WEBVTT - Pat Simmons 0:00:08.600 --> 0:00:12.600 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Set Pod. Next, 0:00:12.800 --> 0:00:16.160 my guest today was Pat Simmons of the Doobie Bills. Pat, 0:00:16.320 --> 0:00:18.079 it's a thrill to talk to you. I thank you, 0:00:18.120 --> 0:00:21.040 Bob appreciated your ticket the time with me. So you 0:00:21.160 --> 0:00:23.799 and Tom have a new book about the Doobie Brothers 0:00:23.840 --> 0:00:27.200 Long Tream Running. How did that come to be? Let's see, Well, 0:00:27.240 --> 0:00:29.639 you know, I always thought I would write a book 0:00:29.680 --> 0:00:32.080 about the band, and then I you know, I kind 0:00:32.080 --> 0:00:36.720 of started doing stuff for years ago and never really happened. 0:00:36.760 --> 0:00:39.880 And then I thought, you know, it's probably never gonna happen, 0:00:40.560 --> 0:00:45.239 and I was doing let's see, I I was, I was. 0:00:45.880 --> 0:00:48.720 This is a little convoluted here, but I was on 0:00:48.840 --> 0:00:55.760 a at a motorcycle event. It was something called the 0:00:56.560 --> 0:01:02.200 Cannonball Uh antique motorcycle and Earns run and my wife 0:01:02.240 --> 0:01:05.160 and I have done it quite a few times, and 0:01:05.200 --> 0:01:10.800 it's a motorcycle ride across country on antique motorcycles. I've 0:01:10.800 --> 0:01:17.480 been into old bikes forever and so we were on 0:01:17.560 --> 0:01:21.280 our old bikes. I had my nineteen fourteen Hourly to 0:01:21.560 --> 0:01:26.800 Speed and she was on her nineteen twin and we 0:01:26.920 --> 0:01:31.400 had made it. Oh gosh, kind of a cross country. 0:01:31.880 --> 0:01:34.399 I think my bike had blown up by that time, 0:01:35.200 --> 0:01:38.440 but she was still riding her bike. And we we 0:01:38.520 --> 0:01:45.720 had scheduled to do an interview with a guy from 0:01:45.760 --> 0:01:50.000 the Huffington Post and his name is Crips Chris Epting, 0:01:50.240 --> 0:01:52.720 and he wanted to do an article about the ride 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:56.200 and about our participation, and it came through, you know, 0:01:56.920 --> 0:02:02.440 the the band's publicist at the time, and so he 0:02:02.520 --> 0:02:06.840 showed up. We were sometime somewhere down out in the 0:02:06.960 --> 0:02:10.919 Palm Desert, somewhere. We had made it that far, and 0:02:11.160 --> 0:02:14.919 uh so, Chris showed up and he took some pictures 0:02:14.960 --> 0:02:17.560 and started talking with us, and we did this interview 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:20.560 and it came out in the Huffington Post and it 0:02:20.680 --> 0:02:24.079 was just a really nice little article about the ride 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:27.680 and my wife and I ended up being more about 0:02:27.680 --> 0:02:31.760 my wife than me. So uh So, then we played 0:02:32.160 --> 0:02:35.520 in San Diego, probably I don't know, a week later. 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:38.520 I went right back on the road from this ride, 0:02:39.200 --> 0:02:44.040 ridden across country and then boom, I'm back on tour 0:02:44.080 --> 0:02:48.520 with the band and we're in San Diego playing and 0:02:48.919 --> 0:02:50.560 Chris lives down there. He said, you know, I'd like 0:02:50.600 --> 0:02:52.640 to come to the show. And so came to the 0:02:52.680 --> 0:02:58.680 show and after sometime during the course of events, while 0:02:58.720 --> 0:03:04.680 he was there, it around in our my hotel room. 0:03:04.760 --> 0:03:07.240 My wife and I were both there, and he said, 0:03:07.320 --> 0:03:10.160 you know, do you guys have a biography about the band? 0:03:10.240 --> 0:03:12.880 Anybody ever write a book about the band? I said no, 0:03:13.200 --> 0:03:15.240 and told him the same thing I said to you 0:03:15.280 --> 0:03:18.000 that it was always something on my bucket list, but 0:03:18.080 --> 0:03:19.920 I had never done any goes. Well, you know, I 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:24.919 just got done writing a book with John Oates kind 0:03:24.919 --> 0:03:30.240 of about his life and you know, his take on 0:03:30.680 --> 0:03:33.840 his participation in Hall of Oates. And he said, you know, 0:03:33.919 --> 0:03:37.320 I you know, if you're into it, I could help 0:03:37.360 --> 0:03:40.440 you get started on something. So I said, well, you know, 0:03:40.480 --> 0:03:43.120 maybe we could talk to the rest of the band, 0:03:43.720 --> 0:03:45.880 and so we went in. I had a little meeting 0:03:46.480 --> 0:03:51.120 with myself and Tommy and John McPhee was there as well, 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:54.040 and started talking about it, and Chris said, I could 0:03:54.400 --> 0:03:57.560 you know, I could help you. I could either you 0:03:57.600 --> 0:04:01.840 could do interviews with me and I could uh, you know, 0:04:02.240 --> 0:04:06.600 right stuff and it would sort of be He said, 0:04:06.640 --> 0:04:10.120 I think it would be most interesting to have it 0:04:10.240 --> 0:04:14.520 from your you guys joint vantage point, you know, Tommy 0:04:14.520 --> 0:04:17.560 and I you you started the band and you're still 0:04:18.120 --> 0:04:20.120 doing it, so it would be you know, you'd have 0:04:20.160 --> 0:04:24.800 a really great overview. So um, that was how it 0:04:24.880 --> 0:04:27.760 came about. And in the end, you know, I would 0:04:27.800 --> 0:04:32.800 say Tommy and I probably wrote more than Chris in 0:04:32.839 --> 0:04:35.880 the end. He would write, he wrote things, and he's 0:04:35.880 --> 0:04:39.200 a great writer, and but sometimes he'd send me something 0:04:39.240 --> 0:04:41.599 back and I think that's not the way I would 0:04:41.680 --> 0:04:44.360 tell that story. And then I would just sit down 0:04:44.440 --> 0:04:47.919 at my computer and I would retype, you know, the 0:04:47.960 --> 0:04:50.760 whole thing kind of more a little bit more from 0:04:50.760 --> 0:04:54.760 my perspective or more in my own voice. And but 0:04:54.960 --> 0:04:59.880 it was really Chris's prompting that that helped us to 0:05:00.040 --> 0:05:03.520 put it together, helped us to you know, dust off 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:06.719 the cob webs and remember events. It was funny, you know, 0:05:06.760 --> 0:05:10.560 we as we did it. Uh. We we wrote things 0:05:10.560 --> 0:05:12.760 and I would think, well, that's good, there's a story. 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:14.920 And then i'd I'd read it and I'd go, oh, 0:05:15.000 --> 0:05:18.040 I forgot about this or I forgot about that, and go, Christal, 0:05:18.120 --> 0:05:21.320 I have time to put this in. And you go, sure, 0:05:21.720 --> 0:05:23.400 you know you want to write it or you want 0:05:23.400 --> 0:05:26.240 me to interview in. We'll put it together and I go, well, 0:05:26.320 --> 0:05:28.560 let me try it, and so I would sit down 0:05:28.600 --> 0:05:31.960 and write and it became a It was a lot 0:05:32.040 --> 0:05:35.200 of work because it took us literally years to do it, 0:05:35.240 --> 0:05:38.080 but it was fun at the same time to to 0:05:38.560 --> 0:05:43.120 remember things and and it was from from my perspective anyway, 0:05:43.360 --> 0:05:46.599 it was something that I originally wanted to do myself. 0:05:47.360 --> 0:05:51.000 So being having that opportunity to actually sit down with 0:05:51.080 --> 0:05:54.080 my own in my own voice and with my computer 0:05:54.160 --> 0:05:56.919 to write it myself, I enjoyed that aspect of it. 0:05:57.080 --> 0:06:02.080 So so that was it. And uh, you know, um, 0:06:02.080 --> 0:06:05.280 you've got to thank Chris for you know, prodding us 0:06:05.279 --> 0:06:07.840 to get the project going, because really, I don't I 0:06:07.880 --> 0:06:10.080 don't know if it would have ever gotten off the 0:06:10.080 --> 0:06:12.040 ground if it hadn't been for him. Now, the two 0:06:12.080 --> 0:06:15.120 points in the book that stuck out for me were 0:06:15.240 --> 0:06:18.800 the transition from Tom to Michael McDonald. There was a 0:06:18.800 --> 0:06:21.520 lot more detail than we've ever seen in the press, 0:06:21.680 --> 0:06:26.480 and a number of negative comments about Skunk Baxter at 0:06:26.480 --> 0:06:29.760 the end of his tenure. How did you feel about 0:06:29.760 --> 0:06:31.960 writing that stuff? Was that something well, I'm just writing 0:06:32.000 --> 0:06:34.520 the truth, or you were fearful that Skunk would not 0:06:34.839 --> 0:06:40.120 like it? What was going through your mind all of that. Absolutely. Um, 0:06:40.160 --> 0:06:43.640 I h that was a very difficult time and a 0:06:43.680 --> 0:06:49.000 difficult um you know, with with Tommy leaving the band, 0:06:49.040 --> 0:06:53.400 that was a horrible time for me personally. UM. Thanks 0:06:53.440 --> 0:06:58.560 to Jeff for really uh standing by me and and 0:06:59.120 --> 0:07:00.599 you know I got a hand it to him. I 0:07:00.600 --> 0:07:06.920 think he was really strong at that point in at 0:07:06.960 --> 0:07:10.520 that transition as it as it turned out, you know, 0:07:10.600 --> 0:07:14.760 it just kind of went to went to hell in 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:19.400 terms of his relationship with with the band. You know, 0:07:19.920 --> 0:07:23.440 in the end, kind of sad I was. I didn't 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:27.080 know exactly how to present that in the end. I 0:07:27.160 --> 0:07:29.960 just kind of wrote it up the way it happened. 0:07:32.280 --> 0:07:36.520 You know. That was probably the only real kind of 0:07:37.360 --> 0:07:42.000 negative moment for me with anybody in the band in 0:07:42.120 --> 0:07:49.320 terms of kind of a rough road to maneuver. But 0:07:49.520 --> 0:07:52.680 you know, I felt like that was that was the 0:07:52.680 --> 0:07:55.080 way it went, and that was the way I wrote it. Now, 0:07:55.160 --> 0:07:58.040 subsequent to the band breaking up in the early eighties, 0:07:58.080 --> 0:08:00.720 and there were a couple of charity gigs. Have you 0:08:00.880 --> 0:08:03.680 seen Skunk? Do you have any relationship with Skunk? I 0:08:03.760 --> 0:08:10.360 have seen him, Yeah, sure, UM, not not a lot. Ideologically, 0:08:10.960 --> 0:08:16.560 we don't. We don't mesh. You know, Um, I don't 0:08:16.560 --> 0:08:19.840 know how far to get into politics because it really 0:08:19.920 --> 0:08:23.600 is political and you know what I mean, well, I 0:08:24.080 --> 0:08:28.760 won't say political ideological, but but these days, you know, 0:08:28.840 --> 0:08:31.640 ideological and political are kind of the same thing. So 0:08:32.360 --> 0:08:36.120 um yeah, I just I don't I don't buy the 0:08:37.000 --> 0:08:45.080 right wing, you know, sort of militaristic, ah intolerant if 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:50.800 you will, attitude about that part of our of our country. 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:53.240 Let's go back to the motorcycle. So how did you 0:08:53.240 --> 0:08:56.760 get into motorcycles? Let's see, Well, you know, kind of 0:08:57.080 --> 0:09:01.080 I had friends in high school that that row, and 0:09:01.360 --> 0:09:07.439 they were always encouraging me to get into bikes. And 0:09:07.760 --> 0:09:16.120 I my first, you know, probably serious girlfriend's brother, um 0:09:17.000 --> 0:09:22.320 road with He had an old gosh, it was in 0:09:22.559 --> 0:09:27.880 nineteen forty forty one Knucklehead Harley that he wrote that 0:09:27.960 --> 0:09:30.800 was his everyday transportation. Really, I don't even think he 0:09:30.840 --> 0:09:34.560 had a car at that point. And I loved that bike. 0:09:34.679 --> 0:09:37.040 I just admired the bike so much. And I had 0:09:37.840 --> 0:09:42.839 I had ridden, um you know, Hondas and stuff, and 0:09:42.960 --> 0:09:45.920 um not nothing I ever owned. It always belonged to 0:09:46.240 --> 0:09:49.200 my friends, and I rode and then one day this 0:09:49.559 --> 0:09:57.439 buddy of mine, Bill said, you know, I have a 0:09:57.480 --> 0:10:01.520 B S A four. He went, Victor, it's up in 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:05.560 northern California at the guy's house and I loaned it 0:10:05.600 --> 0:10:09.880 to him to ride. And uh, I can't remember. We 0:10:09.920 --> 0:10:12.000 had probably talked about it at one point, he said, 0:10:12.040 --> 0:10:14.800 but that bike's up in northern California. He said, I 0:10:14.840 --> 0:10:17.040 gave it to him to ride, and he's not riding it. 0:10:17.240 --> 0:10:20.760 So you know, if if you want to ride that bike, 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:22.920 all you gotta do is go up and get it 0:10:23.120 --> 0:10:26.520 and you can ride it. So I said, oh, let's go. 0:10:26.960 --> 0:10:30.400 So we jumped in. I had a little MGB hatchback 0:10:31.240 --> 0:10:33.720 and we jumped in that car and we drove up 0:10:33.760 --> 0:10:37.200 to Crescent City, which is way up in northern California, 0:10:37.320 --> 0:10:41.920 right on the Oregon border. And uh. We got to 0:10:41.960 --> 0:10:45.480 the guy's place late at night and he said, you know, 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:47.920 where's the bike. He said, Oh, it's in over and 0:10:48.000 --> 0:10:50.959 my dad's business. It's in the garage. His dad had 0:10:50.960 --> 0:10:54.840 some kind of a of a business, screen door business 0:10:54.920 --> 0:10:59.160 or something. He goes over there and we can go 0:10:59.240 --> 0:11:01.679 get it in the morning. So so we stayed the night. 0:11:01.720 --> 0:11:03.200 We got up in the morning, we went over there 0:11:03.880 --> 0:11:05.840 and we walked and go where's the bike and he 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:08.720 points over in the corner. He goes, it's over there, 0:11:08.760 --> 0:11:11.680 and we look at a bunch of cardboard boxes and 0:11:11.679 --> 0:11:17.360 the bike was completely disassembled. So there's the engine here, 0:11:17.480 --> 0:11:20.920 the frames laying there and stuff is you know, not 0:11:21.080 --> 0:11:24.440 completely the engine had not been disassembled. Luckily, it was 0:11:24.480 --> 0:11:28.360 still in one piece. So anyway, we we Uh. My 0:11:28.400 --> 0:11:31.600 buddy says, well, we're taking the bike and he goes, yeah, well, 0:11:31.960 --> 0:11:33.760 I tried to fix it. He goes, I was gonna 0:11:34.000 --> 0:11:37.199 I'm fixing it. He goes, if you're fixing it, why 0:11:37.240 --> 0:11:40.240 did you tear it all to apart? And he goes, oh, 0:11:40.320 --> 0:11:42.719 you know, we just thought that's what we needed to do. 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:45.760 And he goes, I shook our heads. So put it 0:11:45.760 --> 0:11:48.240 in the back of my hatchback and I, you know, 0:11:48.280 --> 0:11:51.000 I tied the back. It couldn't even fit it in there, really, 0:11:51.120 --> 0:11:53.719 so it's hanging out the back. And we drove back 0:11:53.800 --> 0:11:56.120 up north and we got to San Jose and there 0:11:56.200 --> 0:12:02.480 was still it was in those days, it was late sixties, 0:12:02.520 --> 0:12:05.400 there was still a B. S. A dealership in San Jose. 0:12:05.559 --> 0:12:08.760 So we stopped either and I picked up a manual, 0:12:09.040 --> 0:12:13.560 a repair manual, took it home, laid it all out 0:12:13.880 --> 0:12:16.880 and started putting it together. I had my manual there 0:12:17.120 --> 0:12:19.920 and I started putting the bike together, and then my 0:12:20.000 --> 0:12:24.680 girlfriend's uh brother came over and he kind of gave 0:12:24.679 --> 0:12:27.480 me a few pointers. All I really had for tools 0:12:27.640 --> 0:12:30.480 was like a couple of screwdrivers and a pair of 0:12:30.559 --> 0:12:32.800 pliers in a crescent ranch. That was kind of the 0:12:32.920 --> 0:12:36.120 extent of my tool collection. But believe it or not, 0:12:36.240 --> 0:12:38.679 you can do a lot with with that. And so 0:12:38.800 --> 0:12:41.480 I started putting the bike together. I put it all together, 0:12:42.320 --> 0:12:47.280 put it back together, and I couldn't get it started. 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:49.920 It wouldn't start. And then so I'm looking through, well, 0:12:50.000 --> 0:12:52.160 it could be this, it could be that, and uh 0:12:52.640 --> 0:12:57.400 so I I just started take went down to the 0:12:57.480 --> 0:13:00.280 b s A shop. I said, give me a give 0:13:00.320 --> 0:13:05.960 me this or that and different parts, and started replacing 0:13:06.000 --> 0:13:08.920 parts in the bike. And every time I would replace 0:13:08.960 --> 0:13:10.680 a part, I try to start it and try to 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:15.520 start it. And then finally it started and it wasn't 0:13:15.559 --> 0:13:18.200 you know, it was running really rough, but I dialed 0:13:18.240 --> 0:13:21.080 it in and had a little uh you know, British 0:13:21.160 --> 0:13:24.520 carburetor on it. I forget what they call those carburetors, 0:13:24.520 --> 0:13:27.760 but anyway, and just started, you know, tweaking on it, 0:13:27.920 --> 0:13:30.280 and dialed it in, got that bike running, and I 0:13:30.360 --> 0:13:32.920 rode the bike for the next couple of years. That 0:13:33.040 --> 0:13:36.200 was not my main motor transportation, but at times it 0:13:36.400 --> 0:13:38.560 was because my car would break down and then I 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:42.400 have nothing but that that motorcycle. So um and it 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:48.160 was a single cylinder bike with it had was supposed 0:13:48.160 --> 0:13:52.199 to have a compression release because they are super high compression, 0:13:52.600 --> 0:13:57.199 and the compression release was broken. So when you started, 0:13:57.360 --> 0:13:59.680 it would kick back, and sometimes it would kick back 0:13:59.679 --> 0:14:03.320 and just about send you over the handlebars, you know, 0:14:03.360 --> 0:14:06.400 it kicked back so hard. And anyway, I learned a 0:14:06.400 --> 0:14:10.400 lot about, you know, mechanics on motorcycles. I already understood 0:14:10.440 --> 0:14:12.640 a certain amount of mechanics. I had worked in gas 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:16.480 stations and stuff. But uh so I really cut my 0:14:16.520 --> 0:14:19.800 teeth on that bike. And then years later I got in, 0:14:20.000 --> 0:14:21.880 you know, I went out and bought a Harley. When 0:14:21.920 --> 0:14:24.360 I finally made some money with the band, I went 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.520 about Harley Davidson. But but that old B S A 0:14:27.720 --> 0:14:29.640 was a great, great old bike. It was fun. You 0:14:29.640 --> 0:14:32.160 could you could it did a lot, you know. It 0:14:32.240 --> 0:14:33.880 was a good street bike. You could take it in 0:14:33.920 --> 0:14:36.800 the dirt. It was just a lot of fun. It 0:14:36.880 --> 0:14:41.480 was a neat bike, and I had another one until 0:14:41.560 --> 0:14:46.040 recently I just sold it. But anyway, that's kind of 0:14:46.120 --> 0:14:49.000 my beginning. That's how I got into bikes. You worked 0:14:49.000 --> 0:14:52.840 in gas stations and you rebuilt this motorcycle. Were you 0:14:52.920 --> 0:14:56.920 also a tinker with your musical equipment a little bit? Uh? 0:14:57.000 --> 0:15:03.200 You know, Uh, I didn't really, I I was. I 0:15:03.200 --> 0:15:05.600 started playing guitar when I was eight years old, so 0:15:06.120 --> 0:15:08.640 you know, I had to learn about the ins and 0:15:08.680 --> 0:15:13.280 outs of replacing strings and tuning and and you know, 0:15:13.440 --> 0:15:20.200 parts of the guitar. I never really built or rebuilt guitars. Um. 0:15:20.240 --> 0:15:23.080 You know, I just my guitars were all always stock 0:15:24.080 --> 0:15:27.680 instruments pretty much. Um. If I had anything you know, 0:15:28.880 --> 0:15:30.480 crazy I want to do, I would send it to 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:33.440 a you know, an expert, you know, somebody that had 0:15:33.480 --> 0:15:39.640 a guitar shop or something, you know where they worked 0:15:39.640 --> 0:15:43.640 on instruments. But yeah, you know, in terms of you know, 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:48.240 really tinkering, I don't think I ever really. I mean, 0:15:48.280 --> 0:15:52.320 I've taken guitar guitars completely apart and put them back 0:15:52.360 --> 0:15:55.880 together again, uh you know, but they were always with 0:15:55.960 --> 0:15:58.480 the same parts that that came out of them pretty much. 0:15:59.200 --> 0:16:01.680 So how many motor cycles you own now, I don't know. 0:16:02.400 --> 0:16:07.720 Quite a few I've got, I've got, you know, a 0:16:07.800 --> 0:16:13.680 garage I keep mad. I don't know, probably thirty or forty, 0:16:13.840 --> 0:16:17.280 about forty forty, probably closer to forty. Okay. I don't 0:16:17.320 --> 0:16:22.680 know anybody who's ever owned a motorcycle who hasn't dumped frequently, 0:16:22.800 --> 0:16:26.680 not even their fault. Fault is a driver in a car, whatever, 0:16:27.000 --> 0:16:30.800 what has been your experience. There's only two types of bikers, 0:16:30.880 --> 0:16:33.120 the ones that have been down and the ones that 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:39.240 are going down. You know, it's uh, it's something that 0:16:39.360 --> 0:16:42.000 kind of comes with the territory and and really you 0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:47.000 have to I don't think everybody has to take a 0:16:47.000 --> 0:16:51.160 spill on a bike, but often, you know, you you 0:16:51.280 --> 0:16:54.560 push the envelope and that's where the problem is starting. 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:59.600 It's usually often you're not going that fast. Um, you know, 0:17:00.240 --> 0:17:03.880 most people dump a bike in the gravel and they 0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:06.040 may be only going a couple of miles an hour, 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:09.600 but bikes get really squirrely in the gravel, and if 0:17:09.640 --> 0:17:13.639 you hit the brake, especially the front break, you're probably 0:17:13.680 --> 0:17:17.040 gonna go down on the bike on the street. That's 0:17:17.119 --> 0:17:21.080 often when you you're you know, maybe you're you're out 0:17:21.600 --> 0:17:26.560 on a wet road, or you're you're somewhere where somebody 0:17:27.119 --> 0:17:31.399 has been parked or dropped some oil and you happen 0:17:31.480 --> 0:17:36.080 to go through that that spot. Um Probably most often 0:17:36.080 --> 0:17:39.159 it's when people are going too fast on a bike 0:17:39.359 --> 0:17:43.399 and they you know, coming into a corner. That's often 0:17:43.440 --> 0:17:48.280 a place where people lose it on motorcycles. I've really 0:17:48.400 --> 0:17:55.880 learned a lot about safety equipment, wearing the right clothes. 0:17:57.800 --> 0:18:00.360 I didn't used to wear a helmet in the old day. 0:18:00.960 --> 0:18:05.080 After friends of mine had some horrible accidents and were 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:09.720 wearing helmets, I decided, I'm going to go, you know 0:18:10.400 --> 0:18:15.640 with with the helmet, and I'm glad. I had one 0:18:15.800 --> 0:18:18.240 spill and I was wearing a helmet, and I don't 0:18:18.359 --> 0:18:20.680 think I actually hit my head, but I was really 0:18:20.720 --> 0:18:24.119 happy I was wearing a helmet and and and wearing 0:18:24.160 --> 0:18:26.200 all the equipment that I needed. I had the leather 0:18:26.280 --> 0:18:30.639 pants on, and I know, skidded on the road, and 0:18:30.720 --> 0:18:34.359 you know, I actually my toe in my boot, which 0:18:34.400 --> 0:18:37.120 is a steel toe boot, wore all the way through 0:18:37.160 --> 0:18:41.679 the leather to the steel toe and scraped. So you know, 0:18:41.720 --> 0:18:44.359 we're having the right equipment is really important on a bike. 0:18:44.400 --> 0:18:47.359 I have gloves on as well, you know, so I 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:50.919 didn't sustain any injuries. I kind of squashed squashed my 0:18:51.000 --> 0:18:53.240 toe in my boot and my toe hurt for a while. 0:18:53.640 --> 0:18:57.200 And but the bike was fairly well scraped up and 0:18:58.240 --> 0:19:02.280 you know bent bent components and so on. So you know, 0:19:02.359 --> 0:19:07.280 there's safety is an issue, and the proper clothing can 0:19:07.320 --> 0:19:10.879 really make a big difference. And how you you know 0:19:10.920 --> 0:19:14.119 what happens to you in that instance. So what motivated 0:19:14.160 --> 0:19:17.160 you to play the guitar at AG Well, let's see, 0:19:17.200 --> 0:19:21.399 I had taken piano lessons when I was a little kid, uh, 0:19:21.480 --> 0:19:31.040 and I you know, I just loved music, Um, I had. 0:19:31.359 --> 0:19:34.000 I've listened to music all my life, you know, since 0:19:34.040 --> 0:19:38.960 I was a small child, and so I've always been 0:19:39.040 --> 0:19:45.720 inspired by by music in general, all kinds of music, uh, 0:19:46.680 --> 0:19:53.640 specifically rock music in the fifties. You know, I probably 0:19:53.640 --> 0:19:56.680 had a similar kind of experience that that Tom had, 0:19:56.720 --> 0:19:59.240 and that I had a you know, an older friend. 0:19:59.680 --> 0:20:01.879 I think it was his brother that probably turned him 0:20:01.920 --> 0:20:05.119 onto some of the the coolest music. But I we 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:08.120 I had a friend of the family that had come 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:09.800 to stay at our house he was in the middle. 0:20:10.000 --> 0:20:13.120 He was just going into the army and he came 0:20:13.200 --> 0:20:14.760 stayed to our house a little bit, and then he 0:20:14.840 --> 0:20:18.919 left his entire record collection of forty five and it 0:20:19.040 --> 0:20:22.840 was just all the best songs from the area, you know, 0:20:22.880 --> 0:20:32.400 the Everly Brothers, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, Bobby Darren, the Coasters, 0:20:34.600 --> 0:20:41.359 Connie Francis, too too many to even remember. But so um, 0:20:42.080 --> 0:20:44.920 I list sat there and listen to those records for 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:48.560 every day, for hours. I would just sit and listen, 0:20:49.280 --> 0:20:52.200 you know, until I was exhausted, you know, from listening, 0:20:52.800 --> 0:20:57.160 and uh, across the street one you know, I met 0:20:57.200 --> 0:21:00.320 the kid across the street and I around the same time. 0:21:00.400 --> 0:21:03.679 Everything kind of clicked at once I went over to 0:21:03.760 --> 0:21:07.159 his house. I had met him, you know, playing outdoors. 0:21:07.880 --> 0:21:13.440 We just moved into the neighborhood and went over to 0:21:13.560 --> 0:21:17.480 his house and walked. He took me into his bedroom 0:21:17.600 --> 0:21:20.639 and sitting there in the corner was a guitar and 0:21:20.720 --> 0:21:24.199 it was, you know, an arch top harmony guitar, but 0:21:24.520 --> 0:21:27.560 kind of a upper upper end harmony. It was a 0:21:27.680 --> 0:21:34.680 nice guitar for the times. And I just I froze, 0:21:34.720 --> 0:21:36.600 you know when I saw the guitar, because I had 0:21:36.600 --> 0:21:41.800 never I've never seen a guitar in up in person, 0:21:42.080 --> 0:21:44.280 you know. I've seen him on television and of course 0:21:44.400 --> 0:21:48.199 new people played guitars here him on records, but I 0:21:48.200 --> 0:21:50.679 had never seen one. And there it was in the corner. 0:21:50.680 --> 0:21:54.399 I'm just like, it was magical, you know this, wow, 0:21:54.560 --> 0:21:57.520 there it is. We had a piano and that that 0:21:57.640 --> 0:22:01.840 was pretty magical too, But guitar, there's something about it. 0:22:01.840 --> 0:22:07.080 They're just called to me. And so I said, you know, 0:22:07.440 --> 0:22:11.000 can I touch it? Yeah, go ahead to pick it up, 0:22:11.000 --> 0:22:14.240 you know, strum it if you want to. So I 0:22:14.320 --> 0:22:16.840 took it overset on his bed and he put the 0:22:16.880 --> 0:22:20.439 guitar in my hands and and I just, you know, 0:22:20.480 --> 0:22:23.040 I strummed it. And he goes, you want me to 0:22:23.040 --> 0:22:26.000 teach you a chord? And I go yeah. So he 0:22:26.040 --> 0:22:29.440 taught me a g chord and that was the beginning. 0:22:29.920 --> 0:22:33.199 And I was there every day at his house after that. 0:22:33.359 --> 0:22:36.880 Every Hey, Ronnie, can I can I come in look 0:22:36.920 --> 0:22:39.720 at your guitar player? Guitar? Sure, come on in. And 0:22:39.840 --> 0:22:42.240 he had his dad had a guitar to his mom. 0:22:42.480 --> 0:22:46.360 His mom and dad were sort of country folk musicians 0:22:46.560 --> 0:22:49.600 and they had a band or had had a band 0:22:49.640 --> 0:22:52.400 at one point or another, and so his dad had 0:22:52.400 --> 0:22:55.840 a guitar too, So we sat there together and he 0:22:55.880 --> 0:22:58.600 would he taught me chords, and then pretty soon we 0:22:58.600 --> 0:23:03.520 were playing so looks together. He taught me songs and 0:23:03.560 --> 0:23:06.399 that was it. I was off from there on. I 0:23:06.720 --> 0:23:13.159 was you know, live, eat, breathe, guitar songs music. You know, 0:23:13.240 --> 0:23:15.800 that was okay. So this was in the state of Washington. 0:23:16.000 --> 0:23:21.600 It was in California nineteen fifty eight probably, but you 0:23:21.640 --> 0:23:23.879 were born in the state of Washington. Is I was 0:23:23.920 --> 0:23:26.080 born in the state of Washington. And how did you 0:23:26.119 --> 0:23:29.000 end up moving to California. My father was an educator. 0:23:29.119 --> 0:23:35.520 He was a teacher, and my mother was also and 0:23:35.840 --> 0:23:38.880 my father had I went to school to my dad 0:23:38.920 --> 0:23:41.800 in Washington for a little bit. He was a principal 0:23:41.840 --> 0:23:44.960 at a school I attended when I was just a kindergartener, 0:23:45.800 --> 0:23:48.920 and that's how I came to play the piano a 0:23:49.000 --> 0:23:54.760 little bit. My dad would take me to some uh 0:23:55.119 --> 0:24:00.520 one of the students parents and lived nearby, and this 0:24:00.720 --> 0:24:06.119 kid's grandmother was there, and somehow my dad became acquainted 0:24:06.160 --> 0:24:09.560 with her and asked her if she would keep an 0:24:09.600 --> 0:24:11.960 eye on me. After I got out of class. I 0:24:12.000 --> 0:24:14.359 would go half a day, and then my dad was 0:24:14.400 --> 0:24:17.879 there all day until about three or four in the afternoon. 0:24:18.160 --> 0:24:21.360 And so about noon I would go to this lady's 0:24:21.400 --> 0:24:27.239 house and really like the first couple of days we 0:24:27.240 --> 0:24:32.000 were there, I saw her piano sitting in the living 0:24:32.080 --> 0:24:34.720 room and I went over and I tinkled on. I 0:24:34.760 --> 0:24:39.320 can remember really memorable going over and you know, hitting 0:24:39.359 --> 0:24:42.159 the keys. And she said, oh, do you play the piano? 0:24:42.200 --> 0:24:46.480 And I go, Now, we my sister plays. She was, oh, 0:24:46.520 --> 0:24:49.440 you have a piano at home. I go, yeah, she said, 0:24:49.880 --> 0:24:55.800 what would you like to learn? I go sure, She said, well, 0:24:55.880 --> 0:25:00.160 I I teach piano among other things, and you I'd 0:25:00.160 --> 0:25:03.879 be glad to you know, your hair every day, you know, 0:25:03.920 --> 0:25:05.800 would you like to learn to play? And I go, 0:25:07.280 --> 0:25:10.120 she goes, I love. I love to teach piano. So 0:25:10.200 --> 0:25:13.040 she started teaching the piano, and I was there every 0:25:13.119 --> 0:25:16.119 day for the next I don't know how it was, 0:25:16.200 --> 0:25:20.439 probably however long you go for a year, eight months 0:25:20.520 --> 0:25:23.879 or something, but five five days a week I was 0:25:23.920 --> 0:25:28.360 there at her house, playing the piano and loving it, 0:25:28.440 --> 0:25:30.280 you know. And then she was more than she was 0:25:30.320 --> 0:25:32.720 a teacher, but she was a mentor as well, so 0:25:32.800 --> 0:25:36.720 she you know, we would spend a half hour on 0:25:36.800 --> 0:25:40.520 the piano and then it was a cool routine. Every 0:25:40.560 --> 0:25:43.399 day I looked forward to it. We would play a 0:25:43.400 --> 0:25:47.359 little piano and then she would say, okay, time for 0:25:47.440 --> 0:25:53.000 cookies and milk. And so then we'd sit and she 0:25:53.119 --> 0:25:54.919 turned on the radio and every day, you know, the 0:25:55.000 --> 0:25:59.680 Liberaci at a radio show, and she loved that, being 0:25:59.720 --> 0:26:04.400 a anno person, music person. And we'd listened to Libracci 0:26:04.920 --> 0:26:07.680 live on the radio and you know, he would play 0:26:07.760 --> 0:26:11.480 and he was of course, he was fabulous musician and 0:26:11.960 --> 0:26:14.360 funny too, you know, so it was entertaining for all, 0:26:14.560 --> 0:26:18.040 for both of us. But you know that it was 0:26:18.160 --> 0:26:23.680 you know, great applic you know, really uh direct application, 0:26:23.760 --> 0:26:25.320 you know. So I would learn and then I would 0:26:25.400 --> 0:26:28.359 listen to what you know, what could happen if you 0:26:28.440 --> 0:26:32.520 continued in music, you could be playing like and she 0:26:32.200 --> 0:26:34.399 would she told me, you know, if you if you 0:26:34.520 --> 0:26:37.360 keep going, you know you could you could do this too, 0:26:37.400 --> 0:26:41.240 if you if it's in your you know, if it's 0:26:41.280 --> 0:26:44.040 something that calls you, you know you could you could 0:26:44.359 --> 0:26:49.520 be a great piano player. So I never I loved it. 0:26:49.560 --> 0:26:52.200 But then when we ended up in California, my dad 0:26:52.240 --> 0:26:55.359 got an offer for a job in California. So I 0:26:55.400 --> 0:26:59.720 was so happy because I was in Aberdeen, Washington, which 0:26:59.760 --> 0:27:05.960 is like, you know, arguably the rainiest part of the state. 0:27:06.080 --> 0:27:09.520 You know, it's the Pacific rainforest near the coast, and 0:27:09.880 --> 0:27:14.240 pretty much my memories are rain every day. You know, 0:27:14.280 --> 0:27:18.639 it rained every day in my rain really hard some days. 0:27:18.680 --> 0:27:21.159 But even if it wasn't raining hard, it was sprinkling 0:27:21.240 --> 0:27:26.320 or something. It was just always wet, always misty. And so, 0:27:26.520 --> 0:27:29.400 you know, come in California was like I had heard 0:27:29.440 --> 0:27:31.520 of California. It was like, you know, that's where the 0:27:31.560 --> 0:27:35.359 cowboys go, you know, that's where they take their cattle. 0:27:37.160 --> 0:27:42.040 And so we ended up in Palaulto, kind of south 0:27:42.119 --> 0:27:44.560 of San Francisco there, and we spent a year there 0:27:44.600 --> 0:27:47.919 and then ended up in San Jose. And when I 0:27:48.000 --> 0:27:53.000 was about six, I guess six seven, we ended up 0:27:53.160 --> 0:27:56.680 moving to San Jose and I grew up there. That's 0:27:56.680 --> 0:28:00.840 where I was through high school and college, through San Jose, 0:28:01.240 --> 0:28:04.320 all through you know, getting together with with the band 0:28:04.359 --> 0:28:06.520 the Doobie Brothers. I was, you know, I'm a San 0:28:06.600 --> 0:28:18.560 Jose guy. Okay, So you're in school, good student, popular, 0:28:18.880 --> 0:28:22.200 bad student, unpopular. I was a good student. I don't 0:28:22.200 --> 0:28:24.920 know what popular is. I wasn't as popular as I 0:28:25.000 --> 0:28:30.359 as I wished I was, you know. Um, but I 0:28:30.400 --> 0:28:35.640 did well in school, and I love sports. I participated 0:28:35.720 --> 0:28:39.080 in everything, you know, student council. I was always involved, 0:28:39.760 --> 0:28:44.200 you know, and that that aspect of school and you 0:28:44.320 --> 0:28:48.040 finished college. I did not finish college. I went until 0:28:48.320 --> 0:28:55.240 I got a high lottery number in the draft. You know, 0:28:55.280 --> 0:28:59.520 I kind of thought I would go back. I I 0:29:00.120 --> 0:29:03.520 the whole time, I should say, I was playing music, 0:29:03.680 --> 0:29:08.640 like continuously really, from the time I was eight years old, 0:29:09.680 --> 0:29:13.240 playing the guitar. I just played, you know, every day, 0:29:13.280 --> 0:29:19.360 all the time until I could really perform, you know, 0:29:19.400 --> 0:29:21.960 until I could get up in front of an audience 0:29:22.080 --> 0:29:27.920 and and entertain. Um. I think my my parents sort 0:29:27.920 --> 0:29:32.840 of encouraged me in that aspect for a while until 0:29:32.960 --> 0:29:37.520 I until I reached high school, and you know, everything 0:29:37.600 --> 0:29:44.080 kind of changed culturally too, you know, long hair and 0:29:44.200 --> 0:29:46.959 psychedelics and stuff, and then it became a different you know, 0:29:47.480 --> 0:29:51.040 they were freaked out by that, of course, Um, but 0:29:51.800 --> 0:29:55.920 pretty much, you know, continually continually played music and and 0:29:56.000 --> 0:29:58.920 that was always part of it. And so so I 0:29:59.280 --> 0:30:02.360 love college, love learning. And when I went I ended 0:30:02.440 --> 0:30:07.600 up at San Jose State UM, and you know, had 0:30:07.880 --> 0:30:12.680 all intentions of getting a degree, and as time went 0:30:12.760 --> 0:30:18.640 on UM music became more of a focal point for me. 0:30:18.800 --> 0:30:23.760 I thought, you know, if I, if I don't pursue this, 0:30:24.840 --> 0:30:27.440 I could see people around me who were, you know, 0:30:27.520 --> 0:30:32.120 having success in music, and I didn't think we're that great. 0:30:32.440 --> 0:30:36.520 And then so I thought, you know, I you know, 0:30:36.680 --> 0:30:39.520 I may, I may never get rich doing this, but 0:30:39.600 --> 0:30:44.440 at least I can uh maybe make a living around town, 0:30:44.920 --> 0:30:47.760 you know, I can get some gigs at clubs, and 0:30:47.800 --> 0:30:49.840 I did. I was able to work, you know, so 0:30:50.240 --> 0:30:54.760 to me, you know, I've always had jobs, you know, 0:30:55.080 --> 0:30:59.720 hourly jobs, but none was as satisfying as as playing 0:30:59.760 --> 0:31:04.000 you sick, and you know, you make you make more 0:31:04.040 --> 0:31:07.160 money per hour, you know, playing music than then you're 0:31:07.160 --> 0:31:11.520 going to make doing almost any well, not almost anything else, 0:31:11.560 --> 0:31:15.560 but certainly minimum wage jobs at least. Okay, I'm a 0:31:15.560 --> 0:31:18.800 little younger than you, and you know, the early sixties 0:31:18.880 --> 0:31:22.640 was the folk boom. Everybody was playing a nylon string guitar. 0:31:22.840 --> 0:31:27.880 The Beatles hit boom, everybody gets an electric guitar, everybody's 0:31:27.920 --> 0:31:33.200 forming bands. Ay were you playing out before the Beatles? B. 0:31:33.560 --> 0:31:35.520 What was it like when the Beatles hit for you? 0:31:35.720 --> 0:31:41.080 I was already playing electric guitar. I kind of I 0:31:41.560 --> 0:31:45.320 went from acoustic guitar. I was kind of a roots guy. 0:31:46.240 --> 0:31:49.040 I I played, you know, a little bit of country 0:31:49.160 --> 0:31:52.240 music when I was very young, and then when the 0:31:52.280 --> 0:31:55.680 folk boom came about in the early sixties, I love 0:31:55.760 --> 0:32:01.920 that music. I mean I you know, they were TV 0:32:02.080 --> 0:32:09.520 shows that you know, every week that portrayed music, the Limelighters, 0:32:09.560 --> 0:32:13.840 and you know, there were some successful groups in the 0:32:13.920 --> 0:32:19.360 Kingston Trio. Um, this is earlier, kind of pre there. 0:32:19.400 --> 0:32:25.040 I kind of there was a delineation from more ah, 0:32:26.040 --> 0:32:32.040 what would be the word real early American folk songs? 0:32:32.080 --> 0:32:39.760 Would he got three um pete seeger Odetta. I'm trying 0:32:39.800 --> 0:32:45.600 to think of people that were, you know, within that context, 0:32:47.200 --> 0:32:53.480 even people like Johnny cash Um. I can't remember some 0:32:53.560 --> 0:32:59.080 of some of the names, but people that sang more 0:32:59.120 --> 0:33:04.200 traditionalist word it's more traditional music. It's it's early American music, 0:33:04.360 --> 0:33:07.480 older songs, things that were written at the turn of 0:33:07.520 --> 0:33:12.840 the century and then came a more modern era with 0:33:13.560 --> 0:33:18.600 I would think probably the most obvious proponent or you know, 0:33:19.200 --> 0:33:21.920 someone to site would be a band like Peter Paul 0:33:21.960 --> 0:33:27.600 and Mary who suddenly were writing more contemporary songs and 0:33:27.600 --> 0:33:32.200 and UM singing songs by contemporary writers, Bob Dylan being 0:33:32.240 --> 0:33:38.880 the obvious writer, and so that UM really appealed to me. 0:33:39.520 --> 0:33:43.120 Those new songs. I had been singing, you know, early 0:33:43.120 --> 0:33:48.400 American folk songs, burl ives kind of stuff. I had 0:33:48.440 --> 0:33:55.520 teachers that that loved that early music, and I loved 0:33:55.520 --> 0:33:59.000 it too, you know. And and then suddenly there was 0:33:59.080 --> 0:34:04.480 this new uh songwriting going on and kind of obscure 0:34:04.600 --> 0:34:08.240 images that were not as obvious and what those songs 0:34:08.239 --> 0:34:12.160 are even about. Sometimes probably for my young mind, I 0:34:12.200 --> 0:34:15.560 didn't even know what some of those songs were about, 0:34:15.640 --> 0:34:19.040 but I knew that they connected with something, you know, 0:34:19.239 --> 0:34:22.520 in in my in my psyche and and my soul. 0:34:23.200 --> 0:34:29.480 And so that's where I started looking at another aspect 0:34:29.719 --> 0:34:35.359 of of music, songwriting particularly. And then there were at 0:34:35.360 --> 0:34:40.160 that same time here shortly after that, there was in 0:34:40.440 --> 0:34:46.879 the British music scene with you know, the Stones, the Animals, 0:34:47.360 --> 0:34:54.600 um them uh and I love that, and I thought 0:34:54.760 --> 0:35:02.960 that was a There were other artists that I had 0:35:03.000 --> 0:35:07.040 been was familiar with that were more rock oriented artists 0:35:07.040 --> 0:35:14.440 that were blues based, you know, um bo Diddley Chuck Berry. 0:35:14.480 --> 0:35:18.400 But in my mind those were kind of folk artists 0:35:18.440 --> 0:35:22.640 as well. The songs that they wrote and sang, we're 0:35:23.120 --> 0:35:27.479 reflective of our of our daily lives, you know, uh, 0:35:27.640 --> 0:35:30.400 certainly of their daily lives. Probably not my daily life. 0:35:30.760 --> 0:35:32.920 I was, you know, white kid in the suburbs. They 0:35:32.960 --> 0:35:36.000 were black kids from you know, the south and the city, 0:35:36.080 --> 0:35:42.520 but certainly similar music, probably to some of the more 0:35:42.560 --> 0:35:45.080 modern folk music that was coming out. So it all 0:35:45.520 --> 0:35:49.480 it all for me, It's all jelled into a movement 0:35:49.600 --> 0:35:53.759 in music that really spoke to me. And you know, 0:35:53.800 --> 0:35:59.839 I began to two. I discovered the blues, you know, 0:36:00.239 --> 0:36:07.200 uh that that was really meaningful to me at that 0:36:07.360 --> 0:36:11.040 moment in time. I had a friend that was a 0:36:11.080 --> 0:36:16.120 singer at a folk club and I I went I 0:36:16.160 --> 0:36:18.640 would see him play. It was an older guy and 0:36:18.719 --> 0:36:21.279 he was singing the blues, and I thought, that is 0:36:21.840 --> 0:36:26.520 there's there's some music that I aspired to, and so 0:36:26.600 --> 0:36:29.520 I started taking lessons from him. He turned me onto 0:36:29.800 --> 0:36:33.600 you know, different blues artists and and that, and that 0:36:33.640 --> 0:36:38.919 became another focal part in my life. And then from 0:36:38.960 --> 0:36:42.040 there I started looking around and realizing that there was 0:36:42.080 --> 0:36:48.040 some you know, the British blues scene was so wonderful 0:36:48.120 --> 0:36:53.719 because it it turned turned a lot of people onto 0:36:54.440 --> 0:36:57.920 you know, really great people that we had probably not 0:36:58.040 --> 0:37:02.120 I I certainly had not been aware of bb King 0:37:02.480 --> 0:37:11.040 and Albert King and you know, Bobby Blue Bland and 0:37:11.080 --> 0:37:15.800 so when I've heard their music, but only on the fringe, 0:37:15.880 --> 0:37:20.560 you know. And then suddenly that music came alive for me. 0:37:20.680 --> 0:37:23.960 And so I started listening to the blues and uh 0:37:24.120 --> 0:37:28.000 and and learning the blues and you know Paul Butterfield, 0:37:28.880 --> 0:37:35.240 Mike Bloomfield again that I bought that that first Butterfield album, 0:37:35.400 --> 0:37:39.440 and I listened to that album over and over and 0:37:39.680 --> 0:37:43.080 over again. I was like, I wouldn't you know, it 0:37:43.200 --> 0:37:47.200 was just such a wonderful album. And then being there 0:37:47.239 --> 0:37:50.279 in the Bay Area when the Psycho, you know, when 0:37:50.320 --> 0:37:55.040 the Bill Grahams and and all the San Francisco bands 0:37:55.440 --> 0:38:01.280 began again that was the edge of folk and electric. Um. 0:38:01.320 --> 0:38:03.600 It was just such a you know, I was so 0:38:03.719 --> 0:38:08.040 inspired by that, that whole movement, and I was there. 0:38:08.239 --> 0:38:11.200 I was part of it in a sense that not 0:38:11.320 --> 0:38:16.240 that I was, you know, in some really big band 0:38:16.239 --> 0:38:18.839 at that time. I played with a few bands around 0:38:18.880 --> 0:38:21.840 the area and play with the Chocolate Watch Band for 0:38:21.880 --> 0:38:24.759 a little while, which was kind of a uh you know, 0:38:25.400 --> 0:38:31.560 a regional band there that had some success. But primarily 0:38:31.600 --> 0:38:34.960 I was just out playing by myself with my guitar, 0:38:35.160 --> 0:38:37.160 and you know, I would sit in with people and stuff. 0:38:37.160 --> 0:38:43.280 But I recognized that if I was going to work, UM, 0:38:43.320 --> 0:38:46.640 I had better have it together myself by myself before 0:38:46.680 --> 0:38:49.719 anything else. Because band sort of came and went and 0:38:49.960 --> 0:38:51.799 the one you know, you join a band and then 0:38:51.800 --> 0:38:53.520 it would fall apart, and you join a band and 0:38:53.520 --> 0:38:55.719 it would fall apart. But I could always depend on 0:38:55.760 --> 0:38:59.480 the fact that if I had some songs and I 0:38:59.480 --> 0:39:03.120 could leaved, I could I could keep a band together, 0:39:03.400 --> 0:39:06.480 you know. So I did. I was able to make 0:39:06.480 --> 0:39:11.240 a living and and do something I loved at that time. 0:39:11.280 --> 0:39:14.280 You know, so at that time, when did you stop 0:39:14.320 --> 0:39:18.560 doing day gigs and just play music. In the mid sixties, 0:39:21.600 --> 0:39:23.799 I was well, let's see, I probably was in high 0:39:23.800 --> 0:39:28.080 school then, um, and I was always working. I always 0:39:28.080 --> 0:39:32.000 had a job part time. Uh, And so I would 0:39:32.280 --> 0:39:34.400 work during the day and then I would play at night. 0:39:34.440 --> 0:39:38.080 I got gigs and clubs even as a kid. Uh. 0:39:38.480 --> 0:39:42.400 Those are the days of coffee houses, so you could, 0:39:42.560 --> 0:39:46.080 you know, there was no nothing about age. You could 0:39:46.080 --> 0:39:49.799 be as and in fact, being young sort of work 0:39:49.920 --> 0:39:53.560 to my advantage. I was a the youngest kid on 0:39:53.600 --> 0:39:57.120 the stage at most of these coffee houses. So it 0:39:57.400 --> 0:40:00.000 enabled me to have a kind of a unique pres 0:40:00.040 --> 0:40:03.600 since that, oh, here comes the kid, he's gonna play. 0:40:03.680 --> 0:40:07.239 Are you working tonight? Yeah, I'm working, cool man, you know. 0:40:07.360 --> 0:40:11.600 And and so I would get these gigs as a kid, 0:40:12.000 --> 0:40:14.200 and I was able to work. It was just, you know, 0:40:15.560 --> 0:40:18.359 really great. And my parents were cool with it as 0:40:18.440 --> 0:40:20.680 long as it was a weekend. They don't like me 0:40:20.719 --> 0:40:22.840 working during the week because I had to go to school. 0:40:23.960 --> 0:40:26.840 But you know, I didn't make a ton of money, 0:40:26.880 --> 0:40:29.880 but uh, you know, I would work. I worked at 0:40:29.920 --> 0:40:33.799 a gas station. I made a buck a dollar an hour, 0:40:34.520 --> 0:40:38.759 and I worked ten hours, ten twelve hour shift when 0:40:38.800 --> 0:40:43.440 I was sixteen, make twelve dollars. And then you had 0:40:43.480 --> 0:40:47.359 to pay you know, taxes and so security and all 0:40:47.400 --> 0:40:50.799 that stuff. So maybe if I made nine bucks after 0:40:50.880 --> 0:40:56.360 working ten hours, and even by the standards of the time, 0:40:56.760 --> 0:40:59.920 that wasn't much money. And although you know, it was 0:41:00.320 --> 0:41:02.040 money that I made and it was mine, it was 0:41:02.080 --> 0:41:04.160 in my pocket. I could do what I wanted with it. 0:41:05.080 --> 0:41:10.000 But if I played a gig, I could make ten 0:41:10.080 --> 0:41:15.320 bucks in three hours. Uh, you know, at a club 0:41:15.360 --> 0:41:18.480 and doing something I really love. So that was that 0:41:18.600 --> 0:41:21.400 was what I wanted to do. Okay, one theme in 0:41:21.480 --> 0:41:24.719 the book that is really camered and I mean that 0:41:24.760 --> 0:41:27.040 in a good way, over and over And this is 0:41:27.040 --> 0:41:30.440 the first time I've really seen it so consistently. Is 0:41:30.480 --> 0:41:34.040 this love for Moby Grat tell me all about that. 0:41:34.200 --> 0:41:37.160 I had a friend who I played with in a 0:41:37.200 --> 0:41:41.120 band in high school and uh, it must have been 0:41:41.440 --> 0:41:45.680 I forget when that album came out, sixty sixty seven maybe. 0:41:46.200 --> 0:41:50.320 And now one day he calls, maybe, goes, Pat, I 0:41:50.440 --> 0:41:53.239 got something you gotta listen. You gotta here, and I 0:41:53.280 --> 0:41:57.800 said yeah. He goes, I'm coming over. So he comes 0:41:57.840 --> 0:42:00.880 over and he goes, you gotta hear this. This is 0:42:01.640 --> 0:42:04.160 He goes. You know, he had turned me on to 0:42:04.520 --> 0:42:06.960 a big brother in the holding company. He told me, 0:42:08.040 --> 0:42:11.480 you gotta go up to this club in the Santa 0:42:11.480 --> 0:42:14.800 Curus Mountain, the Barn, and here this band, big brother 0:42:14.840 --> 0:42:19.000 in the holding company. And this was sixty six, he said. 0:42:19.080 --> 0:42:21.799 He goes, they've been playing up in San Francisco. He says, 0:42:22.080 --> 0:42:24.400 but they're act there down here and they're playing the 0:42:24.440 --> 0:42:29.239 club in Scott's Valley, which was but twenty minutes from 0:42:29.239 --> 0:42:32.240 my house, you know where I lived. So I drove 0:42:32.239 --> 0:42:39.120 over and I sat there and here comes big brother 0:42:39.160 --> 0:42:43.359 in the holding company of the Janis Joplin, and I 0:42:43.480 --> 0:42:46.400 was cold. My friend, the same guy who brought me 0:42:46.400 --> 0:42:49.520 the Moby Grape album, I sat there and listened to 0:42:49.560 --> 0:42:51.759 the band. Never heard him before, was before they recorded, 0:42:51.840 --> 0:42:54.840 and it was like I never heard any any woman 0:42:55.000 --> 0:43:00.239 singing like this in my life. This is again life 0:43:00.320 --> 0:43:04.760 changing moment to hear that live. I think I paid 0:43:06.400 --> 0:43:08.759 a dollar and a half or something to come in 0:43:08.840 --> 0:43:11.279 and see him. It was the barn in Scott's Valley 0:43:11.360 --> 0:43:14.440 was an old barn. I saw Country Joe there. There 0:43:14.440 --> 0:43:16.719 are all these bands from San Francisco that used to 0:43:16.760 --> 0:43:22.400 come and play. So anyway, the same guy who turned 0:43:22.400 --> 0:43:26.239 me on to going to see Janis Joplin says, you 0:43:26.320 --> 0:43:28.880 got to hear this record, and so we put it 0:43:28.920 --> 0:43:33.479 on and it was the first Moby Grape album. He goes, 0:43:33.800 --> 0:43:35.759 what do you think? He goes, He goes, I think 0:43:35.880 --> 0:43:41.600 it's the best San Francisco band of all of them. 0:43:41.680 --> 0:43:44.520 He goes, what do you think I go, I think 0:43:44.560 --> 0:43:48.640 you're right. I think I go. There isn't a guitar 0:43:48.760 --> 0:43:54.960 player in the whole state, in the whole you know, 0:43:55.880 --> 0:44:00.239 of all the guitar players I had heard, uh, there 0:44:00.280 --> 0:44:04.120 probably wasn't a better rock and roll guitar player than 0:44:04.239 --> 0:44:07.719 Jerry Miller. And it stands up today. He listened to 0:44:07.760 --> 0:44:12.439 the playing. You know, I love you know, I love 0:44:12.560 --> 0:44:17.280 Jerry Garcia, I loved your mcauchinan, I love Barry Melton. 0:44:18.120 --> 0:44:22.000 Back then, I mean I was over the head over 0:44:22.080 --> 0:44:26.959 heels for the San Francisco music, Gary Duncan. I loved 0:44:27.000 --> 0:44:30.800 all those guys. I mean, they were great players, I thought, 0:44:31.080 --> 0:44:34.920 and uh, you know, I still love them to this day. 0:44:35.040 --> 0:44:40.560 But Jerry Miller, he was just amazing, A great sort 0:44:40.560 --> 0:44:45.560 of bebop player, you know, like I'm trying to think 0:44:45.600 --> 0:44:50.799 of the bop guitar players, you know, it doesn't matter, 0:44:50.960 --> 0:44:55.360 but just a great all around player, great blues player, 0:44:55.400 --> 0:45:01.080 a great jazz player, a great country player. Uh. He 0:45:01.200 --> 0:45:06.440 blew my mind. And then the songs were and again, 0:45:06.520 --> 0:45:09.640 you know, this is something that probably our band is 0:45:11.080 --> 0:45:13.120 all the guys in our band I think take to heart, 0:45:13.200 --> 0:45:18.240 and I certainly do. It's about the songs. That's what people, 0:45:20.320 --> 0:45:24.520 at least for for a band like ours, it's and 0:45:24.960 --> 0:45:27.720 in my own mind it's always been about the songs. 0:45:27.800 --> 0:45:31.600 When I hear a great song, that's what stays with me, 0:45:31.760 --> 0:45:37.720 that's what I you know, uh, connects me to an artist. 0:45:38.320 --> 0:45:43.080 And the songs that Moby Grape had were just great 0:45:43.200 --> 0:45:51.520 songs and all these different singers and players writers. It 0:45:51.600 --> 0:45:57.640 was a phenomenally talented bunch of guys. Uh misguided in 0:45:57.800 --> 0:46:02.600 terms of, you know, the business and their management and 0:46:02.680 --> 0:46:07.320 everything else that went that goes with that aspect of 0:46:07.360 --> 0:46:14.040 being an artist unfortunately, but musically, I to this day, 0:46:14.120 --> 0:46:16.480 I think they're one of the best of the San 0:46:16.520 --> 0:46:20.640 Francisco bands ever. And a lot of people don't aren't 0:46:20.680 --> 0:46:23.040 that familiar with them because they never really made a 0:46:23.040 --> 0:46:29.200 big splash nationally. They were limited by their own foibles, 0:46:29.280 --> 0:46:32.600 if you will, you know, the things that you know, 0:46:32.800 --> 0:46:36.759 the obstacles that they put in their own pathway. But 0:46:37.280 --> 0:46:40.680 still a great band. I think people would do the 0:46:40.880 --> 0:46:43.279 do yourself a favor, go back to go listen to 0:46:43.320 --> 0:46:48.279 eight oh five by themby Grape by Skip Spence was 0:46:49.800 --> 0:46:54.720 you know a crazy person, you know, you know, really 0:46:54.719 --> 0:46:58.200 a wild guy. But Oh Maha is a song that 0:46:58.239 --> 0:47:01.640 he wrote that I still think a great rock song. 0:47:02.160 --> 0:47:05.600 It just had it was magical for the times and 0:47:06.840 --> 0:47:10.279 pretty modern for that era, you know, with feedback and 0:47:12.000 --> 0:47:20.200 just just an odd rhythmic track. Really interesting production. David 0:47:20.280 --> 0:47:24.760 Rubinson was it was a great producer. So anyway, great 0:47:24.880 --> 0:47:35.440 great band, great album. Okay, so you're playing solo, you 0:47:35.480 --> 0:47:38.080 don't have to worry about the army. How do you 0:47:38.120 --> 0:47:41.360 get involved in bands? And then how do you ultimately 0:47:41.480 --> 0:47:44.959 meet Tom? I had regular gigs around San Jose Los 0:47:45.000 --> 0:47:49.800 Gatos on my own as a as a solo guitar player. 0:47:50.000 --> 0:47:55.760 IM I have written songs and I was doing covers 0:47:56.000 --> 0:48:00.799 at the time, and then I at one point I 0:48:00.800 --> 0:48:03.719 played this little club in half Moon Bay and it 0:48:03.800 --> 0:48:08.520 was called the shelter In and it was owned by 0:48:08.560 --> 0:48:12.239 a guy that I was acquainted with. He had a 0:48:12.280 --> 0:48:16.759 club in San Jose, also called the shelter In, in 0:48:17.120 --> 0:48:23.800 downtown San Jose, and at that time, in that particular 0:48:23.800 --> 0:48:30.280 club downtown San Jose, your mcachenen was playing um Dave Nelson, 0:48:30.320 --> 0:48:33.040 who ended up playing the new Writers of the Purple Stage, 0:48:33.080 --> 0:48:36.800 had a regular gig there with a band his the 0:48:36.840 --> 0:48:39.560 Pine Valley Boys. I think it was a blue grass band. 0:48:40.040 --> 0:48:42.520 I believe Skip Spence played there a time or two. 0:48:44.520 --> 0:48:51.160 Ah gosh, some some other people that had that had 0:48:51.880 --> 0:48:54.320 done well in the music business around the BA area 0:48:54.840 --> 0:48:57.560 ended up playing there from time to time. Anyway, Mike 0:48:57.760 --> 0:49:04.040 relocated to Half Bay. He sold the place to someone else, 0:49:04.200 --> 0:49:08.279 and then he opened another shelter, and I think the 0:49:08.440 --> 0:49:11.440 shelter in San Jose finally closed. He opened another one 0:49:11.480 --> 0:49:13.120 in half Moon Bay. So I went up there. I 0:49:13.160 --> 0:49:16.000 had heard about it and auditioned, and I got the 0:49:16.040 --> 0:49:18.680 gig and I started playing there. Well, it turns out 0:49:18.760 --> 0:49:21.959 Mike was a pretty good violin player, and he asked 0:49:21.960 --> 0:49:25.680 to sit in with me. Um, this is the owner, 0:49:25.680 --> 0:49:28.600 And of course you don't refuse the owner sitting in 0:49:28.640 --> 0:49:30.960 with you, so he said. And sure enough, he was 0:49:31.520 --> 0:49:36.320 a really good violin players. So we started digging together 0:49:36.360 --> 0:49:39.799 and I I had I got the gigs, and he 0:49:39.840 --> 0:49:46.720 would join me. Um, and then he finally moved down 0:49:46.800 --> 0:49:49.880 to Los Gatos, and then we ended up playing all 0:49:49.920 --> 0:49:54.040 around San Jose and he one day he goes, you know, 0:49:55.920 --> 0:50:00.840 I know this guy is a great bass player. Um, 0:50:00.000 --> 0:50:04.080 you think you'd want to have a bass player play 0:50:04.200 --> 0:50:06.120 was I go, of course, and that would be wonderful. 0:50:06.200 --> 0:50:08.359 So it goes. Let me call him, you know, and 0:50:08.640 --> 0:50:11.319 see if he's interest in coming and sitting. We were 0:50:11.320 --> 0:50:15.360 getting a little bit better, more high profile gigs paying 0:50:15.360 --> 0:50:18.160 a little bit better. And then I had regular gigs. 0:50:18.160 --> 0:50:21.640 I was doing weekly, So I wasn't making a ton 0:50:21.719 --> 0:50:24.880 of money, but it was regular money coming in for 0:50:24.880 --> 0:50:28.560 for both of us. And so we called he calls 0:50:28.600 --> 0:50:32.760 the bass player and he and this was Tyronne Porter, 0:50:33.360 --> 0:50:35.759 who ended up being the bass player for the for 0:50:35.800 --> 0:50:40.799 the Doobies UH a couple of years later. So Tyrone 0:50:41.160 --> 0:50:43.600 uh flew up. Those are the days you could get 0:50:43.600 --> 0:50:47.640 a flight uh for dirt. You know, it's about fourteen 0:50:47.680 --> 0:50:50.879 dollars to fly from l A to to San Jose. 0:50:51.080 --> 0:50:54.600 So we picked him up and we rehearse and started gigging, 0:50:54.640 --> 0:50:56.279 the three of us, and so he would come up 0:50:56.320 --> 0:51:02.440 every weekend, and UH started gigging around San Jose and 0:51:02.440 --> 0:51:06.239 and last adis Santa Cruz and we were doing pretty well. 0:51:06.600 --> 0:51:10.480 And so we ended up digging at the Chateau Liberty 0:51:11.880 --> 0:51:14.279 and that was my first experience at that club. The 0:51:14.280 --> 0:51:16.200 three of us gig in there. I think I had 0:51:16.239 --> 0:51:20.319 gig there once by myself, um and then the three 0:51:20.360 --> 0:51:24.160 of us. So we started digging regularly at the chateau, 0:51:25.120 --> 0:51:32.520 and Mike h Mike and I kind of broke up. 0:51:33.080 --> 0:51:36.279 The band broke up, the three of us. Tyronne had 0:51:36.320 --> 0:51:41.040 something else going on, and I forget something happened with nothing. 0:51:42.880 --> 0:51:45.839 Mike had other things to do. He ended up, I think, 0:51:45.960 --> 0:51:50.400 leaving town, and uh, so I was back on my own. 0:51:50.880 --> 0:51:54.960 So I started playing around town with this guy, Peter Grant, 0:51:55.600 --> 0:51:59.000 and Peter was he was a local I had known 0:51:59.160 --> 0:52:02.960 for years. He was the banjo player, guitar player, he 0:52:03.040 --> 0:52:06.239 had played. He was friends with some of the guys 0:52:06.239 --> 0:52:08.319 in Grateful Dead. He had played on one of the 0:52:08.440 --> 0:52:12.480 Dead albums. He had taught himself to play pedal steel 0:52:13.200 --> 0:52:18.320 and ended up on I think oxom oxiwa playing steel 0:52:18.640 --> 0:52:26.839 and anyway a really decent banjo player. So I had 0:52:26.960 --> 0:52:30.200 played with three different banjo players around town and doing 0:52:30.200 --> 0:52:32.720 blue grass because I was kind of one of my things. 0:52:32.800 --> 0:52:36.440 I had made an effort to study a little bit 0:52:36.480 --> 0:52:40.440 about blue grass, and I had friends that played, and 0:52:40.520 --> 0:52:44.600 so I would just sit in and learn the you know, 0:52:44.640 --> 0:52:48.920 how to learn the songs. You know the lot of 0:52:48.920 --> 0:52:52.719 instrumentals and stuff, and I learned that task myself with 0:52:53.239 --> 0:52:58.000 learning and listening to blue grass. So um, playing with Peter, 0:52:58.160 --> 0:53:00.919 and one day we got this. I get this call. 0:53:01.080 --> 0:53:04.239 It's Mike Mindel, my ex middle player. He goes, I'm 0:53:04.239 --> 0:53:08.280 opening a club in h Campbell. It's the old Campbell 0:53:08.360 --> 0:53:12.560 Theater was the downtown theater in Campbell, California, which is 0:53:12.640 --> 0:53:16.480 kind of a suburb of San Jose. And I'm going 0:53:16.520 --> 0:53:20.200 to call it the gas Lighter Theater. And I'd love 0:53:20.400 --> 0:53:22.200 I love to have you come and play. What are 0:53:22.239 --> 0:53:24.040 you doing now? And I said, well, I'm Paile playing 0:53:24.080 --> 0:53:27.919 with this guy, Peter Grant. He goes, well, I'm trying 0:53:27.920 --> 0:53:32.240 to book hot Tuna, and uh maybe you you guys 0:53:32.280 --> 0:53:35.160 could come and open for hot Tuna. I go, yeah, 0:53:35.239 --> 0:53:39.160 of course that would be wonderful. So so we get 0:53:39.200 --> 0:53:42.680 to the I told Peter Bouty goes, I go, how 0:53:42.760 --> 0:53:45.040 much are you paying? He goes, I'm paying you know whatever. 0:53:45.080 --> 0:53:46.719 It was pretty good. I think he was paying me 0:53:47.000 --> 0:53:49.680 like fifty bucks, which was a lot in those days. 0:53:50.760 --> 0:53:55.080 So um, we get there and uh, no, hot Tuna. 0:53:55.200 --> 0:54:00.600 Hot Tuna. They had a a commit that they had 0:54:00.600 --> 0:54:03.480 to honor, and he couldn't They couldn't show up. So 0:54:03.840 --> 0:54:07.400 he hired this other band, Pachuco. I go, well, I 0:54:07.440 --> 0:54:11.879 know Pachuco. It's uh, Skip Spence and this guy, Bill 0:54:11.960 --> 0:54:14.760 Andres was a guitar player in the band at the time. 0:54:15.760 --> 0:54:19.600 So um, I go, well, that's that's great. You know, 0:54:19.640 --> 0:54:22.840 I love both those guys, and that will be great anyway. 0:54:22.960 --> 0:54:30.799 So um, so I had known Skip previously, and that's 0:54:30.840 --> 0:54:35.680 another story in itself. But so we get there and 0:54:36.280 --> 0:54:41.480 so Peter and I play, you know there, Skip's not 0:54:41.560 --> 0:54:44.279 there yet. Peter and I set up and and we 0:54:44.520 --> 0:54:46.759 do our set. We play an hour or so and 0:54:46.800 --> 0:54:50.200 then I see Skip comes in, and I see these 0:54:50.200 --> 0:54:54.000 other guys, and they go, well, where's Bill Andres. He's 0:54:54.040 --> 0:54:57.040 not with them. So I go I talked to Skip. 0:54:57.040 --> 0:55:00.160 I go as the worst. Bill He goes, I he's 0:55:00.160 --> 0:55:05.000 in jail. So I got these guys. This is you know, 0:55:05.120 --> 0:55:07.560 I mean, you didn't gotta meet these guys. Guys are great. 0:55:08.200 --> 0:55:11.120 I go, okay. Skip was really kind of high strung 0:55:11.560 --> 0:55:15.680 at that point, and uh, he goes, this is Tom. 0:55:15.840 --> 0:55:19.600 This is John. So I to He goes, hey, how 0:55:19.719 --> 0:55:22.600 you doing? You know? He goes, and we caught you. 0:55:22.960 --> 0:55:25.600 We listened to your set coming in this man, you guys, 0:55:26.000 --> 0:55:28.840 you sounded great, you and Peter and you really you 0:55:28.880 --> 0:55:32.359 really nailed it. It was really great, you know. And 0:55:32.400 --> 0:55:34.360 I go, well, I'm anxious, you know, hear you guys, 0:55:34.400 --> 0:55:36.440 And he goes, yeah, well it's kind of loose. You know. 0:55:36.920 --> 0:55:40.280 We really haven't rehearsed much. We just you know, Skip 0:55:40.320 --> 0:55:44.000 told us he, you know, that his regular band members 0:55:44.040 --> 0:55:46.759 weren't going to show up, and so he called us 0:55:46.800 --> 0:55:48.960 and asked us if we play with him. So he go, 0:55:49.280 --> 0:55:51.440 I go, well, whatever. You know, I was used to 0:55:51.440 --> 0:55:54.320 see in bands like that that are kind of thrown together. 0:55:54.480 --> 0:55:58.040 And but I was anxious to see because I I 0:55:58.080 --> 0:56:02.319 hadn't seen Skip for years, and I was anxious to 0:56:02.320 --> 0:56:05.160 see him. And he had this guitar that he had built, 0:56:05.800 --> 0:56:10.280 and it was a stratocaster. Somewhere he'd gotten these longhorn 0:56:11.040 --> 0:56:18.160 cattle uh horns and had him grafted onto the guitar. 0:56:18.320 --> 0:56:22.080 It looked really demonic, you know, and it was painted 0:56:22.600 --> 0:56:25.479 with you know, pin striping like they did on hot 0:56:25.560 --> 0:56:30.280 rods and stuff. And he's wearing this long, this trench coat, 0:56:30.680 --> 0:56:32.879 and he's wearing a hat like I'm wearing, right, now 0:56:32.920 --> 0:56:36.719 he had a beret on backwards. He looked great, you know, 0:56:36.800 --> 0:56:41.040 he looked every bit the rock star that he had 0:56:41.120 --> 0:56:46.279 been and was. And uh so they get up there 0:56:46.600 --> 0:56:51.719 and I can't even hear skips guitar. It's like, I 0:56:51.760 --> 0:56:55.200 don't even I don't think it was plugged in. And 0:56:55.280 --> 0:56:58.799 he's like doing all this you know stuff, and Tom 0:56:58.960 --> 0:57:01.960 is up at the microphone own singing, and John and 0:57:02.320 --> 0:57:06.359 they had a bass player with him, and they are 0:57:06.760 --> 0:57:11.799 killing it. I mean, Tommy, you could tell that they 0:57:11.800 --> 0:57:15.960 were whatever Skip was. These guys were rehearsed, and they 0:57:16.000 --> 0:57:20.520 started playing kind of like like heavy metal, like cream. 0:57:20.680 --> 0:57:23.080 You know, it was before there was even a term 0:57:23.120 --> 0:57:28.400 heavy metal. It was you know, hard rock trio just 0:57:28.920 --> 0:57:31.680 killing it. I mean I was like, oh my god, 0:57:31.800 --> 0:57:34.320 these guys are really good. You know. It was not 0:57:34.400 --> 0:57:36.920 my kind of music. I was like Peter and I 0:57:36.960 --> 0:57:40.040 just got done doing traditional kind of a bunch of 0:57:40.080 --> 0:57:44.720 traditional music and bluegrass and stuff, some blues a little bit. 0:57:45.200 --> 0:57:48.160 And these guys are killing it. And they're playing the 0:57:48.160 --> 0:57:52.360 blues too. But it's like loud, you know to me, 0:57:53.280 --> 0:57:55.640 and as loud as they could get as he could 0:57:55.680 --> 0:57:59.320 get his amplifier to go and they are killing it, 0:57:59.440 --> 0:58:03.800 and I'm just like going, man, where these guys come from? 0:58:03.880 --> 0:58:07.320 You know. And so afterwards I go back, I go, good, 0:58:07.400 --> 0:58:11.040 you guys, you guys are great. You guys are really good. 0:58:11.360 --> 0:58:13.280 And what are you doing? You know? He goes, well, 0:58:13.600 --> 0:58:17.360 you know, I'm John. Was kind of a character, and 0:58:17.360 --> 0:58:20.320 he was like really animated. He goes, yeah, I just 0:58:20.360 --> 0:58:25.720 got here from uh, from Virginia, False Church, and I 0:58:25.760 --> 0:58:27.640 just got into town. Yeah, I met I met up 0:58:27.640 --> 0:58:29.880 with Skippy. Was kind of job. He's going, yeah, I 0:58:29.920 --> 0:58:32.160 just made up a skip and we're putting a band together. 0:58:32.200 --> 0:58:34.720 It's gonna be like really big, really good. And uh, 0:58:35.080 --> 0:58:37.520 we're looking for some other guys. And we saw you playing. 0:58:37.520 --> 0:58:39.480 We thought yeah, and then you know, this guy is 0:58:39.480 --> 0:58:41.440 pretty good. You know, maybe you'd like to come in 0:58:41.440 --> 0:58:43.560 and sit with us. You should come on, come by 0:58:43.600 --> 0:58:45.919 the house. Man. We were we jam, we work out, 0:58:45.960 --> 0:58:48.240 we we play all the time. You know, just this 0:58:50.160 --> 0:58:53.439 rapid speech, and I'm going I'm going, oh, I don't 0:58:53.480 --> 0:58:58.640 know about this, but but I liked him, you know, 0:58:58.720 --> 0:59:02.320 I mean it was to me. They were really great 0:59:02.800 --> 0:59:07.200 characters and really good musicians. And so I said, well, 0:59:07.280 --> 0:59:09.840 you know, I said, I I said I will come by, 0:59:10.320 --> 0:59:13.840 you know, I will come by sometime. He goes, well, 0:59:13.840 --> 0:59:15.640 maybe you'd like to. You know, we're trying to put 0:59:15.680 --> 0:59:17.800 this band together. We could use another guitar player, and 0:59:17.840 --> 0:59:19.440 you look like you'd fit right in with what we're 0:59:19.440 --> 0:59:21.680 trying to do, you know, with Tom's rhythm and you 0:59:21.720 --> 0:59:23.440 and your picking, man, we could we could have this 0:59:23.480 --> 0:59:24.920 whole thing and be like Moby great. You know. We 0:59:25.000 --> 0:59:29.120 get skipping and I go, well, I go, I have 0:59:29.280 --> 0:59:34.720 a band that I'm playing with, you know, um and uh, 0:59:35.000 --> 0:59:37.360 I'm playing with Peter now. And I and I had 0:59:37.440 --> 0:59:41.520 been playing on and off with Mike still the guy 0:59:41.600 --> 0:59:44.760 that had the gas lighter, and Tyranne a little bit. Still. 0:59:44.880 --> 0:59:47.040 We didn't play all the time as much, but we 0:59:47.080 --> 0:59:49.640 still did play around. I said, oh, I have these 0:59:49.680 --> 0:59:52.120 other things I'm doing. But I said, I will come 0:59:52.160 --> 0:59:56.160 by and we'll connect and you know, see where it goes. 0:59:56.200 --> 0:59:58.880 So so I never did. I never went by because 0:59:58.920 --> 1:00:01.840 I thought, you know, I don't know, it's not I'm 1:00:01.880 --> 1:00:05.240 not sure if it's my thing. So one day i'm 1:00:05.280 --> 1:00:08.720 I'm at my house and knock, knock, knock. I lived 1:00:08.720 --> 1:00:14.040 about about five blocks from from where those guys were living. 1:00:14.720 --> 1:00:17.600 And I get to hear this knock and it's John Hartman. 1:00:18.120 --> 1:00:21.120 And John he was in those days. He weighed about 1:00:21.200 --> 1:00:25.520 three d and fifty pounds. He he was wearing clothes 1:00:26.040 --> 1:00:29.080 that it looked like he'd slept in him, you know, 1:00:29.400 --> 1:00:34.640 lived in him. They were just, you know, like he 1:00:34.720 --> 1:00:37.680 looked like a hell's angel, you know. And I was like, 1:00:38.280 --> 1:00:41.600 I loved what who he was and how he presented 1:00:41.680 --> 1:00:45.000 himself that I was kind of like a little bit intimidated. Right, 1:00:45.040 --> 1:00:47.120 So he goes, hey, man, I thought you're gonna come 1:00:47.120 --> 1:00:49.280 over to the house, you know. I go, uh, you know, 1:00:49.400 --> 1:00:52.800 I really I really wanted to. I just I've been busy, 1:00:52.880 --> 1:00:54.960 and you know I've been I had a job, I 1:00:55.000 --> 1:00:57.320 was still working. I had a day job as well. 1:00:58.160 --> 1:01:01.000 So I go, you know, but I will, like I promise. 1:01:01.080 --> 1:01:03.520 He goes, well, you gotta come by, man. We have 1:01:03.600 --> 1:01:06.480 these jams. I mean it is they're out of sight, man, 1:01:06.520 --> 1:01:08.640 and you would love it. You would love it. He goes, 1:01:09.360 --> 1:01:11.320 you know, you got an electric guitar. I going, well, no, 1:01:11.440 --> 1:01:13.600 I have this acoustic, but I do have a pickup. 1:01:14.040 --> 1:01:16.240 I had this darm and pickup that I put on 1:01:16.280 --> 1:01:19.000 my guitar. So so I go. Finally, I go, I 1:01:19.080 --> 1:01:23.360 got it. I can't keep I can't, you know, not 1:01:23.520 --> 1:01:26.400 go by after all that. So I got I got 1:01:26.400 --> 1:01:30.880 the address, and I go by and Tommy's here. He's, hey, man, 1:01:31.560 --> 1:01:34.120 come on in. You know. Yeah, I'm so glad you 1:01:34.160 --> 1:01:36.680 came by. Hey, you want a jam, you know? I go, 1:01:37.360 --> 1:01:39.960 I go, yeah, I just brought my acoustic. Giuse well, 1:01:40.000 --> 1:01:42.200 come on out in the backyard. He says, I got 1:01:42.200 --> 1:01:45.640 my acoustic too, and we'll just sit around a jam. 1:01:45.720 --> 1:01:47.560 What the hell you know, I want to smoke one. 1:01:47.600 --> 1:01:49.920 I go, sure, you know. So, so we go out 1:01:49.960 --> 1:01:52.960 in the backyard and John brings the congo drum out there. 1:01:53.160 --> 1:01:55.680 Tommy is this acoustic. I got my acoustic, and we 1:01:55.720 --> 1:01:58.640 start just playing. I played some of my songs. He's 1:01:58.680 --> 1:02:00.880 playing some of his stuff, and we're just you know, 1:02:00.960 --> 1:02:03.840 backing each other up and having fun. And that was 1:02:03.920 --> 1:02:07.000 the beginning of our relationship. I just I was wondering. 1:02:07.120 --> 1:02:10.280 We spent hours just doing that, you know, we didn't 1:02:10.840 --> 1:02:14.120 we never set up and played electrically or anything. Tommy says, 1:02:14.120 --> 1:02:16.800 you gotta come back. Then we set up, we we jam, 1:02:16.880 --> 1:02:20.600 and other musicians combine. He goes, probably some people you know. 1:02:20.720 --> 1:02:22.560 He started name and name. It's like, oh, yeah, of 1:02:22.600 --> 1:02:27.120 course I know that guy, this guy, and he goes, uh, 1:02:27.320 --> 1:02:31.160 he goes, we're playing at San Jose State. Uh, this weekend. 1:02:31.200 --> 1:02:33.960 You gotta come in and hear us. He goes, it's 1:02:34.160 --> 1:02:36.640 it's different from what you heard was Skips. Skips not 1:02:36.760 --> 1:02:39.080 in the band. So I go over. They play this 1:02:39.120 --> 1:02:43.320 gig and it's like the trio again, but with a 1:02:43.360 --> 1:02:52.040 horn section. It's so great. It's so real and amazing, 1:02:52.200 --> 1:02:57.680 you know. It was like the horn section was really good. 1:02:57.760 --> 1:03:01.280 So they're guys I knew already. They're surround town that 1:03:01.600 --> 1:03:03.840 that I knew of them. They played in different bands 1:03:03.960 --> 1:03:06.920 and I had played with. The sax player used to 1:03:06.920 --> 1:03:08.600 come and sit in with me at a club I 1:03:08.680 --> 1:03:13.640 played at, and so well rehearsed, they killed it. I 1:03:13.720 --> 1:03:19.360 came away thinking, yeah, this is really good. This is 1:03:19.440 --> 1:03:24.280 really something real. These guys are really they really got something. 1:03:24.360 --> 1:03:26.760 I don't know what it is, but and I don't 1:03:26.800 --> 1:03:30.120 know how I might fit into it, but I loved 1:03:30.480 --> 1:03:33.160 to be a part of this, you know. So I 1:03:33.160 --> 1:03:36.280 started going over to the house and we would just jam, 1:03:36.360 --> 1:03:39.200 sit and I had my acoustic guitar with a pickup 1:03:39.240 --> 1:03:41.760 on it. Somebody would have an amplifier. I think I 1:03:41.840 --> 1:03:45.840 had an amplifier. I brought my aunt and we started 1:03:45.920 --> 1:03:50.040 jamming and that was the beginning. And then one day 1:03:50.040 --> 1:03:56.240 they said, you know, hey, uh. I can't remember exactly 1:03:56.240 --> 1:03:58.680 how it came about that. Tom said, you know, we're 1:03:59.240 --> 1:04:02.000 we we have a gig and we'd really like you 1:04:02.040 --> 1:04:04.600 to play on the gig with us. And I said, 1:04:07.120 --> 1:04:10.200 who who's in the band and he said, well, it's myself, 1:04:10.320 --> 1:04:14.000 John and this bass player we got and the other 1:04:14.040 --> 1:04:16.760 guy we had left. We got this new bass player. 1:04:16.840 --> 1:04:19.160 So I go over to the house and it's a 1:04:19.160 --> 1:04:21.320 guy went to high school which was in the band, 1:04:22.280 --> 1:04:26.640 Dave Shogrin. So I didn't, you know, I wasn't close 1:04:26.840 --> 1:04:29.320 friends with Dave, but I knew him. I had met 1:04:29.400 --> 1:04:32.040 him here and there and remembered him from high school. 1:04:32.040 --> 1:04:34.760 He's to see him around the campus. And so that 1:04:34.960 --> 1:04:37.840 was the band and we started. Uh. We we had 1:04:37.840 --> 1:04:40.120 a gig, our first gig, I can't remember. It was 1:04:40.160 --> 1:04:44.400 probably some club somewhere and we started playing and then 1:04:44.520 --> 1:04:49.200 we just kept playing and we're still playing. Okay, so 1:04:49.320 --> 1:04:51.760 you're playing because you've been doing it for a while. 1:04:51.800 --> 1:04:54.600 At this point, At what point you say, man, we 1:04:54.640 --> 1:04:56.720 want to get a record deal or were you always 1:04:56.760 --> 1:04:59.720 looking for a record deal? That is kind of a 1:04:59.760 --> 1:05:03.120 fun story. Um, I was living in this house, the 1:05:03.160 --> 1:05:06.760 house that John came and found me at in the house, 1:05:08.400 --> 1:05:13.840 and uh, one of the gals in the house played 1:05:13.840 --> 1:05:18.040 in a band and the band was had been playing 1:05:18.080 --> 1:05:20.600 around town. And I had known her for years, but 1:05:20.680 --> 1:05:23.160 I never really knew she was a singer. And suddenly 1:05:23.160 --> 1:05:25.439 she was in this band. And she's in a band 1:05:25.480 --> 1:05:28.919 with other people that I knew, and they put they 1:05:28.920 --> 1:05:33.240 started this band, and it was sort of bankrolled by 1:05:33.320 --> 1:05:37.280 this guy who had inherited some money from his parents 1:05:38.080 --> 1:05:40.680 somehow they had a trust fund or something, and so 1:05:40.920 --> 1:05:43.600 they he went out and he bought them all instruments 1:05:43.600 --> 1:05:46.560 and they started rehearsing, and they started gigging and getting gigs. 1:05:46.880 --> 1:05:49.800 And I went to see him and I thought, my friend, 1:05:49.880 --> 1:05:54.040 that singing is the best that this in this band. 1:05:54.120 --> 1:05:56.480 She's the best part of the band. She could sing 1:05:56.880 --> 1:05:58.720 the rest of it. I'm not sure about, you know, 1:05:58.720 --> 1:06:02.680 And I'm not sure but the songs exactly how they're 1:06:03.560 --> 1:06:06.560 you know, how they're getting these gigs because I'm thinking, 1:06:07.400 --> 1:06:09.400 but you know, those were the days when it really 1:06:09.400 --> 1:06:12.200 didn't matter if you had a guitar and you could 1:06:12.880 --> 1:06:16.320 you had something going on, you you could get gigs. 1:06:16.360 --> 1:06:20.360 But you know, I mean I liked them all. They 1:06:20.400 --> 1:06:24.560 were all the good people and and uh as individuals, 1:06:24.600 --> 1:06:26.640 I had seen them in different entities and I thought, well, 1:06:26.640 --> 1:06:29.080 they're this guy is pretty good. That guy's good. But 1:06:29.120 --> 1:06:32.840 as a band, I thought, I'm not sure about this band. 1:06:32.960 --> 1:06:36.680 So one day she comes home, she goes, Hey, we're 1:06:36.680 --> 1:06:40.240 gonna go make we're making a demo at the studio 1:06:41.320 --> 1:06:44.680 up in San Francisco. And the guys that are that 1:06:44.840 --> 1:06:47.640 have the studio, they're here right now in the house. 1:06:48.200 --> 1:06:55.200 And I was there in the house because I shared 1:06:55.240 --> 1:06:58.600 this house with her and a couple of other people. 1:06:59.520 --> 1:07:02.960 And um, we paid. We paid a hundred dollars a 1:07:03.000 --> 1:07:05.680 month for the house and there were three three of 1:07:05.760 --> 1:07:09.120 us that split the rent. It was thirty three dollars apiece, 1:07:09.240 --> 1:07:12.600 and somebody had to pay each each month. Somebody had 1:07:12.640 --> 1:07:17.960 to pay the extra dollar, you know. So uh so 1:07:18.480 --> 1:07:22.680 she comes in and with these two guys and they 1:07:22.680 --> 1:07:26.120 introduced themselves. This is Marty, this is Paul, and uh, 1:07:26.240 --> 1:07:31.080 I go and they were kind of like yeah, well 1:07:31.160 --> 1:07:33.960 yea audio only so they have their noses in the 1:07:34.000 --> 1:07:37.720 airh yeah, okay. They're kind of like high rollers, you know, 1:07:40.560 --> 1:07:46.680 you know, elitist types. And she's going, we're going up 1:07:46.680 --> 1:07:49.680 to make this demo tomorrow, and they're going, yeah this man, 1:07:49.760 --> 1:07:53.640 the guys are really good. And I go, oh cool, 1:07:53.720 --> 1:07:58.880 you know, I'm glad that's happening. So so, uh, they 1:07:58.880 --> 1:08:02.000 go make the demo. I guess, and h I don't know. 1:08:02.040 --> 1:08:04.200 I don't know. I think I heard the demo was like, 1:08:05.360 --> 1:08:10.240 you know, not that great. So it's one name over 1:08:10.440 --> 1:08:15.640 at at Tommy's in John's place and they go, hey, 1:08:15.720 --> 1:08:18.040 we made this demo. You know you want to hear it. Uh, 1:08:18.360 --> 1:08:21.080 you know, it's this two song demo and they he 1:08:21.160 --> 1:08:23.679 puts it on and I go, yeah, that's pretty good. 1:08:23.720 --> 1:08:27.000 You know, it's like these He goes, yeah, I just 1:08:27.600 --> 1:08:30.120 I just wrote the lyrics these. I don't even know 1:08:30.120 --> 1:08:32.080 what I was talking about it. I just wrote these 1:08:32.160 --> 1:08:35.080 lyrics in the studio, you know, we threw these things together. 1:08:35.160 --> 1:08:39.840 And I'm listening to him. I'm going that sounds pretty good. 1:08:39.960 --> 1:08:43.120 You know, those aren't bad, And he goes, yeah, the 1:08:43.200 --> 1:08:46.960 guys that have the studio up in San Mateo and 1:08:46.960 --> 1:08:50.640 and there look there they're they're letting bands come up 1:08:50.680 --> 1:08:54.000 and and do demos, you know, And so I go, 1:08:55.439 --> 1:08:58.680 I guess wouldn't be named Marty and Paul. They ya, 1:08:58.760 --> 1:09:01.080 those are the guys. I go, how did you find 1:09:01.439 --> 1:09:04.800 how'd they find you? And he goes, Skip found they 1:09:04.800 --> 1:09:10.840 found Skip, and Skip found us and took and brought tom. 1:09:11.120 --> 1:09:13.280 It was Tom John and I think at that time 1:09:13.280 --> 1:09:15.960 it was before Dave Chobrin they had made this demo. 1:09:16.560 --> 1:09:19.280 I go, yeah, I met those guys and they go, yeah, well, 1:09:19.320 --> 1:09:22.799 you know, we might be able to do some more demos. 1:09:22.840 --> 1:09:25.960 We're just kind of waiting to hear back. He goes, 1:09:26.360 --> 1:09:29.479 you would you want to, you know, play on something, 1:09:29.520 --> 1:09:32.040 and saying if if we get another opportunity, I go, 1:09:32.120 --> 1:09:35.400 of course, you know that that would be wonderful. So 1:09:35.520 --> 1:09:38.840 I don't know. A few weeks later, Tommy calls me 1:09:38.840 --> 1:09:43.679 and says, Skip just called us. He said we should 1:09:43.720 --> 1:09:46.439 get up to the studio right away. He goes, they 1:09:46.439 --> 1:09:48.679 want to do they want to do some more demos, 1:09:49.640 --> 1:09:54.040 And I go, really now and he goes yeah. I goes, wow, 1:09:54.960 --> 1:09:57.519 I got a gig. I'll cancel my gig and you 1:09:57.560 --> 1:10:00.840 know we'll go do it. So so we drive up 1:10:00.880 --> 1:10:07.599 to San Mateo and there's Skips there and and Marty 1:10:07.680 --> 1:10:10.559 and Paul and we set up and we talked through 1:10:12.040 --> 1:10:14.479 you know, what we're going to do. And so they say, well, 1:10:14.640 --> 1:10:17.559 you know, we have a deal here. If if we 1:10:17.640 --> 1:10:22.960 give you the free studio time, you have to sign 1:10:23.040 --> 1:10:25.360 this contract with us that we're going to be your 1:10:25.439 --> 1:10:32.320 representatives and that whatever we whatever these demos are, that 1:10:32.439 --> 1:10:37.599 we own them, uh in the capacity that we're allowed 1:10:37.640 --> 1:10:41.839 to shop them for you. And so that sounded reasonable 1:10:41.880 --> 1:10:44.400 to me. I didn't that we don't mean better offers. 1:10:44.439 --> 1:10:47.360 So so we went ahead and signed the contract and 1:10:47.360 --> 1:10:49.439 then we go and start doing demos. So over a 1:10:49.520 --> 1:10:53.840 period of three or four days, I guess, we threw 1:10:53.880 --> 1:10:56.519 these demos together. It was a couple of songs of 1:10:56.560 --> 1:11:02.920 mine and then four songs of Tom's. So, uh, weeks 1:11:03.280 --> 1:11:07.879 go by. We heard the demos, we were like, wow, 1:11:08.800 --> 1:11:11.479 those sound really good. We we never thought we could 1:11:11.520 --> 1:11:15.840 sound that good. And we're going, yeah, wow, amazing. You know, 1:11:17.120 --> 1:11:20.479 maybe maybe something will happen. You know, when we're playing 1:11:20.560 --> 1:11:23.080 the demos for all our friends, you know, and they're 1:11:23.120 --> 1:11:26.400 all going, wow, you guys are that sounds really good, man, 1:11:26.439 --> 1:11:31.120 you guys, you guys are really going to do something. So, um, 1:11:31.280 --> 1:11:34.759 weeks go by, months go by, we don't hear anything. 1:11:35.520 --> 1:11:39.720 I guess nothing's going to happen. And and then all 1:11:39.760 --> 1:11:43.360 of a sudden we get a call from the studio 1:11:43.360 --> 1:11:46.320 and they say, look, we got some interest from some 1:11:46.520 --> 1:11:50.720 different parties. A and M as interested in it. They're 1:11:50.760 --> 1:11:54.639 the first ones that called us. And so we spoke 1:11:54.760 --> 1:11:58.960 to producer at A and M. And at that point 1:11:59.040 --> 1:12:03.880 we we would have taken anything, you know. And uh, 1:12:05.000 --> 1:12:08.960 then we here that well, um, a couple of guys 1:12:08.960 --> 1:12:11.840 from Warner Brothers that want to come and see you 1:12:11.840 --> 1:12:16.120 guys play somewhere. People from and M. I think we 1:12:16.160 --> 1:12:20.320 did alive in the studio where we played for them. 1:12:20.360 --> 1:12:22.080 We set up and then we did, you know. We 1:12:22.280 --> 1:12:26.400 ran through a few songs and uh it was a 1:12:26.479 --> 1:12:29.519 producer of note I can't remember his name. Was it 1:12:29.640 --> 1:12:35.280 David Anderley? It was not David Anderley, it was I'd 1:12:35.280 --> 1:12:36.880 know the name if I saw it. I think I've 1:12:36.880 --> 1:12:40.479 seen it not that far in the in the past. 1:12:40.600 --> 1:12:45.640 But um, so then we hear that there are a 1:12:45.720 --> 1:12:48.799 couple of guys from Warner Brothers are coming, So they're 1:12:48.800 --> 1:12:52.480 going to come and see us play at the Chateau Liberty, 1:12:52.560 --> 1:12:54.679 which is this club we've been playing in the Santa 1:12:54.720 --> 1:12:59.360 Cruz Mountains, which is kind of a hippie biker bar 1:13:00.160 --> 1:13:05.880 really kind of ah a great place to hear music, 1:13:05.920 --> 1:13:13.639 but it's you know, a psychedelic inferno. And we're sort 1:13:13.680 --> 1:13:17.280 of arguably the house band that we play there all 1:13:17.320 --> 1:13:21.200 the time, but they love us there. We packed the 1:13:21.280 --> 1:13:24.519 place and it's a small place, I mean full up. 1:13:24.520 --> 1:13:26.880 It would be you know, three people, maybe three or 1:13:26.880 --> 1:13:29.960 four people, and they would be spilling out the doors, 1:13:30.400 --> 1:13:33.600 and we used to pack them in. I mean literally, 1:13:34.240 --> 1:13:38.599 you know, people were packed shoulder to shoulder in the club. 1:13:40.000 --> 1:13:47.360 So in walks ted Templeman and Lenny Warrenker and I 1:13:47.600 --> 1:13:51.639 one of them was wearing like a white cardigan sweater 1:13:54.040 --> 1:13:59.640 with with uh, you know, penny loafers and you know, 1:14:00.520 --> 1:14:03.240 Teddy had you know, longish hair, but not long. It 1:14:03.360 --> 1:14:06.960 was kind of like and and and Lenny is like 1:14:07.479 --> 1:14:12.160 straight as an arrow, and and he's I think his 1:14:12.400 --> 1:14:15.479 his his sweaters like draped over his shoulders and the 1:14:15.520 --> 1:14:18.320 sleeves are tied front of that kind of thing. And 1:14:18.520 --> 1:14:23.160 they're looking around and here's like the Hell's Angels and uh, 1:14:23.200 --> 1:14:26.760 you know, hippies with you know, beards down to their 1:14:26.840 --> 1:14:32.400 waist and you know, chicks with their boobs tips hanging out. 1:14:32.600 --> 1:14:37.600 And I mean it's a scene right and drinking and 1:14:37.600 --> 1:14:40.880 and it's loud in there. And we were in there, 1:14:41.120 --> 1:14:45.759 and by that time I had an electric guitar and 1:14:45.920 --> 1:14:48.439 that I had bought from the bartender, so I got 1:14:48.439 --> 1:14:50.920 my ample and we're turned as loud as we could go, 1:14:51.360 --> 1:14:55.840 and we're blasting, we're rocking hard, you know, and I 1:14:55.880 --> 1:14:58.400 look over and you could see these guys. They stand 1:14:58.400 --> 1:15:02.680 out like a spotlights on and their eyes are as 1:15:02.840 --> 1:15:05.439 big as saucers. And I'm looking at and they're kind 1:15:05.439 --> 1:15:09.439 of like look, you know, looking cursory back and forth, 1:15:09.560 --> 1:15:14.599 like oh man, what have I got myself into? So 1:15:14.680 --> 1:15:19.439 they're they're at They sit there through really the entire set. 1:15:19.520 --> 1:15:21.559 We do a whole set there there the whole time, 1:15:22.040 --> 1:15:24.920 and then finally, at some point, you know, we take 1:15:24.920 --> 1:15:28.040 a break, we go over and meet and they're really nice, 1:15:28.080 --> 1:15:33.080 you know, very you know, complimentary. Man, you guys sound good. 1:15:33.200 --> 1:15:37.479 We heard your demos. We really we really liked the band. 1:15:37.920 --> 1:15:42.240 And my memory is somebody said we really like to 1:15:42.280 --> 1:15:47.439 sign you guys. And we had talked to the people 1:15:47.479 --> 1:15:49.479 at A and M and they had never said, we 1:15:49.600 --> 1:15:53.760 really like to sign you guys. And UM, as far 1:15:53.800 --> 1:15:57.040 as I was concerned, A and M was a great label, 1:15:57.080 --> 1:16:05.600 but Warner Brothers was, you know, a staple in entertainment industry, 1:16:06.000 --> 1:16:09.680 from films to some of the people that I that 1:16:09.800 --> 1:16:13.639 I had admired were on Warner Brothers at the time. 1:16:14.960 --> 1:16:18.599 So we didn't take us long to decide, Yeah, Warner 1:16:18.600 --> 1:16:21.800 Brothers is where we would want to be, so that 1:16:22.360 --> 1:16:26.720 that's how we started. And you know, I think it 1:16:26.760 --> 1:16:29.759 was just a you know, one of those random things 1:16:29.840 --> 1:16:33.880 where our demo tape ended up at the right place. 1:16:34.080 --> 1:16:38.080 Ted was had had been his job was kind of 1:16:38.120 --> 1:16:41.760 listening to new music that was being sent in through 1:16:42.120 --> 1:16:45.759 from different artists, and ours happened to be in the pile. 1:16:45.840 --> 1:16:48.439 And from what he told me, he listened to you know, 1:16:49.000 --> 1:16:55.040 fifty plus artists today sending material. And he told me 1:16:55.080 --> 1:16:58.080 the way he listened to music was he listened to 1:16:58.280 --> 1:17:01.920 the first song and he would listen for you know, 1:17:02.000 --> 1:17:06.080 thirty seconds to a minute, and if it, if it 1:17:06.320 --> 1:17:09.599 kind of he liked it, he would go on and 1:17:09.640 --> 1:17:11.360 get to the middle of it and listen to some 1:17:11.479 --> 1:17:16.599 of that, and that was it. If if he liked it, 1:17:17.800 --> 1:17:20.160 he knew it, and then he would go on and 1:17:20.240 --> 1:17:23.320 listen to the whole thing. But he said, if it 1:17:23.360 --> 1:17:28.120 didn't hit him within that first thirty seconds to a minute, 1:17:28.920 --> 1:17:32.639 it wasn't probably going to get go much further than that. 1:17:32.960 --> 1:17:38.920 So sort of neat knee jerk reactions to the music, 1:17:39.040 --> 1:17:42.680 which is I think probably how it really still is 1:17:43.360 --> 1:17:49.920 that way in the music industry. Um, I find myself 1:17:50.880 --> 1:17:55.160 listening that way a little bit. I listened further because 1:17:56.040 --> 1:17:59.240 these days because I hear things that you know, maybe 1:18:00.120 --> 1:18:02.800 there's something there that maybe I don't like it right away, 1:18:02.840 --> 1:18:06.240 but if I give myself a chance, uh, you know, 1:18:06.439 --> 1:18:10.519 there's there is something much deeper that you can discover 1:18:10.640 --> 1:18:13.360 if you give yourself a chance. But anyway, that that 1:18:13.439 --> 1:18:23.200 was our our experience. So the two of them produce 1:18:23.280 --> 1:18:26.519 your first record, which I'm sure is a thrill You're High, 1:18:27.240 --> 1:18:32.160 has the single Nobody Everything Stiffs Okay, even though Nobody 1:18:32.280 --> 1:18:36.639 is your set opener, now set opener of your box set? 1:18:37.000 --> 1:18:40.280 What goes through your head? And then how much pressure 1:18:40.439 --> 1:18:42.720 is there for the second album? I don't think we 1:18:42.720 --> 1:18:51.400 were surprised necessarily. Um, it's you know, we were well 1:18:51.439 --> 1:18:55.719 aware of how it works, how the music business works, 1:18:55.720 --> 1:18:58.280 and all the stories with that. People like to tell 1:18:58.320 --> 1:19:00.920 you right away, you know, and don't don't get your 1:19:00.960 --> 1:19:05.439 hopes up, kid. Um. And so when it didn't really hit, 1:19:06.000 --> 1:19:10.680 I kind of thought to myself, well, boy, that was 1:19:10.720 --> 1:19:15.840 a great chance we had. And and we got to 1:19:15.880 --> 1:19:18.200 make an album. How many bands get to do that 1:19:18.280 --> 1:19:21.479 on a major label. You know, I'll always be able 1:19:21.520 --> 1:19:25.839 to pull that album out and say, see look what 1:19:26.040 --> 1:19:30.880 I did. I did once, you know. And but we 1:19:31.000 --> 1:19:35.800 still love playing together, and so we didn't really give up, 1:19:35.920 --> 1:19:42.479 we thought, you know, um, Personally, I believed in Tommy Johnston. 1:19:42.840 --> 1:19:46.200 You know, I believe I still believe he's a great, 1:19:47.120 --> 1:19:52.519 uh songwriter, a great singer, a great stylist, a great poet. 1:19:53.720 --> 1:20:00.679 So to me that that, you know what, was meant 1:20:01.080 --> 1:20:04.000 so much to me. And I just at that time, 1:20:04.479 --> 1:20:07.479 at that moment in time, I knew he had other 1:20:07.680 --> 1:20:10.000 great songs that he would write. I just knew it. 1:20:10.080 --> 1:20:13.519 And I was still writing, and I felt like I 1:20:13.560 --> 1:20:17.599 was getting better as a writer, and uh and I 1:20:17.760 --> 1:20:22.360 and the whole process is a gift. You know what 1:20:22.400 --> 1:20:26.320 I mean. Music is and was has always been a 1:20:26.320 --> 1:20:29.400 gift for me. It's something that I didn't do because 1:20:29.439 --> 1:20:33.080 I thought I was going to be Liberaci. I did 1:20:33.160 --> 1:20:37.320 it because I love Liberacci. So you know, I want 1:20:37.720 --> 1:20:42.080 I wanted to be able to do that much. I 1:20:42.120 --> 1:20:45.120 wanted to be able to play and have fun and 1:20:46.280 --> 1:20:49.280 if if there was any success that came with it, 1:20:49.760 --> 1:20:52.240 that was just frosting on the cake for me. So 1:20:54.080 --> 1:20:56.240 I didn't know how long I would feel that way. 1:20:56.320 --> 1:20:59.120 I mean, I obviously there's a point in your life 1:20:59.120 --> 1:21:02.240 where you're going to go, you know, give it up. 1:21:02.920 --> 1:21:06.600 You know you're not gonna make it. So but you know, 1:21:06.640 --> 1:21:11.360 I never happened. We kept on going and uh but 1:21:11.680 --> 1:21:15.120 initially it was simply because I loved what we were doing. 1:21:15.400 --> 1:21:19.320 And and really through the years we've had moments where 1:21:19.360 --> 1:21:24.400 we we haven't done quite as well. Um I could 1:21:24.439 --> 1:21:26.320 say that now you know we're not. We haven't had 1:21:26.360 --> 1:21:29.280 big hit records for a long time. You know, who cares. 1:21:29.360 --> 1:21:32.680 It's about whether or not somebody wants to come to 1:21:32.760 --> 1:21:35.280 your gig and see a play, and whether or not 1:21:36.120 --> 1:21:39.680 you know you can afford to pay the guys to 1:21:39.680 --> 1:21:43.360 to to show up, you know. Um, so that it's 1:21:43.400 --> 1:21:45.760 still kind of the same for me, But back then 1:21:45.800 --> 1:21:49.280 it was it was simply just believe in in in 1:21:49.800 --> 1:21:53.439 the Tommy, particularly as an artist. I knew that he 1:21:53.479 --> 1:21:55.840 was going to write some good songs that I would 1:21:55.920 --> 1:21:58.920 enjoy playing. You know, So the second album comes out, 1:21:58.920 --> 1:22:02.080 I'd be pretty close to tension. If I ever read 1:22:02.120 --> 1:22:06.000 anything about the first Black and White album cover that album, 1:22:06.040 --> 1:22:08.719 I don't remember. And I'm living in the hinter land 1:22:09.280 --> 1:22:13.040 and out of nowhere. Listen to the music just black 1:22:13.120 --> 1:22:15.120 you're reading about everywhere there's this band that do be 1:22:15.120 --> 1:22:18.080 brubh blah blah blah blah. When you were cutting that album, 1:22:18.400 --> 1:22:21.200 did you know that? Listen to the music, man, this 1:22:21.240 --> 1:22:24.400 is gonna be our ticket to paradise. I don't think 1:22:24.400 --> 1:22:27.479 you can predict things like that. I certainly knew it 1:22:27.520 --> 1:22:31.320 was a good song, and I knew that for our 1:22:31.439 --> 1:22:35.320 band anyway, I don't think it it's funny because I 1:22:35.360 --> 1:22:39.120 don't think our music is quite like a lot of 1:22:39.120 --> 1:22:44.479 other bands. You know, we're a little more We're like 1:22:44.600 --> 1:22:47.439 the the White Eisley Brothers, you know what I mean. 1:22:48.040 --> 1:22:53.040 In a way, we're kind of um. You know, you 1:22:53.040 --> 1:22:56.080 could just you look at bands from the era, they 1:22:56.320 --> 1:23:01.920 weren't doing quite as much UH pop R and B 1:23:02.320 --> 1:23:06.000 maybe as we were doing at that time. A lot 1:23:06.040 --> 1:23:11.760 of the music was more h I'm not sure. I 1:23:12.400 --> 1:23:15.160 can't even you know, I can't even tell you what 1:23:15.320 --> 1:23:17.360 was going on in the music world. But I knew 1:23:17.400 --> 1:23:21.200 that we were we had a different take on what 1:23:21.240 --> 1:23:25.200 we were doing and who we were. UM. Even as 1:23:25.560 --> 1:23:29.120 as big a fans of the Moby Grape as we were, 1:23:29.479 --> 1:23:32.559 we weren't like the Moby Grape in that regard. We 1:23:32.560 --> 1:23:38.720 were different, a different kind of a band. UM. But 1:23:38.920 --> 1:23:42.000 I knew that that song listen to music, I just 1:23:42.080 --> 1:23:45.120 knew it was a good song, and I knew it 1:23:45.240 --> 1:23:50.280 was as far as what we were presenting, it was it. 1:23:50.280 --> 1:23:54.920 It exemplified the kind of music that we were doing. UM. 1:23:55.560 --> 1:23:58.439 And in a certain sense, that was an extension of 1:23:58.560 --> 1:24:02.040 a song like Nobody. UM. We had another song on 1:24:02.080 --> 1:24:04.559 that record called Feeling Down Farther. I think it was 1:24:04.640 --> 1:24:10.840 more of a direct um result or not result, but 1:24:11.240 --> 1:24:14.160 much more related to that that kind of a riff. 1:24:15.120 --> 1:24:19.000 But the riff was so catchy when I heard it, 1:24:19.040 --> 1:24:23.639 I thought, well, that that is who Tom is as 1:24:23.680 --> 1:24:27.760 a guitar player he has that, you know, it's sort 1:24:27.760 --> 1:24:32.080 of a signature kind of a way of playing. And 1:24:32.640 --> 1:24:36.880 I loved that aspect I was so you know, it 1:24:36.920 --> 1:24:41.800 was really uplifting for me personally to hear him recognizing 1:24:42.000 --> 1:24:46.960 that aspect of himself that he did so well, and so, 1:24:47.320 --> 1:24:49.200 you know, I felt it was really good. And then 1:24:49.680 --> 1:24:53.120 as a song, I just loved the you know, being 1:24:53.160 --> 1:24:57.840 an old hippie and as as much of a hippie 1:24:57.880 --> 1:25:01.080 then as I ever was, you know, it really had 1:25:01.120 --> 1:25:07.920 a message that of goodness and peace and brotherhood that 1:25:07.920 --> 1:25:11.080 that I believed and still believe in at the time. 1:25:11.400 --> 1:25:13.680 And uh, you know, I was able to jump in 1:25:13.880 --> 1:25:17.960 head first and help to make it as as good 1:25:17.960 --> 1:25:20.640 as we could possibly make it. So the song that 1:25:20.800 --> 1:25:23.280 I play most on the album at this point in 1:25:23.360 --> 1:25:26.240 time that really resonates and I'm not blowing smoke up 1:25:26.240 --> 1:25:29.920 your grass is to Loose Street, which is your song? 1:25:30.280 --> 1:25:33.000 Tell me the backstory on that. We had been on 1:25:33.040 --> 1:25:38.519 the road with Mother Earth nineteen seventy one. I think 1:25:38.560 --> 1:25:41.479 we went out on the road with them, traveling around 1:25:41.520 --> 1:25:45.599 the country, and my memory is we did end up 1:25:45.600 --> 1:25:49.040 in New Orleans briefly. I think we did a date there, 1:25:49.680 --> 1:25:53.680 I want to say, with Alice Cooper and UH and 1:25:53.800 --> 1:25:58.599 Mother Earth maybe the three of us, and we were 1:25:58.720 --> 1:26:02.320 we had done a tour called the Mother's Brothers Show, 1:26:02.400 --> 1:26:06.240 which was a series of dates sponsored by Warner Brothers. 1:26:06.520 --> 1:26:11.280 We both were UH kind of new acts for the label, 1:26:11.640 --> 1:26:15.720 and they were those are the days when they were 1:26:15.840 --> 1:26:19.599 trying to break their acts in you know, different you know, 1:26:19.760 --> 1:26:22.240 going out at different ways. But anyway, they put up 1:26:22.240 --> 1:26:24.720 the money for this tour and we went all over 1:26:24.760 --> 1:26:29.120 the country, did about thirty shows maybe something like that, 1:26:29.560 --> 1:26:31.519 and we ended up in New Orleans. Well, of course, 1:26:32.120 --> 1:26:33.960 anyone that's been to New Orleans and knows what a 1:26:33.960 --> 1:26:38.280 wonderful town it is, and so I basically fell in 1:26:38.320 --> 1:26:42.240 love with it. So months later, after you know, the 1:26:42.320 --> 1:26:49.519 album had um had kind of stiffed. I think by 1:26:49.600 --> 1:26:53.800 that time, we were still booking shows everywhere, and we 1:26:53.920 --> 1:27:02.200 got this offer to play these various venues around the South, 1:27:03.040 --> 1:27:07.680 and so we ended up somehow we went down to 1:27:07.800 --> 1:27:11.479 New Orleans and we stayed in town there and then 1:27:11.479 --> 1:27:14.360 we went out and we played these you know, Baton 1:27:14.479 --> 1:27:19.519 Rouge and these little parishes that were had clubs, and 1:27:19.560 --> 1:27:22.679 we were able to make enough money to we wandn't 1:27:22.720 --> 1:27:24.439 make a lot of money, but we're able to make 1:27:24.520 --> 1:27:30.759 money to UM pay for our overhead. And we took 1:27:30.920 --> 1:27:34.080 albums down there, and we went into a record store 1:27:34.160 --> 1:27:38.640 there and we tried to sell some albums in the 1:27:38.800 --> 1:27:41.719 in the area. I don't know if we ever did. 1:27:42.000 --> 1:27:43.519 I think we went to ended up in a record 1:27:43.520 --> 1:27:46.640 store like Spinal Tap and nobody nobody even came, you know. 1:27:48.080 --> 1:27:52.559 But so we're down there for quite a few days, 1:27:52.880 --> 1:27:58.240 and I think we had already begun working on the 1:27:58.280 --> 1:28:04.000 album to Lose Street, and I was walking just you know, 1:28:04.040 --> 1:28:10.360 walking around town and experiencing like a tourist New Orleans, 1:28:10.479 --> 1:28:14.639 and you know, eating at the gumbo shops and uh, 1:28:14.680 --> 1:28:16.880 you know, down in the French Market and taking the 1:28:16.880 --> 1:28:23.560 street car and so on. And UM came away from 1:28:23.600 --> 1:28:29.680 that experience just in love with New Orleans as as 1:28:29.720 --> 1:28:35.000 a town, the people, the scene. UM and and wrote 1:28:35.040 --> 1:28:41.120 that song and we went into the studio in San Francisco. 1:28:41.680 --> 1:28:46.920 Wally Hiders and Warners had been dumb enough to give 1:28:47.000 --> 1:28:50.759 us a budget, and we ended up in the studio 1:28:50.880 --> 1:28:53.800 there as our own producers. We decided we could do 1:28:53.840 --> 1:28:57.479 it better than than Ted and Lenny and we UH 1:28:58.760 --> 1:29:02.360 started recording songs, and out of all those songs, I 1:29:02.360 --> 1:29:05.400 think we got three songs that ended up on Talu Street, 1:29:05.840 --> 1:29:12.040 one being Talu Street, another something White Sun, and then 1:29:12.600 --> 1:29:16.439 this song called snake Man that Tommy wrote, and they 1:29:16.439 --> 1:29:20.519 were all ended up on the album, almost abbreviations of 1:29:20.560 --> 1:29:23.720 what we had actually done in San Francisco, except for 1:29:23.800 --> 1:29:28.360 Toulu Street. And I had written that song and we 1:29:28.400 --> 1:29:32.040 went in and recorded it, and I had been playing 1:29:32.080 --> 1:29:35.200 the flute. Somebody gave me a flute, and I had 1:29:35.439 --> 1:29:38.280 learned to play taught myself to play the flute, and 1:29:38.320 --> 1:29:41.080 we got UH. We had the record of the song 1:29:41.160 --> 1:29:44.160 and I and I I realized it was in a 1:29:44.240 --> 1:29:46.240 key that was good for the flute, and I said, 1:29:46.240 --> 1:29:49.280 the guys, the guys cure if I try a flute 1:29:49.320 --> 1:29:51.360 on this song. So I went in and I played 1:29:51.400 --> 1:29:53.600 the flute on it, and it was kind of the 1:29:53.680 --> 1:29:57.840 perfect tonality and kind of mood for the song. So 1:29:57.880 --> 1:30:00.840 it ended up on the record as well. UM and 1:30:00.880 --> 1:30:04.000 then we've recorded that song, did the background vocals, the 1:30:04.040 --> 1:30:08.760 three of us, and it was myself, Tom and Dave 1:30:08.840 --> 1:30:12.040 Shogren and Dave was our bass player at the time, 1:30:12.160 --> 1:30:16.760 and he ended up playing acoustic guitar, and he did 1:30:17.160 --> 1:30:21.080 picking guitar with mine as well, which was really added 1:30:21.120 --> 1:30:24.599 to it. I never realized he could do that until 1:30:24.640 --> 1:30:27.680 we did that record, and then so that ended up 1:30:27.920 --> 1:30:31.000 being on the album. In the end, Ted said, yeah, 1:30:31.040 --> 1:30:33.840 we're gonna put that out that on the record as well, 1:30:34.439 --> 1:30:38.240 and then we as we did the record, we realized 1:30:38.320 --> 1:30:41.679 it was a real reflection of our love for Southern 1:30:41.760 --> 1:30:46.639 music because there's so much on there. The blues based, 1:30:47.479 --> 1:30:51.519 uh and some kind of folky based stuff, but all 1:30:51.520 --> 1:30:57.960 of it reflects kind of that Southern mentality and our 1:30:58.360 --> 1:31:01.040 experience in the South. You know, I think we all 1:31:01.200 --> 1:31:05.200 we all loved it h and had not we were 1:31:05.240 --> 1:31:09.120 really California guys when we got down there. We weren't 1:31:09.160 --> 1:31:13.840 California guys anymore. We were Southern guys. We kind of 1:31:13.960 --> 1:31:17.559 we didn't reinvent ourselves. I think we found ourselves who 1:31:17.600 --> 1:31:21.040 we who we had been all along, and uh, you know, 1:31:21.080 --> 1:31:24.439 that's kind of where we are today. The second album, 1:31:24.640 --> 1:31:27.000 you almost can't ask for more success, but the third 1:31:27.080 --> 1:31:32.240 album becomes ubiquitous with China Grove and Long Train Running. 1:31:33.000 --> 1:31:36.360 But my favorite song on that album is the open 1:31:36.479 --> 1:31:38.839 or natural thing. And if you go into the credits, 1:31:39.280 --> 1:31:43.599 it's Robert Margloff and Malcolm cec. Of course we're famous 1:31:43.600 --> 1:31:47.200 for working with Stevie Wonder. How did those guys get involved? 1:31:47.640 --> 1:31:52.519 We heard that Stevie Wonder album. Um, I want to 1:31:52.560 --> 1:31:54.320 say songs in the Key of Life, but it might 1:31:54.320 --> 1:31:56.280 have been something. I think it was talking book at 1:31:56.320 --> 1:31:59.000 that point. That's right, That's right, that's it was. And 1:31:59.200 --> 1:32:04.960 uh was just the most amazing record and the you 1:32:05.000 --> 1:32:09.160 know whatever Stevie wondered us, it's amazing. But uh that 1:32:09.520 --> 1:32:12.519 he for the first time, and I'm sure we had 1:32:12.640 --> 1:32:17.040 heard the synthesizer before in music, but he it was 1:32:17.080 --> 1:32:20.960 at the forefront of his record, and uh, you know, 1:32:21.120 --> 1:32:24.960 start reading about it. I'm sure there was articles written 1:32:25.000 --> 1:32:29.120 about it, and we heard about these guys and we 1:32:30.400 --> 1:32:36.320 mentioned it Ted, Ted, we'd really like to graduate to this, 1:32:37.800 --> 1:32:41.680 you know, this instrument, and I don't know how we 1:32:41.720 --> 1:32:44.280 can do it, how we can incorporate it into our music, 1:32:44.320 --> 1:32:50.200 but we really feel strongly about moving in that direction. 1:32:50.320 --> 1:32:54.240 What do you think? And he said, absolutely, I know 1:32:54.320 --> 1:32:57.479 about it as well, and uh, let's do it. So 1:32:57.520 --> 1:33:01.280 we contacted them. I'm sure Ted contacted them because as 1:33:01.320 --> 1:33:05.479 a producer. He was always at the forefront of helping 1:33:05.600 --> 1:33:12.439 us to contact our resources and musicians and pull it 1:33:12.439 --> 1:33:16.200 all together. He had this assistant, Benita Brazier, who was 1:33:16.920 --> 1:33:24.720 this incredible assistant of his who was really um instrumental 1:33:24.800 --> 1:33:27.080 and and doing so much for us. She's the one 1:33:27.080 --> 1:33:29.240 who helped us put that album covered together for the 1:33:29.280 --> 1:33:34.440 Captain and me among other things. But anyway, we contacted 1:33:34.680 --> 1:33:39.960 UH Robert and Malcolm and and they came and brought 1:33:40.439 --> 1:33:49.200 this This UH structure was huge. Um it was probably 1:33:50.320 --> 1:33:53.680 you know, three ft high and four ft wide, and 1:33:53.760 --> 1:33:58.720 it had all these plugs and they were you know, um, 1:33:59.160 --> 1:34:06.120 quarter inch plugs like guitar type plugs, and that you 1:34:06.160 --> 1:34:09.280 would they would plug. And then and then there was 1:34:09.320 --> 1:34:12.320 a keyboard in front and a small keyboard. It was 1:34:12.479 --> 1:34:18.720 maybe you know, a third of an actual piano keyboard 1:34:18.920 --> 1:34:23.880 what you'd see a normal keyboard would be. And and 1:34:23.880 --> 1:34:26.479 then they would take the plugs and they would plug 1:34:26.560 --> 1:34:33.400 from one junction point to another in this UH the structure, 1:34:34.200 --> 1:34:38.440 and it would create waveforms. And every time they plugged differently, 1:34:38.600 --> 1:34:40.240 it would come up they'd come up with a new 1:34:40.280 --> 1:34:45.920 waveform UH different. It was how they plugged it as 1:34:45.960 --> 1:34:50.920 to how the the tones would change. So for a 1:34:50.960 --> 1:34:53.320 low tone, they would plug it a certain way. For 1:34:53.360 --> 1:34:55.439 a high tone, they'd plug it a certain wave for 1:34:55.880 --> 1:35:02.400 you know, uh, for a a waveform that was uh, 1:35:02.439 --> 1:35:04.920 you know, spiked kind of a form, they plug it 1:35:04.960 --> 1:35:10.479 a certain way. So every form had a certain h 1:35:11.439 --> 1:35:13.800 and they knew it. They knew the formula for how 1:35:13.840 --> 1:35:17.120 to how to make the sounds, and so they just 1:35:17.160 --> 1:35:19.000 started doing it. Well, what do you how do you 1:35:19.040 --> 1:35:20.640 like this sound? How do you like that sound? What 1:35:20.680 --> 1:35:22.080 do you what do you think of this sound? And 1:35:22.160 --> 1:35:25.320 we would play, you know, we got to play the keyboard. 1:35:25.400 --> 1:35:28.400 We would play, or they would play, somebody would play 1:35:28.560 --> 1:35:32.360 until we found that sounds that we that were generated 1:35:32.520 --> 1:35:36.240 from this U synthesizer that we liked. And in that 1:35:36.439 --> 1:35:39.240 with natural thing, it was a horn sound. I'm sure 1:35:39.280 --> 1:35:43.959 Tom said, do you have something that's more brassy sounding 1:35:44.080 --> 1:35:48.080 or horn like? And I'm sure he had something in mind, 1:35:48.160 --> 1:35:52.519 something you'd heard on Stevie's record or something, And so 1:35:52.600 --> 1:35:55.040 they came up with that horn sound for us, and 1:35:55.240 --> 1:35:57.519 Tom said, I love that. That's that's it, that's it. 1:35:58.000 --> 1:36:01.920 And so Tommy played that he uh, and all you 1:36:01.920 --> 1:36:05.160 could play was one note at a time in order 1:36:05.200 --> 1:36:07.600 to get a chord. You'd play that one note and 1:36:07.640 --> 1:36:12.240 then you'd have to double that note using another key 1:36:12.280 --> 1:36:15.000 on the keyboard to get a harmony, and then you 1:36:15.120 --> 1:36:17.479 just build it up until it made a complete chord. 1:36:17.960 --> 1:36:21.640 So I think that's probably three notes to build that. 1:36:21.800 --> 1:36:25.800 But by spreading it, you know, across the mix, it 1:36:25.840 --> 1:36:28.720 makes it sound huge. And you know, Don Landy was 1:36:28.800 --> 1:36:33.760 really good at product producing, making more out of a 1:36:33.800 --> 1:36:36.519 sound than you had so with reverb and effects and 1:36:36.560 --> 1:36:40.200 so on. So um, anyway, that's how that song was. 1:36:40.439 --> 1:36:44.519 That sound was created and we ended up using I 1:36:44.560 --> 1:36:48.479 think we used it on three different tracks on the record. 1:36:49.439 --> 1:36:54.519 Uh Salsie Midnight Lady was another track, and there's something 1:36:54.560 --> 1:36:57.400 else on that record. I don't remember those two songs. 1:36:57.439 --> 1:37:01.720 Those two songs, it stands out in the tracks, so 1:37:01.760 --> 1:37:06.439 you can really hear what the synthesizers doing. But it 1:37:06.560 --> 1:37:09.840 was life changing from us, you know. So you go 1:37:10.040 --> 1:37:15.240 from nowhere to somewhere to being so ubiquitous. This is 1:37:15.320 --> 1:37:18.880 now and we have Friday and Saturday night music shows 1:37:18.920 --> 1:37:21.719 on TV. You're on those that there's almost a Doobie 1:37:21.760 --> 1:37:26.000 Brothers backlash because you're so big what's it like on 1:37:26.040 --> 1:37:29.479 the other side of the footlights? Okay, what's it like 1:37:29.640 --> 1:37:33.680 being in the middle you're finally making some money in retrospect, 1:37:33.760 --> 1:37:36.200 when you're ripped off where you're so busy working that 1:37:36.200 --> 1:37:37.880 you didn't know which end was up? What was it 1:37:37.920 --> 1:37:41.799 like for you? Boy? Good question. You know, I think 1:37:43.240 --> 1:37:47.120 I was so happy just to have some success at 1:37:47.120 --> 1:37:52.160 what we were doing. I don't ah, certainly, you know, 1:37:52.240 --> 1:37:56.960 you get tired, and you know, things get a little 1:37:58.479 --> 1:38:06.679 you know, um foggy as it were. But I enjoyed 1:38:06.680 --> 1:38:08.840 every minute of it. I just kind of went, you know, 1:38:08.920 --> 1:38:11.439 this is what we worked towards. And I knew I 1:38:11.560 --> 1:38:16.160 always in the back of my mind, I always felt, well, 1:38:16.160 --> 1:38:18.439 this you know, it took us a long time to 1:38:18.479 --> 1:38:21.160 get here, but at any moment, you know, it could end, 1:38:21.479 --> 1:38:25.160 and so you know, enjoy every moment of it, get 1:38:25.240 --> 1:38:29.240 get the most out of it that you can. Um. 1:38:29.439 --> 1:38:32.800 I I really didn't second guess it. You know, I 1:38:32.840 --> 1:38:38.639 recognized that it was probably taking away from other aspects 1:38:38.640 --> 1:38:41.720 of my life that I was missing, you know, some 1:38:41.880 --> 1:38:45.719 of the some of the ride, but I really didn't 1:38:45.720 --> 1:38:47.680 care to be honest with the music. Was I was 1:38:47.760 --> 1:38:54.200 married to music? And everything else sort of took a 1:38:54.200 --> 1:39:01.280 back seat. So I think I just enjoyed every bit 1:39:01.320 --> 1:39:06.360 of it, you know, I mean, I love to travel. 1:39:06.840 --> 1:39:08.800 I got to go back to New Orleans. I love 1:39:08.880 --> 1:39:16.280 that I go there a lot. Still, Um, I loved California, 1:39:16.400 --> 1:39:19.240 so you know, I got to got to see California 1:39:19.360 --> 1:39:22.200 for you know, the place it really is. You know, 1:39:22.280 --> 1:39:26.120 most people, you know, you live one place and it's 1:39:26.160 --> 1:39:28.880 a it's a great state to live in. But you know, 1:39:29.000 --> 1:39:32.040 to to get around and see from one end to 1:39:32.080 --> 1:39:35.479 the other, and to see the whole planet from one 1:39:35.560 --> 1:39:40.320 end to the other became, you know, something that I 1:39:40.800 --> 1:39:46.559 never in my wildest imagination could have could have foreseen. Um. 1:39:46.600 --> 1:39:50.960 You know, I'm a hopeless collector. I collect stuff, right, 1:39:51.920 --> 1:39:56.200 I collected stamps when I was a kid. So I 1:39:56.240 --> 1:40:00.760 saw the planet in little you know, one by one 1:40:01.040 --> 1:40:07.000 squares for a good portion of my child my life. 1:40:07.520 --> 1:40:13.240 And to be you know, seeing places that I've only 1:40:13.280 --> 1:40:18.360 seen in postage stamps, you know, was beyond what I 1:40:18.360 --> 1:40:21.760 had ever hoped for. So you know, I love what 1:40:21.960 --> 1:40:31.160 I do. You know, I love what we do. Okay, 1:40:31.200 --> 1:40:35.000 Captain Me almost couldn't be more successful. Doobie Brothers, one 1:40:35.000 --> 1:40:37.280 of the biggest beings in the land. You put out 1:40:37.280 --> 1:40:39.880 the next album, What were one's vices are now habits? 1:40:39.960 --> 1:40:43.519 I don't care what anybody says. It's the Apotheosius, the 1:40:43.640 --> 1:40:46.679 best album from that era, and there was a lot 1:40:46.840 --> 1:40:50.120 of print type about it. And the song is going 1:40:50.160 --> 1:40:53.120 to be another Park another Sunday. You know, Tom has 1:40:53.160 --> 1:40:56.680 told me that, you know, their issues with radio stations 1:40:56.760 --> 1:40:59.519 took it off because you know, what's the lyric in 1:40:59.560 --> 1:41:04.200 the song. Whatever its stalls. The album comes out in February, 1:41:04.760 --> 1:41:09.679 all of a sudden November, Blackwater comes on and then 1:41:09.760 --> 1:41:13.240 just sustains it becomes a classic. So just a few 1:41:13.320 --> 1:41:16.599 questions on that album. One did you feel the pressure? Two? 1:41:16.600 --> 1:41:21.679 Were you disappointed? Three? Tell me the backstory on Blackwater? Well, 1:41:21.720 --> 1:41:24.519 you know that that album, Uh, it took a long 1:41:24.560 --> 1:41:28.400 time to get going. Um, and I think there was 1:41:28.439 --> 1:41:32.080 a certain disappointment obviously. You know when you're a musician 1:41:32.680 --> 1:41:36.880 an artist that you know you've been riding the gravy 1:41:36.920 --> 1:41:42.599 train for a while and then suddenly it's like, where's 1:41:42.680 --> 1:41:47.120 the hit? You know, I don't think I worry about 1:41:47.160 --> 1:41:53.240 the hit. I think I you The whole thing for 1:41:53.320 --> 1:42:01.680 me personally is the act of creativity. So I worry. 1:42:01.479 --> 1:42:04.479 I worried more about the fact that will we be 1:42:04.560 --> 1:42:09.720 able to continue our creative process, because you know, I hit, 1:42:10.120 --> 1:42:15.200 HiT's a hit, but it's just another song that we made. 1:42:15.400 --> 1:42:19.120 Albums we didn't make, you know, hits. We wanted to 1:42:19.120 --> 1:42:24.920 make records, and you get a hit. It's the thing 1:42:25.000 --> 1:42:31.040 that drives your career. And so the career being making music. 1:42:31.360 --> 1:42:34.880 You know, it's not making hits or making money, it's 1:42:34.920 --> 1:42:40.919 making music. And so I that's probably was, if anything, 1:42:40.960 --> 1:42:43.479 that's probably the thing that I was most concerned about. 1:42:43.479 --> 1:42:45.800 I wanted to keep making music, certainly want to make 1:42:45.800 --> 1:42:49.120 a living, but you know, how much money do you need? 1:42:49.200 --> 1:42:51.719 Who cares? You know, it's more about are you happy 1:42:51.840 --> 1:42:54.840 and are you doing the thing something that you love? 1:42:55.520 --> 1:42:58.639 And so that was a concern to me. So when 1:42:58.800 --> 1:43:02.439 when the record petered out a little bit, I kind 1:43:02.439 --> 1:43:05.880 of thought, well, you know, we gotta go back in 1:43:05.960 --> 1:43:10.200 and make another record. That's all, you know, the big deal. 1:43:10.439 --> 1:43:14.120 You know, that's what we would want to do. And 1:43:14.160 --> 1:43:16.960 if you know, how many of those are we going 1:43:16.960 --> 1:43:18.960 to get a chance to do, we better do it 1:43:18.960 --> 1:43:21.559 while we have a chance. So so I was ready 1:43:21.600 --> 1:43:24.760 to kind of go back in. I was right, you know, 1:43:25.000 --> 1:43:28.439 writing more songs myself, and I think Tommy was probably 1:43:29.080 --> 1:43:31.360 you know, we probably had that discussion at some point. Yeah, 1:43:31.360 --> 1:43:33.320 it looks like we're maybe not going to get a 1:43:33.400 --> 1:43:35.200 hit off this record. Maybe we need to, you know, 1:43:35.479 --> 1:43:39.120 get go in and write some more songs. And then 1:43:39.400 --> 1:43:43.559 we were we were in Europe, I think, doing we 1:43:43.560 --> 1:43:47.400 we got this invite to do this again. Warner Brothers 1:43:47.400 --> 1:43:50.400 are so innovative in terms of what they do and 1:43:50.439 --> 1:43:53.120 at that time how much money they were spending on 1:43:53.160 --> 1:44:02.120 their artists. They took the Doobie Brothers, Little Feet, Tower Power, Montrose, 1:44:04.080 --> 1:44:09.519 uh Graham, Central Station, and a band called Bonnaru to 1:44:09.680 --> 1:44:16.000 Europe to do this tour. Um. And we were there 1:44:16.000 --> 1:44:20.160 doing that tour when one day somebody came in and said, hey, 1:44:20.960 --> 1:44:24.559 looks like you got a hit. Really, what what's going on? 1:44:24.680 --> 1:44:30.519 They said Blackwater? I go, I don't think so, you know, 1:44:30.760 --> 1:44:35.320 we all we're looking at another song. I was anyway 1:44:35.760 --> 1:44:39.400 thinking there's other songs that could be hits off the record. 1:44:39.439 --> 1:44:43.559 That wasn't one of them. Um. But I kind of 1:44:43.680 --> 1:44:46.519 took you with a grain of salt, because you know, 1:44:46.560 --> 1:44:50.200 people say stuff like that doesn't mean it's true, and 1:44:50.960 --> 1:44:53.479 we just kind of continue the tour and you know, 1:44:53.560 --> 1:44:56.840 we're it was good news if it was true, but 1:44:56.920 --> 1:45:00.519 if it wasn't true, you know, we're here are doing 1:45:00.600 --> 1:45:04.559 something really cool that we love and with all these 1:45:04.600 --> 1:45:08.559 great bands. And so it turns out it was true. 1:45:08.600 --> 1:45:10.680 We got back and the record was getting played. It 1:45:10.800 --> 1:45:14.599 was just, you know, a big surprise, and I told 1:45:14.600 --> 1:45:17.880 the guys see all along, I was it was me, 1:45:18.080 --> 1:45:23.240 it was but you know, so that we lucked out 1:45:23.320 --> 1:45:26.559 on that one. How was that song created? Kind of 1:45:26.560 --> 1:45:28.800 the same way to Louse Street was created? The song 1:45:28.840 --> 1:45:33.720 to Louse Street down in New Orleans. Um, I had, 1:45:33.800 --> 1:45:36.920 I had the riff and I played it for Ted 1:45:37.000 --> 1:45:39.080 in the studio one time. I think we were making 1:45:40.200 --> 1:45:42.720 uh we were in the studio doing the Captain and 1:45:42.760 --> 1:45:45.599 the album and I had that riff way back then 1:45:46.320 --> 1:45:49.840 and I was fiddling around between takes on something else. 1:45:49.880 --> 1:45:53.120 I was putting some guitar on something and I was 1:45:53.600 --> 1:45:56.840 fiddling with the riff and that's what is that? And 1:45:56.840 --> 1:45:59.640 I go, just, you know, some riff that I have, 1:45:59.680 --> 1:46:03.600 and that's really cool. You should think about writing a 1:46:03.640 --> 1:46:07.160 song with that. And I go, yeah, I'd like to 1:46:07.320 --> 1:46:11.240 I don't know, you know, I've been trying so anyway, 1:46:11.280 --> 1:46:15.439 got down to New Orleans and still fiddling around with 1:46:15.479 --> 1:46:22.000 that riff. And really I have always kind of written 1:46:22.040 --> 1:46:27.479 songs in two different ways. One way, I'll write, you know, 1:46:27.840 --> 1:46:31.960 chords and try to lay lyrics on top of that 1:46:32.520 --> 1:46:36.600 with melodies and other what times I'll write poetry and 1:46:36.640 --> 1:46:39.040 then bring the poetry back and see if I can 1:46:39.120 --> 1:46:42.320 fit it in somewhere with with something I'm working on. 1:46:42.840 --> 1:46:46.760 In the case of Blackwater, I started writing images and 1:46:47.520 --> 1:46:52.639 poetic themes, and I think the first thing I remember 1:46:52.720 --> 1:47:00.280 writing was I was going up to the uptown on 1:47:00.280 --> 1:47:06.799 on the street car goes up St. Charles Uptown towards uh. 1:47:07.120 --> 1:47:11.760 I think it's two lane University up there, and I 1:47:11.840 --> 1:47:14.360 was riding on the car and it was raining outside, 1:47:14.600 --> 1:47:16.759 and I had a piece of paper and I always 1:47:16.800 --> 1:47:19.639 used to carry a pad and paper around within those days. 1:47:19.720 --> 1:47:22.559 I wrote, if it rains, I don't care, don't make 1:47:22.600 --> 1:47:24.759 no difference to me. I'll take I'm taking that street 1:47:24.760 --> 1:47:28.240 car that's going uptown And that was the beginning of 1:47:28.280 --> 1:47:30.920 the song. That's kind of how it started. And I 1:47:30.960 --> 1:47:32.840 got to the laundry mat I was going uptown to 1:47:32.880 --> 1:47:38.400 do my laundry, and uh, I started continuing to write 1:47:38.439 --> 1:47:42.120 stuff and and wrote some more images. And you know, 1:47:42.240 --> 1:47:46.240 I always loved you know, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn 1:47:46.320 --> 1:47:50.439 and the books. And I wrote something about, you know, 1:47:50.800 --> 1:47:55.360 building a raft and and you know, floating on the Mississippian. 1:47:55.479 --> 1:47:58.200 And I had heard the term black water somewhere and 1:47:58.240 --> 1:48:02.880 it really was really in regards to the Mississippi River 1:48:03.120 --> 1:48:06.080 Old black water. And I don't know whether I heard 1:48:06.160 --> 1:48:10.000 a song or a poem or a story, and so 1:48:10.040 --> 1:48:14.960 I incorporated that into it as well. And then I 1:48:15.000 --> 1:48:18.759 wrote the song and came back and put it together 1:48:18.800 --> 1:48:22.120 in the studio, you know, as as we usually do 1:48:22.160 --> 1:48:24.920 with things, you know, we kind of either rehearse a 1:48:24.960 --> 1:48:26.800 little bit and then we go in the studio. And 1:48:27.200 --> 1:48:29.280 but a lot of it came together in the studios 1:48:29.439 --> 1:48:33.160 as it as it turned out. Um, but I had 1:48:33.880 --> 1:48:35.880 I had the lyrics, and I had the melodies, and 1:48:35.960 --> 1:48:38.840 I had the guitar changes in the chords and so 1:48:38.880 --> 1:48:41.280 on going in and then it was just a matter 1:48:41.320 --> 1:48:46.599 of nuance and arrangement these songs. This is almost fifty 1:48:46.680 --> 1:48:49.160 years ago, and I vividly have a memory of the 1:48:49.200 --> 1:48:52.479 song was living in Los Angeles and I went to 1:48:52.520 --> 1:48:55.479 live with these guys because my sister moved where I 1:48:55.520 --> 1:48:57.800 was living with her and another woman. And I lived 1:48:57.800 --> 1:48:59.800 with these guys all of three weeks. But we were 1:49:00.000 --> 1:49:04.000 going up in my car. Blackwater came on and different 1:49:04.000 --> 1:49:05.439 people in the car. There were three people the car 1:49:05.479 --> 1:49:09.240 were seeing different parts and it was a good car stereo. 1:49:09.320 --> 1:49:11.479 You could hear, you know, the left and right. Whose 1:49:11.520 --> 1:49:14.400 idea was to do all that? I had the idea 1:49:14.720 --> 1:49:21.920 for singing around like that. I I didn't think it 1:49:21.960 --> 1:49:25.920 would go into an acapella section, which I which I love, 1:49:26.400 --> 1:49:31.320 and that was really Ted's idea I had. My concept 1:49:31.479 --> 1:49:34.519 was it was going to go into a you know, 1:49:35.439 --> 1:49:38.160 five piece Dixie Land band. So I was going to 1:49:38.280 --> 1:49:43.160 take the guitars and everything to a clarinet, uh, you know, 1:49:43.600 --> 1:49:48.920 a trumpet, a tube, a band joe, that kind of thing, 1:49:48.960 --> 1:49:54.760 and do a traditional dixieland uh kind of an arrangement 1:49:54.880 --> 1:49:59.200 behind it while singing those vocals. And Ted said, well, 1:49:59.240 --> 1:50:03.519 that's a it's a cool idea, But do you mind 1:50:03.600 --> 1:50:06.360 if I if I try some other ideas that I 1:50:06.400 --> 1:50:08.559 have And I go no, of course not, because by 1:50:08.640 --> 1:50:13.040 that time we had recognized Ted's it was a brilliant 1:50:13.040 --> 1:50:17.320 producer and that you know, when Ted said something, listen 1:50:17.400 --> 1:50:19.640 to what he's saying, because you know, it could be 1:50:19.680 --> 1:50:24.960 a really good idea. And so um, we decided that 1:50:25.479 --> 1:50:29.280 it would be better as an acapella thing, and uh, 1:50:30.880 --> 1:50:32.840 I didn't Again, I didn't think it would break down 1:50:32.880 --> 1:50:36.719 totally to an acapella because it really I always envisioned 1:50:36.760 --> 1:50:40.880 at least some rhythm or something going on, and it 1:50:40.920 --> 1:50:45.080 works perfectly in that and that doing that, it's really 1:50:45.080 --> 1:50:50.000 that street corner thing that I love. That anyway, And 1:50:50.000 --> 1:50:54.679 and then Ted brought in um someone to play viola 1:50:54.760 --> 1:50:58.760 on it, which I thought was Again I wasn't sure 1:50:58.800 --> 1:51:02.960 about the instrument because you know, violin is something I 1:51:03.000 --> 1:51:06.919 always was familiar with, but viola that's a little darker. 1:51:06.960 --> 1:51:11.120 And why why a viola instead of a of a violin? 1:51:11.280 --> 1:51:14.200 And and is it going to be a Cajun thing 1:51:14.360 --> 1:51:16.000 or what are you gonna do? Well, it turns out 1:51:16.040 --> 1:51:18.440 it's really not a Cajun thing. It's really more melodic 1:51:18.560 --> 1:51:23.320 and totally different. And Ted had been producing this band 1:51:24.080 --> 1:51:29.120 Chunky Nova and Ernie, so that is no v I 1:51:29.160 --> 1:51:32.840 can't remember how you pronounce her lasting narvo narvo or 1:51:32.880 --> 1:51:36.840 something like that, Um playing the viola, and of course 1:51:36.840 --> 1:51:39.000 when I heard it, I flipped. I thought, oh my god, 1:51:39.120 --> 1:51:43.360 this is so perfect. This is exactly where it should go, 1:51:43.760 --> 1:51:48.559 and the right instrument, the right player, every you know, 1:51:48.840 --> 1:51:52.120 just was like, you know, a dream come true for me. Okay, 1:51:52.160 --> 1:51:55.839 the next album once again, my favorite song is yours. 1:51:55.920 --> 1:51:57.840 Not that it was the one on the radio, but 1:51:58.000 --> 1:52:02.880 well I told you it was Nils fan Dangle. Tell 1:52:02.960 --> 1:52:06.519 me the story of Niels fan Dango. Oh gosh. Well, 1:52:06.680 --> 1:52:10.679 I was a huge fan of Jack Caro Whac and 1:52:11.000 --> 1:52:15.639 all those guys had a presence there in San Jose 1:52:15.760 --> 1:52:18.800 and the Santa Cruz Mountains with unbeknownst to me, I 1:52:18.840 --> 1:52:22.040 always thought they were, you know, San Francisco, the the 1:52:22.120 --> 1:52:26.920 Beat generation. And I learned that Neil Cassidy. In fact, 1:52:27.000 --> 1:52:30.360 I saw Neil Cassidy at that venue I was talking 1:52:30.400 --> 1:52:34.080 about with where I went to see Janis Joplin. There 1:52:34.160 --> 1:52:40.439 was Neo Cassidy walking around with a washing machine and 1:52:40.560 --> 1:52:42.920 some kind of a tube going to some kind of 1:52:42.960 --> 1:52:48.719 a gas mask that he had. Just a crazy, crazy artist, 1:52:49.600 --> 1:52:57.040 you know, nonconformist guy. Um. But as I read those books, 1:52:57.080 --> 1:53:01.439 I recognize that Neil Cassidy was this really character. Of course, 1:53:01.800 --> 1:53:06.640 and then later on when I began reading, uh, you 1:53:06.640 --> 1:53:09.519 know about the electric kool Aid ascid test, and I'm 1:53:09.560 --> 1:53:12.960 trying to think, I I learned about Neil Cassidy before 1:53:13.000 --> 1:53:18.000 I even read that book. He was a legend in 1:53:18.800 --> 1:53:22.080 where I lived around the area there as to being, 1:53:22.520 --> 1:53:25.840 you know, the just this character, and everybody talked about 1:53:25.880 --> 1:53:28.920 everybody seemed all of my a lot of musician friends 1:53:28.960 --> 1:53:32.439 and people in the literary community, they all knew Neil. 1:53:32.640 --> 1:53:36.759 I never knew him, although I saw him the one time, 1:53:36.800 --> 1:53:41.120 but everybody had a story about Neil Cassidy. You know, 1:53:42.400 --> 1:53:49.520 he talks a mile a minute. He juggles uh uh hammers. 1:53:49.600 --> 1:53:55.639 You know what do you call it? Huge? Uh? My 1:53:55.680 --> 1:54:00.920 mind's are blank, but you know, sledge hammers. He juggled sledgehammers. 1:54:00.920 --> 1:54:05.760 I'm trying to visualize this guy. He takes more speed 1:54:06.200 --> 1:54:09.679 than anybody and stays up for a week and then 1:54:10.120 --> 1:54:12.519 he sleeps for a week. And he could take more 1:54:12.600 --> 1:54:15.240 or less d than anyone and drive a bus. And 1:54:15.280 --> 1:54:20.840 I was just like, what is superhuman? Crazy artist? You 1:54:20.880 --> 1:54:26.360 know what is this? And so um, I'm living in 1:54:26.439 --> 1:54:30.920 Las Gatis and I'm I'm at a club and I 1:54:31.000 --> 1:54:32.840 have a friend that plays in a band, and I 1:54:32.880 --> 1:54:36.720 go to see this band and and I hear and 1:54:36.760 --> 1:54:38.440 I hear the band, I go, well, these guys are 1:54:38.440 --> 1:54:42.120 pretty good and and I'm sitting there and uh, after 1:54:42.200 --> 1:54:44.720 they took a break, this guy walks out of the 1:54:44.720 --> 1:54:47.600 band who was playing the guitar in the band. He goes, uh, hi, 1:54:48.520 --> 1:54:52.760 you don't know me. My name is John Cassidy, you know, 1:54:53.720 --> 1:54:58.280 and uh you might know my dad, Neil. And I 1:54:58.400 --> 1:55:02.960 and uh so, I'm so I'm meeting Neil's son John. 1:55:03.120 --> 1:55:08.400 You can be becoming good friends. And and he goes, 1:55:08.920 --> 1:55:11.520 you need to meet my mom, you know, Caroline, you 1:55:11.600 --> 1:55:13.960 need to meet my mom. So at some point. And 1:55:14.120 --> 1:55:20.280 my my girlfriend's brother Bill, he's an author, he wrote 1:55:20.280 --> 1:55:22.640 an author. He wrote a book called be Nut Content. 1:55:23.520 --> 1:55:29.160 And he's a friend of Ken Ken Kesey. And so 1:55:29.640 --> 1:55:37.120 there's this just you know, serendipity about you know, Neil Cassidy. So, um, 1:55:37.160 --> 1:55:39.600 I have this riff and this is one of those 1:55:39.640 --> 1:55:44.040 instances where I'm having this song, this you know, musical 1:55:44.160 --> 1:55:47.520 thing that I'm thinking, you know, I want to write 1:55:47.840 --> 1:55:50.200 something like the Almond brothers. You know, I want to 1:55:50.200 --> 1:55:54.680 write something with rhythm and fast and you know, bluesy 1:55:54.960 --> 1:55:58.800 and and stuff and so uh then I started thinking 1:55:58.800 --> 1:56:02.720 about Neil. And the song is fast, but it gets 1:56:02.760 --> 1:56:07.080 faster one of the great things about it. And I'm thinking, 1:56:07.920 --> 1:56:11.520 this reminds me of Neil Cassikia and so I think, 1:56:11.560 --> 1:56:14.640 I gotta, I gotta write a song with Neil and 1:56:14.720 --> 1:56:18.040 it it's really not about Neil. It's really about about me, 1:56:18.640 --> 1:56:21.680 about my experience, but he is part of He is 1:56:21.920 --> 1:56:26.280 part of my experience. So um, and I find out 1:56:26.320 --> 1:56:28.680 he lived up in the Santa Cruz Mountains where I lived, 1:56:28.840 --> 1:56:31.320 and not far from where I lived, and and John 1:56:31.360 --> 1:56:33.520 and I were talking, you know, and he's telling me 1:56:33.600 --> 1:56:36.840 things about him, and then I'm reading about, you know, 1:56:36.880 --> 1:56:39.320 where he lived in Las Gados and how he lived 1:56:39.720 --> 1:56:42.640 in the Santa Cruz Mountains and what he did and 1:56:42.640 --> 1:56:46.240 and and it all kind of came together as a 1:56:46.240 --> 1:56:49.919 as a little tribute, if you're will, to Neil Cassidy. 1:56:50.080 --> 1:56:53.600 So it's it's about both of us. It's about my 1:56:53.720 --> 1:56:56.560 love for that area and and I know he loved 1:56:56.560 --> 1:56:59.640 that area. He he ended up coming back again and 1:56:59.680 --> 1:57:03.000 again to last get us Okay, the line going back 1:57:03.040 --> 1:57:06.360 to my mountain, the home Loma Creata. Was that your 1:57:06.400 --> 1:57:10.240 life or his both? I think, you know, Loma Priata 1:57:10.280 --> 1:57:13.040 is the like, like the highest peak there in the 1:57:13.080 --> 1:57:16.160 Santa Cruz Mountains. I think there's a you know, some 1:57:16.240 --> 1:57:22.840 kind of defense Department of Defense thing up on top 1:57:22.880 --> 1:57:27.960 of the mountain, you know. But Loma Priata is kind 1:57:28.000 --> 1:57:32.080 of a part of the Santa Cruz Mountains that you know, 1:57:32.120 --> 1:57:34.360 a lot of people refer to as thea. It's up 1:57:34.400 --> 1:57:39.120 near Loma Prieta. There's a road Lama Priata. There was 1:57:39.160 --> 1:57:42.400 a train station in Loma Priata and the eighteen hundreds. 1:57:42.400 --> 1:57:45.000 You know, it's just kind of an iconic part of 1:57:45.040 --> 1:57:49.720 that area. So you know, I lived near there and 1:57:49.960 --> 1:57:52.800 and Neo Cassidy lived there at one time as well, 1:57:52.920 --> 1:57:56.920 near there, so uh so we both ended up going back. 1:57:57.600 --> 1:58:00.960 So okay, needless to say, Tom get it's sick. Michael 1:58:01.040 --> 1:58:03.120 McDonald comes in, You make a couple of oubs. I 1:58:03.160 --> 1:58:06.640 remember buying that album to Drive Cross Country Taken to 1:58:06.720 --> 1:58:09.040 the to the Streets and just being shocked like it 1:58:09.080 --> 1:58:13.280 was a different band that had some success than the 1:58:13.960 --> 1:58:17.360 Living on a Fall line. Did Minute Pie Minute comes out? 1:58:18.040 --> 1:58:21.280 And it's it's almost more successful than The Captain and me. 1:58:21.560 --> 1:58:24.040 Did you have any idea that that album was going 1:58:24.080 --> 1:58:28.320 to break through that way? Not at all. No, U. Yeah, 1:58:28.400 --> 1:58:32.800 you always hope that the records are going to do well. Um. 1:58:33.040 --> 1:58:38.160 I I love the songs on the record, although you know, 1:58:38.200 --> 1:58:42.040 there was a lot of tension probably making the record, 1:58:42.160 --> 1:58:49.120 and I know for a fact that Mike felt very 1:58:50.440 --> 1:58:55.760 um ambivalent about about the record itself. You know, he 1:58:55.800 --> 1:59:00.280 didn't feel that he'd achieved at the time. Mean, we 1:59:00.600 --> 1:59:04.480 talked about it openly, that he he was achieving the 1:59:06.680 --> 1:59:09.520 music that he had set out to, you know, or 1:59:10.520 --> 1:59:12.840 not that he had set out, but he didn't feel 1:59:12.880 --> 1:59:15.200 that he had risen to the occasion as much as 1:59:15.360 --> 1:59:19.640 as he hoped. And I can't. I kept tell him that, Mike, 1:59:19.680 --> 1:59:23.240 you know, it's brilliant. You know, the songs are great. 1:59:23.400 --> 1:59:25.520 You did a great job. You're saying you're butt off. 1:59:26.640 --> 1:59:29.120 Really you have nothing to be worried about with this. 1:59:29.280 --> 1:59:32.120 I I go, you know, and I think there was 1:59:32.160 --> 1:59:37.000 a little um insecurity in terms of you know, we 1:59:37.040 --> 1:59:40.440 had had this success with taking to the streets. Living 1:59:40.480 --> 1:59:44.200 on the fault Line is arguably probably our least successful 1:59:44.240 --> 1:59:48.600 record beyond our very first album. Although it's one of 1:59:48.640 --> 1:59:56.200 my favorite records, it's such an obtuse uh musical venture, 1:59:56.400 --> 1:59:59.520 you know. Really it's nothing like being we ever did 1:59:59.560 --> 2:00:03.480 before or after it, although there are you know, songs 2:00:03.560 --> 2:00:08.160 that certainly fit within our you know, scope of creativity. 2:00:08.200 --> 2:00:14.800 But it was crazy, you know, experimental record. We did 2:00:14.800 --> 2:00:18.880 a lot of experimenting. But minute by minute I I 2:00:18.920 --> 2:00:22.200 thought it was a great record, and particularly I felt 2:00:22.320 --> 2:00:28.120 Mike's songs were of it had risen to another level. 2:00:28.320 --> 2:00:33.400 You know, I just you know, it was very mature 2:00:34.120 --> 2:00:37.680 on his part, you know, with a song like minute 2:00:37.720 --> 2:00:42.960 by Minute, I just felt like, um, with that interesting opening, 2:00:43.440 --> 2:00:50.960 and that it was really bluesy, the kind of music 2:00:51.040 --> 2:00:55.720 that you know, we sort of are known for. He's 2:00:55.760 --> 2:00:58.760 singing the blues on that record, and but it was 2:00:58.800 --> 2:01:04.200 a little more jazzy, which I at that point in 2:01:05.240 --> 2:01:08.760 my presence in the band, I was kind of shooting 2:01:08.800 --> 2:01:11.600 for a little bit more. You know. We certainly did 2:01:11.640 --> 2:01:14.840 some rock and country and all kinds of things, but 2:01:15.560 --> 2:01:18.200 I love the kind of jazz tinge things that we 2:01:18.200 --> 2:01:22.880 were doing at the time. I'm kind of a you know, 2:01:23.120 --> 2:01:26.240 if not a great jazz player at least a real 2:01:26.360 --> 2:01:30.920 jazz fan. So I liked that we were experimenting in 2:01:30.920 --> 2:01:33.560 that direction, and I felt on that record we were 2:01:33.600 --> 2:01:36.800 doing that. At the same time, I felt a song 2:01:36.960 --> 2:01:41.600 like What a Fool Believes was just a great uh 2:01:41.800 --> 2:01:45.560 contemporary pop kind of a of a song that that 2:01:45.800 --> 2:01:52.640 still had a legitimacy as a musical uh presentation. I thought, 2:01:52.680 --> 2:01:59.320 you know, it was really some serious chord structure and 2:01:59.520 --> 2:02:05.600 rhythmic properties there and just great. We all participated, we 2:02:05.680 --> 2:02:09.360 all saying we all you know, did our usual contributions, 2:02:09.560 --> 2:02:12.880 and uh, you know, it was meaningful for me as 2:02:13.000 --> 2:02:16.280 a as a part of that, you know. And what 2:02:16.640 --> 2:02:19.760 where There are songs on records that I never even 2:02:19.800 --> 2:02:25.360 played on, and some that I never sang on, not many, 2:02:25.480 --> 2:02:29.200 but some, and you always feel a little left out, 2:02:29.360 --> 2:02:32.480 you know. But on on that record, you know, we've 2:02:32.480 --> 2:02:36.480 all participated, and you know we were we were here 2:02:36.520 --> 2:02:38.880 and there and everywhere, and I like that. I love 2:02:39.400 --> 2:02:42.720 that opportunity, and it's it just makes you feel part 2:02:42.720 --> 2:02:46.600 of the part of the whole. And but but I 2:02:46.640 --> 2:02:49.360 love the album, you know, as as much as as 2:02:49.520 --> 2:02:54.120 as is insecure as we were about it, I really 2:02:54.120 --> 2:02:57.840 liked the record. Okay, let's talk about something really important. Okay, 2:02:57.880 --> 2:03:00.920 you make that album, you make the sub to Queen album, 2:03:01.000 --> 2:03:04.880 You cut your hair. You were legendary for your long year. 2:03:04.960 --> 2:03:08.240 You cut your hair and then eventually you grew it back. 2:03:08.720 --> 2:03:11.200 What's going on there? Well, you know I hadn't cut 2:03:11.200 --> 2:03:17.160 my hair in like forever, and so, um, I thought, well, 2:03:17.240 --> 2:03:23.360 now that we're firmly established, maybe I can change something 2:03:23.640 --> 2:03:27.760 and it'll be uh something to talk about. You know, 2:03:28.400 --> 2:03:32.200 we're always We had a great publicist at that time, 2:03:32.320 --> 2:03:34.840 David Guest. I don't know if you're familiar with David. 2:03:35.160 --> 2:03:38.240 David Guests who married Lizamanel. Yeah, I wish he was 2:03:38.280 --> 2:03:40.520 still around for you to do an interview with him, 2:03:40.560 --> 2:03:45.600 because it would be a real something special. But he 2:03:45.720 --> 2:03:52.040 was just a madman. But you know, just cutting my 2:03:52.120 --> 2:03:55.680 hair was something he could use to to make publicity 2:03:55.680 --> 2:03:58.480 out of. So you know, that was a good something 2:03:58.520 --> 2:04:01.200 to do, and then you know, it's just something to try. 2:04:02.240 --> 2:04:05.840 At that time, I think it was the beginning of um, 2:04:05.880 --> 2:04:08.360 you know, kind of alternative music too. You know, there 2:04:08.440 --> 2:04:12.440 was especially where I lived. I was living in the 2:04:12.440 --> 2:04:15.240 Santa Cruz area at that time, and there were a 2:04:15.280 --> 2:04:18.480 lot of uh, you know, sort of punk bands going 2:04:18.520 --> 2:04:21.720 on and stuff, and I sort of went, well, these 2:04:22.040 --> 2:04:24.320 these guys are my friends. You know, I want to 2:04:24.360 --> 2:04:27.200 be I want to be a punk too. So I 2:04:27.240 --> 2:04:30.640 always was a punk anyway, but um so that was 2:04:30.720 --> 2:04:33.400 part of it, you know, just kind of wanting to 2:04:33.520 --> 2:04:36.160 do something different. And then once I had done it, 2:04:36.200 --> 2:04:39.000 I realized, oh, jeez, you know, I got a comb 2:04:39.280 --> 2:04:42.960 combe this stuff, this hair, and so then I thought, 2:04:43.280 --> 2:04:45.960 you know it, some was so much easier having a 2:04:45.960 --> 2:04:47.640 longer hair. All I had to do is brush it, 2:04:47.840 --> 2:04:50.840 and uh, I have to you know, jel it or 2:04:50.880 --> 2:04:53.560 you know, do anything to it. So I kind of, 2:04:53.600 --> 2:04:57.200 you know, and I'm you know, I'm really I'm really 2:04:57.200 --> 2:05:01.440 not a punk. I'm a hippie. So okay, So you 2:05:01.480 --> 2:05:05.440 have this tour with Michael McDonald and Tom and then 2:05:05.560 --> 2:05:10.720 COVID happened. Presently you're doing a residency in Vegas. Is 2:05:10.760 --> 2:05:14.680 it a matter of satiating the fans or as long 2:05:14.720 --> 2:05:17.040 as you can sell tickets, Mike will go out with you. 2:05:17.960 --> 2:05:20.280 Or is there no plan or is this a one 2:05:20.360 --> 2:05:23.120 time deal? What's going on? I don't think there's any plan. 2:05:23.960 --> 2:05:27.400 I had mentioned Mike years and years ago, I said, 2:05:27.400 --> 2:05:30.560 you know, would you ever want to come and do 2:05:30.600 --> 2:05:33.760 a tour with us? Because I think it would be 2:05:34.120 --> 2:05:37.840 just a great thing for for our audiences. You know, 2:05:37.920 --> 2:05:41.120 when we're doing gigs, you know, fans come up to 2:05:41.200 --> 2:05:43.280 gonna Have you talked to Mike lately as Mike can 2:05:43.320 --> 2:05:45.000 ever come back and play with you guys? And I go, 2:05:45.840 --> 2:05:48.600 he does, you know, gigs with us once in a while, 2:05:48.680 --> 2:05:51.240 or or we're playing somewhere and he's around, he comes 2:05:51.280 --> 2:05:53.680 and sits in. But I don't know, I don't know 2:05:53.680 --> 2:05:56.960 if that will ever happen, you know, because Mike likes 2:05:56.720 --> 2:06:00.120 the way it the way he does it. And so 2:06:00.200 --> 2:06:02.120 I mentioned to him one time he had he was 2:06:02.160 --> 2:06:04.840 living in uh he had bought a place over in 2:06:04.920 --> 2:06:07.839 Maui and we hung out there, used to go surfing 2:06:08.680 --> 2:06:12.080 once in a while, and I said, you know, would 2:06:12.080 --> 2:06:14.320 you ever feel like coming and doing some kicks with 2:06:14.400 --> 2:06:16.840 us and do a tour? I have to do a 2:06:16.840 --> 2:06:18.760 big tour, you know, just something to go out and 2:06:19.240 --> 2:06:22.600 do a few dates and the fans would flip and 2:06:22.760 --> 2:06:24.520 he goes, no, I'd love to do that. You should, 2:06:24.720 --> 2:06:28.920 We should do something like that. And so we kind 2:06:28.920 --> 2:06:32.560 of never did it, you know, we just kind of decided, 2:06:32.560 --> 2:06:34.240 and every once in a while I'd see, might go 2:06:34.560 --> 2:06:36.800 still up for coming and doing some gigs with us? Yeah, 2:06:36.920 --> 2:06:39.360 just let me know whenever, you know. And so finally 2:06:39.440 --> 2:06:42.000 I went to the guys. I said, you know, Mike 2:06:42.400 --> 2:06:44.920 keeps telling me come out and do some gigs with us. 2:06:45.000 --> 2:06:47.200 Would that be something that would be cool with you guys? 2:06:47.240 --> 2:06:51.400 And John and Tom said yeah, sure, you know, ask him, 2:06:51.480 --> 2:06:53.360 you know when when you'd like to do that. And 2:06:54.160 --> 2:06:56.040 so that's kind of how it came about. It was 2:06:56.080 --> 2:06:59.360 really informal, and and then we just we knew it 2:06:59.360 --> 2:07:02.480 would be, you know, something cool that people would really like. 2:07:02.680 --> 2:07:06.600 And so at that point, we know the pandemic hit, 2:07:06.840 --> 2:07:10.000 and I think we kind of that we're on the 2:07:10.040 --> 2:07:13.440 cusp of doing it in the pandemic hit, and we said, well, 2:07:13.520 --> 2:07:17.600 you know, we have to postpone it, and so we did. 2:07:17.640 --> 2:07:20.640 We postponed it, and then as we postponed it, you 2:07:20.680 --> 2:07:22.760 know more, we kept getting more and more offers people, 2:07:22.880 --> 2:07:24.720 Oh yeah, you gotta come here, you gotta come and 2:07:24.760 --> 2:07:27.280 play it. You guys should come and play there. So 2:07:27.360 --> 2:07:29.360 we ended up playing, you know, booking a lot of 2:07:29.400 --> 2:07:32.320 shows and uh, you know, Mikey, sure you want to 2:07:32.320 --> 2:07:35.080 do this. He says, yeah, this is this is cool. 2:07:35.160 --> 2:07:37.400 You know, well we'll have a lot of fun, and 2:07:38.080 --> 2:07:41.360 I don't have to work so hard. You know, it 2:07:41.440 --> 2:07:43.720 has a lot of work getting out there, you know, 2:07:44.560 --> 2:07:47.600 shouldering all that, and and Tommy's had to work hard, 2:07:47.680 --> 2:07:50.120 you know, his shoulders most of the most of the 2:07:50.160 --> 2:07:54.680 songs for the night. So this has been in some 2:07:54.760 --> 2:07:57.440 sense a bit you know, we're gonna be older guys. 2:07:57.480 --> 2:08:00.440 It's nice to have a little bit of cushion, you know, 2:08:01.200 --> 2:08:03.520 help each other out a little bit so that that 2:08:04.080 --> 2:08:06.720 you know, it's in some ways a lot of fun 2:08:06.960 --> 2:08:10.320 in that regard, just because we we can in what 2:08:10.520 --> 2:08:13.600 we've extended the show. You know, we we actually were 2:08:13.600 --> 2:08:15.560 playing about a two and a half hour show, almost 2:08:15.600 --> 2:08:19.760 three hours. We're down here working in Las Vegas. They 2:08:19.760 --> 2:08:21.600 don't want us to play that long. They want people 2:08:21.600 --> 2:08:25.680 to get back out on the slot machines. But we're 2:08:25.680 --> 2:08:27.920 still playing an hour, a little more than an hour, 2:08:28.080 --> 2:08:30.520 or I'm sorry, a little more than two hours here. 2:08:31.840 --> 2:08:33.880 But it's a good show. We get to do all 2:08:33.920 --> 2:08:37.240 the songs that all the hits that people you know 2:08:37.320 --> 2:08:39.480 that they got to hear the hits, and and then 2:08:39.520 --> 2:08:41.600 we sprinkle in a few of the songs that you know, 2:08:41.640 --> 2:08:44.680 we enjoyed playing and some deep cuts and stuff, some 2:08:44.680 --> 2:08:48.800 stuff we've never played ever. And then, uh, we have 2:08:48.880 --> 2:08:52.160 this new album out that we put out and it 2:08:52.280 --> 2:08:57.360 was October of last I think was October October. Yeah, 2:08:57.680 --> 2:08:59.760 and so we're doing a few songs. We do three 2:09:00.320 --> 2:09:03.280 from from the new album. So that's that's really a 2:09:03.360 --> 2:09:05.960 treat for us to do some new music as well. 2:09:06.040 --> 2:09:09.680 So we're really, uh, I mean, we're having the time 2:09:09.720 --> 2:09:12.520 of our lives. You know. It's never would have thought 2:09:12.640 --> 2:09:17.440 in a million years, fifty years from more than fifty 2:09:17.520 --> 2:09:19.320 years from the time we put it together, that we'd 2:09:19.320 --> 2:09:22.480 still be out here doing it and having the fun 2:09:22.560 --> 2:09:26.839 we're having being able to And I gotta say again 2:09:26.920 --> 2:09:29.720 for me that it's it's all selfish. You know. I 2:09:29.760 --> 2:09:35.640 get to play with great musicians, singing and playing songs 2:09:35.680 --> 2:09:40.640 that are you know, iconic in in uh the American 2:09:40.800 --> 2:09:44.360 soundscape these days. You know, I mean we never never, again, 2:09:44.400 --> 2:09:46.880 I never really would have thought that we would have 2:09:46.960 --> 2:09:50.040 ever made this kind of musical impact as as a band. 2:09:50.720 --> 2:09:53.080 And uh, to be able to be a part of that, 2:09:53.200 --> 2:09:55.360 and to me, it's like a you know, it's a 2:09:55.360 --> 2:09:59.720 gift for me personally. I get to do work in 2:09:59.760 --> 2:10:05.240 this dream band with these fabulous musicians, and our music 2:10:05.520 --> 2:10:09.880 is certainly popular music, but it's it's much more complicated, 2:10:09.880 --> 2:10:13.480 I think than the average songs that are that are 2:10:13.560 --> 2:10:16.560 out there on the radio or that have been um 2:10:17.640 --> 2:10:20.800 and and you know there are certainly there are other bands, 2:10:21.120 --> 2:10:26.880 yes Kansas, you know STEVEE. Dan that write music that 2:10:27.080 --> 2:10:34.520 is equally interesting and complicated. But I love the fact 2:10:34.560 --> 2:10:38.680 that the music is challenging and even after playing songs 2:10:38.680 --> 2:10:41.000 for years and years, I still have to think about 2:10:41.040 --> 2:10:47.960 what I'm doing and that really makes for a great 2:10:49.280 --> 2:10:51.920 enjoyment for me every night. I don't you don't go 2:10:51.960 --> 2:10:54.280 out there just taking over. Oh I know this stuff 2:10:54.320 --> 2:10:56.400 so well. I have to worry about it. You know. 2:10:56.480 --> 2:11:00.400 The intricacies of the music are such that you can 2:11:00.440 --> 2:11:04.440 play a thousand times and still it's it's challenging. If 2:11:04.440 --> 2:11:07.360 you're not paying attention, you're going to screw up. And 2:11:07.440 --> 2:11:12.040 so uh, you know, I'm always deep into it, every song, 2:11:12.320 --> 2:11:15.760 every everything, all night long. It's just it's it's a 2:11:15.800 --> 2:11:19.440 good thing for you know, keeping your brain active. You know, 2:11:19.680 --> 2:11:24.440 as as you get older, I'm still always thinking. Another 2:11:24.560 --> 2:11:28.040 question though, this is very significant in the Doobies career, 2:11:28.840 --> 2:11:31.920 is you had this manager, Bruce Cone. He had a 2:11:32.040 --> 2:11:34.600 very high profile and a lot of managers do not 2:11:35.160 --> 2:11:37.840 so that people in the who are just fans are 2:11:37.840 --> 2:11:40.600 aware of him. He's part of the legacy in terms 2:11:40.600 --> 2:11:44.400 of bringing the band back together for charity things. You 2:11:44.680 --> 2:11:49.080 ultimately switch to irving A's Loss operation, and in addition, 2:11:49.120 --> 2:11:53.080 in the book, Bruce is really not mentioned. How did 2:11:53.120 --> 2:11:57.360 you decide to switch managers and what is the difference 2:11:57.440 --> 2:12:00.320 with the new managers opposed to the old. Well, you know, 2:12:00.320 --> 2:12:04.520 I'm not really supposed to disclose, you know, Well, we'll 2:12:04.520 --> 2:12:07.800 talk about what you can. I'm not trying to you know, yeah, 2:12:07.840 --> 2:12:10.879 I will because you know, Bruce was a great manager. 2:12:10.920 --> 2:12:12.440 I think he did a great job for the band. 2:12:12.800 --> 2:12:17.360 We we had, you know, a lot of success with 2:12:17.360 --> 2:12:21.760 with Bruce, and you know, he was a great person. 2:12:22.640 --> 2:12:27.840 Um at a point there was there were some um 2:12:28.600 --> 2:12:34.200 disagreements and we've found ourselves in a predicament where we 2:12:34.200 --> 2:12:37.760 we had to make a change and it didn't It 2:12:37.840 --> 2:12:43.400 wasn't something that I guess I should speak for myself, 2:12:43.440 --> 2:12:47.280 and it wasn't something that I that I looked forward 2:12:47.320 --> 2:12:53.880 to at the time. Um, but it was necessary. It 2:12:54.000 --> 2:13:00.200 was an impast that came about and we we had 2:13:00.240 --> 2:13:08.080 to make the change. And we I've known Irving really. 2:13:08.080 --> 2:13:15.000 I met Irving through Mike McDonald. Mike introduced me to 2:13:15.040 --> 2:13:19.840 Irving gosh over thirty years ago, forty years ago, something 2:13:19.880 --> 2:13:26.320 like that. And naturally everyone is aware of Irving's abilities 2:13:26.520 --> 2:13:31.120 and presence in the in the music industry. And when 2:13:31.200 --> 2:13:37.760 we when we signed with Irving, it was, you know, 2:13:38.080 --> 2:13:46.120 something that for myself it was like wow, you know, 2:13:46.720 --> 2:13:54.440 he's like this incredible person, both as as a business 2:13:54.560 --> 2:13:57.160 entity and as a person in general. He's kind of 2:13:57.200 --> 2:14:05.960 a guru to me musicians. And we had reached a 2:14:06.080 --> 2:14:12.880 point in our um in our career with Bruce where 2:14:12.920 --> 2:14:19.680 we've kind of hitting a stagnant point and I think 2:14:19.960 --> 2:14:24.400 probably the band was on the verge of just retiring, 2:14:24.680 --> 2:14:31.520 you know, and um, we we made the break with 2:14:31.640 --> 2:14:35.480 Bruce before. We didn't go to Irving and say we 2:14:35.560 --> 2:14:39.680 want to make this break. We made the break earlier 2:14:39.760 --> 2:14:43.120 on and we kind of managed ourselves for a while 2:14:44.560 --> 2:14:47.720 because we could. We were you know, had enough knowledge 2:14:47.760 --> 2:14:51.520 at that point to continue with with what we were doing. 2:14:52.120 --> 2:14:54.880 And we did that for a while. Uh, and then 2:14:55.000 --> 2:14:57.240 of course we knew we were we would be out 2:14:57.360 --> 2:15:01.920 searching for someone to represent, and we spoke to several 2:15:02.360 --> 2:15:05.919 different a lot of different people before we made the decision. 2:15:06.920 --> 2:15:11.800 But when we found Irving would be interested, that was 2:15:12.040 --> 2:15:15.120 we knew that that would be a great place for us. 2:15:15.200 --> 2:15:18.840 Just for me again, once again, I kind of speak 2:15:18.880 --> 2:15:22.280 for myself on this. I'm a California guy. That the 2:15:24.680 --> 2:15:30.200 Irving's business is based in California. UM, I want to 2:15:30.240 --> 2:15:35.920 stay within that context. You know, I feel like we're 2:15:36.200 --> 2:15:41.640 a California band and who thinks they're from New Orleans. 2:15:43.800 --> 2:15:48.760 But you know, so it has been really invigorating for 2:15:48.800 --> 2:15:53.120 the band to be working with Irving and Kareem Karmi, 2:15:53.320 --> 2:15:58.960 who is really our day to day uh management. Kareem 2:15:58.960 --> 2:16:06.440 works for Stop Management, And it's been, you know, I 2:16:06.480 --> 2:16:09.440 don't know, really a shot in the arm. You know, 2:16:09.520 --> 2:16:15.880 we're really being more creative, more enthusiastic about what we're doing. UM, 2:16:16.600 --> 2:16:20.720 having a vision for the future that we kind of 2:16:20.720 --> 2:16:23.680 had begun to dissipate a little bit. I think we 2:16:23.840 --> 2:16:29.480 kind of you know, it wasn't that we were it 2:16:29.520 --> 2:16:31.960 was we were done or anything, but I think we 2:16:32.000 --> 2:16:38.680 had felt like, well we're going to probably at least yeah, 2:16:38.720 --> 2:16:41.400 I think we probably might have been done as a band, 2:16:41.959 --> 2:16:44.959 and we would certainly go on to continuing to be 2:16:45.879 --> 2:16:51.080 musicians and to write and try to be creative. But um, 2:16:53.120 --> 2:16:56.600 there it is. That's really where we ended up. Okay, 2:16:56.760 --> 2:17:00.680 you've been making music professionally for over five two years. 2:17:01.480 --> 2:17:03.880 You know we had VH one behind the music. The 2:17:04.040 --> 2:17:07.600 stories are legend of the people being ripped off or 2:17:07.640 --> 2:17:12.199 blowing all their money signing bad deals. The Doobie Brothers 2:17:12.200 --> 2:17:16.280 has never been a small group. How have you done 2:17:16.320 --> 2:17:18.959 financially over the years and where are you at now? 2:17:19.280 --> 2:17:25.280 I've certainly made some bad decisions financially. Yeah, it kind 2:17:25.280 --> 2:17:28.560 of comes goes with the territory. I think musicians or 2:17:28.720 --> 2:17:33.280 musicians first, and and that's our weak point. You know, 2:17:33.480 --> 2:17:37.200 people can talk you into doing things because they know 2:17:37.320 --> 2:17:42.000 you're you know, you're you're busy tuning your guitar. But 2:17:42.080 --> 2:17:47.000 I mean I've signed bad publishing deals, and you know, 2:17:48.920 --> 2:17:56.000 I've had people who have done nothing and then sued 2:17:56.040 --> 2:17:59.600 you because they can. And then you have to waste 2:17:59.640 --> 2:18:04.120 all your time and on something that really if if 2:18:04.280 --> 2:18:07.120 if you went before a jury or something they would 2:18:07.120 --> 2:18:10.680 never prevail, but you realized by that time you went 2:18:10.720 --> 2:18:13.120 to a jury, you'd lose way more money than it 2:18:13.160 --> 2:18:17.880 took you to get there. So those things happen. I've 2:18:17.879 --> 2:18:20.640 tried to be conservative in terms of of who I 2:18:20.680 --> 2:18:28.039 am financially, I don't you know, I don't have private 2:18:28.120 --> 2:18:36.080 jets and limousines and a lot of expensive jewelry or 2:18:36.200 --> 2:18:41.080 you know, just you know, bad bad drug habits and stuff. 2:18:41.120 --> 2:18:44.840 You know, I've tried to be aware of uh, you know, 2:18:45.640 --> 2:18:51.240 myself and the people around me. Um and I and 2:18:51.320 --> 2:18:54.160 I haven't been afraid to work, you know, I Uh, 2:18:54.520 --> 2:18:58.360 we're working. Is is good. It's good for all of us, 2:18:58.400 --> 2:19:01.880 you know, to continue to to do what we love 2:19:01.920 --> 2:19:04.240 to do, not take it for granted and just go well, 2:19:04.280 --> 2:19:07.440 you know that it used to be fun, more fun. 2:19:07.560 --> 2:19:10.280 I'm not gonna I'm not going to subject myself to that. 2:19:10.800 --> 2:19:13.760 To me, you just hang in there and do it. 2:19:13.840 --> 2:19:17.680 And uh, you know is that old adage if if 2:19:17.720 --> 2:19:19.840 you do something you love, it's going to come back 2:19:19.879 --> 2:19:22.119 to you. And that's that's really the way it's been 2:19:22.200 --> 2:19:25.199 for me. Uh, financially, you know, I'm not the richest 2:19:25.200 --> 2:19:27.080 guy out there. I'm not the poorest guy out there. 2:19:27.080 --> 2:19:29.200 I'm kind of in the middle, and and that's really 2:19:29.200 --> 2:19:32.320 where I want to be. I don't I don't. I 2:19:32.320 --> 2:19:36.400 don't have this, you know, I don't have I don't 2:19:36.440 --> 2:19:39.320 need to make a lot more money. And it's not 2:19:39.360 --> 2:19:41.640 about making money, you know, if you can survive, and 2:19:42.280 --> 2:19:44.360 you know, I don't have a lot of debts, thank god, 2:19:45.360 --> 2:19:49.680 you know, I do own my home. Um, that's really 2:19:49.720 --> 2:19:53.160 all I want out of life. I have a wonderful family. 2:19:53.240 --> 2:19:59.039 I have children, I have grandchildren. That's that's those are 2:19:59.080 --> 2:20:03.240 the real Uh, that's the real wealth, you know, and 2:20:03.360 --> 2:20:09.280 your health. Having your health is health is wealth. So 2:20:09.920 --> 2:20:12.240 you know I'm I'm a rich man. Okay, So you 2:20:12.320 --> 2:20:15.480 mentioned your wife and the motorcycles earlier. Is this have 2:20:15.600 --> 2:20:18.279 were you married before? Is this your one and only wife? 2:20:18.320 --> 2:20:21.240 I have had two marriages. My first marriage was to 2:20:22.640 --> 2:20:27.119 a gal that I spoke about, her brother, Bill Cradock. 2:20:28.320 --> 2:20:34.720 Diane was my first wife, great wonderful person. Um, and 2:20:35.000 --> 2:20:37.640 we still, you know, are good friends and stay in touch. 2:20:38.520 --> 2:20:43.560 I am married to Chris Summer Simmons. We've been married 2:20:43.600 --> 2:20:54.199 for thirty two years and got three children and three grandchildren, 2:20:54.320 --> 2:21:00.320 and UM, It's been a a wonderful relationship we've we 2:21:00.400 --> 2:21:05.039 met through motorcycling. We met that Sturgis, South Dakota, the 2:21:05.160 --> 2:21:11.760 motorcycle rally there. She came to a fundraiser that we 2:21:11.760 --> 2:21:15.640 were the Doobies were doing for the Fight against US 2:21:15.800 --> 2:21:22.680 Muscular Dystrophy that Harley supports and supported then still support. 2:21:23.760 --> 2:21:28.360 And I was the the chairman of the Biker's Fight 2:21:29.080 --> 2:21:34.160 Against Muscular Dystrophy and I was given a press conference. 2:21:34.200 --> 2:21:38.440 The band was there um to play and I was 2:21:38.440 --> 2:21:41.360 doing a press conference with the head of marketing for 2:21:41.400 --> 2:21:46.119 Harley Davidson talking about, you know, the concert and our 2:21:46.160 --> 2:21:51.360 efforts on behalf of the Muscular District Association. And she came. 2:21:52.640 --> 2:21:56.920 She had a motorcycle magazine called Harley Women, and she 2:21:57.040 --> 2:22:00.200 and her partner came to cover the press conference for 2:22:00.240 --> 2:22:05.400 the magazine, and I was introduced to the head of marketing, 2:22:05.480 --> 2:22:14.360 Clyde Vesseler, and we became friends and have been together 2:22:14.360 --> 2:22:18.039 ever since. Chris and I we she she We went 2:22:18.040 --> 2:22:22.800 out to Sturgis that night or the next I was 2:22:22.840 --> 2:22:24.840 that night. We went out Sturgis to the to the 2:22:24.959 --> 2:22:29.400 rally and hung out and walked around and bought some 2:22:29.520 --> 2:22:32.400 t shirts and just got to know each other. And 2:22:32.440 --> 2:22:35.039 we've been together ever since. It's amazing. So, what's the 2:22:35.120 --> 2:22:38.520 key to being together when you're on the road, etcetera. 2:22:38.600 --> 2:22:41.320 You know, the rock and roll road is it has 2:22:41.600 --> 2:22:45.440 littered with divorces. How do you keep together? She has 2:22:45.520 --> 2:22:49.760 traveled with me a lot from time to time. When 2:22:49.800 --> 2:22:54.440 my children were small, they accompanied us on the road. 2:22:54.480 --> 2:22:56.280 We took them on the road with us on the bus. 2:22:56.600 --> 2:22:58.520 They all of their bunks. They loved that, you know, 2:22:58.600 --> 2:23:04.920 camping out with the Doobie brothers on the bus. Um. 2:23:04.959 --> 2:23:11.640 So that's helped. Um. We share so many common interests 2:23:12.560 --> 2:23:17.480 and spend a lot of time together all all the time. 2:23:17.480 --> 2:23:20.200 You know, when we're when I'm not working, we're together 2:23:20.560 --> 2:23:26.640 when I'm working. She comes, um, and you know, I'm 2:23:26.680 --> 2:23:29.480 I love that. I mean, we just have a wonderful relationship. 2:23:29.560 --> 2:23:33.240 It's probably the most important thing in my life really 2:23:33.440 --> 2:23:37.080 is my marriage and my children. So you say, okay, 2:23:37.120 --> 2:23:40.600 you're rich because of that. We're rich in information you 2:23:40.720 --> 2:23:43.000 having taken the time to tell us all these stories 2:23:43.040 --> 2:23:46.360 in depth. Thanks so much for doing this. Thank you, Bob, 2:23:46.440 --> 2:23:49.960 Thank you for having me. I've enjoyed it, spilling my guts. 2:23:51.840 --> 2:23:54.080 You know the other thing. I'm a huge Doobies fan. 2:23:54.360 --> 2:23:57.879 You know that I have too good two things Don Handley, 2:23:57.959 --> 2:24:00.640 the End of the Innocence and the do Be Brothers. 2:24:00.840 --> 2:24:02.680 When it's like they're just in my head, they just 2:24:02.760 --> 2:24:05.360 click through. And that's not blowing smoke up your grass either. 2:24:05.879 --> 2:24:09.000 And on that note, I'll leave it again. Thanks again, 2:24:09.040 --> 2:24:11.920 pat Hey, thank you, Bat great talking to you. Until 2:24:11.959 --> 2:24:14.160 next time. This is Bob left Sex