Episode 691 - Todd Rundgren

All right, let's do this. How are you? What the fuckers? What the fuck buddies?

What the fuck sticks? What the fuck wads? What's happening? What the fuck it?

Alex? I'm Mark Maron. This is WTF my podcast. Thanks for coming by.

Thanks for sticking me in your head Thank you for taking me in wherever you may be in a cave under the ground Todd Rungren is on the show today Todd Rungren who I've known all my life just by virtue of seeing his albums my entire life I know his face and I know I can identify him all my life I think since I I've been cognizant of looking at records I've known Todd Rungren's face and I don't know that I really connected him with his music until you know not long ago Because how did I get to it? Rungren is one of these guys that look I know he's a genius I know he's made a million fucking records. They just released a box set last month of all the Bearsville records He's also on tour. He's taking a tour making a tour doing a tour all over the country in Canada You can go to Todd Rungren calm to find out where he's playing But it was one of those situations where and this has happened a lot on the show most people whether you may know a couple of Todd's hits but a lot of you are sort of hung up Maybe not you but I'm sure you've heard that lived Tyler grew up with him as a father basically because Todd was with the Liz mother BB Bewill I believe it's her name Steve Tyler kind of checked out on that front I guess I don't even know the story but I will tell you right now I wasn't gonna talk to Todd Rungren about that you can go find that kind of cultural Detroitus dialogue elsewhere.

I want to talk about the genius I wanted to learn because I get very intimidated I don't know if some of you know this but you know, I don't have the power to book anybody I want I like when you assume I do but I don't some people aren't available Sometimes you got to find a time window some people don't want to and then some people are offered some people are Are presented that want to do the show and Todd Rungren was one of those people and we hadn't booked and I rescheduled it Or kind of blew it off or pushed it up a bit because I felt insecure about my knowledge of Todd Rungren when you're looking at somebody That's got a career that spans you know almost 50 years With his own music and with production and with and knowing that there are full-on Todd Rungren nerds out there I that's what always intimidates me when I I have the opportunity to interview somebody with a massive career is that I just assume You know people are gonna be out there going no, how could you not talk about that time? He broke his toe in Woodstock because he was running from an angry guitar player, you know, I made that up Why didn't you talk about the two notes that he took out of the thing like I have a series of people I make up in my head And there's always the one voice One of the guys I make up in my head in relation to anybody I talked to is the guy that knows everything about him even the most esoteric nuance stuff and that they're just waiting to call me out Didn't do a good job didn't bring up the soundtrack for Pee-Wee's Playhouse. I didn't know that Yeah, you should have done some research. I don't know Maybe I just want to talk to the guy and learn about him go experience it myself So that's what I do when I have somebody that has a career spanning the amount of time that Todd has is that that means I have to enter the world You know aggressively and and film I had up and try to understand Because I wasn't a lifelong fan that's sort of a hard time with his music because it didn't necessarily resonate with me But you know you listen to some of the records you know this guy's definitely touched You know he's definitely a genius, but you might not be my genius But that doesn't mean I'm not interested so while I gather what I know what I can know from listening to the records and from tidbits here and there And I relied on a friend to the show mr.

Paul Myers who wrote a pretty thorough book about Todd in the studio It's called a wizard a true star Todd Rungren in the studio. It is the book on Todd Rungren's studio work So I emailed Paul and I'm like dude Where do I start man? So he got me on it and the first time that I became sort of fascinated with Todd and I picked up one of his records I used records for was because the sales brothers Hunt and Tony hunt who I've interviewed who were both the offspring of super sales But Hunt is one of the great drummers one of the great rock drummers as is brother one of the great rock basses played a bit with Todd and with Iggy pop on lust for life and with Bowie in the tin machine And that and when I talked to hunt he said that he was playing with Todd when he was 18 years old 17 years old So I became sort of fascinated with Todd then I was in those records and I did what I could but but I wanted to I wanted to talk to him And I wanted to learn from him and just engage in that it's always amazing to me that when I'm insecure about an interview And that usually happens when they have amazingly long careers and are incredibly prolific or have created a lot of great stuff That I just know that I'm not I'm gonna miss something so I overcompensate and I talked for a really long time And I really learned some stuff So that's a that's coming up here You're gonna hear me talk to the wizard himself Todd Rungren who I great stories and a lot of stuff That you know in terms of the history of music and the music that I that I do listen to and enjoy that I didn't know and and was It was great and and he's um he's got opinions man the buzz so Let me just loop you in been having some trouble with the buzz my my my phone oh When I talk about this, it's so stupid But it's you know it's I get obsessed with this stuff because I don't want to deal with my you know pending mortality and The terror of meaninglessness so I'm locked into the buzz situation I talked about building a Faraday box which is an insulated cage usually with grounded copper or something There's a lot of different variations on it that you prove you put over the piece of equipment or overall your equipment So it'll fight off these these intrusive electromagnetic waves From cell towers. Well, here's here's the here's the crux here's the rub here's what I found out I did all the troubleshooting I couldn't I thought that now I'd limited it to the wires because I brought my receiver down the hall To Brian's office and we plugged it in there got no buzz Then I brought his amplifier phone I'll fire down to my office and the buzz was there so that means the buzz was on four different pieces of equipment that I rotated out and in In my office so I figure got to be the plugs got to be the electrical system now There's this mysterious door down the hallway.

That's why keep out don't open It's got a card lock on it and all I know is that there's AT&T equipment in there But I know what that meant you know I thought there was I'd heard there was an AT&T antenna on top of the building but I thought that was for the building wife I wasn't thinking So what happens what I learned is that it's not a Wi-Fi antenna AT&T actually rents space in that building Both in that hallway and on the roof for a fucking cell tower There's a fucking cell tower on the roof of my building and what I learned from the electrician who I had come over all of the Technological and mechanical infrastructure of the cell tower is situated behind a fake brick wall directly on top of my office So I am being bathed with waves all the time and no piece of equipment can stand up to the pummeling of these waves No, Fono preamp is insulated enough to not share with me and whoever's listening the horrible frequency Of people making calls everywhere in this area So what do I do? I don't fucking know I talked to my landlord. She don't want the thing there anymore I got to talk to AT&T some guy said you know just the file a complaint with the FCC man They're not allowed to interfere with your shit and then then the other side of it is I've got people that say well Maybe you should just listen to you know your your iPod or your phone and just plug it in and get a jam box or something It's like no no, I don't want to lay down Because corporate intrusion is causing me a slight inconvenience that I find annoying It's my right To have freedom to listen to my records and not just bow down the automobile sized Infrastructure of fucking Wi-Fi network on top directly on top and what's it doing to my brain? I don't know probably not that maybe I don't know I don't know I thought it was really peaceful in there Maybe that's got to do it Maybe I shouldn't look at give to horse in the mouth is that how that saying goes anyway?

All I can foresee is that it may be a day being alive story David and Goliath not the clay nation and I of course would play the part of David who you know only armed with a certain amount of disappointment and anger is going to fight the waves that run the world What else do I got to tell you real quick? Oh Daniel Klaus? You want a huge fan of you may know him from the eight ball comic books or ghost world the comic graphic novel or you know Several other great pieces of comic arts has released a book called patience This is new graphic novel which I enjoy the great deal and we're going to have him on the show soon We're gonna put it up soon But I just wanted to tell you that patience the new graphic novel by Daniel Klaus is out and it's great Okay, so now watch me learn don't watch me listen to me learn from a true wizard Todd Rungren Todd Rungren's here you're here at the garage. Where were you today?

Well, I got in very early this morning from Kawhi where I live you wouldn't Kawhi the whole time The time I can live there. Yeah, we've been having that discussion all day How much time I've been spending on the road with your manager you've been having that discussion? Yeah, and does that discussion is that like how much fucking more dates can I do or is it like I got to keep doing dates? No, it's how much less dates can I do more or less?

I mean when you let me go out you want to spend at least some time at home. No, absolutely. I've gone there It's the only place in why I've been I've been there like two or three times Wow cuz you know I meet people all the time they say I've been to Oahu. I've been to Maui.

Nope never been only Kawhi for a honeymoon or something like that I've taken several different three different women there Flowing I don't know what it is. I just don't know where to go I'm a sort of an anxious guy and I think I went there with the first wife not for a honeymoon but for vacation We also take him with and I'm like this is gonna be the go-to place I thought it might be with her for the rest of time I can pan out that way. What where did you stay the first time the first time was the South and poo that was the mistake Yeah, that's right. So that's like a hotel road exactly horrible But you know it was okay.

We got a condo and then the second time on my north side North Shore So I went up there now. What was the date of your first visit? Oh boy 96 seven maybe oh gosh So you never had the opportunity to stay at the cocoa palms. No, no, no What how long have you been there?

Well, I've been going to the island since 70 the mid 70s was that the one that there's still burned remains of up towards the north shore There's like a hotel there. I've seen like two or three times where it's just it looks like well It's on the way to North Shore. That's the cocoa palms on the left. Yeah, that was where blue Hawaii was filmed No shit with Elvis.

So is that the one that's got like a haunted house kind of like well? No, no It's full of black moss and you'll die if you go it's like a nut. It's worse than haunted It's like a rotten shell, right? But it's there yeah, they keep saying they're gonna rebuild it There's another consortium says they're gonna rebuild it Mm-hmm.

It'll never be what it used to be because it had just the perfect amount of tack yeah to it But it was like everything you thought about because you saw blue Hawaii Yeah, and it was everything you thought about yeah when you went to the island right you're eating lunch in the La Nye While birds come you know and eat out of your hands and it's right next to like the canal full of Cois moving around and every evening they have you know a torch lighting ceremony a pig is roasted Oh, yeah, and the guys in the parreos are rowing their little canoes down the canals and everything and it's just like and if you ever saw blue Hawaii Oh, that is kind of reenacted in there right right and gone. It's gone That was the first place that I stayed the only place I ever stayed until 1993 hurricane and Nikki came through and the eye of the hurricane 200 mile an hour winds went right over the island leveled it totally leveled it So you were there maybe three years three or four years after that wow happened, you know It's a place to a real haircut well I mean so but you've been going there since the 70s. Yeah, what the hell was down there in the 70s nothing I was getting away from an evil girlfriend. Oh, yeah, well, so you took your girls there you ran away I went there to just get a little respite as far away as I've you know I was living in New York at the time in the city.

So what are we talking 71 72 about then 73 74 somebody suggested? You know why don't you know go get out? Oh, she's gonna kill you. Oh well.

No that go all that came much later and I always killed her so Where's that song? Some things are not meant for publication and really yet to yeah, well, you know, there's always time You know that you know that the deep dark record that's when you can't quite sing anymore. That's when you do that one Where's yeah when I start to sound like where's just wisdom coming out? Yeah, Johnny.

Yeah, right right. Yeah, you're called Reuben up and argue with him about it Here's a deal with me and you Is that why am I here? Come I did want to come but I was surprised to be invited to come well the weird thing is like I've spent my whole life You know saying like you know, I got to get into Todd Rungren. How do I start?

There seems like a lot here. Yeah, how do I start? You know and then like a few years ago I started and I obviously it's very difficult because you continue to put out stuff But that happens and then in a panic when I knew you were coming I DM'd Paul Myers and my dude what it which ones what am I? Well, he's pretty authoritative right well He wrote the biography the well he wrote the biography and he wrote the story of my productions Yeah, essentially was you know each chapter was about a particular record right that got made and interviewed me and interviewed the Musicians who were involved in the record anybody else those are records stuff.

So yeah, it's pretty much it's not gossipy Right, it's I mean if there were any significant, you know things going on those were certainly related But otherwise it was mostly an insight into the process right well the thing is blew me away Is that because I've gotten into vinyl again, right? So I've got I've got the the ballad of Todd Rungren. I've got that one on wow nobody has that really that was the that was kind of The Lost album it was my second album right right yeah first album came out on what was originally Ampex records Yeah, what happened? Wow, what is well?

I'm a grossman, you know who was like the uber manager? Let's talk about that. Let's go. Let's go into in sequence then if we're gonna go like Yeah, exactly so so what happened was you know I started getting into psych rock so then somebody hips me to NAS and then I'm listening to NAS and I'm like Oh shit, that's Todd Rungren.

He's in NAS so how old were you when NAS was in existence? I was 18 when we put the band together and how and where were you from? Where did that half Philadelphia? So you're fairly you're Philly guy grew up in Philly.

I did not grow up in Philly I grew up in West Park, which was in Upper Darby the Westerly suburb of Philadelphia and I went to Upper Darby High School Yeah, other notable graduates were Jim Croci and Tina Fey. Did you know Jim Croci? Oh, sorry. Oh, sorry.

He graduated for I yeah Was there and So anyway, but when you were so that we're talking to mid 60s. You're in high school. Yeah, I graduated in 66 graduated air quotes in 66 So what's going on music? We in Philly?

That was like an R&B town, right? Well, we were sort of an R&B town because we you know, we're right on the Mason Dixon line, right? And so like anything above the Mason Dixon line, that's the north That's the Yankees and as you move below that it gets more questionable until you get into the deep south Right and in the deep south records by black people were called race records Yeah, and they only got played on really low wattage stations, you know and in rural areas But in Philadelphia right on that sort of cusp and we had a DJ his name was Jerry Blavitt Yeah, and he played nothing but R&B records. Yeah, you know, everybody else is playing white music, you know, and Jerry Blavitt the Jewish guy Yeah, he's a gator with the heater.

Yeah, he's waiting for black records He plays all the black records. He's still alive and he's still DJing. Have you a have you met with him and thanked him? Never met him and never got to thank him.

But he's done this time. There's time. So is that what you were taking in? Was that your thing?

Well, when we were growing up. Yeah, that was you know a thing that a lot of other areas didn't get They didn't get that sort of R&B music. So that influence, you know, that's in me It's in Darryl Hall. It's in you know a bunch of people who come out of Philadelphia And what when did you start like what kind of childhood were you and what your dad do?

My dad was an engineer. He worked for DuPont. Oh, really and in Philadelphia. Yeah, I had a big plant there.

Yeah quite guy Umm Stern guy. Yeah. Well, he didn't really have a father figure So his father figure was Jackie Gleason on the honeymooners a child was couple, you know He never really kind of figured out how to deal with the kids. How many were there?

Four. Oh my god He knew how to make them. Yeah, but managing them was a different story. Are you the oldest on the oldest?

Yeah. Oh my god Everybody's still okay. They're still there. We're never okay But they're still in the outside of Philly and stuff still in yeah in the Philadelphia area But when did you start like here's here's the thing I have when I listen to you as much of the catalog is I can fit in my head Is that it becomes sort of difficult to define?

You know what you do because you're singular and I guess that's a good problem to have but like I don't know Like I don't even know what to call it I know that you've spawned a lot of like when you say Oh no, it's a Daryl Hall. Yeah, it feels to me that like without you there'd be no him. Nah, okay I worked on their on Hollen Oates third album. Okay, and up until their third album through the third album Yeah, they're a pretty eclectic band.

Yeah, you know, you think of them now is you know those kind of white blue-eyed soul Yeah, hit after hit after hit right before that. They were much more sort of they were still trying to figure out You know all what they wanted to do out of all the possibilities So their first album which was called Whole Oats almost had like an acoustic sound to it second one called the band and luncheon It had this whole variety of songs and you listen to the title song you wouldn't you wouldn't even know who was right singing it You know, right so no real identity as well No, it's just so different from what people now associate with right and they were still kind of in that mode when we did war babies But at that point, you know, Daryl was starting to think a little more conceptually, you know, he wanted to capture an era He also wanted to push the envelope, you know to experiment a little bit more David Bowie was a big influence, you know Because he was doing all of this kind of Hard to explain that huh? Yeah, it's hard to explain what area we talking well We're thinking you know, it's a little after Ziggy startup. Okay, you know, it's past the science fiction thing You know, right.

Did he have an influence on you as well? I I always thought he was an interesting artist but I never Except for particular things that he did right I never got into his process which was essentially Just trying to stay on the tip of whatever's hip right or a little ahead of it possible a little ahead of it as possible But never really you never write songs about yourself right songs about things that sometimes don't even make any sense sure You know, yeah, they use this process of him and you know use this process sometimes or they just pull clippings of books and magazines out of a hat, you know, that would be the next line in the lyric, right? You know, because lyrics are so hard to write but also if you're the kind of artist who is constantly building artifice in other words You yourself are the art piece right in a way. Yeah, you don't write songs about your real self right You're creating us, you know, an image for people and you write songs about that image Well you on the other hand I imagine but I've gotten this wrong with songwriters before but you I When I was in your music especially the earlier stuff, it seems very heavy-hearted and And and and a little painful are you writing about yourself?

Oh throughout well, you know early years, you know, my first three albums I was learning how to be a songwriter, right? And I was learning how to sing I already knew kind of how to be a producer Well, how okay, let's get back to that. When did you start playing all these instruments? Well, we started playing other instruments like in the NAS, but what was your first way as a kid?

What'd you start on? I started on well if you want to go way back why not well They you know in those days they offered music lessons in school, right? You know, it wasn't like they had a you know great music department But people will go around from school to school Yeah, and they had you could rent an instrument and someone would come and give you some lessons on that instrument Yeah, ideally to teach you how to read music as well, right? And the first instrument that I actually seriously tried to play was a flute really?

Yeah, your choice I just like the sound of it, you know, my dad didn't like a lot of pop music in the house So we heard a whole lot of symphonic music all the time. Yeah, so did you like it? I loved it. Yeah, you can hear that in all the records.

Yeah, I love it. I love all that stuff. I love You know, I love a band like Melt Banana, you know, it's like it was that good. Oh, it's a Japanese trio that find yourself some Melt Banana, right?

I'll write it down. I'll write it down. I make note. They got like a girl singer, a guy guitar player with a bunch of whole bunch of pedals.

Yeah, and a drummer, right? And they just torture everything out of their instruments that they can during these performances, you know, you can't believe how much they are better What this girl is doing to her voice and how crazy the drummer is he's like Keith's moon times two, you know? And the guitar player is doing everything possible, you know with pedals and yeah, yeah And switches and stuff like that and creating these loops on the fly and it's just it's amazing and it makes no sense and that's good Yeah, it's not pop music, but it's no but it's like You know part of music has always been we've gone through this entire illusory period since Edison discovered how to record sound Yeah, illusory in what sense well before that you couldn't hear music unless somebody played it for you, right? Yeah, we're coming over.

Yeah now we got able to capture the performance the sound of the performance right, you know And we've really perfected that over the hundred years or so, you know hundred or more years too perfect sometimes Whatever, but yeah people have lost the idea the difference between like a performance which is always there imagine all the technology disappears, right? Yeah tomorrow. Yeah, what are musicians going back to doing they're gonna learn to get better at playing right right stuff like that So that's that's the underlayer that was always there this whole thing about you know the recorded artifact right has not really come into full Perspective yet, right? I mean just because this you know there is a performance and sometimes it is an even performance right it's a Construction of sound right what you've done a lot of which I do yeah, but you have to perform live clearly Yes, and I also enjoy performing live You know and I realized that that's if you Stop doing that you take most of the joy out of making the music Uh-huh yeah, that makes you know and it doesn't mean you can't perform in the studio But that's the hardest part of all because you don't have an audience there right and when you're producing records for other people It's the hardest thing to get in their head, you know, right don't look at that as a microphone You know what do you look at it that you're supposed to be the ear of the listener.

Oh really yeah, so you start on flute Then play that for a while Yeah, my sister decided she would take clarinet lessons But she sucked and I got better out of the she did not know how to play like two strangers on the shore on the clarinet and I chuffed my dad No, that's when they started to realize that maybe I had some musical talent Uh-huh so they did buy me the guitar lessons that I really wanted uh-huh when the ventures came out with walk don't run Right of course yeah, and I said oh guitar Yeah, I want to do now so then you get to guitar and you're jamming and it's the 60s and it's time Yeah, eventually I get you know a real guitar actually I had you know crappy e-guitars until but I did have a band I was a little bit while I was still in high school actually made some covers Where's your pocket change not all covers? Yeah, you know all covers But that was when we also started to incorporate a lot of blues into what we were doing. Did you like playing blues? I did I like listening to it and playing it, you know And blues guys well in those days of course there were the The old masters Sonny boy Williams and of course and muddy yet wolf Oh, oh junior wells.

Yeah, and buddy guy and buddy guy. Well as long as guitar chord. Yeah, but I'm listening to that Butterfield band yeah, but I was yeah, but I feel band I think they're gonna come out 65 I'm like that and then we say so yeah white guys. Yeah playing the blues all right.

Yeah, just before the English guys Yeah, no the English guys had already done that oh they had no see the whole thing was in In England they had this merchant seaman tradition You know and in a lot of towns especially place like Liverpool stuff like that Merchant seaman would just go back and forth to mobile right you know to the port cities Yeah, south yeah go out and buy like singles and the little record shops Yeah, yeah and bring back all this blues music to England none of it was getting played in America Yeah, I know I talked to may all about that you have to wait for it Like you know you'd have to wait till the one guy who got those records got those exactly you know some merchant seaman Can't have a load of all the kids home will love this right a bunch of singles I'll come back to Liverpool, you know, and then suddenly all those kids are playing this music and we don't find out about it Tell the Yardbirds play on a man, right? Yeah, it's right down. It's right a couple states down from you exactly just wasn't a Dixieland you know it's so weird to think about that sort of like the spice trade that you know like you know the world didn't Certain places didn't have cinnamon until somebody brought it over on a boat But you don't think about the blues being like that that was like well Yeah, well, that's the interesting part about it is we're so close and yet had to go so far, you know to get back So how did how many records did you do at the NAS? We did in actuality to we did a W album and we did what was intended to be a double album but the label was not happy with the double album concept So one album came out and then after that sort of a leftovers album came out and you were writing all the songs pretty much Yeah, and that was part of the problem.

Why I? I suddenly got smitten by Laura Nero. Yeah, Eli in the 13th confession came out and it's only like Yeah rock my world and I think you're way thinking didn't it? Yeah about music you know And up until that you're writing for the group you're in this was like holy crap What about it?

This girl's like 19 years old. Yeah, you know and she is writing and singing like Yeah, you know she was 50. Yeah, and Yeah, she was like you know a star overnight But she didn't know how to manage her career very well, right? But kind of what happened while I was still in the NAS I arranged for got my manager to arrange for me to meet her Was it an Albert Grossman?

Yeah, was it? No, it wasn't right the manager of the NAS okay, and I was that guy doing yeah, but So you meet Lauren here, so I meet Lauren here. I go up to her apartment, which is in the Dakota really yeah, and She makes tuna fish casseroles. They only think she knows how to make because she's a kid in a way Still pretty young.

Yeah, it's the name of her publishing company tuna fish music Yeah, yeah, I think it's a tuna fish casserole. Yeah, I was just really nervous the whole time. So what were you expecting out of this encounter? Nothing.

I just wanted to meet her. Yeah, maybe get some you know reflected right inspiration or whatever figure out how she did what she did And did you she called me like a week or two later to come visit her again? Yeah, so I went to visit her and she said Would you like to be my band leader and then as a just And I'm thinking geez, I'd love to be your band leader, but I have to do this thing with this band But the upshot was I started writing all these Laura Nero songs for her or for you know All these Laura Nero songs That's just you know in the end that just didn't mix well with our original No, I started writing everything on the piano before that I wrote most everything on the guitar right and I mean even hello What's me the first song ever wrote was written on a guitar before I ever figured out a plane on the piano yeah, so Yeah, it just did The other guy sort of like what the fuck is this? What are we doing?

Where's the rock and roll man? So we got to rock them up a little bit more, but they were not enthusiastic Well, what was it because you have a very specific sound there are certain progressions that you like to use or certain chords you like to use and What was it about and I imagine that all tracks back to that moment with Laura Nero that there was a there was a tone to it What was it essentially that changed for you in that moment what opened up well In a broader sense, you know, it was the personal nature the music right you know is that you know She was really sort of pouring out her soul every performance and that was Something that was sort of rare generally yeah in music. Yeah, you know most artists I think of artists as being you know into General categories. Yeah one is that they are revelatory, you know in other words you get the idea that they're really singing They really believe what they're singing.

Yeah, you know and the others are like up the guitar Which it was like David Bowie, you know somebody was like you creating an image You know you don't want that image to crack so you can't be revealing too much of something that isn't that image right? But at some point you you entered a phase of stagecraft that certainly was large Well, yeah, that you could call that maybe even a third category, which is you know a I'm showing too much of myself I better put on to my name. No, it isn't no it isn't It's when you start thinking in actual theatrical terms and you write for that moment Okay, you write for the stage right right, you know like you're writing a musical or something like that And so you're trying to figure out what's the unifying theme here? There is one that's how Concept albums and the tours that follow them are built.

It's like a theater piece. I'm exactly you know is there a unifying theme First of all, you know, you play off of doesn't involve costumes. Yeah, it doesn't involve special effects Yeah, things like that. You know, we could totally dove into that when we could afford it So it went still will but those those first records.

Did you see them as as whole pieces all of them? No, I mean my very first record was a total Pestiche I just was curious about how so run and the one I have the runt the bow of Todd run grinn and I guess like the album after that Was something that was a big record that was like to wreck double record That was a double album had like three hit singles off of it and it was like a that was a concept record wasn't it? Well, the only concept initially was that I was going to play all the instruments myself Which I had not previously attempted to do but that would that take a two years to make no No, then you played all of them night played well except for the last side and the last side Those are all live tracks like there's something anything everyone's familiar with that was a live session that I called in the morning We did three songs that day. Yeah Why why'd you decide to do that just run as neem or no?

I had already gone over the single album limit Yeah, I already had an album and a half. I thought I want to do four sides. Yeah, yeah, oh just me or do I want to do something That's like oh the good old days right good old days being like before you ever got a record contract Right, you got demo time in a label studio in those days There were those very few independent studios Yeah, you wanted to demo for a label you had to go into their studio So you had to do this over and over and over again So you got signed but you got like an hour maybe even less half hour got an hour with an engineer record as many songs as you can in an hour And you do them all live right there's no overdubbing. No, no, we don't overdub you're only going to two track anyway Yeah, that's a more exciting isn't it in a way?

Yes, it brings a whole lot more attention to it. Yeah, yeah And that in a way makes can make a better record and hello it's huge huge song it did become huge It was like the second version of it though, right? Because the flip side of open my eyes of the first nast single was hello. It's me done at a dirty pace With me playing vibes instead of guitar Wow, and that's a whole different song a whole other thing Yeah, and did that song did you feel that like the lowest me that became the huge hit was that?

Were you did you feel like you defined a sound at that point? No, it was non-plussed, you know What were the other hits they were on the other side? I saw the light was the first hit right hello, it's me and I think it wouldn't have made any difference was a lesser hit Right, but it was a big record. So now you was a great record as a matter of fact It opened a whole lot of very interesting doors for me Is that where gross one comes in all of my solo albums are under the Grossman regime and he was a character right that guy Oh, yeah, he looked like Ben Franklin right and he managed who he managed doing bias the band Well, he managed like every significant significant folk act at one point because he had a club in Chicago called the Gatorhorn He was originally a restaurateur, but he cited he would put on these folk acts and any time he saw somebody like he signed them Off to a management contract right which they never got out of ever yeah, but Yeah, by the time I met him The NAS there were there was a partner in the management.

Yeah, like a junior partner He went on to work without the Grossman right and after the NAS broke up. I was on the street I was living with clothes years in the West Village People that I used to buy clothes from when I was in the net. Yeah, I wound up living with them I designed lights in a club. I was doing anything you know you're like 22 less.

Yeah, yeah, no that would be about 20. Yeah, and This guy approached me said, you know, like I watch you do the production and the mixing on the last now I mean you think you might have some talent here So come to the Grossman organization and help us modernize all these folk acts Oh, so that was your job. I started putting me, you know with the Union Sylvia and James Cotton and you know Butterfield band and stuff like that You know just in the booth. Yeah, yeah, essentially, you know, I did Jesse Winchester Elmo did stage right I did wow stage right though.

That's just in house stuff. Did you know guys the band? Well, I was a really you know Those guys were very very experienced. Yeah, and I was not right, you know They had already been like the Hawks running on the hot city And you know played probably like forever doing that.

What impressive when you look down where you like always shit No, I was not okay, I mean, you know, I think we got along they were sort of like, you know They found me, you know, I'm using in certain ways, but also I got things done Yeah, I exuded a certain confidence about what I was doing which always sells Yeah, and did you find did you did you when you listen to that record? Can you identify your sound as a producer? No, I was not a producer. There was no producer on stage, right?

Yeah, they were kind of scrupulous about that. Mm-hmm. You were just mixing I Did all the recording and yeah and mixing and enduring and After that I did you know I was in England and I helped to help to mix that Albert Hall show that they did there So and then I had you know to my first solo album. Yeah, leave on and Rick.

Thank Oh, yeah, did a song. Yeah for me Oh, that's it was it was it so I got along with all those guys. I had all internal dynamic. It was so tense anyway Yeah, you know, there was a lot of tension about the fact that that Robbie wrote everything right and therefore own the publishing to everything Right, and so they kind of felt sometimes like Sidemen, you know to Robbie's thing I never really got into that I never thankfully had to get into the details of that But I knew that that was kind of right a constant source attention So then during the during the sessions there was it got very hard.

It was hurting hurting felines Yeah, it was like it was trying to get everyone all at their instruments and ready and in the mood to do a take Seemed to take most of the time most of the time was not spent doing takes it was getting everyone off to their instrument to do a take Well, you know, there are a lot of things, you know wood and pinch. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah one is that Garth wasn't likely still isn't our kleptic.

So he would just fall asleep at some point. Yeah, even in the middle of a song Levan unfortunately was involved with opiates and stuff like that. We're looking we're doing we're at the root Woodstock theater, right? You know and we can't find Levan, you know, we're ready to do a take Can't finally find him under a pile of curtains somewhere fast asleep.

Yeah, we do a session one day and Richard doesn't show up Where's Richard? No, we know it's where Richard is Richard apparently has spent the night with his in his car nose face down in a culvert Okay, all night long they had issues, but that's how you got into that with Grossman But that's kind of like you know the character I characterize as them. Yeah, you kind of channel those issues and music ultimately and that's a job of a producer Ultimately, but as I say, I was not the producer. I did not know what you this is.

I did not have the authority to say hey Let's get the other 30 say wait. I believe on come on guys. Can we just hey? Well, I did I had it apparently I don't remember literally what I did but I could be very Yeah, sarcastic and needling yeah and stuff like that.

I remember they all got angry with me because at one point I referred to Garth as an old man. Oh really because well to me was but I so after like so okay So that's the that's how you got in with Grossman. So what happened? What were these opportunities that opened up for you after?

You did you know the big one something anything you were about to say like a lot of doors open well this is essentially what characterized my Output right from that point on and why it is so difficult for you to absorb it right okay because I was making more money as a producer Then most people make as an artist okay at that point I had done a bad finger. I was doing grandfunk railroad I'm fun. Yeah, I'm actually I did meatloaf. You know that had hell right.

Yeah, that's a big record It was a very large record big boy big record. Yeah. Yeah still pretty large. Yeah, actually yeah ironically enough guys friends We never see each other but if you know you and him specifically but we were never close right thankfully So you were hired by the label after something anything.

No no exactly wrong. Okay. I'm just throwing by I know I know Assume nothing now meatloaf and Jim Steinman Essentially came to me after they had a demo for everybody in the business and nobody could figure out What to do with this big fat guy with the overly long songs? And the guy and the weird creepy guy with the white hair and the white gloves playing the piano yeah, but They they rented a demo studio and I came in and they performed most of what turned out to be bad out of hell live right Yeah with four people right Steinman on the piano yeah Ellen Foley and Rory Dodd on vocals.

Yeah, and the big guy So anyway, I I watch them do this thing. Yeah at that time I could afford really to take on anything Okay, as long as they were just like sort of a minimal production advance. Yeah, and I thought This is a spoof of Bruce Springsteen This is the ultimate Springsteen spoof. Springsteen was just starting out.

He's undercover at Time Magazine Yeah, and what Springsteen do these overwrought over long songs? Yeah, you know so I thought this is like the anti-Springsteen Yeah, it's the same sort of thing, but it's all like taking it to at some other extreme Yeah, and also it's like you don't look at him and think what a hunk. Yeah, let's just think whoa What a hunk of something, you know So I thought I got to do this. It's gonna be a spoof of Bruce Springsteen.

Yeah, and he had a label at the time Really they just couldn't find a producer right it was sympathetic to what they were trying to do and so we Rehearsed for two weeks and to put a little icing on the cake. I think we had At least two I'm trying to remember we had three members of the E Street bands. Yeah on the record Yeah, we had Roy Bitten and Max Weinberg played on the record So it's kind of like almost E Street band now And we rehearsed for you know like 10 days or something like that You know we worked out the arrangements and rehearsed so we could go in the studio and bang it out The day before we were supposed to come in to the studio meatloaf comes to me and says I don't think my label understands me I went off my label. Yeah, and I'm not as manager.

I can't tell what to do I said well if you can do that, but you know we just rehearsed or two weeks we already run up considerable bill on this record already Yeah, and now you want to fire your label. Yeah, so I wound up underwriting the record I went to bears one said if you let me use the studio and if you you know Pay for the expenses of making this record then you get right a first refusal on the record So this means you you had money in the record so you were on the back end as well essentially if they didn't want to take the record Yeah, I essentially all of that is My bill to them right they have to collect all that money from my future right residuals of something or other but or they won't give me something Yeah, yeah, yeah, but uh We finished the record and bearsville doesn't want the record and neither does want her brothers The distributor of bearsville they decide they don't want to get no labeling at no distribute Yeah, they don't get it. Yeah, don't get the record Yeah, they shop it everywhere it takes them like six months. I can't find anyone put the record out really yes So finally we find this guy steve popovich with a little Subcity area.

I think was epic records or something like that cleveland international. Yeah, and one other artist. Yeah, and uh in hunter the artist yeah, and uh For some reason he thought he could make something of the record And I think like three things happened at the time that really Turned it into what we now remember it being but it's could have been just not on the ash heap of his history Yeah, three things happen. Yeah, one was steven popovich never gave up on the record you put out a single nothing happened Hell and put down another single yeah, he put out three singles before anything ever happened with the record So he never gave up on the record.

Yeah Second thing that happened was during that whole period Meatloaf was touring incessantly just never came off the road he played anywhere anybody would have it Yeah, you know and people and word of mouth started to happen about we didn't have social media Right, so I'm sort of word of mouth started happening about this big fat guy who's running around the stage And he's got this little sexy girl on his leg and that sort of thing you know people say oh you got to see this Yeah, so that started to happen then the third thing that happened Maybe the most significant thing was MTV came on the air right and that's paradise by the dashboard light was the longest video That they had yeah, and just like any other DJ this is where you go get high Yeah, you put on dark side of the moon and get to the roof of on yeah Come back later. You know this was the equivalent. You know, right seven minutes of I don't have to do nothing You know And that's what I think you know kind of pushed it all over the top and then they released the other singles and they all became hits and That's big payday for you too. Ultimately.

It was the biggest payday I ever had because I hadn't gotten anything And here's where albacrossam came in a little handy. Yeah Uh, he went with me to their management office or their, you know, whoever the lawyer whoever it was It was dealing with their business. Yeah, and yeah, the record had been selling and I had never been recouped or compensated So we went to negotiate the terms of that yeah And he negotiated for me more points than both Simon and meatloaf got combined, okay And the check bring a bat with it and the check that I got was just under Well by about 30 percent a million dollars. Yeah, and that's a I remember the first one I looking at this check yeah counting the digits in it Yeah, seriously six digits Yeah, now I have the opportunity to really stupid things with money right and that's what I bought a video studio after that Well, you're a creative guy you need equipment You need a lot of you know So how when you say that they would explain your output how does that explain your output the production opportunities because I most artists when they Make a record right or make anything that they make whatever it is That's intrinsically linked with their economic well-being in a sense in other words if you don't put out the hit You don't get the money.

You don't get the money. You don't get the power. You don't get the woman. You know, it's like it's uh It's all they have in a way.

Yeah, I'm making money off of other people's records Why do I have to think that way when I make my own records? Yeah, so I'm just out there like musical Explorer music is like other planets to me So that was so you were able to detach from the pressure of making hits exactly or even honoring the system In a sense, you have to deal with the physical limitations of the you know the disc You know, that's your that's your limiting factor, but when I was at a true start that was exactly my philosophy I got I don't know 20 to 30 minutes. I can put anything on there I want and would we challenging yourself or did you think it was a joke? That was definitely not a joke.

You were like now. I can really cut loose No, it was like you know, there's all this stuff. I figured out the formula to write a pop song in something anything And I realized that I point it's a formula. Yeah, I could do this over and over again I could I could Continually refer to that high school relationship that inspired all the earlier lyrics even though I'm well beyond that now Now, right?

No, there's other things to think about right, you know besides getting laid right No, it's not a bad thing to think about but there are other things to think about and they realize that never bothered to try Make anything musical or turn it into sound or anything like that all those things that are floating in there Yeah, and I essentially said okay, I think I understand the songwriting formula now. I'm going to destroy it Right. I am not going to abide by that songwriting formula drugs and if I do if I do it's because I'm paying tribute to it Which you did art sort of what it covers in a way. Yeah, when I did this sort of R&B trilogy.

This is like This is also in my head. This is my influences stuff like that. This is my aspirations in some way geez I like to be able to sing this stuff. Well.

Yeah, yeah, but you also wanted to deconstruct it entirely That's why I became medley's and after you take it more and more seriously as your code through the thing it gets sillier and sillier It's like but that but that records almost like it It's it's completely progressive at some points where you're almost doing something that that doesn't make inherent sense in a pop music sense In mind. It's almost like I don't know what if you the comparison would offend you, but it's almost like a like a zappa record in your own style in some ways That you're certainly not offended to be To be conflated with frank zappa, but do you see that conflation? Well, frank zappa was also, you know, a destroyer in a way too Yeah, in a way, it's kind of it was almost my version of absolutely free right. Yeah, which was one of my favorite records on a real revelation for me You know where you just are throwing musical fragments out.

They don't turn into whole songs Yeah, some of them are just a little transitional elements to another thing. Yeah, you know that He did probably more coherently than I did, you know in other words, he has an overarching message of sarcasm, I guess you would call it. Yeah, yeah, no definitely he was cutting but he had some humor there was like, you know, on Wizard of Trishar there. Well, I had some where that's the other thing about frank zappa It's like he doesn't mind being silly right and you did a little of that when you're playing with the sounds and oh, yeah I mean I love being silly as part of your You know when you were kid, you know really young and kind of the first time you heard music You start experiencing music and they just nearly spasic response you have to yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's sometimes, you know, you'd like to be able to Get back to you know to some sort of nursery rhyme level.

Yeah. Yeah, just silly things that rhyme Yeah, you know, but The kind of things that you know a naive mind can find enjoyment. Yeah, and you can do that with music too So you blew it all apart with that record, but then you sort of reconverge a bit And you know that thing sort of split you know that was after that record then We sort of officially founded the utopian concept Yeah, so I had a band that I played with and then I continued to make solo records Although most of the touring through that era was with the band. Was there a manifesto to the utopian concept?

Yeah, it was kind of this you know aggressive, you know collaborative aggressive Musical exploration again. Yeah, there were a lot of For us as players, you know, you start to think of yourself as a player, you know, you play enough to get kind of good at what you're doing There are these Gravitational influences that yeah that come by you know one of them was my vision orchestra that we remind it blew everybody's mind You know, yeah, not just my mind, but we were collectively blown Yeah, and And what those things do usually is open you to possibilities you didn't think of yeah playing in modes that you didn't think of before um creating melodies that Don't have the typical cadences that you're used to and that sort of thing creating textures that are Hard to pin down in terms of their tonality, but add to the right It's like when josem and i'll puts the ring modulator on the piano. How the hell do you put that in standard notation? There's so many weird harmonic things coming out.

So it's jazz essentially more like that's what we call it It was like they call it fusion jazz fusion rock, but it's all about you know having those jazz chops after all john McLachlan was a famous jazz musician. Yeah, you know a lot of the guys that he played with had some reputation before but weren't as well known Right. Well, I just watched uh, I had uh flea and robert johio in here He produced a documentary on jocko which I just saw and I didn't know I don't like I never registered fusion Like I like bebop but fusion just never resonated with me So I had to go back with it, you know in the last month and and try to wrap my brain around weather report and stuff Oh, yeah, well, there's you know whenever you hear like a An apathyme like fusion right it always conjures up assumptions about what you're about to hear you know, but these are Very vague reference points, you know, it's that's the reason why there isn't a word or genre that describes What i'm trying to do right though people will struggle to find what what are they usually label you as all to rock maybe Yeah, but the point is you know rock is a thing you apply to anything has bass and drums now a day Yeah, do you have a problem with what's going on musically now? Either people you must be able to find whatever you want, but I mean in terms of pop music Do you feel like uh, do I listen to the radio?

Yeah I haven't for a long time. No one has a radio anymore. No, but the point is it's kind of you know, it's very weird things are It's pretty dynamic nowadays a lot of it is because of social media and the fact that memes travel way faster than they used to Now it used to be literally word of mouth. Well, before we get to that so utopia was this thing that you created to explore music without any boundaries Exactly and personally it was an opportunity for me to Be more principally a guitar player than the singer-songwriter front man.

So that's going on You know, that's your vacation almost that's your your not it was my vocation We were playing arenas at that point and we had huge productions with lasers and smoke and stuff. That's where I met this guy back You're new man, right and you were still doing the solo records. So like they did um, yeah, but during the course of that You know all this bomb bass. I'll do it.

I'm like a hermit of mccollow and then you get out of that Accidentally, right, but I didn't write a hit, you know, it just became a hit That was a big big song. No, it's a familiar song. It was not a big you know, can we still be friends? I know why where did it top off?

I don't know I don't have that in fact I can actually probably find it where did it top off? I if it made the top 40 I think that maybe us billboard 36. Yeah, okay, that's what I mean It's like I have things that people think are hits, but they're actually just fan favorites Well, I know the song. Yeah, you know, I mean, it's like a Beatles song or any other Yeah, but also you may know it because two other artists recorded it rod steward and robert palmer both recorded that song That wasn't right towards version.

I remember your version. I know but I mean that's the reason why people why more people remember a song than only got the 36 I like the song that I know I don't dislike the song You're just saying you didn't do it on purpose and you know, it was more important No, no, no, while I'm saying it was it was not a hit and right usual So if you think that most of you know the people because you are a guy that has a specific following a specific audience that's stayed with you for many years Yeah, and you have these two lives in there There's something about some of the hits which can be classified as pop rock or or you know, softer rock and utopia is fucking, you know, your spaceman You're an astronaut. Where do you think you garnered most of what you're known for in terms of an audience? I would say that the larger audiences You tell the utopia sure right because it's the live experience partly that the big show but we just you know We got into a certain sweet spot there.

You know, we're the big production and stuff like how many people on stage usually? How many how many people in the before oh really well, no originally we were six I mean two keyboards drums for me and a synthesizer player. Yeah, so usually six people on stage Yeah, and we would kind of have big heavy sets and set them up every night You know, we designed you know the stage in a certain way and had you know people doing our lights It was very important the production and people in those days I think appreciated that idea now everyone's numb to it. You know production is so intense right at this point Right that most people are numb and that's a bad thing.

No, I'm not good. Well, you know, it's Don't give me started Well, I'm just saying don't you know sometimes yeah, you got to get comfortably numb sure because At least for me. I try to be optimistic, you know, and whatever I write, you know, it's not You know, I don't write death metal or that sort of thing I like to challenge, you know conventional ideas, but it's founded in a certain sort of basic belief that There is a better nature somewhere. Yeah in people.

Yeah Yet we're going through times which makes you really almost A shame to be a human being and that's the hard part, you know is to continue to search for that You know like you tell how do well how do we justify ourselves? Right, you know, and you think through art is there's a purity to music that that enables that ability to transcend? No music, you know talking about music as if it's all the same as still the problem Okay, it's like there is music that you know neo-nazi's like to listen to yeah There might be neo-nazi's that love can we still be friends? Yeah, even that you know, and there are more tender moments but you know when they're breaking down on the stand but But otherwise, you know, it's it's a like to me.

It's a challenge, you know, I'm staying in that groove of hope Yeah, to not just go out and write a record say you You fuck with some other fuckers. Yeah, I'm just so tired of looking for what's good in you You know, if you don't freaking care. Yeah, you know, you're just angry. Oh god.

Give me a break Yeah, everybody's got an excuse to be angry You know was that one of the reasons that you know like because it seems to me that in most of your performances and in a lot of the music There there for me even there's a vulnerability there. That's that's their sensitivity That's almost painful and it's part of what I'm not saying that in a negative way But I mean like it seems like some of your stagecraft is around vulnerability. Do you feel that? I'm not satisfied unless I feel like it's coming from a certain place Which is what makes it so hard to sing certain songs over and over and over again because you get you get numb Because yeah, you get numb to it and the only way you can get through it is like don't Torture yourself through the song, you know, just do the freaking song, you know, right?

Yeah, there is something you'd be said for numbness and just focusing, you know, yeah, go numb, but don't lose focus You have to be going somewhere, you know, right and now to talk about memes As as being somewhat, you know destructive and part of the problem that the song bang the drum all day is gotta be Has to be considered a meme at this point Yeah, and it used to be an extremely lucrative meme It's so carnival cruise line started sinking all those ships They just that was their theme song. Yeah, I had to change their image. I don't know what but I do like it's like one of those songs That they have they always run on the radio or they play baseball games all most it's like an anthem of some green Bay Packers Oh, do you think touchdown song? Yeah, it was for the Rams for a while.

I don't know if it still is, you know So that was yeah for the amount of times that people hear it you'd think I'd be a rich man Now the irony of it is and the reason why I don't really care that much. Yeah I was making an album at the time which one I think it was Ever popular tortured artist effect is the end of that time. Yeah, and you know, I was Not happy with my label. That's hence the title, you know, which is they constantly hector you with expectations Yeah, and don't see kind of what's what you've buried in there that they could kind of go and run with yeah, you know They want their job to be really easy so I was you know at that particular point a little cynical about the whole process and I just looked at the album as a deliverable But you know I came up with a few Songs you got it right, you know, I still got it right So I came up with a few songs and when I get into that moment, especially when I'm in my ideal environment Which is alone and sometimes I don't see people for days why well nowadays, but that album was recorded in Minkalo, where's me?

It's uh Upstate New York is a little beyond bearsville. Yeah, it was at the very end of a Of all your chair and you're like I got a service. No, I am not the nut moan. I'm saying no.

I don't give a crap at all You know, I'm just making a deliverable here right well click my money Something good and give me a deliverable not try not to think about it too much Yeah, but what happens is when I get into the mode of writing sometimes I write subconsciously back most of my writing is subconscious and It will permeate every aspect of my life as long as I'm not disturbed by something And so I will start to write songs in my sleep And I don't actually write them. They just come like completely written and you wake up with them and go do it And then I wake up and I have to remember them long enough to go through that So and that's how the drum was just something that I dreamed really literally exactly the way you hear the chorus That's exactly what I dreamed. I didn't have versus yet. I know I had to build verses around it Right, but that chorus just came to me fully realized and that happens a lot in your life.

No only when I'm When I have a luxury but fully immersed in the process and that that means not being disturbed by other people in other words for me See a lot of people they thrive on interaction with other people and a lot of inspiration from You know things that get input maybe during the course of the process Because they go into most people kind of go into the studio. They don't have a whole you know like 12 15 songs all done ready to go Let's just bang them out. It's not Frank. So not through anymore You know, it's you know you go in the studio something of a dragging things out process Well, if you get into that mode where there isn't you know, which is opposite of the collaboration and right which is just internalization constant incessant internalization the only time you've actually You know that noise level comes down you suddenly realize oh, that's what I'm thinking You know, yeah, yeah, I don't have all these other little details that are like like gnats flying around you all the time Yeah, and you know a lot of people can you know somehow get to that space without having a solitude But when I have the solitude, that's kind of what happens it becomes all about just making the music all the time And the song will come to me in my sleep and then I'll go try and jot it down I just don't come to me in my sleep when I was like In cat-man do and I had to like visualize a piano in my head and teach myself how to play it because I was nowhere near any Way to record it and I had to do that line night after night until I got home like two months later.

Did you record it? Yeah, I'm wondering yeah, yeah became a song what song that was lost horizon Uh-huh and then there was a song called uh the waiting game was the most incredibly complex song that I ever dreamed and I can't figure out how I Ever managed to capture what I was out of it. That's on uh nearly human and that was like you blew your own mind I was in the studio. Yeah, I dreamt I was in the studio.

Yeah producing Manhattan transfer And that was a song that was coming out of the speakers. Did you actually produce Manhattan transfer? No, I think at one point I was approached to do that. They dream you're producing Manhattan transfer.

Yeah, but they covered one or two my songs too And you did like you you did a vocal album like that. You almost did a couple. Yeah. Yeah, then so you've tried a lot of things Few yeah, so you've okay.

I one point. I thought I wanted to do a album with a marching band Why did you do it? Well tusk came out and they kind of Yeah, it took the Took the bloom off the rose in a way I remember wrong in this memory. I think one of the first times I remember listening to you was I had a 45 Of a like a cover of good vibrations.

Is that possible? That is possible like it was like perfectly reproduced. Yeah, I did an album called faithful And it was done in what was essentially the 10th year after I had like left high school and became a professional musician and one side of it was attributed to everything you would have heard In like 1966 right what was coming out of the radio. I was in the boutique's yeah Yeah music store and all that other stuff.

So I picked out I think I have a dozen songs that represented that right and made my own radio show I did them as literally as I could more or less as an homage Yeah, as an homage, but also it was like as if you were listening to the radio in 1966 Wow what you might have heard what that was the idea Yeah, and he did it and then I did another side of original songs Yeah, so that I remember having that 45. So now like are you exhausted? Is your is your cynicism? You know invading because I know you keep you I mean you put out a record every year almost Mentally, I'm not exhausted.

Yeah being on the road is exhausting. Do you have to do it? Sorry? We can pretend like your manager's in here No, he's already heard all this already I Mean being on the road works for me in a certain way you like it But the problem is I have two gigs now at least for the last four years Yeah, which is whatever I do as you know as Todd von Grinn and whatever I do with Ringo and the all-stars.

Yeah, which is at least two or three months a year and some years has been more than how's he doing? He's doing great as far as I know I haven't seen him yet this week and what happened with the car thing? Ah, that was a kid that was sad Um, there were possibilities there. I think you were approached by a couple of the guys I was approached by Elliot who I know yeah, so they approached me I guess they approached a couple people but they thought it might work We did a little bit of a run through in the studio here in LA and we thought okay, let's give this try and we'll incorporate Listen to cars Rick would not let us use the cars as a name So that hobble things a little bit because people are thinking is this the old cars are just a different you know, was he mad?

Okay, sick was he mad? Yeah jealous jealous Yeah, oh it's funny. Stephen Colbert made a whole freaking riff about it Yeah, something to do with me being in the new cars and rick o'kasek You know like trying to assassinate me or something. I don't remember what it was Right, it was pretty hysterical for a while to hear your name just pulled out of the blue But you guys toured now we never you didn't hear this I don't I don't think that much we like, you know, we were so heavily invested in this You know finance the whole thing on a giant merchandising advance We're about two two and a half weeks on the road and I wasn't there at the time Because I was hanging out with my son in Cleveland.

It was gonna fly to the next gig but the bus pulling into Washington Somebody some jerk off. Yeah. Yeah, you know, it doesn't it doesn't think a bus is a big deal Pulls in front of the bus without signaling the bus driver slams on the brake Elliott has just woken up to go to the john. Yeah, he gets thrown against the bulkhead.

Yeah breaks his collarbone. Oh, yeah He soldiers on for like another three gigs But if you look at his over here the bone is starting to poke up He's he's left-handed so the strap was on the other side, but eventually it's like this is crazy This is crazy. You have to have surgery. Yeah, and that was just the end of the recuperation So essentially two and a half weeks into what was supposed to be like three months during my note See all right now and lost all of our investment and everything.

Sorry buddy. Yeah, well that's ancient Is that late? All right? Yeah, okay, and like the one thing I didn't cover great place with me all the time And I see when everybody see Elliot, you know, we have There's nothing I mean between the guys in the band there was never any sort of you know, right, right?

It's just it's just bad luck. Yeah, bad luck So I didn't ask you about that like you know, I listened to it when I found out you produced that New York dollars first record I listened to that a lot too. I really tried to identify because I talked to a couple producers and it seems like that You actually when you do produce you like some guys are like you can get out of the way But it seems like you know, you actually make things clearer My philosophy is you do what you have to do isn't like doing a certain thing right because every bands Or every act, you know, it's not always a band but they always come to the studio with strengths and weaknesses and Things you can count on and things that maybe you know, you're not sure you can count on right like for instance the songwriting Yeah, at a certain point Well up to a certain point. I thought well if the band comes in the studio and they don't actually have the songwriting altogether I will go straight for them.

Yeah, and they don't mind that usually well I want to get the record done and get paid and you know, and if they don't have any other ideas Yeah, you kind of have to do but do a lot of them go like oh shit You made it better most of the time or is it most this time like no Christ run gring wants to? Well, no if they have if they have something I'd always rather use what they have but they have nothing That's the problem. You got a song. Yeah, all the great chords.

No lyrics, right, you know, somebody's got to write some lyrics eventually To this song, you know, yeah, you don't come up with some, you know, yeah, we're gonna get this done so So, you know, I mean the example would be like remote control the album that I did first album I did with the tubes Yeah, lots and lots of great musical ideas, but no kind of overarching concept So I kind of had to invent a lot of that for them and Nobody's particularly bothered about that. You know, I think for them being Still at the time essentially a theatrical act. Yeah, you know, they're looking for music to turn into a show, right? And so there's not a whole lot of problem, especially if I'm ghostwriting because I'm not taking any Royal about some of my guys DC when you produce them They're pretty you know together outfit Um together in the sense that yeah, there's a lot of music to work with.

Yeah, yeah, I kind of got lucky because I caught them at a Point of vulnerability. Uh-huh because they've already When I say they we mean Andy. Yeah, let's face it You know It's a band but essentially Andy was the one who called the shots most of the time Yeah, probably the guy that said to Colin hey, let's make a band right And um I was contacted by their label by the AR man at the label and said well, you know The records have been selling less and less right and costing more and more, you know And I knew about the band I was a big fan of the band and I knew about their history Yeah, why don't they ever perform? Well, it's because Andy has debilitating agoraphobia or something like that.

You know, he can't get stage right can't play um And also that you know He was notorious for driving his own producers out of the studio with his constant sort of Ainal demands yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, right. I mean eventually got another project you got to do yeah Can't mix this out for another year. Right. So I knew about the situation I had been listening to their music anyway even before they even approached your fan I was a fan.

Yeah, but I also knew what was wrong with the records Yeah, because I was listening to them right And essentially what was wrong is that Andy had too much of a free hand And the reason why and he had too much of a free hand or why he did so much time was being invested in these remakes and stuff It's because I never played live. Yeah, once the album was over the fun was done You go home you sit around until you come up with another album unlike most musicians go tour the record Go out and play the record stuff like that. Yeah, so So they didn't mind if it took forever or at least he didn't mind if it took forever to make a record Yeah So, you know, I knew from listening to records everything more and more anal they were The sound of them was getting In a subjective sense worse, right? But for reasons that wouldn't be obvious to most people There's a thing called psychoacoustics, which has nothing to do with the actual music that's happening Yeah, but with the kind of stress that sound puts on you.

Yeah So for instance if you mix the vocals at just that level you can just kind of hear them Psychologically you are squinting through the record Why can't I hear that guy? Yeah, you know, and plus, you know, he's like The process usually is you go in the studio spend a day mixing a song you take it home and you listen to it more Yeah, you know, at least that's you know, essentially like Andy's process looking listening to it to see whether something else You can do to it right it comes back the next day He's got an idea for something else to do to it and usually what that is is to take out more air, you know Right the fill in some space with more sounds, you know, I don't think the hi-hat is like high enough Let's make that even higher, you know, he's anal and yeah, the bass is not like low enough So you wind up with like, you know, if you were looking at it on a spectrometer or something like that Spectromatolizer, it would be completely flat, you know Because like every space is filled in right with sound and you don't realize how hard it is to listen to that Yeah, you know, because you're constantly straining to train. Yeah, pick things out of it, you know and so they had completely lost track of that as well and Fortunately as I say a continent of vulnerable point. They didn't know exactly what to do They had gotten an ultimatum from the label which record was it skylarking?

Okay, so they had down like what three records Oh, no more than that. Oh, yeah, so they were vulnerable. They were they were they were a little bit Intralim vulnerable and they just said they just sent me their song demos and I listened to the songs and this whole idea of a song cycle came to me, you know that you could do Make it all a piece like it's from Don till dusk. Yeah, it could be a day or it could be a week or it could be a year.

It could be a lifetime Yeah, you know traveling through all these phases, but it's coming from one place and going to another place Yeah And so I essentially took a real tape and I've done it did it before with the album with the twos where we kind of mapped everything out beforehand Mapped out all the tempos came up with the running order before we ever recorded anything Yeah, and we think question was refining tempos, you know and then doing some overdubs laying some stuff We went to San Francisco laid on all the drums and orchestras and things like that Right came back to a few more vocals and woodstock, but essentially it was kind of preordained by me. No, right the order Is going to be right which is something that they never had endured before Yeah, and so they trusted you I think 60% of the band trusted me and he never trusted me Was he happy with the record initially? No, he went back to England immediately after we finished the record did every took every press Opportunity to say it was the worst record they ever made he hated me at that point and he was willing to sabotage his own career Through his vitriol, you know over me and the fact that I did not give up what I said I was going to do at the beginning of the record I said I'm going to be here at the end of the record You may have driven these other producers off. I'm going to be here when this record is done All right, yeah, and lo and behold we got through three mixes Yeah, we got back to my studio three mixes and they went home.

Yeah, they went back to England Yeah, they were homesick said there was something wrong with the well water. Yeah, it's explained whatever, you know But in any case I finished mixing out myself without Andy. Yeah without anyone looking over my shoulder And delivered the record and then what happened was And it was perfect to that point. Yeah, it was a perfect record, you know took it to Greg Calvie one of the world's premier Masters sterling sound in New York and we got the best master We could possibly get out of it.

We delivered it here a couple weeks later. Okay, we're gonna change the running or the record We're taking dear god off the record. Yeah, we're gonna take the hit record off the record Right that's Andy. That's Andy and his a and R man Andy because he was afraid that you know He would like there would be repercussions personally for him for taking on such a thorny subject What a pussy yeah, and then the a and R man who didn't like it because there was a child singing on it And he hated children's you know the records.

So you had to fight that fight? No, I well I did see I never do that Yeah, I deliver the records. I'm here to make the product you have to market the program Yeah, you figure that out right but I did call him said this is a mistake You know to take this off to put on this other crappy song that Andy made us record Yeah, all the other side like had nothing to do with the record at all He made us essentially rerecord his demo note for note Just to mollify him. We did it.

Yeah, right but the point is had nothing to do with the record Right was not in the running order. Yeah, so he decided to take dear god off So he could stick that stupid song on there. Yeah, next thing you know They put dear god on the B side of grass. What's supposed to be the first single.

Yeah, everybody flips the record Yeah, dear god becomes like a giant phenomenon saves their career and have to go and remaster the record again Put dear god back on it You're mixed of course. Yeah, well, there were no other mixes there were only changes in running order Did he thank you? No, he did not what he did was he's such a Yeah, okay, such a brat. Yeah, even at his age he's such a brat Yeah, that he's decided that his campaign is the original record was not mastered properly That there was something out of phase in the original record and these new vinyl releases that they've just come out with have fixed that Which is you know, which is essentially him trying to impune me but not just me great cowbeat one of the worlds Somebody who's mastered like every record you ever heard of did they make a mess of it?

I mean the new they've really if there was something I think there's just I think it's just a little Complete bullshit. Yeah, but if such a thing existed. It's because they changed the running order the record and had to remaster it Which I had nothing to do with it. That's fucking ridiculous.

Oh, right. Did you do it? Nothing's happened in the 30 years since Skylarking Yes, oh my god, but you keep working there's a you have a what was the last full record you put out It was called global. It's like sort of like I listen to some of that so synthesizer's almost dance music, right?

It's a there's a bit of EDM, but it isn't as EDM as a one before yeah, and how do those do for you? Um, we had great shows. Yeah, but you know, we're independently distributed now. Uh-huh, so it's really not like the good old days But then that's that's a new reality.

Yeah selling recorded music People used to think that was what you know What music is what the goal is yeah from an artist standpoint? Under that old commoditized model, you know, you're selling a thing You know object you can hold I'm buying right here. Yeah, but you know the artist and whoever recorded that record depending on the deal I could be making like five cents library You know, I think you make it god knows better issue run. Do you get anything?

I don't even know what the terms of that are but I would guarantee you that that original well, you know Under the old commoditized model. They're all these so-called material expenses the actual manufacturing of the product and the carting the product to the retailers where it gets old and stuff like that and that was considered to be Considerably significant aspect of the process plus the label figures, you know, our expertise in terms of promotion The fact that we were bank for you, you know, we loan you money to make these projects and things like that That justifies a major participation by us, right? You know, we should be able to take a lot of money back But when they risk you a record like run like whoever bought the rights to that material Because it's it's not the label anymore. No, it isn't but I'm trying to make the distinction between a commodity and a service, okay, and What we have now is, you know, and what I've always believed was the proper model is more of a service model music as a service You pay your absentee $10 a month you listen to anything you want The idea of ownership of music is never was real, you know, you own a piece of plastic But until you put it on the table, yeah Didn't have the value that the artist intended, which was for you to hear it.

Yeah, so people giant racks and racks of vinyl doesn't mean crap Yeah, okay. You got the thing but you're not here in the music, you know, got a lot of things. Yeah, you all got things But so, you know from that standpoint, I'm perfectly happy with the service model But we're still in this phase where you know figuring out how to compensate people for the service model It's much easier to keep track of a thing that it is bits flying through the air and it's it's easier to to pirate bits But also, you know, we're evaluating where the value is right, you know, and a lot of it's in the life performing again, right? It was I say the greatest value is in the life performance, you know, whatever small percentage 12% if you're lucky if it's Michael Jackson 20% Maybe of the recorded song you get 80% of the ticket price right and it costs at least twice as much for a concert ticket Yeah, so that's where your payoff always was right music is promotion and a lot of bands have started to realize that you know It's t-shirts are big t-shirts and if you want to sell CDs at your merch table.

Yeah, how many CDs do you think Jimmy Buffett sells not at his merch table? none Exactly, so you know bands like Radiohead they realize this you know Yeah, pay whatever you want for the record download the music and pay whatever you want But they realize that that's going to encourage them to buy concert tickets right and other merchants stuff like that The music was the music recorded music was always promotion for the live performance right now. Okay in closing You produced grandfunks. It's America.

We're an American band. Oh, yes. I did. Was the cowbell your idea likely More cowbell work cowbell.

Thanks for talking to my pleasure Wow, right good stories, man He's a little prickly, but I enjoy talking to him that Todd Rongren It's always nice to have to sit as audience with a genius go to wtfpod.com for all your wtf pod needs Get on the mailing list check my schedule. I'm going to be in Mission Creek festival and the Ingourt Theater and Iowa City on April 8th The Cocoa Theater in Lincoln, Nebraska April 9th and Harvest Bank Theater at the Midland in Kansas City, Missouri On April 10th, the last I heard that one's a little weak little slow So come on out and it doesn't matter to me if it's just me and you know 50 60 a year in the place it seats However many thousands it'll be interesting There'll be a little intimate and and it'll be hard to transcend the weird sadness and absence of others But it will be an experience that none of us will forget