.600 --> 2:31:26.800
<v Speaker 2>I'm doing Yoshi's in Oakland. I think I sold that

2:31:26.959 --> 2:31:32.680
<v Speaker 2>place out. The Vogel many An Apple, Minneapolis. My concerts

2:31:32.720 --> 2:31:37.800
<v Speaker 2>are always full of there, Kansas City, Saint Louis, same thing, Austin.

2:31:38.000 --> 2:31:42.879
<v Speaker 2>Austin's a little bit more difficult for me, but that's

2:31:42.920 --> 2:31:44.800
<v Speaker 2>a few of the places that I'm going to be playing.

2:31:45.600 --> 2:31:50.240
<v Speaker 2>Just at the end of this year. And before COVID,

2:31:50.360 --> 2:31:54.200
<v Speaker 2>I was doing like fifty a year, and I was

2:31:54.320 --> 2:31:58.320
<v Speaker 2>making some decent money, and I thought, well, this is

2:31:58.520 --> 2:32:06.480
<v Speaker 2>real money, and I'm making the money by doing something

2:32:06.560 --> 2:32:10.760
<v Speaker 2>that I love to do, and I'm exposing my music

2:32:10.840 --> 2:32:14.680
<v Speaker 2>to the public. And that's an avenue that's been close

2:32:14.760 --> 2:32:18.880
<v Speaker 2>to me. By this digital machine thing that they've set

2:32:18.959 --> 2:32:23.200
<v Speaker 2>up here. They don't, you know, I'm not going to

2:32:23.280 --> 2:32:28.200
<v Speaker 2>be I don't think breaking a record on Spotify, so

2:32:33.160 --> 2:32:38.720
<v Speaker 2>you know, I I wish some things could have gone

2:32:39.000 --> 2:32:42.680
<v Speaker 2>better for me, But by and large, it's just been

2:32:42.720 --> 2:32:49.600
<v Speaker 2>a great life surrounded by wonderful friends, helpers all along

2:32:49.680 --> 2:32:56.840
<v Speaker 2>the way, and great personalities and friends for life everywhere

2:33:00.200 --> 2:33:02.200
<v Speaker 2>and I don't think that my life has been too

2:33:02.280 --> 2:33:05.080
<v Speaker 2>different from that of the average songwriter. I think that

2:33:05.160 --> 2:33:10.080
<v Speaker 2>most songwriters will have a red hot moment like a

2:33:10.200 --> 2:33:19.480
<v Speaker 2>Paul Anka, and then styles change, and and and and

2:33:19.640 --> 2:33:24.760
<v Speaker 2>the spotlight the spotlight, the spotlight goes, some focuses somewhere else.

2:33:27.800 --> 2:33:32.120
<v Speaker 2>I watched the same thing happen to film stars, and

2:33:32.240 --> 2:33:34.840
<v Speaker 2>I see like one of my old favorite actors like

2:33:35.000 --> 2:33:37.960
<v Speaker 2>doing some cheap movie that I mean really cheap. You

2:33:38.040 --> 2:33:41.560
<v Speaker 2>can tell that it's it's it's being shot you know

2:33:41.720 --> 2:33:45.520
<v Speaker 2>on it's you know, it's it's being shot with with

2:33:45.640 --> 2:33:52.880
<v Speaker 2>the home home cameras and mh. I realized that it

2:33:52.959 --> 2:33:55.840
<v Speaker 2>must be very disappointing for them not to be commanding

2:33:55.920 --> 2:33:59.600
<v Speaker 2>the kind of salaries that commanded the kind of respect

2:33:59.680 --> 2:34:02.800
<v Speaker 2>when they walk into a room. I understand all that,

2:34:04.840 --> 2:34:13.280
<v Speaker 2>but I cling to the idea that I am one

2:34:13.400 --> 2:34:21.960
<v Speaker 2>of the best people that do what I do, that

2:34:22.080 --> 2:34:27.400
<v Speaker 2>I could be better, that all I need is a

2:34:27.480 --> 2:34:30.800
<v Speaker 2>Broadway show. All I need that anything can happen, and

2:34:30.920 --> 2:34:34.120
<v Speaker 2>it always has happened for me, and I expect it.

2:34:34.200 --> 2:34:38.600
<v Speaker 1>Well again, Okay, you know, I don't mean to cut

2:34:38.640 --> 2:34:40.640
<v Speaker 1>you short, but we've been going on a long time.

2:34:41.240 --> 2:34:44.920
<v Speaker 1>Maybe we'll come back and visit again. But I think

2:34:45.160 --> 2:34:47.080
<v Speaker 1>you've been a good case for people to go to

2:34:47.120 --> 2:34:50.040
<v Speaker 1>see you live. There's a lot of stuff I want

2:34:50.080 --> 2:34:53.520
<v Speaker 1>to know more like the Linda Ronstad easy for you

2:34:53.680 --> 2:34:57.280
<v Speaker 1>to say and the lyrics. But I think for now

2:34:57.600 --> 2:34:59.039
<v Speaker 1>this is a good stopping point.

2:35:00.480 --> 2:35:03.480
<v Speaker 2>Okay. I mean, I hope I've given you something. Oh

2:35:03.520 --> 2:35:05.119
<v Speaker 2>you're giving me. You're giving me a lot.

2:35:05.200 --> 2:35:06.560
<v Speaker 1>I mean there's a lot. You know. Listen, when you

2:35:06.640 --> 2:35:10.320
<v Speaker 1>start telling about your personality and when you start telling

2:35:10.400 --> 2:35:12.680
<v Speaker 1>about the tales of your I eat that stuff up.

2:35:13.560 --> 2:35:18.240
<v Speaker 2>Well, you know, listen, Robert, it's tough. It's not a

2:35:18.360 --> 2:35:21.920
<v Speaker 2>life that I would recommend to anybody, but but it's mine,

2:35:23.560 --> 2:35:28.680
<v Speaker 2>and I would if I had to do it again,

2:35:30.080 --> 2:35:33.360
<v Speaker 2>I would do it again. Would I not work with

2:35:33.959 --> 2:35:38.680
<v Speaker 2>Frank Sinatra because he wasn't because he was a Republican

2:35:38.800 --> 2:35:43.280
<v Speaker 2>and because you know, the hippies didn't like him, you know,

2:35:45.160 --> 2:35:45.520
<v Speaker 2>would I?

2:35:46.160 --> 2:35:46.200
<v Speaker 4>No?

2:35:46.400 --> 2:35:46.920
<v Speaker 2>I don't think.

2:35:47.040 --> 2:35:47.080
<v Speaker 1>So.

2:35:47.520 --> 2:35:52.519
<v Speaker 2>I was privileged to walk with them, to know Lewis Armstrong,

2:35:52.760 --> 2:35:56.960
<v Speaker 2>to to know rosem Rosemy. It gives me a perspective.

2:35:57.200 --> 2:36:02.680
<v Speaker 2>It's very unique because I so new intimately, well, I

2:36:02.720 --> 2:36:05.840
<v Speaker 2>don't want to say antimately, because that that's an inference

2:36:05.920 --> 2:36:08.600
<v Speaker 2>that I don't want to put on that. But I

2:36:08.840 --> 2:36:14.640
<v Speaker 2>had fantastic relationship with Share and with with the Supremes

2:36:14.720 --> 2:36:21.160
<v Speaker 2>and with Linda Ronstadt and and uh Graham Nash and

2:36:21.320 --> 2:36:27.400
<v Speaker 2>David h who were always like good, good pals of mine.

2:36:30.240 --> 2:36:33.640
<v Speaker 2>It's enough already, well I could always get more.

2:36:33.800 --> 2:36:35.960
<v Speaker 1>But Jimmy, I want to thank you for taking this

2:36:36.160 --> 2:36:37.200
<v Speaker 1>time with my audience.

2:36:38.040 --> 2:36:41.760
<v Speaker 2>Well, thank you. It's an honor to be on this show.

2:36:41.920 --> 2:36:47.800
<v Speaker 2>It's it's well known hot spot on the internet, and

2:36:48.400 --> 2:36:53.880
<v Speaker 2>I congratulate you on that. And I haven't I hope

2:36:53.920 --> 2:36:56.520
<v Speaker 2>I haven't misled anyone. And if I've made an error,

2:36:57.920 --> 2:37:05.120
<v Speaker 2>h please the public is invited to point out my

2:37:05.879 --> 2:37:09.560
<v Speaker 2>shortcomings and honor respond on jimmyweb dot com.

2:37:10.040 --> 2:37:13.360
<v Speaker 1>Okay, you can reach out to Jimmy there. Until next time.

2:37:13.800 --> 2:37:15.199
<v Speaker 1>This is Bob left Sis