Episode 831 - Randy Newman

Episode 831 • Released July 23, 2017 • Speakers detected

00:00:00Guest:Lock the gates!

00:00:09Marc:Alright, let's do this.

00:00:10Marc:How are you, what the fuckers?

00:00:12Marc:What the fuck buddies?

00:00:13Marc:What the fuckineers?

00:00:14Marc:What the fuckaroos?

00:00:17Marc:What the fuckadelics?

00:00:18Marc:What's happening?

00:00:19Marc:I'm Mark Maron.

00:00:20Marc:This is my podcast, WTF.

00:00:22Marc:Thank you for tuning in, for making the choice, for hanging out with me and my mind and my guests and my mouth and my weird lisp and the moving lozenge in my mouth on occasion.

00:00:38Marc:I gotta get off them again.

00:00:39Marc:I think my body is turned on him so it's not having the same effect anymore Randy Newman is on the show today and I can't tell you what a honor it was for me to have him in here because I love him I love his work I've always liked him as a person when I was a kid I obviously I don't know him I didn't have never met him before but I

00:01:04Marc:But he was one of the first guys that really blew my mind when I was turned on to his music by a kid I used to ride a bus with.

00:01:09Marc:And I think I had the first records I had were Good Old Boys and Sail Away.

00:01:13Marc:And I was must have been in junior high.

00:01:16Marc:And I was just sort of like, man, this stuff is beautiful.

00:01:19Marc:It's poignant.

00:01:20Marc:It's cutting.

00:01:21Marc:It's funny.

00:01:22Marc:It's I just I loved him and I always have loved him.

00:01:27Marc:And he used to appear on Letterman, and he was hilarious.

00:01:30Marc:And I just tell you, for years I've been trying to get him on this show, and you're going to hear it today.

00:01:35Marc:And I think I managed the fanboy-ness.

00:01:38Marc:This was not an all-out fanboy interview.

00:01:42Marc:I was engaged and interested, and it wasn't just me being beside myself.

00:01:50Marc:Yeah, man, I'm all right.

00:01:54Marc:I'm out there.

00:01:54Marc:I'm doing the comedy.

00:01:56Marc:I'm doing the new stuff.

00:01:57Marc:It's so funny.

00:01:58Marc:There's a comedy boom.

00:01:58Marc:People are like, what's happening?

00:01:59Marc:Why is there a comedy boom?

00:02:00Marc:Because when people are terrified of the end of the world on a daily basis, they tend to seek some relief and distraction.

00:02:11Marc:Hey, why is the economy so good still?

00:02:13Marc:Why is the stock market so good?

00:02:14Marc:Because when Americans are terrified, we turn to stuff.

00:02:20Marc:Oh my God, this is horrendous.

00:02:23Marc:I need some new shoes.

00:02:25Marc:I need a car.

00:02:25Marc:I imagine someone should check the traffic on the free porn sites.

00:02:31Marc:It's got to be out of control.

00:02:33Marc:Some people turn to God.

00:02:35Marc:Other people turn to stuff.

00:02:38Marc:Shiny stuff, moving stuff, things that make me feel good, things that make me look at myself and go, yay!

00:02:44Marc:Things that go fast.

00:02:47Marc:Anything to get me away from this very in-my-face existential panic that is founded in reality.

00:02:55Marc:Not just the ingrained...

00:03:01Marc:consciousness of one's mortality but to have it in your face every day and in the hands of somebody else that you have no fucking control over yeah yeah that that'll lead you right to your dick right to the store right to the ice cream pint right to the comedy club right to amazon right whatever

00:03:26Marc:That's the way the American economy works.

00:03:29Marc:Holy shit, I can't deal.

00:03:31Marc:Hey, will that thing make me feel better?

00:03:33Marc:How much is it?

00:03:35Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:03:36Marc:You know what?

00:03:36Marc:Also, this is exciting.

00:03:38Marc:This is getting more exciting because the book, you know, as I've told you, we've got a book coming out in October called Waiting for the Punch, Words to Live By from the WTF podcast.

00:03:49Marc:And I kind of want to give you a good idea of what the book is about.

00:03:54Marc:But I also want to say that there's already feedback coming in from the few copies that are out in the world that we gave away at BookCon and some people have gotten hold of them.

00:04:02Marc:It's really compelling and powerful, and I'm very proud of it.

00:04:06Marc:Because one of my favorite books is Please Kill Me, The Uncensored Oral History of Punk by Legs McNeil and Jillian McCain.

00:04:13Marc:And we wanted to make something as good as that book, all right?

00:04:17Marc:So Waiting for the Punch is actually a deep dive into some of the most common themes that come up over and over on this show.

00:04:22Marc:Relationships, failure, success, addiction, mental health, parenting.

00:04:27Marc:Each chapter is a different theme, and we have conversations with more than 150 people

00:04:32Marc:in the book, who have all been on this show, all chiming in together about these shared experiences and ideas.

00:04:38Marc:And it was a hell of a thing to wrangle.

00:04:41Marc:Brendan MacDonald is the genius of the editing, the compiling.

00:04:45Marc:Guy's got a memory as a steel trap.

00:04:48Marc:Is that that saying?

00:04:49Marc:But anyways, look.

00:04:51Marc:I want to give you an example, and I think this will work.

00:04:54Marc:In the chapter on relationships, you've got Conan O'Brien, Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, and Rob Reiner all talking about friendship.

00:05:01Marc:These were four separate interviews done over several years, but the way it's arranged in the book, it's all part of one big conversation.

00:05:10Marc:All right, so take a listen to this.

00:05:12Guest:When I came out to Los Angeles, I met...

00:05:14Guest:All these people.

00:05:15Guest:85?

00:05:16Guest:In 85, I came out here.

00:05:18Guest:And over time, I met all these people.

00:05:20Guest:And it's the same cast of characters.

00:05:22Marc:Yeah.

00:05:22Guest:I mean, everyone just keeps popping up.

00:05:26Guest:And it is funny that you're assigned a set of characters when you're born.

00:05:31Guest:Yeah.

00:05:31Guest:And they keep showing up in your life.

00:05:34Guest:And that's just how it works.

00:05:35Guest:Yeah.

00:05:36Guest:Oh, it's you again.

00:05:37Guest:I really believe that there is a force in the universe that has a sense of humor.

00:05:41Guest:These things are just too weird.

00:05:42Guest:Yeah, it's beyond coincidence.

00:05:44Guest:Yeah.

00:05:44Guest:And sometimes Carl Reiner.

00:05:46Marc:Yeah.

00:05:47Guest:I get Carl to come up.

00:05:48Marc:You spend a lot of time with him still, right?

00:05:50Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:05:52Guest:Almost every other night.

00:05:54Marc:Yeah.

00:05:54Guest:Three nights a week, I'll be at Carl's house.

00:05:56Guest:Yeah.

00:05:57Guest:Carl loves...

00:05:59Guest:More than anything, what he calls reallys that we do.

00:06:03Guest:And Carl is so proud that we do them only for ourselves.

00:06:07Guest:We don't do them for an audience.

00:06:08Guest:We don't do them for another person.

00:06:09Marc:You just try to one-up each other?

00:06:10Guest:Yeah.

00:06:10Guest:Well, we try to really...

00:06:14Guest:amaze each other with where we're going, with our minds.

00:06:18Guest:And we're still pretty good at it.

00:06:20Marc:So you guys just sit and hang out for an hour or two?

00:06:23Guest:Well, about three, four hours.

00:06:25Guest:And sometimes while we're watching something that's not terribly, he'll fall asleep and I won't wake him.

00:06:31Guest:Because he drives home, and I'm saying he probably, better he sleeps here than falls behind the wheel.

00:06:39Marc:What is that thing he told me about movies, that you like watching movies with certain phrases?

00:06:43Guest:Oh, yeah, that's true.

00:06:45Guest:And it's really, it started with the Bourne, you know, the Bourne series.

00:06:50Guest:And the phrases are...

00:06:52Guest:Secure the perimeter.

00:06:54Guest:Lock all doors.

00:06:57Guest:And if one character in the movie says, get some rest.

00:07:04Guest:If those words are in the movie, that movie's a good movie.

00:07:07Marc:And as you get older, you don't see people as much anymore.

00:07:09Marc:No, that's true.

00:07:10Guest:And why do you think that is?

00:07:12Guest:Time.

00:07:12Guest:I think it has to do, I really believe, that whole thing they say where you're born alone, you die alone, that bit.

00:07:20Guest:Well, I think what happens as you get older, you start thinking about that.

00:07:27Guest:And also that you don't want to spend any time with anybody that's going to annoy you.

00:07:36Guest:Or make it uncomfortable.

00:07:38Guest:And as you get older, you realize that there are more and more people that annoy you.

00:07:43Guest:So you limit.

00:07:44Guest:Your world keeps narrowing and getting narrower.

00:07:48Guest:This happens at a subconscious level or a conscious level?

00:07:50Guest:I think it's unconscious.

00:07:52Guest:I don't think you're consciously saying, I think I'm going to narrow my world now.

00:07:58Guest:No, you think...

00:07:59Guest:You know, I don't really like that person that much.

00:08:03Guest:So why should I stay?

00:08:04Guest:You know, it's like when you're young, you'd never leave a movie theater until the movie's over.

00:08:09Guest:Now you go, I don't really like, why do I have to watch the last hour of this piece of crap?

00:08:15Guest:You know, because I have such a limited time on the planet.

00:08:17Marc:And now with phones and computers, it's like all the time is eaten up, unnecessarily eaten up.

00:08:23Guest:Yes.

00:08:23Guest:And you fake, you trick yourself into believing that you're actually either working or communicating with people.

00:08:31Guest:Right.

00:08:31Guest:You know, I'm texting, I'm emailing, I'm doing, you're not talking to anybody.

00:08:35Guest:Exactly.

00:08:35Guest:You're talking to a computer.

00:08:38Guest:Right.

00:08:38Marc:And actually talking to people is like it's exhausting.

00:08:41Guest:Like we're doing now.

00:08:42Marc:It becomes exhausting.

00:08:43Marc:It is exhausting.

00:08:44Marc:If you could text somebody, it's like, oh, boy, what a thrill.

00:08:47Guest:I'm so happy to not have to talk to him.

00:08:50Guest:So here's the thing.

00:08:51Guest:You look at this show like Friends, right?

00:08:54Guest:Friends, the show Friends.

00:08:55Guest:It's so funny.

00:08:56Guest:And you've got all these people.

00:08:59Guest:They're in their, I guess, their 20s or something.

00:09:03Guest:And they're hanging out with each other.

00:09:05Guest:And I guess that's what you do.

00:09:07Guest:You go in packs.

00:09:08Guest:But when you get into your 30s, your 40s, your 50s, you don't do that anymore.

00:09:12Guest:You got kids.

00:09:13Guest:You got kids.

00:09:14Guest:You hang out with them.

00:09:15Guest:And then when you get older, you don't have that.

00:09:17Guest:Hey, let's go and hang out at the coffee shop.

00:09:20Guest:They don't do it.

00:09:20Marc:Maybe you get one guy.

00:09:22Marc:Yeah, one guy.

00:09:22Marc:I mean, I talked to your father.

00:09:24Marc:I was at the house you grew up in, I think.

00:09:25Marc:Yeah.

00:09:25Marc:And he says he hangs out with Mel every night.

00:09:27Marc:Mel.

00:09:28Guest:Mel and my dad every single night.

00:09:30Guest:Really?

00:09:30Guest:Every night?

00:09:31Guest:Yeah, virtually every night.

00:09:33Guest:That's really something.

00:09:34Guest:Listen, it's wonderful that they have each other.

00:09:36Guest:They met each other when they were in their 20s doing the show of shows.

00:09:40Guest:And to have that kind of bond and that bond to stick and they make each other laugh, they enjoy each other's company.

00:09:46Guest:Yeah.

00:09:46Guest:They both lost their spouses recently, so they have that.

00:09:50Guest:And they'd say that, you know, they watch any movie that has secure the perimeter in it.

00:09:56Guest:They watch it.

00:09:57Marc:That was Conan O'Brien, Mel Brooks, Carl Reiner, and Rob Reiner, as you'll read in Chapter 4 of Waiting for the Punch.

00:10:04Marc:You can pre-order your copy now, and starting today, we've got a little bonus for anyone who pre-orders the book.

00:10:09Marc:When you send in your proof of purchase, we'll send you a special Waiting for the Punch book plate signed by me.

00:10:16Marc:that you can stick right on the inside cover.

00:10:18Marc:Just go to WTFPod.com and click on book at the top of the page or click on the cover of the book anywhere on the site.

00:10:25Marc:Then pre-order the book to get your signed book plate.

00:10:30Marc:Dig it.

00:10:31Marc:You good?

00:10:32Marc:All right.

00:10:34Marc:So...

00:10:36Marc:Also, I forgot to mention that, as many of you know, the great Martin Landau died last week.

00:10:45Marc:And I had one of the most amazing conversations with him about a lot of things, but about acting a lot.

00:10:50Marc:And it was very helpful to me.

00:10:52Marc:And I'm planning on re-listening to it myself.

00:10:56Marc:If we get picked up for another season of glow we haven't heard yet, but I just want to I just want to make sure that I'm engaging as Well as I could be but we can all listen to that episode because we'll keep that episode in the free feed it's episode 779 and it's a great conversation about acting about film about life and it was He's gonna be missed.

00:11:17Marc:He lived a good long life So speaking about good long lives

00:11:24Marc:What I've been doing as opposed to going to Vancouver as I've been locking into my life, doing work around the house, I cleaned the garage.

00:11:32Marc:It's clean.

00:11:34Marc:Vacuumed it.

00:11:35Marc:Dusted it.

00:11:36Marc:Got rid of shit.

00:11:37Marc:Organized a lot of papers.

00:11:39Marc:Went through stuff.

00:11:40Marc:And I dug up an old, it's what you call an eighth step list.

00:11:49Marc:in the recovery jargon, in the program, 12-step program.

00:11:55Marc:And it's one of these things where you make a list of all the people you've harmed and you're willing to make an amends.

00:12:01Marc:Now, many of you have heard me make amends before, you know, on this show.

00:12:06Marc:But this is one of the first lists I ever made when I got sober almost 18 years ago.

00:12:11Marc:It'll be 18 years, August 9th.

00:12:15Marc:And it's just very weird to see this list.

00:12:18Marc:I don't know where it was.

00:12:19Marc:It was around.

00:12:20Marc:It was here in a pile of papers.

00:12:23Marc:And I almost threw it out.

00:12:24Marc:I thought I threw it out.

00:12:25Marc:And I didn't get to a lot of them, man.

00:12:28Marc:And some of them I don't know if I need to make.

00:12:30Marc:And so I just was going through it.

00:12:32Marc:And I just...

00:12:33Marc:Let's just go through it real quick.

00:12:35Marc:Ex-wives.

00:12:36Marc:Yeah, those I did.

00:12:38Marc:I did those pretty effectively.

00:12:39Marc:My brother, my mom, my dad.

00:12:41Marc:Yup.

00:12:42Marc:My ex-in-laws.

00:12:44Marc:That's outstanding.

00:12:45Marc:I should do that one.

00:12:47Marc:Amy.

00:12:47Marc:Yeah, we're good.

00:12:49Marc:Devin.

00:12:49Marc:Good.

00:12:50Marc:Sarah.

00:12:50Marc:We're good.

00:12:50Marc:Gail.

00:12:51Marc:Good.

00:12:51Marc:Alan.

00:12:53Marc:I'm not clear what I have to do there.

00:12:54Marc:Janet.

00:12:55Marc:I think we're okay.

00:12:56Marc:Kathy.

00:12:56Marc:We're okay.

00:12:57Marc:Bob.

00:12:57Marc:I don't know you anything.

00:12:59Marc:Rolf, I think we're all right.

00:13:00Marc:Gary, I don't even know if you're alive.

00:13:03Marc:Oh, here's a big chunk, a big bunch of teachers.

00:13:06Marc:Mr. Ross, Mrs. Block, Mr. Sanderson, Mrs. Randall, Mrs. Webber, Mrs. Croco, Mr. Clout.

00:13:17Marc:Yeah, I was difficult.

00:13:18Marc:I apologize.

00:13:19Marc:And I'm sorry for making you cry, Mrs. Webber.

00:13:22Marc:brill i'm okay with adam sandler pending cliff dude i know what this is about this is about some party that happened in a hotel room there's a bunch of us i think i made out with your sister for 10 minutes and i don't know if i owe you an apology because i was sort of a two-way street but it was probably inappropriate but whatever long time ago hope everything's good with you colin yeah i'd like to make that happen john stewart i don't know that that's that one i'm just gonna have to live with

00:13:47Marc:Amy, yeah, in college, it was a nice dinner you made, but I just had to go see that band.

00:13:53Marc:And I'm sorry I left early.

00:13:54Marc:It was rude.

00:13:55Marc:It was rude.

00:13:57Marc:John, yeah, I'm sorry I broke all the stuff in my kitchen around you in a menacing way, but you were fucking my girlfriend.

00:14:05Marc:Okay.

00:14:07Marc:Here's one.

00:14:07Marc:This is a great one on the list.

00:14:09Marc:It just says audiences.

00:14:11Marc:I should put some dates there.

00:14:14Marc:Audiences throughout the 80s and early 90s.

00:14:17Marc:I'm sorry.

00:14:18Marc:I am sorry.

00:14:19Marc:You're right.

00:14:21Marc:You're right.

00:14:22Marc:It was hard for all of us.

00:14:26Marc:Audiences.

00:14:28Marc:Oh, there was one other guy in the amends list that I didn't mention.

00:14:31Marc:How come I just went by that?

00:14:32Marc:Brian, junior high.

00:14:35Marc:Yeah, I'm sorry I got us both suspended.

00:14:38Marc:I should have done my homework and studied as opposed to cheat off of your paper.

00:14:43Marc:I have shame around that.

00:14:45Marc:That's shame.

00:14:46Marc:That was a lesson.

00:14:47Marc:And it was an incredible moral compromise on my part.

00:14:50Marc:And I'll never forget it.

00:14:52Marc:And I'm sorry.

00:14:53Marc:I hope everything worked out for you.

00:14:56Marc:I personally enjoyed the few days off.

00:14:59Marc:But that was bullshit.

00:15:02Marc:And yeah, I feel bad.

00:15:04Marc:Okay, Randy Newman.

00:15:07Marc:One of my heroes, and I've been trying to get him in here for a long time, and I was just so excited to talk to him.

00:15:17Marc:And he came.

00:15:18Marc:He's got a new record out called Dark Matter, which is great.

00:15:23Marc:It's like a real Randy Newman record.

00:15:26Marc:from back in the day.

00:15:28Marc:It's going to be out on August 4th.

00:15:30Marc:And also, I guess he recently did some sort of Trump penis song.

00:15:35Marc:This was recorded a little while ago, a couple weeks maybe.

00:15:39Marc:And so that wasn't on the radar yet.

00:15:41Marc:But we did talk about how he would handle the topic of Trump in one of his songs because he is a great satirist and a very bright guy.

00:15:50Marc:Sharp.

00:15:51Marc:I love talking to him.

00:15:53Marc:This is the first time I've ever done this.

00:15:56Marc:Like he's got a representative.

00:15:58Marc:But because of the conversation we had, I wrote to her after it and I said, hey, you know, I don't know how busy he is or if he gets sad or if he likes to hang out.

00:16:07Marc:But I'm always available.

00:16:10Marc:I'm around if Randy wants to have lunch or something.

00:16:15Marc:I've never done that before.

00:16:17Marc:And she said she'd tell him.

00:16:20Marc:But I mean, what does that mean?

00:16:21Marc:I felt kind of stupid for doing it.

00:16:23Marc:I just like talking to him so much.

00:16:24Marc:I was like, I'd like to make this a regular thing.

00:16:28Marc:Yeah, maybe monthly, biweekly, something.

00:16:30Marc:Just sit down with Randy over some food and just talk for an hour.

00:16:34Marc:Maybe that dream will come true.

00:16:37Marc:I don't know.

00:16:37Marc:But I do know that we did sit here and talk in the garage a while back and I was thrilled.

00:16:43Marc:So this is me and the brilliant Randy Newman.

00:16:53Marc:I'll tell you something.

00:16:54Marc:I've been holding on to a story for years and I don't know if it's true and it's about me and it's about you and I'm going to ask you about it.

00:17:00Marc:Years ago, you're friends with Lorne Michaels.

00:17:04Marc:Yes.

00:17:04Marc:And years ago, I was on Conan O'Brien and Lorne Michaels had a guy who worked for him named Jim Biederman.

00:17:12Marc:You remember Jim Biederman?

00:17:13Marc:Very vaguely.

00:17:14Marc:Yeah.

00:17:14Marc:Well, I don't know.

00:17:16Marc:I guess, Lauren, I had come up in conversation between you and Lauren because I had appeared on Conan O'Brien doing comedy.

00:17:22Marc:And I guess Lauren was, you know, not quite sold on me.

00:17:26Marc:And Jim Biederman relayed to me that you told Lauren I was a verbessen.

00:17:31Guest:A what?

00:17:33Guest:A farbissner or a sour person.

00:17:35Guest:Yeah, a farbissner, yeah, yeah.

00:17:36Guest:It sounds like a word I might have used talking to Lorne.

00:17:41Marc:Yeah, so I go good.

00:17:42Marc:So it might be credible.

00:17:43Marc:I'm not asking you to remember, but I just want to- I don't remember, but yeah, that's possible.

00:17:49Guest:Well, good.

00:17:49Guest:That makes me happy.

00:17:50Guest:I don't know whether that's praise or criticism.

00:17:53Guest:All I know is that- Farbissner.

00:17:56Guest:Farbissner, yeah.

00:17:57Guest:Yeah.

00:17:57Guest:Is that a word you got from your grandmother?

00:18:00Marc:Yeah.

00:18:00Guest:Yeah, there's only a few, but that's one of them.

00:18:03Guest:They're all pejoratives in some sense, you know.

00:18:05Marc:Pejorative Yiddish?

00:18:07Guest:Yeah.

00:18:08Guest:Well, the language is pejorative in a way.

00:18:10Guest:Yeah.

00:18:10Guest:My father used to call me things, and only, we got that Leo Roston book, you know, The Joys of Yiddish.

00:18:17Guest:You look him up, and he was calling me a little shithead.

00:18:20Guest:Yeah.

00:18:20Marc:Because they were trying to fool you at first.

00:18:24Marc:Yeah.

00:18:24Marc:It was their way of communicating.

00:18:25Marc:No, it was a way of affection, possibly.

00:18:27Marc:Yeah.

00:18:28Marc:But you didn't grow up that Jewish, right?

00:18:30Marc:Not at all.

00:18:30Marc:No?

00:18:31Marc:But they were there.

00:18:31Guest:It was there.

00:18:33Marc:The Jews were there.

00:18:35Guest:But not a great... Yeah.

00:18:36Marc:Not like a great...

00:18:38Marc:amount yeah i listened to the uh the new record the whole new record and i enjoyed it very much thank you and i'd like to think that because i've been listening to a lot of your records uh recently because i knew i was going to talk to you i had to refresh a lot of them and it seems to me that a couple of the ones on here are very uh reminiscent to a style that you've kind of carried through from the 70s yeah like uh like i guess one question i wanted to ask do you prefer the past or the present present okay

00:19:06Guest:I never believe that things were better, even the stuff about music, that the 70s were better and Saturday Night Live was funnier and all that stuff.

00:19:20Guest:I don't know about that thing.

00:19:22Guest:I think it's hard to judge.

00:19:23Guest:I mean, you got to watch out for the old crock factor.

00:19:27Guest:Which is what?

00:19:27Guest:Which is things were better when I was a kid.

00:19:31Guest:So you mean just nostalgia?

00:19:32Guest:Yeah.

00:19:33Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:19:34Guest:It's not always a valid way of...

00:19:36Marc:judging things no i know i'm up against it myself i'm 53 and i wonder about that when i find myself saying stuff like that but then i start to think other other ways i start to think like well if rock and roll as we know it started in 1955 when you're closer to the source and there were fewer people doing it and everyone kind of knew each other maybe at least it was a little warmer a little more connected i can't

00:19:57Guest:I like it better, you know.

00:19:58Guest:Now?

00:20:00Guest:Early stuff, no.

00:20:00Guest:Oh, yeah, right.

00:20:01Guest:But I don't necessarily completely trust my affection for it.

00:20:08Guest:The fact that the music has lived since the 70s and that there are so many people on the road in the 70s, from the 70s, maybe is an indication that...

00:20:18Marc:That it was solid.

00:20:18Marc:It was good, yeah.

00:20:19Marc:And also that it represents something to a certain bunch of people who need something now.

00:20:24Guest:And it's a big bulge in the population, too, the baby boomers.

00:20:28Marc:Yeah, and they're seeing the light now.

00:20:31Marc:Yeah.

00:20:32Marc:So maybe they need to tap into what they were.

00:20:34Marc:Maybe.

00:20:34Marc:A little bit.

00:20:35Guest:Yeah.

00:20:35Marc:And also on this album, there's a kind of unique song about the Kennedy brothers.

00:20:41Guest:Yeah.

00:20:42Guest:I'll say it's unique.

00:20:43Guest:There's nothing like it.

00:20:45Yeah.

00:20:45Marc:That maybe some of the compulsion to move on Cuba was about a lady.

00:20:51Marc:Yeah.

00:20:51Guest:Let's hear your cruise.

00:20:53Marc:Did you pick that... Did you glean that from a story?

00:20:56Marc:No.

00:20:57Guest:I made it all up entirely.

00:20:59Guest:What I...

00:21:00Guest:and interested in is the relationship of brothers.

00:21:05Guest:That's why I call it brothers.

00:21:07Guest:The older brother kind of teasing the younger one for his excitement.

00:21:11Guest:Bobby Kennedy is going, you know, we're going to go and we'll march to Havana.

00:21:15Guest:The people will march and the people, the peasants, will join them.

00:21:19Guest:And John says, oh, the peasants will join them.

00:21:21Guest:I like that.

00:21:23Marc:Yeah, that they have this dynamic.

00:21:25Guest:Yeah, the older brother...

00:21:28Guest:They sing, and Jack says, sing harmony, Bobby.

00:21:34Guest:Bobby says, I always sing harmony.

00:21:37Guest:Jack says, I know you do.

00:21:39Guest:I like that.

00:21:41Marc:It's sort of interesting to me that you have these, they're almost poetic vignettes that kind of just float to the music.

00:21:50Marc:A lot of them don't have specific definition, but that makes them even broader and bigger and more mysterious and powerful.

00:21:58Guest:Thank you.

00:21:59Guest:I hope so.

00:21:59Guest:This one is different in that...

00:22:03Guest:other voices intruded on things.

00:22:06Guest:You know, the first song is a song about science versus religion more or less.

00:22:12Guest:Yeah.

00:22:12Guest:And there are two or three voices in it, which I've never done before.

00:22:16Guest:I do write songs that are in character where I'm not the narrator of the song.

00:22:23Guest:A lot of songs.

00:22:24Guest:A lot of them.

00:22:24Guest:Yeah.

00:22:25Guest:It's mostly my style, whether it was shyness or whatever it is that did it.

00:22:29Guest:I was more interested in

00:22:31Guest:in sort of aberrant personality.

00:22:33Marc:Well, let me ask you this, though.

00:22:34Marc:Was your very first song that you wrote and performed, you know, on record, was that you?

00:22:40Marc:Yeah.

00:22:41Marc:That gridiron.

00:22:42Guest:Oh, that gridiron golden boy?

00:22:44Guest:No.

00:22:45Guest:It was one of those things.

00:22:46Guest:The bitter guy who's like, oh, the jock gets the chick.

00:22:49Guest:I wrote songs like a summer song, say.

00:22:56Guest:It would be 16, 17.

00:22:58Guest:I don't know whether I got the idea.

00:22:59Guest:My father wrote.

00:23:01Guest:so he was a doctor but he wrote song lyrics yeah and so he'd write a christmas song when it was christmas time yeah it was like holiday in the bing crosby movie yeah yeah and so i wrote a summer song was like the actually the first one i wrote they tell me it's summer fleetwoods did it yeah but so that would just give me an idea so i wrote a why i wrote a football song i don't know

00:23:24Marc:Yeah.

00:23:25Marc:Well, to me, it was more of like a kind of an embarrassment.

00:23:29Marc:Yeah.

00:23:29Marc:The plight.

00:23:30Marc:No, the plight of the sort of the nerdy, sensitive guy.

00:23:33Guest:Yeah.

00:23:34Guest:I don't know whether I was rooting for him or against him, though.

00:23:38Marc:Well, I think that like that comes through, too, that you ride this weird balance between sympathetic and critical that is offers a little bit of gray area.

00:23:47Marc:It does.

00:23:48Marc:So what were you saying about the first song on this album?

00:23:50Marc:Oh, the multi-voices.

00:23:50Marc:You had like a creationist, a scientist, and then... A scientist and a narrator.

00:23:56Guest:And at the end, there's someone who sort of intrudes on the thing and says how that I... Talks about the actual...

00:24:04Marc:about me a little bit yeah oh yeah yeah yeah yeah so uh but that's something that's fascinated you for a long time hypocrisy and uh you know power stupidity both ends yes yes uh and insensitivity in general people who don't know themselves very well and

00:24:25Guest:people who are insensitive to the effect their words or actions may have on others.

00:24:31Guest:Yeah, we're all living in that.

00:24:33Marc:We are, yeah.

00:24:34Marc:Yeah, I mean, because I listened to a few words in defense of our country.

00:24:37Marc:That was, what, 2008?

00:24:38Marc:And I'm wondering if you're shifting in your point of view.

00:24:41Guest:It's much more appropriate now.

00:24:43Guest:And who would have ever believed there'd be a worse administration than the Bush administration?

00:24:48Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:24:48Guest:Because it didn't seem competent to me.

00:24:52Guest:But this one is...

00:24:54Guest:Baffling.

00:24:55Guest:Dwarfs it.

00:24:56Guest:Yeah.

00:24:56Guest:And never a dull moment in the wrong way.

00:24:59Guest:Well, you know, there's that famous saying, it's a curse to live in interesting times.

00:25:02Guest:Yeah.

00:25:03Guest:And it is.

00:25:04Guest:You know, it's words, you know, he'll listen to what the mayor says and just not understand that the mayor was saying, you know, be calm, you know, everything's under control.

00:25:16Guest:Right.

00:25:17Guest:He says...

00:25:18Guest:Telling the people to be calm.

00:25:20Guest:Don't be alarmed.

00:25:20Guest:Yeah, he said we should be alarmed.

00:25:23Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:25:23Marc:Yeah, what are you going to do?

00:25:24Marc:Well, you've lived through many interesting times, right?

00:25:27Marc:Not like this one.

00:25:28Marc:No, of course.

00:25:29Marc:I don't think any of us have.

00:25:30Marc:But there's certainly, like, if you don't mind going back through it, but even...

00:25:36Marc:on good old boys which i think was the first album i had of yours that you know there was still this tension in the country there was there was racism there was misguided people there was uh you know all this stuff was still there and still you know kind of hot then in the 70s and you were able to address that with some empathy yeah yeah i mean could you address this with empathy

00:25:59Marc:Yeah.

00:26:00Guest:Yeah?

00:26:01Guest:Yes, I could.

00:26:01Guest:I mean, you did... I had an idea that you could write...

00:26:10Guest:A song coming for a woman, for Ivanka Trump.

00:26:16Guest:Yeah.

00:26:17Guest:Saying, dear daddy, you know, I'm writing you this letter because there's things I could never say to you.

00:26:24Guest:And then doing all the requisite Oriental almost praising of him that you have to do.

00:26:29Guest:Right.

00:26:29Guest:I know how wonderful and brilliant you are.

00:26:33Guest:And how everyone loves you, all the people that I just was wondering.

00:26:38Guest:And she'll say it.

00:26:39Guest:She could say it in some kind of way where, do you know what real is?

00:26:44Guest:Do you really know what's going on here?

00:26:48Guest:Right, right.

00:26:49Guest:You could do it.

00:26:50Guest:You could do it like that, like someone like Lorde, you know, or could do a song, very effective one like that, I think.

00:26:58Guest:Are you going to write it for Lorde?

00:27:00Guest:I don't know.

00:27:00Guest:Well, now anyone can write it.

00:27:03Guest:But I didn't.

00:27:06Guest:I restrained myself.

00:27:06Guest:I didn't want to have an idea.

00:27:08Guest:I like her.

00:27:08Guest:I'm sort of fascinated by her.

00:27:10Guest:To have written that song about class, shocking, you know, it's great.

00:27:15Guest:And no one did it.

00:27:17Guest:It's like...

00:27:18Guest:There's subjects that people just have giant ones that they haven't covered.

00:27:23Guest:I don't think like Janice Ian wrote that song, 17, about not being worried about how you look.

00:27:31Guest:Right.

00:27:33Guest:Which is endemic, you know, when you're a teenager.

00:27:37Guest:Yeah.

00:27:38Guest:But I can't think of any songs about it but that one.

00:27:42Guest:I mean, no, there's more, but not much, you know.

00:27:45Guest:The medium is mostly love songs.

00:27:47Guest:It has been always.

00:27:48Guest:And there's a good reason for it.

00:27:49Guest:That's what people like.

00:27:50Guest:You mean pop songs?

00:27:51Guest:Yeah.

00:27:51Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:27:52Guest:Well, any kind, yeah.

00:27:54Marc:Classical songs, too.

00:27:55Marc:Folk songs are slightly different.

00:27:57Marc:Right, because they have the populist drive back in the day anyways, right?

00:28:02Marc:They did.

00:28:02Marc:Yeah, the fight.

00:28:03Marc:The wobblies.

00:28:04Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:28:05Marc:Yeah, there's still some people carrying that torch.

00:28:07Guest:There are, yeah.

00:28:08Marc:I don't know what the effect of it is.

00:28:10Marc:Yeah, I'm glad it's there.

00:28:12Marc:And I'm glad that the passion is still there and that the form still exists.

00:28:15Marc:But do you ever come up against that yourself when you're writing songs?

00:28:18Marc:Do you think like, well, who is this for?

00:28:21Guest:Well, I've thought, some of my songs are kind of weird, and I thought, who could possibly like this?

00:28:32Guest:But I do it.

00:28:34Marc:But your weirdest songs are like, let's burn down the cornfield.

00:28:37Marc:I listened to that three times.

00:28:38Marc:It's a little weird.

00:28:40Guest:But that's sort of about sex, though, a little bit.

00:28:42Guest:Oh, is it?

00:28:43Guest:Okay.

00:28:44Guest:Well...

00:28:44Guest:But yeah, it's weird.

00:28:46Marc:I thought it was more of an existentially terrifying thing.

00:28:49Marc:It's about boredom.

00:28:50Marc:Yeah, boredom.

00:28:51Marc:Exactly.

00:28:52Marc:That's what it's about, really.

00:28:54Marc:And I think that those shorter... It's a good subject, that one.

00:28:57Marc:Yeah, it is, because that's where it all happens.

00:29:00Guest:Yeah.

00:29:00Marc:In the boredom is where all the darkness comes.

00:29:03Marc:That's right.

00:29:04Okay.

00:29:04Marc:But like Guilty is like that song, the four stances of that, like they make me cry every time I listen to it.

00:29:10Marc:Because I personally can relate to it, which I don't know.

00:29:12Marc:Sure, me too.

00:29:12Marc:You can.

00:29:13Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:29:14Guest:Being in the wrong place, you know, hi.

00:29:19Marc:But that line, it's like, you know, it takes a whole lot of medicine for me to believe that it's somebody else.

00:29:24Marc:Absolutely.

00:29:25Marc:Oh, my God.

00:29:27Guest:Did you clap when you came up with that?

00:29:29Guest:No, but I did because it was exactly right, you know, about taking drugs.

00:29:36Guest:Yeah.

00:29:37Guest:You know, it's...

00:29:38Guest:You can look at the bottle and you don't know what's going to be ahead of you.

00:29:42Guest:But if you look at the bottle in 45 minutes, you say, well, I know how I'm going to feel.

00:29:47Guest:You think.

00:29:48Guest:It doesn't work out.

00:29:50Guest:Right, right, right.

00:29:51Guest:It's bad.

00:29:52Guest:It's always bad, but you think it's going to be better.

00:29:54Guest:That's right.

00:29:55Marc:There's that moment where this will fix it.

00:29:57Guest:Yeah.

00:29:57Guest:I don't know what.

00:29:59Guest:why i think i'm that was that broken but yeah when i wrote it i thought well that's that's that's right were you going through it well that's various times yeah you know uh but but uh but yeah i do know it yeah yeah well you certainly that's one thing the 70s provided everybody was to be surrounded by that uh in it did in individuals like you know just people dropping from dope or booze or whatever the hell it was falling out yeah it and and

00:30:29Guest:And you'd run into people that really were sort of crazy.

00:30:33Guest:Sure.

00:30:34Guest:Much more frequently.

00:30:35Guest:And sometimes you didn't know they were crazy till two hours.

00:30:39Guest:You talked to them.

00:30:40Guest:After they laid down some pretty good tracks.

00:30:42Guest:Yeah.

00:30:44Marc:You're like, man, that sounded great.

00:30:46Marc:Yeah.

00:30:47Marc:Who are you talking to?

00:30:48Marc:That's right.

00:30:49Yeah.

00:30:50Guest:You know, and you weren't worrying.

00:30:52Guest:Meanwhile, all the time, you're worried about yourself.

00:30:55Guest:Right.

00:30:55Guest:Well, that's, I think most people are.

00:30:58Guest:The whole world is a drum.

00:31:01Guest:Is it?

00:31:05Marc:Yeah.

00:31:05Marc:Let me ask you, because in listening to stuff all the way through again, where does, because I'll tell you, and I'm embarrassed to say it, that when I was poking around just listening to music, which is what I do when I talk to musicians, I don't think I ever listened to Van Dyke Parks' song cycle.

00:31:25Marc:Yeah.

00:31:26Marc:Until today.

00:31:27Marc:Yeah.

00:31:28Marc:And I always knew of him because of the Beach Boys connection.

00:31:32Marc:But then, like, listening to that, you know, I was able to sort of identify... Because I listened to Joanna Newsom, you know, recently.

00:31:38Marc:I had her on the show.

00:31:38Guest:Yeah, it was very good.

00:31:39Marc:Yeah, but the orchestration that seemed to be the area you guys were working in...

00:31:45Marc:Where the hell does that come from?

00:31:47Guest:You know, it's like a branch of homo sapien that didn't become homo sapien.

00:31:53Guest:Homo robust.

00:31:55Guest:I think we thought then that maybe pop music could go in that direction too.

00:32:03Guest:Like using a drum was almost cheating to move things along.

00:32:07Guest:You know, it comes from...

00:32:10Guest:But does it come like... You know, European music, classical music to some extent, I guess.

00:32:14Guest:But what about, like, Copland?

00:32:16Guest:Sure.

00:32:17Guest:Oh, the various composers.

00:32:18Guest:Gershwin.

00:32:19Guest:Right, because it's an American sound.

00:32:21Guest:That's where I come from, yeah.

00:32:22Guest:Gershwin, Copland, and Joanna Newsom comes from, too.

00:32:25Guest:Right, right.

00:32:26Marc:But it's rare to hear.

00:32:28Marc:Like, it's still rare to hear it.

00:32:29Marc:And when you hear it, it's uniquely yours.

00:32:31Marc:It is in that kind of context.

00:32:33Guest:Yes, it is.

00:32:33Guest:In pop music.

00:32:34Guest:Yeah.

00:32:35Guest:Yeah.

00:32:35Guest:Part of it might have come...

00:32:37Guest:Well, from listening to Copland or Gershwin, but not consciously.

00:32:43Guest:Yeah.

00:32:43Guest:But movies, too.

00:32:47Guest:Three of my uncles were motion picture composers.

00:32:50Guest:And I thought, well, that's what I do with music when I grew up.

00:32:56Guest:I mean, it didn't look easy, but it looked like age... Did you go to the... Yeah.

00:32:59Marc:You went to the studio with them?

00:33:00Guest:I went sometimes, yeah.

00:33:02Marc:When they had orchestras sitting in there?

00:33:04Guest:And they were conducting... And that's a big...

00:33:07Guest:I have in my ear the sound of a really great orchestra, the Fox Studio Orchestra.

00:33:14Guest:Fortunately for me, I've got it.

00:33:15Guest:Yeah.

00:33:16Guest:And it made an impression on me.

00:33:20Guest:Right.

00:33:20Guest:I love the sound of an orchestra.

00:33:22Guest:I like it almost too well for pop music.

00:33:25Guest:I think I've torn songs up a bit just to be able to arrange it the way I thought was right so I could put it in a place, particularly on the first record I made.

00:33:35Right.

00:33:36Marc:Well, that's a big orchestra.

00:33:37Guest:It's fairly big, yeah.

00:33:39Guest:This one's about as big on this record, yeah.

00:33:43Guest:There's some similarities between the first record and this one, I think.

00:33:46Marc:Yeah, I mean, the first record is not only as an orchestra, but you don't separate it much.

00:33:52Marc:I mean, they're all there in a lot of the songs.

00:33:54Guest:That's right, they're there, four or five of them, yeah.

00:33:57Marc:Yeah, and listening to that and the sort of drop off from that to 12 songs.

00:34:03Marc:Complete.

00:34:04Marc:Right, you just stripped it all down.

00:34:06Guest:Because it didn't sell.

00:34:09Guest:And it's all been feeble attempts.

00:34:12Guest:to try and do something that a lot of people liked.

00:34:16Guest:Yeah.

00:34:16Guest:The first one, like, I don't know what it sold, 6,000 or something, if that.

00:34:21Guest:Really?

00:34:21Guest:That's last week.

00:34:25Guest:That's the latest.

00:34:26Guest:I don't know.

00:34:26Guest:You're still getting those quarter weeks?

00:34:28Guest:But it was tiny.

00:34:29Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:34:30Guest:And the second one, so I got rid of everything.

00:34:33Guest:Yeah.

00:34:33Guest:I think I'll try this, you know, do pop music.

00:34:37Guest:And that's what I did.

00:34:38Guest:And even though it was an evil...

00:34:43Guest:mind process, you know, to make a decision that way, I wrote all right.

00:34:47Guest:Yeah.

00:34:48Guest:I never let that be affected.

00:34:51Guest:Yeah.

00:34:53Guest:By any kind of considerations, but, you know, whether I liked it.

00:34:57Marc:But the thing is that, but, you know, even venturing into pop music, like in the past, you know, before it seems like you made the first album, you'd had, you know, plenty of experience with arranging, you had written songs, you know, that were used.

00:35:09Guest:A little, not much with arranging.

00:35:10Guest:Yeah.

00:35:11Guest:I mean, that was really something the first time I was in there with the orchestra.

00:35:14Guest:Yeah.

00:35:15Guest:And, you know, an orchestra's got some weight to it.

00:35:19Guest:You know, you go like this bum, and you're trying to go this fast, and they'll slow it down a little, and you feel it, and you don't know, oh, come on, come on, come on.

00:35:28Guest:And what you do is, eventually, I found out, you shorten up a little.

00:35:32Guest:But you can feel that.

00:35:34Guest:And it was, so I ended up doing a song, Davey the Fat Boy, that goes, I've been his friend.

00:35:41Guest:and they were slowing up, so it was like, I built a mountain, I couldn't climb.

00:35:50Guest:I did the track, and then I had to sing, and I couldn't really.

00:35:53Marc:But also, it seems that throughout the non-orchestral stuff in those few albums, and all the way through, you have a propensity to swing a bit.

00:36:03Marc:Yeah.

00:36:04Marc:I sure do.

00:36:05Marc:Yeah.

00:36:05Marc:And there's a trick to get an orchestra to swing.

00:36:09Marc:It seems like that's what you're saying is like, how do you get that?

00:36:13Marc:They can do it.

00:36:14Guest:Yeah.

00:36:15Guest:Now, particularly in this town.

00:36:17Guest:Sure.

00:36:18Guest:It's hard.

00:36:19Guest:It was hard getting strings to shuffle.

00:36:21Guest:Right.

00:36:22Guest:Right.

00:36:23Guest:But.

00:36:24Guest:You can do it now.

00:36:25Guest:They do it, yeah.

00:36:26Guest:They've adapted.

00:36:28Guest:Some places, you know, it's tough in Linz, Austria.

00:36:31Guest:But they can do it here.

00:36:35Guest:And I really do.

00:36:36Guest:Another thing that I love too much is shuffles.

00:36:39Guest:Drummers hate them.

00:36:41Guest:Really?

00:36:42Guest:Yeah.

00:36:43Guest:It makes it complicated.

00:36:47Guest:Right, because they can't all do it.

00:36:49Guest:Did you see that?

00:36:50Guest:It was absolutely shitty.

00:36:52Guest:Excuse me.

00:36:53Guest:Sorry, you can say shitty.

00:36:54Guest:But in the movie about the drummers, what was the name of that thing?

00:36:58Guest:Oh, yeah, Whiplash.

00:37:00Guest:Whiplash.

00:37:00Guest:Yeah.

00:37:00Guest:They had a scene where they had a guy who was supposed to be bad drummer.

00:37:04Guest:Yeah.

00:37:04Guest:And he was doing, okay, do a fast shuffle.

00:37:07Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:37:07Guest:So it was... It was a very lame attempt at being bad.

00:37:12Guest:I mean, nobody, a four-year-old wouldn't have been that bad.

00:37:14Guest:Right, right.

00:37:15Guest:But they are a drag and a fast shuffle.

00:37:18Guest:I mean...

00:37:19Guest:I don't even like to think about it.

00:37:23Guest:Right, but the slow one, that moves you.

00:37:27Guest:It really does.

00:37:28Guest:Yeah, well, I mean, I love it.

00:37:29Guest:I don't know why.

00:37:30Guest:You can't track it?

00:37:31Guest:I spent a few years in New Orleans when I was, well, I was like a baby, and then I'd go back into summers until I was nine.

00:37:37Guest:What got you there from here?

00:37:39Guest:My mother.

00:37:40Guest:She was from there?

00:37:40Guest:Yeah.

00:37:41Guest:So that must have been something.

00:37:44Guest:I guess it was.

00:37:45Guest:I mean, I...

00:37:47Guest:I remember it was hot, and the river always meant a lot to me.

00:37:53Guest:But you don't remember music.

00:37:56Guest:It's everywhere there.

00:37:58Guest:It is, right?

00:37:58Guest:I don't specifically remember walking around in the quarter and saying, whoa, listen to that.

00:38:03Guest:At four or five?

00:38:05Guest:No.

00:38:05Guest:Yeah.

00:38:05Guest:I mean, a lot of musicians I've talked to have a better relationship with music than I have.

00:38:12Guest:Yeah, yeah.

00:38:12Guest:I mean, it's not something that I...

00:38:15Guest:Ever loved, exactly.

00:38:17Guest:Really, though?

00:38:18Guest:I don't know.

00:38:20Guest:I mean, really, that's really a good question.

00:38:22Guest:Because compared to them, no.

00:38:25Guest:I mean, it was always work to me, I felt, you know, because my family felt the kind of weight on it.

00:38:33Marc:Just in the sense that you had working musicians in your family and you decided that that was your profession.

00:38:38Guest:And they were pretty grim about it.

00:38:39Guest:You know, I mean, even my Uncle Alfred, who was as good as any film composer has ever been, I think.

00:38:44Guest:Yeah.

00:38:45Guest:Even he, I'd go in and see him.

00:38:47Guest:I was like 10.

00:38:49Guest:Yeah.

00:38:49Guest:What would he have been doing?

00:38:50Guest:I can't remember.

00:38:51Guest:The robe or something.

00:38:52Guest:Yeah.

00:38:53Guest:And he'd say, hey, what do you think of this?

00:38:54Guest:He'd play me something.

00:38:56Guest:And I, oh, that's good.

00:38:59Guest:And he said things like, you know, he was like talking himself into it.

00:39:02Guest:He'd say...

00:39:02Guest:He said, you know, if things sound good on the piano, if they play on the piano, they'll sound good in the orchestra.

00:39:10Guest:And I said, yeah.

00:39:11Guest:Well, you know, what am I going to say?

00:39:12Guest:I'm 10.

00:39:13Guest:But you took it to heart.

00:39:16Guest:I took it to heart and I remembered it.

00:39:18Marc:Well, I think that the difference is whether you think you like music as much as other musicians or know about it as much as other musicians, it seems to me that your musical style, and more importantly,

00:39:31Marc:your vocal and poetic, uh, phrasing is, is unique to you.

00:39:37Marc:And, and as both of them are, but you like to write songs.

00:39:42Guest:I'm yelling at you, hoping that you'll agree with me.

00:39:46Guest:Randy, you like to believe that, but I never have written unless I had to.

00:39:51Guest:What you mean to get a record done or?

00:39:53Guest:Uh, it's a, Oh, well, a couple of times, you know, where you have to make a record.

00:39:58Guest:I ran out of money.

00:39:59Guest:Yeah.

00:40:00Uh,

00:40:00Guest:or writing songs on assignment for something or a movie, doing a score for a movie and there's a deadline on it.

00:40:09Guest:I don't just go in there and let's... Like this idea I had about the girl song, Ivanka.

00:40:17Guest:Yeah.

00:40:17Guest:A song for Lord.

00:40:18Guest:I mean, I had that idea and I said, oh, that's great.

00:40:20Guest:But I sort of restrained myself till it passed a little bit.

00:40:24Guest:I didn't go in there and work on it.

00:40:26Guest:I didn't want to.

00:40:28Guest:But might you?

00:40:29Yeah.

00:40:29Guest:Like when you're bored?

00:40:31Guest:Yeah.

00:40:32Guest:No, just talking to you, making me conscious of it, I might do it just because it's a pretty good idea.

00:40:40Guest:Right.

00:40:40Guest:Now that when I just laid it out there, I can see where it could go.

00:40:45Guest:Easy.

00:40:45Guest:But you never... You could see where it would go.

00:40:47Guest:Sure.

00:40:47Marc:But you were never... I know you're being self-effacing a bit.

00:40:52Guest:No, I'm not.

00:40:53Guest:Not about that I'm not.

00:40:54Guest:I think it's an indictment.

00:40:55Marc:Yeah.

00:40:56Guest:What?

00:40:57Guest:I'm a fabissner.

00:40:58Yeah.

00:41:00Guest:I am.

00:41:01Guest:I know.

00:41:02Guest:But you're also a very prolific guy that never seems to fucking stop working.

00:41:07Guest:Thank you.

00:41:08Guest:Glad to hear that.

00:41:09Guest:I think I haven't.

00:41:11Guest:I don't want to really get into this.

00:41:14Guest:I don't think I've done enough, but okay.

00:41:17Guest:The new records, I'm satisfied.

00:41:20Guest:It's good.

00:41:21Guest:You know what I mean?

00:41:23Guest:To be doing good work in pop music at my age is...

00:41:27Marc:is not usual no i i think that i think it's great and i think it's a return to form in a way it sounds like the same guy as all the other ones do well look you you well you are the same guy but like i like okay so let's go back to this shift you know the the shift from from the orchestra to uh 12 songs yeah

00:41:47Marc:Now, this was you saying, like, I'm going to make pop music, and then you pull in Rykooter, and you pull in those dudes from The Birds, and you're kind of doing a thing where, like, there was... You seem to be part of the movement of creating a new American music, you know, along with the band and, you know, whoever else was doing it at that time.

00:42:06Guest:Well, thank you.

00:42:06Marc:Grateful Dead, maybe.

00:42:07Marc:I don't know who was around.

00:42:10Marc:Well, they didn't get to it until a little later.

00:42:12Marc:But...

00:42:13Marc:You know, working with Rye and, you know, no matter how much you think you don't know or like music, I mean, you were bringing together something that was unique.

00:42:21Guest:Yeah.

00:42:23Guest:To do that stuff.

00:42:25Guest:They're certainly part of American music.

00:42:27Guest:And I am, too, as a writer.

00:42:30Guest:Yeah.

00:42:31Yeah.

00:42:32Guest:That's a nice thing to say.

00:42:36Guest:I've never thought of it, but that's true.

00:42:41Guest:I'm part of it in some kind of way.

00:42:43Guest:I've influenced a lot of songwriters, I think, in some way.

00:42:46Guest:But not...

00:42:47Guest:to be so foolish as to do to write songs in character the way i do right it's not like come on boys and everybody followed me out of the trench right yeah yeah uh yeah people don't do it what write in character neil young does it occasionally right but but nobody does it much well i talked to i was sort of blown away because i had nick lowe in here yeah

00:43:09Marc:Peace, love, and understanding.

00:43:11Marc:Right, good song, right?

00:43:12Marc:But he wrote The Beast and Me, too, for Johnny Cash.

00:43:15Marc:And it was the first lesson I learned about songwriters where I had really gotten in my head that Nicola was the guy in The Beast and Me.

00:43:24Marc:No.

00:43:24Marc:We're not.

00:43:27Marc:Right.

00:43:27Marc:So I guess my point is, I think a lot of you guys write in character, it's just a step away.

00:43:33Guest:Oh, it's different than they are, but it's usually a romantic hero.

00:43:41Guest:Now, Patty may not be a romantic hero.

00:43:44Guest:He may not think of himself as a romantic hero.

00:43:47Guest:Yeah.

00:43:47Guest:But he does when he writes songs.

00:43:48Guest:I mean, that's what he's writing.

00:43:50Guest:Right, right.

00:43:51Marc:All from that angle, though.

00:43:53Marc:You're saying he, as a songwriter, is writing from a point of view.

00:43:56Guest:Let me think.

00:43:57Marc:Not all, no.

00:43:58Guest:No, no, no.

00:43:58Guest:But a lot of it.

00:44:00Marc:It's also in a very American sense of longing.

00:44:03Guest:He came and did, when I got in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, he came and he and Jackson Brown,

00:44:10Guest:And Jeff Lynn came down and we did I Love L.A.

00:44:12Guest:for everybody.

00:44:14Guest:And when he first started singing it, he didn't sound solid or good.

00:44:18Guest:But then he figured out how Tom Petty would sound singing I Love L.A.

00:44:23Guest:and he did it great.

00:44:24Guest:Yeah.

00:44:25Guest:It's a...

00:44:26Guest:Sometimes it's conscious, you know?

00:44:28Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:44:30Guest:Oh, see, you gotta find... Yeah.

00:44:31Guest:Where Tom Petty is in the National Anthem, you know?

00:44:33Marc:And the only way you can know that is by knowing who that guy is from years.

00:44:36Guest:And by trying it.

00:44:37Guest:Yeah.

00:44:37Guest:He's gotta do it.

00:44:38Marc:Yeah, yeah.

00:44:38Marc:But, you know, those guys who have... Oh, yeah.

00:44:41Marc:Yeah, that presence.

00:44:42Guest:They know.

00:44:42Guest:He knows who he is, yeah.

00:44:43Guest:Sure.

00:44:44Marc:Right.

00:44:45Marc:But, like, also that shift from orchestra to that first album, that freed up your voice, too.

00:44:49Marc:It seemed like on the first record... Yeah.

00:44:52Guest:That's very wise of you to say that.

00:44:54Guest:I mean, I kept...

00:44:56Guest:wondering about that i mean it does sound stiffer and then i thought after that i said do i have to always do this do i have to always beat right right right along yeah yeah and then the the next one was sail away which is half and half oh man that record you must do you i you don't you're not one of these guys that's sort of like that's behind me no that's pretty good that's a fucking great record it had

00:45:23Guest:That record and Bad Love, I think, have the best songs I wrote.

00:45:27Marc:Well, Bad Love, man.

00:45:29Marc:That stuff seemed really close to the bone, man.

00:45:33Guest:It's good.

00:45:34Guest:Never.

00:45:35Guest:Let me think.

00:45:37Guest:Well, there's Great Nations of Europe on it.

00:45:39Guest:Yeah.

00:45:40Guest:The thing about Karl Marx.

00:45:43Guest:And I Miss You.

00:45:45Guest:I Miss You, yeah.

00:45:46Guest:I wrote a love song.

00:45:48Guest:for my first wife while I'm married to my second.

00:45:51Guest:Right.

00:45:51Guest:That always goes over well.

00:45:52Guest:It's a comic, I know.

00:45:53Guest:Oh, Jesus.

00:45:54Marc:Once you start talking about the ladies.

00:45:56Guest:It doesn't go well.

00:45:57Marc:It doesn't go well.

00:45:57Guest:There's towns you can't play it.

00:46:00Marc:Where you have to say like, look, let's just keep this between us.

00:46:03Marc:No one record this.

00:46:04Marc:No one tweet that I did this song here.

00:46:06Guest:It's like at a certain point in your life you think that

00:46:08Guest:Somehow telling a girl about other women the experience you've had will matter.

00:46:16Guest:They'll think you're a better fuck or something.

00:46:18Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:46:19Guest:It doesn't work.

00:46:21Guest:No.

00:46:21Guest:It's a horrible idea.

00:46:23Guest:Do you want her more than me?

00:46:24Guest:Yeah.

00:46:24Guest:There's no way.

00:46:26Guest:There's something that they're just too smart for it all.

00:46:30Marc:Well, it's good that you learned that lesson again in 2000 or 1999.

00:46:33Marc:Oh, no, I didn't learn it.

00:46:38Guest:Really, that song for me was about writing.

00:46:40Guest:Right.

00:46:41Guest:It was about sort of, this is so complicated.

00:46:43Guest:This is what you told her?

00:46:45Yeah.

00:46:45Guest:that's what i told them both it scared the first one is it bad as it did the second one yeah worse but no what i told him it's about oh so weird pretending to be sort of or being ruthless about writing i'll take a song anywhere i can get it and i do think that

00:47:06Marc:Well, no, at some point, you got to defend it.

00:47:08Marc:Like, you know, I actually had to tell, like, the only way I learned not to do jokes about, you know, specifically the relationship I'm in was by going publicly through a divorce on stage, working the whole thing out on stage.

00:47:22Marc:Oh, yeah.

00:47:22Guest:Yeah.

00:47:23Guest:I saw you doing that.

00:47:24Guest:You did?

00:47:25Guest:Yeah.

00:47:25Guest:On TV?

00:47:26Guest:Yeah.

00:47:26Guest:No, at a comedy club, too, and on TV.

00:47:29Guest:And it was not comfortable material.

00:47:32Guest:I wondered.

00:47:34Guest:Yeah.

00:47:34Marc:It was funny.

00:47:36Marc:Right.

00:47:36Marc:It was funny because it was so fucking painful.

00:47:38Marc:But to the women, I've actually said to women, I said, look, if it's going to come down to you or the joke, it might be the joke.

00:47:46Marc:The joke might win.

00:47:47Marc:Feels good to say that kind of romantic, bold, writerly thing.

00:47:52Guest:That's what I did with this song.

00:47:53Guest:It's about faking to do that.

00:47:58Guest:Trying to get away with it.

00:47:59Guest:You wouldn't write a song, well, I have written about my kids.

00:48:04Guest:You have, right?

00:48:06Guest:I have, and sometimes not directly.

00:48:12Marc:Right.

00:48:13Marc:But yes, I have.

00:48:14Marc:But you've written about the father and son relationship for a long time.

00:48:18Guest:I have.

00:48:18Marc:Yeah.

00:48:19Guest:It's amazing.

00:48:21Marc:Even on the new album.

00:48:21Guest:To me, it's sort of amazing that other writers...

00:48:26Guest:don't branch out some because there's so many subjects, you know.

00:48:30Marc:Well, I think it is about emotional risk on some level and being misunderstood or being understood.

00:48:35Marc:Both of those things could go wrong.

00:48:38Guest:But the way you feel about a joke, that it's worth almost anything, relationships and stuff, is the way I feel about a song.

00:48:45Guest:I mean, it's always how I have judged myself, more or less.

00:48:50Marc:Yeah, that you have the emotional integrity to do it.

00:48:53Marc:yeah but you don't want to wear that like a badge like no like you know you want to get away with it i'll do anything yeah you want to get away with it you know i just want to do it yeah then i don't care so much yeah what happened well here's the concession i i made was like you know with this a recent joke that was about the relationship i'm in now yeah uh hurt her feelings and i said i'll just move it back a relationship this girl i used to go out with

00:49:19Marc:Not the thing I'm in now.

00:49:20Marc:It's just a change of tense.

00:49:22Guest:You don't have to change a thing.

00:49:23Marc:Yeah, it's still the same thing.

00:49:25Guest:Then you wonder, is it as funny?

00:49:27Marc:Of course.

00:49:28Marc:Of course.

00:49:29Marc:If I'm not dealing with it in the present, is it as menacing as it is if I push it back in a relationship?

00:49:36Guest:Because it's so important.

00:49:38Guest:I don't know.

00:49:39Guest:I've never been able to disabuse myself of the idea that what I was doing was very important to me, not to the world.

00:49:49Guest:I never thought that music was going to change the world like in the 70s and stuff.

00:49:55Guest:I always thought that what Madonna wore had more to do with life in America than anything anybody, any great writer was writing.

00:50:03Guest:than Neil Young was doing at the time, or whoever was writing well then.

00:50:07Marc:Right.

00:50:07Marc:Well, I guess it is sort of a lofty pretense that is crashing down on us now that all this introspection and expression would fundamentally change the way the world works.

00:50:21Guest:I never believed that.

00:50:22Guest:You never did?

00:50:23Guest:No, never.

00:50:24Guest:Maybe too much so.

00:50:26Guest:I mean, I would have liked to then... You were cynical.

00:50:28Guest:...to believe... I was.

00:50:30Guest:I mean...

00:50:31Guest:The Hippies and all that is so benign and such a good idea, peace, love, and understanding.

00:50:39Guest:That's a great, nasty song, but a great one.

00:50:42Guest:Yeah.

00:50:44Guest:Not but a great one, and a great one.

00:50:46Guest:Yeah.

00:50:47Guest:No, I never believed that...

00:50:52Marc:it was working that things would get better and that music would transform anything but you but you just believe that well clearly it was bringing people together and you know everybody you know seemed to uh have their heart in the right place but it didn't facilitate action necessarily no i don't think so i i mean sadly

00:51:12Marc:Well, I think that the wave of that is crashing now to a degree, because I've done a couple bits on stage where I go, you know, why did we lose?

00:51:22Marc:And then I say, what have you been doing for the last eight years?

00:51:25Marc:Oh, you know, just working on me.

00:51:26Marc:Yeah, that's right.

00:51:28Marc:And that's the legacy.

00:51:30Guest:It is.

00:51:31Guest:But what I've been thinking about this thing is, in a way, it's the legacy we ended up with right.

00:51:38Guest:But the people who voted for him,

00:51:41Guest:They're not as bad as he is.

00:51:43Guest:That's right.

00:51:44Guest:I mean, would they have him to their house and a guy like that or be friends with them or on a bowling team or on?

00:51:52Guest:I don't mean that in a pejorative way.

00:51:53Guest:A bridge to play bridge or whatever the fuck, you know, you'd want him to do.

00:51:59Guest:They're not as bad.

00:52:01Guest:racism you gotta look it up that's that's bad well i think the narrator of right racism newman says racism is bad yeah but the narrative the narrator of your song rednecks yeah that that that is not changed

00:52:16Guest:No, it hasn't changed.

00:52:18Guest:The only thing is that everyone knows that the North is just as, almost as culpable as the South in treatment of the races.

00:52:27Marc:Well, a lot of people don't want to believe it.

00:52:28Marc:And I think a song like that, that, you know, when you put in, you know, the last, you know, 30 seconds of that song is pretty haunting and pretty real kind of.

00:52:37Guest:It's the only part that the guy wouldn't know.

00:52:39Guest:You know what I mean?

00:52:40Guest:The character.

00:52:40Guest:Right, right, right.

00:52:41Guest:I did it anyway.

00:52:42Marc:Well, you had to because that was the point.

00:52:44Guest:That was the balance.

00:52:45Guest:That's right.

00:52:45Marc:It was the hypocrisy.

00:52:46Guest:I had to.

00:52:48Marc:Well, it's interesting about like in terms of how you approach politics in the songs, like political science or but more like there's something beautiful.

00:52:58Marc:The one song I've listened to like three or four times in the last few days is Mr. President.

00:53:01Marc:Yeah.

00:53:02Marc:Really?

00:53:02Guest:Yes.

00:53:03Marc:Like, well, there's that swing thing again.

00:53:06Marc:But it's just, you know, we get it.

00:53:09Marc:You know, like the narrator is like, we understand who you are.

00:53:12Marc:but can't you just throw us a bone?

00:53:15Marc:Yeah.

00:53:15Marc:Yeah, can't you just see us?

00:53:16Marc:And this monster that's there now... That's exactly right.

00:53:20Guest:It's deeper than my song, but that's right, yeah.

00:53:23Marc:But this monster saw that and now is using it to a bad end.

00:53:28Marc:But the sort of vulnerable plea of the working man, have pity on the working man.

00:53:33Marc:You can have your place, but we're out here.

00:53:36Guest:We're dying out here.

00:53:37Guest:Absolutely.

00:53:38Guest:And he says...

00:53:41Guest:I love Steelworkers.

00:53:42Guest:And you know what that means.

00:53:43Guest:It's just like he saw Clark Gable in Pittsburgh, you know, that movie.

00:53:50Guest:I love Steelworkers.

00:53:52Guest:And, you know, they applauded him and they were happy to see him.

00:53:55Guest:Oh.

00:53:56Yeah.

00:53:56Guest:I think he sort of knows he's not good at anything.

00:54:00Guest:Oh, remember Nixon?

00:54:02Guest:Yes, but he's great at foreign affairs.

00:54:04Guest:Sure.

00:54:04Guest:Or shit.

00:54:05Guest:Yeah, right.

00:54:05Guest:And this guy, you know, he's a great negotiator, great businessman.

00:54:09Marc:I don't know.

00:54:10Marc:I doubt it.

00:54:11Marc:No, no.

00:54:12Marc:And the narcissism will never enable him to see.

00:54:14Marc:No.

00:54:16Marc:The tremendous risk of the true narcissist is the break in the narcissistic bubble.

00:54:21Marc:Yeah.

00:54:21Marc:So like, cause at the core of it is just a very tiny thing.

00:54:24Marc:A very sad abandoned baby.

00:54:27Guest:And is narcissism an actual, uh, psychosis?

00:54:31Guest:Yeah.

00:54:32Marc:I think they, they down, they, uh, they downgraded it in the DSM.

00:54:37Marc:Uh, you know, cause I, I told my father that he should be happy about that.

00:54:40Marc:uh but did you really i did yeah yeah guess what you're not sick so did he laugh yeah he did he did well you know he's a he's a fortunate hybrid he's he's a total narcissist but he's also a depressive which looks like self-awareness yeah

00:54:59Guest:Depressive about himself or about the times?

00:55:03Marc:Yeah, both.

00:55:03Marc:Himself.

00:55:04Marc:But the vulnerability of being depressed is kind of a trick.

00:55:08Marc:If a narcissist is a depressive, it almost looks like they're capable of empathy in things when they're depressed.

00:55:16Guest:Does he think he didn't live up to his potential?

00:55:19Guest:I don't know.

00:55:19Marc:I think he thinks that he... That thing they always beat you over the head with?

00:55:22Marc:I don't know what the hell.

00:55:24Marc:He just, he was not unlike our president.

00:55:28Marc:He was a bit of a sucker.

00:55:29Marc:And he was a bit, you know, he liked being, he liked hanging around tough guys.

00:55:33Marc:And, you know, he was a doctor, my father.

00:55:34Guest:And, you know, and he got... My father, too.

00:55:36Guest:He liked it.

00:55:37Marc:And that's what happens.

00:55:38Guest:Was he a tough guy, your dad?

00:55:39Marc:No.

00:55:40Guest:My dad got in fights.

00:55:41Marc:Oh, he did?

00:55:42Marc:Yeah.

00:55:42Marc:No, my dad was not a tough guy.

00:55:43Marc:He thought he was, but he was a lot of wind.

00:55:45Marc:You know what I mean?

00:55:46Marc:But your dad was a scrapper?

00:55:48Guest:Yeah.

00:55:48Guest:I mean, there was a lot of, yeah, I said to smack, I was going to smack this guy.

00:55:54Guest:There was a lot of that, but there was a lot of times when he did.

00:55:56Guest:Oh, yeah?

00:55:58Guest:Yeah.

00:55:59Guest:He had a terrible temper.

00:56:02Guest:My brother and I remember, we were in a parking lot at a restaurant.

00:56:06Guest:We were kids.

00:56:08Guest:And the kid gives him a key and he says, thanks, sonny.

00:56:12Guest:And the kid says, I'm not your son.

00:56:14Guest:And the kid didn't say it that rough.

00:56:18Guest:But my father took it badly.

00:56:19Marc:Yeah.

00:56:21Guest:That was it?

00:56:21Guest:Nuts.

00:56:22Guest:He opened up on him?

00:56:23Marc:He clocked him?

00:56:25Marc:Was that the first time?

00:56:26Guest:I was just rattling around.

00:56:29Guest:He fought like Bob Steele.

00:56:31Guest:Which is what?

00:56:31Guest:It was a cowboy.

00:56:32Guest:Yeah.

00:56:33Guest:In his cowboy movies.

00:56:34Guest:Yeah.

00:56:35Marc:Oh, just got right in there?

00:56:36Marc:Yeah, like it.

00:56:37Guest:Get as much done as possible?

00:56:38Guest:Miniature golf course, the boxing thing.

00:56:40Marc:Yeah.

00:56:40Marc:Get as much done before you go down as you can.

00:56:43Marc:That's what I remember.

00:56:45Marc:You just got one brother?

00:56:46Marc:One brother, yeah.

00:56:47Marc:Yeah, me too.

00:56:47Marc:He's a doctor.

00:56:48Marc:Younger or older?

00:56:49Marc:Younger.

00:56:49Marc:Oh, yeah?

00:56:50Marc:Yours?

00:56:51Marc:Mine's younger.

00:56:53Marc:Were you nice to him?

00:56:55I don't know.

00:56:55Marc:I don't know.

00:56:56Marc:You know, we're painfully similar.

00:56:58Marc:I mean, as time goes on, no matter what we go through, you know, we come back to the notice where, you know, what I've noticed about friends, too, in general, is that, you know, there are guys that you see after not seeing him for 20 years and you know that guy.

00:57:12Marc:And then there are guys you see after you haven't seen them in 20 years and you're like, who the fuck are you?

00:57:17Marc:You know, brothers, hopefully you always know them.

00:57:20Guest:Yeah.

00:57:21Guest:And mannerisms.

00:57:22Guest:Everything.

00:57:22Guest:He's a lot like me.

00:57:23Guest:The look of their back, you know, something I haven't seen my back in 40 years.

00:57:27Guest:Right.

00:57:27Guest:But I mean, his back looks like mine.

00:57:29Marc:Sure.

00:57:30Marc:And the way they move.

00:57:31Guest:Yeah.

00:57:31Marc:Very familiar.

00:57:32Guest:Very familiar.

00:57:33Marc:there's no one else yes in your genetics you know yeah we're tight like that but you know i think there's the the tension of you know success failure whatever the other things happen and you know shame all of that plays into the dynamics but you know these blood can happen yeah but like this like you were talking about your kids like you know i i feel like i remember very specifically enjoying you on the original david letterman show because david he would have you on a lot yeah

00:57:59Marc:And there was a... God, I don't remember what year it was, but you always had very great timing.

00:58:06Marc:And David asked about your son at that time.

00:58:09Marc:It must have been in the 80s.

00:58:10Marc:Oh, when he was in the punk... Well, you said, well, that one's doing fine, but the other one has sort of gone bad.

00:58:15Marc:Yeah.

00:58:19Guest:Never bad.

00:58:19Guest:I mean, they're all...

00:58:23Guest:Very good.

00:58:25Guest:How many you got?

00:58:26Guest:I got five.

00:58:27Guest:Four boys and then a girl.

00:58:30Guest:Which a friend of mine had the same kind of thing happen and he said, you know, if the girl had been born first, he would have thought the boys were retarded.

00:58:39Guest:Because there's no doubt that they're superior.

00:58:42Guest:Do you have any kids?

00:58:44Guest:No.

00:58:44Guest:I avoided that somehow.

00:58:46Guest:Yeah.

00:58:46Marc:I think it was smart.

00:58:47Marc:I don't know.

00:58:48Marc:I think people find a lot of joy in it.

00:58:50Marc:But I think the fact that it was never at the front of my brain to do, and I've been married twice, must mean something.

00:58:57Marc:Yeah.

00:58:57Marc:That was protecting me again.

00:58:59Marc:I'm an anxious, worrying, selfish person.

00:59:01Guest:It is that serious a choice.

00:59:04Guest:It should be to people.

00:59:06Guest:I mean, if you do it, you should do it.

00:59:09Guest:Wanting to do it.

00:59:10Guest:Be there for it, yeah.

00:59:11Marc:Did you make that decision in that way then, in the first one?

00:59:14Guest:I just didn't think it would be otherwise.

00:59:17Guest:I mean, everything I knew was family.

00:59:20Guest:Right, yeah.

00:59:21Guest:And so I always thought I'd be part of one and have my own.

00:59:26Guest:And both my wives were...

00:59:29Guest:I thought about what kind of mother they'd be kind of.

00:59:32Guest:Oh, yeah.

00:59:34Guest:And they both were great.

00:59:36Marc:Yeah.

00:59:37Marc:Yeah, I think that my relationship with family was more like, you know, is there any reason to continue this?

00:59:43Guest:Yeah.

00:59:44Guest:I never quite felt that way.

00:59:46Guest:It was always, I mean, I had problems with my father, my mother to some extent.

00:59:52Guest:What did your mother do?

00:59:54Guest:You know, she was from Louisiana and she was sort of a southern belle, I guess.

00:59:59Guest:And my dad met her down there and married her.

01:00:01Guest:And she couldn't

01:00:07Guest:sort of got overwhelmed down here by the speed of things.

01:00:11Guest:Yeah.

01:00:11Guest:You know, the South, those towns on the Gulf are slow.

01:00:15Guest:Yeah.

01:00:16Guest:Galveston and New Orleans and Mobile.

01:00:19Guest:And so she would be getting to the pronoun of a sentence.

01:00:22Guest:Yeah.

01:00:22Guest:And they were done, you know.

01:00:26Guest:So there was some degree of... She never...

01:00:29Guest:became a fully sort of expressed person that I know.

01:00:33Guest:She was very proud of me, like when I pitched in baseball, Little League, she would keep a box score, and it was a big thing to her, and then when anything was about me in the paper, she'd cut it out.

01:00:46Guest:Yeah.

01:00:47Guest:And I wasn't very gracious about any of that kind of stuff.

01:00:50Guest:I mean, I almost wish you weren't at the ball games.

01:00:53Guest:Yeah.

01:00:54Guest:I just wasn't as nice as I should have been.

01:00:56Guest:So they didn't stay together.

01:00:57Guest:They did.

01:00:58Guest:Oh, they did.

01:01:00Guest:They didn't stay together.

01:01:01Guest:They watched the same show in different rooms.

01:01:05Guest:Right.

01:01:06Guest:But they stayed together.

01:01:07Marc:Oh, yeah, yeah.

01:01:08Marc:And most of it here in L.A.

01:01:09Marc:Yeah.

01:01:10Yeah.

01:01:10Marc:So all of it.

01:01:11Marc:Yeah.

01:01:11Marc:So when now through the course of the career, you know, you did a lot of songs and a lot of songs that people covered.

01:01:17Marc:I mean, Jesus, like I think everyone has has recorded.

01:01:21Marc:I think it's going to rain today.

01:01:22Marc:A lot of people and they continue to do it.

01:01:25Marc:Is that is that would that be called an American standard at this point?

01:01:28Guest:God, you know, maybe.

01:01:30Guest:I mean, it's really a decline in standards from all alone by the telephone.

01:01:39Guest:Well, I guess there are standards out of the 70s.

01:01:42Guest:I don't know about that.

01:01:43Guest:I don't think so.

01:01:44Marc:But back then, what was your relationship with the record companies?

01:01:49Marc:Do you have your publishing?

01:01:50Marc:Does it still benefit you every time that happens?

01:01:54Guest:I have it past a certain point, like past some date.

01:01:58Guest:Up to that date, I think...

01:02:01Guest:uh i think it's gonna rain i don't think i have any of early first record i didn't i was with a publisher i think oh really and then i did yeah i would advise anyone now kids uh to keep their publishing sure well i mean the record companies are barely holding on i think and yeah they really are the but they try and get that and they get performance money now record companies they well that's the that's the market performance and merch some

01:02:28Guest:Unbelievable.

01:02:29Guest:Yeah, that's right.

01:02:31Guest:So this record's coming out, and I'd like to be excited like, oh, I wonder what it'll do.

01:02:36Guest:But I mean, I don't guess it'll do anything.

01:02:39Guest:And it's just if my price goes up by $2,000 on the road, that's the accomplishment.

01:02:48Guest:Right.

01:02:48Marc:But what about your relationship with Lenny?

01:02:53Marc:Lenny I knew since I was one year old.

01:02:55Guest:Warren Kerr, is that how you say his last name?

01:02:56Guest:Warren Kerr.

01:02:57Marc:Because the relationship that you had with him seemed to really carry you through the first decade or so, huh?

01:03:04Guest:Whole time.

01:03:05Guest:Yeah.

01:03:06Guest:He was the first person I'd played things for since I was 15.

01:03:10Guest:And when he was with the record company, he...

01:03:15Guest:I never experienced bad record company stuff because I was protected from it by him.

01:03:21Marc:And was he in music as a kid, or how did he get into it?

01:03:24Marc:Because he's still at it, right?

01:03:26Guest:Yeah, he's still at Warner's in A&R.

01:03:30Guest:He got into it.

01:03:31Guest:His father was a violinist in the Fox Orchestra.

01:03:34Guest:And then he started...

01:03:37Guest:So you met him through your uncle?

01:03:39Guest:I met, yeah, I was only one or two.

01:03:42Guest:He was friends with my uncle, friends with the family.

01:03:46Guest:And he was interested in music as a kid, you know, jazz and stuff.

01:03:53Guest:I remember Lenny Niehaus and he had all that stuff.

01:03:55Guest:And his father started a record company, which became Liberty Records.

01:04:03Guest:And...

01:04:05Guest:When I started writing songs, I went to a couple publishers and they signed me at that company.

01:04:14Guest:Yeah.

01:04:15Guest:At Liberty.

01:04:16Guest:At Liberty Records publisher.

01:04:20Guest:Yeah.

01:04:21Guest:And then people heard me singing on the demo and a couple, Lenny was at Warner Brothers by then.

01:04:27Guest:And A&M and Warners offered something, and I went with Warners, with Lenny.

01:04:33Marc:But he used to, what, he managed bands or he just produced bands?

01:04:36Guest:He produced them.

01:04:37Guest:Yeah.

01:04:37Guest:He produced, you know, the Doobie Brothers, Gordon Lightfoot.

01:04:43Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:04:43Guest:They were pretty big.

01:04:45Guest:Ricky Lee.

01:04:46Guest:Oh, yeah, that was big.

01:04:46Guest:But early on, was he... Oh, big.

01:04:49Guest:He had...

01:04:50Guest:hits while he was doing me.

01:04:55Guest:It wasn't his main thing, exactly.

01:04:58Marc:But early on, were you in a band?

01:05:01Marc:No.

01:05:02Marc:Never was in a band.

01:05:02Guest:No, I never was.

01:05:03Guest:I wish I were.

01:05:05Guest:I could have played well enough to play with an orchestra.

01:05:10Guest:I mean, I do it because I wrote it.

01:05:13Guest:But I almost wish I were in a band because I have trouble playing in time when I do have to play with... Even at that Rock and Roll Hall of Fame thing, we're doing I Love L.A.

01:05:25Guest:Yeah.

01:05:25Guest:And you know, when I do it by myself, which is the way I perform usually, you drop an eighth note here and there, you're in seven, eight, four, four, three, four.

01:05:34Guest:But with them, you know, they were looking at me, you know, come on, come on.

01:05:37Guest:And it was strange.

01:05:38Guest:I said, am I going to get thrown out of the Hall of Fame?

01:05:40Guest:Because I can't play with a goddamn band, my own song?

01:05:44Guest:But they once asked Jimmy Keltner, the drummer.

01:05:50Guest:He said, how do you follow her?

01:05:52Guest:And he said, I watch his hands.

01:05:56Guest:So it's not exactly, you know.

01:05:58Guest:I got my own time, but it's not standard.

01:06:02Guest:That's a good drummer.

01:06:04Guest:He's a great drummer, yeah.

01:06:05Marc:So I actually, I just remembered that I was going to tell you, I saw you when I was in high school.

01:06:11Marc:Oh, yeah?

01:06:12Marc:Yeah, you know, I got turned on to you.

01:06:14Marc:I got Good Old Boys because my buddy in seventh grade's hippie dad had it, and we used to listen to it.

01:06:20Marc:But then I went and saw you because I was a huge fan of Sail Away and Good Old Boys, and I must have been, it must have been like 77 or something, the Albuquerque Civic Auditorium on the Little Criminals tour.

01:06:31Marc:I've only played...

01:06:32Marc:there once and that and that was it yeah that was it and i remember because you know there was a strange protest of of little people and i a few of them but i remember i hung out i hung out because it was just you up there and you know in in and uh and you came out and said hi yeah yeah yeah good i saw you then and i was like so uh so thrilled that you were a

01:06:58Marc:No, no.

01:06:58Marc:I was so happy that you noticed me because I've been such a fucking fan.

01:07:02Guest:That's a recommendation for Lauren.

01:07:04Guest:Well, yeah, that's what I thought.

01:07:06Marc:Because I didn't know what I was and I said, well, I guess Randy knows.

01:07:11Marc:I'm a permissor.

01:07:12Guest:I can't remember that you were.

01:07:13Guest:I don't remember you being particularly.

01:07:15Guest:I was cranky.

01:07:16Guest:Cranky.

01:07:16Marc:That's all that means.

01:07:18Marc:i know yeah yeah well i was definitely that yeah so like like and also like you know like when i when i found your song on the on the soundtrack of the performance yeah with uh with right long was it long black i didn't like that long gone train gone dead train gone dead train i just sung it yeah you just sung it yeah that uh jack nichey and russ teitelman you played it yeah i played it yeah and rye was in there too right i was in there too we were the rolling stones too on uh not memo from turner did we do that

01:07:44Guest:Yeah, a memo for it.

01:07:46Guest:I can't remember.

01:07:47Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:07:48Guest:We were on one of them, yeah.

01:07:49Marc:Yeah, that memo from Turner, because that's all slide, and that must be you playing piano.

01:07:52Guest:Yeah, I think we got it back, yeah.

01:07:54Marc:When I found that record, I'm like, I know something about Randy Newman, and everybody knows this.

01:07:58Marc:He's on this record.

01:07:59Marc:That's true.

01:07:59Guest:And you played with the Stones?

01:08:01Guest:That's like a highly thought of movie now.

01:08:03Guest:No, not with the Stones.

01:08:04Guest:They weren't there.

01:08:05Guest:They just did a rough track of it, and I think we did that one again, too.

01:08:10Guest:Yeah, but had that groove again.

01:08:11Guest:I don't know if that played on it or not.

01:08:12Guest:Yeah.

01:08:13Guest:Yeah.

01:08:13Guest:Had that groove again.

01:08:14Guest:They had that.

01:08:15Guest:Yeah.

01:08:15Guest:That was theirs.

01:08:16Guest:Yeah.

01:08:17Guest:Are you still friends with Rye?

01:08:20Guest:Yes.

01:08:20Guest:I haven't seen him in a little bit, but still friends, definitely.

01:08:24Marc:Now, at that time in the 70s, when you were hanging out with those guys and the guys from The Birds and whoever else was around, Van Dyke, The Eagles.

01:08:31Marc:Oh, yeah.

01:08:32Marc:Henley and Fry.

01:08:33Marc:Very early on, they sang on one of the records, right?

01:08:36Marc:A few of them.

01:08:37Marc:Yeah.

01:08:38Marc:Was Beefheart in the orbit?

01:08:41Guest:No.

01:08:42Guest:He was out in the desert.

01:08:44Guest:Hardly anyone knew him.

01:08:45Guest:I don't know whether Cooter knew him well.

01:08:47Guest:He was just in that first incarnation of the band?

01:08:49Guest:Yeah.

01:08:50Guest:And he'd make his records, and there was no... They just came in from the desert?

01:08:56Guest:Yeah.

01:08:57Guest:As far as I knew.

01:08:58Guest:Now, that may be a misrepresentation of things.

01:09:01Guest:But there would be people who know him who would call, say, yeah, Don, I talked to Don.

01:09:06Guest:They never said, I talked to Don the other day.

01:09:08Guest:Right, right, right.

01:09:09Guest:But they call it, yeah, Don's got a new record.

01:09:12Guest:I said, Don.

01:09:14Guest:So he was not like, did you like what he was doing?

01:09:19Guest:Yeah.

01:09:20Guest:Not always, but sometimes.

01:09:23Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:09:23Guest:He's a trip, right?

01:09:24Guest:Yeah.

01:09:24Guest:But that wasn't... I was very glad he was doing it.

01:09:27Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:09:27Marc:But that wasn't your world.

01:09:28Guest:There were other worlds.

01:09:30Guest:Not really.

01:09:30Guest:I mean, there were other worlds, and this was just recording world.

01:09:35Guest:Yeah.

01:09:36Guest:Socially...

01:09:39Guest:I didn't see, who did I see often?

01:09:42Guest:Sal Valentino, who sung with the Bo Bremels.

01:09:45Guest:Yeah.

01:09:46Guest:I'd see him.

01:09:47Guest:Didn't they do some of your songs?

01:09:48Guest:Yeah, they did a couple, and he was a good guy.

01:09:52Marc:Yeah.

01:09:54Marc:All right, so moving into, like, obviously we can't cover everything, but the two songs, like, I want to believe that It's Money That Matters and It's Money That I Love represented some sort of existential battle and realization on your part.

01:10:09Guest:yeah they're about how important money is i mean someone said i don't like in that song how you criticized people who work for public radio and have backpacks i said i'm not criticizing him far from it yeah you know i'm all for it for stepping stepping out of the race yeah yeah uh it's just that since i write on a lot of subject money is really important in the world and i would that it were not yeah uh

01:10:38Guest:But, I mean, I try not to make it important to me when I write.

01:10:41Guest:It isn't.

01:10:42Guest:Right, right.

01:10:43Guest:But whether the rest of my life is clean, I don't know.

01:10:47Guest:I mean.

01:10:48Guest:You need it.

01:10:49Guest:I went and played for a company thing recently.

01:10:53Marc:Is that something you do often?

01:10:54Guest:And usually you just get in and get out.

01:10:56Guest:No.

01:10:56Guest:Yeah.

01:10:57Guest:But I did it.

01:10:57Guest:And I think of Neil Young, who hates any corporate thing at all.

01:11:01Guest:But there I was.

01:11:02Guest:That's what I'm playing.

01:11:03Guest:And they were just shitty.

01:11:05Guest:Yeah.

01:11:05Guest:So I just had to put my head down and think of money.

01:11:08Guest:Yeah.

01:11:09Guest:And every time I've done something just for money, I got screwed.

01:11:13Guest:Yeah.

01:11:13Guest:Like a festival in Baton Rouge with the rain and they didn't pay.

01:11:17Guest:Yeah.

01:11:18Guest:It just is like, oh, you get punished for that evil.

01:11:23Marc:For just doing it for me.

01:11:24Marc:You've mentioned Neil like three or four times.

01:11:26Marc:Do you love Neil?

01:11:27Marc:Yeah.

01:11:27Guest:He's something, right?

01:11:28Guest:He's something and he stayed good.

01:11:31Guest:Yeah.

01:11:31Guest:You know, which is not, you know, there's ups and downs like for everybody.

01:11:36Guest:Right.

01:11:36Guest:But it isn't like he did his best work at 27 necessarily.

01:11:41Marc:Well, what's interesting about you and him is the bulk of your work is not beholden to time.

01:11:48Right.

01:11:48Marc:that it's a it's a unique thing you know maybe some production elements you know come and go yeah just in the 80s right record yeah yeah but but you know but but you listen to Neil Young's song from 50 years 40 years ago and you don't go like that's so 60s you know that you know from you know from your first album on there's nothing that's tied into some you know kind of dated motifs that that are are pop music no yeah that's good that's good that's that's some timeless shit

01:12:17Guest:I didn't do a mambo record in the 50s.

01:12:23Guest:But yeah.

01:12:24Guest:I think you've incorporated some mambo elements towards the end of songs.

01:12:27Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:12:27Guest:I definitely do it.

01:12:28Marc:On the new record, I think.

01:12:29Guest:Yeah, there it is.

01:12:30Guest:The Syria Cruz thing.

01:12:31Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:12:31Marc:She was the queen of the mambo.

01:12:32Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:12:34Marc:So when did the soundtrack start?

01:12:35Marc:When did you realize that you were going to follow in the path of your family to your uncles to do soundtracks?

01:12:40Guest:I think in the early 70s, I did the first one.

01:12:43Guest:I did a movie called, what the hell was the name of that thing?

01:12:46Guest:Hold it.

01:12:47Guest:oh my god it's the one about the town quitting smoking i can't believe the dick van dyke movie yeah cold turkey cold turkey yeah did that that was norman lear yeah director the challenge of of well with cold turkey just it was songs no it was a score and there's there was one song in it uh it was the challenge was writing for orchestra right which really scared me yeah uh

01:13:14Guest:I had an orchestrator who was a great, famous orchestrator.

01:13:20Guest:He was Jerry Goldsmith's orchestrator, too, Arthur Morton.

01:13:23Guest:And I was loathe to suggest I'd write something and I'd sort of let him orchestrate it.

01:13:31Guest:Yeah.

01:13:32Guest:And he said, well, give me, you know, give me some ideas, you know, orchestration later.

01:13:36Guest:And toward the end of the picture, I did some stuff.

01:13:39Guest:And after it, I always I did it mostly.

01:13:41Guest:But I mean, I was.

01:13:44Guest:Because of my family or something and writing for orchestra, it just scared the shit out of me.

01:13:50Guest:Well, it's a big job.

01:13:52Guest:Right.

01:13:52Guest:A lot of people looking at you waiting.

01:13:54Guest:It's a lot of people looking and, but like my uncle did, what he said was true, that if it sounds okay on the piano, it'll be okay in the band.

01:14:03Marc:But like, it seems to me that like the natural and ragtime played to your strengths.

01:14:09Guest:Yes, they did.

01:14:12Guest:I don't know why... Well, they don't make movies like that anymore.

01:14:14Guest:I've had about eight animated ones in a row.

01:14:17Guest:Yeah.

01:14:18Guest:It got me a lot of recognition.

01:14:20Guest:Cars 3.

01:14:20Guest:It did in places that I would never have had.

01:14:23Guest:Right.

01:14:23Guest:You know, when I have assignments where you can't say, shit, piss, fart, fucking damn, I'll write, you know, you got a friend in me.

01:14:31Guest:I'd sound like a used car salesman if I wrote that as me.

01:14:37Guest:But I'd like...

01:14:39Guest:to bust myself out of that box i've got myself in and just write a straight when somebody let me from the second picture yeah and from cars those are like the straightest things i i write right i'm getting further and further away from any mainstream and stuff i'm doing right now yeah and

01:14:58Marc:Well, yeah, I mean, but that's, it's sort of like, I wonder if that's bittersweet to you that, you know, all the Grammys and the Oscars come for the cartoons.

01:15:05Marc:Yeah.

01:15:05Marc:Is it?

01:15:06Marc:No.

01:15:07Guest:I don't, I don't take that as.

01:15:09Guest:Well, I don't think it's not like, you know, you don't.

01:15:11Guest:Oh yeah.

01:15:11Guest:I would have liked to got a, uh, a nomination for like album of the year or something.

01:15:16Guest:Sure.

01:15:16Guest:One of those times.

01:15:17Guest:Yeah.

01:15:18Guest:But I know.

01:15:19Guest:I knew that's not coming.

01:15:23Guest:Awards are not... It's easy to say this, but I actually really do mean it.

01:15:30Guest:They're not a measure of anything that I accept as valid.

01:15:34Marc:They're a measure of PR.

01:15:35Guest:Yeah, they very often are.

01:15:38Marc:Yeah, but those songs, it's weird.

01:15:39Marc:The songs that you did for the animated films, they weren't a compromise.

01:15:44Marc:They sound like Randy Newman songs.

01:15:45Guest:No, they sound like me.

01:15:46Guest:They do, but the lyrics are...

01:15:49Guest:What they wanted was they wanted to emphasize the friendship, so I said it four times.

01:15:57Guest:And that was it.

01:15:58Guest:That's the job.

01:15:58Guest:Yeah.

01:15:59Guest:I'm glad.

01:16:00Guest:I think one of the things that I'm confident about that I do best is right to assignment.

01:16:06Guest:Yeah.

01:16:06Guest:I mean, if they want an Albanian waltz about a goatherd,

01:16:12Marc:i could do it yeah do a little research yeah pull it together and then just do it well i mean it's it i guess left to your own devices it it still seems to me difficult to to believe that like given all the albums that you did outside of uh uh soundtracks yeah that uh you know you're compelled to to write songs whether you're on assignment or not i'm not

01:16:36Guest:You keep saying that.

01:16:38Guest:I don't do it.

01:16:40Guest:You've got a record coming out.

01:16:41Guest:That's why we're here.

01:16:42Guest:Yeah, I do.

01:16:43Guest:Remember Singing in the Rain?

01:16:49Guest:Yeah.

01:16:49Guest:There was a montage about their careers.

01:16:53Guest:And when they started their careers, they were in low form of burlesque.

01:16:57Guest:And they're going all over the stage.

01:17:00Guest:Moving around.

01:17:01Guest:Yeah.

01:17:01Guest:The next one, they're doing a review somewhere, St.

01:17:05Guest:Louis, and they're a little slowed down.

01:17:07Guest:By the time they're in the Siegfried Follies, you know, at the end of this montage, they're barely moving around.

01:17:12Guest:You know, they're just a little gesture, you know.

01:17:16Guest:Newman sings greatest hits of whatever it is.

01:17:20Guest:But I mean...

01:17:21Guest:In the 70s, I put out three records, four records, I don't know.

01:17:25Guest:Then lately, they've all been like 10 years apart.

01:17:27Guest:And there's no reason for it.

01:17:32Guest:Well, I was doing movies somewhat, but still.

01:17:37Guest:Yeah, I do feel compelled.

01:17:38Guest:You know, the way I feel compelled is that...

01:17:42Guest:I don't want to be dying and say, oh, I wish I'd written this.

01:17:49Guest:It's stupid, but I do feel that.

01:17:54Marc:Well, I mean, you did the Faust project.

01:17:56Marc:Yeah.

01:17:57Marc:I mean, that wasn't an assignment.

01:17:59Guest:No, I enjoyed that.

01:18:01Guest:Yeah.

01:18:01Guest:There was so much different stuff going on, people dancing to stuff, and there was always something to work on.

01:18:08Guest:And it was constructed as, what would you call it?

01:18:11Guest:It was constructed as a Broadway vehicle.

01:18:15Guest:Yeah, like a musical.

01:18:17Guest:Yeah, it was a musical, straight ahead.

01:18:20Guest:But, and it had, you know...

01:18:23Guest:And the critics liked the score and didn't like the book.

01:18:33Guest:The musical book.

01:18:37Guest:Personally, I liked it.

01:18:38Guest:Yeah.

01:18:39Guest:It's a good story.

01:18:40Guest:In a way, it's a phenomenal story.

01:18:42Yeah.

01:18:42Guest:It's great.

01:18:45Guest:The devil.

01:18:46Guest:And I love all this.

01:18:47Guest:I love stuff about heaven.

01:18:49Guest:Yeah.

01:18:49Guest:And I've written a number of songs where I got heaven in it.

01:18:52Guest:And God.

01:18:53Guest:God talking.

01:18:53Guest:He's one of your favorite characters.

01:18:55Guest:Yeah, he really is.

01:18:56Guest:And the devil, you know, the devil's, you know, it's like God's desk is completely clear.

01:19:01Guest:And the devil's like tons of stuff.

01:19:05Guest:And he doesn't understand how this guy can beat him.

01:19:08Yeah.

01:19:08Guest:that's what i did and uh they couldn't comprehend what i was getting at no so it didn't it didn't you ran it a couple of times didn't get past uh indiana oh really uh chicago and but did yeah we did it in san diego and in uh chicago yeah i remember listening to the album of it goodman theater yeah and uh but is that something you still want to do a musical

01:19:32Marc:No.

01:19:34Marc:It's done.

01:19:34Guest:It was an unwelcoming atmosphere.

01:19:36Guest:Really?

01:19:36Guest:Yeah.

01:19:37Guest:It's a tough idea.

01:19:37Guest:It wasn't like, come on, you know.

01:19:39Marc:Right.

01:19:39Marc:Well, it seems like not like everything else.

01:19:42Marc:It's got to be spectacular.

01:19:43Marc:Everything's a superhero speed.

01:19:45Guest:I don't know what it's got to be, but they've got this.

01:19:47Guest:Maybe things have changed with something that's genuinely funny, Book of Mormon, and worked.

01:19:53Guest:But the form of it, you have to have a big opening number, and there are certain forms that you have to follow.

01:20:02Guest:Right.

01:20:03Guest:I don't know whether Book of Mormon had that or not.

01:20:06Guest:Did you see it?

01:20:06Guest:Yeah, it's funny.

01:20:07Guest:I got to see it.

01:20:08Guest:Yeah, you should.

01:20:09Guest:I mean, it's really what musical comedy should be.

01:20:13Guest:Oh, great.

01:20:15Marc:Yeah.

01:20:15Marc:Did anyone ever do like a big, like a musical based on the songs of Randy Newman?

01:20:19Guest:Yeah.

01:20:20Guest:How'd that go over?

01:20:20Guest:Three times.

01:20:21Guest:Yeah?

01:20:22Guest:I don't know.

01:20:23Guest:You know, I had problems with it, but it was noble efforts in each case.

01:20:31Yeah.

01:20:31Marc:Now, one of the persons I recently got into in sort of a compulsive way a couple years ago was Harry Nelson.

01:20:38Marc:Yeah.

01:20:38Marc:And he did that amazing record.

01:20:40Marc:He did.

01:20:41Marc:Of your songs.

01:20:41Guest:It's quite a thing, you know, to do a, for someone who wrote as well as he did, to do an album of,

01:20:47Guest:nilson plays newman yeah and did you were you guys friends yeah yeah he was kind of a amazing guy right he was he's one of those guys that had his problems but he had a low opinion of himself yeah you know uh we all did to some extent but he really did hell of a voice though huh hell of a voice oh my god and he uh

01:21:11Guest:He really could sing.

01:21:13Guest:All of a sudden, we were close.

01:21:17Guest:Yeah.

01:21:18Guest:And then all of a sudden, I never saw him again.

01:21:20Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:21:21Guest:I don't know what it was.

01:21:22Guest:Booze.

01:21:23Guest:Yeah, I could do it.

01:21:25Guest:You know, your brain twists up.

01:21:28Guest:I was thinking about that.

01:21:30Guest:You know, there's a reason why alcohol came down through the years rather than something else.

01:21:35Guest:I think it's like a powerful, powerful thing.

01:21:38Yeah.

01:21:39Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:21:41Guest:It's a bigger deal than maybe the other stuff is.

01:21:44Marc:Well, yeah, it's a real Jekyll and Hyde shit, man.

01:21:47Marc:It's a real kind of personality changer.

01:21:50Marc:I don't know why, but it's the most accessible thing.

01:21:54Marc:You would think weed now, but there's something about alcohol.

01:21:59Guest:When Coke was in big, I knew.

01:22:02Guest:People don't want to be sped up.

01:22:04Guest:They want...

01:22:06Guest:You knew either heroin or alcohol was coming, both probably.

01:22:09Marc:Right, right.

01:22:10Marc:Well, those are the ones, yeah.

01:22:11Marc:Yeah.

01:22:11Marc:Yeah, it's fucking, well, you're lucky you have dodged that, and that was not something that compelled you.

01:22:16Guest:I didn't like cocaine that much.

01:22:17Marc:No?

01:22:18Marc:No.

01:22:18Marc:Yeah, because eventually it's just you alone wondering if you're going to die.

01:22:21Marc:Yeah.

01:22:22Guest:It's always going to end up there.

01:22:25Guest:And wondering why is it you're seeing someone from 14 years ago?

01:22:29Guest:Hi, mind if I come over?

01:22:31Marc:Right, exactly.

01:22:33Marc:Or hanging out with a guy you don't know for three days.

01:22:35Marc:That's right.

01:22:37Marc:Who's that guy?

01:22:37Marc:How do I get him out of my house?

01:22:38Marc:In Long Beach.

01:22:43Marc:Yeah.

01:22:43Marc:So there's a song on this new record, too, that seems to be about a son, is it?

01:22:48Marc:Which one?

01:22:49Marc:Wandering Boy?

01:22:50Guest:not directly yeah it's a sweet sad song it's a very sad song yeah it's about well i used to go to you know la you grew up here or no albuquerque la doesn't have any sense community in some ways yeah and i knew a lot of people say from cleveland yeah and they've had parades yeah parties and they wanted to be out of cleveland yeah but they did have that yeah and uh

01:23:18Guest:I'd go to this one place, one guy's house in the neighborhood every year, and then I'd miss three years, four years.

01:23:24Guest:And you'd see a kid that I, and then 20 years later, I'd say, oh yeah, and I'd say, what happened to so-and-so?

01:23:32Guest:And there's, sometimes there's holes.

01:23:35Guest:The kid was, as you were saying earlier, fell out.

01:23:41Guest:And I thought about that and how it would be if your kid had

01:23:48Guest:you know we're the homeless people you see yeah right on ocean avenue and uh downtown yeah so that's it that's what the song is yeah yeah it's like it's it's one of those gut punchers it does work that way yeah in in person uh

01:24:05Marc:yeah i mean a lot of your songs are sort of like that because they leave that space to have the emotion best of them yeah yeah and the other song that like i i was obsessed with i don't know where it came from is uh you know last night i had a dream you were in it and i was in it yeah yeah it just it's funny yeah

01:24:23Marc:like that song there's just something about honey can you tell me what your name is it's very 70s but it's insulting and weird yeah that you know you know because what my mind goes is like whatever was going on in the barn was not good and there were a lot of men involved that's right and she didn't know you yeah

01:24:42Guest:Why do you think that was 70s?

01:24:45Guest:Because of this vaguely psychedelic nature of events.

01:24:50Guest:Yeah, and also that sound.

01:24:51Guest:In The Attempt, that was the second record.

01:24:56Guest:I made a single of that song with four electric guitars.

01:25:02Guest:Yeah.

01:25:03Guest:Thinking, that'll do it.

01:25:05Guest:Yeah.

01:25:05Guest:And it's really one of the worst records ever made.

01:25:08Marc:Okay, I keep backtracking.

01:25:09Marc:But with Sail Away, do you see Good Old Boys and Sail Away as concept records in a way?

01:25:15Marc:Like, are they whole pieces?

01:25:16Guest:Good Old Boys was almost a whole piece and was a whole southern piece.

01:25:21Guest:Yeah.

01:25:21Guest:Part of it was by Huey Long a bit.

01:25:23Guest:the kingfish song yeah and louisiana oh yeah yeah flood was in 27 uh and about the guy birmingham and then i thought i had to write another song to explain the guy after i wrote rednecks birmingham yeah so i wrote marie and roland yeah uh so it was it was a bit of a concept album sail away no i i don't see it as such i always felt like sail away was some sort of weird kind of uh uh like you know this is america record

01:25:53Guest:Well, I'm interested in America very much.

01:25:55Guest:Yeah.

01:25:56Guest:And written about it, trying to think of what was on there.

01:26:01Guest:God's Song is on there, isn't it?

01:26:03Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:26:04Marc:It's a good song.

01:26:06Marc:Yeah, that's a good song.

01:26:07Marc:It was, yeah, God's Song, You Can Leave Your Hat On.

01:26:10Marc:Yeah.

01:26:10Marc:Memo to my son.

01:26:11Marc:Yeah.

01:26:12Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:26:14Marc:I like that.

01:26:15Guest:Burn on.

01:26:15Guest:Memo.

01:26:16Guest:Yeah.

01:26:17Guest:Yeah, burn on about cleaving the river.

01:26:19Guest:Yeah, yeah.

01:26:20Yeah.

01:26:20Marc:Now, were these things that you would sit and think about, or are these things that you drove past?

01:26:27Guest:The river I saw in Cleveland on fire.

01:26:31Guest:Yeah.

01:26:32Guest:Oh, you did?

01:26:32Guest:Well, on television I saw.

01:26:33Guest:Yeah, sure, sure, sure.

01:26:34Guest:Right, right, right, right.

01:26:35Guest:Just like our president, a lot of television.

01:26:36Guest:Yeah.

01:26:37Guest:The...

01:26:39Guest:The Flood, I read.

01:26:41Guest:Yeah, of course.

01:26:42Guest:It was in my family, you know, where they do stuff like that.

01:26:46Guest:And I read a biography of Huey Long.

01:26:49Guest:Yeah.

01:26:49Guest:That was good.

01:26:50Guest:Better than All the King's Men, I thought.

01:26:51Marc:Yeah, yeah.

01:26:53Marc:And you can leave your hat on.

01:26:54Marc:That one got some traction too, right?

01:26:56Guest:Yeah, it did.

01:26:58Guest:But it got traction when someone did it like a sixth higher.

01:27:01Guest:And they, baby, take off.

01:27:03Guest:You know, they did it way up like that.

01:27:05Guest:Right, right.

01:27:05Marc:I didn't think of that.

01:27:06Marc:Yeah, yours was a little darker, a little more menacing.

01:27:09Marc:And then all of a sudden, it becomes this sort of soul song.

01:27:11Guest:Exactly.

01:27:13Guest:I mean, I liked it the way I did with Cooter.

01:27:15Guest:You could barely hear me singing.

01:27:17Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:27:19Guest:But the success it had was when Tom Jones and Joe Cocker took it out.

01:27:23Marc:Yeah.

01:27:24Marc:Joe Cocker.

01:27:25Marc:That guy could sing, too.

01:27:26Guest:He really could sing.

01:27:26Marc:It's interesting, the tone.

01:27:27Marc:I wonder how you experience that.

01:27:29Marc:Because even with like, I talked to Springsteen, which was kind of amazing.

01:27:33Guest:Yeah, I'll bet.

01:27:34Yeah.

01:27:34Marc:But if you hear the original version of Born in the USA versus... That's right.

01:27:40Marc:When you have a song that goes out there, obviously you want people to play the songs, but when they do something that is contrary to the tone, and that was something he did on his own, I don't know what the reasons why I didn't get into specifics with him, but the folk version of Born in the USA is a dark song.

01:27:58Marc:It is, yeah.

01:27:59Marc:Yeah.

01:28:00Marc:But, like, when someone else does what you just said they did to your song, is there a moment where you're like, oh, what are they doing to my kid?

01:28:06Guest:Well, I'll tell you, it's not... I didn't mean it as celebration.

01:28:11Guest:Right.

01:28:12Guest:But, you know, so what?

01:28:16Guest:Who are you to moralize or begrudge people?

01:28:18Guest:No, I'm not... You know, to tap them on the shoulder and know that's wrong.

01:28:21Guest:Yeah, yeah, yeah.

01:28:22Guest:It's a much more dark song.

01:28:24Guest:I mean, that's why I stopped...

01:28:26Guest:When people would say, gee, this is a great song.

01:28:28Guest:And I would say, I don't like that one much.

01:28:31Guest:Because it makes you think that you think they're stupid.

01:28:34Guest:Oh, yeah.

01:28:36Marc:I learned that the hard way.

01:28:38Guest:Just keep your thoughts to yourself.

01:28:39Marc:That's when you learn the hard way.

01:28:41Guest:Right, yeah.

01:28:41Marc:Like, oh, that song?

01:28:43Marc:Why are you doing that song?

01:28:44Marc:You say that to Three Dog Night, you would have been a few bucks lighter.

01:28:47Guest:I tried to say it, and I was stopped.

01:28:50Guest:Oh, really?

01:28:51Guest:Well, when I heard the record, I said, you know, they'd had eight.

01:28:54Guest:number one records in a row or something like that.

01:28:56Guest:And I didn't want to be responsible for them not doing it.

01:28:59Guest:And I was going to call them and say, well, maybe it doesn't, don't release it as a single.

01:29:05Marc:Mama told me when not to come.

01:29:07Guest:But I was going to call them, but Lenny stopped me or someone did.

01:29:10Marc:Yeah.

01:29:11Marc:Just let him do it.

01:29:11Guest:And let it, let it.

01:29:12Guest:And it was a big hit, right?

01:29:13Guest:It was.

01:29:15Guest:It was a number one, I think.

01:29:16Guest:Number one or number two.

01:29:18Marc:So what are you doing?

01:29:19Marc:What are you doing with yourself now?

01:29:20Marc:Are you going to go on the road?

01:29:21Marc:Yeah.

01:29:21Guest:Yeah.

01:29:23Guest:Do you like it?

01:29:24Guest:Yeah, once I get into it.

01:29:27Guest:People come out, they're happy to see you.

01:29:29Guest:Yeah, they're happy to see me.

01:29:30Guest:I think they come out better now than they ever have, I think.

01:29:36Marc:Oh, really?

01:29:37Marc:What's the audience mostly?

01:29:40Guest:Pseudo-intellectuals.

01:29:41Guest:Yeah.

01:29:42Guest:The audience is... What's the age?

01:29:46Guest:Over 40, but with more...

01:29:49Marc:uh 20 year olds than i've i've seen oh yeah in 30 years yeah well that's see that's the beautiful thing about music man is that like anybody can come to it at any point in their life and it's you know that you're never late to the party that's right you know what i mean that is and and uh

01:30:06Guest:I'm always surprised when it's like a festival.

01:30:11Guest:I've been the last act in some festivals.

01:30:14Guest:Yeah.

01:30:15Guest:And there are people packed out, and you drive by them, and they're just packing up to go.

01:30:20Guest:It was before I got on.

01:30:21Guest:Yeah.

01:30:22Guest:But, I mean, it's just amazing that people want to do that.

01:30:26Guest:Sure, man.

01:30:27Marc:Because I don't think I'd do it.

01:30:28Marc:Oh, yeah.

01:30:28Marc:I don't.

01:30:29Marc:I say that when I perform comedy sometimes.

01:30:31Marc:It's like, I don't know how to have a good time.

01:30:33Marc:I'm not sure I would have come to this show.

01:30:34Guest:Yeah.

01:30:34Marc:I'm sure I wouldn't have.

01:30:39Guest:But thank God they do.

01:30:41Guest:Thank God they do.

01:30:43Guest:And they're right.

01:30:44Guest:It's better than just reading or sitting home watching television, maybe.

01:30:49Guest:Why don't you do another live record?

01:30:52Guest:I don't know.

01:30:53Guest:There's no point to it for me.

01:30:54Guest:I don't think it's not what I do.

01:30:56Guest:Where was that one in 1970 or whatever recorded?

01:30:59Guest:Bitter End.

01:30:59Guest:Yeah.

01:31:00Guest:So I did Lonely at the Top in front of about four people on the third show.

01:31:06Guest:You know where they do, it was Friday and Saturday at three shows.

01:31:09Marc:Sure, sure.

01:31:10Marc:Both nights?

01:31:11Marc:Yeah, both nights.

01:31:12Marc:Oh, my God.

01:31:13Marc:So you're recording your live album and it's four people on the third show on Saturday?

01:31:17Guest:It was about that.

01:31:18Guest:Lonely at the Top.

01:31:19Guest:Yeah.

01:31:20Guest:But those are beautiful moments, aren't they?

01:31:21Guest:Yes.

01:31:22Guest:Those are the awful moments sometimes are the things that you remember most.

01:31:27Guest:And they're not so awful.

01:31:29Guest:Right.

01:31:30Guest:They are beautiful moments.

01:31:31Guest:Sure.

01:31:32Marc:I wonder what the story of the four people told.

01:31:34Marc:We saw him once.

01:31:35Marc:It was just me and two other guys.

01:31:38Marc:It was the best show we ever saw.

01:31:39Guest:Yeah.

01:31:40Guest:I can hear myself on, unless I had a dream.

01:31:44Guest:I'm applauding.

01:31:46Guest:That's me.

01:31:47Guest:Yeah.

01:31:47Yeah.

01:31:47Marc:All right, man.

01:31:48Marc:Well, I hope this was a good experience.

01:31:50Marc:Very.

01:31:50Marc:I really enjoyed it.

01:31:51Marc:Thanks, Randy.

01:31:57Marc:Amazing.

01:31:58Marc:An amazing day for me that I think back on.

01:32:00Marc:There's a few that I think back on.

01:32:02Marc:And I'm just so glad I had that conversation.

01:32:04Marc:I had that opportunity to do that and that we got along.

01:32:08Marc:Randy Newman's new record, Dark Matter, will be released on August 4th.

01:32:13Marc:Soon.

01:32:14Marc:Coming up.

01:32:15Marc:So that's it.

01:32:16Marc:I don't know.

01:32:16Marc:What do I do next?

01:32:19Marc:When do I get to talk to Albert Brooks?

01:32:21Marc:Hey, by the way...

01:32:24Marc:Vice President Al Gore is supposed to come by on the show soon.

01:32:31Marc:So hopefully that'll be before the sky catches on fire.

01:32:36Marc:Anywho, don't say that.

01:32:38Marc:Anyhow, I haven't played guitar in a while because I think there was something about playing with musicians and doing the work on songs that mildly diminished my confidence in myself.

01:32:50Marc:But I cleaned everything up in the garage, and I've gone through a lot of pedals and boxed a lot of stuff up, and maybe I'll just noodle for a second.

01:32:59Marc:Like the old days.

01:33:00Marc:Like a few weeks ago.

01:33:01Marc:.

01:33:30Guest:Boomer lives!