In The Studio with Redbeard

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  • Grand Funk Railroad- Best pt 2- Don Brewer, Mark Farner

    Grand Funk Railroad- Best pt 2- Don Brewer, Mark Farner

    When we left off in part one with my guests Grand Funk Railroad’s drummer/vocalist/songwriter Don Brewer and former singer/ guitarist/ songwriter Mark Farner, the band had exploded with the release of their third studio album in eighteen months, Closer to Home. Amidst all of the hard-earned record and concert ticket sales for the trio, behind the scenes several coincident tectonic plates were adrift in opposite directions,  putting tremendous pressure on the band members. Composing that much original material in that brief period of time, while simultaneously touring almost non-stop, was about to draw down composer Mark Farner’s creative well like a bucket with a hole in it. Like it or not, the story of the original Grand Funk Railroad is entwined inextricably with deejay-wannabe singer-band manager-record producer Terry Knight, who had a vise grip on every aspect of Grand Funk’s career while earning a notorious reputation along the way.

    Severing the relationship with Knight was an ugly divorce but, when the band realized that Knight had been taking 90% of the music royalties while leaving the three musicians to divvy up the last ten, they made their move. Enter young music wizard Todd Rundgren who, while only in his early twenties had already engineered and produced The Band Stage Fright and Badfinger’s Straight Up while establishing  a successful solo career with the brilliant Something/ Anything?. Rundgren brought some polish to Grand Funk’s freight train in the studio, which also encouraged my guest, singing drummer Don Brewer, to step up his game with songwriting and step up to the main vocal microphone with the #1 hit title song We’re an American Band in 1973 as well as on the follow up, Shinin’ On. -Redbeard

  • Steve Perry- Street Talk Solo Best

    Steve Perry- Street Talk Solo Best

    Predictably, the induction of Journey into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame   rekindled several obvious questions with loyal fans once again  for former lead singer/songwriter Steve Perry: Why did the much-beloved and enormously successful Eighties line-up of the Bay Area band, fronted by Perry, disband? After having a major debut solo album  Street Talk  in 1984, why did Steve Perry wait a full ten years before releasing another one? With all of the other Journey alumni very visibly active in recording and touring projects after the late ’80s Journey break up, why did Steve Perry disappear? And most importantly, who is the mysterious late-night radio deejay “The Love Monkey”, and what connection could he have to the answers to all of these issues? Journey’s enormous popularity from 1978 to 1988 required a Super Bowl mentality and a professional pace be maintained in order to meet the insatiable appetite then of fans, record company, and concert promoters alike, leaving precious little time for the individual Journey members to address real-world responsibilities (that notorious pace had already cost them one key member, co-founder Gregg Rolie). As you will hear in this July 1994 interview rewind, the end of the protracted Raised on Radio tour in the conspicuously un-California setting of Anchorage Alaska seemed symbolic on many levels to Steve Perry. –Redbeard

  • Elton John-The Bitch is Back- Foxboro MA Stadium 9-6-93

    Elton John-The Bitch is Back- Foxboro MA Stadium 9-6-93

    Elton John and his fabulous band led off a Labor Day 1993 benefit for Walden Woods in Foxboro MA stadium with truly one of the hottest hour-long sets I have ever heard. Elton opened with “The Bitch is Back” and barely stopped, absolutely delighting the 75,000 in attendance while simultaneously putting the list of heavyweight performers to follow on notice that he had just figuratively burned the stage down!  Sir Elton John is surprisingly vital, exceedingly creative, and energetic as he is now poised with breaking seventy, clearly with a lot left in the tank, and us mere mortals know full well that only God Almighty will ever be able to pull him over eventually and write that ticket. –Redbeard

  • Chuck Berry 1926- 2017

    Chuck Berry 1926- 2017

    For quite some time now this photo of Bo Diddley ( l ) and Chuck Berry on stage at New York City’s Madison Square Garden around 1973 has adorned the top main masthead of my personal Facebook page. It was chosen because it visually proclaims the joyful abandon, physicality, sensuality, and visceral power of rock’n’roll. The photo also proclaims that decoding the rock genome irrefutably  establishes rock’s origins in the US’s own “Fertile Crescent” of the Mississippi Delta, and undeniably finds its authorship American and black.

    Chuck Berry died at the age of ninety. We extend our sincere condolences to his family ( mistakenly I originally wrote that  includes Oscar winner Halle Berry, but the Oscar-winning actress now claims to be related instead to Sarah Palin, so you could see how I could get Chuck & Palin confused ) ; to untold tens of thousands of musicians like the Beatles and Rolling Stones who were inspired by Berry’s seminal songs and guitar playing; and to Keith Richards who adored Mr. Berry ( until Richards produced a documentary film Hail, Hail Rock & Roll saluting Chuck Berry and Keef almost ended up strangling Berry for being so difficult ).

    I guess that Jerry Lee Lewis has finally won the bet as to who goes on last. – Redbeard 

  • Jonny Lang- Forty Days- Dallas 3-17-97

    Jonny Lang- Forty Days- Dallas 3-17-97

    Though barely old enough legally to drive a car, Jonny Lang had such obvious talent (and an old soul) that A&M Records signed the teenager. Here in 1997 Jonny, apparently mistaking me for a leprechaun, offered a song for a pot of gold and performed live on my Dallas radio show singing Muddy Waters’ “Forty Days”. –Redbeard

  • YES- Best pt 1- Jon Anderson,Tony Kaye,Bill Bruford,Steve Howe,the late Chris Squire

    YES- Best pt 1- Jon Anderson,Tony Kaye,Bill Bruford,Steve Howe,the late Chris Squire

    The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame  finally employed some “affirmative action”  with the induction of progressive rock icons YES, a band whose family tree has enormous branches. For part one of the best, In the Studio  miraculously assembled everyone pictured below to share the saga, first focusing on the music and years  of The YES Album,  Fragile,  and the #1 seller Close to the Edge  from the detailed recollections of band co-founders Jon Anderson and the late Chris Squire, plus original and prodigal keyboard player Tony Kaye, original drummer Bill Bruford, guitarist Steve Howe, and rock keyboard pioneer Rick Wakeman all here in this classic rock interview. –Redbeard

     

  • Def Leppard- And There Will Be…Live- Joe Elliott

    Def Leppard- And There Will Be…Live- Joe Elliott

    When barely three songs into a blistering set by Def Leppard live in Detroit on 2016’s 70-city North American tour, I had to ask lead singer/ songwriter Joe Elliott how they could possibly perform the definitive version of “Let It Go”, the second Def Leppard single released in the US over thirty-five years ago, with such fire and conviction all these years later. “Well, it’s a band !” Joe replied emphatically. “None of us think that we’re the star. When you have five alpha males in a band, you have to realize who the boss is. And we quickly established that the ‘boss’ is the song, and we adapt ourselves to suit ( the song ).” The impressive concert performance on Def Leppard’sAnd There Will Be a Next Time- Live From Detroit DVD or Blu Ray with double CD is up to the platinum-plus pedigree of the career best of the Sheffield, England quintet, including”Pour Some Sugar on Me”,”Rock of Ages”,”Photograph”,”Bringin’ On the Heartbreak”,”Animal”,”Foolin’ “, and “Love Bites” along with strong new songs “Dangerous”, custom concert opener”Let’s Go”, and borderline gender bender”Man Enough”. Def Leppard continues their uncanny knack here for covering just the right classic chestnut at precisely the right moment in their concert setlist with a stunning version of David Essex’s 1973 hit “Rock On”, proving that the song’s ability to transform any radio station which played it back then into another space, loses nothing in translation to the concert stage, or to the next century for that matter.

    Def Leppard lead singer Joe Elliott joins me In the Studio for a lively conversation covering a wide range of topics, including high-tech isolation and the almost tribal need for people of all ages to physically come together around one unifying purpose. –Redbeard

  • Simple Minds- Celebrate the Greatest Hits pt2- Jim Kerr

    Simple Minds- Celebrate the Greatest Hits pt2- Jim Kerr

    After forming in the Post-Punk late Seventies, then rising to heady international success in the MTV Eighties, by 1995 there was a real question whether Scottish band Simple Minds could remain relevant in a third decade. Led by guitarist Charlie Burchill and singer Jim Kerr, the conclusion of my 2013 interview he reveals just how close Simple Minds came to packing it in at a time when American Grunge grew so dominant, without a keyboard in sight. Also, Jim Kerr shares their  song “Broken Glass Park”  included on their excellent 2014 album Big Music , highly recommended. Part two of two –Redbeard

  • Greg Lake Dies, 69- From the Beginning

    Greg Lake Dies, 69- From the Beginning

    King Crimson original singer/ bass player and ELP co-founder Greg Lake passed away December 2016 after battling cancer. He was 69.

    Greg Lake brought his choirboy voice In the Studio of my Q102 Dallas/ Ft Worth radio show one afternoon in 1992, sat a curvy blonde on his knee ( a guitar ), and sang several songs including the gorgeous “From the Beginning”, which appeared on Emerson, Lake, and Palmer’s 1972 progressive rock album Trilogy. Greg also joined the late Keith Emerson and Carl Palmer in the links below. –Redbeard

  • John Lennon’s Assassin Had a Hit List & David Bowie Was Next

    John Lennon’s Assassin Had a Hit List & David Bowie Was Next

    Honestly, no matter how thoroughly I prepare for an interview with a musician, I never can be totally certain of what might be revealed. I’ve been rattled more than once by a revelation from a musician for which there had been no previous report, but none more stunning than the one the late David Bowie gave me in 1999 when the recording  was turned off. According to Bowie, New York City police discovered that his name was next on a hit list of targets of John Lennon’s assassin, Mark David Chapman. David Bowie-DLL-131210

     

    At the time of Lennon’s December 8, 1980 murder outside of his Manhattan apartment, just blocks away David Bowie was starring  on Broadway in the play The Elephant Man. “I was second on his list, the detectives said”, Bowie told me in the New York studio we shared near Madison Square Garden.”Chapman had a front-row ticket to ‘ The Elephant Man‘ the next night. John and Yoko were supposed to sit front-row for that show, too. So the night after John was killed there were three empty seats in the front row. I can’t tell you how difficult that was to go on. I almost didn’t make it through the performance.”

    The irony is that David Bowie’s first #1 hit “Fame”, from the Young Americans album, was co-written with Lennon who also played guitar on the track. And it was indeed their fame as rock stars which drew Mark David Chapman to stalk them, and subsequently  to murder Lennon. –Redbeard