Latest / The Bob Lefsetz Podcast / Steve Ferrone

Transcript

Steve Ferrone · The Bob Lefsetz Podcast

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Stats Podcast.
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: My guest today is drummer extraordinaire Steve Farone or Feroni Steve?
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Which one is it?
• 0:22
  Speaker 2: Well when people, when people read it, they say Farone, right,
• 0:27
  Speaker 2: But if I if they asked me my name and
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: I say Faron, they go what, So I say Feroni.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: It's actually Italian Ferone. So I answer to anything. As
• 0:38
  Speaker 2: long as it's close one of those in there, it's
• 0:41
  Speaker 2: still good for me. But Fi, my mom used to
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: say for him.
• 0:46
  Speaker 1: I always heard it was Feroni, but I didn't know
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: whether that was just amongst players. You know, it's like
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: sort of a nickname. And I know I you pronounce it,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: but the e I think I have it now. So
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: in any event, in preparation.
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: Do you know, there's a very I got a very
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: interesting story about that. Actually. Yeah, when when I was
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: born in nineteen fifty, right, my father was African and
• 1:11
  Speaker 2: my mother was English, so you can imagine it was
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: it was a little bit sort of scandalous. He was
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: considered scandalous back then, and uh, and so I was.
• 1:24
  Speaker 2: I was born in my in my home, in my house,
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: and we had a midwife. Yeah, so when I when
• 1:31
  Speaker 2: I came out, I didn't have color that I have now.
• 1:34
  Speaker 2: I came out and I was very very old. I
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: looked kind of swore. Actually, they thought I looked Italian,
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: so so they took that because my mum wasn't married
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: to my dad. There was another thing that was like
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: a scandal as well. Back then they this woman had
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: been to see some movie and there was somebody in
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: there called Feroni, and they so she decided we call
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: him Feroni. So they actually wrote on the birth certificate
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: f E r O n I. Then a few days later,
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: when I took to color, they felt stupid, so they
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: just took an ink pen and they altered my certificate
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: with an ink pen to f E r O n
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: E and pronounced it fern because they thought it was
• 2:18
  Speaker 2: a bit crazy having the black man money around with
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: an Italian name. But everybody called me Feroni anyways at school,
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: Oh a Fona, go get Feroni, you know.
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: Okay, so your parents weren't married. What were the last
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: names of your father and your mother?
• 2:34
  Speaker 2: Well, I came My mother's name was Banks, a maiden
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: name was Banks, and my father's my father's name. I
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: came to find out that. I didn't find this out
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: until I was about forty seven years old that it
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: was was Nicholson. No relation to Jack Nicholson, but Nicholson.
• 2:54
  Speaker 1: So you're going to school, you're like the beginning of
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: the line. You're the first farone Feroni.
• 2:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, correct, Yeah, yeah, for on the number
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: one and the last. Actually I mean, I mean yeah,
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: I got nine grandchildren and the only one that carries
• 3:09
  Speaker 2: the Feroni name is the goal.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: Wow, you have nine grandchildren. How many kids do you have?
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: Four?
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: Four kids?
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, two boys, two girls.
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: And how many times you've been married.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: I've been married four times, but my but I only
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: had children with one of my ex wives. It's complicated,
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: not that complicated because many people it's multiple ex wives.
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: Okay, are you married now?
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: No, I'm engaged. Actually I stopped I stopped getting married
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: when I stopped drinking. And then and then and then
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: I had a friend for twenty years. In twenty seventeen
• 3:53
  Speaker 2: it turned romantic and uh and uh.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: So this will be number five, right, Yes, tell me
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: about stopping drinking.
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: Well, uh, you know, basically, it stopped. It just stopped
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: working for me. Really, I mean, I had I had
• 4:11
  Speaker 2: a lot of I had a lot of problems I had.
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: I looked at these children actually were the were the problem?
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: I mean I had. I had two children. I had
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: two children with with with my wife, and then another
• 4:28
  Speaker 2: child showed up with and this was a nine year
• 4:31
  Speaker 2: old that was actually in between the two children that
• 4:33
  Speaker 2: I had with my wife and sewed up with a
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: with a with a with a uh a lawsuit and
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: uh and and and basically, you know, because I worked
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: with Eric Clapton and and you know, average white band
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: and and a lot of high profile durand Duran and
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: u uh uh uh and Tom Petty, they thought that
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: I had their money. You know, I'm just a really
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: well I'm a well paid side man, but I don't
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: make I don't make that kind of money. So they
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: actually came after me with that. And and the way
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: that I would hide out from that stuff was I
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: just get drunk and go out and get get and
• 5:18
  Speaker 2: hang out in the clubs and don't forget about it,
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: you know, and and uh and then after a while
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: they just stopped working. So I decided I was out
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: here in Los Angeles and I did a late show
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: with Brian Ferry, like a late late show, and I
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: was over at nathan East house and I was in
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: his kitchen and he was cleaning the kitchen and I
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: was doing drugs and swinging Bokra out of a bottle
• 5:43
  Speaker 2: and I just said to Nathan, I said, I'm I'm
• 5:46
  Speaker 2: gonna I'm gonna stop. I'm going to stop doing this now.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: And Nathan said, great, that's fantastic. Swear off of swear
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: off now, swear off now. And I'm like, wait, slow down, cowboy,
• 5:56
  Speaker 2: I'm going to finish this first. And uh. And That's
• 6:02
  Speaker 2: what I did, and then uh. And then I got
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: on a plane the next day and I went went
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: back to New York. And a couple of weeks later,
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: I started to go mad. That was basically it. And
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: I was in withdrawal. I was in detox, and I
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: had no idea what was going on. Uh, And all
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: I knew was that it was it was just craziness.
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: It was just I was I was just going I
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: couldn't all I can think, this should not be happening
• 6:28
  Speaker 2: to me. I shouldn't be having these nightmares. And you know,
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: I guess kind of like uh, I mean, I guess
• 6:41
  Speaker 2: I'd have these vivid dreams of a drink, either drinking
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: or using dreams and and and it's actually just I
• 6:52
  Speaker 2: couldn't when I woke up coming in swept, my heart pounding, terrified,
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: thinking have I done this or I did I do it?
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: Or what?
• 7:00
  Speaker 3: What?
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: Uh, I couldn't tell if it was real or not.
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: And it was just Man. All I could think I
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: was I'm not that bad. This shouldn't be happening to me.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: And that was it.
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: Okay, a couple of questions. The person who was suing you,
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: did it turn out that they were your biological kid? Oh?
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: Yes, as a matter of fact, as a matter of fact,
• 7:24
  Speaker 3: as a matter of fact, when well, first time, the
• 7:28
  Speaker 3: first time that I met met her Whitney, her name
• 7:30
  Speaker 3: is Whitney, and uh and the first time that I
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: met her, was was down getting the blood test and
• 7:36
  Speaker 3: uh and and.
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: This little kid walked up to me. And I looked
• 7:41
  Speaker 2: at this kid, and it's like, oh, ship, that's one
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: of mine. And the woman and the woman who actually
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: did the blood test, she said to me, she said,
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: you know, there's really no need for me to do this,
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: to do this test. Your two peas in a pod,
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, Hey, you stop drinking and drugging totally by yourself.
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: Oruld you go to the program or any of that.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: Well I did. I did about six weeks on my own.
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: Uh and and uh, like I say, I was just going,
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: I was going. I was Actually I was in a
• 8:19
  Speaker 2: losing I was in a losing battle. I was. It was.
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: It was kicking my butt, it was gonna, it was
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: beating me. I knew what would stop it. I knew
• 8:30
  Speaker 2: what would stop all this stuff, which would just have
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: a drink or go go go, just go out and
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: get get smashed. And you know, but I didn't want
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: to do it. I didn't want to. I didn't want
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: to do that. And a really good friend of mine
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: I used to used to be in cahoots with with
• 8:46
  Speaker 2: with this stuff. It actually stopped, uh four years before
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: he stopped. He stopped drinking and using it. And he
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: just told me, said, I don't do that anymore. And
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: he and he and he come to New York and
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: he visited me and we go out to the clubs
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: and we'd out and he was his name was Stephen Bruton.
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: Of course, yeah, you know Stephen interactive just a little bit.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: I certainly know.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: Well, Steve Stephen. He was what they called us the
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: Steve brothers, and well, you know what he looked like. Yeah,
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: we said that we were the Steve twins like the
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: Schwarzenegger movie. Yeah, exactly exactly and uh and uh and
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: Stephen would just you know, he just got me up
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: with that drawl of his that say that texted, ah,
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: my brother, how are you doing?
• 9:30
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: And he called me up when I was just in
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: the middle of this mess, sitting there like getting punched in,
• 9:36
  Speaker 2: just looking like I've been you know, a few rounds
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: with Muhammad Ali, just just as like stunned that's had
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: that sort of stunned uh look on my face, just
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: punched out, you know, just just been destroyed really and uh.
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: And I told him I giving up everything. Yeah, and
• 9:58
  Speaker 2: he said, what do you mean You're giving up everything?
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: I said, no more boots, no more drugs. Yeah, how's
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: it going? Totally the whole story? What's going on? And
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: and that was the first time that he actually he
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: actually mentioned a A to me. You know, he said,
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: you he said, you have you try going to And
• 10:24
  Speaker 2: my knee jerk reaction, as bad as everything was, was,
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: I don't want to go down there. I'm not that bad.
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: So he said, just stay where you are, and he
• 10:34
  Speaker 2: got on. He got he got on a plane in
• 10:37
  Speaker 2: Austin and he flew to New York. And he arrived
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: that evening in New York, and he came to my
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: house and hung out with me at my house, and
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: all he said was me, I find a meeting for
• 10:47
  Speaker 2: us tomorrow. And I thought, well, you know, he's come
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: all this way. You know, I'm a nice guy. I'll
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: go with him my humor room. And and he took
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: me to this place that's called Midnight Madness down on
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: Houston Street. He found that meeting when they're twelve thirty pm.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: And walked into that meeting and there was a guy
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: doing you know what you see guys doing in AA,
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: sitting up there telling the story. He was a marine.
• 11:17
  Speaker 2: And I felt better than I'd felt in the three
• 11:19
  Speaker 2: the three previous weeks. I was just sitting in that
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: room with those people, and and that was what kept
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: me going back in the beginning, because I didn't want to.
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: I didn't want to do I didn't want to do
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: any of that stuff, get a sponsored, you know, whatever
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: the steps were, read that book. I didn't want to
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: do any of that. They gave me a copy of
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: Living Sober that was and I've read that. I read
• 11:41
  Speaker 2: that bit and that that was pretty that was pretty cool.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: But I like to go and listen to people talk
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: about the war stories. So I go into the meetings
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: that I sit there and they tell all these stories
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: about what they did and they'd laugh and I think
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: it's funny. And then somebody would get up and start
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: talking about recovery, and I think, boring you. They said,
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: I'd like to do you a story, give me, give
• 12:05
  Speaker 2: me a war story, because now it is that you know,
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: that was thirty years ago and uh, and now now
• 12:14
  Speaker 2: I like to hear the recovery more than I do
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: about the drinking. We will know about that and the drugging.
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: I stopped drinking before that, and that was before it
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: was cool to have like a perier or something. That
• 12:29
  Speaker 1: was when you still went to the bar and people say, hey,
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: come on, come on, have a drink. So, being sober,
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: after experiencing all this other stuff, how hard was it
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: to live your life?
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: Well, I used to live in the China Club in
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: New York. Right, guess what all the bombing They were
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: all aa oh, they said what. There was one that wasn't,
• 12:56
  Speaker 2: but he wasn't. He wasn't anywhere near being an alcoholic. Yeah,
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: name as Jack. He passed away a few years ago.
• 13:02
  Speaker 2: But the other guys, the other guys, they they're sober,
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: still sober today. So I didn't really have that much
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: much of a problem. And my friends, my friends were
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: pretty encouraging and uh and uh and uh uh. I
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: mean that I never told them to stop, to stop
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: drinking and you know, doing, but they were always really
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: nice around me. There was the odd one or two
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: of course that tried that I'll come on have a drink,
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: and they became they became an acquaintance, like really quickly,
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: they got dropped in the on the on the on
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: the other side of stuff. For me, I didn't, I've
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: got no time for that. Yeah. So but but most
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: of them, i'd say, the majority of my friends, even
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: though even though that they they still they still drink.
• 13:51
  Speaker 2: And they, I mean they've got families and stuff that
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: they you know, they've got children and now you know,
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: one of them, a couple of girls had just qualified,
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: just graduating from college. And yeah, you know, he still
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: has a drink every once in a while. But he's
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: not nowhere near the crazy man that he was when
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: he hung out with me. But I don't you know,
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: I say that, but I don't know. If I was
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: maybe the crazy one'd maybe he didn't do quite as much. Well,
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: I know he didn't do it quite as much as
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: I did, because you would always say, you know, guy,
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: you guys need to slow down a little bit. He
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: would do all that sort of you'd say that to us, Yeah, yeah,
• 14:28
  Speaker 2: you need to go you need to show show some restraint.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: And I was like, what's that.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: Let's go back to the beginning. Yeah, So you're growing
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: up in the fifties, you're half black, you're half white,
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: your parents aren't married to what degree? Is that a
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: stigma or everybody just treats you normally?
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: But everybody treated me normally. I didn't have I didn't.
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: I didn't. I mean, you know, my mom lied to me,
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: my grandmother. I live. I live with my mother, my
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: grandmother and my grandfather. Uh. I mean they lied to me.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: They said, they said, you know that my dad was away,
• 15:05
  Speaker 2: and and they give sometimes every once in a while
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: they give me a present to say it was for
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: my dad. Huh and uh and and and I just, uh,
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: I didn't think there was anything unusual. My mom went
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: out to work. She was more the father figure than
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: than than you know, she's a father figure than I
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: had that I had, not my grandfather. But my grandfather
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: was a miserable, untreated alcoholic. He didn't know he was
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: a milkman. He actually my grandfather used to work at
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: the brig was a brewery right down the street from
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: where I lived, called Tamplin's Brewery, and he used to
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: work in there and get free beer and come home drunk.
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: One day, he came home drunk and he raised his
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: hand to my grandmother, and my grandmother sent my mother
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: up the street to go and get my uncle Ted.
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: Uncle Ted was uncle Ted Harmon. She's a champion boxer,
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: and and Ted came down and gave me a boxing lesson.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: And so he gave him such an ass whipping that
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: he became a milkman. It started delivery milk.
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: That is really funny. Okay, So you're in Brighton, Yeah,
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: and you know, what do we know? Because I'm an American,
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: we hear about the mods and rockers and all that
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: stuff happening in Brighton in the sixties. Exact they were
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: exposed to.
• 16:26
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I was there. I was in the midst
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: of that. I was in the middle of that, as
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: a matter of fact. But I was playing in a
• 16:34
  Speaker 2: band and The Who used to play this little club,
• 16:39
  Speaker 2: and I think it was called the Florida Rooms, and
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: it was down in the aquarium where the aquarium is
• 16:45
  Speaker 2: in Brighton, as a matter of fact, where you go
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: to buy your ticket and to get into the aquarium.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: If you look to the right, this is a little
• 16:51
  Speaker 2: stage and that was that was the club. It was
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: tiny that it used to be packed with mods. When
• 16:56
  Speaker 2: The Who used to play in there, it was fantastic
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: and my and used to open for him.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you're growing up in Brighton. Okay, you're a
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: little younger than you know the first generation of rock stars.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: So by time you're growing up, is England still in
• 17:15
  Speaker 1: black and white? Or is it really kind of like
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: America a few thousand miles away.
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: Well, you know, it's it's I started when I was twelve.
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: I tap danced. I used to tap dance. My parents noticed,
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: my mom and my grandma, they noticed that I had
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: that'd sit in the high chair and we listened to
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: the radio and I banged my spoon in time with
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: the music, and they said, you know, he's playing in
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: time with that stuff. So so they said, we've got
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: to do something with that. My grandmother was a huge
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: Fred Astaire and Jim Kelly fan, and get him go
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: tap dancing. So pretty much as soon as I could walk,
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: they took me to tap dancing school. Uh. And so
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: I did that and I was really good at it.
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: I'm twelve years old, and they and as soon as
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: I was twelve years old, you could actually perform in
• 18:18
  Speaker 2: the theater. And there was a summer show and they
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: had they had auditions for a children's chorus. So I
• 18:25
  Speaker 2: go into this. I go into this children's children's chorus.
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: I get I get to get the part in that
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: I get to play in this in this summer show
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: with this guy Max Bygraves, who's an enormous star in England.
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: And uh and and uh and I'm out there on
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: the stage with the kids chorus. We're doing the twist
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: and see, let's twist again like we did last summer.
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: And I looked down and looked down into the orchestra
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: pit and I see the drummer and he's going, hell,
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: why is this usually his hands. How's he doing that
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: with his hands? And and uh. And then I'd go
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: upstairs the dressing room and I'd practice, get those motor
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: skills together, and then i'd go down on the stage.
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: Next night, I'd be down there and be looking down
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: there in that pit. What's he doing with his feet?
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: And so I learned how to how to do the stuff.
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: And I just learned how to do that with their
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: knife and fork and stuff. And then then Take five
• 19:18
  Speaker 2: came out and I heard Take five, and oh, let
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: me see, how can I learned how to do that?
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: And and I had pretty much and good ideas about songs.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: You know, I'd listen the Beatles were coming out, and
• 19:32
  Speaker 2: I'd listen to listen to their songs, and I knew
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: new sort of song construction from all the tap dancing.
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: So one Saturday morning I go where the little kids
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: go to the the the ballroom and in the day
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: the in Saturday mornings that have a place where parents
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: could drop their kids off, go do their shopping and
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: then come back and pick them up. And we'd sort
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: of act like we were big grown ups in this
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: little dance all and that night Manfred Man were going
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: to be playing for the grown ups in the club,
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: and uh, and they did a sound check and they
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: played for us little kids, and and you know, being
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: a dancer, I go, I got to go out and
• 20:08
  Speaker 2: dance with the girls, and they say, oh, thank you
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: very much, and then they just walk off.
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: Now I'm twelve years old and my hormone is the guy.
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: Now I want to be James Bond. I want him
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: to at least adore me a little bit. You know, nothing,
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: nothing a good dancer. But that was it barely talk
• 20:23
  Speaker 2: to me. All my friends who are all just in
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: the same trouble. Manfred Man comes down. They play. They
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: played three notes and every little girl in the place
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: is screaming and going crazy over manfred Man. And they
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: said to my friends, that's it, no more dancing. So
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: one of the guys he had a real guitar. He
• 20:47
  Speaker 2: stayed on the garage and so he had money, so
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: he got him in like a real guitar and he
• 20:52
  Speaker 2: made it, made it go a record player and sort
• 20:54
  Speaker 2: of Jerry did up to so it had he could
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: plug into it. And they have a little amplifier. I
• 20:59
  Speaker 2: had a toy drum kit and we go and we
• 21:02
  Speaker 2: play We play sauce standing there. We had the other guy.
• 21:05
  Speaker 2: He had a te chest with you know, like the
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: skiffle thing with the broomstick and sticking out of it
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: them piece of string and boom boom boom boom boom,
• 21:12
  Speaker 2: you know, and uh and uh we play sauce standing there.
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: That was about the only song that he knew. But
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: he he used to hang out in the in the
• 21:21
  Speaker 2: music stores. Because he had a real instrument, he was
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: allowed to hang out in the music stores. And the
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: older kids that had bands used to go in there,
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: and nobody had telephones back then. Everybody you put you
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: put a notice in the paper, or you put if
• 21:36
  Speaker 2: you wanted a musician and you wanted to find another musician,
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: you got to a music store and you put up
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: a notice drummer wanted, a guitarist, wanted bass player, wanted
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: you know, or you put in an add in the
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: New Musical Express or a melody maker or something like that,
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: you know. And these guys were in there and they
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: were putting up an ad and they were talking to
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: the owner. He said that their drummer, they had a
• 21:58
  Speaker 2: gig at a youth club and their drummer had to
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: have his appendix out, and so he couldn't do this
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: gig and they needed a drummer to sit in. So
• 22:07
  Speaker 2: my friend took his life into his hands and said
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: to these eighteen year olds, hey, I know a drummer.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: And they're like, who's that. You know? Really he's good
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: and they were a blues ban too, and he said,
• 22:18
  Speaker 2: he said, he's good. And he's black guy too, you know,
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: So that that was my first reference. So they said, well,
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: tell him to come to this address. They gave him address,
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: and tell him to come here and see it in
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: like six o'clock and we'll try him out. So this
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: gig came around to my house and he said, you know,
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: there's the big kids and they got a band. And
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: I told him that you play for him, you know,
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: and I was, well, said the drummers. Did they want
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: you to just play gig? So I said, well, okay,
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: So he gave me the address and I went over.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: There's over on mon Peleia Road somewhere, and remember them
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: went to this place and I went in there and
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: they had a drum kit set up and they said, okay,
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: sit down and they started to play the blues and
• 22:55
  Speaker 2: I started to play with him, and I jammed with him.
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: They said, well, okay, you can do the gig. I
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: did gig, and then they fired the drummer.
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: Now, so.
• 23:05
  Speaker 2: It was my It was my gig. So now I'm
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: wandering around a twelve year old terrified that I've stolen
• 23:13
  Speaker 2: the gig of some eighteen year old drummer who if
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: he comes face to face with me, it was my
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: butt and now. And the other thing was I wasn't
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: too difficult to find, you know, the only black kid
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: for like fifty miles in any direction. So it was
• 23:32
  Speaker 2: a pretty scary time. But they used to take me
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: down to see all the blues tours that used to
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: come in. The Chicago blues guys used to come to
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: Sonny Terry Brownie McGee, John Lee Hooker, Buddy Waters, all
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: those guys used to come through Bill dog It. They'd
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: come and they play at the Dome, and they would
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: take me down and see these people play, and I
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: just loved it. It was kind of just knew that
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: that was what I wanted to do when I left Scores.
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: I wanted to play the drums.
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: Okay, you went to the gig as a twelve year old,
• 24:10
  Speaker 1: you played their drum set. When did you get a
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: drum set?
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: Wow? You know I had I had this sort of
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: makeup drum kit. It was it was like the bass
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: drum was as big as I was. It was like
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: a big, huge march in basic bed. I actually have
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: a photograph. I have a photograph of my first gig.
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: And I wore a little bow tie. My mom made
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: me dress up and put a bow's eye on, you know,
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: it look smart and uh. And I had this, and
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: I had this, I had this. They had a snare drum,
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: a skinny snare drum, and I liked the skinny snadrow.
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: And my grandma bought me a big thit snare drum.
• 24:46
  Speaker 2: So I took I took the snares off and I
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: used it as a tom tom and they put it
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: on the sand and they use it as a tom tom.
• 24:53
  Speaker 2: And I had really you know, crappy symbols. When I
• 24:55
  Speaker 2: found out how much you know, good cymbals cost, it
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: was like helmu. You know, back then it was probably
• 25:01
  Speaker 2: like twenty pounds. Yeah they were free, but it might
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: as well have been like, you know, two thousand pounds
• 25:08
  Speaker 2: for me, But it was. It was just a lot
• 25:11
  Speaker 2: of money.
• 25:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you have the gig with the band, they
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: kick out the other guy, they put you in. Then
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: what happened?
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: And then they got me They got me a drum kit.
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: They got me a they got me a a an
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: Olympic drum kit which was an entry level. Well no,
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: the entry level was a gigster. Premiere that they had
• 25:30
  Speaker 2: three a gigster which was really crap awful, and then
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: they had the intermediate which was so so if you
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: found a decent one, it was okay Olympic and then
• 25:41
  Speaker 2: Premiere was was the big one, which is what Keith
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: Moon started playing after they stole his love wig, and
• 25:48
  Speaker 2: and and and so I had this a little Olympic
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: kit that really worked out all right for me. But
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: the great thing was was that when when I used
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: to go and open in this little club for like
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: for the likes of the Who, that they'd let me
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: use their drum kit. Wow, so I you know them
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: was like the Hollies and all these bands used to
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: get all the Mersey bands and the London bands used
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: to come down there and they didn't want to have
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: to take off because it was a tiny stage. They
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: didn't want to have to take their drum kit off
• 26:21
  Speaker 2: and to put mine up there, you know, and there
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: was no room otherwise up there to do it for anything,
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: you know, So so they'd say, well, just use your
• 26:28
  Speaker 2: own snare drum and put your own bass drum pedal
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: on there, and then you can play. And I'd sit
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: there and I'd play all these. I wouldn't move anything.
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: I just I wouldn't dare move anything. And I just
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: sit there and I played these. I played these, you know,
• 26:41
  Speaker 2: these eyes came down. I had like love with kids
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: and tricks and kits and Rogers kits. I never saw
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: a gretch, but I heard about them as I got there.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: Okay, so we're in America. We're the lead like about
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: year and a half. The Beatles don't hit here until
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: the beginning of sixty four. Were is it hits in England?
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: Sixty two sixty three? It's a menia in America?
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: Yes, What was it like in the UK? It was
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: the same, you know, it was. It was just a
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: great But okay, so the Beatles were the principals, Beatles
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: and the Stones And actually I was more of a
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: Stones Stones fan because of the blues connection that I
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: had with the band. There was the Beatles and the Stones, right,
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: and then there was all these other bands that were
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: you know, like the Mersey, the Mersey Sounds, you know
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: that the Liverpool sort of became like a fashion a center.
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: So and then you had the London bands that that
• 27:40
  Speaker 2: were that was sort of modeled themselves sort of the
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: Who sort of stuff or blues bands, and and so
• 27:46
  Speaker 2: there was there was a lot of bands. It wasn't
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: just the Beatles, but the Beatles were the were the
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: were the the superstars because you know, all the girls
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: used to chase them about all over the place and
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: scream at them all the time and make a lot
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: of noise and and and they made they make you know,
• 28:04
  Speaker 2: it's funny. I'd listened to the Beatle. When I first
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: heard Hey Jude, I was like, what the hell are
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: they doing? You know, I didn't get it. I thought
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: that they you know, they sort of messed up. They
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: they sort of left the you know, where's the pop song?
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: I don't This is a weird song, you know. But
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: then it sort of morphed into becoming Hey Jude for me,
• 28:26
  Speaker 2: you know, and and oh really, you know, and then
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: I started to get into like Sergeant Pepper and their stuff,
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: and and and and that was a whole that was
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: a whole different experience.
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you're twelve.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: A few questions combined her. How long do you stay
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: in school? When do you decide? When do you decide
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: you want to become a professional musician? And what path
• 28:51
  Speaker 1: does that do?
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: I gotta tell you, I gotta tell you. This afternoon,
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: I was out there at this college. I'm doing this,
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: doing this orchestral thing. And I walked into this class
• 29:00
  Speaker 2: and there was a couple of guys in there and
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: I said, is this the green room? And they said, oh, no,
• 29:03
  Speaker 2: this is a classroom. We're changing that. We're changing the carpet.
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: And I looked and I said, you know, I hated school.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: I hated school and I still do. They started to
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: ask me when I was about thirteen or fourteen years old,
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: what do you want to do? Is the school leaving
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: age was fifteen? And I said, I want to be
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: a drummer. And they said, well, you can't do that,
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: and I said why not? I said because it's not
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: a real job. I said, ringo star does it?
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: And they said yeah, but you ain't Ringo star And
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: I said no, but I can hang with Ringo. Yeah,
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: I was really cocky, cocky little kid. You know, it's
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: pretty pretty sure of myself. And and and so I rebelled.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: I just stopped studying all together. I did nothing I
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: used to I used to play football. I used to
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: box at the school. Uh, I was in the A
• 30:07
  Speaker 2: stream and I sort of hovered in the middle of
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: the A stream. I went out of that. I just stopped.
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: I mean, I wasn't doing any of that. And all
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: I did was go play with my band. I go
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: and play youth clubs with my band and come in
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: all bleary eyed the next morning. And uh and uh
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: and they called me. They you know, they mocked me.
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: They called me Ringo at school?
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: Was he?
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: And I was like, yeah, okay, I even went I
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: even went to this to this teacher because I knew
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: that I wanted to travel, and they had a French class.
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: And I said to him, his name was Savell, And
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: they said, mister Savelle, what would it take? How could
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: I get into your class? I want to learn how
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: to speak French because I knew I wanted to travel,
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: and I thought I'd better get a second language. And
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: he looked at me and he said, I don't want
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: you in my class, and I said, okay, fine, and
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: then I went off and I taught myself French.
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: Okay. So in this in this period, yeah, you stop
• 31:01
  Speaker 1: going to school of fifteen, I assume.
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, as I could get out of the way.
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: And are you continuing to live with your grandparents? Are
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: you making a living drumming or do you have a
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: street job.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: In addition, I have a I had had. I had
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: a numerous ever worked in a car washer a bit.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: I worked in a building site. I was a paint sprayer.
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: I did all kinds of I did all kinds of jobs,
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: you know, anything anything to pay. I mean I had
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: a good job on the building site. You know that
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: the owner of the of the company, you really liked me,
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: and you wanted to put me through school to make me,
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: make me become a site agent.
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 31:45
  Speaker 2: I just wanted to make music, That's all I wanted
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: to do. And the paint sprayer guy, he you know,
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: he'd been in he been in the says in the war,
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: and he actually he actually I said, when I got
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: the opportunity to go up to London, I said, I
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: got this opportunity to go up to London, go and
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: play some music. And he said, take it, he said,
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: you know, he said, you can always come back here
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: and work if you need to. You know, I'll always
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: give you a job, he said, But these opportunities to
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: do something that you love only coming around once in
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: a while, So just go up there and take the
• 32:21
  Speaker 2: opportunity and do what you can with it. And I
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: went up there, and I did the starving musician thing,
• 32:26
  Speaker 2: you know, just.
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: Before we get there. You know, the train from London
• 32:31
  Speaker 1: to Brighton is not that long, no, and it's not
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: that different from where I grew up in these you
• 32:37
  Speaker 1: take the train into New York City. You're living in
• 32:40
  Speaker 1: Brighton before you moved to London. How often would you
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: go to London?
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: I went a couple of times with my parents.
• 32:47
  Speaker 1: That was it. That was it?
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, So what was the invitation, What was the
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: opportunity that got you to London? Well, there was a
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: there was a answered an ad in the back of
• 33:01
  Speaker 2: the New Musical Express for a drummer and and there
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: was a guy who lived in North London, and he
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: said that he was managing this band, and would I
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: go out? Would I go up there and and and
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: try playing with him. So I went up. I just
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: went up to London and I started playing with these guys,
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: a guy named Calvin Bullen and Hugh Bullen and some
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: other guy that was a singer and Hugh. Hugh died
• 33:28
  Speaker 2: a couple of years ago. Calvin, I'm still in touch
• 33:31
  Speaker 2: with his guitarists and and anyways, uh uh. We we
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: lived in the guy got us a one room. There
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: was like this room in the basement, I guess what
• 33:47
  Speaker 2: they call a garden and room, and and we we
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: robbed it. Used to have to rob the gas meters
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: so that we could get hot water.
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: It was.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: It was pretty It was really bad, you know. And
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: we go and we rehearse in not not In hill
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: in Notton hill Gate. We go down there and rehearse,
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: and you know, go up to clubs and tell them
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: that we were poor musicians. Would they let us in?
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: And the dormant would let let musicians in sometimes and
• 34:13
  Speaker 2: go and play, you know. And I remember one Christmas,
• 34:17
  Speaker 2: I had to get a job delivering delivering mail as
• 34:20
  Speaker 2: like a Christmas mailman, so that I had a bit
• 34:23
  Speaker 2: of money, you know, to live. We rely on We
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: rely on on girls that we met in clubs that
• 34:31
  Speaker 2: would feed us, you know, and there was we met
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: West Indian, a couple of West Indian girls, and and
• 34:39
  Speaker 2: they gave me. They gave me, They took me the
• 34:41
  Speaker 2: house and they cook cook curry goat and rice and peace.
• 34:44
  Speaker 2: As somebody who's used to diet of fish and chips
• 34:47
  Speaker 2: and roast potatoes and roast beef, curry goat and rice
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: and peace wasn't very appetizing, but I was hungry, so
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: I learned to eat it. Now I love it. Yeah,
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: and uh, and that's it was.
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: It was a rough time. Well, okay, what's the journey
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: from there to a big break for you?
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: Well, I just played with a lot of different bands.
• 35:14
  Speaker 2: Got with the band that went to went to Italy
• 35:17
  Speaker 2: for a week and and we got into a car
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: crash in a blizzard in Belgium, put all the equipment
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: on the train and went down went down to Italy
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: to play in this club called the Titan Club. And
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: we got there and we set up and we started playing,
• 35:34
  Speaker 2: and this American guy named Ronnie Jones, who was a
• 35:37
  Speaker 2: singer in Italy, asked me to stay. And you know,
• 35:46
  Speaker 2: we got down to Rome. It was sixty degrees, which
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: for me was boiling hot, and I loved it in January,
• 35:52
  Speaker 2: so I'm not leaving here. I'm going to stay right here.
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: And I stayed there and I worked with RUnni. I
• 35:57
  Speaker 2: stayed there for I went for two weeks and I
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: stayed there for three years in Italy and just work
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: with different bands. And that's where I met Robbie McIntosh
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: from Average White Band and Alex lidget Wood. You used
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: to sing with Santana, and I followed Robbie into another
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: band after.
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, but well that's a little fast for me.
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: So you're in Italy that is not the epicenter of
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: the music world.
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: No, but there's music there. No, No, come.
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: I'm wondering what's going on in your mind? Are you
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: saying I like the weather I'm playing, or you're saying shit?
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: Am I ever going to break through here? Do I
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: have to go back to London? No?
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: I didn't even even thinking about that. I was just
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: thinking about that. You know, I was meeting lots of gals,
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: Italian girls and Italian girl that that's nothing to Tonian.
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: I was up at I was making music, I was
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: earning a living. I was I didn't have any responsibility
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: to go home and be with my parents or anything.
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: I was having a ball and I was playing playing
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: music with these great musicians. You were teaching me stuff.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: Okay this late date. You know, like Kenny Aronoff, you
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: went to ah the school and he can write music,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: et cetera. You where are you on that spectrum?
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: I started that at twenty one with this with this
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: French band, and they were going to go and they
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: were they were they were real musicians. They knew how
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: to read music, they knew how to do all that stuff.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: And I knew and all I knew was was that
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: if I wanted to be a professional, I'd have to
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: learn to do what they did. And they all went
• 37:29
  Speaker 2: to this music school in Nice and Andy. They approached
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: me they I was playing with them in Italy and
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: they said, listen, we've been off of the residency in
• 37:39
  Speaker 2: a casino in Nice. Would you come and do you
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: want to come and stay there for a year with
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: us to get your work permits and everything. It be
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: on the up and up and you'll make earn money.
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: And I said, well, I was. I was kind of
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: in that space where I was like, Okay, I'm twenty
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: going to be twenty one, I got to do something.
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: I'm either going to go back to England and go
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: back to school. And I met some of my Americans
• 38:00
  Speaker 2: that messed around with computers and that kind of interested me.
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: But I knew what it would take to be a musician,
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: and either one involved school, the nemesis of school. And
• 38:15
  Speaker 2: so they offered me this gig and I said, well,
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: can you get me into that music school that you
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: go to, and they said, we should be able to.
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: Shouldn't be a problem with that. So I went there
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: and I started to work with them in this casino
• 38:27
  Speaker 2: and the percussion teacher from the Conservatory of Nice came
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: and saw me play and he said, he said, oh,
• 38:37
  Speaker 2: you said, I just turned twenty one. I was twenty
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: one when I came here to Denis the day I
• 38:41
  Speaker 2: went to Nie, it was on my twenty first birthday,
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: and he said, well, you're too old to get into
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: the music class, tool to get in the percussion class.
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: The eldest that they would take somebody for the percussion
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: class as fifteen. I said, what can I do? They said, well,
• 38:58
  Speaker 2: we're going to make you a teacher. And I said, well,
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: what do you talk? Are you how can you make
• 39:02
  Speaker 2: me a teacher? He said, well, you play modern drums.
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: And the only thing that we teach in this conservatory
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: is classical music. To teach classical drums, we don't treat
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: They don't teach meat and potatoes drums. And we got
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: a lot of young kids, and they want to learn
• 39:18
  Speaker 2: to play like Bernard Perty. They want to learn to
• 39:21
  Speaker 2: play like Billy Cobbram, they want to play like Ringo Star,
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: they want to play like Charlie Watts, they want to
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: play like John Bonham. And you know how to do that,
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: you know. So they said, you teach them to do that,
• 39:33
  Speaker 2: and you're in the school and we'll get you into
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: the soul fish classes. So I said, okay. And my
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: first thing was the first thing to do was that
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: school was to put on a concert with these kids
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: and play some jazz with these kids, and for a
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: radio show to publicize the school. And they did that,
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: and then I started teaching these kids, and they used
• 39:54
  Speaker 2: to pay me private lessons and everything to teach them
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: how to play modern drums. And then I go sitting
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: in the selfish class. Selfish classes meant, this is a
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: great thing. I'd have to write out stuff for them
• 40:09
  Speaker 2: for them to practice. It was simple, very simple stuff
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: like straight up, straight down, drop a beat here, and
• 40:16
  Speaker 2: I'd write this stuff out. And these kids have been learning.
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: They knew how to read music since they could walk.
• 40:21
  Speaker 2: So they would look at me and they say, no,
• 40:23
  Speaker 2: mister FERRONI, that's not how you write that. You write
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: it this way. So they would teach. They were teaching me.
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: They were teaching me how to write stuff out. It
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: was the best deal. And I was making money in
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: the casino. It was just the best I had, the greater.
• 40:38
  Speaker 2: The three years of that, I did, okay.
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: So what happened after three years of that?
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: After three years of that, I got the phone rang
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: in the casino and they said, there's a phone call
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: for you from England. And I thought it might be
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: my mother. I thought it might be something wrong going
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: on at home. And I picked up the phone and
• 40:54
  Speaker 2: it was Brian Auger and he said, do you want
• 40:59
  Speaker 2: to come to a marror work with me? And I
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: was ready and I said yes, I want to go.
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: And he said you got two days to get to England.
• 41:10
  Speaker 2: So I sold all my stuff, got on a plane
• 41:12
  Speaker 2: and flew to England.
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: And how did Brian Orgar know you or you know him.
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: Robbie McIntosh and he he come.
• 41:22
  Speaker 1: He'd been in.
• 41:25
  Speaker 2: When I was in Italy working Robbie who used to
• 41:28
  Speaker 2: play with the Piranhas. We all went to see Robbie
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: play with Brian Orga and I sat in with him.
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: They let me sit in. They asked me to sit in,
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: so I went and sat in and play some music
• 41:37
  Speaker 2: with him, and he remembered me. So when Robbie left,
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: he said, I need to get another drum. And Robbie said,
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: once you called Steve. Remember that guy Steve? And he said, yeah,
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: so yew did I get old of him? And he
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: tracked me down in the in the casino. And that
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: was when I made my first trip to the United States.
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: Okay, two days you're in England. You fly to America.
• 41:56
  Speaker 1: Good experience or bad experience with Brian Auger.
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: Awesome experience, awesome and and and I remember like we're
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: driving driving up we get you know, I arrived with
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: the cart with my drum kit on it, you know,
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: And and the guy said, what are you doing here,
• 42:21
  Speaker 2: I'm on vacation. I'm on vacation And he said no,
• 42:27
  Speaker 2: I said, you're a musician. I said, yes, yes, I
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: come here. I want to play music with people. And
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: he said, ah, he said, you got any drugs? And
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: I said no, so, no, so I don't have no drugs.
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: And he said, see that door there, that door was
• 42:39
  Speaker 2: New York City. There's all the drugs that you want
• 42:41
  Speaker 2: in there. Boom stamped my passport and then I went
• 42:43
  Speaker 2: that was it. And then riding up looking at those
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: skyscrapers on Sixth Avenue, he was like, oh my god.
• 42:51
  Speaker 2: And the smell, just the smell of the city was
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: like amazing. And opposite the hotel where we were at
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: was a New York Jazz Museum and you go over
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: there and people were just sitting in there playing jazz
• 43:03
  Speaker 2: in their little concert people sitting on the floor listening
• 43:06
  Speaker 2: to people played that girl. That was heaven for me. Heaven.
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, you were in New York and how long were
• 43:14
  Speaker 1: you in the US.
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: For that trip? I think we were here. I think
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: we were here maybe two or three weeks because we played.
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: We played in New York in a club in New York.
• 43:25
  Speaker 2: It was up in mid to up up on the
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: Upper East Side. And then we went to Boston and
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: we played in this club called Paul's Mare. Did you ever? Yeah, yeah, absolutely,
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: And we played in Paul's More and then and then
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: we drove from Boston. We drove three or four days
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: across the country to Los Angeles.
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: You drove.
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: In a couple of station well, and the first part
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: of it was really boring, right, But then we got
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: to the Rocky Mountains and I remember coming round on
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: this road going up the Rocky Mountains and there was
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: a huge moose standing by the side of the road
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: and that was the first toy o. Oh, this is
• 44:07
  Speaker 2: We're getting into the West. Now, this is great. And
• 44:10
  Speaker 2: then driving through the desert and being terrified that we
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: were going to run out of gas. And I remember
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: stopping at a gas station and there was near Vegas,
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: and there was a slot machine. I put a quarter
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: or something in the slot machine and I won two
• 44:23
  Speaker 2: silver dollar pieces and I've still got them. Wow. Yeah
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: and uh and and then finally getting to Los Angeles
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: and playing at the Whiskey of Go Go. I mean,
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: it was it was everything that I wanted, everything everything
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: that was it was. It was fun, it was music,
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: it was I was just playing great music with a
• 44:51
  Speaker 2: great player, Brian Olver, And he's still still my friend,
• 44:55
  Speaker 2: still a great player. Yeah, here's the eighty something now
• 44:58
  Speaker 2: and he's just as in Uday say to Brian, Hey, Brian,
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: you want to play, but I'm there. He's there immediately
• 45:05
  Speaker 2: there you know, and and it was an amazing, amazing experience.
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you go back to England, then what do
• 45:22
  Speaker 1: you do?
• 45:23
  Speaker 2: I started playing with with the with some local guys
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: in in England, the studio studio musicians. They had a
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: band called Gonzales. Uh and and I started to do
• 45:36
  Speaker 2: record dates and people started to ask me to play
• 45:40
  Speaker 2: on on records. Gonzales. Gonzales was a band that if
• 45:48
  Speaker 2: if you if you were a musician and they and
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: they knew you and they knew you could play. It
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: was sort of run by a guy named Mickey's. He
• 45:55
  Speaker 2: was a saxophone saxophone player. Uh So, what would happen
• 46:00
  Speaker 2: was you get asked to go and play that seat
• 46:04
  Speaker 2: was then yours until you had a conflict, you had
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: a gig that you couldn't be there and play with
• 46:11
  Speaker 2: the band. Then somebody else, somebody like Richard Bailey would
• 46:13
  Speaker 2: come in and be would be would be the drummer
• 46:16
  Speaker 2: and it was his gig until he couldn't do it,
• 46:18
  Speaker 2: and then somebody else would come in or if you
• 46:20
  Speaker 2: were available, and they just called around and find out
• 46:22
  Speaker 2: who was there. And that was we actually opened for
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: Average White Band at the Townhouse one one Easter Easter
• 46:30
  Speaker 2: Bank Holiday, and and I was hanging out with Robbie.
• 46:34
  Speaker 2: Robbie and Hamish and Alan and those guys, all of
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: them were hanging out with everybody. I was hanging out
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: with everybody there. And that was a great gig at
• 46:42
  Speaker 2: the Roundhouse. So so you know I started. I got
• 46:47
  Speaker 2: this guy Mike Vernon, yeah, a producer. He called me
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: up and well, actually he came to see the band
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: play at Ronnie Scott's and he said, I'm doing this
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: album with freddie King, and I want you guys to
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: play on this album with Freddy King, an album called Burglar.
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: And so that was my first full album, like first
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: first real studio musician gig was was that freddie King album?
• 47:19
  Speaker 2: Pretty good start?
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, freddy King a lot of Americans, no One from
• 47:25
  Speaker 1: the Grand Funk Railroad song We're an American band, and
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: he never had a hit on the rock charts, and
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: now his reputation keeps going up and up. So what
• 47:36
  Speaker 1: was it like working with Freddy King?
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: It was amazing. He was He was quite a character.
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: You know. He'd wear these jumpsuits, his big white jumpsuits
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: and he had a huge belt buckle with FK on it,
• 47:47
  Speaker 2: you know, and the studs all around it. Sort of
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: Elvis Presley out sort of guy. And he was loud
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: and he drank gin. He liked to drink gin. Yeah,
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: and they were what they were doing with this album
• 48:00
  Speaker 2: was they were trying to bring him a little bit
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: more into the R and B area, to make him
• 48:04
  Speaker 2: a bit more popular with this with this record. So
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: that's why they had us play on it. But he
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: insisted on playing straight, straight blues every single day, and
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: he would wander down to the studio usually with a
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: buttle of gin and he's hand and it's like it's
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: time to play and we just sit down and play
• 48:22
  Speaker 2: a blues. But he's a what a player. God, he
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: is just a great player. What a character. Excellent.
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, So you know where you're hanging in London, you
• 48:32
  Speaker 1: know everybody, you're doing some sessions, you're working with Freddie King. Yeah,
• 48:37
  Speaker 1: what's the next step for you after that?
• 48:40
  Speaker 2: Well, Mike Vernon said, do you want to, uh, come
• 48:46
  Speaker 2: out and I'm doing a record with this span Bloodstone.
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: They're doing a movie. Would you come out to Los
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: Angeles and and and and work with me with them? Yeah? Sure,
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: So I came out to Los Angeles and ended up
• 49:02
  Speaker 2: recording with with with Bloodstone working on their movie. And
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: it was at that point that right then that Robbie died.
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: Was Robbie came in. They were playing The Average White
• 49:12
  Speaker 2: Band were playing in at the Troubadoor, and I spoke
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: to Robbie and he said, once you come down on
• 49:19
  Speaker 2: Sunday night. We hung out a little bit and he said,
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: once you come down on Sunday night, it's going to
• 49:22
  Speaker 2: be a big party. It's going to be a last night.
• 49:24
  Speaker 2: And I said, I got to work on this movie.
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: If I get through, I'll come down. And as luck
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: would have it, I couldn't go. So next day my
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: drum tech guy named Terry Merchant called me up and
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: said Robbie's dead. And I said, what, they're drunk and
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: he said, no, man, Robbie's dead, and and that was shocking,
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: shocking to me. Robbie always said I'm going to dive
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: before I'm twenty five. I never thought that was going
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: to happen to him. I thought he was indestructible. Robbie
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: could drink, God, he could drink. He could drink like
• 50:03
  Speaker 2: a butler of Voca, and then switched to Scotch and
• 50:05
  Speaker 2: he'd never get sick. He'd just pass out, you know.
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: And I think that's what happened. Somebody gave him this.
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: They said it was cocaine and it was heroin. It
• 50:14
  Speaker 2: was cut, was strickening, and it stayed in his system
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: and he killed him. Yeah, did that stop me? No?
• 50:22
  Speaker 1: But well, I mean that's when I first became aware
• 50:26
  Speaker 1: of you. Yeah, they came to La. I was in
• 50:27
  Speaker 1: La and the album had just come out. So how
• 50:31
  Speaker 1: do you become a member of the band so fast?
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: Well, it wasn't very fun. I mean, you know, I was.
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: I went down when I after Robbie had died. I
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: went to the hotel they were staying down here on
• 50:45
  Speaker 2: just off a venture of Boulevard, in this hotel, just
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: off a venture or and doing what scotsman do when
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: they were having awake drinking and I was down there
• 50:57
  Speaker 2: with what are you guys going to do?
• 51:00
  Speaker 4: You know?
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, And nobody really knew. Everybody was just a mess.
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: And then I would say, I said, look, you know, Robbie,
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: Robbie wouldn't want you guys to stop right now. They
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: were just starting to get airplay with it, pick up
• 51:14
  Speaker 2: the pieces were just starting. I said that that's like,
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: that's that's that's not what he would want. I said,
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: I'll tell you what if I can help you out,
• 51:23
  Speaker 2: if I got time, I'll help you out and I'll
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: come and play with you. And then Stick Super offered
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: the same thing from from the Crusaders.
• 51:30
  Speaker 1: He was.
• 51:31
  Speaker 2: He was like, yeah, the same same deal. So if
• 51:33
  Speaker 2: I couldn't do it, Sticks would do it. So they
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: were going out and doing like the odd weekend here
• 51:38
  Speaker 2: and there.
• 51:39
  Speaker 4: Uh.
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: When I started playing with them, they were they were
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: opening opening for Billy Cobham and that's when I first
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: met Mike and Randy Brecker who was playing with them,
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: and uh and and uh uh uh pick up the pieces.
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: All of a sudden was like boom bang number one
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: and then Billy Cobbin was opening for us. Yeah, but
• 52:08
  Speaker 2: I was under contracted, Bloodstone. I was contracted. I mean
• 52:12
  Speaker 2: I signed a contract and they you know, they gave
• 52:14
  Speaker 2: me a car and and they gave me you know,
• 52:17
  Speaker 2: paid me money every week and just to work with
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: this band. We did a gig down at the old
• 52:23
  Speaker 2: Long Beach Arena and we're down there and we played
• 52:27
  Speaker 2: this gig.
• 52:29
  Speaker 1: And uh we finished.
• 52:30
  Speaker 2: To give us a great gig. Everybody every started. Everybody
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: started off a little bit skeptical. I was this band,
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: you know, and then when they realized that we were authentic,
• 52:39
  Speaker 2: and then they all started dancing and the place just
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: went wild and it was really great. And they came
• 52:43
  Speaker 2: off the stage and this little guy with a goate,
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: very dapper, like a sports jacket, I think like a
• 52:52
  Speaker 2: shirt and instead of like they speaking a little bit
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: like this. Ah. He came walking up to and he said, ah, yeah,
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: you gotta giant in the band. You gotta be in
• 53:03
  Speaker 2: the band. And I said, I'd love to, but I can't.
• 53:08
  Speaker 2: I'm in a contract to this other band. And he said,
• 53:11
  Speaker 2: you're out of that contract and you're in this band.
• 53:14
  Speaker 2: And then he turned around and whooked a white and
• 53:16
  Speaker 2: Bruce McCaskill, the manager of the Bad Spanager, was there.
• 53:18
  Speaker 2: I said, who is that and he said, oh, that's
• 53:21
  Speaker 2: aw'm I herd again.
• 53:23
  Speaker 5: Heard that coming, and I was that was it. I
• 53:28
  Speaker 5: was out of the out of that contract, and I
• 53:30
  Speaker 5: was in Average White Band. It was that that's simple,
• 53:34
  Speaker 5: Average White Band. They have that huge album, you know, yeah,
• 53:38
  Speaker 5: so many great tracks. I love the cover of Work
• 53:40
  Speaker 5: to Do.
• 53:41
  Speaker 2: But uh yeah, okay, they do that.
• 53:44
  Speaker 1: They do the Cut the Cake album.
• 53:46
  Speaker 2: That's what I did.
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: That was my first So, although not quite as commercially
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: successful as the previous album, where does this leave you,
• 53:55
  Speaker 1: because you've been doing a million different things at this point,
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: do you say, I'm just a member of the average
• 54:00
  Speaker 1: White being. This is all I do with us?
• 54:02
  Speaker 2: I mean, that's kind of what I was doing, you know.
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: I mean I was I did Average White Band and
• 54:06
  Speaker 2: that was it. And and uh and we recorded Cut
• 54:09
  Speaker 2: the Cake. And while I was in you know, if
• 54:13
  Speaker 2: if if if I played something and a Reef said, uh,
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: so I first met a Reef Mardin, he said, I
• 54:20
  Speaker 2: really like that. That's I like that pattern that you're
• 54:22
  Speaker 2: playing there. Just keep playing that pattern that that's that's
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: the groove that I want, so that I can remember it.
• 54:27
  Speaker 2: So everybody was talking while they were called it. I'd
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: write it down. I write write out what the pattern was,
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: so I wouldn't forget it. Yeah, because I could do
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: that forget get stuff and uh and uh. At the
• 54:42
  Speaker 2: end of cut the cake, a ref said to me,
• 54:44
  Speaker 2: he said, listen, I noticed you read music and I said, yeah,
• 54:48
  Speaker 2: a little bit. He said, he said, uh, would you
• 54:52
  Speaker 2: would you? Would you like to do some sessions for me?
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: Would you do some sessions for me? So I said, oh, yeah,
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: I'd love to, you know, so he bought me. I
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: think the first session that I ever did and was
• 55:02
  Speaker 2: was a bet Middler song, like a bet middle of
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: sort of dance song that I did. That was the
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: first session that I did from And then he started
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: to use me on Sha Ka Khan and all the
• 55:12
  Speaker 2: Shaka Khan stuff started to happen. And then other producer
• 55:16
  Speaker 2: Zarif was such a hot shot producer. Other producers in
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: town suddenly started hearing, Hey, you know the guy who's
• 55:22
  Speaker 2: playing with the average white man, he's doing sessions. And
• 55:25
  Speaker 2: so I started to get these calls and I went
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: to what I what I call the the the the
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: school of Local eight o two in New York with
• 55:36
  Speaker 2: all those wonderful studio musicians, all those guys that that
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: that became my friends that still today my friends. And
• 55:47
  Speaker 2: they taught me. They taught me everything. They taught me
• 55:51
  Speaker 2: what worked, what didn't work, and and and they they
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: even let me try stuff out. And uh ref Mardin,
• 56:00
  Speaker 2: I owe so much to a Reef Mardin. A Treasury's
• 56:05
  Speaker 2: memory is just a wonderful, wonderful man.
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: So what was his magic? What is it that he did?
• 56:11
  Speaker 4: He he he.
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: He, Okay, you could sit and you could play. You
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: could run down. You're running down a song and you're
• 56:19
  Speaker 2: sitting down and you're playing a song and you're trying
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: to find a part, and you're trying to get this thing,
• 56:23
  Speaker 2: and you'll play, you'll play. And then he would come
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: in and he'd say to me, says, Steve, come here
• 56:28
  Speaker 2: a second, and he take me in into the into
• 56:30
  Speaker 2: the into the into the control room, and he would
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: have the engineer. He'd say, just play from number five
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: twenty right, and so he he's u and then he
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: get to this area and he say, hear that that's
• 56:47
  Speaker 2: what I want. I want that all the way through,
• 56:50
  Speaker 2: you know, and I get it, I get I get
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: what he was talking about. You that that's that's the
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: groove he was looking for. And so sometimes it was
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: it was difficult to grab that and sort of hang
• 57:02
  Speaker 2: onto it schoolboy crush on.
• 57:07
  Speaker 1: On.
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: I mean, I came that. I got credit, rid a
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: credit because that was that was my group, you know,
• 57:12
  Speaker 2: that was that was my thing that made that come together.
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: And we must have done like twenty six takes of
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: that dang thing that one day, I mean, and it
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: just did not hang together. And the reef said, okay,
• 57:26
  Speaker 2: everybody go home, come back tomorrow and we cut it
• 57:28
  Speaker 2: first thing in fresh and it'll be okay. So we
• 57:31
  Speaker 2: all go out go do what we go to do
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: that evening' get a get up. The next day, go
• 57:35
  Speaker 2: to the studio. We walk in and said, well, let's
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: let's run it down. Just make sure we got the form.
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: And we ran the song down. Okay, let's go for
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: a take. We do a take. We go in and
• 57:45
  Speaker 2: we sit there and we listen and it didn't hang
• 57:47
  Speaker 2: together again. It was like god, no, here we go again.
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: And the engineer, Jean Paul, who was Les Paul's son,
• 57:56
  Speaker 2: is less Paul so much to say. Jean Paul turns
• 57:59
  Speaker 2: around and said, you want to listen to the run through?
• 58:02
  Speaker 2: You'd hit that button and boom there it was. It's uh,
• 58:11
  Speaker 2: you know, a reef had a really great sense of
• 58:14
  Speaker 2: of of of.
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: Uh.
• 58:18
  Speaker 2: You know it's only like with Shaka, come uh. We'd
• 58:23
  Speaker 2: have a song. Shaka always showed up late, always late, right,
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: So so so we're in there and working the work
• 58:30
  Speaker 2: in the rhythm section, you know, all this like Richard T. Cornell,
• 58:34
  Speaker 2: the Prix were all these great players, and we were
• 58:37
  Speaker 2: sitting in there and we learn our part and we
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: let we get this whole thing. We get okay, this
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: is how the song's going to go right perfect, and
• 58:43
  Speaker 2: then Shaker would show up about two o'clock in the afternoon.
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: She walk in that vocal booth and she'd open her
• 58:48
  Speaker 2: mouth and everything would change. Everybody would just adjust to
• 58:56
  Speaker 2: for this, for this vocal for this vocalist, you know.
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: And a Reef was big enough to say that's great. No,
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: that's not what I taught you. That is great. That
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: stuff is great, and and he just knew his stuff
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: if right right, string arrangements that were just there was
• 59:16
  Speaker 2: there was so cool with you know, with lots of
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: stuff going on, but the never get in the way
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: of anything. What I found about a Reef was when
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: we recorded average White Man, we we could we could,
• 59:30
  Speaker 2: we could he could add horns. I mean we had
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: Brecker Brothers would come in and and and and and
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: we'd have like a horn section on certain stores, the
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: Brecker Brothers coming. We we we'd add string sections, uh
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: a reef of right string arrangements. We'd have all this stuff,
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: but percussions. Ray Bredo would come and play with us,
• 59:46
  Speaker 2: you know, all these people would come and would come
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: and play with it, and we'd make this album. We'd
• 59:51
  Speaker 2: make this thing. But we could always go out a
• 59:55
  Speaker 2: six people and play that album. And that wasn't the
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: case with other with other producers. We'd have to augment
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 2: the band with like and that. Later on we started
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 2: having these other other producers that were coming, and they're
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: great producers, but just not I don't know if they
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 2: knew how to produce a band, you know, because we'd
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 2: have all this with a reef, we'd have all this
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 2: other stuff on there. But we could still go out
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: with six people and just play this, play these songs.
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 2: With these other people, we'd have to have the background
• 1:00:26
  Speaker 2: vocalists and add another piano player. And and and I
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: was sitting out there playing it was like where did
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: my band? Where'd my band go?
• 1:00:34
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: And with some other band, Now that's not average white band,
• 1:00:38
  Speaker 2: this is this is some other band. And that was
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: kind of like when things started to go downhill when
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 2: we when we when we left the Atlantic and went
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: to Arista. Okay, let's stop there for a second. You
• 1:00:52
  Speaker 2: said you learned something. You learn a bunch of stuff
• 1:00:55
  Speaker 2: from all the studio musicians in New York. Tell me
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: a couple of things you learned. Well, I think the
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: most important thing was not to be afraid to ask
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 2: about something if you saw something that you didn't understand,
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 2: to ask. Asked that. I remember I was doing a
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: session one day with Marcus Miller and and and and
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: there was this thing that was on that was on
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: the on the chart that they that they give me
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 2: and I didn't know what it was, you know, and Marcus,
• 1:01:21
  Speaker 2: what's that like? You know barfi what is that thing
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: at bar fifty seven? And he said, oh, that's oh okay,
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: got it, know what it was? And Marcus said, turn
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 2: around and said thank you. I said what he said,
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: thank you, thank you for not messing it up and
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: blaming somebody else. He said, it's always great to ask stuff,
• 1:01:44
  Speaker 2: you know, ask about stuff. And yeah, he was wonderful.
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: And so I mean I got to play stuff that
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: was that for me was really difficult. When I played
• 1:01:55
  Speaker 2: with the band. I played with this band with Anthony
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: Anthony Jackson, Uh what was what I forget what they
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: called the Dang brand now, but it was Michelle Camello
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 2: was was in the band. Gordon Gordon gott Lee was
• 1:02:12
  Speaker 2: who was a New York Philharmonic percussionist was in the band.
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: Peter Gordon was played french horn in the band. Uh
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: and and and when Anthony couldn't do it, will Lee
• 1:02:23
  Speaker 2: would do it. But the music was just really difficult
• 1:02:27
  Speaker 2: stuff and they they would teach me how to do it,
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 2: how to play it, and I'd have to figure out
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 2: ways to play things that was kind of out of
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 2: my out of my out of my domain, you know, Uh,
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 2: these mixed measures and stuff that they were playing, and
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: I had to figure out how to play my simple
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 2: stuff through there to make that, make it speak properly.
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: So if they didn't call you, who did they call?
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: And how competitive was it?
• 1:02:58
  Speaker 2: I never felt and he and he sort of competition
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: at all. I mean, there was there was the cats,
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: and there was there was those people that were the cats,
• 1:03:05
  Speaker 2: and there was those that weren't, you know, I mean,
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: I go and see like Steve Gadd play with stuff
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: all the time up at Michael's. Chris Barker was a
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: good friend of mine and Steve and Omaha Kim was
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: was a friend Lenny White. I used to see him around.
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 2: We'd run into people in the studios.
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: There was.
• 1:03:28
  Speaker 2: There was just lots of lots of I mean, I
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: mean I used to come out. I used to come
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: out here and out to California and hang out with
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 2: Jeffercaro who's a friend of mine. So there was enough
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: with his brother this afternoon. We just was just just
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: playing with his brother this afternoon.
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, So tell me about going to rist and how
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 1: that kills the band.
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: Well, I think Clive had ideas about what he wanted
• 1:03:59
  Speaker 2: the band to be, and he sent us these songs
• 1:04:04
  Speaker 2: that frankly there they were just awful. They were like
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: songs that Barry Man and I didn't want to put
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: on his record. I think Clive I had this vision
• 1:04:14
  Speaker 2: of making average white Man into the next air supply,
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 2: and for me, there already was an air supply and
• 1:04:21
  Speaker 2: we didn't want to be that anyways, And and it
• 1:04:25
  Speaker 2: just sort of got there. We started making records that
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 2: I still I still listen. I tried to like him.
• 1:04:31
  Speaker 2: I just don't like them. Cupan's in fashion was just awful.
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: H and uh we started to do that, and then
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: it's just sort of like, man, you know, this is
• 1:04:42
  Speaker 2: like they're dying. I'm going to leave before I don't
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: want to see it dead. I'm just gonna leave. Mhm.
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: And you left it and did you have enough studio
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 2: work or what were you thinking? When that's what I went,
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: That's what I went to do. I just went back
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 2: to doing studio work. I just did a lot of that.
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: And when did you start going out on the road again.
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 2: I did a little bit here and there, I mean
• 1:05:06
  Speaker 2: a little bit with a little bit with with with
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: the Chaka Kahan. Not much, just very very I spent
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: all my time in town. I would travel a lot.
• 1:05:17
  Speaker 2: I traveled a lot. I started to travel a lot
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 2: to England and uh and uh Los Angeles. Did a
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: lot of work in Los Angeles, and and then I
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: got I got this. I was in London and and
• 1:05:35
  Speaker 2: I went to Bob Goldoff's I was playing with Deran
• 1:05:38
  Speaker 2: Duran and and I went to Bob Goldofs Knighthood party
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 2: at the hard Rock cafe and and I was sitting
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: there and Phil Collins walked up, tap me on the
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: shoulder and said hey Phil. He said, have you ever
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: met Eric Clapton? And I said, well, I met him.
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: I met him once. He showed up once at a
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: an average white band show and I just meant just
• 1:05:59
  Speaker 2: to say hello, meet meeting, you know. He said, uh,
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 2: he said, well, come over, come with me. Come and
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: come on, I'm sitting over there with you. Come over
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: and come over and meet him. So I go over
• 1:06:08
  Speaker 2: and I sit at the table at Clapton's there as
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: someone else is there to and I'm sitting there. We're
• 1:06:12
  Speaker 2: just talking, make small talking there for a little bit
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: and I say, okay, well then I go back hang
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 2: out with my bunch and my my crowd over there.
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: Nice to met you. And then a couple of weeks later,
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 2: I got a phone call. You want to go play
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 2: with Eric Clapton. Yeah, yeah, I'd like that. And it's
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: a way. He's just playing a couple of gigs. You know,
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 2: he's playing a little club up in Boston, and he's
• 1:06:35
  Speaker 2: going to play another club in New York. Yeah, yeah, yeah,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: he's in the band. Well, Greg Felin Gains and Nathan East.
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: Oh perfect. I had done dates of them out here
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 2: and get I knew them doing record dates to reproduce
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 2: them for record days. Great players, and and so I
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 2: went and did did those those gigs. When I did
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 2: those gigs room and that, they said, well, you know,
• 1:07:02
  Speaker 2: what do you want? What do you want to go
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: and do it? Eric Clapton at that point, I hadn't
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: done a lot of you sort of like, oh, he'd
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 2: been off Maradar for a long time. Yeah, a little
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: bit of money enough to sort of cover cover the week,
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: you know, just have some fun. I was just looking
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 2: forward to play with Eric Clapton, you know. And and
• 1:07:22
  Speaker 2: and then I I I get back, had a great
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: time playing with him, and did the rehearsal. I think
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 2: I think Eric actually got drunk in the rehearsals, had
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 2: to go in the hospital for a couple of days
• 1:07:35
  Speaker 2: and just sort of left us to rehearse on our own,
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 2: and then sort of came back out and joined the
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 2: band a couple of days rehearsal, and then we went
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: and played these two gigs, you know, and we had
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 2: a great time playing those gigs. And uh, and then
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 2: I got this check in the mail. For like three
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 2: times four times as much money as I'd ask for,
• 1:07:53
  Speaker 2: you know, and I couldn't. I said, I think I
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 2: think he made a mistake. And they said, no, no, no, no,
• 1:07:59
  Speaker 2: that's a miss clubs and wants you to have that.
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 2: Thank you very much. I really enjoyed playing with you. Well,
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 2: I really enjoyed it too. And then I started to
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 2: get these calls it comes to England. So I got
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 2: to England and work and we started to do these
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 2: runs with the Royal Albert Hall, you know, started with
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 2: three days, and then seven days, and then a week,
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 2: two weeks, and they think, you know, twenty four nights
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: and working up to twenty four nights. And then record
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 2: companies started to learn that we were there and they
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 2: would say call us up and ask us if we
• 1:08:27
  Speaker 2: could go do session on our day off. And it
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 2: was the boom years, you know, and I was doing
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 2: this Saturday night live as well at that point.
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 1: Okay, well just let's slow down, get a couple of
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 1: things here. You're playing with Clapton. Clapton's had many different
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 1: periods of his career, different music, up and down. It
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: was probably the first guitar hero and rock, but his
• 1:08:52
  Speaker 1: audience is so primed for Clapton, you're on stage, Does
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 1: it make any difference? Does the audience know whether you're
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: on or your offer? It's just Eric clapped in their satisfied.
• 1:09:04
  Speaker 2: My job with Eric Clapton. Eric told me was I
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 2: got to be up there be Eric Clapton every day,
• 1:09:10
  Speaker 2: make me play Wow, that was it. So I just
• 1:09:15
  Speaker 2: I sit there and and sometimes you have difficulty, you know,
• 1:09:21
  Speaker 2: it's not easy to be out there to play a
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 2: great solo every time. You have to be inspired. You know,
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 2: sometimes you're the person that he's the person that inspires,
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 2: and other times he needs a little kick in the
• 1:09:35
  Speaker 2: ass to do that.
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: You know. And and.
• 1:09:39
  Speaker 2: It was just a question of knowing when he was
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 2: just trying to figure out some way to get in it,
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 2: or to give him like a big opening, something to
• 1:09:45
  Speaker 2: do like really big, or even just like break it
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 2: down so that he got really loud and found himself
• 1:09:50
  Speaker 2: out there on his own. And I had no other
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: choice but to play, you know. It was it was
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: a great band of doing that. It was was. It
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 2: was really a great band for playing that rock with Eric.
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back to Duran Duran. Duran Duran had
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: all their hits in the mid eighties. They were incredibly
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 1: cold and I remember K Rock Acoustic Christmas in nineteen
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: ninety two. They were the headliner. The album hadn't come
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: out yet and they played Ordinary World and what the
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: the other big hit off that album which you were
• 1:10:26
  Speaker 1: involved with, So tell me about that.
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I mean I did. Notorious was the first
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 2: the first album that was when they first started to
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 2: get back together, and Notorious sort of was sort of
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 2: an icebreaker for them, you know, getting doing this stuff.
• 1:10:44
  Speaker 2: And that was sort of like there was that one
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 2: year where it was Eric Clapton and Duran Duran and
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 2: I got to stay home for like three weeks out
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 2: of the whole year. Yeah, and uh and uh and
• 1:10:58
  Speaker 2: I was just loving playing with Clapton's and and and
• 1:11:01
  Speaker 2: I just sort of, I mean, it wasn't even like
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to play with anymore. It was just
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 2: all I went off and I was just I spent
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 2: more time playing with Eric and that and that was
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 2: that was more more of my gig. But uh, so'm
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: I'm in London and uh to do George Harrison and
• 1:11:20
  Speaker 2: George just hired Eric's band and uh uh to go
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 2: and do this concert tour in Japan, and uh and
• 1:11:30
  Speaker 2: and I get there and and because I'd stayed at
• 1:11:33
  Speaker 2: the Royal Albert Hall, I mean I used to. I
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 2: rented an apartment on Sloan Street and I would just
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 2: walk up the streets sometimes. And they get on the
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 2: bus and ride with the fans up to were you
• 1:11:44
  Speaker 2: going to play the night Steve? And I haven't seen
• 1:11:45
  Speaker 2: the set list yet, know, And uh, I ride with
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 2: the fans on the bus up there. And so I
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 2: had this apartment on Sloan Street. I used to stay
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 2: in there like that. Side I go in there with
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 2: with George. I had rendered a car and I would
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 2: have to drive out to Bray and rehearsal George. But uh,
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 2: so day one I'm there and then take a ride
• 1:12:06
  Speaker 2: down the King's Road. Just have a look around the
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 2: King's Road, see what's going on. I drive down to
• 1:12:11
  Speaker 2: the kings Old and I'm driving along in traffic in
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 2: the King's Wold very slowly, you know, And I look
• 1:12:16
  Speaker 2: on the on the sidewalk and I see this guy
• 1:12:19
  Speaker 2: walking and I say, dang, they looks like Warren Cook Carrillo,
• 1:12:24
  Speaker 2: you know. But he's got all these muscles, you know,
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 2: it's like muscle bound. It's like a body build a
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 2: sort of guy. And I said, but the last time
• 1:12:35
  Speaker 2: I saw war and he's like skinny mister skinny guitarists,
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 2: you know, missing person's little skinny, skinny skinny guy. And
• 1:12:43
  Speaker 2: uh and I look and hey, we Warren and it's
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 2: and it's it's Steve. You're in town. Yeah, yeah, he said,
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 2: I need you to do a session for me. And
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 2: this is I'm still driving along now very so, and
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 2: I said, I don't know what my schedule is. I'm
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 2: doing this thing with George Harrison. And he puts his
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 2: hand in his bag and he pulls out this cassette,
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 2: throws the cassette in through the car. Win call me.
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 2: We set it up when you get time. And I
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 2: drive off and I take this cassette and I put
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 2: it in the cassette player and listen to it. Ordinary World,
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 2: a demo of ordinary World. So I get back to
• 1:13:21
  Speaker 2: the hotel, I call up Warren and I say, listen,
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 2: you don't need me on this song. You know, this
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 2: is a hit song like this, just like this is
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 2: got a little drum machine on there that they did
• 1:13:31
  Speaker 2: the thing too. I said, you don't he said, no,
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 2: we really want you to play on it. I said, well,
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 2: I said, this is this is a great song. This
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 2: is a hit song. Ifever I heard it. What a
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 2: great song that is. I watched last night. I went,
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 2: I went onto YouTube and I watched the I watched
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 2: the band, watched them. They had like a new one
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 2: of their late latest concerts, Taylor playing. I watched them
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: play Ordinary World. This is just a beautiful What a song,
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: What a great song.
• 1:13:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, you've worked with all these legendary guitarists. Is there
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: one that you prefer to play with more you were
• 1:14:09
  Speaker 1: more amazed by? Or are they all unique? What's your think?
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: I'm a you know, Mike Campbell never ceases to amaze me.
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 2: Is that the most underestimated guitarist?
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 1:14:26
  Speaker 2: Anybody to talk about Mike Campbell? They are people that
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 2: talk about Mike Campbell are great, great, what a great guitarist,
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: But they I don't know. Maybe he's not as flashy
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 2: as like some of these other guitarists are, but he
• 1:14:37
  Speaker 2: just has a way of being as some of those
• 1:14:39
  Speaker 2: solos that he plays, I mean, that's just no composingness.
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 2: So that's what he plays. That's how he plays, Yeah,
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 2: when he sits back in the band, the tones that
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: he comes up with to fit in with the band,
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 2: that sounds that he comes up with. He's just a phenomenal,
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 2: phenomenal player. I love playing with Mike Campbell. That's that's
• 1:14:58
  Speaker 2: for sure. But how do you how do you how
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 2: do you compare Eric clapped better? How do you put
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 2: them on a scale? Eric? You know George Benson. I
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 2: played with George Benson. He's a pretty badass guitarist. George Benson,
• 1:15:15
  Speaker 2: you know, but he doesn't know. He doesn't know, he
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 2: doesn't know how to reader. Note George, you got no idea,
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 2: and then you get guys like OSNOI. He's just phenomenal.
• 1:15:27
  Speaker 2: That I mean, just crazy is the stuff he comes
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 2: up with, and and and his stuff. He first time
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 2: he called me and asked me to play with him,
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 2: I said, he said, will you play with me? I'm
• 1:15:37
  Speaker 2: going to do this gig out in Los Angeles?
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: And I said no.
• 1:15:39
  Speaker 2: He said why not? I said, because your stuff is
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 2: too hard. It is not hard, it's in four fourth.
• 1:15:44
  Speaker 2: I said, what planet are you from? Your stuff? Your
• 1:15:48
  Speaker 2: stuff is so difficult, you know, and it isn't FO
• 1:15:51
  Speaker 2: four But it's like where he puts the accent away
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 2: with me, and it is pretty once, you know, once
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 2: you find it, it's not that different. But I mean
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 2: he has some stuff. I still can't even figure out
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 2: how he gets that phenomenal guitarist Humor Kraken. What can
• 1:16:08
  Speaker 2: I say? No more? You know? Uh uh oh god,
• 1:16:13
  Speaker 2: uh uh He's what I thinking of. I mean, there's
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 2: just so many guys, all these guys in New York,
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 2: the studio guys, Michael Thompson out here, Yeah, David Williams
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 2: from from from I was sitting listening to students your
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 2: your show that your podcasting you did with Steve Lucath,
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: and he was mentioning all these guys, Paul Jackson Jr.
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 2: All these players, you know guys. A lot of people
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 2: say they, who the hell is that? Well, you don't know,
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 2: you know, how come you don't know who David Williams is?
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 1: You know?
• 1:16:54
  Speaker 2: I mean, you know if you go bug a Darren
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 2: do bugger dar David Williams, you know, and that just
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 2: didn't happen. That was David Williams playing that did that?
• 1:17:04
  Speaker 2: Uh yeah, Lucas, I mean, all these guys, I mean,
• 1:17:10
  Speaker 2: I don't know I can't really.
• 1:17:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, wells which gif? How'd you end up in the
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: s n L band?
• 1:17:16
  Speaker 2: Uh? I gotta, I gotta call I just I think
• 1:17:20
  Speaker 2: I got a call. I just got a call. I
• 1:17:22
  Speaker 2: got a call from who. I forget Who the musical
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 2: director was at that point was g Smith g g
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 2: g was was was the was the musical director of
• 1:17:32
  Speaker 2: the band. But but the but uh uh was it?
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 1: How was not?
• 1:17:38
  Speaker 2: How? No, it wasn't how. I forget the guy the
• 1:17:42
  Speaker 2: original guy. He does a lot of movie stuff. He
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 2: was he was the guy that sort of would pick
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 2: out the band. Uh And and he asked me to
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 2: come and during the new season when Lawn Michael Lawn
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 2: Michaels came back, they asked me to do the Saturday
• 1:17:58
  Speaker 2: Unite Light Band And that was that was a thrilled too.
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 2: That's really well, Leon Pandalvis.
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 1: And who what was it like?
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 2: It was fun As a matter of fact, some of
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 2: the jokes that went on in the band were actually
• 1:18:11
  Speaker 2: funny as in the show until until Lovetz came up
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 2: with the liar. It was kind of we sat up
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: there and we've grown at some of these jokes. That
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 2: is awful. And then and then all of a sudden,
• 1:18:26
  Speaker 2: John Lovitz came along and started doing that liar thing
• 1:18:29
  Speaker 2: you know. Yeah, my wife Merk Morgan Fairchild, and it
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 2: was like, oh, this is good, this is really good. Okay.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: Traditionally the drummer is the business guy, is that you
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 1: or not?
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 2: Well, well, you mean doing the business of the band.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and making sure it goes forward and getting the
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 1: gigs and being on top of it and being the
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 1: driving force.
• 1:18:57
  Speaker 2: Oh no, no, no, I'm pretty I'm pretty lazy. I
• 1:19:03
  Speaker 2: don't want to have any any kind of responsibility like that.
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 2: I would say the best I'm a good, a good,
• 1:19:11
  Speaker 2: a good sergeant arms uh to have around, uh, to
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 2: hang out and and keep the camera to you of
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 2: the band around. I mean, Jesus, like, you know, there's
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 2: all these people out there writing books at the moment,
• 1:19:27
  Speaker 2: you know, and and and you know, Tessa and Iles
• 1:19:29
  Speaker 2: from from Merrick's Band wrote a book. Uh, Phil Palmer
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 2: wrote a book from Merrick's Band, And and I feature
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 2: heavily in all of these books. And there's yeah, jan
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 2: gay Marvin Gaye widow, she she she wrote a book.
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 2: And I mean that Rick James wrote a book. And
• 1:19:50
  Speaker 2: I mean and I mean that book. I was like, jeez,
• 1:19:54
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna have to write my own book. A lot
• 1:19:58
  Speaker 2: of a lot of the a lot of these they
• 1:20:00
  Speaker 2: call me up and they say, well, you know, we've
• 1:20:02
  Speaker 2: written some stuff about you in in the book of
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 2: some of some of the adventures that we've had with you,
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 2: and do you want to read it and see if
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 2: you want to take anything out and that? And you know,
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 2: my life's pretty much I'd say, pretty much my life's
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 2: and open book. Really. I mean, I know they love
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 2: me and I love them, and they would never intentionally
• 1:20:23
  Speaker 2: write anything that was that was going to be considered harmful.
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 2: So just just put it out. I trust him, and
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 2: then when I have got around of reading it, it's
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 2: all as awful as it is sometimes. When I got
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 2: arrested once for trunk driving and ended dub calling Roger
• 1:20:40
  Speaker 2: Forrester's phone of Eric Clapton's manager calling call in the
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 2: office and see I got the phone. Nobody answered the
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 2: phone answering machine, So nobody knows the trouble Tess and ours.
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 2: But Tess and Arles put that in the know. You
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 2: just just wait until I write my book. I got
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 2: some stuff on YouTube, but no, it's it's.
• 1:21:10
  Speaker 1: Well that's a you know, the promoter in Montreal tells
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 1: a great story how the who got busted and he
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 1: went to the mof you to get the money to
• 1:21:18
  Speaker 1: the cash to nail him out, and he went in
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 1: there all in jail and they started singing, don't fence
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 1: me in? So how did you end up in Petty's band?
• 1:21:34
  Speaker 2: Well? That was you know that when when after we
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 2: finished the tour with George in in Japan, Yeah, I
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 2: came back and and George caught me up and said, listen,
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna do this other gig. When one other gig
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 2: and the one more gig at the Royal Albert Hole,
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 2: you know, you said, can you come and do it?
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah?
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 2: I love to sell problems. It was a couple of problems.
• 1:22:02
  Speaker 2: He said, Eric, Eric, Eric's not going to do it.
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 2: So I'm getting Mike Campbell to come and do it.
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 2: And I'm like, who Mike Mike Campbell plays with Tom Petty?
• 1:22:13
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, I don't really know too much about it
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 2: better other than I'd seen few videos on on an MTV,
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 2: you know, And and he said, he said, he said,
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 2: he said, who could I get to play play bass?
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: Who? You know?
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 2: Because Nathan can't do it. He's going out. He's going out.
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 2: I think he's doing something with Phil Collins. And I said, well,
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 2: that's simple. Will Lee call Will Lee because Will Lee's
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: a huge Beatles fan, you know, and uh and equaled
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 2: Will and Will came over and did that. Anyways, were there?
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 2: I get. So we did the gig and and and
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 2: we did the rehearsals and everything, and I noticed that
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 2: this guy, Mike Campbell, he just had this way of
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 2: fitting in that was you know. And then he would
• 1:22:57
  Speaker 2: play some really great stuff. And when George went to
• 1:23:00
  Speaker 2: a solo, he would just step up and play something incredible, right,
• 1:23:04
  Speaker 2: And I'm like, who the hell is this Mike Campbell guy?
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 2: And Will Lisa and he plays with Tom Petty. Don't
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 2: really that for me? So I used I took the
• 1:23:17
  Speaker 2: habit of walking up looking at Mike and going fucking
• 1:23:21
  Speaker 2: Mike Campbell, looking right there, fucking Mike Campbell and uh.
• 1:23:28
  Speaker 2: And then we went out and had dinner. A couple
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 2: of times we went out and then sort of end
• 1:23:32
  Speaker 2: up sitting around around Mike and we ended up doing
• 1:23:35
  Speaker 2: some talking and it's very nice. Didn't didn't exchange numbers
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 2: or anything that was it finished. No, after he went
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 2: back to America and we did that gig in it
• 1:23:44
  Speaker 2: and it was it was maybe a month or so
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 2: month or two later that I got this phone call
• 1:23:49
  Speaker 2: from from my answering service radio registry. Wouldn't I used
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 2: to everybody had a radio Radio Registry telephone number. Now
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 2: you call in and they'd book you for stuff. And
• 1:23:58
  Speaker 2: they call me out and say, Steve, you're you know,
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 2: you're open next week and you go to Los Angeles?
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 2: And they said, yeah, what for? They said, Oh, it's
• 1:24:04
  Speaker 2: top secret, geek, top secret. Can't tell you who it is?
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 1: I do.
• 1:24:10
  Speaker 2: Who's the booker? So they put me to into the
• 1:24:12
  Speaker 2: booker and and I say, who's this kid? Who's this
• 1:24:18
  Speaker 2: gid for? Sorry, Steve, we can't tell you. It's top secret? Okay,
• 1:24:23
  Speaker 2: triple scale, mister mercenary, no problem, Okay, all right then?
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 2: Yeah fine, So they flying me out and they put
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 2: me in the Sportsman's Lodge, right, which was I never
• 1:24:40
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'd seen it, but I never really taken
• 1:24:41
  Speaker 2: that much notice of it though. Sports I mean I
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 2: was staying at four Seasons or something like that, the
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 2: High High House. I stayed at the High House. I
• 1:24:50
  Speaker 2: never stayed in the valley, and so I check in
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 2: their first thing that happens. I'm going there, I check in.
• 1:24:58
  Speaker 2: I just walk in there and I signing. The thing
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 2: is this sort of half talk to the person behind her,
• 1:25:02
  Speaker 2: and they look up at the person behind the desk,
• 1:25:05
  Speaker 2: and it was Fluff. The girl used to be the
• 1:25:07
  Speaker 2: cash here at the at the at the Roxy. Fluff, Steve,
• 1:25:13
  Speaker 2: what do you do? This is gonna gonna gig out
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 2: here in some secret gig. So she puts me in
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 2: a suite, and and and and and and and then
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 2: I found out that they had the i'd say, the
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 2: second best swimming pool in the hotel in Los Angeles.
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 2: Over there, it's a great swimming pool. And uh, and
• 1:25:34
  Speaker 2: so I the next day, I have to go out
• 1:25:39
  Speaker 2: to Sound City and get a rental car and drive
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 2: out there. And as I'm as I'm arriving, Kenny Arnos
• 1:25:50
  Speaker 2: drum kit in his flight cases. Kennyanos names on it
• 1:25:53
  Speaker 2: coming out. She is still not unusual, you know. Uh
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 2: and uh. I mean, because sometimes people hire you to
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 2: play on certain songs on a record. I want this
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 2: guy to play on that song. He's really good at
• 1:26:07
  Speaker 2: playing that kind of style. Something so I didn't didn't
• 1:26:10
  Speaker 2: really didn't think too much of it. And I walked
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 2: inside and Russ was setting up my drums in the
• 1:26:17
  Speaker 2: studio and they said to me, I just just go
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 2: through into the control room. And I walk in the
• 1:26:21
  Speaker 2: control room and there was Tom Petty and Mike Campbell
• 1:26:26
  Speaker 2: and then like fucking Mike Camera and Tum Petty and
• 1:26:34
  Speaker 2: then just the three of us went and we went
• 1:26:38
  Speaker 2: and and uh sat down started to play you don't
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 2: know how it feels?
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 1: And that was that.
• 1:26:47
  Speaker 2: And we we went into into the control room and
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 2: I was standing behind the board and they were standing
• 1:26:53
  Speaker 2: in the front with the engineer listening, listening to the
• 1:26:56
  Speaker 2: listening to the take that we did, and and Tom
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 2: turned around the mic and he said, well, what difference
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 2: of drummer make sir? Now I'm like, what the hell
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 2: does that mean?
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 2: I mean it could mean anything, right, right, Like, well,
• 1:27:12
  Speaker 2: this this guy, yeah, I mean, this guy's useless. Get
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 2: rid of it. What do you bring him out here for?
• 1:27:17
  Speaker 2: And then Mike Tom looked to look right at me
• 1:27:20
  Speaker 2: and he said, oh, don't worry. You won. And that
• 1:27:24
  Speaker 2: was it the start start of Wildflowers actually start twenty
• 1:27:28
  Speaker 2: five years I didn't know. It started twenty five years
• 1:27:33
  Speaker 2: and and when I finished, I did two. The first
• 1:27:37
  Speaker 2: time I was out there, I was I was drinking.
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 2: And the second time I came back out to do
• 1:27:44
  Speaker 2: the second half of Wildflowers, I'd stopped. And there was
• 1:27:48
  Speaker 2: only one person that noticed that I'd stopped. Really yeah,
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 2: and that him You'll have to find out yourself, because
• 1:27:57
  Speaker 2: I don't. But he said to me, have you stopped drinking?
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 2: I think we only went out to dinner once. Yeah,
• 1:28:11
  Speaker 2: and so yeah. So so it was uh and so
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 2: and and and uh and then and then the next
• 1:28:18
  Speaker 2: thing was like, you know, I mean, I just went
• 1:28:20
  Speaker 2: back and started doing my stuff. I was working did
• 1:28:22
  Speaker 2: some stuff with Brian Ferry. But I really loved the
• 1:28:26
  Speaker 2: way that the Heartbreakers worked in the studio. I really
• 1:28:30
  Speaker 2: loved the way that they went after a take, and
• 1:28:32
  Speaker 2: they went after and then and they had these great
• 1:28:35
  Speaker 2: songs too. I mean, Tom was just such a great songwriter.
• 1:28:39
  Speaker 2: You know, we had such good stuff to work with,
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 2: and and and the other thing. The thing that really
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 2: impressed me was Wildflowers was so much different than the
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 2: other stuff that Tom had done before. It was it
• 1:28:55
  Speaker 2: was like, I mean, even sometimes we'd play a song
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 2: and I say, oh, here we go. Now this is
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 2: this is sounding more like this is more like Tom
• 1:29:05
  Speaker 2: Petty a Tom Petty song. And he played we play
• 1:29:08
  Speaker 2: about three times and then Tom would say, you know what,
• 1:29:12
  Speaker 2: we've been there before. Next we'll move on and do
• 1:29:15
  Speaker 2: something else. And he would just and I'm like, what
• 1:29:17
  Speaker 2: are you doing? And some of that stuff got on
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 2: to Wildflowers and all the rest, and he found it
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 2: like later on there in twenty seventeen, I guess he
• 1:29:28
  Speaker 2: started going through going through that that stuff to do
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 2: that album with Wildflowers and all the outtakes. And he
• 1:29:38
  Speaker 2: said to me when they said you know, he said,
• 1:29:41
  Speaker 2: I was. I was listening to these songs. There's a
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 2: couple of songs that didn't get on the record. They
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 2: sound like real songs that they're really good. They they're
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 2: pretty much ringing. I don't know how they didn't make
• 1:29:53
  Speaker 2: it onto Wildflowers. And I said, well, you didn't want
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 2: them on there. You said that you've already been there.
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 2: Who visited that place before? You remember you saying that
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 2: about a couple of the songs.
• 1:30:09
  Speaker 1: How do you end up in the band you're working
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 1: on the solo record?
• 1:30:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, then they well, so they finished their they finished,
• 1:30:19
  Speaker 2: they finished their record, and and.
• 1:30:23
  Speaker 5: And uh.
• 1:30:25
  Speaker 2: I was working with Brian Ferry. Brian had a way
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 2: of working. He had these guys that weren't musicians that
• 1:30:32
  Speaker 2: were sort of advisors, right, and and so they'd walk
• 1:30:36
  Speaker 2: into the dressing room and Brian would feel there was
• 1:30:38
  Speaker 2: something wrong with a song. So he would say what
• 1:30:41
  Speaker 2: was what was wrong with that? Love is a drug?
• 1:30:43
  Speaker 2: And they say, oh, it's too fast, Oh too slow? No, no,
• 1:30:46
  Speaker 2: it's too fast or it's too slow. He said, we'll
• 1:30:48
  Speaker 2: go and talk to God, talk Frony about that.
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 2: And so these guys would walk up to me and
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 2: they would say, Steve, Brian feels love the drug is
• 1:31:01
  Speaker 2: too fast or it's too slow, one or the other.
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 2: And I say yeah. They said, well, yeah, could you
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 2: do something about that? And I said, well, I'd love to,
• 1:31:12
  Speaker 2: but I don't start it. The bass player starts it,
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 2: you're talking to the wrong person. I just played whatever is.
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 2: But whatever temper starts whatever it does, and it always
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 2: feels all right to me. So I'll tell you what,
• 1:31:26
  Speaker 2: why don't you just fuck off? So they kind of
• 1:31:31
  Speaker 2: got used to this thing where they come up to
• 1:31:34
  Speaker 2: tell me something and I'd sit there and I listened
• 1:31:36
  Speaker 2: to what they had to say, and I'd say, you
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 2: know what I'm going to tell you, right the fuck off?
• 1:31:41
  Speaker 2: And I said, yeah, that's about it, and they would leave.
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 2: So I really wasn't that that that. I always felt
• 1:31:49
  Speaker 2: that it would have been nice if Brian had come
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 2: in and as a band, talked about the stuff as
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 2: a band, and then then sending these guys who really
• 1:31:58
  Speaker 2: didn't know what the hell they were talking about. Yeah,
• 1:32:01
  Speaker 2: so as manager asked me, you know, he said, would
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 2: you go out on the road with us like next
• 1:32:08
  Speaker 2: year and do some stuff next year? And I said, no, no,
• 1:32:11
  Speaker 2: I'm actually I'm kind of busy. I didn't really just
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 2: didn't really want to do it, you know. And and
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 2: uh and uh and and I called my girlfriend and
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 2: and I said, you know, they asked me to do
• 1:32:21
  Speaker 2: next year and I didn't. I didn't really want to
• 1:32:23
  Speaker 2: do it, so I said, and she said, what, well,
• 1:32:26
  Speaker 2: what are you going to do? You know, it's a gig.
• 1:32:28
  Speaker 2: I said, yeah, but this is not really a gig
• 1:32:30
  Speaker 2: for me, you know, I'm something I happened. I just
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 2: make you go back making records whatever, I do something
• 1:32:37
  Speaker 2: and uh, and she said, well, what would you like
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 2: to do? I said, in truth, what I'd really love
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 2: to do. I love doing that record with the Heartbreakers,
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 2: you know. But I said, but that ain't going to happen.
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 2: That's standing in She's gig. Yeah, I said, that's not
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 2: gonna that's not going to happen. But something to show up,
• 1:32:55
  Speaker 2: I said, I had so much fun playing with those guys.
• 1:32:57
  Speaker 2: It was really terrific. H So that was the end
• 1:33:00
  Speaker 2: of that, pretty much the end of that conversation. The
• 1:33:03
  Speaker 2: next day, phone rings. She calls me up. She said
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 2: Tom just called her. Who wants you to call him?
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 2: And they said what? She said, Tom? She said, I
• 1:33:12
  Speaker 2: think he wants you to do a tour with him.
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 2: And I said, well, I said, I don't let me
• 1:33:17
  Speaker 2: make a call, So I called Tom. I called Tom
• 1:33:20
  Speaker 2: up and Tom. Tom said to me, he said the listen.
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 2: He said, what are you doing next year? He said,
• 1:33:26
  Speaker 2: would you like to come out play with the Heartbreakers?
• 1:33:29
  Speaker 2: I said, well, I'd love to. I said, well, first,
• 1:33:34
  Speaker 2: let me just tell you. I'm really flattered that you're
• 1:33:39
  Speaker 2: asking me to do this, you know, I said, And
• 1:33:41
  Speaker 2: and I'd really like to do it. However, I've been
• 1:33:46
  Speaker 2: in bands and I know that they're like they're families,
• 1:33:50
  Speaker 2: and they're usually dysfunctional families. Have you spoken with Stan
• 1:33:54
  Speaker 2: yet about this? And he said, well, no, I actually
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 2: I haven't. I said we have. He said, we have
• 1:33:59
  Speaker 2: some issues between us and they're not getting to go.
• 1:34:02
  Speaker 2: And I said, well, I'll tell you what I said.
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 2: Let's leave it like this, right. I'm really flattered that
• 1:34:06
  Speaker 2: you ask me, why don't you talk to stand and
• 1:34:09
  Speaker 2: if things, if things work out, if you can work
• 1:34:11
  Speaker 2: things out with them, that's great. And if you can't,
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 2: if things, if things don't work out, come back to me.
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 2: And i'd and I'd love to and I'd love to
• 1:34:19
  Speaker 2: do to do it. And he said, oh, okay, fair enough.
• 1:34:23
  Speaker 2: I hung out the phone. An hour later my phone rang.
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 2: It was tell me, said you're working next year.
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 1: That was it?
• 1:34:32
  Speaker 2: Now I was in the band.
• 1:34:33
  Speaker 1: Okay. So you're in a band that's been in existence
• 1:34:38
  Speaker 1: for the better part of twenty years and they play
• 1:34:42
  Speaker 1: all kinds of stuff. How do you catch up with
• 1:34:46
  Speaker 1: that stuff? Do you listen to the records or you
• 1:34:47
  Speaker 1: can just tune into anything the rehearsal? How do you
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 1: end up fitting in? Because in the Wildflower's album, they're
• 1:34:54
  Speaker 1: creating that stuff from scratch.
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 2: Right, Well, okay, those difficult things for me to learn
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 2: was the stuff was the stuff their songs there, there, there,
• 1:35:06
  Speaker 2: there there song. I mean, I knew I won't back down.
• 1:35:10
  Speaker 2: I'd heard that, I knew a great wide open I'd
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 2: seen the video right, all the stuff that was on MTV.
• 1:35:18
  Speaker 2: I knew all those songs. I knew those songs. I
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 2: thought it was a terrific song. But there was other
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 2: songs like the deeper. Well I considered deep, deeper tracks,
• 1:35:30
  Speaker 2: and I'll give you the example of what I considered
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 2: the deeper second of it. Well I did. That was
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 2: the most difficult thing what I came to find out
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 2: about the Heartbreakers. They're living in Gainesville, Mike and Tom
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 2: nineteen fifty, same as me, same year as me. They're
• 1:35:46
  Speaker 2: growing up. I'm growing up in England. We're listening to
• 1:35:49
  Speaker 2: the same stuff. They're listening to the English stuff. I'm
• 1:35:52
  Speaker 2: listening to the American stuff. Elvis. You know all these
• 1:35:57
  Speaker 2: blues guys that used to come through that my, my, my, my,
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 2: my teenagers guys took me to when I was twelve.
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 2: We're all listening to the same stuff, except Tom's living
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 2: in the same town as Bo Diddley, you know, you know,
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 2: I had to go. I have to go and see
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 2: him play at the dome, you know. But we're listening
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 2: to we know the same songs. We knew the same songs.
• 1:36:21
  Speaker 2: So when when they would they would say, well, let's
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 2: let's play that, I'd know it, you know, I just
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 2: know it. But I didn't wasn't familiar with a lot
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 2: of heartbreak and stuff. So to go out and do
• 1:36:34
  Speaker 2: the Wildflowers to it. I had a list of songs
• 1:36:36
  Speaker 2: that they were going to do, So I the wildflower
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 2: stuff I recorded that. I pretty much knew that, But
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 2: the other songs I had to sort of, you know,
• 1:36:46
  Speaker 2: learn them and figure out what what standard played or
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 2: whoever it was that played drums on the seat, what
• 1:36:53
  Speaker 2: what was like the the stuff that was ultra necessary,
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 2: like certain fields that people need to hear, certain feel
• 1:37:01
  Speaker 2: that people need, and other ones I could just take
• 1:37:03
  Speaker 2: complete advantage of and do whatever I want, like don't
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 2: come come around here no more. I could just make
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 2: up my own stuff, you know, and and uh and
• 1:37:11
  Speaker 2: and so that that was. That was well, we were
• 1:37:15
  Speaker 2: So we're out on the road and we get to
• 1:37:17
  Speaker 2: Chicago and We're playing that big stadium where the Bulls
• 1:37:20
  Speaker 2: play right packed to pack to the scene, people going crazy.
• 1:37:26
  Speaker 2: We finished the show, we come off stage. We're bout
• 1:37:29
  Speaker 2: there having a couple of drinks while the crowd's just
• 1:37:31
  Speaker 2: still going wild, getting ready to go and do the encore.
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 2: And Tom looks at me and says, do you know
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 2: breakdown And I said no, it wasn't. It wasn't on
• 1:37:42
  Speaker 2: the list. He said, Okay, boom, check them scat, boom,
• 1:37:50
  Speaker 2: check them scat. Do that they're going crazy. Follow me,
• 1:37:54
  Speaker 2: and we walked out on the stage. We will down
• 1:37:56
  Speaker 2: on the stage and that's what we did. Wow, And
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 2: that was that was my rehearsal. That was my rehearsal
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 2: in front of like twenty five thirty thou people.
• 1:38:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, when Tom Pitty and the Heartbreakers was like twenty
• 1:38:13
  Speaker 1: fifteen somewhere around there, you played like a week at
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 1: the Fund. Then there was different stuff all night. Did
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 1: you guys rehearse for that?
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 2: Were we rehearsed, uh for the funder the funder here, Yeah, somewhat.
• 1:38:29
  Speaker 2: There was a couple of things that we that we
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 2: that we that we rehearsed. One of the things we
• 1:38:37
  Speaker 2: kind of went over was that Mystic Eyes. We kind
• 1:38:43
  Speaker 2: of jammed that a little bit of the rehearsal. Some
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 2: of the things that we just jam. I just think
• 1:38:49
  Speaker 2: that we were playing for fun. And then he would
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 2: just say, Okay, well we know that that's good. We
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 2: don't know Tom's even done. We don't want to over rehearse,
• 1:38:56
  Speaker 2: you know. And Tom was a very very good leader.
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 2: You keep your eye on him. He tell you where
• 1:39:02
  Speaker 2: you want the song, where we want the song to go,
• 1:39:05
  Speaker 2: you know. And uh. And so some of the things,
• 1:39:09
  Speaker 2: some of the things that rehearsed, and some of them
• 1:39:10
  Speaker 2: I don't even remember rehearsing. Sometimes it was kind of
• 1:39:14
  Speaker 2: like the the film or show where we we'd rehearse
• 1:39:19
  Speaker 2: something in the afternoon and then play it that night,
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 2: and and and and and then not play it again.
• 1:39:24
  Speaker 2: So some of them, some of those songs, like like
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 2: from like from the film or Exile on Main Street,
• 1:39:31
  Speaker 2: I don't I listened to that. I mean, I'm completely
• 1:39:34
  Speaker 2: surprised because we must have rehearsed it, learned it that afternoon,
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 2: played it that night, and then never played it again.
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 1: Okay, I saw you know Petty many times, but I
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 1: wasn't in the band. Were there good nights and bad nights.
• 1:39:50
  Speaker 1: What was the band like? Were they always good? It was? Yeah?
• 1:39:53
  Speaker 2: I think you know, I don't remember a bad night
• 1:39:56
  Speaker 2: with Harb. I mean there were some nights that were
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 2: that were just there was other nights that were magic,
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 2: of course, like every band has that, but I can't
• 1:40:04
  Speaker 2: say it was just okay. The band was great every night.
• 1:40:07
  Speaker 2: It was a great band. And I think that the
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 2: reason that the band was a great band was because
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 2: Tom used to rest the band. He didn't he didn't
• 1:40:17
  Speaker 2: work the band into the ground. He would he would.
• 1:40:20
  Speaker 2: We worked a couple of nights and then a night off.
• 1:40:25
  Speaker 2: We always traveled. We had our private jets, so we
• 1:40:28
  Speaker 2: would stay like in Chicago, fly out, do a gig,
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 2: and fly back, and some nights were we'd play one
• 1:40:33
  Speaker 2: night and then we'd have two nights off. So so
• 1:40:36
  Speaker 2: we were every time that we that we went to
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 2: walk on stage, we were eager to play. Yeah, and
• 1:40:43
  Speaker 2: we were fresh. We were rested, and uh and I
• 1:40:47
  Speaker 2: think that's what I mean. I know I played with
• 1:40:53
  Speaker 2: excuse me, I played with some people that just want
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 2: to play, like, you know, five or six shows in
• 1:40:59
  Speaker 2: a row and it's you get down. I get to
• 1:41:02
  Speaker 2: the fourth show, and it's like, I don't want to
• 1:41:04
  Speaker 2: be there. I just want to know. I want to
• 1:41:05
  Speaker 2: lie off and I need to rest because I don't.
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 2: I don't when I when I play, I don't. I
• 1:41:12
  Speaker 2: don't cruise. You know, Uh, I burn energy. I like
• 1:41:20
  Speaker 2: to put everything, everything physically, everything physically that I have
• 1:41:25
  Speaker 2: into playing the playing the drums might not look like it,
• 1:41:27
  Speaker 2: but there's there's a lot of work going on back there.
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 2: You know, there's a lot of drumsts getting worn to
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 2: pieces up there. I don't break them that much, but
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 2: I'll wear them out.
• 1:41:36
  Speaker 1: Okay, needless to say at this point in his career.
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 1: At that point in his career, Tom was going on tour,
• 1:41:43
  Speaker 1: not every year, and he wasn't working six months eight
• 1:41:46
  Speaker 1: months in a row. What were you doing with the downtime?
• 1:41:51
  Speaker 2: Well we we uh that that that but that that
• 1:41:55
  Speaker 2: was the way that it was all the time. You know,
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 2: Tom will go Tom we go out on the road
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 2: and he and he'd finish the tour. What we do
• 1:42:03
  Speaker 2: maybe three or four months that just and and every
• 1:42:06
  Speaker 2: three weeks we go home for a week to ten days. Yeah,
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 2: And and then because he liked the band, wanted to
• 1:42:13
  Speaker 2: be out there. Didn't want to have to kick the
• 1:42:14
  Speaker 2: band out there when he would have a band wanting
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 2: to go home. He wanted him to want to be
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 2: out there. So we would all, you know, we actually
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 2: get to the end and say keep going for another
• 1:42:23
  Speaker 2: week or something, and and then we'd just go about
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 2: our stuff and then we'd look forward to getting back
• 1:42:28
  Speaker 2: out on the road.
• 1:42:29
  Speaker 1: Uh uh.
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 2: He was a very wise man when it came to that.
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 2: You know, he he he watched his ticket prices so
• 1:42:39
  Speaker 2: that people could get in, you know, his fans could
• 1:42:42
  Speaker 2: get in. And uh, he was he was really concerned
• 1:42:46
  Speaker 2: with with all that.
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 1: Did it take up all your time? If there's twelve
• 1:42:49
  Speaker 1: months in a year, were there time we could do
• 1:42:51
  Speaker 1: your own things?
• 1:42:52
  Speaker 4: Or yeah?
• 1:42:53
  Speaker 3: I did?
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 1: I did.
• 1:42:54
  Speaker 2: I did my own things. I mean playing playing with
• 1:42:56
  Speaker 2: Tom Petty allowed me to build the studio, so so.
• 1:43:02
  Speaker 1: Uh I did. I did.
• 1:43:04
  Speaker 2: I did my own stuff. Once I called up Mike
• 1:43:08
  Speaker 2: Campbell and I said, I said, what are you doing?
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 2: He said nothing, Just I said I know. I said, look,
• 1:43:13
  Speaker 2: I know you got some songs, right. I said, why
• 1:43:17
  Speaker 2: don't you call Ron Blair and that Ron come over
• 1:43:20
  Speaker 2: and we we'll sit there and and we we we'll
• 1:43:23
  Speaker 2: play some songs down. He said, you do that. I said, yeah,
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 2: that's I just want to play. And he said okay.
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 2: So I go over to go over to Mike's house
• 1:43:34
  Speaker 2: and the Dirty Knobs started and we started, you know,
• 1:43:38
  Speaker 2: I said, We started playing with Ron and and and
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 2: then they got Jason Sana. Mike found Jason Say and
• 1:43:46
  Speaker 2: got him to come and play with the band, be
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 2: second guitar. And we we would we would cut a song.
• 1:43:53
  Speaker 2: If we'd learn the song, we play it once and
• 1:43:55
  Speaker 2: then move on to the next song. Wouldn't even listen
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 2: to it. And then and I got these the tapes
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 2: that said it's really great, it's really exciting, you know,
• 1:44:04
  Speaker 2: and and Mike was loving it. And then he took it,
• 1:44:08
  Speaker 2: took it to Tom to listen to and Tom Tom said,
• 1:44:13
  Speaker 2: this is awful. It's horrible. What are you doing this for?
• 1:44:17
  Speaker 2: You don't need to do this. Yeah, And Mike was like, listen,
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 2: you don't like I like, the songs are awful, horrible stuff. Mike.
• 1:44:26
  Speaker 2: Tom was in the defense boat. I don't want to
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 2: lose Mike Campbell.
• 1:44:30
  Speaker 1: Right right right, right right right.
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 2: So he turns out the turns around to Mike and
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 2: he says, he said, it's ship And while we're at it,
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 2: you know what, because by then, how he had died
• 1:44:43
  Speaker 2: and Ron was back in the band. He said, And
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 2: by the way, in case you didn't know this, that's
• 1:44:48
  Speaker 2: my band that you're using.
• 1:44:50
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 1:44:54
  Speaker 2: Mike was so upset, he was so upset, he called
• 1:44:58
  Speaker 2: me up you Steve. Tom just doesn't like it. Just
• 1:45:04
  Speaker 2: he just my brother wants Eve and listen to the
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 2: stuff that I'm doing with you know, And and I
• 1:45:10
  Speaker 2: can't have you in the band anymore. He said, he'd
• 1:45:12
  Speaker 2: fired you and run and just so so Mike had
• 1:45:18
  Speaker 2: to go out and find another band. A few months later,
• 1:45:22
  Speaker 2: he'd left, he'd left the house so upset that he'd
• 1:45:28
  Speaker 2: left the c D. Tom had one of those hundred
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 2: CD players right he'd left. He just left the house
• 1:45:33
  Speaker 2: completely distraught. Tom's walking around in his house and he's
• 1:45:37
  Speaker 2: got the thing on, like, you know, just automatic, just
• 1:45:39
  Speaker 2: play something here there. This thing is whizzing around and
• 1:45:42
  Speaker 2: playing all these different songs. And he hears this song
• 1:45:46
  Speaker 2: and he says, that's a that's a pretty good song.
• 1:45:49
  Speaker 2: Who the hell's that? Just can't stop the sun, can't
• 1:45:56
  Speaker 2: stop the sun from from shining and and so he
• 1:45:59
  Speaker 2: called up Mike and he's like, I want that SOUD
• 1:46:04
  Speaker 2: And he said, who else is on there? The other
• 1:46:07
  Speaker 2: nub guys that take that guy off? And I'm going
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 2: to put the put the guitar on there. And he
• 1:46:11
  Speaker 2: changed the guitar and uh, and then he put it
• 1:46:13
  Speaker 2: on the last DJ. Wow.
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 1: So you know, everyone knew that Tom was hurting. But
• 1:46:22
  Speaker 1: you go on on a run, it's incredible. You finish
• 1:46:25
  Speaker 1: up at the Hollywood Bowl. Yeah, and then the next day, okay,
• 1:46:32
  Speaker 1: what they say, you know, disgusted some with Tony, but
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 1: who knows what the truth is. You know that ultimately
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 1: fentanyl was the cause of death, and fentanil. Although there's
• 1:46:45
  Speaker 1: legal fent nail, there are other drugs. It's a big
• 1:46:49
  Speaker 1: issue now lace was fentanyl?
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 4: Was this?
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 1: Did you know during the tour he was taking drugs
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 1: that were not like pharmaceutical drugs.
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 2: I No, he wasn't taking I don't personally. I don't
• 1:47:04
  Speaker 2: think Tom was taking drugs that were known that were
• 1:47:09
  Speaker 2: non pharmaceutical. I think what he was taking on the
• 1:47:12
  Speaker 2: tour was was was prescribed. He wasn't dirty.
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 1:47:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Look I think i'd seen Tom uh when he
• 1:47:22
  Speaker 2: went to a period, a drug period. It wasn't pretty,
• 1:47:26
  Speaker 2: you know, and uh and and and he kicked that,
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 2: he stopped it and uh and uh and and uh
• 1:47:34
  Speaker 2: and he cleaned up Tom uh the last the last years,
• 1:47:41
  Speaker 2: I would say, you know, basically he would drink Coca
• 1:47:45
  Speaker 2: cola and he didn't even seem to smoke as much,
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 2: but that is what he had a certain points that
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 2: I'd say, you have a joint once in a while,
• 1:47:54
  Speaker 2: just seemed not really within the problems as normally, you know.
• 1:47:57
  Speaker 2: And he had a lot of pain with that hip hop.
• 1:48:00
  Speaker 2: Is because I used to help him up onto the stage.
• 1:48:03
  Speaker 2: And I think he I've said, I've said stuff before
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 2: that got me in trouble with with with with people.
• 1:48:12
  Speaker 2: But I think that well, I know that he had
• 1:48:15
  Speaker 2: said stuff about it to other people that he would
• 1:48:18
  Speaker 2: take he would take some moxie cotton that would get
• 1:48:21
  Speaker 2: him through the show. And but I think that that's
• 1:48:25
  Speaker 2: the only thing other than that I never saw, I
• 1:48:28
  Speaker 2: never saw any indication that Tom was using anything to
• 1:48:31
  Speaker 2: get high. He was using it for what it was for,
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 2: and that was so he could get through that show.
• 1:48:37
  Speaker 2: And then it gets you know, I wish, I wish
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 2: like I think a lot of other people had that
• 1:48:42
  Speaker 2: he had stopped the tour and uh and and got
• 1:48:45
  Speaker 2: that hip fix and then you know, resumed later on.
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 2: But you know, he was very loyal. He was He's
• 1:48:51
  Speaker 2: very loyal to everybody. He was loyal to us. He
• 1:48:54
  Speaker 2: was loyal to the crew. You would think a lot
• 1:48:56
  Speaker 2: about them, you know. Uh. I think that when at
• 1:49:01
  Speaker 2: the point when he's hit broke. Uh, that's that's when
• 1:49:05
  Speaker 2: the illegal the illegal drug came into it. That he
• 1:49:08
  Speaker 2: was in so much pain when that happened. But uh, uh,
• 1:49:13
  Speaker 2: I would, I would, I would state anything on it
• 1:49:18
  Speaker 2: that while we were out on the road, he wasn't
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 2: recreationally using anything to do anything. And I'm sure I'm
• 1:49:24
  Speaker 2: pretty much sure that fent mold didn't come into it.
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 2: It was just something that would get him through the show, Okay,
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 2: either either an orco or or like I had for
• 1:49:36
  Speaker 2: my knee I needed to. I'd have Norco every every
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 2: six hours for my knee when I when I did
• 1:49:42
  Speaker 2: my knee replacement, and then i'd have oxy cotton for
• 1:49:45
  Speaker 2: for for a bridge and uh and I gave it
• 1:49:50
  Speaker 2: to Julia and she come in say what's your what's
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 2: your pain level? On and I'd say it really hurts,
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 2: and she give me something. Well, I'd say, it's not
• 1:49:58
  Speaker 2: too bad, and then she give me something. I had
• 1:50:00
  Speaker 2: no idea at the end. One day I turned around
• 1:50:03
  Speaker 2: her and I said, have I had any painkillers today?
• 1:50:05
  Speaker 2: She said, you haven't had any painkillers for three days. Yeah.
• 1:50:09
  Speaker 2: So I think, having been around enough, I've been around
• 1:50:16
  Speaker 2: this stuff, I can say that. I would say that
• 1:50:19
  Speaker 2: my guess was pretty educated that when we were out
• 1:50:22
  Speaker 2: on the road, Tom was using drugs. He was in
• 1:50:28
  Speaker 2: enough pain that he needed something for sure, Because, like
• 1:50:31
  Speaker 2: I say, i'd have to. He put his arm around
• 1:50:34
  Speaker 2: me and we'd walk up those stairs to that stage.
• 1:50:36
  Speaker 2: And sometimes we'd stop halfway up and I'd say how
• 1:50:39
  Speaker 2: are you doing? And he say, just get me up
• 1:50:41
  Speaker 2: there and I'll get through this. Yeah.
• 1:50:43
  Speaker 1: And so.
• 1:50:46
  Speaker 2: Some nights when we came off for the when we
• 1:50:50
  Speaker 2: came off of the on core, he'd need me to
• 1:50:52
  Speaker 2: help him back up to the OnCore. Other nights it
• 1:50:55
  Speaker 2: was working just fine, the stuff, and he'd walk up
• 1:50:57
  Speaker 2: the stairs on his arm without any help. But that
• 1:51:01
  Speaker 2: was few and far between. Most times he'd need my
• 1:51:03
  Speaker 2: help to get up there. And uh, and so, uh,
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 2: I think you can tell, well, I think I can tell.
• 1:51:12
  Speaker 2: I have enough experience with that stuff now that I
• 1:51:15
  Speaker 2: can tell if somebody's using something recreationally or if somebody's
• 1:51:19
  Speaker 2: using something that they shouldn't. And uh, and he was
• 1:51:23
  Speaker 2: definitely within the realms of prescription what I could from
• 1:51:26
  Speaker 2: what I could see.
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, how did you find out? And then it was
• 1:51:32
  Speaker 1: a loss for all of us, in a shock for
• 1:51:34
  Speaker 1: all of us. But then as time goes by, how
• 1:51:38
  Speaker 1: long did it take you to put the pieces back
• 1:51:39
  Speaker 1: together yourself? You know?
• 1:51:48
  Speaker 2: I remember it was. It was such a shock when
• 1:51:53
  Speaker 2: when and when I found out about Tom I was
• 1:51:57
  Speaker 2: I was in San Francisco, and I did I'd done
• 1:52:01
  Speaker 2: a gig up in San Francisco, and and I had
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 2: a really early flight back to Los Angeles, like six
• 1:52:05
  Speaker 2: am flight the next day. So I went to bed
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 2: about nine o'clock at night. I woke up about one
• 1:52:11
  Speaker 2: o'clock in the morning, and uh and uh and and
• 1:52:14
  Speaker 2: I turned on the TV just to have something to
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 2: look at to go back to sleep, and and uh
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 2: and and and the the news was full of the
• 1:52:25
  Speaker 2: shooting in Las Vegas, the people getting shot in Las Vegas.
• 1:52:29
  Speaker 2: And I was sitting there and I was listening to
• 1:52:31
  Speaker 2: the sound of those machine guns and I couldn't I
• 1:52:34
  Speaker 2: couldn't believe that that was that was going on.
• 1:52:37
  Speaker 1: I was just it.
• 1:52:41
  Speaker 2: It must be like shooting into soup, those guns, you know,
• 1:52:45
  Speaker 2: just all those people and just firing into those people.
• 1:52:48
  Speaker 2: And I couldn't believe it. And my phone was on
• 1:52:50
  Speaker 2: the other side of the room, plugged in and uh
• 1:52:54
  Speaker 2: and and it started to ring and I thought, Ah,
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 2: it's just somebody from England calling. They've seen this thing.
• 1:53:02
  Speaker 2: And I wondered, some somebody panicking. Oh, Steve, and Steve's there.
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 2: Let me find it out. No, just let it, let
• 1:53:08
  Speaker 2: it ring. And I was watching this thing and the
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 2: phone stopped and they started ringing again, and I thought,
• 1:53:13
  Speaker 2: who the hell is that? And I go over and
• 1:53:15
  Speaker 2: I look and it's Benmont. And I answered the phone
• 1:53:18
  Speaker 2: and say, hey, but how you doing? And he said
• 1:53:20
  Speaker 2: and he and he talked about somebody somebody being gone,
• 1:53:25
  Speaker 2: you know, uh and and he said and he was
• 1:53:31
  Speaker 2: he was like crying and shaking and and and and
• 1:53:38
  Speaker 2: ben Mont's wife was pregnant at that time. And I thought,
• 1:53:48
  Speaker 2: this is how far away it was for me that
• 1:53:51
  Speaker 2: it was Tom. I said, I say, I say. I
• 1:53:55
  Speaker 2: said to Ben Ah, muh, your wife state and he said, no, no, no,
• 1:54:06
  Speaker 2: she's fine. Tom. Tom's gone, you know. Uh and uh
• 1:54:15
  Speaker 2: and that's when the nightmare started.
• 1:54:17
  Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, well it's a whirlwind week and then it's
• 1:54:25
  Speaker 1: ere quotes returned to normal. How did you ultimately adjust
• 1:54:30
  Speaker 1: and move forward?
• 1:54:31
  Speaker 2: I don't think. I don't think any of us did.
• 1:54:35
  Speaker 2: I don't think any of us. I still think that
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 2: we the Heartbreakers really has a special bond with this
• 1:54:41
  Speaker 2: crew everybody. I don't think. I still think that any
• 1:54:48
  Speaker 2: given time, Uh, it can it can overwhelm us. The
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 2: loss of Tom. Uh uh huh uh. The day the
• 1:55:02
  Speaker 2: next day, I got up and I flew until six
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 2: o'clock flight, and I flew and I went straight to
• 1:55:06
  Speaker 2: Tom's bedside. The whole band was there. Everybody was there,
• 1:55:10
  Speaker 2: and we we we spent all day waiting for Tony
• 1:55:15
  Speaker 2: to show up, waiting for Tom's brother to show up,
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 2: and and finally we were all in the room when
• 1:55:22
  Speaker 2: he died. And I never forget the sound and what that,
• 1:55:26
  Speaker 2: what that room was like. I never forget that, and
• 1:55:29
  Speaker 2: and uh and then we all just sort of went
• 1:55:33
  Speaker 2: out of ways. You know. Some some months after yeah,
• 1:55:40
  Speaker 2: and Mike was really every everybody was grieving in their
• 1:55:43
  Speaker 2: own way. Everybody was going through their stuff. And I
• 1:55:48
  Speaker 2: remember going to to the funeral memorial service and and uh,
• 1:55:58
  Speaker 2: uh I I got, I got, I got put into
• 1:56:03
  Speaker 2: the rock will fame in Brighton, in my hometown, and
• 1:56:07
  Speaker 2: uh and Julia uh decided to do something for me.
• 1:56:13
  Speaker 2: She got in touch with a lot of people, you know,
• 1:56:17
  Speaker 2: Nathan Easton, Eric Clapton, and and I mean just all
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 2: these musicians, you know, all these musicians that I know
• 1:56:25
  Speaker 2: and I love all made a little film and she
• 1:56:29
  Speaker 2: edited the whole thing together. You know, congratulations Steve are
• 1:56:33
  Speaker 2: getting into the rock, Will you deserve it? That sort
• 1:56:35
  Speaker 2: of stuff, and and and and and she tried to
• 1:56:39
  Speaker 2: show me this film. She tried to show me this
• 1:56:41
  Speaker 2: film through about a week. And I'm getting ready to
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 2: go get We're getting ready to go to England, and
• 1:56:47
  Speaker 2: and I'm like, I haven't got time, I haven't got time.
• 1:56:50
  Speaker 2: Take a minute, look at it. I haven't got time
• 1:56:51
  Speaker 2: to do it. Now, I've got to do this. I've
• 1:56:52
  Speaker 2: got to do that. I've got to get this. And
• 1:56:55
  Speaker 2: finally we get to the airport and we're sitting there
• 1:56:57
  Speaker 2: waiting for the plane and she pulls out a computer
• 1:56:59
  Speaker 2: and she right, now you've got time, and you never
• 1:57:01
  Speaker 2: look at this film, and I see all these people
• 1:57:04
  Speaker 2: go through the whole thing with all these people, all
• 1:57:06
  Speaker 2: these people saying, you know what a great guy I am,
• 1:57:10
  Speaker 2: you know, And the very last thing that she put
• 1:57:13
  Speaker 2: on that reel and sorry, yeah.
• 1:57:23
  Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah yeah, the very last thing she put on
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 4: the reel was Tom Petty introducing me at the Hollywood bot.
• 1:57:44
  Speaker 2: H And I did what I just did. Then see
• 1:57:52
  Speaker 2: what I'm talking about. He was a wonderful, wonderful man
• 1:58:02
  Speaker 2: and great songwriter, great great a great human being. Yeah,
• 1:58:14
  Speaker 2: miss him and we're still missing.
• 1:58:17
  Speaker 1: And uh.
• 1:58:22
  Speaker 2: Thanks. That feels good to do that, to know that
• 1:58:26
  Speaker 2: I could have that kind of capacity of love for
• 1:58:30
  Speaker 2: another human being. And five years later I just started
• 1:58:34
  Speaker 2: talking about it.
• 1:58:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, Okay. The past five years have been crazy
• 1:58:46
  Speaker 1: for all of us with COVID, etcetera. Although everyone's kind
• 1:58:49
  Speaker 1: of in gear. Now you talked about this school thing
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 1: you're doing. What's been keeping you busy?
• 1:58:54
  Speaker 4: Now?
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 2: Well, I was in in New York when when COVID hit,
• 1:59:02
  Speaker 2: I was doing the Seth Meyers Show. I was the
• 1:59:04
  Speaker 2: guest drummer on the Seth Meyers show, and the last
• 1:59:06
  Speaker 2: day they canceled it, they pulled them plug. And the
• 1:59:12
  Speaker 2: next morning I got up and walked to an AA
• 1:59:14
  Speaker 2: meeting across Times Square at seven o'clock in the morning,
• 1:59:16
  Speaker 2: and there was only three people in Times Square, and
• 1:59:18
  Speaker 2: I was one of them. And I said, this is
• 1:59:22
  Speaker 2: gonna be something else. And so I got back here
• 1:59:28
  Speaker 2: and I called the guy that puts all my stuff
• 1:59:31
  Speaker 2: together in here, and I said to him, how can
• 1:59:39
  Speaker 2: I what would it take to make my studio so
• 1:59:42
  Speaker 2: that somebody can engineer me remotely? And he said, oh,
• 1:59:46
  Speaker 2: eight to ten thousand dollars, And then he came back
• 1:59:48
  Speaker 2: and just to put all the new stuff in. And
• 1:59:51
  Speaker 2: then my good friend Eric tongran Et, as he's known,
• 1:59:56
  Speaker 2: he's a great engineer. He lives down in Long Beach.
• 2:00:01
  Speaker 2: He came up here and he set everything up, gave
• 2:00:03
  Speaker 2: me a quick crash course in how to how to
• 2:00:05
  Speaker 2: adjust levels and and to get to do stuff. And
• 2:00:09
  Speaker 2: then we we do zoom and uh and and I've
• 2:00:14
  Speaker 2: learned how to make make little adjustments and stuff. I
• 2:00:17
  Speaker 2: started to do my own radio show here and and
• 2:00:24
  Speaker 2: we kind of worked through the We just worked through
• 2:00:26
  Speaker 2: the through the through the lockdown every every every once
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 2: in a while, a couple of guys would come over
• 2:00:32
  Speaker 2: and we'd cut something live and put put a little
• 2:00:35
  Speaker 2: band together with some friends that I knew were prudent,
• 2:00:38
  Speaker 2: and we'd all stay. It's not very big room, but
• 2:00:42
  Speaker 2: there's enough to keep six feet between everybody, and we
• 2:00:45
  Speaker 2: wore masks and we we'd make some music and do
• 2:00:48
  Speaker 2: a little recording, and we did. I'm glad, I'm glad
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 2: we're all back back together now. I did just did
• 2:00:54
  Speaker 2: a couple of days, did a date in a couple
• 2:00:56
  Speaker 2: of dates in the in in Nashville, and we're all
• 2:00:59
  Speaker 2: in the same room, a bunch of guys playing again
• 2:01:02
  Speaker 2: instead of just being me overdubbing something.
• 2:01:05
  Speaker 1: This one, Okay, I see behind you a Gretch kit. Yeah,
• 2:01:11
  Speaker 1: it's a nineteen How many sets of drums do you have?
• 2:01:14
  Speaker 2: Oh? I quite a few. I don't know. I got
• 2:01:20
  Speaker 2: mainly I got maybe like five or six gret drums sets.
• 2:01:28
  Speaker 2: And this one is a it's a nineteen nineteen fifty
• 2:01:33
  Speaker 2: Gretch broadcaster. It's the same age as I am, except
• 2:01:36
  Speaker 2: it's in a bit better condition.
• 2:01:40
  Speaker 1: So let's assume you get called to go to Nashville
• 2:01:42
  Speaker 1: you got a set of drums in Nashville, yep. So
• 2:01:47
  Speaker 1: if I call you Nashville, New York, London, there's a
• 2:01:50
  Speaker 1: set of drums in all those places.
• 2:01:52
  Speaker 2: Well, I have.
• 2:01:54
  Speaker 1: In New York.
• 2:01:55
  Speaker 2: I have a friend that lived out here for a while,
• 2:01:59
  Speaker 2: Dan Stay because and he was my drum tech and
• 2:02:03
  Speaker 2: he well he will he lived out He actually lived
• 2:02:06
  Speaker 2: here in my house. Is he had a roommate. He's
• 2:02:10
  Speaker 2: a young guy, you know, And and he had a
• 2:02:12
  Speaker 2: roommate that he was living with. And he came home
• 2:02:15
  Speaker 2: one day and his friend that hadn't been feeling very
• 2:02:17
  Speaker 2: well found his friend dropped dead. He had an undiagnosed
• 2:02:22
  Speaker 2: heart heart problem and uh, and he found his friend there.
• 2:02:26
  Speaker 2: So I said, well, he couldn't keep the apartment, so
• 2:02:29
  Speaker 2: I said, we'll move in with with with me and Julius.
• 2:02:31
  Speaker 2: He moved him with me and Julia and was my
• 2:02:33
  Speaker 2: drum taken and uh and and he wanted to get
• 2:02:37
  Speaker 2: himself a set of great drums. So I helped him
• 2:02:39
  Speaker 2: get a set of dreat drums and broadcast as the
• 2:02:41
  Speaker 2: reissues and he loves them. And then he moved back
• 2:02:45
  Speaker 2: home to New Jersey. And so whenever I go on
• 2:02:49
  Speaker 2: the around New York area. I called him up and
• 2:02:51
  Speaker 2: he brings his kit in and uh and and I
• 2:02:54
  Speaker 2: play that one. So that's pretty cool. Why gretch best
• 2:02:59
  Speaker 2: sounding drums and on it? Because they just got away
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 2: of you know, they have they have a motto, the
• 2:03:06
  Speaker 2: the great greats, that great, great sound. They have a
• 2:03:11
  Speaker 2: tone that I don't I don't think any other drum
• 2:03:15
  Speaker 2: kits that ever actually managed that. People aspire, they say,
• 2:03:20
  Speaker 2: people will come up to you from other companies and
• 2:03:22
  Speaker 2: they say, we make drums that sound like great drums,
• 2:03:24
  Speaker 2: And I say, but I play great drums. When when
• 2:03:29
  Speaker 2: when I was a kid started playing, I asked around, Yeah,
• 2:03:34
  Speaker 2: what's the best drum kit?
• 2:03:35
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 2:03:36
  Speaker 2: I mean it's like if you if you, if you,
• 2:03:37
  Speaker 2: if you're gonna, if you're going to play cricket or
• 2:03:41
  Speaker 2: you know, play baseball, you say, what's the best back right?
• 2:03:44
  Speaker 1: Right?
• 2:03:45
  Speaker 2: What's what's the best what's the best glove? Yeah, because
• 2:03:49
  Speaker 2: there are degrees of good in everything, and everyone would
• 2:03:53
  Speaker 2: say great drums And I never saw I never The
• 2:03:56
  Speaker 2: only person I saw playing great drums was Charlie Watts,
• 2:03:59
  Speaker 2: and he has a great sound.
• 2:04:00
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 2:04:01
  Speaker 2: Everybody else was like lovewig or tricks and there were
• 2:04:05
  Speaker 2: people playing trickson when I was growing up singer, and
• 2:04:08
  Speaker 2: then they make good drums too, that they all make
• 2:04:10
  Speaker 2: good drums. But this everybody said there was something special
• 2:04:15
  Speaker 2: when I started with average white Man and I could
• 2:04:18
  Speaker 2: finally get my own afford to buy my own drum kit.
• 2:04:21
  Speaker 2: And that's what I bought, was a great drum kit.
• 2:04:23
  Speaker 1: Now with guitars, even though they look the same, everyone
• 2:04:28
  Speaker 1: is different. Yeah, when it comes to drums, is everyone different.
• 2:04:32
  Speaker 1: You have to play them.
• 2:04:33
  Speaker 2: Every one of those drums back there, every one of
• 2:04:35
  Speaker 2: those snare.
• 2:04:36
  Speaker 1: So people can't see we're audio only. I can see
• 2:04:38
  Speaker 1: about twenty snares there they go, keep going up.
• 2:04:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that they all have different characters. Uh, you know
• 2:04:50
  Speaker 2: something like this.
• 2:04:51
  Speaker 1: This week.
• 2:04:54
  Speaker 2: I was in Nashville. I have a signature model that
• 2:04:58
  Speaker 2: they don't make anymore because they said it was too expensive,
• 2:05:00
  Speaker 2: so they stopped making it. But but uh I have
• 2:05:05
  Speaker 2: I had the Singing Great chickenature model and and it's
• 2:05:10
  Speaker 2: very versatile. But uh, what I had to do was
• 2:05:15
  Speaker 2: when when I listened to a song, it depends on
• 2:05:18
  Speaker 2: how how how I want this imagine the song sounding
• 2:05:24
  Speaker 2: each one of these drums there was a different sound
• 2:05:26
  Speaker 2: there was different quality and some I just drag one
• 2:05:30
  Speaker 2: out and put let me put this up in see
• 2:05:32
  Speaker 2: what this does to this song. Yeah, like you'll see
• 2:05:37
  Speaker 2: you know, people with guitars. The player of the other day,
• 2:05:40
  Speaker 2: Mike was playing, uh and his band and Chris and
• 2:05:44
  Speaker 2: the other guitarist in the band in the in the
• 2:05:47
  Speaker 2: dirty knobs he was playing. He said to Mike was like, no,
• 2:05:52
  Speaker 2: he said, here, take use my rickenbacker and he and
• 2:05:55
  Speaker 2: he gave me a rickenbacker and which is still a
• 2:05:58
  Speaker 2: piece of wood with the same six strings, but it
• 2:06:01
  Speaker 2: has a tone that suddenly made everything pop to life.
• 2:06:04
  Speaker 2: Well that's what what drums do. Yeah, And who are
• 2:06:08
  Speaker 2: your drum heroes? Well, uh, okay, let's start with We'll
• 2:06:15
  Speaker 2: start with with with Bernard Purdy. Was the first guy
• 2:06:18
  Speaker 2: that that I heard play syncopation like that was just amazing,
• 2:06:23
  Speaker 2: amazing drummer. I love Bernard. I saw him. Uh. I
• 2:06:28
  Speaker 2: saw him a few weeks ago, and I think NAM Show.
• 2:06:33
  Speaker 2: I saw him down in the Nam Show. I hadn't
• 2:06:35
  Speaker 2: seen him for a while. Uh. And and I really like.
• 2:06:41
  Speaker 4: Uh.
• 2:06:44
  Speaker 2: I like the older guys Elvin Jones, Max Roach uh
• 2:06:49
  Speaker 2: uh uh uh, Blakey uh uh uh a another guy
• 2:07:00
  Speaker 2: at sam Woodard. He used to play with the bassie Sorry,
• 2:07:04
  Speaker 2: Duke Ellington. Just an amazing swing swing drummer. There was
• 2:07:09
  Speaker 2: a uh, what's that guy's name? Michael Michael the Silver
• 2:07:18
  Speaker 2: was the drummer that really impressed me when I was little.
• 2:07:20
  Speaker 2: We played with Sammy Davis Jr. And UH and he
• 2:07:23
  Speaker 2: would Sammy Davis Junior would sing like day in day
• 2:07:26
  Speaker 2: out with just Michael Silver playing some songs with some
• 2:07:29
  Speaker 2: some toms, with some mallets and google and uh and
• 2:07:35
  Speaker 2: Sammy Davis Junior would would sing day in day out.
• 2:07:38
  Speaker 2: That was very impressive for me. Very melodic player. But
• 2:07:42
  Speaker 2: my favorite favorite favorite player of all has nothing to
• 2:07:46
  Speaker 2: do with the way that I play. And Uh and
• 2:07:49
  Speaker 2: uh as a gentleman by the name of Jack de
• 2:07:51
  Speaker 2: Johnnett right, just an incredible player. And the thing that
• 2:07:57
  Speaker 2: I love about him is that he's so musical. The
• 2:08:00
  Speaker 2: way that he listens, the way that he listens and
• 2:08:03
  Speaker 2: and and and and accents draws your attention to other
• 2:08:09
  Speaker 2: players in the in the other people as they're playing
• 2:08:12
  Speaker 2: things that they're playing. I first became aware of him
• 2:08:16
  Speaker 2: playing with the Charles Lloyd Quartet on an album I
• 2:08:20
  Speaker 2: think it was called Live at the Live in the
• 2:08:22
  Speaker 2: Soviet Union, which was recorded at the height of the
• 2:08:25
  Speaker 2: Cold War. It's like, I got to say that, how
• 2:08:28
  Speaker 2: the hell did you do that? You said, well, it
• 2:08:31
  Speaker 2: was a state department thing and that Russian American were
• 2:08:33
  Speaker 2: fighting and every time they went to walk on stage,
• 2:08:36
  Speaker 2: some international incident would happen, and in the Russians saying yet, yeah,
• 2:08:40
  Speaker 2: you can't go on. Finally they got the idea that
• 2:08:43
  Speaker 2: you know that had to wait to get. As soon
• 2:08:44
  Speaker 2: as they got the all clear, they ran on stage
• 2:08:46
  Speaker 2: and started playing. Before before that they could, you know,
• 2:08:49
  Speaker 2: they get something else could happen that they get stopped
• 2:08:51
  Speaker 2: playing for and that the excitement on that record is
• 2:08:56
  Speaker 2: just amazing to hear guys play modern jazz like that
• 2:08:59
  Speaker 2: for a bunch of Russians who really had no idea
• 2:09:02
  Speaker 2: at all what that was. Uh, And it's pretty impressive.
• 2:09:08
  Speaker 1: And we were talking on the phone, you were talking
• 2:09:10
  Speaker 1: about practicing to what degree do you practice? And do
• 2:09:14
  Speaker 1: you play every day or if you're out of town
• 2:09:16
  Speaker 1: you might not play for a month, but your situation, No.
• 2:09:21
  Speaker 2: I'm not a woodshed person. The only thing I like
• 2:09:24
  Speaker 2: to do what I what I consider I like to
• 2:09:28
  Speaker 2: sit down and play with people. That's why I got
• 2:09:31
  Speaker 2: like piano here, I got guitars. I got guitars and
• 2:09:34
  Speaker 2: basses on the walls. So when my friends come over,
• 2:09:38
  Speaker 2: but let's jam a little bit, you know, and we
• 2:09:40
  Speaker 2: just come in the studio, we start messing around and
• 2:09:42
  Speaker 2: start jamming. And that's the best. That's the best practice
• 2:09:45
  Speaker 2: that I can do. But I'm not one to sit
• 2:09:48
  Speaker 2: and practice rudiments or try to find stuff. I like
• 2:09:51
  Speaker 2: to be challenged. When Osnoy asked me to play with him,
• 2:09:56
  Speaker 2: he sent me this stuff, and the charts that he
• 2:09:58
  Speaker 2: sent me didn't make any sense to what I was
• 2:10:01
  Speaker 2: listening to, if you know what I'm talking about. It
• 2:10:04
  Speaker 2: was so I said, well, you know what, how would
• 2:10:05
  Speaker 2: that tear up the chart? I'm going to learn it?
• 2:10:07
  Speaker 2: And I and I had to come in here and
• 2:10:10
  Speaker 2: uh and wood shed the piece by piece to some
• 2:10:14
  Speaker 2: and then tie it together. And then I had him
• 2:10:18
  Speaker 2: come in a few days early and make sure that
• 2:10:20
  Speaker 2: I had that I've done it properly to check my homework.
• 2:10:25
  Speaker 2: But he's, yeah, it was it was, I know it now.
• 2:10:31
  Speaker 2: I got it.
• 2:10:32
  Speaker 1: The stuff that I learned with okay, So in a
• 2:10:34
  Speaker 1: perfect world, and we don't live in a perfect world.
• 2:10:37
  Speaker 1: If you could play as we disagree, I disagree. Well
• 2:10:42
  Speaker 1: stop there is that a joke? Or do you have
• 2:10:45
  Speaker 1: a philosophy on this?
• 2:10:46
  Speaker 2: I have a philosophy on that.
• 2:10:47
  Speaker 1: We'll lay the philosophy on me.
• 2:10:50
  Speaker 2: I just think that nothing would be as it is
• 2:10:52
  Speaker 2: as things weren't as they were. That's all. We live
• 2:10:55
  Speaker 2: in a perfect world. Everything's perfect, we just don't see
• 2:10:59
  Speaker 2: it yet. That's all.
• 2:11:00
  Speaker 1: Well, that begs the question. Do you ever get down
• 2:11:03
  Speaker 1: and frustrated yourself? Oh?
• 2:11:05
  Speaker 2: Hell yeah, I just I just remodeled my house.
• 2:11:09
  Speaker 1: You ever done a after me.
• 2:11:13
  Speaker 2: A nightmare? Yeah? Uh?
• 2:11:16
  Speaker 1: Nobody works in a contractor.
• 2:11:19
  Speaker 2: And you know, and and and the other thing too
• 2:11:21
  Speaker 2: is that you know, I mean Julia came came here
• 2:11:24
  Speaker 2: to live with me in twenty seventeen and we went
• 2:11:27
  Speaker 2: through COVID together. Yeah. So so yeah, we had three
• 2:11:32
  Speaker 2: years of three years of bliss and then we had
• 2:11:35
  Speaker 2: to we had to figure out where she's here all
• 2:11:37
  Speaker 2: the time now. Yeah, so so so that was that
• 2:11:42
  Speaker 2: was something too. We came to that. That was that
• 2:11:44
  Speaker 2: was pretty good. But uh, I mean I've been when
• 2:11:52
  Speaker 2: I looked when I came in, when I got sober.
• 2:11:55
  Speaker 2: But when I got sober, my life was just a mess.
• 2:11:59
  Speaker 2: I thought it was over and never no way out
• 2:12:02
  Speaker 2: of this and never they never go never going to
• 2:12:05
  Speaker 2: let me go there. I'm never going to own a
• 2:12:07
  Speaker 2: house again. I'm never going to do this again, never
• 2:12:09
  Speaker 2: going to be able to do that again, never going
• 2:12:10
  Speaker 2: to be and and and and I got a sponsor,
• 2:12:16
  Speaker 2: a guy named Bill Summers passed away last year October
• 2:12:19
  Speaker 2: the nineteenth and and uh the best part of of
• 2:12:25
  Speaker 2: twenty five years he was. He was my sponsor. And
• 2:12:30
  Speaker 2: uh and uh and he told me, you know what,
• 2:12:34
  Speaker 2: one day, all this is going to be over. You
• 2:12:36
  Speaker 2: just ain't seeing it yet. It will be over if
• 2:12:40
  Speaker 2: you stay sober. And so that's what I did. And
• 2:12:44
  Speaker 2: uh and uh and now I look back and and
• 2:12:46
  Speaker 2: and you know, the persons that were that were my
• 2:12:51
  Speaker 2: biggest what I considered my biggest tormentors. If they hadn't
• 2:12:55
  Speaker 2: have stayed with it and can continued to torment me,
• 2:12:59
  Speaker 2: I wouldn't have found it necessary to stay sober. If
• 2:13:03
  Speaker 2: they just if they have eased up after a year,
• 2:13:05
  Speaker 2: I just said, well that's that I can go back
• 2:13:07
  Speaker 2: to I can go back to to drinking. Now everything's
• 2:13:10
  Speaker 2: everything's good. Yeah, and and yes, sometimes I got some
• 2:13:16
  Speaker 2: friends that are going through some stuff that that's seemingly overwhelming.
• 2:13:20
  Speaker 2: Yeah at the moment, but I can talk from experience
• 2:13:24
  Speaker 2: that I've been there. And uh and uh, you know what.
• 2:13:29
  Speaker 2: Sometimes I found this. There's a little booklet that I
• 2:13:32
  Speaker 2: found that I haven't got one out here, but I
• 2:13:35
  Speaker 2: got it on YouTube. If I need to listen to it. Uh,
• 2:13:39
  Speaker 2: a little booklet called the Golden Key. We've telling it
• 2:13:42
  Speaker 2: just stops thinking about the problems, start thinking about God
• 2:13:44
  Speaker 2: and it will heal itself. And and and it got
• 2:13:48
  Speaker 2: me to to my problems. It really did get me
• 2:13:51
  Speaker 2: through them. And it does work if if you work it. Yep.
• 2:13:56
  Speaker 2: So so yeah, I hear people say that you know
• 2:14:00
  Speaker 2: a lot in a perfect world, and it's like things
• 2:14:03
  Speaker 2: are perfect, you're just not seeing you're going to grow.
• 2:14:06
  Speaker 2: You're going to grow from from whatever problems that you're
• 2:14:09
  Speaker 2: going to I mean, would it be desirable not to
• 2:14:12
  Speaker 2: have to go through those problems? Yes, But what would
• 2:14:14
  Speaker 2: you do if you if you, if you, if you
• 2:14:16
  Speaker 2: didn't have any problems, Ah, life would have carried on
• 2:14:21
  Speaker 2: being one big party for me, and probably I probably
• 2:14:24
  Speaker 2: wouldn't be here now, okay, it is the perfect one.
• 2:14:28
  Speaker 1: Let me reframe the question. If you could play any
• 2:14:30
  Speaker 1: kind of music you wanted, what would that be.
• 2:14:37
  Speaker 2: Good? Good music? Uh? You know, I just got back
• 2:14:45
  Speaker 2: from Nashville doing some recording with the guy named Ira Dean,
• 2:14:49
  Speaker 2: who introduced me to some players that were down there. Uh,
• 2:14:54
  Speaker 2: guys like like a Pork, the bass player named Pork
• 2:15:00
  Speaker 2: and and and a keyboard player named Moose uh who
• 2:15:05
  Speaker 2: just like incredible musicians that I'd never heard of before,
• 2:15:08
  Speaker 2: I never met them before. Yeah. Uh uh, That's what
• 2:15:12
  Speaker 2: I love to do, is to play with with with
• 2:15:16
  Speaker 2: great players. There's there's nothing like it. And this thing
• 2:15:20
  Speaker 2: that I'm doing with this uh, this orchestral thing that
• 2:15:24
  Speaker 2: I'm doing with all these I've seen these players, these
• 2:15:27
  Speaker 2: orchestral players, I've been down I've been down to Disney
• 2:15:31
  Speaker 2: and I've and I've seen them. I've seen them play
• 2:15:34
  Speaker 2: play stuff that I wouldn't even attempt to attempt to play,
• 2:15:38
  Speaker 2: some Beethoven stuff. That's just it's so difficult, such such
• 2:15:44
  Speaker 2: hard music to play, you know, And they're going to
• 2:15:47
  Speaker 2: be over there playing some Chicago, Chicago songs and that
• 2:15:50
  Speaker 2: have been orchestrated these you know. Uh, and and and
• 2:15:56
  Speaker 2: and and a lot of times I've sat there and played.
• 2:15:58
  Speaker 2: I've done that stuff before all over the country with
• 2:16:01
  Speaker 2: Jason and Jason Cheffin and uh, you know, some trumpet
• 2:16:08
  Speaker 2: players they come up, especially trumpet players, they come up
• 2:16:12
  Speaker 2: and say, man, it's really great to play with you
• 2:16:13
  Speaker 2: and really know where I am with this backbeat yours.
• 2:16:15
  Speaker 2: It's really it's really nice to have that, you know.
• 2:16:19
  Speaker 2: So they like, these are the guys that can play anything,
• 2:16:22
  Speaker 2: you know, but they like they find a good, good musician,
• 2:16:25
  Speaker 2: a guy does what he does well, and they dig playing,
• 2:16:29
  Speaker 2: they dig playing that stuff. It's just it's just wonderful
• 2:16:33
  Speaker 2: to be able to play with all these players.
• 2:16:36
  Speaker 1: And it's been great to talk to you, Steve. I
• 2:16:38
  Speaker 1: could go on for days. We just hit the highlights,
• 2:16:41
  Speaker 1: so many stories in between, but I'm gonna let you
• 2:16:45
  Speaker 1: go now. Thanks so much for making the time and
• 2:16:47
  Speaker 1: making this.
• 2:16:48
  Speaker 2: And thank you for taking your time from writing all
• 2:16:51
  Speaker 2: the writing stuff that you write. You know, I read
• 2:16:55
  Speaker 2: that stuff. That's good good.
• 2:16:59
  Speaker 1: It's like in the it's like being in the eye
• 2:17:01
  Speaker 1: of the hurricane. You know, I'll go somewhere, so know,
• 2:17:03
  Speaker 1: I was just talking about you with this pretty much
• 2:17:06
  Speaker 1: I don't know. I just wrote and said it out there.
• 2:17:10
  Speaker 1: It's kind of weird, you know.
• 2:17:12
  Speaker 2: I really I really enjoy like sometimes, you know. I mean,
• 2:17:17
  Speaker 2: I I do my research and I hear you talk
• 2:17:19
  Speaker 2: about a musicians that and and and and and and
• 2:17:22
  Speaker 2: and and I researched for my show. I said, let
• 2:17:26
  Speaker 2: me have a listen to this person, you know, and
• 2:17:28
  Speaker 2: and and then usually when I'm reading about them on Wikipedia,
• 2:17:32
  Speaker 2: they say that they play with somebody else and I
• 2:17:34
  Speaker 2: never heard of them. Who's that? And I start to
• 2:17:36
  Speaker 2: feel my way around and I find find something that's
• 2:17:40
  Speaker 2: that for me is obscure, but from other people say, oh,
• 2:17:43
  Speaker 2: we knew about that all the time, and uh so
• 2:17:47
  Speaker 2: it's uh it really helps me, uh to read, to
• 2:17:52
  Speaker 2: put my put my show together, gives me stuff to
• 2:17:54
  Speaker 2: listen to with something fresh, and it's funny our popular
• 2:18:00
  Speaker 2: my radio show has become. I was walking to an
• 2:18:01
  Speaker 2: April the other day and they said, oh, you're that drummer, right,
• 2:18:04
  Speaker 2: the one with the radio show new Guy. You're the
• 2:18:06
  Speaker 2: new guy I used to.
• 2:18:08
  Speaker 1: Be on KLSX on Sunday nights and it's radio, you
• 2:18:13
  Speaker 1: don't know anything. And I was backstage at the old
• 2:18:17
  Speaker 1: Universal the Amphitheater and John Boyle. In the record, Bruster says,
• 2:18:23
  Speaker 1: you want to talk to Timothy Beachman. They said, I
• 2:18:25
  Speaker 1: don't like to be introduced to people who don't know
• 2:18:28
  Speaker 1: who I am. It's like a waste of time. I
• 2:18:30
  Speaker 1: don't want to waste their time. And then Timothy comes
• 2:18:34
  Speaker 1: up independently, like fifteen minutes later, and the goes, good
• 2:18:38
  Speaker 1: to put a face with a voice, and I say,
• 2:18:41
  Speaker 1: I literally had no idea, what are you talking about.
• 2:18:44
  Speaker 1: We've never met before. Bla blah, goes, oh, I listen,
• 2:18:46
  Speaker 1: I'm careless X every Sunday night. It's like you don't
• 2:18:49
  Speaker 1: even know you put it out there, and yeah, I
• 2:18:53
  Speaker 1: tell you.
• 2:18:53
  Speaker 2: You know. I was in New York, working in New
• 2:18:57
  Speaker 2: York and there was a jingle guy and he he
• 2:19:01
  Speaker 2: said to me, I think it was Bernie Draken. He
• 2:19:03
  Speaker 2: said to me, you know, Steve, He said you should
• 2:19:08
  Speaker 2: check out the Reverend Milton Brunson. He says, a great
• 2:19:12
  Speaker 2: choir and they have great voices, right, And he said
• 2:19:17
  Speaker 2: it's really well recorded. So so I go out and
• 2:19:20
  Speaker 2: I find this, this this record, Reverend Milton Brunson, incredible stuff.
• 2:19:25
  Speaker 2: Start reading the names on the back the the the
• 2:19:30
  Speaker 2: orchestra leader, musical director guy named Percy Beady, and he
• 2:19:33
  Speaker 2: sings a song on there. And he's got a great
• 2:19:35
  Speaker 2: voice too, you know. So I start buying stuff music
• 2:19:40
  Speaker 2: when they when they have and and and I find
• 2:19:42
  Speaker 2: out that there are church in Chicago. So I'm in
• 2:19:47
  Speaker 2: Chicago with the Heartbreakers, and first time I've ever had
• 2:19:50
  Speaker 2: a Sunday off in Chicago, staying at the Four Seasons.
• 2:19:55
  Speaker 2: I called downstairs to the concierge desk and I say, listen,
• 2:19:58
  Speaker 2: do you know where this re? Milton Bronson's churches? And
• 2:20:04
  Speaker 2: hold on, We'll get back to you. So they come
• 2:20:06
  Speaker 2: back and they say, we don't know anything about that.
• 2:20:10
  Speaker 2: And I said, look, look, look, I know this is
• 2:20:12
  Speaker 2: the Poor Seasons, but I know you've got a black
• 2:20:14
  Speaker 2: person works in. I know you've got to have a
• 2:20:19
  Speaker 2: black person working the here somewhere. Ask them. So they said, okay,
• 2:20:23
  Speaker 2: So they hang out the phone. They come back. We
• 2:20:25
  Speaker 2: got the address. So it's on the and the outside
• 2:20:29
  Speaker 2: of outside of the loop, you know, outside they want to.
• 2:20:34
  Speaker 2: I go out there and I'm sitting there and I'm
• 2:20:37
  Speaker 2: watching the choir and they're just rocking the joint right
• 2:20:40
  Speaker 2: and there's this woman, an old woman, sitting in front
• 2:20:43
  Speaker 2: of me, and she is like alumni of the choir.
• 2:20:46
  Speaker 2: So they say, please come up and sing. So she
• 2:20:50
  Speaker 2: gets up and she goes up there and she sings
• 2:20:53
  Speaker 2: this song. She sings her ass off and she comes back.
• 2:20:55
  Speaker 2: Everybody's clapping her. She comes back and she sits down
• 2:20:57
  Speaker 2: in front of me. And after the service has finished,
• 2:21:00
  Speaker 2: I say, do I say that was?
• 2:21:01
  Speaker 1: That was?
• 2:21:02
  Speaker 2: That was really wonderful? I said, it says, excuse me,
• 2:21:04
  Speaker 2: I said, it's Percy Bady up there. She said, yes,
• 2:21:07
  Speaker 2: that's him at the organ right. So I walk up
• 2:21:11
  Speaker 2: and he said getting these music together on top of
• 2:21:14
  Speaker 2: the organ. And I say I walk up and say.
• 2:21:17
  Speaker 2: He looks up and he looks at me, and he
• 2:21:18
  Speaker 2: goes Steve Feroni and I say, Percy Bady, And how
• 2:21:27
  Speaker 2: do you know who I am? I said, I'm a fan.
• 2:21:30
  Speaker 2: That's why I'm here. You never know, right, No, that's
• 2:21:36
  Speaker 2: you know.
• 2:21:37
  Speaker 1: What I tell my girlfriend is you never know what's
• 2:21:40
  Speaker 1: going to happen when you walk out the front door.
• 2:21:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 2:21:42
  Speaker 1: It's like if you stay at home, I mean now,
• 2:21:44
  Speaker 1: in the internet area, you can hear from people, but
• 2:21:46
  Speaker 1: once you get out there, anything can happen. That's one
• 2:21:49
  Speaker 1: of the great things about life. M Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, Okay, Steve,
• 2:21:56
  Speaker 1: I think we've covered it in any events.
• 2:22:00
  Speaker 2: Have been enjoyable meeting you start face to face.
• 2:22:02
  Speaker 1: And absolutely ditto.
• 2:22:04
  Speaker 2: Let me know if you ever want to come and
• 2:22:05
  Speaker 2: see the Dirty Knobes or if you want to come
• 2:22:07
  Speaker 2: and see this symphonic thing.
• 2:22:08
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, but let me be clear. I talked to
• 2:22:11
  Speaker 1: Mike my end to uh, you know, you don't go
• 2:22:16
  Speaker 1: on the road with them.
• 2:22:17
  Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, I've been doing it. They asked me. They
• 2:22:21
  Speaker 2: asked me to go out, uh and play with him
• 2:22:24
  Speaker 2: on the on the last two. So I did the
• 2:22:26
  Speaker 2: I did the West Coast and and Mike said, well,
• 2:22:28
  Speaker 2: you want to be in the.
• 2:22:29
  Speaker 5: Band now, but let's be clear, if fire me and
• 2:22:33
  Speaker 5: you get me back now, they're not staying at the
• 2:22:35
  Speaker 5: four seasons.
• 2:22:37
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, So what's it like starting all over?
• 2:22:40
  Speaker 2: Oh it's fun, man, I'm telling you, it's great. It's yeah,
• 2:22:45
  Speaker 2: it's it's it's like it's the Heartbreakers. It's playing with
• 2:22:49
  Speaker 2: the Heartbreaker. I'm playing with Mike. Yet we understand each other. Yeah,
• 2:22:56
  Speaker 2: I give him credit. You know, he'll go out and
• 2:22:58
  Speaker 2: do that stuff that he did. Yeah, Cole Sung, I
• 2:23:00
  Speaker 2: don't even know. It's like, what's ups that? Three?
• 2:23:04
  Speaker 1: Four?
• 2:23:05
  Speaker 2: Uh okay, it turns out pretty good.
• 2:23:11
  Speaker 1: Absolutely well. People can't see you got a smile on
• 2:23:15
  Speaker 1: your face. That's the most important thing in any event.
• 2:23:19
  Speaker 1: We're gonna wrap it up until next time. This is
• 2:23:22
  Speaker 1: Bob left. Six