Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / The Art Of Rock Promotion with Columbia Records Veteran Paul Rappaport [Episode 273]

Transcript

The Art Of Rock Promotion with Columbia Records Veteran Paul Rappaport [Episode 273] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: On this episode of booke Don Rock, legendary music promoter
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: and longtime VP of Columbia Records Paul Rapaport. Paul shares
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: the behind the scenes moments promoting legendary artists like Springsteen,
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Bob Dylan, Pink Floyd, and a whole lot more. That's
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: next rock and roll.
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: I mean, I'll leave you. You're reading. Little Hands says
• 0:19
  Speaker 2: it's time to rock and roll roll.
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: I totally booked. Welcome back to Booked on Rock and
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Eric Sanitch. Our guest is legendary music business veteran and
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: former VP of Columbia Records, Paul Rapaport. He is the
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: author of Gliders Over Hollywood, Airships, Airplay in the Art
• 0:41
  Speaker 1: of Rock Promotion. Welcome to the podcast, Paul.
• 0:44
  Speaker 2: Thanks very much, thanks for having me on. I'm excited
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: to be here. I just watched your show with Liberty
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: de Vito, who's an old friend of mine.
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: Oh well, very cool, very cool, Yeah, Liberty. Yeah, that's
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: definitely the most popular episode on this podcast thus far,
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: so it was great to have him on. I have
• 0:59
  Speaker 1: so many questions about all these artists that you know
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: and worked with, But let's start before working for Columbia.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: You were a musician, So talk about your background and
• 1:07
  Speaker 1: what led to the Columbia job. Also, how did Tony
• 1:11
  Speaker 1: Bennett play a big role in the early part of
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: your career.
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: For me, it's always been about the music, if you're
• 1:17
  Speaker 2: read in the book, ever since I'm a little kid.
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: It just music does something for me. Even at an
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: early age. You know, I'm listening to even sort of
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: child rhymes, but you know, there's messages that are in
• 1:30
  Speaker 2: filtrating and growing up, I used to on Sunday mornings
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: watch a show on TV in the fifties. There's not
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: a lot on on television on Sunday mornings, and there
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: was a guy who had a car lot, famous car salesman,
• 1:45
  Speaker 2: cal Worthington, and he had a show live from his
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: car lot and he would have upcoming country artists play
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: and then in between him showing you the cars you know,
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: that he had for sale. But so it was live,
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: so it was very intriguing. And it was the first
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: time that I really saw guitars. I knew what a
• 2:06
  Speaker 2: guitar was, but you know, I'm seven years old and
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: I'm looking at this and I'm amazed by all these
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: guitars and they all look different, and each one has
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: a different sound, and they seem like they have different souls.
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: And this music that's coming out of them, you know,
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: is important because there's songs that people are writing. And
• 2:23
  Speaker 2: I was just, you know, infatuated with the whole idea.
• 2:28
  Speaker 2: And at seven years old, I told my parents I
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: need to learn how to play guitar. So long story short,
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: the woman comes to the house and said she thought
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: I might have problems with it. What she called it
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: traditional Spanish style guitar because she said, you know, maybe
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: my fingers would have trouble putting the strings down. I
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: don't really know what the true story was, but I
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: got enrolled in a lap steel program, which is like
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: steel guitars, like pedal steel, only without.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: The Yeah, lap still guitars very cool.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: So you know, there was a guy on country music time,
• 2:57
  Speaker 2: guy named Red Rhodes. He became a very famous session musician,
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: and this guy read he looks so cool and he
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: was playing this steel and I went, well, that looks cool.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: You know, maybe some of that cool, you know, well,
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: we'll flow into me somehow. But that's how I started.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: And it was electric, and the idea of it being
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: electric was really cool, and you know, I plugged it
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: into this Fender Champ amplifier. I still own the apps
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: nineteen fifty five Fender Champ. You know. It was okay
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: for a little while, but it just, you know, it
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: really didn't do it for me so much. And when
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: the folk movement came and I heard Bob Dylan, you know,
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: and I saw Peter Paul and Mary and then I
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: was like, okay, I forget that. I'm going to go
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: out and learn how to do this myself. I went
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: and bought a guitar, fixed it up for myself so
• 3:39
  Speaker 2: I could play it properly, sat with a music book
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: and just learned chords. And then friends would come over
• 3:44
  Speaker 2: and say, hey, you know this. And you know, it
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: wasn't YouTube then or anything, so but I just never
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: the guitar would never leave my hands. I mean I
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: could be watching television and still just courting, you know,
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: just just to make sure that I was, you know,
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: doing things by road. And it's just the guitar has
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: just been a companion forever. I played in bands since
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  Speaker 2: I was a young teenager. And you grew up where
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: I grew up, southern California, a small town called Bellflower
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: went to Downey High. You know, as you read in
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: the book, I actually went to high school with Karen Carpenter.
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: She and I were buddies. She sat in front of
• 4:20
  Speaker 2: me in French class.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and Karen and her brother from New Haven, Connecticut. Oh, oh,
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: that's right there originally not far yeah, not far from
• 4:27
  Speaker 1: where I am here.
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  Speaker 2: And I did not know that, you know, I just
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: thought they were California because later, you know, you know,
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  Speaker 2: for all I knew, we didn't even know she could sing.
• 4:35
  Speaker 2: She was just a drummer in the band, and we
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: knew she had a band band. I knew she could
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: play drums because I knew the guy had taught taught
• 4:40
  Speaker 2: her how to play drums. We didn't know that she
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: could sing until the record came out, and it was like, oh,
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: Carpenters have a record. We're trying to figure out, why
• 4:46
  Speaker 2: don't we have a record deal. We're paying these hip
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: psychedelic bands. It. Karen somehow got a record deal, but
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: she worked hard on it. And there was a music teacher,
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: mister Gifford at Downey High, had helped them out. Her
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: and Richard and lo and behold they get a record
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  Speaker 2: deal and we hear her sing and we're like, oh
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: my god, we didn't even know she could sing, right,
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: So so it was kind of cool. So the music
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: thing for me has just always been there. I actually
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: fell into the music business. I mean I did not
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: have a plan to go into the music business. I
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: was just playing in bands. I was playing in bands
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: in college. I went to u c. L A. I
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: played in a punk band in early an early punk
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: la punk band called Mogan David and His Whinos, which
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: has somehow become a cult thing. If you if you
• 5:27
  Speaker 2: go on if you go on eBay and look for
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: a Mogen David and his Winos album, I mean there's
• 5:31
  Speaker 2: like bidding Wars.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: No really, yeah, that's cool.
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: And the thing, the funniest thing is it's a takeoff
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: on the first Beatles album before Ringo was in in
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: the band. There's there were there was an album called
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: Savage Young Beatles and there's a guy named Pete Best
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: for those of you who know your Beatle history, And
• 5:48
  Speaker 2: we literally shot our album covered to look exactly like
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: that cover. So we were Mogan David and his Winos
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: and we were the Savage Young Whinos. If you go
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: on eBay and and the music is is on YouTube,
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: which amazes me. Are the last bidding war Our album
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: went for like one hundred and thirty three dollars. If
• 6:08
  Speaker 2: you want the Beatle album with Pete Best on it,
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: Savage Young Beatles, you can get it for three dollars
• 6:13
  Speaker 2: and fifty cents. Wow, go figure man, figure, I don't
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  Speaker 2: get it. I'm get so so now I fell into
• 6:21
  Speaker 2: the record bness because you know, I played dances for
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: the fraternity I was in. They knew that I was
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: into music because I had stacks of amps and guitars.
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: I'm always practicing. And one day Columbia Records was looking
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: for a college representative. A number of the record companies,
• 6:36
  Speaker 2: the bigger ones that started college representative programs because they
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: wanted street teams. Because you have to realize all this
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: new music was happening late sixties, early seventies, all this
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: new music that the record companies are not used to.
• 6:50
  Speaker 2: They're used to, you know, nineteen fifties kinds of music.
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  Speaker 2: And then okay, the new artists for them for Columbia,
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  Speaker 2: and Neil Diamond's a big star for them, and Barbi
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: streisand and they're in their money with pop music all
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: of a sudden, they signed Bob Dylan and he becomes something.
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: And then you know, Clive Davis at sign Genis Joplin
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: and all this new music's exploding, and they're going, we
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: need kids who know this music to go out and
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  Speaker 2: promote on campus. And then what I didn't realize was
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: they were also grooming us to be the next executives
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: because we were from this music, we understood this music.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: A lot of the guys who I worked with, great guys,
• 7:25
  Speaker 2: you know this. The music was odd to them. They
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: couldn't they couldn't relate to it. The whole sixties was
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: such a shift in culture.
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: Oh yeah, the generational gap was generation gap was seismic.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Right. So one day I'm just sitting on the steps,
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: you know, at UCLA, watching all the girls go by,
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: and friend mine from the house of AEPI fraternity. I
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: guess my first boss had called his attorney, who was
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: an alumni of this fraternity, looking for somebody to be
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: a college rep. I get a piece of paper with
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: a phone number on it. My nickname is Rap because
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: my last name's Rapaport. Okay, so brother comes by and goes, hey, Rap,
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  Speaker 2: there's a record company looking for some man is part time,
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: and we figure that's you, right, because they knew from
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: you know, all the music I was, you know, I
• 8:06
  Speaker 2: was doing so so it was just a happenstance, you know.
• 8:10
  Speaker 2: I mean, I mean, I'm a pretty spiritual guy. I mean,
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: I think all this stuff was meant to happen. To
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: be honest with you, I mean, yeah, especially later in life,
• 8:16
  Speaker 2: I'm like, wait a minute. You know, it's like, wait
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: a minute, I think I think I was supposed to
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: do all this. But that's you know, different story. But
• 8:24
  Speaker 2: at any rate, at that time, I just call up,
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: you know, and I'm talking to this guy and he's
• 8:29
  Speaker 2: telling me about the music business. And also what you
• 8:32
  Speaker 2: have to understand at that time is, you know, there's
• 8:35
  Speaker 2: a big culture shift in you know, this sort of
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: new hippie generation of could we change the world, could
• 8:43
  Speaker 2: we make it better? How could we make it better?
• 8:45
  Speaker 2: And of course we're anti war, we're for civil rights,
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: we're for women's rights, we're for all these things that
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: it's a tumultuous time, but I'm coming from an authentic
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: place where corporations, in our minds were sort of like
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: the enemy. You listen to all the music and all
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: the lyrics from all these bands. I mean, Boston people
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: living in competition. All they want is peace of mind.
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: So I wasn't sure I wanted to work for a corporation.
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: I knew that Columbia was a it was a music label,
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: but I knew it was a corporation. I mean, they're
• 9:16
  Speaker 2: owned by CBS, you know, And that was a big
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: question mark for me. And I'm asking this guy what
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: I get, how does it work? And he's having trouble
• 9:23
  Speaker 2: figuring out why he has to talk somebody into working
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: for a record company in nineteen sixty nine, And he's
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: telling me all these things, and then then he says
• 9:31
  Speaker 2: the magic words I said. He says, you get fifteen
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: dollars a week, and you know you're going to go
• 9:35
  Speaker 2: to the local radio station and you're going to try
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: to get you know, reviews at the daily Brew and
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: you could bring some you know, some of our bands
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: onto campus. This is what the job is. You know,
• 9:43
  Speaker 2: you do displays. And he says, you get I think
• 9:45
  Speaker 2: at the time, you got fifteen dollars a week or something,
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: which back then you could eat if you're a student,
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: you could eat for twenty dollars a week if you
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: plan things right, you know you you know where money was.
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: And he said, you can get all your records for free.
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: You're going to get a camera. I was like, wait, stop, wait,
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: did you just say did you just say I get
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: all my records for free? Now you know Eric, Yes,
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: I'm I'm a blue collar kid. I didn't have a
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: big record collection. I mean, three dollars for an album
• 10:12
  Speaker 2: for me is a is a luxury. So my record
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: collection when I go to UCLA, it's like two Jimmy
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: Hendrick's albums, two Rolling Stones albums, and Truth by Jeff
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: Becken Cream. That's it. Like, that's what I have, right.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: I couldn't believe it because I knew Columbia. I was like,
• 10:26
  Speaker 2: wait a second. You guys have Bob Dylan, you guys
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: have the Birds, you have Janet Shop, Like, well, you
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: guys have Miles Davis. And even though I'm a rock guy,
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: I mean I love cool jazz, I love Miles Davis.
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: He said, oh, yeah, yeah, you get all this for free.
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: Any any thought I had about the corporation and my
• 10:41
  Speaker 2: hippie ideals, it's all melting, it's all melting away. I'm
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: like I'm like, really, that's real. He goes, yeah, that's real,
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: and if and we all trade records with other labels.
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: I'm I'm like, okay, whatever else you said, I don't care.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: I'm your man. I'm coming right now. I'm getting in
• 10:57
  Speaker 2: my car. I'm coming right down. I'm your guy. He's like, no, no, no, no, son,
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: sound son, I'm busy. Now we get wait a week, right, Hestead,
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: come next Wednesday. But I made him promise me. I said,
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: do not give this job to anybody until you meet me,
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: because it's always been about the music. To me, it's
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: just the music. And even you read in the book
• 11:14
  Speaker 2: about my career and all the things I was able
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: to accomplish, it's still the music. Like I knew we
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: had to sell CDs. L Y started with LPs and
• 11:21
  Speaker 2: then CDs, and I knew that that was the job.
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: But I wanted to do it in a big way
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: and put smiles on fans' faces and just celebrate this music,
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: which I thought with some of the greatest music ever made.
• 11:35
  Speaker 2: Turns out it is some of the greatest music ever
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: made rock music seventies, eighties and nineties. I mean, it's
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: as good as you know bach Beethoven. It's just rock
• 11:43
  Speaker 2: and roll. I mean, it's just a different genre of music.
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: But this music's going to stand the test of time,
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: which is what we're witnessing right now. And so, so
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: I got into the music business, and I was a
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: college rep but parts of the business at that time,
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: and you know, and even in today's world, I mean,
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: it can be duplicitous. I mean, you got people that
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: are a little shady, you know. I can't the guys
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: in the fifties, right, the hey babe guys. You know,
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: they would walk into a radio station and put an
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: album down and say, you got to hear this. There's
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: not a bad track on the album. That was promotion.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: Then I couldn't be that. I was like, that's not real.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: Who's gonna believe that? Like, and so I was having
• 12:18
  Speaker 2: trouble knowing if I was going to fit in to
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: you know, did I need to be that to do
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: promotion or an R or anything. Even the A and
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: R guys I met seemed a little it's not as
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: authentic as the generation I'm coming from, as you read
• 12:35
  Speaker 2: in the book I had. At first, I thought it
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: was a chance meeting. Now I think it was a
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: complete destiny meeting. I went to a party for Tony Bennett.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: He had a new album out, and there was a
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: big party in a hotel, typical Hollywood party, you know, booze, food,
• 12:48
  Speaker 2: people dancing, whatever else they're doing. And I'm looking around
• 12:51
  Speaker 2: and going, these people are having a great time. I
• 12:54
  Speaker 2: don't know if any of them have heard Tony's record.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: Are they just here for the party, because I don't
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: get the sense that there's a connections bothering me, Like,
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: you know, hey, you know I don't like this. Parties
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: over they leave. I go up to Tony. I'm a
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: punk man, you know, I got hair out to here,
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: I got you know, mustache go to you see pictures
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: of me in the book. And at that time, I
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: didn't even have the fro yet. I was still like
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: the surfer due but any rate, I just went up
• 13:20
  Speaker 2: to him and I just asked him. And you know,
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: I'm young, I don't even have a filter, you know.
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: I just said Tony. I think I probably called him
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: mister Ben and I said, I just man, can I
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: talk to you? He goes sure. I said, I'm brand
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: new to the business. I'm a college rapper. I'm about
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: to enter this business, but I don't know if I
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: can do it because everywhere I look it just seems
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: kind of fake. I go, look at this party. Everybody's
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: here and they're drinking your booze and they're eating your food,
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: and honestly, Tony, I don't even a lot of these
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: people are just hangers on, Like I don't even know
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: if they care about your album and your I heard
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: your job is really cool, and I just don't like this.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: So I was getting ready. He was still in his
• 13:58
  Speaker 2: sort of ouse cott and pipe phase. I was getting
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: ready for this Tony Bennett, you know, sort of amazing
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: flowerly flower like language. He looks down at me and
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: he goes, you know what, Paul, Sometimes it's pretty fucked up,
• 14:12
  Speaker 2: and it just blew my mind. Here's Tony Bennett, right
• 14:15
  Speaker 2: and I'm going, oh, wait a minute, and he goes, listen,
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: I'm going to tell you a story. And the guy's
• 14:20
  Speaker 2: immediately cool to me, like he's just down to earth.
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: What's Tony Bennett for anbody who ever met him? He's
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: like every man, That's how he is. It's just who
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: he is. He goes, you know what, I'm going I
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: tell you a story I've had some really big hits
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: in my life. You know. I left my heart in
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: San Francisco, made me a world citizen. But then the
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: music changed, and now all of a sudden, I found myself.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: I don't know where I am now, like maybe I'm
• 14:41
  Speaker 2: out of popularity because you know, now there's the British
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: invasion and whatever. I didn't know what to do, he said.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: I went to see a good friend of mine, Duke Ellington.
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: I said, Duke, I don't know, soly like remake myself?
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: What do I do? And Duke said, Tony, the business
• 14:54
  Speaker 2: is fickle. People are fickle. Don't you dare change who
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: you are? You are an apple. You're the best Tony
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: Bennett apple we have. Do not try to change yourself
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: into an orange. It's not going to work for you,
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: and you're just going to get lost. And if you
• 15:10
  Speaker 2: remain true to yourself, you'll see you're a great artist.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: The world will come back. It'll come back and find
• 15:15
  Speaker 2: you for who you are. And he looked at me
• 15:18
  Speaker 2: and said, Paul, IM going to tell you what Duke
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: told me, same thing. You seem like a really good kid.
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: He goes. The most important thing is that you love
• 15:25
  Speaker 2: music in this business. That's the most important thing. I
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: can tell that you just love music, You'll be fine.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: Just do it your way. You don't have to be
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: like anybody else. If you go in and you have
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: to talk about an album, talk about the tracks that
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: you like, think about the positive things. But you do
• 15:39
  Speaker 2: not have to be like some of these people you're
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: seeing to be successful in this business. And when I
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: walked out of that party, my whole life changed. Like
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: it was just a big load off my back. I
• 15:51
  Speaker 2: was like, Okay, wow, thanks Tony. I'm going to now
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: decide how can I do this my way? And as
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: you read in the book, very creative mind. So I'm
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: doing crazy shit.
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: You know. But yeah, yeah, but it turns out that
• 16:05
  Speaker 1: passionate love for music is what it's sold it even
• 16:08
  Speaker 1: more so, it.
• 16:09
  Speaker 2: Is what you've seen. So yeah, it's it's yeah, that's
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: what he was trying to tell me. It's it's it's
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: it's sincerity. And look what happened to him. I mean,
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: I have this great career. He turns out, you know,
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: winds up on MTV with the Chili Peppers next time,
• 16:20
  Speaker 2: you know, twenty five year olds listening to Tony Bennett.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: I mean his whole career just you know, shot to
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: the moon again.
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: So jumping on his shoulders. Yeah, I remember that.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah. And Tony and I became good friends. You know,
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: I would work a lot with him. You want to
• 16:35
  Speaker 2: talk about a work ethic. I wanted to take rock
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: bands that I work with on Come with me on
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: the road with Tony Bennett. Okay, you want to see
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: what a work ethic is. You want to know how
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: you stay great and you remain a superstar your whole life.
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: Watch this guy's work ethic. He's early to rehearsal. There's
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: no attitude, you know, it's just what do we need
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: to do? Let's get it done. Oh I already did
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: this on the plane. What's next? You know, there's no shenanigans,
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: there's no bullshit. And the greats, you know, we have
• 17:00
  Speaker 2: been known to party whatever, The Rolling Stones whatever, they
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: still have a work ethic, you know. And Tony Bennett.
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: I mean, the two guys, the biggest work ethic I've
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: ever seen. The two guys, Tony Bennett, Bruce Springsteen. They're
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: like up here and then there's a space, and then
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: there's everybody else. Trust me, these bands were card in
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: Pink Floyd. They work hard at being Pink Floyd. You know.
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: Keith Richards rehearses the Rolling Stones a lot. How do
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: you think they're so good?
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: You know because David Gilmore story in the book he said,
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: he said, Paul, it's like I'm like a nine to
• 17:29
  Speaker 1: five er. Yeah, yeah, I'm going to work every day
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: and I'm doing the Pink Floyd thing.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: That's what he told me. He said, Just like you
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: go to the office with your briefcase, I go to
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: the office with my guitar case. I have to be
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: the best Pink Floyd I can be. I know what
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: it is, I know what the job is. I have
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: to be that way. After one step ahead, I always
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: have to do. The next show has to be greater
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: than the one before. He said. People, you know, they
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: they think that we like smoke a fat one and
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: sit around and just play. Because that's nothing could be
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: farther from the truth. And you see this and all
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: the people that have been around for years and years
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: in years, you you know, and you read about it.
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: If you read Keith's book, you read about the work ethic,
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: what they have to do, and you know, my god,
• 18:06
  Speaker 2: Mick Jagger. Jeez, you gonna talk about a business guy.
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: The wheels are turning right in him all the time.
• 18:11
  Speaker 2: So they are working really hard. I'll tell you a
• 18:15
  Speaker 2: story that's not in the book. And Eric Senwich exclusive exclusive, exclusive, exclusive. Yeah,
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: I was working with a singer songwriter and he was
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: working with Bruce. Went over to Bruce's house and Bruce
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: was talking to him about the work ethic, you know,
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: about writing, and Bruce is very cerebral, and Bruce works
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: at writing. Clarence Clemens used to tell me that Bruce
• 18:39
  Speaker 2: had to write four songs to get one. That's that's
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: how Clarence put it. Now, Bruce writes four songs and
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: then turns into one. And the kid said to Bruce,
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: because Bruce had made it by then, and he's got
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: a big spread, right, you know. Bruce is saying, look,
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: you always got to mash the potatoes. You got to
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: mash the potatoes. And the kid looks around and he goes, well,
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: it's probably easier having all this right, and Bruce goes, no,
• 19:02
  Speaker 2: it's not. It doesn't matter. You still have to mash
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: the potatoes, right, all of this. If you can get
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: this great, you know, if you're successful, but you it
• 19:11
  Speaker 2: doesn't get any easier. It's like you still have the
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: mashed potatos. I thought it was a great They said that.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: Get the more expectations there are are.
• 19:19
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's the hardest part. I mean, now, you know,
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: because most bands have this magical time in their life
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: where it's just this artistic explosion, and maybe they have
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: three or four albums and and and it seems to
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: be that way, and certain bands like the Rolling Stones
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: will have phases. They'll go in and out, and then
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: they'll have a really good phase of three or four
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: albums and another phase we're from Certainly it's been that
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: way for Bruce and others. But I think that you're
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: held to those magic moments. If you're Bob Dylan, you're
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: held to times there a change and you're held the
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: subterranean Homestick Blues, Hurricane, you know, blood on the tracks,
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: they're genius records, and that's you're held to that bar,
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: you know. So, yes, it gets harder.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you were there for Born in the USA. That
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: was Colombia. Yeah, so that was that was an interesting
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: period because he had Nebraska prior to that.
• 20:10
  Speaker 2: Yes, you were.
• 20:12
  Speaker 1: Expecting Columbia was expecting Born in the USA to come earlier,
• 20:15
  Speaker 1: but then Bruce decided, I'm not ready yet. These are
• 20:18
  Speaker 1: the songs I want to do.
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: I think that what was happening in Bruce's mind. I
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: think he could feel it coming, and I think that
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: he wanted to try to negotiate being a rock star,
• 20:28
  Speaker 2: which you can try to and then you it just
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: takes you over. And I think he just wanted to
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: get He could feel it coming, and I think he
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: just wanted to do something very spare and real and
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: honest before you know, the big hit machine was going
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: to take over. And that's interesting, yeah, like like you know,
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: that's what I think. I think that's what that was about.
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: Kind of just hold this off for a second and
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: do one something from the gut here because the next
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: record is going to be just you know, a blowout
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: and uh. And I think that's why he did it.
• 21:10
  Speaker 2: And I think that he negotiated Born in the USA
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: you know pretty well. But you know, I mean, it's
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: it's rockstart and it's funny. People only see the bright
• 21:22
  Speaker 2: side of it. They don't see that it's part of it.
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: It's really hard and and and you say that to
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: people like, oh, don't tell me that. You know, these
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: guys got more money than God. They're playing on they're
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: doing all these things, but they're still human and a
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: lot you go on the road. It's hard to keep
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: a marriage together on the road. You know. Lucky for Bruce,
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: his wife joined the band, so right, easier for him,
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: you know, but it's hard. It's a hard life right
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: on the road. Is a hard life doesn't make for
• 21:51
  Speaker 2: great marriages. It's difficult to keep a marriage when you're
• 21:54
  Speaker 2: when when you do this for a living, and then
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden you got all this money, and
• 21:59
  Speaker 2: then and then you're like paranoid, like, oh god, do
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: I keep all this money? Everybody's wants to touch you
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: for money. I'll come out of the woodwork. It's like,
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: now you've got all this money. I mean, I talked
• 22:10
  Speaker 2: to h I don't want to mention his name, but
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: a very very famous superstar singer front man, who said,
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: you know, I finally made it big. I have all
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: this money. I have a daughter who was out of wedlock,
• 22:21
  Speaker 2: but it's somebody who still, you know, takes care of
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: and wants to take care of. And she's asking me
• 22:25
  Speaker 2: for money, and I and I don't know what to do.
• 22:27
  Speaker 2: I kept trying to tell her, if I give you
• 22:29
  Speaker 2: all this money, it's going to ruin you, right. But
• 22:32
  Speaker 2: if I don't give her the money, then she looks
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: at me like I'm some bad guy or something. You know.
• 22:36
  Speaker 2: It's like it's a it's a walk, this fine line
• 22:39
  Speaker 2: of all this kind of stuff.
• 22:41
  Speaker 1: So everybody wants something from you and you have.
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: To it's it's you know, I saw stuff again and
• 22:49
  Speaker 2: this this this is another story that that isn't in
• 22:52
  Speaker 2: the book. But I was on a plane with Mick
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: Jagger once. We're doing a promotional tour for She's the
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: Boss's first solo album, and I'm sitting in first class
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: with me and the woman in the back of the
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: plane wants his autograph. So the flight attendant comes up
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: and says, hey, woman wants your autograph, So mixed. A
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: cool guy says, okay, so my briefcase, I've got like
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: one of those promotional pictures, you know, mixed. She's the Boss,
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: asked for her name, signs of things, sends it back.
• 23:15
  Speaker 2: Five minutes later, there's like a commotion. We're hearing commotion
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: and know what's going on flight something. She goes now
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: she wants one for her daughter, and mix like, you know,
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: come on, like you know, I'm working. I'm trying to
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: just tell her thanks, but no thanks. I was happy
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: to give her one and you know, just let her
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: be happy. But the woman goes nuts. She throws a fit.
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: You know, we're in first We're hearing her yelling things like,
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: who do you think you are? You think you're some
• 23:42
  Speaker 2: big rocks? Are you can't give me two autographs? I
• 23:44
  Speaker 2: mean obnoxious, I mean horrible, embarrassing. She's embarrassing herself, She's
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: embarrassing everybody on the plane. And they had to calm
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: her down. And I looked at Mick and I said,
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: does this kind of thing happen a lot? And he
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: looked at me really evenly, and he said, rap, you
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: have no idea? Wow, And my knees buckled just the
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: way he said it, Like it wasn't Mick Jagger the
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: rock stars, just a guy, right, you have no idea?
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: And I began to think of the kinds of things
• 24:20
  Speaker 2: that could happen, you know, I mean, Keith even writes
• 24:23
  Speaker 2: in his book when the girls were ripping their clothes off,
• 24:25
  Speaker 2: everybody wanted to be a rock star. But he was
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: actually afraid for his life because it got very physical. Sure,
• 24:29
  Speaker 2: I mean, girls were like like he thought he was
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: going to suffocate sometimes. I mean. So, I'm not saying
• 24:34
  Speaker 2: they don't like being rock stars, because clearly that you
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: know they're on stage for a reason. That's what they
• 24:40
  Speaker 2: love to do. But there's another side. There's a friend
• 24:42
  Speaker 2: of mine who wrote a book and John mellencamps in
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: the book and he literally says in this book, if
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: you think that you want to be on stage and
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: be a rock star, whatever, just let me tell you
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: it's not what you think it is. And when you
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: see me on stage and I look like I'm having
• 24:58
  Speaker 2: a good time, I am. I am working really hard.
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: Do not think I'm just getting up there and having
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: a good time and all the other stuff that goes
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: with it. Just be prepared. It's not what you think
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: it is. And it is healthy advice for you know,
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: for anybody who's coming up who wants to do this
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: for a living.
• 25:15
  Speaker 1: Booked on rock podcasts will be back after this patience boys,
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: All good things to those who wait. Now, as far
• 25:27
  Speaker 1: as the hard work that you would have to put
• 25:28
  Speaker 1: in for a band, say, it's an unknown band. What's
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: the key to getting an unknown band attention? Like, getting
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: a record played at rock radio was not easy.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: It's not easy because programmers program radio in a safe manner.
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: They need ratings. If you play something new, there's a
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: chance somebody could tune out if you're not playing something
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: new that they're going to like. And so new music
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: would be added to rock stations. You know, I was
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: involved in the heyday of rock from the seventies and
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: the eighties and the nineties. New music has to be
• 26:02
  Speaker 2: spoon fed. You know, maybe you're gonna play a track
• 26:05
  Speaker 2: at night or maybe in the afternoon, but you're not
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: just gonna put a flood of new music on. And also,
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: most bands that are really good, they have their own sound.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: So for instance, early on for Bruce Springsteen. I mean,
• 26:19
  Speaker 2: I did twelve years for Columbia Records on the West
• 26:22
  Speaker 2: Coast out in Los Angeles before I moved to run
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: the rock department in nineteen eighty to New York. You know,
• 26:27
  Speaker 2: if you're on the West Coast, those rock stations are
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: local band van Halen, so you're gonna hear a lot
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: of Van Halen, You're gonna hear a lot of Laed Zeppelin.
• 26:34
  Speaker 2: You're gonna hear that kind of rock. Now, this guy
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: comes along named Bruce Springsteen. It's a whole different sound.
• 26:40
  Speaker 2: He's got a band, it's different. He's got Clarence Clemens
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: on sacks earlier records, got a tube. I mean, it's
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: a different thing. Even Aerosmith's first album caught people by surprise,
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: so it takes time for them to warm up to
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: something new. And my job was to sort of open
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: their minds as something new, get them to want to
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: hear something different. As you read in the book There's
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: I had a lot of little tricks. I would never
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: go into anybody's office with an album and in their
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: office play them new music because and a lot of
• 27:15
  Speaker 2: promotion people did, because they do have those days where
• 27:18
  Speaker 2: you go in and you play music. I never did
• 27:20
  Speaker 2: it that way because they're busy, they're on the phone
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: and you know they're listening, but then a disc jockie
• 27:25
  Speaker 2: comes in, Hey, you know, do you have that spot
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: that I need for the you know, or they get
• 27:29
  Speaker 2: a phone call from their you know, significant other's it's
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: you can't. I would say, hey, let's go to lunch,
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: and then I would make lunch twenty minutes away. Put
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: them in a car springtime, roll the windows down, put
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: their radio station on loud. They're happy, they're proud of
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: their station. They're free, they've escaped. They're on a mini vacation,
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: like they've escaped work. They're looking around all of a sudden,
• 27:51
  Speaker 2: your mind's open. Music sounds great if you don't pin
• 27:55
  Speaker 2: them and you just say, hey, I got a few
• 27:57
  Speaker 2: things I want to play. I'm excited about that. Don't worry.
• 27:59
  Speaker 2: I'm not going to ask you to add their record
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: in next week or and it's not coming out for months.
• 28:02
  Speaker 2: Just listen to the music. They sit back and they
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: just listen to music, and their minds are open. Right.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: I would talk to programmers that I knew were into
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: certain kind of genres of music to warm their mind up.
• 28:17
  Speaker 2: It's like in the book I write, it's like a
• 28:19
  Speaker 2: planting a flower bed. Before you put the plants in,
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: you till the soil, you put ingredients in, you put
• 28:24
  Speaker 2: nutrients injured. You want to nurture something that's going to grow.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: And so I felt like that's the programmer's mind. So
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: if I had an artist, like let's say Chris Whitley,
• 28:33
  Speaker 2: who's not write the down. He's not right down the
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: center rock, but he's an authentic blues rock type player.
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: I knew a big consultant was in charge of sixty
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: rock stations in Atlanta love the blues. So if I
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: would call him up and say, Greg, I got a
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: new guy way into the blues, totally authentic. Guy's playing
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: resonator guitars. All of a sudden, I have Greg's ears,
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: really because he wants he wants the genre of the
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: blues to continue, you know, it's something that he tries
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: to help out. He already wants to like the record
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: before I've even sent it to him. So I would
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: try to do these kinds of things to till the soil,
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: if you will, to add nutrients to make a garden
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: ready to grow, so that the music's going in. Not
• 29:22
  Speaker 2: in a way of like, oh i've got this record
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: coming out. Yeah, yeah, you know they're jamming me. I'm
• 29:26
  Speaker 2: gonna probably ask you to add it in a couple
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: of weeks. None of that's gonna work. It's the music,
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: the music, the music, And so that would be my
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: approach to try to just open someone's mind to hear something.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: New, and then what determines the roster of artists, who's
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: going to be at the top, who are you going
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: to put the most money into. How does that all
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: play out?
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: Well, there's things that we think we know, and we
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: call them priorities for a second, because we think we
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: hear a record, go oh, this is you know. But no,
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: the truth is that nobody really knows. The job is
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: to get the music on the radio. In today's world,
• 29:59
  Speaker 2: job is to get it on you know, Spotify and
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: Title and whatever streaming services in YouTube, make a video
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: or TikTok. It's really the public that decides. We can
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: have our priorities, but our priorities will change as soon
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: as some music hits the airwaves, listeners call up and go,
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: oh my god, I love that. You know. In today's world,
• 30:19
  Speaker 2: you know, it would be people making playlists or whatever,
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: people talking to each other, you know, about what they
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: want to hear. So, you know, I do write in
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: the book about a big meeting we had up at
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: Caribou Ranch where in Columbia and our sister label, all
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: the album promotion people were getting together and we would
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: play all of our music. We put our heads together
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: about how to promote this music, And so I write
• 30:38
  Speaker 2: a story where the epic fellow the priority was a
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: band called Mother's Finest. They were from Atlanta. They were
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: sort of like sllying the family stone. They were blowing
• 30:48
  Speaker 2: people off the stage, like they were opening for big
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: bands and blowing them off the stage. So it would
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: make sense that they would be a priority. And he's
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: playing music. He's playing music, and he says, and I
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: have this new thing by a band called Boston, and
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: he puts on more than if Well, when you hear
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: more than a feeling, you only have to hear that once.
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: You don't have to be a record guy, you know.
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: I mean people that work with music, you know, we'd
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: like to think that we have ears like we can.
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: We can hear a hit pretty quick, just because that's
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: what you do for a living. You play more than
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: a feeling for anybody. It's gonna blow their hair back.
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: It's like, whoa wait a second, what was that? And he,
• 31:22
  Speaker 2: you know, he played again. And as you read in
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: the book, I said, you know, Mike, Mother's Finest. Yes,
• 31:28
  Speaker 2: we understand why you would want them to be a
• 31:30
  Speaker 2: number one priority, But when this thing hits the airways,
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: it's gonna flip flop. This thing is going to blow
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: on album rock radio so big, it's going to be
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: like a firestorm. I mean, this is going to be
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: your number one priority and you won't be able to
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: control it. Not that you want to, you know. I
• 31:43
  Speaker 2: write in the book about lover Boy there's certain music
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: I and anybody else you will hear it, and sometimes
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: we don't. The first lover Boy record, it just didn't
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: sink in and went okay, I think this is pretty good.
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: But it didn't. It didn't hit me like it should.
• 31:55
  Speaker 2: It's for whatever reason. I'm a professional promotion man. My
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: job is to get the music on the radio. Let
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: the people tell me. And I got a call from
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: Gloria Johnson at kgo N in Portland. She was a
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: big rock jock. She goes, oh my god, do you
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: have a hit. What do you mean? She goes, lover Boy.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: I'm like lover Boy. She goes, yeah, she doesn't. Playing
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: a track called turn Me Loose. And in those times
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: we used to just albums would come out and then
• 32:17
  Speaker 2: jocks would play whatever they want. She found turn Me Loose.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: Start playing it. Phone lines are lighting up, people are going,
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: oh my god, was it played again? If you're a promotion. Man,
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: that's all you need to know. Now I go back. Now,
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: I'm telling everybody that that's how records are built. Now
• 32:31
  Speaker 2: you go to other cities and I would have twenty
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: five local promotion people in different cities, you know, telling
• 32:37
  Speaker 2: a story. Hey, the rock station orders plans. If you
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: know the phones are going crazy, you should try this.
• 32:42
  Speaker 2: That's credibility. Oh rock station goes, okay, we won't add it,
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: but we're played at night. Oh my god, you're right.
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: It works. That's how you know music welt. Now. Of course, eventually,
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: not too long after, I go by listening to the
• 32:54
  Speaker 2: album again and go, scot, how did I miss this?
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: This is really good? Run Yeah, but do you do?
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: You just can't. No, not, Everybody's gonna hear everything all
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: the time. So and I'm not too proud to tell
• 33:04
  Speaker 2: you that. And and and in my book, you know,
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: I wrote that about you know, about that band. But
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: as soon as you see a band live you can
• 33:10
  Speaker 2: tell also you can get a record. I mean, I
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: was really into Bruce Ringsteen's first record, but when I
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: saw him live with the Jupidour, I was like, oh
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: it's this, Yeah, this is like unbelievable. Same for Psychedelic Firs.
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: I love their first record, so I'm Live. I was like,
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: oh my god, these guys are gonna be huge. When
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: Alison changed, Alison changed, saw I saw the new led Zeppelin.
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: I saw, I saw the new face of rock. It
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: was like, good.
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: God, the spin doctors has it. There's this great story
• 33:39
  Speaker 1: I just heard Chris Baron talk about because they were
• 33:41
  Speaker 1: under Epic.
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: Yes, so what what.
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: Columbian Epic like? Is Epic?
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: The we called him our sisters? Well there's they were
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: just they weren't as big a label, but they're they're
• 33:53
  Speaker 2: a force to be reckoned with. I mean, on the
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: rock side, you're talking Jeff Beck, you're talking Stevie Ray Vaughan,
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: Ozzy Osbourne, right, you know, meet Love. I mean on
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: the pop side, you're talking Michael Jackson. So it's not
• 34:06
  Speaker 2: like they're a small label. It's just they have less artists.
• 34:09
  Speaker 2: Okayama's roster has got rock and country and you know
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: Tony Bennett and Johnny Mathis and Barbarus Trice and it's huge. Yeah,
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: you know Epic Sport Compact.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: But yes, there are two really cool stories regarding that.
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: One was there was a station in Vermont that was
• 34:27
  Speaker 1: playing little Miss Campy Wrong or two Princes, one of
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: those two, and it blew up there. And so then
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: just like you say, now, now the record label could say, hey,
• 34:36
  Speaker 1: this station over in Vermont is playing. This station is
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: blowing up, you guys, and then it slowly picks up.
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: And that's always a great story. But there's another. There's
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: another story that Chris barn just talked about it epic.
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: They had Pearl Jam as the priority. So to this
• 34:50
  Speaker 1: day he says, I can't stand Pearl Jam. Like he's
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: saying it, you know, he's kiddingly say it, but kind
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: of half half joking, you have serious, but he said this.
• 34:58
  Speaker 1: He goes from what I'm told there was somebody that
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: worked at the record label. There was a huge fan
• 35:02
  Speaker 1: of us that went to somebody there who was really
• 35:06
  Speaker 1: you know, helped could make a big decision like like
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: you know, to really put more money into the spins
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: because you know, everywhere you went, Pearl Jam had the
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: big billboard at the record shops and they were they
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: fully stocked, but the spin doctor had maybe one CD,
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: you know, in the back. So this this girl was
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: a huge fan of and she said, if I if
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: I can drink. If I can out drink you will
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: you promise to promote the spins And this person said,
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: go ahead, let's do it, and she drank him under
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: the table and he said, okay, you win, and then
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: said okay, we'll put money behind and they were on
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: Saturday Night Live Stone Color.
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: That's the record business. I know, yeah, no, no, but
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: that's why I wrote this book because people won't believe
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: this stuff. This is the This business was run on
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: ego and whim and eric. Logic never got in the
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: way all of this stuff all. I mean, you know
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: you can't. The manager of Okay, I wrote in the
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: book Okay. The manager of Journey.
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: Herbie Herbert, the late great Herbie Herbert.
• 36:09
  Speaker 2: Er, Okay, Journey is huge. We're selling fifty thousand albums
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: a week. I can't remember what album it is. But
• 36:16
  Speaker 2: we have to come up with a new single. And
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: it's a timely conversation because when you're selling records like that,
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: you need to put singles out to keep the momentum going.
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: So I have to tell rock stations what the new
• 36:27
  Speaker 2: single is. We have to put it in production whatever.
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: I'll never forget. This is a Thursday, and I have
• 36:31
  Speaker 2: to have the single that afternoon. So Herbie called me. Now, Herbie,
• 36:36
  Speaker 2: just like the grow you know, drink me under the table.
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: Herbie got on a Yiddish kick. He's not even Jewish.
• 36:42
  Speaker 2: You read about it in the book Why He Did,
• 36:44
  Speaker 2: But he got on a Yiddish kick, sends Yiddish for
• 36:47
  Speaker 2: dummies to the whole industry and says, if you want
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: to speak to me or They had a famous road manager,
• 36:52
  Speaker 2: Pat Bubba Morrow, if you want to speak to me
• 36:55
  Speaker 2: or Bubba, you're gonna have to speak a couple of
• 36:56
  Speaker 2: lines Yiddish. I get the book. It's cute. I get
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: the note. I get a call from Herbie this Thursday.
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: We have to discuss the single. I'm like, hey, Herbie,
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: how you doing? Yeah? Man, we got to pick a
• 37:05
  Speaker 2: single today was Schmachs two. How are you? He starts
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: talking to me in Yiddish. I'm like, Herbie, I got
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: the book. It's cute, right, I said, this is the
• 37:13
  Speaker 2: time of the conversation. He keeps talking to me in Yiddish.
• 37:15
  Speaker 2: He talks to me Yiddish for two minutes. Then he stops.
• 37:18
  Speaker 2: He goes, rap, what the fuck? A nice Jewish boy
• 37:22
  Speaker 2: like you can't learn a couple of lines of Yiddish,
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: I said Herbie, I got the book. It's cute this
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: We're selling fifty thousand records a week. This is a
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: heavy conversation, like you and I have to figure this
• 37:32
  Speaker 2: out today, this afternoons, three o'clock in the afternoon here
• 37:35
  Speaker 2: in New York. He goes, I know, learn your Yiddish
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: and call me back. All right, welcome to rock and
• 37:41
  Speaker 2: Roll Business nineteen eighty five. If characters, yes, you can't
• 37:46
  Speaker 2: make this shit up. If I want a new Journey single,
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: which I have to have, I have to get the
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: book out, learn two lines of Yiddish to speak to
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: him before I can get the Journey single. Right. This
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: is this is this is real. That's why I wrote
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: the books. I want people to understand how amazing and
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: how wacky and how gloriously crazy at all was. This
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: is our reality? Right?
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Yes?
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: How was a.
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: Book on rock podcasts? Will be back after this.
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: Surely you can't be serious. I am serious, and don't
• 38:20
  Speaker 2: call me surely.
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: Well, we got to talk about the King of phone screamers,
• 38:26
  Speaker 1: Irving Ason.
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: I love this one. I have to get Irving the book,
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: so you know, or somebody he would get a kick
• 38:34
  Speaker 2: out of it. So for those who don't know or
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: Irving's claim to fame as he managed the Eagles, his
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: other claim to fame is that he was the biggest
• 38:44
  Speaker 2: notorious screamer in the business. People were terrified of him.
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: In fact, I remember having a phone call with somebody
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: who was trying to intimidate me, and I'm on the
• 38:55
  Speaker 2: phone with them and they're really trying to get me
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: as a manager or whatever, and I said, listen, I've
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: been screamed at by irves Off, So whatever you have,
• 39:05
  Speaker 2: you're not gonna get to that level. So cut the
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: crap and just let's get to what we have to
• 39:10
  Speaker 2: talk about, because like it ain't gonna work on me.
• 39:12
  Speaker 2: I have like the fucking heat shield from r Okay.
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: No introductions, no Hello, how are you?
• 39:17
  Speaker 2: No so IRV call? And it was it was a
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: Dan Folgelberg record at the time, and I had just
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: gotten it to a radio station. They were just you know,
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: you radio has to listen to it. Then you know,
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: it takes a week. They had the record, I knew
• 39:30
  Speaker 2: they would like it. It was right in the pocket
• 39:32
  Speaker 2: for you know, southern California. But as you read in
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: the book. You know, it's a irvese offline one. Hey V,
• 39:38
  Speaker 2: how you doing? I want klos and I want it
• 39:42
  Speaker 2: now right Koos is the big rock station at the time. IRV, Hey,
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: how's about? Hey rap, how you doing? Hello? First and
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: then yell at me, I want kalo ass and I
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: want it. And as you read in the book, that's
• 39:56
  Speaker 2: all he said to the whole entire comfort. No matter
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: what I said, that's all I back. And I would
• 40:01
  Speaker 2: tell him, IRV, I just brought the record to the
• 40:04
  Speaker 2: rate it takes a week to you know, just give
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: him a second and think they're going to add And
• 40:08
  Speaker 2: I'm pretty sure everybody loves Dan. Don't worry and you know,
• 40:11
  Speaker 2: and the last thing I heard from him was the
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: first thing I heard from him. Why what?
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: And his reasoning was, I'm going to put everything out
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: there for my client.
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: So no, no. His herb's mo is, you know, intimidate everybody,
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: get anything you can. Then he can go back to
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: his client and say, hey, look I got everything I could,
• 40:29
  Speaker 2: and he'll push you to the brink. But I will
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: say also, as the years have gone by, he helped
• 40:35
  Speaker 2: me out through some you know, some things I really
• 40:36
  Speaker 2: had to negotiate and he's really cool and he goes, hey, rap,
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: look at tell the guy this, tell it this way,
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: tell him that way. So and he's done a lot
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: of things and he's gone on to do like Nation.
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: I mean, this guy been in charge of everything. But
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: I but I do think what he accomplished for the Eagles,
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: even after the business fell apart, and he was able
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: to put out his own stuff and make things happen.
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: You know, I don't really give a shit about the
• 41:00
  Speaker 2: corporations and ticket sales and all the stuff. I care
• 41:02
  Speaker 2: about the artists. What this guy did for the Eagles
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: is sure phenomenal.
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the title Gliders over Hollywood comes thanks to there's
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: another great story, a very clever idea that you had
• 41:13
  Speaker 1: to help Aerosmith, who had just signed with Columbia. You
• 41:17
  Speaker 1: were promoting them, you and Elton John on the roof.
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, what happened was, you know, we always would
• 41:24
  Speaker 2: make sort of chotchkey's for bands that we thought we
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: really had a shot with, So we'd make hats and
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: belts and belt buckles and T shirts. And somebody in
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: New York decided that they would make gliders like Balswood
• 41:35
  Speaker 2: gliders and they would put aerosmith on the wings. That
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: was a good idea. Now, I was still working on
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: the West Coast at the time, and a big bag
• 41:42
  Speaker 2: must have been a thousand of them. Of these gliders
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: show up in the mailroom. I'm just a big kid
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: and I've been flying gliders and you know, reading the
• 41:51
  Speaker 2: book I'm shooting rockets off. Yeah. I saw this bag
• 41:55
  Speaker 2: of gliders and I went to the friend of mine
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: who was in the mail room at the Times, guy
• 41:58
  Speaker 2: named Ron Simms. His nickname is Spider. I said, Spider, Yeah, Yeah,
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: we're going to take all these to radio stations in retail,
• 42:05
  Speaker 2: and you know they're going to hang them and it's
• 42:07
  Speaker 2: all going to be a thing. But before that happens,
• 42:10
  Speaker 2: you and I have to go on the roof of
• 42:12
  Speaker 2: this building. Because it's fourteen floors up. It overlooks Sunset Boulevard.
• 42:16
  Speaker 2: You can see Hollywood like crazy, I said, imagine flying
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: gliders off the roof. Imagine how far they go. We
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: don't have to worry about trees. Like when you're a kid,
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: you know, thermals are going to come up like these
• 42:28
  Speaker 2: things will go forever. So his eyes light up. We
• 42:31
  Speaker 2: go up on the roof. We start flying gliders. Next
• 42:34
  Speaker 2: thing you know, we're sponsoring glider races at noontime. Come
• 42:37
  Speaker 2: up and fly gliders with you know, spider and wrap.
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: You know, we're like, man, I think I can hit
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: the Hollywood Freeway and on and spiders go, no, no, no,
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: I think I could hit the Hollywood ball. So we
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: would have guest pilots. Well, one day outon John showed up.
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: He wasn't on Columbia, but he came to see an
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: old friend that used to be his road manager, a
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: guy named Johnny Babcock, who you read about in the
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: book Johnny Baggs. So, you know, bags callus us. He
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: goes hey, want to me. I'm like, yeah, yeah, sure.
• 43:01
  Speaker 2: So we go in. He goes, hey, this is Elton
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: and Eltons. You know, looks like Elton John with the
• 43:05
  Speaker 2: big ros glasses and the platform boots and everything. He's
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: a cool guy. So we knew, we knew he loved music.
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: Out and come with us. We take him to the
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: record room, We give him free records. He's got records
• 43:15
  Speaker 2: stacked up to here right because we have a library
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: of And then we go, hey, listen before you go,
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: we're on the roof. We're flying balstwood gliders off the
• 43:24
  Speaker 2: roof all over Hollywood. Do you want to fly gliders?
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: And he was like sure, you know, and he's like
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: reduced to a kid. So we're bounding up the stairs
• 43:33
  Speaker 2: and we're thinking, oh, you know, Elton John Man, you know,
• 43:36
  Speaker 2: take me to the pilot, rocketman. He must be a
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: good glider pilot. What the fuck do we It's like,
• 43:43
  Speaker 2: you know, doesn't matter. We spent all afternoon without John
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: like tossing glyders.
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: It's awesome.
• 43:49
  Speaker 2: So I wanted a title that, you know. It turned
• 43:52
  Speaker 2: out that I couldn't come up with the title, and
• 43:54
  Speaker 2: the publisher said, you know, if you can't come up
• 43:57
  Speaker 2: with a title that explains the book, come let's come
• 43:59
  Speaker 2: up with another title. People might go, geez, what is
• 44:01
  Speaker 2: this about? And then you can have a subtitle. He said,
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: I just loved this chapter about gliders over Hollywood. It's
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: just when I think of gliders over Hollywood, it's Hollywood
• 44:09
  Speaker 2: is big. And later on, I'm sure you want to
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: talk about the airship, the Pink Floyd airship, and yeah,
• 44:13
  Speaker 2: he says, he says, you know, he goes, you think
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: about this title gliders over Hollywood, and then you can
• 44:18
  Speaker 2: have a subtitle. So then I came up with Airships
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: airplay in the Art of Rock promotion. If you see
• 44:24
  Speaker 2: that and you see all these names smashed on the
• 44:26
  Speaker 2: front of the cover of all the artists I work with,
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: you'll turn the book over and then read what it's about.
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's perfect.
• 44:32
  Speaker 2: And he loved it. He just loved it, and I
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: thought about it. I thought about it. I went, God,
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: I think he's right. And that's where that's where it
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: came from. So it kind of connotes the fun we
• 44:39
  Speaker 2: had in this business. I mean, Eric, in our business.
• 44:43
  Speaker 2: Fund was a part of your job description, it really was.
• 44:47
  Speaker 2: We had bowling in the hallways in the afternoon. We
• 44:49
  Speaker 2: had water gun fights.
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: That's cool.
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: You read in the book. I had a fencing duel
• 44:53
  Speaker 2: with Bruce Dickinson from Iron Maiden down the hallways of
• 44:56
  Speaker 2: Columbia Records. There was a meeting call to discuss the
• 45:00
  Speaker 2: fact why the LA branch would no longer be allowed
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: to set their table on fire at future record company
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: conventions because every convention we were rowdy, you know, in
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: our table and at the end we'd set her on fire.
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: We became the hit of the convention, and you know,
• 45:14
  Speaker 2: somebody figured out in New York this is not a
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: good idea that these guys are lighting a fire in
• 45:17
  Speaker 2: a ballroom and hotel.
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: That's the other story that it is great.
• 45:21
  Speaker 2: But this is a business meeting, to right, this is normal.
• 45:25
  Speaker 2: This is what I want people to understand. This is
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: how nuts it was. This is normal for our business.
• 45:31
  Speaker 2: Half the people in this meeting rebelled and they want
• 45:33
  Speaker 2: to know why we couldn't set our table.
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: Yeah, but here's my question. Did that change over time?
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: Did it? Did things get two sterile? Yeah? I hate
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: to skip too far ahead, but I might as well
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: just asking towards the end, when you decided to step
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: aside and you he said it's time for me to
• 45:51
  Speaker 1: move on. Had it gotten to that point where it
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: was Yeah, the same as it was. Yeah by that
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: point two thousand and three. You know, I lied work
• 45:57
  Speaker 1: there since nineteen sixty nine. You always want to talk
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: about the eighties. Oh my god, the eighties.
• 46:01
  Speaker 2: I go the eighties. You should have been there during
• 46:03
  Speaker 2: the seventies. The seventies was just like one giant party.
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: There were so many parties we couldn't plan them all.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: There was actually a side business that developed. Two guys developed.
• 46:12
  Speaker 2: Then they just did parties for record companies because there
• 46:15
  Speaker 2: was just too much to celebrate.
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: Booked on rock podcasts. Will be back after this.
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna need some flyers and set of thirty waight
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: ball bearings. Flack Fred gets here before I'm back. You
• 46:26
  Speaker 2: can tell them a start without me. Hell you need
• 46:28
  Speaker 2: bull bearings. Oh, come on, guys, it's so simple. Maybe
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: you need a refresher course. Okay, it's all ball bearings nowadays.
• 46:37
  Speaker 1: In three that's when things really were starting to change.
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: Not in a good way, right, because the streaming services
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: and file sharing and all that.
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, all of that. You know, we're feeling the
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: brunt of that. The business is starting to contract. The
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: business that I was in was like the wild West.
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: The rock business especially exploded in the seventies and through
• 46:57
  Speaker 2: the eighties. We were selling so many record and CDs
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: you didn't even need to hit single just rock radio
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: was so big. That's what I was in charge of.
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: But what happened was somewhere along the line, the record business, well,
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: let me put it this way better, the music business
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: became the money business. And that's what ruined it. Because
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: when the all through my time, seventies, eighties, and even
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: the early nineties. The accent was on the music. The
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: accent was on the art. The accent was on players
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: wanted to be the best players they could be, make
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: the best records you can make. We're gonna put you
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: in studios that are the best studios in the world,
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: that are made for the best fidelity, with the best producers,
• 47:40
  Speaker 2: and then we're gonna give you the greatest album cover designers.
• 47:42
  Speaker 2: And you're gonna get people like me who are experts
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: in their field to be able to make something big happen.
• 47:48
  Speaker 2: It's like a whole village of people that would make
• 47:50
  Speaker 2: this happen. But it was all based on the art,
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: and it also was based on fun and having making
• 47:59
  Speaker 2: fun for the fans. Even as late as nineteen ninety four,
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: I talked, I'm sure we'll get the right Even as
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: late as nineteen ninety four, I talked Columbia Records into
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: an airship for Pink Floyd. Okay, the thing costs three
• 48:10
  Speaker 2: quarters of a million dollars. There's an aerosmith party for
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: nine lives four hundred and fifty thousand dollars. But the
• 48:17
  Speaker 2: most amazing party you've ever been to. It was like surreal.
• 48:21
  Speaker 2: It was full of a bunch of different rooms and
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: the rooms lifted up by a pulley. I mean it
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: was so we were that kind of business. We were
• 48:30
  Speaker 2: bigger than life. If you did something bigger than life,
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: people would talk about it for months, right, and that
• 48:35
  Speaker 2: helped perpetuate what you were trying to promote. But somewhere
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: along the line, it was like, wait a minute, don't
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: leave any money on the table. That's the big phrase.
• 48:45
  Speaker 2: It's still today, don't leave any money on the table. Well,
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: if you don't leave any money on the table, where's
• 48:50
  Speaker 2: the fun money, where's the where? Where's this vibe come from?
• 48:55
  Speaker 2: Bill Graham used to build movie sets like backstage for
• 49:00
  Speaker 2: all the bands that played for him in San Francisco.
• 49:02
  Speaker 2: If you were Pink Floyd and you played for Bill
• 49:04
  Speaker 2: Graham and you went backstage with you know, the industry
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: was such a big industry. There were so many people backstage.
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: Bill would build an English pub that you walked into,
• 49:14
  Speaker 2: sat down, had a beer and a steak and kidney pie,
• 49:17
  Speaker 2: a real English pub built backstage. It's like a movie set.
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: What do you think that costs? For Bruce? It was
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: a New York bar and it was a gelato stand.
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: I mean for the who. He had a bunch of
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: ping pong tables. They were all painted like the Union Jack.
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: Why it was part and parcel to Bill Graham was
• 49:34
  Speaker 2: the pt Barnum of rock. Right, this is the She's
• 49:37
  Speaker 2: a showman, right, this is what happens.
• 49:39
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: It's like, yeah, I could do a big event, but
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: I want to do something that people are going to
• 49:44
  Speaker 2: talk about forever you read about in the book. I mean,
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: I'm shooting laser beams off mountain sides that go for
• 49:49
  Speaker 2: thirty miles. Half the people looking at it think this
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: is War of the World. They think, you know the
• 49:53
  Speaker 2: you know, I want to do big, bigger than life
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: kinds of things. And so by the time Too and
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: Three comes, I had a TV show then on A
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: and E called Live by Request and I was producing Yeah, yeah,
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: I was producing three DVDs. Okay Tony Bennett. Okay, Live
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: by Request is Tony Bennett comes from a radio show
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: I did with Tony Wow. Yeah that became a television
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: that became that television show. So I had to produce
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: three DVDs at once, and I'm getting pressure to put
• 50:22
  Speaker 2: them out. Get I need them, put them out by Christmas.
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: I'm like, yeah, yeah, but they have to be good,
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: they need they need bonus material. I just don't want
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: to put a TV show up. I want an interview
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: with Tony or you know, here's a disciography or just
• 50:32
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm taking a page off the movies at
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: the time that everything had bonus features and the pressure
• 50:38
  Speaker 2: on you know, just get them out. We don't care.
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: So I'm thinking, way, this isn't the business that I
• 50:43
  Speaker 2: was in. Just get them, just get them out.
• 50:45
  Speaker 1: Like push the product out there.
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: Yeah I'm not I'm not doing it. And then everything
• 50:50
  Speaker 2: was easier. On the pop side. It was like, wait
• 50:51
  Speaker 2: a minute, Yeah, you know, when you go to developing
• 50:54
  Speaker 2: ours like Springsteen or any new band, Billy Joel or
• 50:57
  Speaker 2: any singer songwriter, it takes you know, a couple three albums,
• 51:00
  Speaker 2: you know, to get the music out there. The band's
• 51:02
  Speaker 2: got a tour, the artist has the tour. It became
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: easier just to you know, just to get like a
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: young pop star, get him a song from you know,
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: Max and Sweden, whatever, you know, put five producers on it.
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: And then that's how we are now. We're living this
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: pop world because it's it's it's like a it's like
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: a sort of a formulaic machine that pumps this music out.
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: Now that's thankfully not all the music that's out there
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: that you know, there's still a lot of young up
• 51:27
  Speaker 2: and coming artists, thank god, that aren't in that machine.
• 51:30
  Speaker 2: But the music business has run, you know, on this
• 51:35
  Speaker 2: kind of thing for a while now, especially when hip hop,
• 51:38
  Speaker 2: you know, became bigger everything. It just became a pop
• 51:41
  Speaker 2: it became more of a pop business. So there's sort
• 51:44
  Speaker 2: of the camelot that I knew, all the characters that
• 51:47
  Speaker 2: if you watch the movie Guys and Dolls, Right, Okay,
• 51:50
  Speaker 2: that's what our record business was, except it was the
• 51:52
  Speaker 2: record business. It's the Guys and Dolls. But it's the
• 51:54
  Speaker 2: record business, and we're just like those guys. And we
• 51:57
  Speaker 2: all have nicknames Big Julie and sky Mann or something.
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: It's a business of characters. We're making it up as
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: we go along, and everybody wants to do something to
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: get noticed and be noticed, and everybody's having a good time,
• 52:09
  Speaker 2: and we're making a shitload of money doing it. And
• 52:12
  Speaker 2: it all worked the seventies and the eighties and into
• 52:15
  Speaker 2: the nineties was the perfect combination of art and commerce
• 52:21
  Speaker 2: that just worked together like this to make all the
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: music that a lot of us hold deer by the way,
• 52:30
  Speaker 2: well a lot of younger people. If you look at
• 52:32
  Speaker 2: the numbers on Spotify, a lot of the pop numbers
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: are going down. And guess with the numbers that are
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: coming up the streams Fleetwood Mac.
• 52:40
  Speaker 1: Yes, you're right. Bohemian Rhapsody I think is like two
• 52:44
  Speaker 1: billion streams.
• 52:46
  Speaker 2: Because younger kids are well wait a minute, who are
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: these Fleetwood Mac people? Who is this Tom Petty guy?
• 52:51
  Speaker 2: What is this Bohemian Rhapsody? What is this queen thing?
• 52:54
  Speaker 1: Thank god, man, I'm so happy to hear that. Yeah,
• 52:57
  Speaker 1: well you mentioned Petty. I'm sorry to interrupt, but Mike
• 53:01
  Speaker 1: Campbell has a book out, fantastic book.
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: I want to read it. Yeah, I would love to
• 53:06
  Speaker 2: read that book.
• 53:06
  Speaker 1: Well, tell me what you think about this, because he
• 53:08
  Speaker 1: said he talked about having a conversation with Bob Dylan
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: and this was probably late eighties, and he's saying to
• 53:13
  Speaker 1: Bob Dylan, Hey, these CDs, man, this is really great.
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: You know, it sounds great, great, and Dylan was looking
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: him like this, this is the worst thing that can
• 53:21
  Speaker 1: happen to the business. And I think what he was
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: trying to say is Dylan was basically saying that this
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: is going to lead to like people can copy these
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: CDs a hell of a lot easier now, it's going
• 53:32
  Speaker 1: to be it led to file sharing, It led to
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: all that stuff where people were getting the music for
• 53:37
  Speaker 1: free because it was easy to burn CDs.
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: No, No, I think that. I think also for Bob
• 53:43
  Speaker 2: knowing Bob, because I had the conversation with David Gilmour
• 53:46
  Speaker 2: from Pink Floyd. They were all worried about the fidelity
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: because okay, so he's the CD is. First of all,
• 53:52
  Speaker 2: it is very convenient. The first time I saw a
• 53:54
  Speaker 2: CD the big thing. I went to the president of
• 53:57
  Speaker 2: Columbia Records I'll tell her at the time, said I'm
• 53:59
  Speaker 2: going to show you the future. He has a box,
• 54:01
  Speaker 2: puts the disc in, disc starts playing. You hear the music.
• 54:04
  Speaker 2: He turns the box upside down, it's still playing. It
• 54:08
  Speaker 2: was like, oh, whoa, this is convenient.
• 54:11
  Speaker 1: Now.
• 54:12
  Speaker 2: None of us knew what digital meant at the time
• 54:15
  Speaker 2: until it started to come out and we were like,
• 54:17
  Speaker 2: wait a minute, this doesn't sound as good as a
• 54:21
  Speaker 2: as a vinyl album because it's just yes, no signals. Okay, yeah,
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: so you don't have overtones. Gilmore was beside himself. He says,
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: I can't hear my guitars over there's no overtones because
• 54:33
  Speaker 2: an analog signal will just but not digital digital. It's
• 54:38
  Speaker 2: a yes no, it shuts it off. And probably for Bob,
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: who's the purest, I'll bet you he was more thinking
• 54:45
  Speaker 2: about the fidelity, because Bob is really all about the vibe,
• 54:50
  Speaker 2: all about the song. He's not even into perfection that much.
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: He's into paint a picture, and when the pictures painted,
• 54:58
  Speaker 2: it's painted right. He doesn't need to do a lot
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: of overdubs. It's not his style. And I would imagine
• 55:04
  Speaker 2: that some of what you know. I want to read
• 55:07
  Speaker 2: Campl's books. I'm a big fan of his, and I
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: would imagine some of it for Bob was that I
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: don't know. What I couldn't figure out is this Okay,
• 55:17
  Speaker 2: Columbia Records is owned by CBS Broadcasting for a long
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: time and then it gets sold to Sony Music. Okay,
• 55:23
  Speaker 2: this is Sony Music. These guys are creating this thing
• 55:28
  Speaker 2: called the CD like they know about digital and computers
• 55:31
  Speaker 2: are happening at the same time. What I could never
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: figure out was these guys are smart guys, right Japanese. Well,
• 55:38
  Speaker 2: if you see this digital thing that you're making, and
• 55:41
  Speaker 2: you see how it digitizes and works on the computer,
• 55:45
  Speaker 2: aren't you like afraid that this can be stolen? Right?
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: You know, I don't understand how they didn't get it.
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: I mean, they're making both things like, how do you
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: not understand this could be dangerous unless you put some
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: kind of protection and you know, next thing, you know,
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: napster happens and then that's that. But I just can't
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: figure out how they couldn't figure that out. But digital
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: is digital. It's convenient, you know, I don't want to
• 56:10
  Speaker 2: sound like some old guy. You know, go listen to
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: an album. But the truth is, if you listen to,
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: you know, a record album on a good sound system,
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: it sounds markedly different than the same album digitally. There's
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: more space, You feel the instruments more. It's just just
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: just the way.
• 56:27
  Speaker 1: This is the fact feel like you're in the room.
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: If you put them on a onto a computer and
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: look at the sound waves, it's one big block on
• 56:35
  Speaker 1: the newer music, on the newer music, and you look
• 56:37
  Speaker 1: at the other the older, the vinyl era. It's nice,
• 56:41
  Speaker 1: beautiful space and between up and down.
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: Right. Yeah, So it's just a fact. And you know
• 56:45
  Speaker 2: that they're selling vinyl. Vinyl's making a comeback. I don't
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: know if it's gonna you know, I don't know how
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: big it's going to make a comeback, but it's they
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: can't press it fast enough. I mean, if you want
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: to if you're putting out of you know, music now
• 56:58
  Speaker 2: and you want a Vinyl album, you got to tell
• 56:59
  Speaker 2: those guys six months in front. There's six months backed
• 57:01
  Speaker 2: up because there's so much vinyl being pressed. So I
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: think that's a good thing. I mean, look, we all
• 57:05
  Speaker 2: move forward, but I think that's healthy. Yeah. I would
• 57:08
  Speaker 2: hate for people to just forget about that. I'll tell
• 57:11
  Speaker 2: you something fascinating. I went to a friend of mine's house,
• 57:13
  Speaker 2: a guy named Josh Rosenthal, who worked with a Columbia's
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: a good friend of mine, and he's got his own
• 57:17
  Speaker 2: label called Tompkins Square, does a lot of acoustic guitar
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: music and stuff. He collects seventy eights. I went over
• 57:24
  Speaker 2: to his house and he goes to you want to
• 57:25
  Speaker 2: hear some seventy eights? I said, sure. Now I'm thinking, oh,
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: this is an old technology, right, you know, because it's
• 57:32
  Speaker 2: before thirty three and the third he put on Aretha Franklin.
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: He's a collector. He put on Aretha Franklin's demo and
• 57:39
  Speaker 2: it's across the room and I'm hearing it and it's
• 57:42
  Speaker 2: like she's singing to me in a chair. And I
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: looked at Josh and I went, what the hell. He goes, Yeah,
• 57:50
  Speaker 2: it's even better than thirty three, and at three it's
• 57:52
  Speaker 2: going faster. He goes, You don't understand. The seventy eight
• 57:56
  Speaker 2: is even more magical than the third. I didn't even
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: know this, You're right. I thought people just collect seventy
• 58:01
  Speaker 2: eighths because they're antiques. No, they sound amazing. I swear
• 58:06
  Speaker 2: Aretha Flanklin was in the room. I mean, oh my god.
• 58:09
  Speaker 2: So yeah, there is a magic to this. The black
• 58:13
  Speaker 2: vinyl we used to call it black magic because it
• 58:16
  Speaker 2: was yeah, and.
• 58:17
  Speaker 1: Also forced artists to put the best of the best
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: on side one inside two. Once CDs came in, you
• 58:23
  Speaker 1: could put more songs on there. But I don't know
• 58:25
  Speaker 1: if that's a great thing, because then sometimes you're putting
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: a lot of filler well, not only that.
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: But it's too much for the human brain. I remember
• 58:33
  Speaker 2: early on when Elvis Costello put out Get Happy. It
• 58:36
  Speaker 2: was a double set, and I was like, oh my god,
• 58:39
  Speaker 2: this is too soon. You can't. People can't. They're not
• 58:42
  Speaker 2: going to be able to just accumulate all of this.
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: You know, it could have. It would have been better
• 58:46
  Speaker 2: if that record would have come out down the line. Also,
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: you don't have to think as hard because you go, oh,
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: I'm not sure about this track. Yeah, I throw it
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: on there. But man, when you have twelve tracks, you're
• 58:56
  Speaker 2: going to get the best of the best of the best.
• 58:58
  Speaker 2: I remember talking on Leonard Cohen once they had the
• 59:00
  Speaker 2: greatest hits coming out and they put on a bonus track.
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: It was an outtake. It was really good, but it
• 59:06
  Speaker 2: was an outtake, and I said, Leonard, what's up with
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: the outtake? And he goes, I'm gonna tell you what's
• 59:11
  Speaker 2: up with that. He goes, it's an outtake, meaning I
• 59:15
  Speaker 2: didn't think it was good enough ever to put on
• 59:17
  Speaker 2: a record, so I didn't, and the label talked me
• 59:21
  Speaker 2: into putting it on because they're telling me people who
• 59:22
  Speaker 2: want to hear it because it's something different. Et cetera,
• 59:25
  Speaker 2: et cetera. He goes, but what they're calling bonus material, right,
• 59:29
  Speaker 2: A lot of these bands, right, Okay, here's an outtake, Well,
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: that'd be Some outtakes are kind of fun sometimes. I like,
• 59:34
  Speaker 2: there's certain albums that I have in CDs that I
• 59:37
  Speaker 2: have of different outtakes, or you hear a band, you know,
• 59:39
  Speaker 2: creating a song or whatever, and it can be interesting.
• 59:42
  Speaker 2: But his point, his overall point, was if I wanted
• 59:44
  Speaker 2: that on an album, it would have been on an album, right,
• 59:47
  Speaker 2: And so that means that every track that you hear
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: on a Leonard Cohen album is there for a reason
• 59:52
  Speaker 2: and all these other ones aren't. Right, So to your point, yes,
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: you know, it makes it a tighter more. Here's the
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: best of the best of the best, because we can
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 2: only fit you know, twelve.
• 1:00:03
  Speaker 1: Book on Rock Podcasts will be back after this, be
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 1: right back with a snack check.
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 2: Go go away.
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: Bob Dylan, let's go back to him again. There's a
• 1:00:13
  Speaker 1: quote about him. He told you people think they're meeting
• 1:00:16
  Speaker 1: my lyrics.
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 2: Yes, which is the truth, because it happened to me.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: If you grow up in the sixties, which I did,
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: and Bob Dylan shows up and you're in the middle
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: of the Vietnam War, and you there's a cultural revolution
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 2: about the way people are living life, the way they
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: feel about life, the way the way they the birth
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: control pills invented all of a sudden, there's sex before marriage.
• 1:00:41
  Speaker 2: But the whole world is changing, and this guy is
• 1:00:44
  Speaker 2: leading the charge, you know, with these songs. And as
• 1:00:48
  Speaker 2: a young you know, as a whole young generation, these
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: songs are going inside of us where where he's helping
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: shape our lives the times they are changing, you guess
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: what you are making that change, et cetera, et cetera.
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: So because he is such an amazing songwriter and the
• 1:01:04
  Speaker 2: songs are so heavy, and the songs come with so
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: much meaning, and it happens also with other artists too.
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: If the music's inside you first, when you meet Bob Dylan,
• 1:01:14
  Speaker 2: you you don't know who he is as a person.
• 1:01:16
  Speaker 2: You think what you when you if you meet Bob Dylan,
• 1:01:20
  Speaker 2: the first thing you look at when you see him
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 2: is the songs, like you can't help it, You just
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: can't help it. Every song you know came out of
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 2: this guy's head. I remember the first time I met him.
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 2: And because he's not really a big guy. He's like
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: a small stature. This is going to sound really funny
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: and probably sound stupid, but under honesty is the best policy.
• 1:01:41
  Speaker 2: I remember looking at Bob Dylan going he doesn't really
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 2: have like a big head. Its head is kind of small. Hot,
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 2: how did all that come? Right? I'm looking at him
• 1:01:53
  Speaker 2: right like, you know, I know that sounds like like
• 1:01:56
  Speaker 2: I'm an idiot, but I you know, I was like,
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 2: how do so? But but that's what would happen to me?
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: And then when you meet him, you think you're gonna
• 1:02:05
  Speaker 2: hear lyrics, so you it's just it's crazy, like you
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 2: could maybe say, oh, you know, Bob, I need to
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 2: talk to you about promoting your record, and maybe you
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: might think he's going to come at you with well rap,
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: you know, you don't need it with a man to
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: know which way the wind blue, you know, right, But
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: that's not him. He's a guy, right, And so he
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: would say to me, Paul. The trouble is people think
• 1:02:25
  Speaker 2: they're meeting the lyrics. I know that I wrote those songs.
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 2: I know how heavy they are, but those are the
• 1:02:30
  Speaker 2: songs I'm me like, I am like human being, and
• 1:02:33
  Speaker 2: it's different.
• 1:02:34
  Speaker 1: I thought it was interesting that he was bummed out
• 1:02:36
  Speaker 1: if his album sales weren't too good. You know, you know,
• 1:02:39
  Speaker 1: I just figured a guy like him to be like,
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: yeah whatever. Yeah, he felt like he was losing touch
• 1:02:44
  Speaker 1: with the audience made.
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 2: But I thought so too. No, we when we talked
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 2: about that, as you as you read in the book,
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: I mean, this was a very serious conversation. He says, well,
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 2: I don't understand why Fleetwood max sells six million records
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 2: and no matter what I do, I can only sell
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: a million records. Yeah, and I'm thinking, I'm thinking, why
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: does he why does he cares Bob Dylan? Yeah, you know,
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: it's like, don't you get it? You're a Bob Delan.
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 2: So I'm trying to tell him that, right, But I
• 1:03:10
  Speaker 2: try to explain him, said, Bob, come on, man, Fleetwood back.
• 1:03:13
  Speaker 2: These people craft hit singles. They're not writing twelve minutes,
• 1:03:17
  Speaker 2: Sat Eyed Lady of the Lone Land and Desolation. You're
• 1:03:20
  Speaker 2: a poet right there. They craft hit singles like they're
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: almost jingles, and they put hooks in them and they
• 1:03:24
  Speaker 2: over dub. In the six months in the studio, I go.
• 1:03:27
  Speaker 2: You know, he had a famous album where I said,
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 2: you you pull a mobile truck up to a dentist's
• 1:03:33
  Speaker 2: office and go in there, and two weeks later it's
• 1:03:35
  Speaker 2: roll that Bob and an album comes out. But it's great.
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 2: It's a great Bob Dylan album because you work fast.
• 1:03:40
  Speaker 2: You don't need all that stuff. You're not writing for
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 2: the radio. You're not writing hit singles, so you know
• 1:03:46
  Speaker 2: your music is a certain amount, is an acquired taste.
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 2: I mean, you're a poet, you know, so people you know,
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 2: they're hearing poetry. They're hearing very intellectual stuff. It's not dancey,
• 1:03:57
  Speaker 2: sing songy stuff. So he thought about it. As you know,
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 2: I wrote about this because I want of people understand
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: that even Bob Dylan is concerned about his career. Yeah,
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 2: you know, you know, I'm so great if I'm Bob Dylan.
• 1:04:08
  Speaker 2: How come I can't sell six million records? And I'm
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: trying to explain to him Bob's apples and oranges. But
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 2: then I said to him, but Bob, no matter, I
• 1:04:17
  Speaker 2: don't care what fleetwood Back writes, They'll never be Bob Dylan.
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: They're never gonna write blown in the Wind. They're never
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 2: gonna write subterranean homesick blues. They can't every artist I
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: know wishes they could write one song as good as
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: a Bob Dylan song, only one, and they'd be happy
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 2: and they all want that, right, And he understood that intellectually,
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 2: but he's still in his mind. Was like, but if
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: I'm this guy, Bob Dylan, I just maybe I should
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 2: sell you know, one million, five hundred thousand sometimes right.
• 1:04:47
  Speaker 2: He could was it was hard for him to to
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 2: understand it.
• 1:04:51
  Speaker 1: So I just can't believe he was thinking about pulling
• 1:04:54
  Speaker 1: the plug and saying I'm done.
• 1:04:55
  Speaker 2: Well. He had writer's block for yeah, it's well known,
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 2: and I didn't I didn't know what I should write
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 2: that that conversation I had with him in my book,
• 1:05:03
  Speaker 2: and then I decided to because I just thought, this
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 2: is real and people should know that even a guy
• 1:05:10
  Speaker 2: like Bob Dylan can go through, you know, writer's block
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: and have troubles. And so, you know, I writed my
• 1:05:15
  Speaker 2: book that he called up one day and said, hey, man,
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 2: you know, I say, Bob are doing I think I'm
• 1:05:21
  Speaker 2: going to quit? Man? I go what he goes, Yeah,
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 2: he says, I don't think people go to hear my
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: shiit anymore. I was like, what, I was like, Bob,
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: you know, I said, I want to say it's it's
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: after eighty five. He did a couple of cover records.
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: He did a couple of blues, you know, cover blues
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: albums that that he just had to get out of
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 2: a writer's block. He had to just make some music, right.
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 2: A friend of mine help him with that. But but
• 1:05:47
  Speaker 2: I was astonished because I said, Bob, well, first of all,
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 2: you know, don't look now, buddy, but you just are
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: like you're Bob Dylan. It's not a job like Bob
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: Dylan's not a job. You are Bob Dylan. So you
• 1:06:00
  Speaker 2: can't quit. It doesn't work that way. And I know,
• 1:06:03
  Speaker 2: you know, because I know this guy's life is that
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 2: I know, being Bob Dylan comes with a lot of ups,
• 1:06:07
  Speaker 2: a lot of downs, right, So I get the crazy
• 1:06:11
  Speaker 2: life that you live. But I don't think you have
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: a choice. And I think that you're probably just going
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 2: through a writer's block. I mean, Bob, every writer goes
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 2: through a writer's block. Think about you. How many songs
• 1:06:21
  Speaker 2: have you written? Hundreds hundreds hundreds of songs. They're all amazing.
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: Maybe your brain just needs a rest. I mean that's
• 1:06:30
  Speaker 2: what I think. I said, just because it happens, and
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: you're not used to it because you've been so prolific.
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: But I can't imagine it won't come back for a
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 2: guy like you, like you're just because you're like Picasso. Man,
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 2: sure you know, and it did ohr nine yeah yeah no,
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 2: And look the last two way this guy, how old
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 2: is this guy?
• 1:06:50
  Speaker 1: Out? Time?
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 2: Out of mind? And then rough and rowdy ways. I
• 1:06:52
  Speaker 2: mean the guy's gone stop.
• 1:06:55
  Speaker 1: The song he made on j JFK's assassination is still
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 1: mind blowing to me. That's murder most foul.
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: Yeah right, I mean he's the Shakespeare of our time.
• 1:07:07
  Speaker 1: I mean, he just is.
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 2: And uh, I know he's acquired taste for some people,
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 2: but and so I I just didn't know if that
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 2: was too personal to put in the book. And I went,
• 1:07:14
  Speaker 2: you know, and I just this is one. I just
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 2: gotta go right up to the line and just tell
• 1:07:18
  Speaker 2: this norm because it's it's it happened, and it's it's
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: well known. They did a writer's block, So.
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 1: Podcasts we'll be back after this, right, that's it.
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna be right outside those doors the next time
• 1:07:31
  Speaker 2: I have to come in here.
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 1: I'm cracking skulls. Let's talk about I got all these artists.
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: I want to ask you about my god, well, I
• 1:07:40
  Speaker 1: want to ask you about the Dylan and the Grateful
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 1: Dead album, because the key to that was the timing,
• 1:07:44
  Speaker 1: because you kind of knew, like, this album is not working,
• 1:07:47
  Speaker 1: it doesn't sound great. That that was the Bob Dylan
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: and Grateful Dead album which was panned, and but you
• 1:07:52
  Speaker 1: spun it into a gold record timing.
• 1:07:55
  Speaker 2: So well, it's it's timing, I think, you know, I don't.
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 2: I don't know how many more questions you some of these,
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 2: some of these we should let people hopefully get the book.
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: Get the book. We can skip over. Yeah, like let
• 1:08:05
  Speaker 1: me pay you know what.
• 1:08:06
  Speaker 2: Let's just I would just tell you by the Dylan
• 1:08:07
  Speaker 2: and the Dead it's worth reading because that's a complete
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 2: magic trick.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 2: Sometimes you as a promotion person, you're doing things organically.
• 1:08:15
  Speaker 2: There's a couple of things in the book that you
• 1:08:16
  Speaker 2: read about this and Tommy Conwell record going from five
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: to one. There's things that you can finesse the charts.
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 2: There things that you can do to help things along.
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 2: The Dylan and the Dead is I think really something
• 1:08:28
  Speaker 2: special because it's a magic trick. It's you know, I mean,
• 1:08:31
  Speaker 2: I was getting heavily into magic. I was working with
• 1:08:34
  Speaker 2: a you know, legendary, fantastic, great elderly magician, and he
• 1:08:40
  Speaker 2: taught me some things that I put into working this
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 2: Dylan and the Dead, And I think, if you get
• 1:08:46
  Speaker 2: the book and you read about it, I'm the guy
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 2: that wrote it. But even if I didn't write it,
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: whoever wrote it, it's it'll blow your fucking mind. I
• 1:08:55
  Speaker 2: don't mean to come up with some ego. God, that's
• 1:08:58
  Speaker 2: not who I am. I just proud of that one.
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 2: It was that it was like, okay, how do I
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 2: get this done? Kind of a deal.
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 1: So you know, let's talk about Pink Floyd, because we
• 1:09:06
  Speaker 1: did promise to talk about that number one, the Division
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: Bell album story, and then I do want to ask
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 1: about momentary labs of readers. But tell me about the
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: Pink Floyd Airship, biggest rock marketing event in history.
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: You sat in the book. Yes, yeah. When I do
• 1:09:23
  Speaker 2: big events, I like to take a page out of
• 1:09:26
  Speaker 2: a band's music or their live show so that there's
• 1:09:29
  Speaker 2: a there's an authenticity to it, so that it makes
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 2: sense for a fan to I'm going to do a
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 2: big event, it's going to be like look here, but
• 1:09:38
  Speaker 2: it needs to be attached in an authentic way to
• 1:09:41
  Speaker 2: the band. Early on in the book, you read about
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 2: the Blue Oyster calling the laser beam shot because they
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 2: were getting into laser technology. They were one of the
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 2: first bands to use that in their production, so that
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: made sense. When it comes to Pink Floyd, they were
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 2: very famous for their inflatables. Anybody who ever saw The
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 2: Animals two or subsequent two is that at a giant
• 1:10:00
  Speaker 2: pig that would float across the stadium. They're famous for inflatables.
• 1:10:04
  Speaker 2: They're famous for bigger than life, you know, for the
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 2: wall they had, the marry and nets. I mean, you're
• 1:10:08
  Speaker 2: talking Florida stealing giant puppets, and this is what they're
• 1:10:11
  Speaker 2: known for. In nineteen ninety four, I knew that they
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 2: would make a great album, and I knew that they
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 2: would do a successful tour. But at this time, now
• 1:10:21
  Speaker 2: I'm out of promotion. I mean, I'm now doing a
• 1:10:24
  Speaker 2: marketing department for Columbias, sort of creative marketing department, and
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 2: part of it is at these big events. So I'm thinking, Okay, Pink,
• 1:10:33
  Speaker 2: it's nineteen ninety four. There's a lot of young people
• 1:10:36
  Speaker 2: that are probably could be new fans, you know, for
• 1:10:39
  Speaker 2: Pink Floyd, right, how do we get these people involved?
• 1:10:42
  Speaker 2: How do we get them to know what a Pink
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: Floyd is? Also, I knew they're going to sell a
• 1:10:46
  Speaker 2: lot of music, but when you get to what is
• 1:10:49
  Speaker 2: beyond superstardom, super duperstardom. I wanted something beatlesque. When the
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 2: Beatles came to town, everybody knew they were in town.
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 2: Grandmother knew the Beatles were in town. I mean, she
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 2: knew what a beetle was. She may not know the music,
• 1:11:05
  Speaker 2: but you couldn't escape it. And so for Pink Floyd,
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: I was like, Okay, that's what I want. I want
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 2: something so big and so amazing that a whole city
• 1:11:16
  Speaker 2: knows that Pink Floyd has an album and a tour.
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 2: And I was sitting on the fourteenth floor of or
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 2: maybe it's twenty six, I can't know what for it was,
• 1:11:22
  Speaker 2: but high above Manhattan, and I look out my window.
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 2: I'm looking over the Hudson River and I see the
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 2: Budweiser blimp. It's huge. When blimp's becomes so after they
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 2: becomes so big, they call them airships. And this this giant, floating,
• 1:11:38
  Speaker 2: beautiful object. Maybe it's one thousand feet over the Hudson
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 2: and it's just cruising and I'm like, oh my god,
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 2: we need one of those. And I thought it would
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 2: be a pig. At first. I thought it, you know,
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 2: would be a flying pig. So I went to my
• 1:11:54
  Speaker 2: assistant at the time and I said, find out who
• 1:11:56
  Speaker 2: makes that and how do we get one and what
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 2: does it cost? And it turns out that there are
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 2: airship companies and they you know, the way the airships
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 2: work is that you rent them, you paint them. I mean,
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 2: Budweiser had its logos, and you know, met Life had
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 2: theirs and Goodyear has theirs and you can paint whatever
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 2: you want. I thought it was going to be a pig,
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: but Gilmore thought that was an old image. He wanted
• 1:12:18
  Speaker 2: something new. The Division Bell album was about communication. I
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 2: got on the phone with Storm thorguson, who's their graphic designer,
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 2: who legend well. I spent a lot of time in
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 2: the book. I want people to know Storm. I want
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 2: to know what he did. I want them to understand
• 1:12:33
  Speaker 2: how he worked. Because when you read about when you
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 2: read about these album covers, how they're created, that it's
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 2: mind blowing to read about how he does this stuff right,
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 2: So this is not computer generated. These album covers are
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 2: are works of art that he you know, that he photographed.
• 1:12:47
  Speaker 2: And he designed a psychedelic airship with a bunch of
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 2: faces facing each other in flames. And I mean this
• 1:12:56
  Speaker 2: thing looked like a creature of its own when it flew,
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 2: Like if you looked at it, you didn't even register
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 2: as a blimp right away. It registered as like something
• 1:13:05
  Speaker 2: from Jules Vern. You know. It's like, you know, it's
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 2: like a robar of the conquer, like, what the hell
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 2: is that thing flying in this guy? And it was gorgeous.
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 2: There's a great color picture of it in the book.
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 2: You can find it on YouTube. I mean there's a
• 1:13:17
  Speaker 2: video on YouTube of a little documentary about it. You'll
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 2: read in the book about how you had to talk
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 2: to President into it because it was a lot of money.
• 1:13:24
  Speaker 2: But it became such an event because it could float
• 1:13:30
  Speaker 2: from city to city a giant airship, psychedelic Pink Floyd,
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 2: even if you didn't look up and see it. I
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 2: put rock stations in the gondola and they broadcast live
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 2: from the Pink Floyd airship, so you could be and
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 2: I don't know Chicago. Hey, this is Lynn Bremer from XRT.
• 1:13:50
  Speaker 2: I'm broadcasting live from the Pink Floyd Airship and we're
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 2: going to be flying by the Sears Tower in about
• 1:13:55
  Speaker 2: thirty minutes if you want to wave to us as
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 2: we fly by. We gave rides to you know, with
• 1:14:00
  Speaker 2: land and you could win a ride in the Pink
• 1:14:02
  Speaker 2: Floyd Airship from your local record store. And when you
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 2: when you got in, you got a sunny Walkman. You
• 1:14:07
  Speaker 2: heard the new album The Division Bell. The thing takes off,
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: you know you're in heaven. The band loved it because
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: they'd all become pilots and they wanted to log time
• 1:14:15
  Speaker 2: in an airship, which I thought was fascinating. It was
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 2: so huge because it got so much coverage, not only newspapers,
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 2: not only radio, but television and yeah TV because the
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 2: traffic helicopters would be doing a traffic report. Oh here's
• 1:14:33
  Speaker 2: the so and so Highway, but you know it's having trouble.
• 1:14:36
  Speaker 2: But that's not you know the story today. This is
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 2: And then the camera swings around. They're flying right next
• 1:14:41
  Speaker 2: to this two hundred foot giant psychedelic flying machine that
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 2: says Pink Floyd on it, and the guy at the
• 1:14:48
  Speaker 2: television station, going what the heck is that all of
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 2: a sudden they're talking about Pink Floyd. I don't know,
• 1:14:52
  Speaker 2: it says Pink Floyd whatever. So it was bigger than
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 2: I ever. I knew it would be big, I didn't
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 2: know it would be that. It was so successful that
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 2: when the band went back to England, they built one
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: over there, a little bit of a smaller version, and
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 2: they made it into a fish. I don't know why,
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 2: but Storm wanted a fish, so I had a fish.
• 1:15:12
  Speaker 2: But it was it was very Floydian. You know, it's big,
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 2: it's psychedelic, it floats. It was miraculous.
• 1:15:22
  Speaker 1: Podcasts. We'll be back after this short pause.
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 2: Hold your breast for the dynamic.
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 1: Duo and real quickly. I was gonna ask about momentary
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 1: laps of Reason, and there's so many questions I could ask,
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 1: but I'll just stick to one because there is. You know,
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: I know that I know there was an album that
• 1:15:40
  Speaker 1: David Gilmore brought to Columbia and they said it doesn't
• 1:15:42
  Speaker 1: sound like Pink Floyd, you know, keep working on it,
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 1: and he did, and and that's a great story too.
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 1: But I guess sticking with Storm Thorgerson is the iron
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: beds on the beach right, That again not no no
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: trickery here, This is an actual poto.
• 1:15:58
  Speaker 2: If you look at the momentary reason now I'm covered,
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 2: you'll see beds on the beach. Most people think it's maybe,
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 2: you know, maybe it's five seven beds and the rest
• 1:16:06
  Speaker 2: it's you know, computer generated, you know CGI. But it's not.
• 1:16:10
  Speaker 2: It's seven hundred beds on a beach that you know,
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 2: in those days, everybody had a budget. Storm had a
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 2: big budget. If you'll notice when you look at a
• 1:16:20
  Speaker 2: momentary lapse of reason, it looks wet, looks damp. It's
• 1:16:24
  Speaker 2: damp because it had rained the day before they were
• 1:16:27
  Speaker 2: supposed to shoot it. The day before it rained, they
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 2: had to take seven hundred beds off a beach and
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 2: the next day put them back on it. So you know,
• 1:16:37
  Speaker 2: if you look at houses of the Holy led Zeppelin,
• 1:16:40
  Speaker 2: that's not CGI. Those are real children in costumes climbing
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 2: up a rock face somewhere in Ireland. And Storm would
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 2: create these events, photograph them. For anybody who's got an
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 2: album collection, I can tell you that probably eighty percent
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 2: of your album collection album covers are by Hypnosis, which
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 2: is Storm Thorguson and his partner Poe pal Who did
• 1:17:07
  Speaker 2: you know? They were just the foremost sought after people
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 2: for this kind of thing. And so I put Storm
• 1:17:13
  Speaker 2: in there because look, you read the book, it's a
• 1:17:17
  Speaker 2: deep dive into a lot. You to meet all these
• 1:17:19
  Speaker 2: people and you have conversations with him because I, thankfully
• 1:17:23
  Speaker 2: I have a photographic memory. So you're going to talk
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 2: to Mick Jagger and Keith Richards and David Gilmore, Nick Mason,
• 1:17:28
  Speaker 2: and I was Costello and Bruce Springsteen and Billy Joel
• 1:17:30
  Speaker 2: and on and on, albeit through my eyes. But I
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 2: wanted to write it. I just I wanted people to
• 1:17:36
  Speaker 2: have fun like I had fun. I wanted people to
• 1:17:39
  Speaker 2: see what I saw, no understand how things were in
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 2: behind the scenes and with these artists, And so I
• 1:17:46
  Speaker 2: put people like Storm in Otherwise no one, if no
• 1:17:49
  Speaker 2: one writes about it, no one ever is going to
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 2: know about Storm Thorgerson and his genius. He's a genius,
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 2: the genius a genius.
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 1: I mean, of all the legendary album covers I think funny,
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 1: the funniest is Steve Miller's Let Your Hair Down, and
• 1:18:03
  Speaker 1: it's a bald guy with a rabbit. You know a hair, yeah,
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 1: the top, Come on, you know.
• 1:18:09
  Speaker 2: This guy's you know, he's just so. I wanted all
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 2: this in there so that people could really be there
• 1:18:17
  Speaker 2: through the seventies, the eighties and nineties and know just
• 1:18:19
  Speaker 2: how beautiful this all was booked on rock podcasts.
• 1:18:23
  Speaker 1: We'll be back after this, well, we'll waiting. Yeah, this
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 1: book is packed with all stories and I could, I
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 1: could keep you here all night. So let's just finish
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 1: with a great little statistic that you put in the book.
• 1:18:38
  Speaker 1: You left Columbia in two thousand and three, and you
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 1: calculated that you had worked there for exactly thirty three
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 1: and a third years and made most of your living
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 1: promoting and marketing thirty three and a third LPs.
• 1:18:50
  Speaker 2: There you go, yes, and that blew my mind. I
• 1:18:54
  Speaker 2: could I left in March, which is a third of
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 2: a year, right, And I'm trying to think, geez, how
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 2: long did I work for this company? And I I
• 1:19:00
  Speaker 2: couldn't believe it myself. I was like, you know, you
• 1:19:02
  Speaker 2: start and then CDs come in, but most of my
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 2: living is thirty three and a third LPs. And I'm going,
• 1:19:07
  Speaker 2: wait a minute, this can't be right. And I went,
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 2: oh my god, it's right. I've worked here for exactly
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 2: thirty three and a thirty years. And I looked up.
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 2: I said, you know, I said, nobody's going to care,
• 1:19:17
  Speaker 2: you know, but if there's a bow tie on my career,
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 2: there you go. Thank you very much.
• 1:19:23
  Speaker 1: So obviously you're you're out promoting the book. What these
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: days are you partially retired? I see your guitar behind you.
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 2: There.
• 1:19:28
  Speaker 1: You still make Yeah.
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 2: No, I love to play. I still play in the band.
• 1:19:32
  Speaker 2: You know, we play every other week. I still play.
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 2: I don't think I'll ever retire. I just I took
• 1:19:37
  Speaker 2: years off to write this book. I mean, believe it
• 1:19:40
  Speaker 2: or not, it took it took six years to write
• 1:19:42
  Speaker 2: this book. Wow. And I'm talking a real job, like
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 2: get up every morning, two cups of coffee, write, rewrite,
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 2: throw things out, put stuff back four editors because I
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 2: wanted to make it great and it and it took
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 2: six years to make what what you've read as good
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 2: as it could be because I slaved over paragraph sentences, words,
• 1:20:05
  Speaker 2: this word isn't exactly right because I needed it to
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 2: be great. So that was a job. This last six
• 1:20:12
  Speaker 2: years has been a job to write it and work
• 1:20:14
  Speaker 2: with editors, to make what you see and put all
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 2: the pictures in there and everything.
• 1:20:18
  Speaker 1: Beautifully laid out. We were talking about that before we
• 1:20:20
  Speaker 1: started recording.
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 2: So now you know, my job is to promote the book,
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 2: which is something I'm comfortable with because you know, I
• 1:20:26
  Speaker 2: did this for other people for my whole life. I
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 2: know how to do this. So this whole year, the
• 1:20:31
  Speaker 2: way this book's going, this book's gone bonkers. I mean,
• 1:20:34
  Speaker 2: I'll be promoting this book all year, and in England
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 2: it's doing quite well also, so I'll be working promoting
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 2: this book all this. You're probably into the next because
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 2: of how how well it's being received, and then after that,
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 2: you know, honestly, I think there's a television series in here.
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 2: I don't even know if it has to be the book.
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 2: I mean, honestly, with all these characters, it could be
• 1:20:55
  Speaker 2: a sitcom. And you can't make these characters up. They're
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 2: hysterical as you read, right, So that'll probably be my
• 1:21:01
  Speaker 2: next job. But I don't Honestly, I'm not the retiring kind.
• 1:21:05
  Speaker 2: I'm like, I'm a guy that has to do stuff
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 2: all the time. I have a lot of I have
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 2: a lot of wonderful hobbies. I play guitar at the time.
• 1:21:12
  Speaker 2: I do close up magic. I'm a surfer. I mean,
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 2: there's a lot that I do. But I can't just
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 2: do that like it's not that's fun, that's not like real.
• 1:21:20
  Speaker 2: I'm just one of these people that has to work
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 2: doing something you like to do. Yeah, so no, I'll
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 2: just keep going until, you know, maybe one day I'll just,
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 2: you know, maybe I should sit around and just play
• 1:21:31
  Speaker 2: with these grandkids.
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 1: I don't know, you know, yeah, you know, well, I
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 1: appreciate you coming on to talk about just some of
• 1:21:38
  Speaker 1: the stories in this book. There's so many of them.
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 1: Gliders over Hollywood, airships, airplane, the art of rock promotion.
• 1:21:43
  Speaker 1: It's out now. You can find out wherever books are sold,
• 1:21:45
  Speaker 1: and you can look forward at your nearest bookstore, independent
• 1:21:48
  Speaker 1: bookstores if you got one nearby, look for one there
• 1:21:50
  Speaker 1: and ask them to get a copy. If they don't
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 1: have it bookedwn rock dot com. You can search for
• 1:21:55
  Speaker 1: your nearest bookstore, and then where can people find you online? Paul.
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 2: The best thing to do is real, I've got that
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 2: big on socials, you know, but if you want to
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: know what's happening or you know, I have a website
• 1:22:07
  Speaker 2: now gliders over Hollywood dot Com. It would just keep
• 1:22:10
  Speaker 2: you up to date on if I'm going to be
• 1:22:12
  Speaker 2: somewhere doing a book signing or what have you. Eventually
• 1:22:16
  Speaker 2: I have to get on socials telling me I have to,
• 1:22:18
  Speaker 2: so they're going to make me. But if you just
• 1:22:21
  Speaker 2: go to gliders over Hollywood dot com, you can read
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 2: about the book and anything that's worth seeing there. You know,
• 1:22:28
  Speaker 2: I'm sure when you post this, I'll put you right
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 2: up there.
• 1:22:32
  Speaker 1: So cool. Go yeah, I'll put a link in the
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 1: show notes. People can get right onto your website from there.
• 1:22:36
  Speaker 1: Paul Rappaport, thanks so much.
• 1:22:38
  Speaker 2: Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate it. Thank you.
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 2: That's it.
• 1:22:51
  Speaker 1: It's in the books.