Joe Cocker- Mad Dogs and Englishmen- with Leon Russell

Stop and think for a moment: have you ever seen or heard legendary British singer Joe Cocker interviewed? Despite a career that  spanned over four decades, we hadn’t seen or heard Joe Cocker speak beyond possibly a five-second blurb on some over-amped entertainment magazine tv show (when did murderers, their victims, and politicians who borrowed their playbook from WWE wrestling become “entertainment”? But  I digress). There’s usually a good reason for the absence of a major star from the talk circuit, as David Letterman found out awhile back  with actor Joaquin Phoenix. So when it took 36 years after Cocker’s iconic coming-out party at the Woodstock Festival for me to get access, understandably I was anxious as to what I would get.

As you’ll hear in my rare classic rock interview, Joe Cocker was a softspoken gentle soul who was an easy conversationalist, sometimes endearing, often hysterically funny. And the addition of  Mad Dogs & Englishmen musical director the late Leon Russell as a guest here answered a lot of questions about both of their subsequent careers after this tour, double live album, and feature film. Joe Cocker lost his battle with lung cancer, age 70. He was a lovely, humble person as well as a legendary singing talent. But Joe Cocker died without being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Kudos to the many who  lobbied tirelessly to get that omission corrected in 2025. -Redbeard