Episode 356 - Lucinda Williams

Episode 356 • Released January 27, 2013 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Guest:Lock the gates!

00:00:09Marc:All right, let's do this.

00:00:10Marc:How are you?

00:00:10Marc:What the fuckers?

00:00:11Marc:What the fuck buddies?

00:00:12Marc:What the fucksafers?

00:00:13Marc:What the fucksafers?

00:00:15Marc:What the fucksafers?

00:00:17Marc:Oh, I did it.

00:00:17Marc:I got an email from a dude in the sedan.

00:00:20Marc:He said, what about us?

00:00:22Marc:What the fucksafers?

00:00:26Marc:What the fucksafers?

00:00:35Marc:You're listening to it, and I appreciate that.

00:00:37Marc:This is a great one.

00:00:38Marc:The amazing, the fucking phenomenal, the, I mean, transcendent Lucinda Williams is here.

00:00:44Marc:I couldn't be more fucking thrilled about this.

00:00:48Marc:To have Lucinda Williams in my garage, are you kidding me?

00:00:52Marc:Love her.

00:00:53Marc:Was thoroughly intimidated.

00:00:55Marc:And it was all I made up.

00:00:58Marc:I made it all up.

00:00:59Marc:But wait, let's do this.

00:00:59Marc:I don't want to forget to do this because I forgot to promote something.

00:01:02Marc:There's a live WTF at the Trippany House in the Steve Allen Theater tomorrow night, Tuesday, January 29th at 8 p.m.

00:01:11Marc:Please come.

00:01:12Marc:I'd completely forgotten to publicize it.

00:01:15Marc:So if you're in L.A., it's Tuesday.

00:01:16Marc:Come on.

00:01:17Marc:It's going to be a good show.

00:01:19Marc:Jason Nash, the always angry at something Jason Nash.

00:01:22Marc:He's completely unhappy because he's got a lovely wife and family.

00:01:27Marc:Christina Pazitsky.

00:01:28Marc:Hope I said that right.

00:01:30Marc:Hilarious.

00:01:31Marc:Matt Kirshen.

00:01:33Marc:Hope I said that right.

00:01:34Marc:From Britain.

00:01:35Marc:He's a British Jew.

00:01:39Marc:That in and of itself.

00:01:41Marc:And the lovely Jeff Richards.

00:01:44Marc:And he's nuts.

00:01:46Marc:And he sings and stuff.

00:01:47Marc:And, of course, Jim Earl.

00:01:48Marc:Eddie Pepitone, I believe, is still out of town.

00:01:50Marc:So it's live WTF at the Tripany House in the Steve Allen Theater tomorrow night, Tuesday.

00:01:56Marc:Come to that.

00:01:57Marc:Sorry.

00:01:58Marc:Yeah, I got it.

00:01:59Marc:Okay, I got it.

00:02:00Marc:I got the thing.

00:02:01Marc:All right, it's not the flu, but it's the thing.

00:02:03Marc:Wait, I'm not done.

00:02:04Marc:I'm not done.

00:02:05Marc:Albany, this Friday at The Egg.

00:02:08Marc:That's this Friday, the 1st of February.

00:02:11Marc:Correct?

00:02:12Marc:Correct.

00:02:12Marc:At The Egg in Albany.

00:02:14Marc:Saturday in Washington, D.C.

00:02:17Marc:at the Sixth and I Synagogue.

00:02:19Marc:Believe is close to sold out.

00:02:20Marc:You can try.

00:02:22Marc:But here's what I want to talk to you about.

00:02:23Marc:Ohio.

00:02:25Marc:Ohio, listen to me.

00:02:27Marc:Ohio.

00:02:28Marc:Specifically.

00:02:29Marc:Cincinnati and Columbus, Ohio, February 14th at Bogarts in Cincinnati.

00:02:34Marc:If you guys don't buy your tickets soon, I'm going to think that I don't have people up there, which is okay, but I know there's a few of you, but I thought there might be more.

00:02:41Marc:Ohio might not be my place.

00:02:43Marc:I know there's some of you that are there for me, but I don't know that there's a lot of you there.

00:02:46Marc:I just...

00:02:48Marc:February 15th at the Capitol Theater in Columbus, Ohio.

00:02:50Marc:I just don't know.

00:02:51Marc:Is Ohio not my thing?

00:02:53Marc:I mean, that happens.

00:02:54Marc:I'm specific.

00:02:55Marc:I'm an acquired taste.

00:02:57Marc:Some people don't like me.

00:02:58Marc:Some people are fast-forwarding through this.

00:03:01Marc:But Ohio, I need you.

00:03:03Marc:February 14th, Bogarts in Cincinnati.

00:03:05Marc:Get those tickets.

00:03:05Marc:February 15th, Capitol Theater in Columbus.

00:03:09Marc:Or else Live Nation will think, who cares what they think?

00:03:15Marc:But I thought I had love in Ohio, but I could understand how maybe I don't, but I'm not going to complain about it.

00:03:21Marc:As I said, I'm not a demographic.

00:03:23Marc:It's a disposition.

00:03:25Marc:Perhaps Ohio's much more well-adjusted than I thought.

00:03:30Marc:Is that it?

00:03:30Marc:Is that all we need?

00:03:31Marc:Oh, second printing of the DVD with the first 100 episodes and MP3 files that you can download is available at WTFpod.com for $39.99.

00:03:41Marc:All right?

00:03:42Marc:Yes, I have it.

00:03:43Marc:I have the thing.

00:03:45Marc:It's a cold...

00:03:46Marc:I don't have a flu.

00:03:47Marc:I don't know when it became difficult to decide between the two.

00:03:51Marc:A flu is aches and pains and fever, and you're completely annihilated.

00:03:56Marc:A cold, I was struck with this cold.

00:03:58Marc:They seem more virulent.

00:04:01Marc:The cold is a virus.

00:04:02Marc:The flu is a virus, right?

00:04:03Marc:Cold's not bacteria.

00:04:04Marc:Break it down for me.

00:04:05Marc:I'm not a scientist.

00:04:08Marc:But I was hit with this thing.

00:04:09Marc:I was struck, struck with a head full of snot.

00:04:12Marc:I was like, I feel like something's coming.

00:04:13Marc:Then boom, you're drowning in your own mucus.

00:04:17Marc:Your brain has become viscous and you might lose it out your nose.

00:04:22Marc:I'm neti potting, although I know you frighten me with the amoebas and the brain parasites.

00:04:26Marc:I boil the water.

00:04:28Marc:I use distilled water.

00:04:29Marc:I'm very cautious.

00:04:30Marc:But now I'm in.

00:04:31Marc:I'm in.

00:04:31Marc:I don't know how long it's going to last.

00:04:33Marc:I hope it goes away soon.

00:04:34Marc:I'm okay.

00:04:36Marc:But I feel for all you people.

00:04:37Marc:I don't think the flu's gotten here yet.

00:04:40Marc:Yeah, I've got a very sort of high-end creative bacteria in my sinuses that I think I picked up at Sundance.

00:04:48Marc:Pow!

00:04:49Marc:Look out!

00:04:49Marc:I just shit my pants.

00:04:50Marc:God, can you believe Lucinda Williams is here?

00:04:52Marc:Can you fucking believe that?

00:04:54Marc:I was just in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

00:04:56Marc:I couldn't tell you I was going.

00:04:58Marc:But I went.

00:05:01Marc:I went to my friend's 50th surprise party.

00:05:04Marc:This is a kid I've known since second grade.

00:05:08Marc:Since Hebrew school.

00:05:10Marc:Since fucking Hebrew school.

00:05:12Marc:David Kleinfeld.

00:05:14Marc:Great guy.

00:05:16Marc:And look, it's bizarre, man.

00:05:17Marc:There were people there I haven't seen really much in 20, 30 years.

00:05:21Marc:30 years, there's people that I haven't seen in decades.

00:05:25Marc:When did I become that guy?

00:05:27Marc:It was a little weird though, because I'm at the party, I saw some people, and then I didn't really realize how difficult it is to sort of like, all right, how much, let's catch up a little bit.

00:05:37Marc:All right, the last time I saw you was that when we were in the car in high school and you threw up.

00:05:42Marc:And then what happened after that?

00:05:44Marc:What happened?

00:05:45Marc:Oh, you have kids?

00:05:47Marc:Oh, seriously?

00:05:49Marc:Wow, you've been divorced twice?

00:05:51Marc:No kidding.

00:05:52Marc:Really?

00:05:53Marc:That's your business?

00:05:54Marc:You invented that?

00:05:54Marc:I had no idea.

00:05:56Marc:Oh my God.

00:05:57Marc:It was daunting to cover that much time.

00:06:00Marc:But you know what's weird?

00:06:01Marc:When you see somebody you haven't seen in that long, 20 years, 30 years, is that my memories are sort of like in some kind of amber of high school or of Hebrew school, even younger.

00:06:13Marc:These guys I knew when we were so young, like third grade, fourth grade, and they're just suspended there.

00:06:20Marc:In an amber of my mind, I know those kids.

00:06:24Marc:I was that kid that hung out with them, but I remember them almost exactly like they were at that time.

00:06:30Marc:And the bizarre thing is, is they're not that different.

00:06:36Marc:You know, they're the same, we're the same people.

00:06:38Marc:Like I think in my mind that I've changed all, like I'm almost undecipherable from that kid I was in high school.

00:06:44Marc:I didn't, that guy was, you know, a sort of frightened mess, unlike the fully unfrightened, unanxious guy I am now.

00:06:53Marc:But these guys, it's amazing.

00:06:55Marc:It's like the same guy is in there.

00:06:57Marc:You know they're in there.

00:06:59Marc:But they're just sort of beat up a little bit.

00:07:01Marc:They're a little chiseled, a little fatter, a little broken.

00:07:07Marc:But they're all faring pretty well, those who are still with us.

00:07:10Marc:And it was a pretty amazing thing.

00:07:11Marc:And I stayed at this place.

00:07:14Marc:In Albuquerque, I grew up in the Northwest Valley.

00:07:18Marc:For those of you who are familiar, back in the day, there was a guy who lived at the end of my street that actually owned a herd of buffalo off Real Grande Avenue, Real Grande Boulevard.

00:07:27Marc:There was a herd of buffalo that I grew up with.

00:07:30Marc:And I lived down that street.

00:07:32Marc:And then just up real grand a little bit, there were these giant piece of property with these two families living in these giant houses.

00:07:39Marc:One was like an old-style mansion.

00:07:41Marc:The other was like a hacienda.

00:07:42Marc:And they'd been there forever, the houses.

00:07:45Marc:They originally belonged to one of the, I guess, original landowners, the big landowners of New Mexico.

00:07:50Marc:And I knew both families, the Rembys and the Walkers.

00:07:52Marc:I went to school with the Rembys since, you know, there were four of them.

00:07:55Marc:There were three boys and a girl, Emily.

00:07:59Marc:And I went to, you know, elementary school with them.

00:08:01Marc:Emily and I were the same age.

00:08:02Marc:I was in love with her in junior high.

00:08:07Marc:But long story short...

00:08:09Marc:They have made the entire property, the Remby family.

00:08:12Marc:It's all their property now.

00:08:13Marc:The walkers are gone.

00:08:15Marc:And they've made it into like a retreat, like an inn with a restaurant and a farm.

00:08:22Marc:And they have a farm store and they turn the bigger house into like an event place for weddings and stuff.

00:08:27Marc:And I figured, fuck it, let's go stay down there.

00:08:29Marc:This Los Poblanos Inn, an organic farm.

00:08:33Marc:And it was so bizarre.

00:08:37Marc:Because I'd been in those houses, the barn is where I killed the pigeon.

00:08:42Marc:That's where the pigeon death occurred.

00:08:45Marc:Cody Walker, who lived in the big house, they were cousins.

00:08:50Marc:The Remy's and the Walkers were cousins.

00:08:52Marc:He took me out to that barn with a fucking pellet gun and it was full of pigeons and I shot one.

00:08:58Marc:And I, you know, I think I told you about this.

00:09:00Marc:It's still like there's a scar on my heart from that fucking pigeon and

00:09:05Marc:But I had a lovely time, and I will say this completely from my own heart here.

00:09:12Marc:If you want to go to northern New Mexico, if you want to get a real feel of the place, check out that Los Poblanos place, man.

00:09:19Marc:It's reasonably priced, and you're on this big piece of property, and it feels like my childhood.

00:09:25Marc:I guess that's what I'm saying.

00:09:27Marc:If you want to feel my childhood,

00:09:29Marc:you know go check it out please listen to my conversation with the I can't tell you man when I fucking heard car wheels on a gravel road that record I was like who is this woman how is this so raw how is this so fucking earnest and great how come her band sounds so fucking good I was in love with Lucinda Williams from a record that's the power of it man

00:09:56Marc:And the song Lake Charles brings tears to my eyes to this day.

00:10:02Marc:And I asked Lucinda to play that.

00:10:04Marc:So that's going to happen.

00:10:06Marc:So here's me and Lucinda Williams.

00:10:13Marc:Musenda Williams is in my garage, and I'm very nervous about it.

00:10:18Marc:I'm nervous.

00:10:19Guest:Well, I'm a little nervous.

00:10:20Guest:I'm okay.

00:10:22Marc:I spent the day listening to all your music, because I have most of it, but I had...

00:10:30Marc:Lake Charles, the song, I must have listened to like 30 or 40 times in a row when it first came out, because it used to, it actually made me cry for some reason.

00:10:41Marc:Do you hear that a lot?

00:10:41Guest:Yeah.

00:10:41Marc:You just nodded like, yes.

00:10:43Guest:Well, it made me cry when I was writing it.

00:10:45Marc:Now, something, was that about a specific person?

00:10:48Guest:Yeah, that was about this guy I lived with for four years, I guess, back in the early 80s.

00:10:55Guest:Yeah.

00:10:56Guest:When I was living in Texas.

00:10:58Marc:Yeah.

00:10:58Guest:I spent 10 years back and forth in Austin and Houston.

00:11:03Guest:Houston?

00:11:04Guest:Huh?

00:11:05Marc:Houston?

00:11:05Guest:Yeah.

00:11:06Guest:Well, this was in the 70s.

00:11:08Marc:Okay.

00:11:09Guest:There was a cool scene there at the time.

00:11:11Marc:Okay.

00:11:11Marc:Yeah, there's some good comics come out of Houston, actually.

00:11:14Guest:Yeah.

00:11:14Marc:Yeah.

00:11:14Guest:So this guy- So he was from, it's all true, he's from Nacogdoches, Texas, East Texas.

00:11:22Guest:He was just one of these, you know, his parents were well off, but, you know- He was the bad seed.

00:11:29Guest:Screwed up.

00:11:29Guest:Can we say the F's word?

00:11:31Guest:Sure, you can fuck away.

00:11:32Guest:His word-

00:11:33Guest:His parents were, you know, members of the country club.

00:11:36Guest:They were both alcoholics.

00:11:38Guest:Right.

00:11:38Guest:He was, you know, a brilliant guy.

00:11:41Guest:Yeah.

00:11:41Guest:Funny, charming, but just kind of a fuck up.

00:11:45Marc:Right.

00:11:45Guest:You know, so.

00:11:46Marc:And eventually he.

00:11:47Guest:Of course, those are the kind of guys that I was drawn to.

00:11:51Guest:Yeah.

00:11:52Guest:Because of the, you know, his personality and charm and this and that.

00:11:57Guest:He was a great cook.

00:11:58Guest:He would cook up a big pot of gumbo.

00:12:01Guest:Not a musician.

00:12:01Guest:You know.

00:12:02Guest:Well, he was, but, you know, he wanted to be.

00:12:06Guest:He was a bass player and he was into, he loved R&B and, you know, black Southern music.

00:12:14Guest:He just, he died of, I guess, technically his liver gave out.

00:12:19Guest:oh my god and the doctors told him that he could have lived had he but it would have meant he would have had to completely change his diet you know no more gumbo no more spicy food no more beer booze and um you know he decided to go with the gumbo he just wanted to go he went with the gumbo and you know

00:12:41Marc:The difference between who you are now and then, I mean, do you ever listen to those records?

00:12:47Marc:My question when I was listening to them today is, would you ever go back and do all those blues covers now?

00:12:53Marc:Could you imagine what you would do with them now?

00:12:55Guest:Yeah, and I do them sometimes live, some of those songs.

00:13:00Guest:But the thing about me is, I mean, I grew up in a time when it was this sort of...

00:13:05Guest:It was kind of labeled the singer-songwriter thing.

00:13:08Guest:It was kind of more by default, just because it was my guitar and me.

00:13:13Marc:Right, it wasn't a rock.

00:13:15Marc:It was almost an extension of folk.

00:13:17Guest:Yeah, but I mean, over the years, I grew and developed into doing other things with bands and stuff, but I was always...

00:13:26Guest:Even back then in the 70s when I was starting out playing in, you know, bars and coffee houses and things.

00:13:33Guest:I mean, you know, I would sing a song by I would do a Jimi Hendrix song.

00:13:37Guest:I do a Hank Williams song and a Robert Johnson song, you know, and I was starting to do in a few of my own songs.

00:13:44Guest:Yeah.

00:13:45Guest:I always mixed it up and I always listened to a lot of different kinds of stuff, you know, like the pretenders and talking heads while I was listening to Nick Drake and Bruce Coburn.

00:13:55Guest:And, you know, so it was I guess what I'm trying to say is.

00:14:00Guest:you know i it just took me a while over the years to kind of go to where i yeah always kind of wanted to be you know you knew that then though where you wanted to be yeah well i kind of knew i mean you know i just i was always exploring and listening to i was influenced by so much so many different kinds of music like when i heard chrissy hein and the pretenders i went oh my god like yeah you know i want to make a record like that a chick who rocks

00:14:25Guest:Yeah.

00:14:27Guest:But I didn't have a band for a long time.

00:14:29Guest:It was just me and my guitar, like I said, or me by myself or maybe one guitar player.

00:14:34Marc:Right.

00:14:34Marc:Well, we're like the same age and like we sort of got that, like the music of our time was kind of like for a few years there in the early 70s.

00:14:43Guest:Yeah, the 70s was a weird decade for me because the punk thing was happening, but I didn't really I didn't connect.

00:14:50Guest:I kind of missed it at the time.

00:14:51Guest:Yeah.

00:14:52Guest:And what I was doing at that time was starting to write my own songs.

00:14:56Guest:And like I said, you know, listening, kind of exploring older music like all the Delta Blues stuff.

00:15:03Marc:Well, what was the first thing?

00:15:04Marc:Because I'm driven the same way.

00:15:07Marc:I usually say I have a blues-based brain.

00:15:09Marc:And we kind of got the crashing wave of the 60s and all those rock bands at that time.

00:15:15Marc:And then all the Brit bands who were tracing back the blues.

00:15:19Marc:And I think I got to Robert Johnson through the Stones initially.

00:15:23Guest:Yeah.

00:15:24Marc:But was that when how old were you when you started when you first heard that stuff?

00:15:28Guest:And when I first heard Robert Johnson, I was probably 17, something like that.

00:15:33Guest:Did you even know it?

00:15:34Guest:17 or 18.

00:15:35Guest:Well, yeah, because I'd already been listening to this.

00:15:37Guest:My dad would bring home records.

00:15:39Guest:He would bring home light and Hopkins albums in Mississippi.

00:15:41Guest:John Hurt.

00:15:42Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:15:43Guest:You know, yeah.

00:15:44Guest:But of course, Robert Johnson was a thing.

00:15:47Guest:I mean, it was like something from another planet.

00:15:50Marc:It was like the Rosetta Stone or something.

00:15:51Marc:You had to wrap your brain around it.

00:15:53Guest:Yeah, it was just a whole other deal.

00:15:55Guest:And this friend of mine, he was a little bit older than I was.

00:15:59Guest:You need that guy.

00:15:59Guest:And he played blues guitar.

00:16:01Marc:Right.

00:16:01Guest:And he turned me on to that, you know, when Sony or Columbia released.

00:16:07Marc:Those 20 songs or whatever.

00:16:09Guest:Robert Johnson albums.

00:16:10Guest:And, you know, I flipped out.

00:16:13Guest:Everybody else flipped.

00:16:14Guest:That's all I listened to.

00:16:15Marc:And it just wired your brain for that stuff.

00:16:18Guest:Yeah.

00:16:19Guest:But I'd already been, you know, listening to a lot of the folk blues and all that, like Mississippi John Herb.

00:16:24Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:16:25Marc:But then that, you know, what was it?

00:16:27Marc:Do you think that was so appealing about Robert Johnson?

00:16:29Marc:There's something like sort of darkly magical.

00:16:32Guest:It was dark.

00:16:33Guest:It was dark.

00:16:34Guest:Like you just heard it.

00:16:35Guest:Yeah.

00:16:35Guest:It was dark and magical and sexy and just fucked up.

00:16:40Guest:You know, then his legend, of course, went along with the whole thing.

00:16:43Marc:Were you, can you separate the two?

00:16:47Marc:I mean, did you know the legend?

00:16:48Marc:Like, did the guy who turned you on to Robert Johnson say like, oh, and this dude went to the crossroads?

00:16:54Guest:I kind of, that was already coming out at that time.

00:16:57Guest:You know, people were already talking about, but some of the lines like, you know,

00:17:02Guest:squeeze my lemon till the juice run down my leg or something yeah yeah yeah and i was just oh my god i know what he's talking about well it was so it was just so you know but i'd been i was really into the doors when i was at like 15 and 16 into him or the music and everything the music everything the darkness the lyrics and you know it's weird it's so dark he was doing that blues thing yeah that um he did that howlin wolf song i think it was um

00:17:30Marc:backdoor man backdoor man yeah it's so weird with the doors though because it's so dark but that you know because i don't have a bass and it's just that silly piano it always sounds sort of jaunty i i had a really hard time if it weren't for jim morrison singing that the doors music i was like i just couldn't it wasn't well you know i was a girl teenage girl and you were once in the 60s i mean you know yeah absolutely the guy you know look at him yeah so where'd you grow up

00:17:57Guest:I was born in Lake Charles.

00:17:59Guest:My dad's family's all from, I'm sorry, my mother's family's all from Louisiana.

00:18:03Guest:My dad's family all hailed from Arkansas.

00:18:07Marc:Arkansas.

00:18:08Guest:Yeah.

00:18:08Marc:I don't really know anything about Arkansas.

00:18:10Guest:Well, yeah.

00:18:12Guest:It's kind of a, you know.

00:18:14Guest:Yeah.

00:18:15Guest:It's its own place.

00:18:16Guest:Yeah.

00:18:16Guest:Like different parts of the South.

00:18:18Guest:Yeah.

00:18:18Marc:Well, you write it on West.

00:18:22Marc:There's a song in there that sort of talks about how all these towns are no longer what they used to be.

00:18:27Marc:I imagine with the amount of time that you spend on the road, it's hard to find anything authentic or interesting anymore.

00:18:34Marc:And I imagine that you have some memories in your childhood about when these places had some personality to them.

00:18:39Guest:Yeah.

00:18:39Guest:Well, you can still find those places, but now that they've built freeways.

00:18:43Marc:You just drive right through.

00:18:44Marc:Right.

00:18:45Marc:You don't even have to connect.

00:18:47Guest:So that's what happened over the years, you know, the last 50 years or whatever.

00:18:52Guest:All the little mom and pop places got left behind because it used to be Route 66.

00:18:57Guest:Right.

00:18:57Guest:For instance.

00:18:58Marc:I grew up in Albuquerque.

00:18:59Guest:Right.

00:19:00Guest:Exactly.

00:19:00Guest:I love that.

00:19:01Guest:area there you know but unless you get off the interstate and take the time you know but when you and I were growing up you know all the little places and stuff like that so you know so what your father was a teacher yeah he was he is a poet and he taught college you know for years and years so we would you know until he eventually he achieved tenure as they call it at the University of Arkansas but up until that time

00:19:31Guest:He would teach for a year or two here, a year or two there.

00:19:34Guest:So he taught at LSU and Baton Rouge.

00:19:38Guest:He taught at Loyola, New Orleans.

00:19:40Marc:So you got to grow up in that environment with people talking lofty things and groovy people hanging around.

00:19:46Marc:But good academia, like liberal arts academia.

00:19:49Guest:Very good academia.

00:19:50Guest:And let me tell you, I never realized once I grew up and left home,

00:19:57Guest:how much i was going to miss that environment yeah because then i was just surrounded by a bunch of you know singer songwriters smoking a bunch of pot it was kind of a shock culture shock when i left that environment went out into the world on my own and was so disappointed because in what

00:20:16Guest:Well, you know, I'm just hanging around with a bunch of potheads who are politically apathetic for the most part.

00:20:23Guest:You know, nobody... I'm used to... Arguments in the living room?

00:20:27Guest:Yes.

00:20:27Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:20:28Guest:Passionate arguments.

00:20:29Guest:Political arguments, passionate arguments till three in the morning.

00:20:31Guest:About Marxist theories?

00:20:33Guest:Yes.

00:20:33Guest:Yeah.

00:20:34Guest:And, you know, my dad would read a poem and everybody drank, you know.

00:20:39Guest:Wine.

00:20:39Guest:Jack Daniels.

00:20:40Guest:Oh, Jack Daniels.

00:20:40Guest:Oh, no, no.

00:20:41Guest:No wine.

00:20:42Guest:These guys were hardcore.

00:20:43Marc:So.

00:20:44Guest:Like bourbon and, you know, whiskey or scotch.

00:20:47Marc:Uh-huh.

00:20:47Marc:So your dad would sit down and he would like, you know, actually at some point in the evening stand up and jam some poems?

00:20:52Guest:Yeah, he would read a couple of poems sometimes or he asked me to go get my guitar and I'd sing.

00:20:57Guest:And so I started getting that was, you know, how in my younger years, I, you know, I had that kind of supportive environment.

00:21:06Marc:But do you remember the first time your mind was blown by like, you know, somebody like outside of the guy that showed you the Robert Johnson record?

00:21:13Marc:I mean, there must have been these moments where you're just listening to these grownups tell poetry or there must have been one or two where you're like, what the fuck is that dude about?

00:21:22Guest:Yeah.

00:21:23Guest:I mean, you know.

00:21:25Marc:Sure.

00:21:25Guest:I wasn't really.

00:21:26Guest:I got into E.E.

00:21:28Guest:Cummings.

00:21:29Marc:Oh, that's great.

00:21:30Guest:Yeah.

00:21:31Guest:Because it's a little simpler.

00:21:32Marc:And it's sweet.

00:21:33Guest:Yeah.

00:21:34Marc:And there's a lot of weird letters here and there.

00:21:36Guest:Yeah.

00:21:36Marc:Yeah.

00:21:37Marc:No punctuation.

00:21:38Marc:Everything's small letters, right?

00:21:40Guest:Most of it.

00:21:40Marc:Yeah.

00:21:41Marc:Who are some of the other poets?

00:21:42Guest:Well, you know, my dad's mentor was John Chardy, the late John Chardy.

00:21:48Marc:I wish I knew him.

00:21:49Guest:And well, he was the director of the Bread Loaf Writers Conference.

00:21:53Guest:That was a big part of my experience growing up was going because my dad was on the staff there.

00:22:00Guest:Yeah.

00:22:00Guest:Writers Conference.

00:22:01Marc:Yeah.

00:22:02Guest:in Millbury, Vermont.

00:22:03Marc:So you'd fly out every year?

00:22:04Guest:We'd go in the summer in August.

00:22:07Guest:And people would write?

00:22:09Guest:Well, they would have workshops.

00:22:12Guest:Younger, up-and-coming writers would be there, and there'd be a staff of writers, like Maxine Heumann and my dad and John Chardy.

00:22:21Guest:Was there ever a time where you thought, like, I'm gonna be a poet?

00:22:24Guest:No, not really.

00:22:25Guest:Isn't it a weird world?

00:22:26Guest:It's a whole different deal.

00:22:28Guest:And every time I try to write what I thought was maybe a poem, my dad would say, honey, I think that wants to be a song.

00:22:36Guest:Oh, well, thank God he didn't say, honey, that shit.

00:22:39Guest:At least he stirred you in the right direction.

00:22:41Guest:He would give me lyrics sometimes to try to put music to or something.

00:22:45Guest:Oh, really?

00:22:47Guest:Did you do it?

00:22:48Guest:No.

00:22:48Guest:You know, I think it was a similar kind of a thing.

00:22:52Guest:Yeah.

00:22:53Guest:You know, I learned early on that those are two different worlds.

00:22:58Marc:Poetry and songwriting.

00:22:59Guest:Songwriting, yeah.

00:23:00Guest:Some people would argue that fact.

00:23:03Marc:Songwriters would probably argue it.

00:23:04Guest:Yeah, well, I remember my dad's having these late into the night debates with his songwriting students.

00:23:12Guest:He would be over at the house.

00:23:14Marc:Oh, he taught songwriting?

00:23:15Guest:No, I mean his portrait students, sorry.

00:23:18Guest:About whether Bob Dylan was a songwriter or both.

00:23:22Marc:And where'd he fall on that argument?

00:23:24Guest:He said, no, he's a songwriter.

00:23:26Marc:Oh, my God.

00:23:26Guest:He's not a poet.

00:23:28Guest:You know, that kind of thing.

00:23:29Marc:So we had a bunch of young minds yelling at him that he didn't understand.

00:23:32Oh, yeah.

00:23:33Guest:He didn't like the doors or any of the... How could you not like Dylan, I mean, as a poet?

00:23:38Guest:No, he liked Dylan.

00:23:40Guest:But he just wasn't going to give him... He just said, no, he's a songwriter.

00:23:43Marc:I guess poets are not... You're not supposed to make money if you're a poet.

00:23:48Marc:Yeah.

00:23:49Marc:That's the weird thing about poetry.

00:23:50Marc:As great as all these poets are, it's academic in the way that where else are they going to find their homes?

00:23:56Marc:I know that poetry has this power and it has this truth.

00:23:59Marc:And I like poetry.

00:24:00Marc:I wanted to be a poet at some point.

00:24:01Marc:But at some point you realize, like, how am I going to earn a living?

00:24:05Guest:They all teach.

00:24:06Marc:Yeah, they have to.

00:24:08Marc:What else are you going to do?

00:24:09Marc:I don't think there's going to be a poem that comes out in America that is going to change the culture completely.

00:24:14Marc:You know, like you read about like Central American revolutions and there's always the poets at the forefront of these things.

00:24:21Marc:What kind of fucking poems are these?

00:24:23Marc:They got to be amazing.

00:24:25Marc:But I've never read too many American poems that changed everything.

00:24:29Marc:Well, how about Allen Ginsberg?

00:24:30Marc:Did you ever read that?

00:24:31Guest:Yeah, I read a little bit of it.

00:24:32Marc:It's kind of crazy.

00:24:34Guest:Yeah.

00:24:34Marc:So when you started playing, why did you go like Folkways, what is it, Folkways, Smithsonian?

00:24:39Guest:Yeah.

00:24:40Marc:Because they did- They were huge.

00:24:44Guest:Yeah, they were a big- But it was for mostly folk?

00:24:47Guest:Yeah, they did all that, you know, those field recordings and everything.

00:24:51Marc:Right, the Alan Lomax recordings.

00:24:52Guest:Right, yeah.

00:24:54Marc:Those are amazing.

00:24:54Guest:John and Alan Lomax, yeah.

00:24:57Marc:And so were you looked at as some sort of artifact of American music?

00:25:00Guest:Well, I think that's kind of how, I don't know how they were looking at it.

00:25:04Guest:I mean, at the time, I had a friend from New Orleans who had moved to New York City and made this album on Folkways.

00:25:12Guest:Who was that?

00:25:13Guest:And his name was...

00:25:15Guest:His name was Jeff Ampolsk.

00:25:21Guest:Ampolsk.

00:25:23Guest:A-M-P-O-L-S-K.

00:25:25Guest:And his album was called God, Guts, and Guns.

00:25:28Marc:Yeah.

00:25:30Marc:That sounds powerful.

00:25:31Guest:And it was on Folkways, and he got in touch with me and said, you know, you should make a record for Folkways.

00:25:38Guest:They'll give you some money, and you can go make a record.

00:25:41Guest:And I said, okay, wow, because I knew all about what Folkways was and everything.

00:25:46Guest:And they sent me a check for $200 and a one-page contract.

00:25:51Guest:This was when Mo Ash was still there running the thing.

00:25:55Guest:Big spender.

00:25:56Guest:Yeah.

00:25:57Yeah.

00:25:59Guest:And you probably thought it was great.

00:26:00Guest:I thought, wow, I did at the time, you know, because all my folk heroes had all been on.

00:26:06Guest:You know, I had the John and Alan Lomax Folk Song USA songbook and all that, you know.

00:26:12Marc:So you're part of a tradition.

00:26:13Guest:Right.

00:26:14Marc:Yeah.

00:26:15Marc:And when you look back at those records, do you love them?

00:26:18Guest:No.

00:26:19Marc:Why not?

00:26:22Guest:Well, I just like the way I sound better now.

00:26:24Marc:Yeah.

00:26:25Marc:But can you hear, like, is there some part of you that, like, can you go back and feel, like, you know, where your voice was at then?

00:26:33Guest:Kind of, yeah.

00:26:34Guest:I mean, the reason I didn't do any mansons on the first Folkways album was because I thought that Folkways was like a sort of...

00:26:43Guest:you know, archival thing like you were saying.

00:26:46Guest:And I didn't think they were interested in my own stuff, so I just did all the... They're great covers.

00:26:52Marc:Now, who was the band on that?

00:26:53Guest:Because, I mean, it seems like a lot of your evolution... That's just me and one guy on the first...

00:26:58Marc:And the second one there was more though, right?

00:26:59Guest:The second one was the first time I, well actually we didn't even have a drummer.

00:27:03Guest:We recorded the second one initially at Houston, Texas at Sugar Hill Studios.

00:27:10Guest:Yeah.

00:27:11Guest:With Mickey Moody and did it in about three days and I went in one day and he had brought a drummer in and overdubbed drums onto the track.

00:27:20Guest:And at some point he absconded with the money that, you know, and left town or something.

00:27:27Marc:How much money?

00:27:29Guest:Well, Folkways gave me $500 for that one.

00:27:32Guest:But then a friend of mine threw in some more and helped, you know, pay for the studio time.

00:27:37Marc:And this dude just split with the bread?

00:27:39Guest:Yeah.

00:27:40Yeah.

00:27:40Marc:And you never saw him again.

00:27:41Guest:The studio called and one day had said, we haven't gotten paid yet.

00:27:45Marc:And did you ever track that dude down?

00:27:47Guest:No.

00:27:48Guest:He had worked.

00:27:49Guest:To this day?

00:27:50Guest:That's where Huey Moe, Sugar Hill Studio is famous for recording.

00:27:57Guest:What was that guy, that Mexican country singer, Mexican-American guy?

00:28:03Guest:In the last Teardrop Falls.

00:28:05Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:28:07Guest:Freddie.

00:28:08Guest:Freddie Fender.

00:28:09Guest:Freddie Fender.

00:28:10Guest:Yeah.

00:28:10Guest:That was, they had that big hit out of there.

00:28:13Guest:I'll be there before the last.

00:28:13Guest:Yeah, and that was Huey Moe, and Vicky Moody was his assistant.

00:28:19Marc:So when you were doing what was essentially like blues and country music, I know you had a relationship, a professional, but I know you know Steve Earle, and I know that there was this whole movement at some point to sort of maybe reinvent country a little bit.

00:28:34Marc:Was there a thought in your mind that you were going to be able to play mainstream country?

00:28:40Guest:No.

00:28:40Guest:Ever?

00:28:40Guest:Because, well, I mean, I guess you're talking about the kind of country music that's on the Nashville radio stations.

00:28:48Guest:That kind of... Well, yeah, because... Mainstream country today is...

00:28:52Marc:No, it's horrible.

00:28:53Marc:It's like pop.

00:28:54Marc:Yeah.

00:28:54Marc:But at that time, there seemed to be a little bit of a movement, you know, kind of springing from the Flying Burrito Brothers to do something different.

00:29:02Marc:Emily Lou Harris and that crew.

00:29:04Guest:Right.

00:29:04Marc:And then like, but I think they're a little younger, a little older than we are.

00:29:07Guest:Yeah, that was probably about a little bit ahead of my time when Emily Lou was coming out and all those people.

00:29:14Guest:I would have been like, you know, that would have been the late 60s.

00:29:18Guest:And, you know, so I wasn't quite like out on my own doing that whole thing.

00:29:22Marc:But Steve Earle was doing like off, you know, out of the, you know, kind of off the grid country records in the what?

00:29:28Marc:The 80s, late 70s.

00:29:29Guest:See, that's the thing.

00:29:30Guest:They didn't know what to call it back then because they didn't have this whole Americana thing like they have now.

00:29:35Guest:Right.

00:29:35Guest:Alternative country, whatever, blah, blah, blah.

00:29:38Marc:So, yeah.

00:29:38Marc:So, but I mean, I think he sort of felt like he was falling through the cracks as well.

00:29:44Guest:He did, maybe did, but he made it work somehow.

00:29:49Guest:I don't know.

00:29:50Guest:Well, he got successful before I did, so he just got in there.

00:29:53Marc:With Guitar Town, like early on?

00:29:55Guest:Right.

00:29:55Guest:He got in there sooner.

00:29:57Guest:By the time I made that, before that self-titled album, one that has Passionate Kisses and all on it,

00:30:05Guest:But right before that album, I had those songs like Passionate Kisses and Crescent City and all that.

00:30:11Guest:But I couldn't get a record deal at all because they kept telling me I fell in the cracks between country and rock.

00:30:16Marc:Right.

00:30:17Guest:And that it was just like the worst time ever.

00:30:19Guest:What was that business?

00:30:21Guest:This would have been like the mid 80s.

00:30:23Marc:Right.

00:30:24Marc:But there were still like, who were some of those people?

00:30:26Marc:Are you friends with Alejandro Escovito?

00:30:29Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:30:30Marc:And what about Maria McKee and those?

00:30:31Marc:Weren't they kind of doing that?

00:30:34Guest:Right around the time.

00:30:35Guest:That would have been like when I first moved out to L.A.

00:30:38Guest:in 1985.

00:30:39Guest:Right.

00:30:40Guest:They were gaining some notoriety.

00:30:42Guest:Right.

00:30:42Guest:yeah what was her band called lone justice one justice and all that yeah and then also the blasters were around right the blasters and dwight yokum was just starting to yeah you can so those were your like those were your peers you think well see they were a little bit ahead of me but in terms of having already having record deals and all that so you came to la once before yeah and then you ran away

00:31:06Guest:Well, I came here in 1985 and I got that record deal with Rough Trade Records.

00:31:11Marc:For which album?

00:31:12Guest:For that self-titled one.

00:31:13Guest:Right, right, for Lucinda Williams.

00:31:14Guest:And then all of a sudden everybody said, where have you been all this time?

00:31:17Guest:Yeah.

00:31:18Guest:You know, and RCA Records signed me and then, you know.

00:31:22Guest:Yeah.

00:31:23Guest:And then I got caught up in that whole time when labels were starting and closing and falling and people were getting fired and leaving.

00:31:31Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:31:32Guest:So it wasn't until I got on Lost Highway Records that I kind of found a home.

00:31:38Guest:That's one of the reasons everybody says, oh, you used to take so long in between albums.

00:31:43Guest:Well, a large part of that was because all these labels were going under.

00:31:48Guest:I was on Chameleon Records for one record, which was part of Elektra, and then they went under.

00:31:58Guest:And then I got signed to American Records with Rick Rubin, and then his label went under.

00:32:02Guest:Finally ended up on Mercury.

00:32:05Marc:Has he ever reached out recently to record you again?

00:32:09Guest:No, but he really wanted to work with me.

00:32:12Guest:He was the executive producer initially for Car Wheels.

00:32:15Guest:And then in the middle of everything, it was going to come out on American Records, Car Wheels was.

00:32:24Marc:He's kind of interesting.

00:32:24Marc:It's like one of those guys that's like, okay, I've got all the money in the world.

00:32:28Marc:Why not just do some pure shit now?

00:32:31Marc:Do you like his Johnny Cash records?

00:32:33Guest:Yeah, I love it.

00:32:34Guest:I mean, well, he wanted to do something with me.

00:32:37Marc:There's still time, Lucinda.

00:32:38Guest:He kind of took me aside initially, and, you know, at the time, I was very loyal and faithful to my band at that time.

00:32:46Guest:And he saw...

00:32:50Guest:a lot of potential in me and said you know would you consider working with other musicians and all and at the time i was the idea of that was terrifying to me i said no no i'm i've got my band and i'm just gonna work with them and you know that kind of thing but i remember rick sat me down in his house in the hollywood hills and played me that pj harvey song that flood had produced yeah at the time um and you know so he was kind of saying look

00:33:17Guest:You know, he saw.

00:33:18Marc:This is some raw shit.

00:33:19Guest:He said, you know, he connected me with.

00:33:22Marc:Right.

00:33:22Marc:With PJ.

00:33:23Guest:Sometimes, yeah.

00:33:25Marc:That's interesting, because that makes sense to me.

00:33:26Guest:I know.

00:33:27Guest:And so he saw, and I wonder what had happened.

00:33:30Guest:Had I gone, let him kind of direct things more.

00:33:34Guest:I think that album did pretty well.

00:33:36Guest:It did, yeah.

00:33:37Marc:It's a big record.

00:33:38Guest:The Carwell's album?

00:33:38Guest:Yeah.

00:33:39Guest:Yeah, it did.

00:33:40Marc:It was an amazing record.

00:33:41Marc:I mean, it brought you to my attention.

00:33:43Marc:Everybody was talking about you.

00:33:45Guest:That's the one that did.

00:33:46Marc:Yeah, I have two ex-wives that have gone and seen you.

00:33:52Marc:I'm not blaming you for anything.

00:33:54Guest:No, I read about, yeah.

00:33:58Guest:Well, the thing is, though, the record on Rough Trade really was the thing that initially opened the door.

00:34:05Marc:The self-titled record.

00:34:06Guest:Right.

00:34:06Marc:But is that the same band that's on car wheels?

00:34:09Guest:Yeah, it's the same band, except then I brought some other musicians in.

00:34:14Guest:Different producer, though?

00:34:16Guest:Well, what happened was Gerf Morlix was my guitar player and co-producer on the self-titled album and the Sweet O' World album, and initially on Car Wheels.

00:34:27Guest:Yeah.

00:34:28Guest:And then in the middle of everything...

00:34:30Guest:We had a falling out and he didn't in terms of produce production sounds and all of that.

00:34:36Guest:Yeah.

00:34:37Guest:And I wanted to bring in Steve Earl to help work on the album.

00:34:41Guest:Yeah.

00:34:42Guest:Because Steve's album was just coming out.

00:34:46Guest:Which one?

00:34:47Guest:I feel right.

00:34:48Marc:Oh, El Corazon.

00:34:48Marc:Yeah.

00:34:48Guest:And I listened to his rough mixes and I loved the sound that he was getting.

00:34:54Guest:He had been working with Ray Kennedy at a little studio room and board in Nashville.

00:34:58Marc:Is that before or after I Feel Alright?

00:34:59Marc:Is that the one before?

00:35:01Marc:Because I Feel Alright was like, I love that record.

00:35:03Marc:I love El Corazon too, but it might be the same dudes.

00:35:07Guest:Maybe it was.

00:35:08Guest:Yeah, it was the same guy.

00:35:09Guest:Yeah.

00:35:10Guest:Well, he had brought me in to sing on that song.

00:35:12Guest:You're still standing there.

00:35:13Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:35:14Marc:It's great.

00:35:14Guest:And so that's how I got turned on to Steve and Ray Kennedy and their whole sound.

00:35:19Guest:And I'd gotten tired of L.A.

00:35:21Guest:So I'd moved to Nashville in 93.

00:35:24Guest:And so this would have been, I don't know, whenever he was 95 or 96.

00:35:29Marc:Did you get tired of L.A.

00:35:31Marc:and like, you know, fuck you, L.A.?

00:35:32Guest:Oh, no.

00:35:33Guest:It was just, I was just, you know, tired of everything.

00:35:35Guest:It's so big.

00:35:36Guest:It's, you know, the city's so big and you never see anybody.

00:35:39Marc:And you recorded Car Wheels in Nashville?

00:35:42Guest:We started recording it in Austin, Texas.

00:35:44Marc:How long did you live in Austin?

00:35:46Guest:I lived in Austin in the... Remember, I lived in Austin and Houston like in the 70s.

00:35:51Guest:Going back and forth.

00:35:52Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:35:53Guest:Yeah.

00:35:54Guest:And then I moved to L.A.

00:35:55Guest:for six years.

00:35:56Guest:Then I moved to Nashville for nine years.

00:35:57Guest:Then I moved back to L.A.

00:36:00Marc:So you reached out to Steve.

00:36:02Guest:So I sang on Steve's album and I listened to his tracks, what he was doing.

00:36:07Guest:And I said, this is more how I want my album records.

00:36:10Marc:What was that specifically?

00:36:11Guest:Just bigger sounding, you know, fuller and bigger.

00:36:14Marc:Uh-huh.

00:36:15Marc:And did you, like, I had heard that you, on Car Wheel specifically, that there was not much overdubbing, that you let the band play all together.

00:36:26Guest:Yeah, I always did.

00:36:26Guest:I always do that.

00:36:27Guest:It makes a big difference.

00:36:29Guest:Yeah.

00:36:29Guest:I mean, there's always a little bit of overdubbing, you know, later because you're not sure yet what you want to put on something.

00:36:34Guest:Right.

00:36:35Guest:So initially, you know, you just record the basic tracks with the basic band, you know, guitar, bass, drums.

00:36:41Guest:Yeah.

00:36:41Guest:And maybe you might have something else.

00:36:43Guest:Maybe you might have.

00:36:44Guest:But at the same time.

00:36:45Guest:At the same time.

00:36:46Guest:Yeah.

00:36:47Guest:And then later you'll bring maybe overdub another guitar part or something like that.

00:36:50Marc:So what happened with Steve?

00:36:52Guest:Well, we went, I wanted to, Gurf didn't want to work with Steve.

00:36:56Guest:And he felt threatened, and it was just, it was a nightmare.

00:36:59Guest:So it was a cockfight.

00:37:01Guest:Yeah, pretty much.

00:37:03Guest:And it was like, I was like, okay, Gurf, you know, I love you, I want to work with you.

00:37:08Guest:You know, he decided to leave.

00:37:11Guest:And he hasn't spoken to me since.

00:37:14Guest:Oh, my God.

00:37:15Guest:I know.

00:37:16Guest:I went to see him recently at the Hotel Cafe perform, and...

00:37:19Guest:I ended up in tears at the bar.

00:37:21Guest:He refused to talk to me and wouldn't see me.

00:37:24Marc:And he knew you were there.

00:37:25Guest:He knew I was there.

00:37:26Marc:So he hasn't let it go.

00:37:27Guest:He hasn't let it go.

00:37:28Marc:Isn't that weird about letting things go?

00:37:30Marc:Just like some things just kind of, well, did you ever try to reach out to him?

00:37:35Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:37:36Guest:Won't do it.

00:37:37Guest:I tried to reach out a lot of times.

00:37:39Marc:So it seems to me that like on, you know, the difference between like Sweet Old World and Car Wheels was like, there's like something happened to you musically and vocally.

00:37:51Marc:Can you identify?

00:37:52Guest:Well, it sounds better.

00:37:53Guest:It's a better produced album.

00:37:54Marc:But it's also laid back at rocks more.

00:37:57Guest:Yeah, you know the guitars Steve was helping with that.

00:38:00Guest:He was like, that's the thing I mean, he got that he added that whole sort of Drive to it.

00:38:07Guest:That's right.

00:38:08Marc:Yes, like a stones.

00:38:09Guest:That's what he had.

00:38:10Guest:That's what he did And he just rocked it he'd like he played the rhythm guitar on several tracks and he like helped set

00:38:18Guest:set the tone uh-huh you know for the songs like that so that's you know and are you guys still friends oh yeah we've gotten to be better friends actually over the years you know i was really intimidated working with him i mean he he had just gotten out of jail he was a handful and yeah i was like an emotional wreck because girth had bailed on me and you know recording in a studio was still really

00:38:45Guest:You know, and it still is a very kind of, you know, I hadn't made that many records.

00:38:52Guest:I mean, I still haven't made compared to somebody like Steve Ruhl.

00:38:55Guest:You know, and I would get all insecure about a vocal I'd done, you know, and Steve would go...

00:39:02Guest:Lou, it's just a record.

00:39:04Guest:Get over it.

00:39:05Guest:You know, God damn it.

00:39:07Guest:You know, and I'd be like, one time I was curled up in the fetal position on the floor in the fucking sound booth.

00:39:15Guest:And Steve's going, fuck this shit.

00:39:17Guest:I'm going to New Orleans.

00:39:19Guest:I've had enough, you know.

00:39:20Guest:And he left?

00:39:22Guest:No, no.

00:39:23Guest:But, you know.

00:39:24Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:39:25Guest:We just butthels like crazy.

00:39:27Guest:Yeah.

00:39:27Marc:Yeah, I worked with him at Air America, and I did his show.

00:39:30Guest:Right?

00:39:30Guest:So you know what I'm talking about.

00:39:31Guest:He's just like, boom, boom, boom.

00:39:33Marc:Oh, he will not stop talking.

00:39:34Guest:Yeah, he is just, boom, but he likes to work really quickly.

00:39:37Guest:You know, go in, put it down, boom, that's it, next thing.

00:39:40Guest:And I'm much more sort of deliberate.

00:39:42Guest:I like to kind of take my time a little bit, and maybe I want to try this, maybe I want to try that kind of thing.

00:39:48Guest:Yeah.

00:39:48Marc:Yeah, and he was, like, got his story, like, it's, like, I'm sober, and whatever the hell he went through.

00:39:57Marc:Yeah, it is.

00:39:58Guest:He's still talking about that, you know?

00:40:01Marc:Yeah, I mean, but, like, his story, you know?

00:40:04Guest:Oh, my God.

00:40:06Marc:It was, like, way unbelievable.

00:40:08Guest:Like, he told me one time about being fucked up on...

00:40:11Guest:I don't know what, alcohol, coke, and some kind of pills or something.

00:40:17Guest:He had one of those things that you put your feet over and hang upside down.

00:40:21Guest:And he was doing that fucking thing all fucked up.

00:40:28Guest:He just had story after story when we were in the studio together.

00:40:32Marc:He loves to talk, man.

00:40:33Marc:He's got good stories.

00:40:36Guest:He's got big ideas.

00:40:37Guest:He just goes.

00:40:40Guest:He called me a while back about something and

00:40:43Guest:I saw a number pop up, and it was 615 area code, which is Nashville.

00:40:48Guest:And, of course, now he's living in New York City.

00:40:50Guest:Yeah.

00:40:51Guest:And he has been for a while.

00:40:52Guest:Smoking a pipe, I think.

00:40:53Guest:Yeah.

00:40:54Guest:He's wearing those corduroy blazers.

00:40:56Guest:I know.

00:40:56Guest:He's doing the professor thing.

00:40:57Guest:He's like a Mr. Poet guy now.

00:40:59Guest:But anyway, so I called him back, and I said, Steve, I didn't recognize your number at 615.

00:41:05Guest:He says, this is the same phone number I've had since I got out of jail in Nashville.

00:41:11Yeah.

00:41:11Guest:And it's the same phone number I'm going to have for the rest of my life.

00:41:14Guest:You know, he'll say stuff like that.

00:41:15Marc:He's committed to it, yeah.

00:41:17Marc:I know you're compelled towards ruffians and gypsies and rock and roll.

00:41:23Guest:Well, aren't we all?

00:41:24Guest:I am.

00:41:25Guest:Yeah, hell yeah.

00:41:26Marc:I mean, I built my life around it.

00:41:27Marc:I mean, I never had sports heroes.

00:41:29Marc:For me, it was like Keith Richards and William Burroughs.

00:41:31Marc:It was like those were the guys.

00:41:33Marc:Like that song, Too Cool To Be Forgotten is a beautiful song.

00:41:36Marc:Thanks.

00:41:37Marc:But you didn't end up getting too fucked up?

00:41:41Guest:I've made it through.

00:41:42Guest:I mean, you know, I could have, but see, I had my, I was very close with my dad and there was that bond thing and I didn't want to disappoint him.

00:41:51Guest:And that's not to say I didn't go through my share of, I mean, when I think back on the stuff I did in high, mostly junior high and high school.

00:41:58Marc:Okay.

00:41:59Yeah.

00:41:59Guest:which is one of the reasons I'm a big advocate for legalizing marijuana because let me tell you, the kids, we, at school would go get to the drugstore and buy over-the-counter pharmaceutical shit to get high with that could have killed us.

00:42:17Marc:Like what?

00:42:17Marc:Like NyQuil, cough syrup?

00:42:21Guest:Yeah, I drank a whole bottle of rum or cough syrup one time.

00:42:25Marc:And did it work?

00:42:26Guest:Yeah, I mean, I puked my guts out.

00:42:29Guest:My heart was racing 90 miles an hour and, you know.

00:42:32Guest:No, I think, yeah, obviously.

00:42:34Guest:I mean, we would do all this shit like that.

00:42:36Guest:Like, every week it was a different thing.

00:42:39Guest:You know, like, one week it was Midol.

00:42:42Marc:Midol?

00:42:42Guest:Midol pills.

00:42:44Marc:Yeah.

00:42:44Guest:I took like five of them one time.

00:42:46Guest:And I was at school.

00:42:48Marc:What does that do?

00:42:50Guest:I don't know.

00:42:50Guest:Somebody said you could get high, get a buzz or whatever.

00:42:53Guest:It was all about just, you know, but...

00:42:55Marc:My most shameful moment was snorting.

00:42:58Marc:I ground up late at night after we were wasted.

00:43:01Marc:Me and another guy ground up vibrant.

00:43:04Marc:You remember that over the counter?

00:43:05Marc:Stay up.

00:43:06Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:43:07Marc:So we chopped that into lines and we were snorting.

00:43:10Guest:Oh, no.

00:43:10Guest:My God.

00:43:11Marc:Snorting vibrant.

00:43:12Guest:I never did that.

00:43:13Marc:And some guy walked in and saw us doing that.

00:43:15Marc:And we had all that yellow shit in our nose.

00:43:18Marc:And he just looked at us and said, I'm not going to tell anyone I saw this.

00:43:21Guest:Yeah.

00:43:22Guest:Morning Glory Seas was another one.

00:43:24Marc:That was bullshit.

00:43:25Guest:Yeah.

00:43:26Guest:Everybody's smoking banana peels.

00:43:28Marc:No, that's not.

00:43:31Marc:So you did high school in New Orleans?

00:43:33Guest:Yeah.

00:43:34Guest:I went to public inner city school in New Orleans.

00:43:36Marc:But everybody fucking drinks.

00:43:37Marc:You drink on the street in New Orleans.

00:43:38Marc:I mean, when I was in high school, we got people to buy booze for us.

00:43:41Marc:You must have been able to get booze.

00:43:42Guest:Yeah.

00:43:43Guest:I don't know if I was a big, I was more about smoking pot and getting whatever.

00:43:50Guest:I don't really remember.

00:43:51Guest:I mean, I did drink.

00:43:53Guest:I drank at home with my dad, my stepmother.

00:43:56Guest:I mean, they taught me how to drink.

00:43:58Guest:I would mix drinks for them at parties and stuff.

00:44:01Guest:Honey, can you go make me a vodka tonic or gin and tonic?

00:44:05Guest:That was in the summer, gin and tonic.

00:44:07Marc:So you knew how to make drinks.

00:44:08Marc:That's good.

00:44:09Marc:Where was your mom?

00:44:11Guest:My mother, after my parents split up, she stayed in New Orleans.

00:44:15Guest:So she had her own apartment down there.

00:44:17Guest:And, you know, I would go visit her and go back and forth.

00:44:20Marc:Every weekend or was it?

00:44:21Guest:No, no.

00:44:21Guest:Well, this was later after we moved to Fayetteville.

00:44:24Guest:And my dad was at the University of Arkansas.

00:44:27And.

00:44:27Marc:Did they have an okay relationship?

00:44:29Guest:They had an okay relationship.

00:44:31Guest:I mean, you know.

00:44:31Marc:How'd you end up with your dad?

00:44:33Marc:I mean, that seems like you never hear that.

00:44:34Guest:Well, because.

00:44:35Guest:That's happening.

00:44:35Guest:Yeah, I know, especially back then.

00:44:37Guest:Yeah.

00:44:37Guest:Because my mother was an alcoholic and had mental illness.

00:44:42Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:44:43Guest:She was just, my dad said, she was just, you know, I guess.

00:44:49Guest:Manic depressive?

00:44:50Guest:Yeah, manic depressive with paranoid schizophrenia tendencies.

00:44:54Marc:Wow.

00:44:56Guest:Yeah.

00:44:56Guest:Whatever that means.

00:44:57Marc:Well, it means, you know, you get manic and you think the world's closing in on you.

00:45:01Guest:Yeah.

00:45:02Guest:So, yeah, that's a whole nother, we would take, we need more time, really.

00:45:07Guest:You know, I mean, so, but, you know, we grew up, my dad would always, but that's why we went with my dad, because she wasn't capable of taking care of us and she was very well aware of that.

00:45:17Guest:So she didn't fight it.

00:45:19Guest:My mother, no, she was brilliant and funny and talented and beautiful.

00:45:25Guest:But she grew up in that age like Sylvia Plath, where women didn't talk about that stuff.

00:45:33Guest:And they didn't know about antidepressants.

00:45:36Guest:I mean, she was put on lithium.

00:45:37Guest:Lithium was just, that would make her feel bad and feel horrible.

00:45:41Guest:She would go off of it and that kind of thing.

00:45:45Guest:So it was just a really difficult...

00:45:47Guest:time to be mentally ill in her back in that day you know and my dad it didn't really show up until after they were married which I guess happens sometimes I don't know why and my dad's bipolar and like in his mid 40s it started like that yeah that's what my dad describes it like I was sitting at the table with your mother and we were having dinner and all of a sudden she looked across the table at me with this you know just hostility in her face and just kind of snapped and

00:46:17Marc:Yeah.

00:46:18Guest:And, you know.

00:46:19Marc:And she was a different person.

00:46:20Marc:He just felt that there was something.

00:46:22Guest:Yeah.

00:46:22Guest:She would just get hostile.

00:46:23Marc:Yeah.

00:46:24Guest:You know.

00:46:24Marc:Yeah.

00:46:25Marc:And he couldn't.

00:46:26Guest:She had a lot of baggage from her family life.

00:46:30Marc:Yeah.

00:46:31Guest:Arkansas?

00:46:32Guest:No, Louisiana.

00:46:33Guest:No, I saw Louisiana.

00:46:34Guest:Okay.

00:46:34Guest:Her dad was a Methodist minister.

00:46:36Guest:Oh, my God.

00:46:37Guest:Hellfire and Brimstone.

00:46:39Guest:No way.

00:46:39Guest:Kind of thing.

00:46:40Guest:Yeah.

00:46:41Guest:She had four brothers, and we think there might have been some sexual abuse in the family and all of that.

00:46:50Guest:And so she was at therapy all of my life.

00:46:54Marc:Oh, she was proactive.

00:46:55Marc:That's great.

00:46:56Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:46:56Guest:She was at therapy in and out of mental institutions.

00:47:00Guest:But my dad was always...

00:47:02Guest:You know, he would say, your mother can't help it, she's not well.

00:47:06Guest:So there was never, you know, he wanted us to understand.

00:47:09Marc:Not vindictive and not, you know.

00:47:11Guest:Yeah.

00:47:11Marc:Right.

00:47:12Marc:And you were able to maintain the relationship.

00:47:14Guest:I was able to maintain the relationship and, you know.

00:47:17Marc:It's interesting that it like because I think about myself and I think about your father that there's something about, you know, people who are at the edge of whatever they're at the edge of.

00:47:27Marc:They're very compelling, you know, until they're over the edge.

00:47:31Marc:And then it's hard to know what the hell to do.

00:47:34Guest:Yeah.

00:47:35Marc:So did you have to visit your mom in mental hospitals?

00:47:38Guest:No, I didn't.

00:47:38Marc:You weren't part of that?

00:47:40Guest:That was, I was young.

00:47:41Guest:Oh, right, right.

00:47:42Guest:I was like, you know, a child.

00:47:44Guest:And I would be, you know, more protected from it.

00:47:48Marc:Yeah.

00:47:48Guest:You know.

00:47:49Marc:He wasn't going to put you through that.

00:47:51Marc:Your dad.

00:47:52Guest:Well, I didn't, it wasn't really, it's not like she was in a middle hospital for that long of a time.

00:47:56Guest:It would just be sort of,

00:47:57Marc:Oh, for a few days.

00:47:59Guest:I guess.

00:47:59Guest:Get her leveled off.

00:48:00Guest:It was kind of, it was sort of a blur for me growing up.

00:48:04Guest:Like I, I didn't even realize that she had a drinking problem until much later because I was so used to seeing her on medication and she would just be kind of slurring her speech and she would just say, I'm on my medication.

00:48:16Guest:Right.

00:48:16Guest:You know?

00:48:16Guest:Right.

00:48:17Guest:And so I just had that locked in my brain that, okay, there was my mother.

00:48:21Guest:I love her.

00:48:22Guest:she's mentally ill and she takes medicine for her mental illness.

00:48:26Guest:And I just kind of put it there, you know.

00:48:29Guest:Yeah.

00:48:29Guest:It wasn't until I was probably in my early 20s when I would go visit her once I was sort of an adult.

00:48:37Guest:Right.

00:48:38Guest:And...

00:48:39Guest:You know, when she would drink, she would just check out.

00:48:43Guest:She wasn't a rage or she wasn't abusive or anything.

00:48:46Guest:No, she would just check out.

00:48:47Guest:She would hang out in her bedroom with the door closed and her nightgown on.

00:48:50Guest:And, you know, it'd be like... Mm-hmm.

00:48:54Marc:Just hanging out.

00:48:55Guest:She wasn't like a social drinker kind of thing.

00:49:00Guest:She was an isolation.

00:49:02Marc:Well, it's great that your father sort of put it into context for you so you didn't have to grow up with that idea that you could help or that it was your job to fix her and that kind of stuff because that makes people pretty crazy.

00:49:13Guest:Well, he would help me, too, by saying...

00:49:15Guest:You know, like if I was having problems, he would say, honey, you know, it's not your fault.

00:49:21Guest:You, you know, your mother locked you in a closet when you were three.

00:49:25Guest:You didn't remember that, did you?

00:49:29Guest:No, of course not.

00:49:30Guest:So now you knew.

00:49:31Guest:Apparently, you know, my dad came home from work one day.

00:49:35Guest:My mother was, and I was like being a, whatever three-year-olds do and, you know, crying.

00:49:40Guest:And she just kind of was like, you know, and...

00:49:45Guest:so you're not gonna shut up closet treatment you know but i got so used to that kind of analysis when i was growing up my dad was really into into sigmund freud and you know so he was he was a he was a an amateur therapist

00:50:05Guest:I guess, you know, he would just say, well, you know, subconsciously you, you know, so and my mother studied.

00:50:14Guest:She was at therapy so long from the time I was born, pretty much.

00:50:19Guest:Yeah.

00:50:20Guest:You know, she would talk to me about Carl Jung and all this stuff.

00:50:23Guest:And she had a handle on it.

00:50:25Guest:oh yeah she knew all the stuff yeah i mean you know she couldn't apply any of it necessarily right she tried to apply it you know but um well if you're fighting with chemicals you know with the you know they didn't have good antidepressants like they have today yeah lithium just knocked them out oh that was it was horrible stuff she hated it made them feel numb and yeah they couldn't yeah like it like it made it made everything sort of like uh fuzzy probably yeah

00:50:50Marc:Did you find in looking at your life or your songs that are there things in you that you not necessarily blame your parents for but that you feel scarred from?

00:51:00Marc:Well, of course.

00:51:02Guest:I mean, I think that's pretty obvious, you know, what I'm talking about and all the songs and everything.

00:51:08Guest:It is obvious.

00:51:08Guest:But, you know, I don't want to be one of these.

00:51:12Guest:See, that's what separates me, I think, as a songwriter is...

00:51:16Guest:You know, there's that fine line between, I call it the sort of sitting on the edge of your bed kind of songs.

00:51:23Guest:Like, you know, those kind of songwriters that you hear sometimes.

00:51:27Guest:It's like, ooh, you know, it's all about me and this.

00:51:32Guest:And it's all like, ooh.

00:51:33Guest:Right.

00:51:34Guest:Well, I mean, there's that fine line.

00:51:37Guest:You know, you don't want to get too self.

00:51:40Marc:Too inside your head.

00:51:42Marc:You want it to be relatable.

00:51:43Guest:You want it to be relatable.

00:51:44Guest:Right.

00:51:45Guest:And I learned how to do that.

00:51:47Guest:And I think maybe because I sort of had that, I don't know what you want to call it, like a checking thing.

00:51:53Guest:Like a lot of it was my dad with his writing.

00:51:56Guest:I mean, he was like my writing mentor.

00:51:59Guest:Right.

00:51:59Guest:I would show him lyrics.

00:52:01Yeah.

00:52:01Guest:You know, he would teach me just real basic tenets of what not to do.

00:52:07Guest:You know, like, don't you, like, refrain from cliches.

00:52:11Guest:You know, like the moon in June and the stars in your eyes and the poet's wine or whatever.

00:52:17Guest:You know, and that kind of thing.

00:52:18Marc:Anything that looks like it might be on a greeting card.

00:52:21Guest:Exactly.

00:52:22Guest:Yeah, so he kind of like, you know, I didn't, somehow I had that...

00:52:28Guest:ability to kind of watch, look at myself.

00:52:33Guest:Get outside of myself and look at myself.

00:52:36Marc:Well, it's interesting that Rick Rubin made this analogy between you and PJ because when I first listened to Car Wheels, compared to your other stuff, the song You Took My Joy, what's it called?

00:52:45Marc:Joy?

00:52:46Guest:Yeah.

00:52:46Marc:I mean, that thing for me...

00:52:49Marc:was was so raw and i i listened to it today and it didn't seem to have the same effect it had me first listening to it but i was like holy this woman is putting herself out there yeah and and that seemed to happen with that record your voice seemed to change do you know my voice and also my courage as a writer you know because that was the other thing i mean i was so impressed with

00:53:12Guest:You know, like some of the points my dad would write, for instance, would he could write about a cat sleeping in the window or a wreck on the highway.

00:53:22Guest:Right.

00:53:22Guest:You know, and and a lot of and that's what poetry did.

00:53:27Guest:Right.

00:53:28Guest:And and novels also in short stories.

00:53:30Guest:I really preferred I loved Flannery O'Connor and Dora Welty and all.

00:53:36Guest:you know because of the darkness and the realism yeah yeah and they were able to beauty and just like dark beauty yeah you know and so i did i wanted to be able to go there as a songwriter you know and not my dad used to say don't ever censor yourself like that was one of the rules and when did you stop doing that or when did you like find that you really just a gradual thing you know i think it was just growing like anything you know you just get better as you go along and

00:54:02Marc:Well, you recovered, which one?

00:54:05Marc:I Lost It?

00:54:06Guest:Yeah, that was initially on my second Focus album.

00:54:09Marc:And then if you listen to those two versions, though, the emotional depth that it has on car wheels, it's a whole different thing.

00:54:19Marc:And why that song?

00:54:21Marc:Did you feel like it was deeper than you were able to handle when you first recorded it?

00:54:25Guest:I'm not really sure how that came about, you know.

00:54:28Guest:I think I was just maybe talking about re-recording one of those old songs or something.

00:54:34Guest:I'm not really sure, to tell you the truth.

00:54:36Guest:I think I worked with that with Gurf.

00:54:39Guest:We kind of, I think I know what it was.

00:54:41Guest:We just started performing it.

00:54:43Guest:It came out of a live thing.

00:54:44Guest:Right, right, right.

00:54:45Guest:Because I was doing, you know, I'd still do some of the songs off the folkways, like Happy Woman Blues or whatever.

00:54:51Guest:Yeah.

00:54:51Guest:I used to do that with Girf with the band.

00:54:54Guest:I lost it and we just figured out a new arrangement for it.

00:54:59Marc:So when I talk to songwriters, I just insist, even though it's not usually true, that they've lived through everything in their songs.

00:55:08Guest:Yeah.

00:55:09Marc:And I and some people that I talked to are like, no, I did.

00:55:12Marc:I just made it up.

00:55:13Marc:And I'm like, no, you got to be.

00:55:15Guest:I wish I could do that.

00:55:16Guest:I mean, that would be great.

00:55:17Guest:I'm so happy to hear that.

00:55:18Guest:I think I would be able to write.

00:55:19Guest:Well, I was always impressed with how Bob Dylan apparently could read an article in the newspaper and create a song out of it, like the song about Hurricane Carter.

00:55:29Marc:He's a little tricky, Bob Dylan.

00:55:30Guest:You know what I mean?

00:55:31Marc:He's a little tricky.

00:55:32Marc:Yeah.

00:55:34Marc:Even now, as fascinated as I am with him, and I just got Blonde on Blonde on a new vinyl pressing.

00:55:40Guest:I'm getting all into records.

00:55:43Guest:That one and Howard Sixth Storm Revisited.

00:55:45Marc:Right?

00:55:45Guest:Those are the ones that-

00:55:47Marc:They're just mind blowing.

00:55:48Marc:I can't like visions of Joanna.

00:55:49Marc:I can't even know what to do with that song, man.

00:55:53Marc:And then when you see him sort of shift, like he's like a shape shifter, you know, like you don't know what's really in there, what isn't in there and what's easy for him and what's hard for him.

00:56:02Marc:But it doesn't matter the distance between you want him to be this guy, but he tends to avoid that at all costs.

00:56:08Guest:Yeah, he says that, but I don't know.

00:56:10Guest:Yeah.

00:56:10Marc:Have you ever met him?

00:56:11Guest:Yeah, I've met him.

00:56:13Guest:He's very, you know, kind of, I mean, I've just briefly, I went out and opened some shows in the 90s when he was touring with Van Morrison.

00:56:22Marc:That's another one.

00:56:23Guest:That's another one.

00:56:25Marc:Astro Weeks?

00:56:26Marc:Where the fuck does that come from?

00:56:28Marc:Am I right?

00:56:28Marc:I just ordered it on vinyl again.

00:56:30Guest:I know.

00:56:30Guest:It's like this spirituality.

00:56:32Guest:It's like this sort of, you know, alcoholic thing.

00:56:37Marc:you know stumbling around guy who's this kind of has this whole spiritual channel something and in terms in terms of like the darkness like that on astral weeks even the song like the the one song that kills me outside well madam george and and the other one but that one at the end that swim slow slider where where it's just like this weird fragment of a song about this girl that just gets i think she dies and you're not it's not it's not clear but like i'm just sitting in my car and i'm like

00:57:04Guest:squirting out tears and i don't even know what that it's like i don't know where it comes from that's the thing that's the there aren't too many of them yeah well you do it too i i will squirt out tears during your song now that's what i want you to do i that's no dancing just crying

00:57:20Guest:No dancing.

00:57:21Guest:No, I like the dancing, too.

00:57:23Guest:Dance and cry.

00:57:24Guest:Because of what we were talking about before, I was going to say I like to push people's buttons.

00:57:28Guest:I like to kind of, you know, make people think.

00:57:34Marc:Or feel.

00:57:34Guest:Feel and think.

00:57:36Marc:Do you do anything outside of writing songs?

00:57:41Marc:Do you do anything to keep your sanity in check?

00:57:45Marc:Are you involved in some sort of spiritualness or something?

00:57:51Guest:No.

00:57:51Guest:Well, not formally or anything.

00:57:53Guest:Right, right.

00:57:53Guest:I've explored a lot of the same stuff you probably have.

00:57:56Guest:Yeah?

00:57:57Guest:Like what?

00:57:59Guest:Well...

00:58:00Guest:I got into the Four Agreements.

00:58:03Guest:It's got Don Miguel Ruiz.

00:58:07Guest:And I thought it was beautiful.

00:58:08Guest:It's very mythological.

00:58:10Guest:But not a day-to-day thing.

00:58:12Guest:I'm very drawn.

00:58:13Guest:Well, it's not really a thing.

00:58:15Marc:You're very drawn to what?

00:58:17Guest:I'm very drawn to Latin American, Mexican culture, the art, all the Santeria stuff.

00:58:26Marc:Sure, sure, yeah.

00:58:28Marc:It's sexy.

00:58:29Marc:It's bloody.

00:58:29Guest:It is.

00:58:30Guest:It's bloody.

00:58:31Marc:It's painful.

00:58:32Guest:you're the only not there it's hard to explain because you know people come over to the house and i have this wall of crosses i collect different yeah you know because it's like works of art oh absolutely and you know this the bleeding jesus is and the yeah there's all that the sacred hearts yeah oh yeah it's just hearts with thorns around yeah it's just the symbolism and

00:58:56Marc:Well, Jesus, the pain of Jesus has been very appealing for a lot of years to a lot of people.

00:59:02Guest:Yeah.

00:59:02Marc:I mean, he did it for all of us, apparently.

00:59:05Marc:But that art in particular is disturbing.

00:59:08Marc:And where I grew up in New Mexico.

00:59:09Guest:Oh, that's the thing.

00:59:12Marc:You know about those guys?

00:59:13Marc:The penitentes who march and...

00:59:15Marc:Oh, yes.

00:59:17Marc:And carry the cross once a year.

00:59:19Guest:I've got a painting that Luke Lewis from Lost Highway Records gave me, an old, like an antique, it almost looks like a lithograph or something of that.

00:59:31Guest:Of the self-flagellation.

00:59:33Marc:Yeah, they do it.

00:59:34Marc:They still do it.

00:59:35Guest:It's just the whole Catholic thing with, well, that's the Santeria voodoo mixed with Catholicism.

00:59:42Guest:It's just...

00:59:42Marc:How can you lose?

00:59:43Marc:I mean, that's like that's the blues and something exotic and different.

00:59:49Marc:Yeah, I love that.

00:59:50Guest:I love it, too.

00:59:51Guest:And I was noticing this area where you're living as we were driving down.

00:59:56Marc:Yeah.

00:59:57Guest:One of the main streets is down there.

00:59:59Guest:It's like, well, I read how you lived in Queens.

01:00:03Guest:I did live in Queens.

01:00:04Guest:For a long time.

01:00:04Guest:And I'm driving through here and I'm thinking, this is like Queens almost.

01:00:09Marc:It's a little interesting.

01:00:10Guest:Well, the original Mexican culture who settled here, now you've got the hipsters coming in.

01:00:15Marc:They're just starting to come in.

01:00:16Guest:And with the little hipster shops and stuff.

01:00:18Marc:With their bookstores and their comic book stores and their coffee.

01:00:21Guest:Yeah.

01:00:21Marc:Right next to these hand-painted signs for beauty products.

01:00:24Marc:Yeah, and candles.

01:00:26Guest:Yeah.

01:00:27Marc:On the West record,

01:00:29Marc:I mean, am I am I wrong or was with some of that fueled by spite?

01:00:35Marc:A couple of songs.

01:00:37Marc:No, I mean, there are a couple of songs on the on the West record.

01:00:41Guest:Well, that was right after my mother died and I was had been in this horrible, abusive relationship.

01:00:47Marc:So that was in there.

01:00:48Marc:There was definitely that was some some songs about that dude.

01:00:52Guest:Yeah.

01:00:53Marc:They were good.

01:00:54Guest:There was that one.

01:00:55Guest:Yeah, he was pretty fucked up.

01:00:57Guest:That was my last fucked up one.

01:00:58Marc:Yeah.

01:00:59Marc:And what was he?

01:01:00Guest:Well, no, there was one right after that, sort of.

01:01:02Marc:So you were in an abusive relationship and your mother passed away.

01:01:05Guest:Yeah.

01:01:05Marc:Double whammy.

01:01:06Guest:Double whammy.

01:01:07Marc:And that's what that album comes out of.

01:01:09Guest:Yeah, there are actually enough songs that do two albums.

01:01:14Guest:Actually, West and then Lil Honey right after that.

01:01:17Guest:Same jam.

01:01:18Guest:Lil Honey has a lot of the songs left over from the West period.

01:01:22Guest:And it was kind of frustrating because when West, I wanted it to be a double album and just...

01:01:28Guest:As a writer, once I've... You know, I want to get that stuff out and move on.

01:01:32Marc:Yeah.

01:01:32Guest:You know, so... Why didn't you... The label didn't want to do a double CD thing for whatever reason.

01:01:40Guest:You know, they'd have to charge more money, and they were worried people wouldn't want to spend the money, and I don't know.

01:01:45Guest:It was a business decision, so...

01:01:48Marc:And how many songs did you write about your mother?

01:01:50Marc:I know there's the one sort of like that two chord riff with the ocean.

01:01:53Guest:Mama, you're sweet.

01:01:54Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:01:55Guest:I love you, mommy.

01:01:56Guest:Fancy Funeral.

01:01:57Marc:Fancy Funeral is a fucking amazing song.

01:01:59Guest:Yeah.

01:02:00Marc:What's the songwriting process for you?

01:02:02Marc:I mean, do you just wait?

01:02:03Marc:Do you sit and do it actively?

01:02:05Marc:Do you carry pads of paper with you?

01:02:06Guest:I do it all the time.

01:02:07Guest:My mind's constantly going.

01:02:09Marc:Does it come in fragments or sometimes whole songs?

01:02:10Guest:Fragments, usually.

01:02:12Guest:And I'm always writing stuff down, writing ideas down, or writing a little hook or a line or a verse or something.

01:02:20Guest:And then...

01:02:21Guest:It kind of all piles up and then at something, I don't know what it is.

01:02:27Guest:Put together the pieces?

01:02:28Guest:I sit down and get everything out and kind of, yeah.

01:02:32Marc:At that moment, what moment drives you there?

01:02:36Marc:Is it a moment where you're tired of yourself or that you're like,

01:02:39Marc:Like, you know, what the fuck am I gonna do with all this stuff?

01:02:43Marc:I need to do something new.

01:02:44Guest:Yeah, I don't know.

01:02:46Guest:It's just, I kind of, I'm not real disciplined, you know, in terms of getting up and writing every day, trying to finish a song every day.

01:02:53Marc:How can you do that?

01:02:55Marc:But you're incredibly prolific.

01:02:57Guest:Well, I have been more so since starting with the songs.

01:03:01Guest:It was kind of like the floodgates opened up with, you know, the West, that period.

01:03:07Marc:So that dude, did he hear the songs?

01:03:09Marc:Do you know?

01:03:09Marc:Did he?

01:03:09Guest:Yeah, he's heard them.

01:03:12Guest:There is another guy briefly.

01:03:14Guest:This is your new guy?

01:03:17Guest:A little fling thing.

01:03:19Guest:This is your new guy?

01:03:19Guest:Yeah, it's Tom.

01:03:21Guest:It's your husband.

01:03:21Guest:It's my husband and my soulmate.

01:03:24Marc:Now, have you been married before?

01:03:26Guest:I was briefly married to, he was a drummer in this band, The Long Riders.

01:03:34Guest:Oh, I remember that.

01:03:35Guest:Back in the 80s.

01:03:35Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:03:36Guest:Yeah, they had a couple albums out on Island Records.

01:03:40Guest:And we lived together for about a year or so, and then we got married, and it lasted about a year.

01:03:45Guest:And now we're friends.

01:03:47Guest:In fact, he's my publisher at Warner Chapel.

01:03:50Okay.

01:03:51Marc:So that's good.

01:03:52Guest:Yeah, I'm friends with all my... Not that dude that you wrote about on West.

01:03:59Guest:No, it's better not to... Talk about it?

01:04:04Guest:Well, no, I mean, I don't care.

01:04:06Guest:It doesn't bother me to talk about it, but it was just like, you know.

01:04:11Guest:I love those songs.

01:04:13Guest:He was living at a sober living house when I met him.

01:04:16Guest:Yeah.

01:04:17Guest:And I didn't know.

01:04:19Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:04:20Guest:And I didn't know about all that, you know.

01:04:23Guest:You didn't?

01:04:24Guest:Come on.

01:04:24Guest:No, but I mean, he didn't tell me, you know.

01:04:27Guest:About him.

01:04:27Marc:You knew about it.

01:04:28Guest:Later, you know, it all started coming out.

01:04:30Marc:But in general, you knew about it.

01:04:31Guest:I didn't realize.

01:04:32Guest:Well, yeah, of course.

01:04:33Guest:But, you know, he'd had problems with heroin before.

01:04:38Guest:Yeah.

01:04:38Guest:Then he started at some point during towards the end of our relationship, he started using again.

01:04:44Guest:And I've never been around anyone high on heroin before.

01:04:48Guest:I never got I never was in that scene at all.

01:04:51Guest:Right.

01:04:52Guest:And, you know, he was trying to kick.

01:04:53Guest:He thought he could just do a little bit.

01:04:55Guest:And it was like he had the flu or something.

01:04:57Guest:It wouldn't go away.

01:04:58Marc:He kept saying he had the flu.

01:05:00Guest:Well, the sentence were like that.

01:05:02Marc:Oh, okay.

01:05:03Guest:And then I said, well, we better get you to the doctor.

01:05:06Guest:You know, this is going on, dragging on.

01:05:08Guest:And he finally broke down and said, you know, he'd start it.

01:05:12Guest:Yeah.

01:05:12Marc:Yeah.

01:05:14Guest:And then he was doing speedballs.

01:05:16Guest:You know, and then he almost died.

01:05:18Guest:And he said...

01:05:20Guest:you know i was upstairs at our apartment he was downstairs yeah it was amazing how it was right under my nose and i didn't know well that's that's the whole weird thing about that codependent trip he would go downtown he'd be like i'm gonna go downtown i mean i've got some some art missing oh you know there's some stuff my get right with god grammy went missing no he stole he stole your grammy and sold it

01:05:45Guest:I think probably.

01:05:48Guest:He denied it.

01:05:49Guest:I asked him about it.

01:05:50Marc:I bet you that thing shows up eventually.

01:05:53Guest:It's somewhere in a fucking pawn shop downtown LA.

01:05:57Guest:I don't know.

01:05:57Marc:So you got hustled by a junkie.

01:06:00Guest:Oh, man.

01:06:01Marc:How long were you with him?

01:06:03Guest:Too long.

01:06:04Guest:I don't know.

01:06:05Marc:A couple years.

01:06:06Marc:All right.

01:06:06Guest:I know what it's like, the battered woman syndrome, though.

01:06:10Guest:I know what that's like now.

01:06:11Marc:Yeah.

01:06:12Guest:You know, I know what that's like because I was there.

01:06:15Guest:And, you know, they talk about this, but it's like you just numb yourself.

01:06:22Marc:Mm-hmm.

01:06:22Guest:It's really weird.

01:06:24Guest:I don't know.

01:06:25Guest:I've never been like that.

01:06:26Marc:You put blinders on.

01:06:27Marc:You don't even realize it's happening.

01:06:28Guest:It's right there.

01:06:30Marc:Yeah.

01:06:30Guest:I mean, like when he started drinking, he wasn't drinking at first and he would drink whiskey and he would just it was like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

01:06:39Sure.

01:06:39Guest:And he wouldn't know who I was.

01:06:41Guest:Yeah, blackout.

01:06:44Guest:He would just like jump on top, he would be like, you know, we were at the Peabody Hotel.

01:06:49Guest:Yeah.

01:06:50Guest:And he went down to the bar and I was getting ready for bed and he came up to the room and it was like,

01:06:55Guest:I'm like getting ready.

01:06:56Guest:I'm tired.

01:06:57Guest:Let's go to bed.

01:06:58Guest:He's like, and he's like, you know, trying to take my clothes off.

01:07:04Guest:And he's like, the next thing I know, he's like on top of me, like holding my neck down with his arm.

01:07:09Guest:And I'm going, okay, now it's okay.

01:07:12Guest:I'm going to fucking die.

01:07:13Guest:I'm going to fucking die.

01:07:15Guest:I got to get out.

01:07:16Guest:It took all my...

01:07:18Guest:That was the moment?

01:07:19Guest:That was the moment where you realized this isn't healthy?

01:07:21Guest:That was the moment I went, holy shit.

01:07:23Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:07:23Guest:And his eyes were like as big as saucers.

01:07:26Marc:Oh, man.

01:07:27Guest:He didn't know who I was or something.

01:07:29Guest:I don't know.

01:07:29Marc:He was in a blackout, right?

01:07:30Marc:Did he wake up and not remember it?

01:07:32Guest:Yeah.

01:07:32Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:07:33Guest:And then I tried to call downstairs, and he slammed the receiver down.

01:07:38Guest:Now, both of us are completely naked at this point, right?

01:07:42Guest:So I'm fighting for my life.

01:07:45Guest:So I go and run and open the hotel door, and he follows me out into the hallway there.

01:07:52Guest:You're both naked in the hallway.

01:07:53Guest:Right, and the door closes to the room.

01:07:56Guest:Now we're locked out.

01:07:57Guest:And naked.

01:07:58Guest:And I'm sitting, like, in a fetal position, like, trying to cover myself up, and he's now, like, snapping out of it.

01:08:05Guest:And he's laying, like, spread eagle, buck naked on the fucking hallway outside the hotel door going...

01:08:13Guest:fuck, they're gonna call the cops, I'm gonna go to jail, they're gonna call the cops, that's all he could think about, and I'm sitting there like this, trying to cover myself up.

01:08:22Guest:Well, God bless the Peabody Hotel in Memphis, because a guy came, he saw it, I guess, on the thing, on the monitor, and he comes with a key, doesn't look at either one of us, because somebody said, you know what, they've seen this before.

01:08:40Guest:They've got, you know, the football players stay there, you know, the Peabody in Memphis.

01:08:45Guest:They've seen it all.

01:08:46Guest:Another Saturday night at the Peabody.

01:08:49Guest:So he just, like, God bless him, you know, he walks up and just opens the door at the key and just, like, walks away.

01:08:56Guest:Nobody ever says a thing.

01:08:58Guest:It's like, what happens at the Peabody stays at the Peabody?

01:09:01Guest:Right, right.

01:09:02Guest:Sure.

01:09:03Guest:And then, of course, the next day, you know, he didn't.

01:09:06Guest:And that was the breaking point, though?

01:09:07Guest:I said, you know what happened last night, you know?

01:09:10Marc:Was that it, though?

01:09:10Marc:That moment was like, I got to get out of here.

01:09:13Guest:Well, no.

01:09:14Guest:See, that's what I'm saying.

01:09:16Guest:Yeah.

01:09:16Guest:You know, you think, oh, no.

01:09:18Marc:Did you get to see the ducks at least?

01:09:21Guest:Please forgive me and all this.

01:09:22Marc:Oh, sure, right.

01:09:23Marc:The begging and the crying.

01:09:24Marc:I'm going to change.

01:09:25Marc:Yeah.

01:09:25Marc:Yeah, I've been on the other side of that.

01:09:27Marc:Not as crazy as he was, it seems, but I've been that guy.

01:09:30Guest:But I feel like, I mean, not to sound all, you know, but everything happens, you know, for a reason.

01:09:38Guest:That's my spirituality thing.

01:09:40Guest:Well, I mean, that's... When I get to, you know, I've been to Al-Anon meetings and stuff.

01:09:44Guest:Yeah.

01:09:45Guest:You know, I really, I mean...

01:09:47Guest:I believe in that let go and let God thing.

01:09:51Guest:You know, I mean, what else can you do?

01:09:54Guest:It's like, what else can you fucking do?

01:09:56Guest:You know, it's like, that's it.

01:09:58Marc:Well, you got to protect yourself and know that, you know, that it's not your responsibility.

01:10:02Marc:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:10:03Marc:I mean, you were sort of, you know, born to handle that, having the mother you had.

01:10:09Marc:So, I mean, you're kind of wired that way.

01:10:11Marc:But those songs were, those were great.

01:10:13Guest:I was wired that way, and it's amazing that I didn't.

01:10:16Guest:I mean, Clyde, the guy I wrote like Charles about, there was a little bit of that in our relationship.

01:10:23Guest:I mean, it was definitely tumultuous, but he would just take a plate of food and throw it sort of over my head and it would hit the wall.

01:10:30Guest:You know, that kind of thing.

01:10:31Marc:Right.

01:10:32Guest:You know, or threatened to put me in Bracken Ridge Hospital.

01:10:36Marc:Right, but never put hands on you.

01:10:38Guest:Never, yeah.

01:10:39Marc:He was drama queen.

01:10:39Guest:This other guy was like right on like.

01:10:43Marc:Right.

01:10:43Guest:I would be sitting, you know, he'd push me off a stool or something.

01:10:46Marc:Does he still bother you?

01:10:47Guest:No, no, no.

01:10:49Marc:Oh, okay.

01:10:50Marc:Well, that's good.

01:10:51Guest:He sobered up.

01:10:52Guest:Hopefully he still is.

01:10:54Marc:That's a, that's a, it's a hell of a story.

01:10:56Guest:Yeah.

01:10:57Marc:Did you see the ducks though?

01:10:59Guest:At some point, I've seen the ducks.

01:11:01Guest:Yeah, I don't know what, you know, it was like.

01:11:06Guest:I can't believe I'm telling all this.

01:11:08Guest:See, they were right about you.

01:11:10Guest:What, I'm just sitting here.

01:11:11Guest:They were right, see?

01:11:13Guest:No, you're like a therapist.

01:11:16Guest:They talked about that.

01:11:17Marc:I thought it was going to be a duck story.

01:11:18Marc:It turned out to be a lot darker than a duck story.

01:11:21Marc:I thought you were going to tell me that he came up and he kidnapped the ducks, that they walked down that dumb red carpet to that fountain every morning at the Peabody.

01:11:28Guest:I can see why the women you were married to were drawn to you.

01:11:32Marc:That's very flattering.

01:11:33Guest:You're a Scorpio.

01:11:34Marc:No, I'm a Scorpion.

01:11:37Marc:I'm a Libra.

01:11:38Guest:No, I thought you were... Wait.

01:11:40Guest:Oh, that's right.

01:11:41Guest:You're the...

01:11:44Guest:Thank God you're not a Scorpio.

01:11:46Marc:Why, can we be in trouble?

01:11:47Marc:Everybody be in trouble in the room?

01:11:51Guest:Tom's a Libra.

01:11:52Guest:No, but I've been with some of the most enigmatic men I've been drawn to for some reason.

01:12:00Guest:Scorpios?

01:12:01Guest:I've also been, you know.

01:12:03Marc:Well, it's good to be a Libra.

01:12:04Guest:I just see a little sort of a... Yeah, it's Scorpio mixed.

01:12:08Marc:It's Libra mixed with manic depression.

01:12:10Marc:It's good.

01:12:10Marc:I'm not clinically bipolar, but I think that the depressive father gives me the Scorpio moment.

01:12:18Guest:Those eyes and that very intelligent look.

01:12:21Guest:And you are intelligent.

01:12:22Guest:You're funny.

01:12:23Guest:What's not to love?

01:12:25Marc:Oh, thank you.

01:12:26Marc:Well.

01:12:27Marc:Thank you.

01:12:27Guest:I don't want you to feel bad because your marriages didn't work out.

01:12:31Guest:I mean, are you all still friends?

01:12:33Marc:Why?

01:12:34Marc:I don't have children.

01:12:37Marc:What's the point of friendship?

01:12:40Marc:Look, the second one, I was, you know, I got sober like 13 years ago and I grabbed hold of that woman and I just held on and drained her of her life force.

01:12:50Marc:Al-Anon is what broke up my marriage.

01:12:52Marc:See, when you're like, I believe Al-Anon's a great thing, but at that time I was like, who the fuck are these people and what does detachment mean?

01:13:00Marc:Look at me!

01:13:01Marc:You know, so...

01:13:02Marc:So I've been through the other side of that.

01:13:05Guest:You were too analytical.

01:13:07Marc:No, I was emotionally needy and angry.

01:13:11Marc:Honestly, her leaving me was the key to any peace of mind I ever had.

01:13:18Marc:Because you think...

01:13:19Marc:especially when you're an alcoholic or you're nuts like that, that you have some sort of control and that you will always be forgiven and that you can just do that shit.

01:13:26Marc:It's like, I'm sorry, baby, I didn't mean to hurt you.

01:13:29Guest:Oh, yeah, yeah.

01:13:30Guest:And it doesn't matter whether it's alcohol or drugs or you're just fucked up mentally or whatever.

01:13:36Guest:It's just always the over and over excuses, excuses.

01:13:39Marc:Yeah, eventually that person is going to be exhausted of that shit if you don't help yourself.

01:13:43Marc:I learned a big lesson.

01:13:44Marc:It was great to have my ass handed to me.

01:13:47Marc:Well, how long have you guys been together?

01:13:49Guest:We got married in 2009, but we've been together all together now for seven, eight years.

01:14:00Marc:Well, congratulations.

01:14:02Marc:He seems like a very peaceful kind of Buddha guy.

01:14:05Guest:He is, but he has his, he's one of those tall, handsome, seemingly quiet guys who...

01:14:15Guest:But if you push his button or something, he's got his little moodiness.

01:14:22Marc:I've never done any couples counseling, but I think this is going to be this.

01:14:26Marc:This might be a first on the show.

01:14:27Marc:After this interview, I can refer you to a guy.

01:14:33Marc:Well, you want to sing?

01:14:35Guest:That's great.

01:14:37Marc:Do you want to sing songs?

01:14:39Guest:I guess if you want me to.

01:14:42Marc:Yeah.

01:14:42Marc:Like which songs?

01:14:46Guest:He had a reason to give back to late Charles.

01:15:04Guest:He used to talk about it.

01:15:09Guest:He just called it on.

01:15:13Guest:He always said Louisiana was where he felt at home He was born in Nacogdoches

01:15:33Guest:That's in East Texas Not far from the border But he liked to tell everybody He was from Lake Charles Did an angel whisper in your ear

01:16:01Guest:And hold you close and take away your fear In those long last moments We used to drive through Lafayette and Baton Rouge

01:16:30Guest:In the yellow of Camino Listen to Howlin' Wolf He liked to stop in Lake Charles Cause that's the place he loved Did you run about as far as you could go?

01:16:58Guest:Down the Louisiana Highway A cross-legged Pontchartrain Now your soul is in Lake Charles No matter what they say Did an angel whisper in your ear

01:17:26Guest:and hold you close and take away your fear in those long last moments

01:17:44Guest:Did an angel whisper in your ear And hold you close and take away your fear In those long last moments

01:18:12Guest:In those long last moments.

01:18:24Guest:Oh my god.

01:18:26Guest:That was unbelievable.

01:18:29Marc:I don't even know how to handle it.

01:18:30Marc:That was beautiful.

01:18:32Guest:Did that sound okay?

01:18:34Marc:Sounded great.

01:18:35Marc:Okay.

01:18:35Marc:So great to talk to you and listen to you.

01:18:38Marc:I hope you had a nice time.

01:18:40Guest:I did have a nice time.

01:18:42Marc:All right.

01:18:48Marc:That's it.

01:18:49Marc:How great was that?

01:18:51Marc:How great was that?

01:18:52Marc:Can I even, I can't even fucking say.

01:18:54Marc:Go to WTFPod.

01:18:56Marc:I love Usenda Williams.

01:18:57Marc:Can I say that again?

01:18:58Marc:Go to WTFPod.

01:19:00Marc:I love her.

01:19:00Marc:Go to WTFPod.com for all your WTFPod needs.

01:19:03Marc:Get on the mailing list.

01:19:04Marc:Kick in a few shekels.

01:19:05Marc:Comment.

01:19:06Marc:Check the episode guide.

01:19:07Marc:Get the app.

01:19:08Marc:Upgrade to the premium app.

01:19:09Marc:Get the first 100 episodes on DVD.

01:19:12Marc:Check out the Lipson deal they got over there's.

01:19:15Marc:And then, you know, do what you got to do.

01:19:18Marc:Please stay well.

01:19:19Marc:Try not to get this cold.

01:19:21Marc:It's not good.

01:19:22Marc:And try not to get the flu.

01:19:23Marc:All right?

01:19:24Marc:Wear a mask like the Asian people do.

01:19:27Marc:Is that racist?

01:19:28Marc:Because I see a lot of Asian people wearing masks.

01:19:30Marc:But I don't think it's racist.

01:19:31Marc:Maybe that's too specific.

01:19:33Marc:Look, I'm not going to parse all that shit.

01:19:36Marc:I got to go.

01:19:37Marc:I have to go.

01:19:38Marc:All right?

01:19:39Marc:I have to go.

01:19:42Marc:Yeah, I'm gonna go in just a second.

01:19:46Marc:Is this guitar in tune?

01:20:12Marc:Something like that.

01:20:19Marc:I didn't practice.

01:20:20Marc:Alright.

01:20:21Marc:Whatever.

01:20:21Marc:Oh.

01:20:23Marc:That was out of tune.

01:20:24Marc:Look.

01:20:25Marc:Boomer lives!