RedRam
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RAMSinLA
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RocknRam29
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/ente...647f2c-fc1e-11e5-80e4-c381214de1a3_story.html
Merle Haggard, revered country singer of common man anthems, dies at 79
By Terence McArdle
Merle Haggard, the Grammy Award-winning singer whose autobiographical prison songs and populist political anthems, notably “Mama Tried” and “Okie From Muskogee,” made him one of country music’s most formidable and celebrated entertainers, died April 6 at his home in Palo Cedro, Calif. He died on his 79th birthday.
The cause was complications from pneumonia, said his manager, Frank Mull.
Mr. Haggard was widely regarded as one of the most moving singers in the country genre. John Rumble, senior historian for the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum, called him “country music’s greatest songwriter, with the arguable exception of Hank Williams. When you think about the vast array of subject matter, it’s astonishing: the realism, the very careful and artful way that he puts songs together, the turns of phrase — it is deceptively simple.”
Along with singers Buck Owens and Wynn Stewart, Mr. Haggard typified country music’s “Bakersfield sound” of the 1960s. The California city, home to many who fled the dust bowls of the 1930s and worked in its oil fields, was a thriving center of country music. Whereas Nashville producers pressured their singers to adopt a “countrypolitan” style with choirs and string sections, Bakersfield built its reputation on a grittier sound and twangy guitars.
Mr. Haggard was best known for his 1969 song “Okie From Muskogee,” which protested the counterculture of the time with such lines as “We don’t smoke marijuana in Muskogee/We don’t take our trips on LSD” and “We don’t burn our draft cards down at the courthouse.”
The song won him an audience at the Nixon White House in 1973. Mr. Haggard later said that he did not intend the song as a political anthem; in fact, he acknowledged his own drug use by stating that he often smoked marijuana before going out on stage.
Between 1966 and 1987, Mr. Haggard had 38 No. 1 country hits, including several drawn from his experiences in the California penal system. Mr. Haggard once described his career in music as a “35-year bus ride,” and a theme of restlessness runs through such compositions such as “The Running Kind” and “Ramblin’ Fever.”
Other songs, such as “Hungry Eyes” and “If We Make It Through December,” were filled with empathy for the working poor — a reflection of his family background. “Today I Started Loving You Again,” a plaintive love song about obsession co-written with Bonnie Owens, became one of the country genre’s most covered songs.
Merle Ronald Haggard was born in Bakersfield, Calif., on April 6, 1937, in a makeshift home that his father built from an abandoned boxcar. Mr. Haggard’s parents left a barren farm in Oklahoma as part of the exodus from the Dust Bowl.
His father, a western swing fiddler and carpenter, died when Merle was 9. While his mother struggled to support the family, Mr. Haggard spent his childhood in a reckless pattern of petty crimes, truancy and narrow escapes from the police, once running away to Texas by hopping freights and stealing cars. By 14, he had escaped from three juvenile facilities.
For Mr. Haggard, the one bright spot in this youth was music. After hearing country singer Lefty Frizzellat a local dance hall, Mr. Haggard took up singing and guitar. He prided himself on his ability to mimic Frizzell’s singing style and, by his teens, secured music jobs in local honky tonks.
Prison curtailed these activities. In 1957, he was sentenced to five years in California’s San Quentin State Prison for car theft and burglary.
The burglary charge resulted from an inebriated attempt to pry open the back door of a restaurant in broad daylight. After his apprehension, Mr. Haggard simply walked out of the Bakersfield City Jail.
Having embarrassed the local police with his escape, he was captured at his brother’s house in Lamont, Calif., 25 miles away. Mr. Haggard recalled in his 1999 memoir, “Merle Haggard’s My House of Memories,” written with Tom Carter, that he had been spotted earlier that day in Bakersfield wearing a propeller beanie as a disguise.
While in San Quentin, Mr. Haggard sold home brew to other inmates, an activity that landed him in solitary confinement. Through the walls of solitary, he befriended death row inmates Caryl Chessman and Jimmy “Rabbit” Hendricks. Mr. Haggard said their executions inspired him to change his criminal behavior.
He recalled in his autobiography: “San Quentin was beneficial to me as the army is for some people. I was 20 and full of piss and vinegar with no intention of doing anything right.”
Mr. Haggard was paroled in 1960 and was pardoned by then-California Gov. Ronald Reagan in 1973. On his release from prison, Mr. Haggard performed in Bakersfield and Las Vegas clubs, eventually joining established singers Wynn Stewart and Buck Owens as a bassist and opening singer.
In 1964, Stewart offered Mr. Haggard one of his compositions, “Sing a Sad Song,” for his first recording on a small Bakersfield label, Tally Records. Capitol Records bought Mr. Haggard’s contract when the record made the Top 20 country charts.
After his second release, “All My Friends Are Gonna Be Strangers” (1965), Mr. Haggard put together a touring band, the Strangers, with steel guitarist Norm Hamlet, lead guitarist Roy Nichols and vocalist Bonnie Owens.
Owens, previously married to Buck Owens, became Mr. Haggard’s second wife in 1965. The two divorced in 1978. Bonnie Owens served as a bridesmaid later that year when Mr. Haggard married another backup singer in his band, Leona Williams. Owens and Mr. Haggard continued to perform together after their divorce.
His first marriage, to Leona Hobbs, ended in divorce, as did a later marriage to Debbie Parret. His fifth wife was Theresa Lane. Besides his wife, survivors include four children from his first marriage and two from his fifth marriage; a sister; and many grandchildren.
Mr. Haggard’s first No. 1 hit, “I'm a Lonesome Fugitive” (1967), written by Liz and Casey Anderson, was the first of many songs to allude to a criminal past. Mr. Haggard followed it with similarly themed songs from his own pen.
Perhaps the most memorable of these songs was “Mama Tried,” with its line, “I turned 21 in prison doing life without parole.” The song was later covered by the Grateful Dead and folk singer Joan Baez.
With the success of “Okie From Muskogee” and other conservative anthems such as the hawkish “Fightin’ Side of Me” (1970), Mr. Haggard was given greater artistic freedom by Capitol. He exercised it with several concept and tribute albums.
The album “A Tribute to the Best Damn Fiddler in the World (Or My Salute to Bob Wills)” (1970) featured Mr. Haggard’s versions of songs by western swing bandleader Bob Wills. The record revitalized western swing, a musical hybrid of traditional Southwestern country music and New Orleans jazz, popular in the 1930s.
Mr. Haggard received a Grammy for lifetime achievement in 2006 and a Kennedy Center Honor in 2010. He also won Grammys in 1998 for the Marty Stuart song “Same Old Train” — a collaboration with 12 other country performers — and in 1984 for his version of “That’s the Way Love Goes.” He was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1994.
During the past two decades, a new generation of country singers gradually supplanted Mr. Haggard on the radio and in the charts. He was openly hostile about the lack of promotion by record companies and radio.
“Radio doesn’t want substance,” he told The Washington Post. “If a song actually had an opinion, that’s the first thing they’d throw in the trash.”
He remained a favorite of critics, garnering praise for such releases as “If I Can Only Fly” (2000) and “The Bluegrass Session” (2007). In 2005, he surprised many of his listeners with the song “Rebuild America First,” which criticized the U.S. war in Iraq and suggested the money that paid for the war be put into infrastructure needs.
In 2007, he toured and recorded with two other veteran country singers, Willie Nelson and Ray Price, as “the Last of the Breed.” A few months after the tour, surgeons removed a tumor from Mr. Haggard’s right lung. He told reporters afterward that he craved marijuana. He had earlier acknowledged addictions to amphetamines, cocaine and valium.
“Life has been peaks and valleys all the way for me,” Mr. Haggard once told the Toronto Sun. “The only way I know to come out of the valleys is to write my way out.”
RAMSinLA
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Du Hast was posted above, took me back to studying in Europe (not quite same time frame, but for years I listened to German language music afterwards). This was a minor hit in Vienna in 1984 - about a poor boy from near Graz who travels to Vienna and is terrified at what he sees, and just needs enough money for a train ticket home to his fairly small town Fuerstenfeld - mocking Vienna the whole time.
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Something for all the Robin Trower fans...
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http://www.classicrockrevisited.com/show_interview.php?id=1155
Robin Trower – Going Where the Music Takes You!
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By Jeb Wright
Where You Are Going To is the latest release by guitar virtuoso Robin Trower. The album mixes Robin’s love of blues with his classic rock grooves from his most popular era. This is a welcome return to the classic sound his fans have been waiting for. Trower plays guitar (duh) but also handles lead vocals throughout, as he has done on his last few albums. Joining the iconic guitarist are Chris Taggart on drums, with Livingstone Brown playing bass, co-production and mixing/mastering. Robin even generated the album cover concept which was turned into cover art by graphic artist Eric Krause. There will be a limited run of vinyl LPs available, too.
In the interview that follows, Trower opens up about the song details on the new album, how he composes his tunes, and what music means to him. We also talk about why he left Procol Harum way back when, and discuss few of his most popular tunes of all-time.
Jeb: Now, you’ve been doing this a long, long time. At this stage of the game, when you go into the studio—do you have a game plan or do you just pay attention to the ideas and go with the flow?
Robin: First of all, the music starts to come and that is a natural thing. The songs and the music that I’m writing comes naturally. Once you are three or four songs deep into the next album, in terms of your writing, I think you take hold of an idea of what you could do as an overall picture.
Jeb: You think in terms of albums?
Robin: Yeah, I do. I think it is good that you can tie all of the songs up in terms of an overview. I think that makes for a much more satisfying overall feeling about the music that you’re listening too. When you listen to an entire CD it is nice if you can tie them all together.
Jeb: The opening song, “When Will the Next Blow Fall” has such a cool guitar groove. You are singing on the album, but then there is that damn lead guitar sound that is so ‘you’. You nailed it.
Robin: Thank you very much, I really appreciate that. I think I am very fortunate that the creativity hasn’t dried up. I’m still churning out lots of songs. I’m sort of six or seven deep into the next album already. I try and do a little bit every day. If I’ve got anything coming up, which I usually do, I usually have the studio or a tour, then I like to play every day. That is how I stumble across ideas.
Jeb: Talk about “Where You Are Going To?”
Robin: That is a song about when I first started out. It’s about when I first came out to America in the ‘70s with Jimmy [Dewar] and Reggie [Isidore] and became quite successful. I suppose it is looking back, but it applies to anybody who was suddenly successful today in music. No one asks where you came from or where you’re going to. Just because you’re successful you just sort of float by.
Jeb: Are these all brand new songs?
Robin: Yeah.
Jeb: Do you carry a recorder around and tape ideas, or do you just go into the studio fresh?
Robin: There is one song where I had the idea for when I was on an American tour, it was the tour before last. I had the idea while I was on the road in my hotel room so I put it on my iPhone. That doesn’t happen very often. Mostly I work at home and I put stuff down on a recorder. I’m coming up with ideas all of the time. I just have to choose which one I am going to put a lyric to and then I am stuck into it.
Jeb: Did you turn 71 years old yet?
Robin: I did.
Jeb: It is hard to envision a 71 year old guy ripping a guitar solo the way you do.
Robin: I still have quite a bit of fire in the old boiler. I mean, I think I am playing as well as I ever have. I feel as turned on, personally, playing the guitar. It is still magical to me to play the guitar.
Jeb: Is your signature sound made by your effects pedals, the secret gauge of strings, the amp tubes and tones, or your fingers?
Robin: There is a certain amount to the fingering and picking of the note as that is what makes the sound first. You treat it afterwards. I go into a pedal and into a Marshall amp. The way the guitar is set up… I use very heavy strings. That has a lot to do with it as well. The fingers on the neck and the way you hit the strings is important. I also play very loud. Well, I don’t play as loud at home as that is not the place for it. In the studio I play very loud. That is the only way I can get that kind of tone.
Jeb: You use volume as a tool.
Robin: Yeah, that’s right. You can’t replicate the effect you get by cranking a loud amp, by cranking a Marshall 100 watt amp… that is the only way you can get that sound.
Jeb: When you play at loud volume it can be hard to control feedback and even touching the guitar can make nasty noises…
Robin: Control…. you’ve got to be able to control it, obviously. I’ve always played that way, so it is just natural to me. It is not something that I even need to think about. I think right from Procol Harum I was always driving the guitar through something else to make it very loud. That’s always been my thing. Before they even had overdrive pedals, I used to play through a small practice amp and then put that into a Marshall 100 watt amp to overdrive it. I was always trying to imitate that early Howlin’ Wolf guitar sound. He had a really driven amp and a big fat sound. That is what was always in my mind.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYpMLqXR6cw
Jeb: Today’s studios have too much available, in my opinion... The creative process needs to be able to allow people to experiment organically and discover sounds… not just push a button.
Robin: I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. What you’re seeing now is how it has become something different. That is not to say you can’t still make great music with all of these preset sounds. But… the fundamental of my sound is the guitar and the way it is set up into an amp that is turned way up. It is just a different way… I may have an old fashioned way of doing it, but that is my way of going about it. What they do today is something completely different, but it doesn’t make it any less valid.
Jeb: The 1970s had a lot of different styles of popular music. I’ve never thought of Robin Trower as a rock star, more of a guitar guru…
Robin: No, I’ve always thought of myself as being a musician. That is job number one… to make the best music I can make. Without a bit of fame you don’t fill out the rooms and you don’t sell CDs, so you need it. Rock star? That’s not me.
Jeb: Do you have an unearthly respect for music?
Robin: I think I do. I love all good music and it doesn’t matter what genre, if it is good… particularly voices that are great instruments. If it has that voice, then I don’t care what genre it is. James Brown is my all-time favorite artist. Not only is his voice an unbelievable instrument, he just is the most soulful guy. His singing is so soulful. When you put that against that incredible feel it is quite a combination. I saw an interview the other day with Mick Jagger and he was saying that when James Brown Live at the Apollo came out, every musician in England had a copy of it. That’s how important he was.
Jeb: You have had a big Jimi Hendrix comparison. Is that okay with you?
Robin: He was a big influence on me. He is a big influence guitar-wise for me. He is probably the biggest. I’ve always admitted to that. When people then don’t go on to recognize what I’ve actually created myself, I am disappointed. If they say I am just a Jimi Hendrix rip-off then I find that uncomfortable. I think he opened some doors for me and I rushed through them, to be honest.
Jeb: Jimi was out before you were in Procol Harum. Do you remember hearing his music for the first time?
Robin: I remember hearing “Hey Joe” on the radio and really loving it. I think it is still my favorite Jimi Hendrix track.
Jeb: I wasn’t around for Procol Harum as I was just being born. I’ve studied your career. How did you know it was time to leave that band?
Robin: The thing is that I was starting to write more music. I was starting to come up with a lot more song ideas and there just wasn’t room in Procol Harum for me to become one of the principal writers. Gary Brooker was the main writer and it was a keyboard band. If I was going to do all of this guitar music I was coming up with, I had to leave.
Jeb: Back in those days it was hard to make a buck as a musician.
Robin: We were ripped off royally. I don’t think I made any money from Procol Harum.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eylDs3Wzar4
Jeb: That must have made your choice easier.
Robin: It was comfortable in that band, but I was driven by creative ambition, really. When I left I just told them I had to go on and do something else. It was a good breakup.
Jeb: Did you have the classic Trower sound ready to go?
Robin: No, I don’t think so. I formed a band with a singer called Frankie Miller who I really loved his voice. That didn’t really work. Through Frankie I found James Dewar, who was in that band. That helped me form my sound. That band was called Jude. We never recorded together. We never got it together enough to go into the studio. It kind of fell apart of its own volition, as it were. From there, as I say, I was lucky enough to discover Jimmy who was an incredible singer.
Jeb: Imagine him not doing the singing in a band. That’s hard to do.
Robin: He was doing bass and background vocals behind Frankie. Frankie was a great singer. When I heard Jimmy’s voice I just loved it. I could hear that he would be great singing the stuff I wanted to do.
Jeb: He could stand next to Paul Rodgers in his vocals.
Robin: Don’t get me wrong, I love Paul Rodgers but Jimmy was really, really special.
Jeb: When you left the previous band and started having success on your own it was much bigger than you had before… You were pushing 30 by the time you hit big.
Robin: I was 29 or 30 by that time.
Jeb: For a rocker that might be considered old. That maturity may have helped you from going off the deep end.
Robin: Being in Procol Harum was a great schooling. They had already had hit records and toured America and Europe. I learned about recording and touring from them. It was really great schooling and I learned from it.
Jeb: Did it teach you any business sense?
Robin: No, I’ve never been interested in that to my great loss here and there. That has never been the important thing to me.
Jeb: Sometimes in America we have a short memory. Many people I talk to don’t remember or realize who you are, even today. You had some huge years in America. Look at the photo on the live album. You were selling out everywhere.
Robin: We had great success and we sold a lot of records. We did great. Things changed. Things started to get less free in what they could play on the radio. It got more poppy and more sort of Bee Gees and disco. If we had a star, it started to fade and that’s all there was to it. Plus, I was doing stuff that was more off the wall. I am thinking about In City Dreams which was a space age rhythm and blues album. There wasn’t an audience for that.
Jeb: I think that is a strong album.
Robin: I’m very proud of that album but you can see what I mean by saying that it didn’t fit what people were expecting from me and it didn’t fit the times. My producer Don Davis later on, God rest his soul, told me that he thought In City Dreams was more in tune with the ‘90s than it was back when it came out.
Jeb: I love “Somebody’s Calling” and “Falling Star.”
Robin: “Somebody’s Calling” we do live all the time. I love to play that one. I am very proud of that album. The thing is you can’t have your cake and eat it. You can’t go and just do exactly what you want, musically, and then cry if it isn’t a hit. If you want to have hits then you’ve got to do all of the bits and pieces that fit what makes a hit. You can’t just go down your own road and assume it is going to be a hit.
Jeb: With the new album I think it is kind of neat that you revisited the blues and now you’ve returned to a more rock sound.
Robin: People like Howlin’ Wolf fade into a lot of what I’ve done. Howlin’ Wolf has something magical and deep about his stuff. I think over that period where I went more blues it all started to come through. I was coming up with these ideas and I was grooving on it and I wanted to play lead guitar on it… so I did! Again, I can only do the songs that I come up with. It all goes in cycles anyway. You sort of discover a new slant on an old thing.
Jeb: Did you come up with the idea for the cover art?
Robin: Yeah, I did. It is the same thing as with a song, you’ve got to have an idea. Once you’ve got the idea then you just work on it until you’re happy with it. The idea is the thing. The inspiration was that I would have doors going away into the distance. I had to try and make that something that looked like a piece of artwork.
Jeb: It is the modern day and going back to the beginning.
Robin: I’ve always felt my very rock stuff had a blues influence in it. As I say, the Howlin’ Wolf stuff and the James Brown stuff with the funky grooves all fed into it. All of the music I love is feeding into what I come up with all of the time.
Jeb: Will the next album have the rock feel like this one has, or are you going somewhere new?
Robin: It is hard to say. I am very pleased with the new stuff and there are some quite fresh ideas on it, for me anyway. I think it is going to be pretty rocking with some bluesy and some rhythm and blues vibes. That is what I am hoping. I think it is another guitar album.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FtHGaOcBUE
Jeb: As an artist that has some specific songs anchored in his set for a long time, are there any you wish you didn’t have to play every night?
Robin: I wouldn’t put them in if I didn’t enjoy playing them. There may be songs that people want to hear that I don’t want to play, but if it is in the set then I enjoy doing it. That early stuff has a real sort of power to it. It plays you rather than you playing it.
Jeb: Let’s talk some classic Trower. “Too Rolling Stoned.”
Robin: That’s a very James Brown influenced song. The turnaround part I lifted from a James Brown track called “Down and Out in New York City.” I know it doesn’t sound like James Brown. The lyric is all about my time with Procol Harum. If you were not told that then you wouldn’t be able to guess that.
Jeb: “Lady Love.”
Robin: That’s an oddball song to me because it is more of a pop song. I love the guitar riff on that and Jimmy did a great job. I co-wrote that with Jimmy and he made it into a really good song.
Jeb: “Bridge of Sighs.”
Robin: That is an interesting song, that one. I came up with the guitar part and then I came up with the verse lyric, but it took about six months to come up with the turnaround. That was a long time writing to be able to finish that one. There are all sorts of things in that song. There is a lot of stuff feeding into “Bridge of Sighs” even though it is done as a power-trio thing there are a lot of blues influences there. I think I was already working on other stuff at the same time I was working on that song. I eventually finished it off and we started to play it live before I had even finished the lyric on it. It was a great thing to play live right from the beginning.
Jeb: “Hannah”
Robin: “Hannah” is mine and Jimmy’s. There is a big part of Jimmy on that. The vocal on that is fantastic. He didn’t seem to have any problem singing that one live. In the studio we used to put the backing track down first and then he would do the vocals separately. There is no way he could do the bass and the vocals in the studio to get that kind of performance.
Jeb: Did you like playing the smoky clubs or the stadiums?
Robin: I do like clubs because the atmosphere is great and you get a great sound, but the ideal place is a theater. The thing is in a bigger room you can get a sound, especially on the slow stuff like “Bridge of Sighs” and “Daydream” you can get it rolling down the room. It is more open and it gives you a freedom because the sound is sort of going around the room. It is harder to connect in the outdoor shows. That is something else. You can’t get that same thing outdoors for the slow moody stuff, especially in the daylight.
Jeb: Are you happy with your legacy?
Robin: I think there is a lot of stuff that I really, really am very proud of. There is also stuff that I don’t like at all. I think probably everybody has got something in that kind of balance.
Jeb: Would you consider doing an instrumental guitar album?
Robin: I have done the odd instrumental. I don’t find it as satisfying because the lyrics add so much to the atmosphere to a piece of music. It adds dimensions to it that you can’t achieve with just instrumentals. I think there is enough guitar playing on the new album, though.
Jeb: The new album is on my iPhone, and it is in my CD player in the car, and I have a second copy in my house...
Robin: Brilliant. That’s great.
Jeb: You have never done acoustic songs. Are you anti-acoustic?
Robin: I don’t play acoustic. I have some. I have written the odd thing on acoustic, but these last few years it has been in a cupboard and I haven’t got it out for years and years. I’m all electric guitar, and I’m all about that.
Jeb: Last one: What was your inspiration to pick the guitar up in the first place?
Robin: I think I loved Scotty Moore who played behind Elvis. I think that is the first time I was really aware of electric guitar. I asked my dad to buy me one and he bought me one for Christmas. I was 14 when I had my first guitar. It was an acoustic but it wasn’t long before I got a pickup for it. I remember with my first guitar I plugged it into the back of the radio. I don’t know how I did that and I probably shouldn’t have done that. I probably could have electrocuted myself. That was the first time I ever played through something.
http://www.trowerpower.com/
********************************************
http://www.classicrockrevisited.com/show_interview.php?id=1155
Robin Trower – Going Where the Music Takes You!
By Jeb Wright
Where You Are Going To is the latest release by guitar virtuoso Robin Trower. The album mixes Robin’s love of blues with his classic rock grooves from his most popular era. This is a welcome return to the classic sound his fans have been waiting for. Trower plays guitar (duh) but also handles lead vocals throughout, as he has done on his last few albums. Joining the iconic guitarist are Chris Taggart on drums, with Livingstone Brown playing bass, co-production and mixing/mastering. Robin even generated the album cover concept which was turned into cover art by graphic artist Eric Krause. There will be a limited run of vinyl LPs available, too.
In the interview that follows, Trower opens up about the song details on the new album, how he composes his tunes, and what music means to him. We also talk about why he left Procol Harum way back when, and discuss few of his most popular tunes of all-time.
Jeb: Now, you’ve been doing this a long, long time. At this stage of the game, when you go into the studio—do you have a game plan or do you just pay attention to the ideas and go with the flow?
Robin: First of all, the music starts to come and that is a natural thing. The songs and the music that I’m writing comes naturally. Once you are three or four songs deep into the next album, in terms of your writing, I think you take hold of an idea of what you could do as an overall picture.
Jeb: You think in terms of albums?
Robin: Yeah, I do. I think it is good that you can tie all of the songs up in terms of an overview. I think that makes for a much more satisfying overall feeling about the music that you’re listening too. When you listen to an entire CD it is nice if you can tie them all together.
Jeb: The opening song, “When Will the Next Blow Fall” has such a cool guitar groove. You are singing on the album, but then there is that damn lead guitar sound that is so ‘you’. You nailed it.
Robin: Thank you very much, I really appreciate that. I think I am very fortunate that the creativity hasn’t dried up. I’m still churning out lots of songs. I’m sort of six or seven deep into the next album already. I try and do a little bit every day. If I’ve got anything coming up, which I usually do, I usually have the studio or a tour, then I like to play every day. That is how I stumble across ideas.
Jeb: Talk about “Where You Are Going To?”
Robin: That is a song about when I first started out. It’s about when I first came out to America in the ‘70s with Jimmy [Dewar] and Reggie [Isidore] and became quite successful. I suppose it is looking back, but it applies to anybody who was suddenly successful today in music. No one asks where you came from or where you’re going to. Just because you’re successful you just sort of float by.
Jeb: Are these all brand new songs?
Robin: Yeah.
Jeb: Do you carry a recorder around and tape ideas, or do you just go into the studio fresh?
Robin: There is one song where I had the idea for when I was on an American tour, it was the tour before last. I had the idea while I was on the road in my hotel room so I put it on my iPhone. That doesn’t happen very often. Mostly I work at home and I put stuff down on a recorder. I’m coming up with ideas all of the time. I just have to choose which one I am going to put a lyric to and then I am stuck into it.
Jeb: Did you turn 71 years old yet?
Robin: I did.
Jeb: It is hard to envision a 71 year old guy ripping a guitar solo the way you do.
Robin: I still have quite a bit of fire in the old boiler. I mean, I think I am playing as well as I ever have. I feel as turned on, personally, playing the guitar. It is still magical to me to play the guitar.
Jeb: Is your signature sound made by your effects pedals, the secret gauge of strings, the amp tubes and tones, or your fingers?
Robin: There is a certain amount to the fingering and picking of the note as that is what makes the sound first. You treat it afterwards. I go into a pedal and into a Marshall amp. The way the guitar is set up… I use very heavy strings. That has a lot to do with it as well. The fingers on the neck and the way you hit the strings is important. I also play very loud. Well, I don’t play as loud at home as that is not the place for it. In the studio I play very loud. That is the only way I can get that kind of tone.
Jeb: You use volume as a tool.
Robin: Yeah, that’s right. You can’t replicate the effect you get by cranking a loud amp, by cranking a Marshall 100 watt amp… that is the only way you can get that sound.
Jeb: When you play at loud volume it can be hard to control feedback and even touching the guitar can make nasty noises…
Robin: Control…. you’ve got to be able to control it, obviously. I’ve always played that way, so it is just natural to me. It is not something that I even need to think about. I think right from Procol Harum I was always driving the guitar through something else to make it very loud. That’s always been my thing. Before they even had overdrive pedals, I used to play through a small practice amp and then put that into a Marshall 100 watt amp to overdrive it. I was always trying to imitate that early Howlin’ Wolf guitar sound. He had a really driven amp and a big fat sound. That is what was always in my mind.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYpMLqXR6cw
Jeb: Today’s studios have too much available, in my opinion... The creative process needs to be able to allow people to experiment organically and discover sounds… not just push a button.
Robin: I don’t think that’s necessarily a bad thing. What you’re seeing now is how it has become something different. That is not to say you can’t still make great music with all of these preset sounds. But… the fundamental of my sound is the guitar and the way it is set up into an amp that is turned way up. It is just a different way… I may have an old fashioned way of doing it, but that is my way of going about it. What they do today is something completely different, but it doesn’t make it any less valid.
Jeb: The 1970s had a lot of different styles of popular music. I’ve never thought of Robin Trower as a rock star, more of a guitar guru…
Robin: No, I’ve always thought of myself as being a musician. That is job number one… to make the best music I can make. Without a bit of fame you don’t fill out the rooms and you don’t sell CDs, so you need it. Rock star? That’s not me.
Jeb: Do you have an unearthly respect for music?
Robin: I think I do. I love all good music and it doesn’t matter what genre, if it is good… particularly voices that are great instruments. If it has that voice, then I don’t care what genre it is. James Brown is my all-time favorite artist. Not only is his voice an unbelievable instrument, he just is the most soulful guy. His singing is so soulful. When you put that against that incredible feel it is quite a combination. I saw an interview the other day with Mick Jagger and he was saying that when James Brown Live at the Apollo came out, every musician in England had a copy of it. That’s how important he was.
Jeb: You have had a big Jimi Hendrix comparison. Is that okay with you?
Robin: He was a big influence on me. He is a big influence guitar-wise for me. He is probably the biggest. I’ve always admitted to that. When people then don’t go on to recognize what I’ve actually created myself, I am disappointed. If they say I am just a Jimi Hendrix rip-off then I find that uncomfortable. I think he opened some doors for me and I rushed through them, to be honest.
Jeb: Jimi was out before you were in Procol Harum. Do you remember hearing his music for the first time?
Robin: I remember hearing “Hey Joe” on the radio and really loving it. I think it is still my favorite Jimi Hendrix track.
Jeb: I wasn’t around for Procol Harum as I was just being born. I’ve studied your career. How did you know it was time to leave that band?
Robin: The thing is that I was starting to write more music. I was starting to come up with a lot more song ideas and there just wasn’t room in Procol Harum for me to become one of the principal writers. Gary Brooker was the main writer and it was a keyboard band. If I was going to do all of this guitar music I was coming up with, I had to leave.
Jeb: Back in those days it was hard to make a buck as a musician.
Robin: We were ripped off royally. I don’t think I made any money from Procol Harum.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eylDs3Wzar4
Jeb: That must have made your choice easier.
Robin: It was comfortable in that band, but I was driven by creative ambition, really. When I left I just told them I had to go on and do something else. It was a good breakup.
Jeb: Did you have the classic Trower sound ready to go?
Robin: No, I don’t think so. I formed a band with a singer called Frankie Miller who I really loved his voice. That didn’t really work. Through Frankie I found James Dewar, who was in that band. That helped me form my sound. That band was called Jude. We never recorded together. We never got it together enough to go into the studio. It kind of fell apart of its own volition, as it were. From there, as I say, I was lucky enough to discover Jimmy who was an incredible singer.
Jeb: Imagine him not doing the singing in a band. That’s hard to do.
Robin: He was doing bass and background vocals behind Frankie. Frankie was a great singer. When I heard Jimmy’s voice I just loved it. I could hear that he would be great singing the stuff I wanted to do.
Jeb: He could stand next to Paul Rodgers in his vocals.
Robin: Don’t get me wrong, I love Paul Rodgers but Jimmy was really, really special.
Jeb: When you left the previous band and started having success on your own it was much bigger than you had before… You were pushing 30 by the time you hit big.
Robin: I was 29 or 30 by that time.
Jeb: For a rocker that might be considered old. That maturity may have helped you from going off the deep end.
Robin: Being in Procol Harum was a great schooling. They had already had hit records and toured America and Europe. I learned about recording and touring from them. It was really great schooling and I learned from it.
Jeb: Did it teach you any business sense?
Robin: No, I’ve never been interested in that to my great loss here and there. That has never been the important thing to me.
Jeb: Sometimes in America we have a short memory. Many people I talk to don’t remember or realize who you are, even today. You had some huge years in America. Look at the photo on the live album. You were selling out everywhere.
Robin: We had great success and we sold a lot of records. We did great. Things changed. Things started to get less free in what they could play on the radio. It got more poppy and more sort of Bee Gees and disco. If we had a star, it started to fade and that’s all there was to it. Plus, I was doing stuff that was more off the wall. I am thinking about In City Dreams which was a space age rhythm and blues album. There wasn’t an audience for that.
Jeb: I think that is a strong album.
Robin: I’m very proud of that album but you can see what I mean by saying that it didn’t fit what people were expecting from me and it didn’t fit the times. My producer Don Davis later on, God rest his soul, told me that he thought In City Dreams was more in tune with the ‘90s than it was back when it came out.
Jeb: I love “Somebody’s Calling” and “Falling Star.”
Robin: “Somebody’s Calling” we do live all the time. I love to play that one. I am very proud of that album. The thing is you can’t have your cake and eat it. You can’t go and just do exactly what you want, musically, and then cry if it isn’t a hit. If you want to have hits then you’ve got to do all of the bits and pieces that fit what makes a hit. You can’t just go down your own road and assume it is going to be a hit.
Jeb: With the new album I think it is kind of neat that you revisited the blues and now you’ve returned to a more rock sound.
Robin: People like Howlin’ Wolf fade into a lot of what I’ve done. Howlin’ Wolf has something magical and deep about his stuff. I think over that period where I went more blues it all started to come through. I was coming up with these ideas and I was grooving on it and I wanted to play lead guitar on it… so I did! Again, I can only do the songs that I come up with. It all goes in cycles anyway. You sort of discover a new slant on an old thing.
Jeb: Did you come up with the idea for the cover art?
Robin: Yeah, I did. It is the same thing as with a song, you’ve got to have an idea. Once you’ve got the idea then you just work on it until you’re happy with it. The idea is the thing. The inspiration was that I would have doors going away into the distance. I had to try and make that something that looked like a piece of artwork.
Jeb: It is the modern day and going back to the beginning.
Robin: I’ve always felt my very rock stuff had a blues influence in it. As I say, the Howlin’ Wolf stuff and the James Brown stuff with the funky grooves all fed into it. All of the music I love is feeding into what I come up with all of the time.
Jeb: Will the next album have the rock feel like this one has, or are you going somewhere new?
Robin: It is hard to say. I am very pleased with the new stuff and there are some quite fresh ideas on it, for me anyway. I think it is going to be pretty rocking with some bluesy and some rhythm and blues vibes. That is what I am hoping. I think it is another guitar album.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7FtHGaOcBUE
Jeb: As an artist that has some specific songs anchored in his set for a long time, are there any you wish you didn’t have to play every night?
Robin: I wouldn’t put them in if I didn’t enjoy playing them. There may be songs that people want to hear that I don’t want to play, but if it is in the set then I enjoy doing it. That early stuff has a real sort of power to it. It plays you rather than you playing it.
Jeb: Let’s talk some classic Trower. “Too Rolling Stoned.”
Robin: That’s a very James Brown influenced song. The turnaround part I lifted from a James Brown track called “Down and Out in New York City.” I know it doesn’t sound like James Brown. The lyric is all about my time with Procol Harum. If you were not told that then you wouldn’t be able to guess that.
Jeb: “Lady Love.”
Robin: That’s an oddball song to me because it is more of a pop song. I love the guitar riff on that and Jimmy did a great job. I co-wrote that with Jimmy and he made it into a really good song.
Jeb: “Bridge of Sighs.”
Robin: That is an interesting song, that one. I came up with the guitar part and then I came up with the verse lyric, but it took about six months to come up with the turnaround. That was a long time writing to be able to finish that one. There are all sorts of things in that song. There is a lot of stuff feeding into “Bridge of Sighs” even though it is done as a power-trio thing there are a lot of blues influences there. I think I was already working on other stuff at the same time I was working on that song. I eventually finished it off and we started to play it live before I had even finished the lyric on it. It was a great thing to play live right from the beginning.
Jeb: “Hannah”
Robin: “Hannah” is mine and Jimmy’s. There is a big part of Jimmy on that. The vocal on that is fantastic. He didn’t seem to have any problem singing that one live. In the studio we used to put the backing track down first and then he would do the vocals separately. There is no way he could do the bass and the vocals in the studio to get that kind of performance.
Jeb: Did you like playing the smoky clubs or the stadiums?
Robin: I do like clubs because the atmosphere is great and you get a great sound, but the ideal place is a theater. The thing is in a bigger room you can get a sound, especially on the slow stuff like “Bridge of Sighs” and “Daydream” you can get it rolling down the room. It is more open and it gives you a freedom because the sound is sort of going around the room. It is harder to connect in the outdoor shows. That is something else. You can’t get that same thing outdoors for the slow moody stuff, especially in the daylight.
Jeb: Are you happy with your legacy?
Robin: I think there is a lot of stuff that I really, really am very proud of. There is also stuff that I don’t like at all. I think probably everybody has got something in that kind of balance.
Jeb: Would you consider doing an instrumental guitar album?
Robin: I have done the odd instrumental. I don’t find it as satisfying because the lyrics add so much to the atmosphere to a piece of music. It adds dimensions to it that you can’t achieve with just instrumentals. I think there is enough guitar playing on the new album, though.
Jeb: The new album is on my iPhone, and it is in my CD player in the car, and I have a second copy in my house...
Robin: Brilliant. That’s great.
Jeb: You have never done acoustic songs. Are you anti-acoustic?
Robin: I don’t play acoustic. I have some. I have written the odd thing on acoustic, but these last few years it has been in a cupboard and I haven’t got it out for years and years. I’m all electric guitar, and I’m all about that.
Jeb: Last one: What was your inspiration to pick the guitar up in the first place?
Robin: I think I loved Scotty Moore who played behind Elvis. I think that is the first time I was really aware of electric guitar. I asked my dad to buy me one and he bought me one for Christmas. I was 14 when I had my first guitar. It was an acoustic but it wasn’t long before I got a pickup for it. I remember with my first guitar I plugged it into the back of the radio. I don’t know how I did that and I probably shouldn’t have done that. I probably could have electrocuted myself. That was the first time I ever played through something.
http://www.trowerpower.com/
Ramsey
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Wow so many Progressive Rocks songs. Force 16 turned me on to OSI, whom I had never heard. OzarkRam Tubular Bells and Merle Haggard? I bet they've never played on the same bill. My eyes are still green over RedRam's recent Gilmore concert evening. (How was the lightshow RedRam?) And yet, again Primetime delivers a thought provoking eulogy on Merle Haggard.
I often bemoan the lack of Progressive Rock bands touring Dallas/Fort Worth. They always hit the East and West coasts. Today I find myself up to my ears in tears and Lone Star beers over living legends like and Outlaws Merle , Willie, and Jerry Jeff. I guess I've been ungrateful. Hell yeah. Today, instead of Chimay Ale, I'm gonna crack open a Coors and celebrate my hometown heroes! Here's to you Merle! Yippee Ki Yay!
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRNMkrDfJMY
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eFHJ41ktt3Q
RIP Merle, you Desperado!
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2wRlXAsy-Y
Last edited:
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http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/rip-merle-haggard-the-only-man-who-could-live-up-to-th-1769420018
RIP Merle Haggard, The Only Man Who Could Live Up To The Name
Rob Harvilla
Photo via Getty.
Ah, Merle Haggard died, shit. On his 79th birthday. He was one of the greats. You know this for two reasons. First off, objectively, he just was, an acerbic and jovially iconoclastic teller of hard truths and winsome lies, a prickly charmer and actual outlaw (he once attended a Johnny Cash concert in San Quentin while doing time in San Quentin) who got warmer the crabbier he got, somehow. Take his phenomenally bitchy and eternally awesome 1969 anti-protester protest song “The Fightin’ Side of Me,” wherein he literally bellowed, If you don’t love it, leave it, and still sounded like a uniter, not a divider. Nary a karaoke night will go unimproved by its presence.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHAFmFsb9XM
The other reason you know he was one of the greats is because every damn modern country star is constantly yapping about what a great he was. Merle, Johnny, Hank, Waylon, Willie ... these guys only exist on country radio nowadays as totems, as cheap name-drops, as authenticity bulwarks erected by a host of gallivanting bros in tight pants and backwards mesh baseball caps who sing exclusively of their desire to drink moonshine and punch deer to death and tenderly fornicate with ripped-bluejean queens in the beds of their trucks on backroads amid cornfields under a harvest moon, and what have you.
True, I like many of those songs, corny as they can be, but they tend to pay fealty to the Real Deal in a way that dilutes the impact of the Real Deal. So by all means, listen to the actually pretty decent 2006 Eric Church song that I swear is called “Pledge Allegiance to the Hag,” but don’t just take his word for it. Merle’s catalog is a mess, naturally, but fart around on your streaming service of choice, or, if you’re truly about that life, buy random old records of his on vinyl. I picked up 1976's The Roots of My Raising for $4 a couple years back based entirely on the rad shirt he’s wearing.
The ecstatic Dukes of Hazzard / Miami Vice crossover this cover portends does not exactly come to pass; nonetheless, my jam at this hour is “Walk on the Outside,” a gently spoke-sung prison lifer’s lament—“I’ve been in here so long / I forgot what I did wrong,” it begins—imbued with a weight and gravitas that’d be unbearable if he wasn’t so sweet about it. All he wants is a beer, and all you want is to have a beer with him.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTYDamB6zFQ
He never stopped touring; he never stopped doing anything, really. Last year he released a full duet album with Willie Nelson called Django and Jimmie; here they are cutting the pro-protestor anti-anxiety song “It’s All Going to Pot,” with Merle belting out his verses while wearing ... a backwards mesh baseball cap. How about that. That’s America for you: The contradictions are the whole point. If you don’t love it, leave it. Otherwise, now’s the time to pledge allegiance.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6c6eUeoa9Q
RIP Merle Haggard, The Only Man Who Could Live Up To The Name
Rob Harvilla
Photo via Getty.
Ah, Merle Haggard died, shit. On his 79th birthday. He was one of the greats. You know this for two reasons. First off, objectively, he just was, an acerbic and jovially iconoclastic teller of hard truths and winsome lies, a prickly charmer and actual outlaw (he once attended a Johnny Cash concert in San Quentin while doing time in San Quentin) who got warmer the crabbier he got, somehow. Take his phenomenally bitchy and eternally awesome 1969 anti-protester protest song “The Fightin’ Side of Me,” wherein he literally bellowed, If you don’t love it, leave it, and still sounded like a uniter, not a divider. Nary a karaoke night will go unimproved by its presence.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZHAFmFsb9XM
The other reason you know he was one of the greats is because every damn modern country star is constantly yapping about what a great he was. Merle, Johnny, Hank, Waylon, Willie ... these guys only exist on country radio nowadays as totems, as cheap name-drops, as authenticity bulwarks erected by a host of gallivanting bros in tight pants and backwards mesh baseball caps who sing exclusively of their desire to drink moonshine and punch deer to death and tenderly fornicate with ripped-bluejean queens in the beds of their trucks on backroads amid cornfields under a harvest moon, and what have you.
True, I like many of those songs, corny as they can be, but they tend to pay fealty to the Real Deal in a way that dilutes the impact of the Real Deal. So by all means, listen to the actually pretty decent 2006 Eric Church song that I swear is called “Pledge Allegiance to the Hag,” but don’t just take his word for it. Merle’s catalog is a mess, naturally, but fart around on your streaming service of choice, or, if you’re truly about that life, buy random old records of his on vinyl. I picked up 1976's The Roots of My Raising for $4 a couple years back based entirely on the rad shirt he’s wearing.
The ecstatic Dukes of Hazzard / Miami Vice crossover this cover portends does not exactly come to pass; nonetheless, my jam at this hour is “Walk on the Outside,” a gently spoke-sung prison lifer’s lament—“I’ve been in here so long / I forgot what I did wrong,” it begins—imbued with a weight and gravitas that’d be unbearable if he wasn’t so sweet about it. All he wants is a beer, and all you want is to have a beer with him.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTYDamB6zFQ
He never stopped touring; he never stopped doing anything, really. Last year he released a full duet album with Willie Nelson called Django and Jimmie; here they are cutting the pro-protestor anti-anxiety song “It’s All Going to Pot,” with Merle belting out his verses while wearing ... a backwards mesh baseball cap. How about that. That’s America for you: The contradictions are the whole point. If you don’t love it, leave it. Otherwise, now’s the time to pledge allegiance.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A6c6eUeoa9Q
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- Haole
Not my normal genre,,, but my favorite Nugent song.
And now my favorite Nugent video. You'll have to click over to YouTube to see it but it's well worth it.
And now my favorite Nugent video. You'll have to click over to YouTube to see it but it's well worth it.
Dieter the Brock
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RocknRam29
Live, Love, Laugh, & Learn
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Ramsey
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I saw Ghost on their first American tour with Opeth and Mastodon a few years back. Ghost was eerie, ersatz Catholic and groovy! Supposedly, nobody knows who is in Ghost. It's a secret. We took my wife's learning disabled brother Gary to his first rock concert. Gary was very excited and jammed out to Ghost. We got twin Ghost concert t-shirts.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u6YMAvfwTFo&nohtml5=False
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NR3Pko6UsEk&list=RDNR3Pko6UsEk
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q9C50NMZeGc
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PA Ram
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I like the song too--but it's funny how the right video can just add so much to a song.
