The "almost" official blog for everything Todd Rundgren Related........................................................................................................................................................................... Please visit the sister facebook page https://www.facebook.com/Ma4utopia?ref=hl
Friday, July 9, 2010
DONT MISS OUT ON THESE SHOWS
GO TO WWW.SONSOF1984.COM TO GET INFORMATION ABOUT THE TODD HEALING TOUR IN SEPT OF THIS YEAR.
Interview: "expect the unexpected" from CantoRep.com
Expect the unexpected from Todd Rundgren
http://www.cantonrep.com/carousel/x1876486273/Expect-the-unexpected-from-Todd-Rundgren
By Dan Kane
CantonRep.com staff writer
Posted Jul 09, 2010 @ 07:00 AM
Why is it not so surprising that Todd Rundgren's latest tour and recording project is a salute to blues pioneer Robert Johnson?
After all, Rundgren has been confounding fans and critics since the late '60s with his kaleidoscopic and deeply eclectic talents and tastes.
Best known as a keyboard-based pop-rock tunesmith with a string of breezy hits — "Hello It's Me," "We Gotta Get You a Woman," "I Saw the Light," "Can We Still Be Friends," "Bang the Drum All Day" — Rundgren has at various points explored electronics, R&B, progressive rock, hard rock, bossa nova, Beatles homages, show tunes, outright silliness and Eastern spirituality.
And now, Robert Johnson's Mississippi Delta blues of the 1930s. Rundgren's upcoming tribute album is titled "Todd Rundgren's Johnson."
A longtime Northeast Ohio favorite who has played three sold-out shows at Canton's Palace Theatre, Rundgren will appear in concert July 16 at Clay's Park Resort in Lawrence Township, headlining the Rock N Resort Music Festival.
Joining Rundgren, on guitar and vocals, will be bassist Kasim Sulton, guitarist Jesse Gress and drummer Prairie Prince. Recent shows have alternated Johnson standards, such as "Sweet Home Chicago," "Love in Vain" and "Crossroads," with such Rundgren diversities as "Black Maria," "Unloved Children" and "No. 1 Lowest Common Denominator."
I phoned Rundgren, 62, at his home in Hawaii for an expansive interview. He was great to talk to — funny, thoughtful and still very engaged in his career. Highlights follow.
Q. Can you give me a preview of your upcoming show here?
A. We usually play two hours. We'll do the 12 songs from the Robert Johnson record, then the rest will be more or less blues-influenced songs from my own career. Which sounds strange, but as it turns out, my first job as a professional player was in a blues band, which is a little-known fact, and that's what gave me the gumption to undertake this blues project. It's a very bluesy evening featuring Robert Johnson, but not exclusively. I don't want people to think this is some type of Library of Congress presentation. (Laughs)
Q. I'm very curious — why Robert Johnson and why now?
A. I finished an album called "Arena" about two years ago and we needed distribution for it, which is the nature of the music business these days with many artists trying to figure out how to get their records into stores. So we shopped it around and found a company that was interested in the record, but they had an additional clause in the contract that I would also record an album's worth of Robert Johnson songs, because they had acquired the administrative rights to Robert Johnson's songwriting. So they convinced me to do it. It took me about a year to get (the album) done. I soon found out after I agreed to do it that Eric Clapton has made a second career out of tributing Robert Johnson. (Laughs)
Q. Well, you've just got to outdo him!
A. I was kind of thrown into a tizzy at that point trying to figure out what my approach would be. I finally came to the conclusion that this actually did have something to do with Eric Clapton and all of the other white blues guitar players in England in the mid-'60s, who were essentially a more direct influence on me than Robert Johnson was. The English had such a leg up on us American guys. We were playing the Ventures and surf guitar and along come the Yardbirds and all these other British bands who'd been listening to Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf.
Q. Does your Robert Johnson album sound like a Todd Rundgren album?
A. I never thought doing something very authentic or Robert Johnson-like was going to be the approach. There's a difference in the way you approach blues as opposed to R&B. I have experience with both, but as a singer I have more experience as an R&B stylist. The blues takes a certain other discipline. It's supposed to be more simple and it does have an improvisational aspect about it. I wasn't trying to mimic Robert Johnson. I was still trying to sound like myself in a sense. It's more about a feeling and trying to give voice to that feeling.
Q. The last couple of times I've seen you in concert, you have been very guitar-oriented and very rocking, versus playing piano and singing. It must be great to play something like "Black Maria" and let it wail.
A. I like to wail, yes. (Chuckles) We get a little crazy with the guitar. I started out in music as a guitar player, then I got into the piano because it was a good songwriting tool. And writing songs on the piano naturally led to having to perform them on the piano. Then I discovered that I was never going to be very good at singing and playing the piano together. Some people are very good at it, but for some reason, whenever I start to get into the singing, I forget that I'm playing the piano and make a mistake and it's all downhill from there. (Laughs) It was something I could get away with in front of my fans. But then I went out on tour with Joe Jackson, who is a real piano player, and I came to the conclusion that I have no business singing and playing the piano live. I'm just not good enough at it. That's when I made the decision to migrate back to the guitar and, thankfully, it has come back to me. If you don't play the guitar all the time, you can lose your edge.
Q. It's fun to watch you play guitar. You seem very into the moment and into the musicianship of it.
A. It's a quality that goes back to the start of my musical career, when I wanted to be the gunslinging guitar player. I wanted to be mentioned in the same breath with Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton and all that.
Q. You're playing a show in September in Akron, where you are doing the "Todd" and "Healing" albums in their entirety. So I guess you're going to be doing that insane Gilbert and Sullivan song ("Lord Chancellor's Nightmare Song")?
A. (Laughs) I'm doing that song, yes. Gilbert and Sullivan was one of my refuges from the travails of my teenage years. I had a friend who was a very smart guy and I did very poorly in school, so the way I would prove that I was smart was I would memorize all these Gilbert and Sullivan songs. I'd go to the library and get the full libretto in the bathtub for hours memorizing all the lyrics, then I'd come out with this stream of Victorian English. ("Nightmare Song") is still somewhere in my brain. It just needs dusting off. I've often thought it would be fun to do a stage musical like "Pirates of Penzance" or something like that.
Q. When you listen to the "Todd" album 36 years later, are you impressed with what you concocted? Some of that stuff is visionary.
A. Actually, I built my own studio during "A Wizard, A True Star" and that kind of set things off. We were no longer operating in a world of rules. (Laughs) We could do anything at any time. We had pretty much thrown off the yoke of the clock and whatever the studio owner might have told us about not plugging box A into box B. (Laughs) We could essentially do any nasty thing that we wanted. But that resulted in sounds that are difficult or impossible to reproduce later. The equipment doesn't exist anymore, or we just can't remember what order we plugged the things in.
Q. You have been adored in the Cleveland area for as long as I can remember. Any theories about this?
A. It just goes back a very long way, I think. Ohio was one of the first places that accepted the Nazz (Rundgren's late-'60s band), and for some reason that just continued. As soon as I began to play solo, Cleveland was one of those places we'd always go back to. We got good airplay. It's one of those mysteries I can't fully explain.
Q. Would you say you are happy with your place in the scheme of things? Many less talented than you have gone much further.
A. I probably could have managed my finances better, but at least I have finances to manage. (Chuckles) No, it's been great. I get just enough fame that I get a little consideration in restaurants sometimes, but at the same time I can eat that meal in that restaurant without getting pestered all through by people wanting attention for themselves from me. I've toured with Ringo, and I know the option is often just a really cloistered lifestyle and I don't like to live like that. I like to go out and walk around and see things. I'm totally satisfied.
Q. And you're going to keep performing forever?
A. Just like Tony Bennett and B.B. King. (Laughs)
Copyright 2010 CantonRep.com. Some rights reserved
Source and to add commentary:
http://www.cantonrep.com/carousel/x1876486273/Expect-the-unexpected-from-Todd-Rundgren
http://www.cantonrep.com/carousel/x1876486273/Expect-the-unexpected-from-Todd-Rundgren
By Dan Kane
CantonRep.com staff writer
Posted Jul 09, 2010 @ 07:00 AM
Why is it not so surprising that Todd Rundgren's latest tour and recording project is a salute to blues pioneer Robert Johnson?
After all, Rundgren has been confounding fans and critics since the late '60s with his kaleidoscopic and deeply eclectic talents and tastes.
Best known as a keyboard-based pop-rock tunesmith with a string of breezy hits — "Hello It's Me," "We Gotta Get You a Woman," "I Saw the Light," "Can We Still Be Friends," "Bang the Drum All Day" — Rundgren has at various points explored electronics, R&B, progressive rock, hard rock, bossa nova, Beatles homages, show tunes, outright silliness and Eastern spirituality.
And now, Robert Johnson's Mississippi Delta blues of the 1930s. Rundgren's upcoming tribute album is titled "Todd Rundgren's Johnson."
A longtime Northeast Ohio favorite who has played three sold-out shows at Canton's Palace Theatre, Rundgren will appear in concert July 16 at Clay's Park Resort in Lawrence Township, headlining the Rock N Resort Music Festival.
Joining Rundgren, on guitar and vocals, will be bassist Kasim Sulton, guitarist Jesse Gress and drummer Prairie Prince. Recent shows have alternated Johnson standards, such as "Sweet Home Chicago," "Love in Vain" and "Crossroads," with such Rundgren diversities as "Black Maria," "Unloved Children" and "No. 1 Lowest Common Denominator."
I phoned Rundgren, 62, at his home in Hawaii for an expansive interview. He was great to talk to — funny, thoughtful and still very engaged in his career. Highlights follow.
Q. Can you give me a preview of your upcoming show here?
A. We usually play two hours. We'll do the 12 songs from the Robert Johnson record, then the rest will be more or less blues-influenced songs from my own career. Which sounds strange, but as it turns out, my first job as a professional player was in a blues band, which is a little-known fact, and that's what gave me the gumption to undertake this blues project. It's a very bluesy evening featuring Robert Johnson, but not exclusively. I don't want people to think this is some type of Library of Congress presentation. (Laughs)
Q. I'm very curious — why Robert Johnson and why now?
A. I finished an album called "Arena" about two years ago and we needed distribution for it, which is the nature of the music business these days with many artists trying to figure out how to get their records into stores. So we shopped it around and found a company that was interested in the record, but they had an additional clause in the contract that I would also record an album's worth of Robert Johnson songs, because they had acquired the administrative rights to Robert Johnson's songwriting. So they convinced me to do it. It took me about a year to get (the album) done. I soon found out after I agreed to do it that Eric Clapton has made a second career out of tributing Robert Johnson. (Laughs)
Q. Well, you've just got to outdo him!
A. I was kind of thrown into a tizzy at that point trying to figure out what my approach would be. I finally came to the conclusion that this actually did have something to do with Eric Clapton and all of the other white blues guitar players in England in the mid-'60s, who were essentially a more direct influence on me than Robert Johnson was. The English had such a leg up on us American guys. We were playing the Ventures and surf guitar and along come the Yardbirds and all these other British bands who'd been listening to Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf.
Q. Does your Robert Johnson album sound like a Todd Rundgren album?
A. I never thought doing something very authentic or Robert Johnson-like was going to be the approach. There's a difference in the way you approach blues as opposed to R&B. I have experience with both, but as a singer I have more experience as an R&B stylist. The blues takes a certain other discipline. It's supposed to be more simple and it does have an improvisational aspect about it. I wasn't trying to mimic Robert Johnson. I was still trying to sound like myself in a sense. It's more about a feeling and trying to give voice to that feeling.
Q. The last couple of times I've seen you in concert, you have been very guitar-oriented and very rocking, versus playing piano and singing. It must be great to play something like "Black Maria" and let it wail.
A. I like to wail, yes. (Chuckles) We get a little crazy with the guitar. I started out in music as a guitar player, then I got into the piano because it was a good songwriting tool. And writing songs on the piano naturally led to having to perform them on the piano. Then I discovered that I was never going to be very good at singing and playing the piano together. Some people are very good at it, but for some reason, whenever I start to get into the singing, I forget that I'm playing the piano and make a mistake and it's all downhill from there. (Laughs) It was something I could get away with in front of my fans. But then I went out on tour with Joe Jackson, who is a real piano player, and I came to the conclusion that I have no business singing and playing the piano live. I'm just not good enough at it. That's when I made the decision to migrate back to the guitar and, thankfully, it has come back to me. If you don't play the guitar all the time, you can lose your edge.
Q. It's fun to watch you play guitar. You seem very into the moment and into the musicianship of it.
A. It's a quality that goes back to the start of my musical career, when I wanted to be the gunslinging guitar player. I wanted to be mentioned in the same breath with Jeff Beck and Eric Clapton and all that.
Q. You're playing a show in September in Akron, where you are doing the "Todd" and "Healing" albums in their entirety. So I guess you're going to be doing that insane Gilbert and Sullivan song ("Lord Chancellor's Nightmare Song")?
A. (Laughs) I'm doing that song, yes. Gilbert and Sullivan was one of my refuges from the travails of my teenage years. I had a friend who was a very smart guy and I did very poorly in school, so the way I would prove that I was smart was I would memorize all these Gilbert and Sullivan songs. I'd go to the library and get the full libretto in the bathtub for hours memorizing all the lyrics, then I'd come out with this stream of Victorian English. ("Nightmare Song") is still somewhere in my brain. It just needs dusting off. I've often thought it would be fun to do a stage musical like "Pirates of Penzance" or something like that.
Q. When you listen to the "Todd" album 36 years later, are you impressed with what you concocted? Some of that stuff is visionary.
A. Actually, I built my own studio during "A Wizard, A True Star" and that kind of set things off. We were no longer operating in a world of rules. (Laughs) We could do anything at any time. We had pretty much thrown off the yoke of the clock and whatever the studio owner might have told us about not plugging box A into box B. (Laughs) We could essentially do any nasty thing that we wanted. But that resulted in sounds that are difficult or impossible to reproduce later. The equipment doesn't exist anymore, or we just can't remember what order we plugged the things in.
Q. You have been adored in the Cleveland area for as long as I can remember. Any theories about this?
A. It just goes back a very long way, I think. Ohio was one of the first places that accepted the Nazz (Rundgren's late-'60s band), and for some reason that just continued. As soon as I began to play solo, Cleveland was one of those places we'd always go back to. We got good airplay. It's one of those mysteries I can't fully explain.
Q. Would you say you are happy with your place in the scheme of things? Many less talented than you have gone much further.
A. I probably could have managed my finances better, but at least I have finances to manage. (Chuckles) No, it's been great. I get just enough fame that I get a little consideration in restaurants sometimes, but at the same time I can eat that meal in that restaurant without getting pestered all through by people wanting attention for themselves from me. I've toured with Ringo, and I know the option is often just a really cloistered lifestyle and I don't like to live like that. I like to go out and walk around and see things. I'm totally satisfied.
Q. And you're going to keep performing forever?
A. Just like Tony Bennett and B.B. King. (Laughs)
Copyright 2010 CantonRep.com. Some rights reserved
Source and to add commentary:
http://www.cantonrep.com/carousel/x1876486273/Expect-the-unexpected-from-Todd-Rundgren
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Tye Dye TODD / HEALING shirts
You say you are trying to figure out what to wear at the Akron Todd/Healing show? (Or maybe at the Rundgren Radio Birthday Bash?)
How about a limited edition tie-dye shirt, featuring the concert poster I created?
Accepting pre-orders up until July 31 (must pre-pay). I'm not making any money on these, just charging my cost - $35 for kid's to X-large size, $38 for 2X and 3X. $3 more if you want the shirt mailed to you instead of being delivered in Akron. They are summerweight cotton t-shirts.
Send me a message if you are interested!
mjbphotos@yahoo.com mike birch
TELL HIM MIKE A SENT YOU !!!
Wednesday, July 7, 2010
Interview: "Elsewhere" TODD RUNDGREN INTERVIEWED (2010): Getting out his Johnson for you
http://www.elsewhere.co.nz/absoluteelsewhere/3309/todd-rundgren-interviewed-2010-getting-out-his-johnson-for-you/
Todd Rundgren laughs as he predicts the end the current model of on-line music sales which will disappear like the Sony Walkman and vinyl singles: “Because some songs are priceless, some songs are worthless . . . and some songs are worth exactly 99 cents”.
He should know. In a 40-plus year career he's made songs, and whole albums, in each category.
However although he has appeared on over 40 albums under his own name or that of his bands (the Nazz in the 60s, Utopia from the mid 70s), been producer for everyone from the New York Dolls and Patti Smith to Meat Loaf (Bat Out of Hell), Shaun Cassidy and the Psychedelic Furs, Rundgren allows himself another dry laugh as he describes his position in the marketplace of music.
“I'm a fringe artist.”
Given his long career – which admittedly has only troubled the American top 20 singles charts with I Saw the Light and Hello It's Me in the early 70s – you'd think this innovative musician who was also in the vanguard of video and internet technology would be a household name.
But if he's known for anything today it's as the man who acted as father for actress Liv Tyler – daughter of Aerosmith's Steve Tyler – when she was a child.
An amusing and almost detached observer of his own career, he notes a rare experience when he fronted the New Cars in 06 – the old Cars with him in for lead singer Ric Ocasek – and discovered a very different audience response from what he was use to. He admits people come to his shows expecting and wanting Hello It's Me “and I mostly don't play it because it's too out of context of what I'm doing at the time”.
Rundgren's wayward career has taken him from soul-pop through expansive prog-rock, from guitar hero to abandoning the guitar entirely. Yet he is currently out playing a programme of blues by the legendary Robert Johnson (1911-38) delivered in the style of the late 60s power-rock bands like Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. His new album is Todd Rundgren's Johnson – a title more risque to an American audience.
And he picks up a local rhythm section players when he comes to Australia and New Zealand later this year – and his visit is a surprise, even to him.
Just like the traveling bluesmen of old, just being a troubadour?
(Laughs) There has certainly been no up-tick in my record sales that would cause me to be popular Down Under, but my association with Hal Wilner brought me to Australia in January to do a Sydney summer festival and this was a fairly significant event, so I got a lot of direct exposure and coverage by the press. That was the necessary foot in the door to try and pursue some sort of tour.
The record only requires a quartet and a lot of people are familiar with the material, so it is plausible to pick up a rhythm section: my principal guitarist will rehearse the rhythm section before I get there.
And why versions of Robert Johnson at this time?
I went through an era where I almost eschewed electric guitar, my focus went elsewhere and I wanted to become a better singer and performer. So for a number of years I would front a large band and never play the guitar, never play any instrument, just dance around and sing.
I got back into the guitar some years ago and in a big way. I wanted to do an arena rock-style record – the record was Arena – but like so many artists of my generation – and maybe everyone these days – you get your material distributed independently. No one I know has any major company, five-record deal.
So it came time to do distribution for Arena and the company that made the deal also happened to administer the Robert Johnson music publishing. They made as a requirement to distributing Arena that I record an album of Robert Johnson tunes as well. They claimed to me that they were getting many requests for Johnson songs to be used in films and tv shows, essentially the mechanical license.
While they had the publishing they had no recorded versions so they required I make a record. I agreed to do it mostly because I wanted to get my record out and thought I would figure out how to deal with this later.
To my chagrin when I got around to doing it, it turns out Eric Clapton had been making a second career out of tributing Robert Johnson. After U2 did a song I was crestfallen, what was I going to do?
One of my heroes [Clapton] has already done it so anything I did would pale by comparison if nothing else. And the whole process will be creepy for me, constantly trying to outdo Eric Clapton.
It took a year and I came to the conclusion I was not directly influenced by Johnson, Eric Clapton was – and I was influenced by Clapton.
So I am not attempting to compete in my authenticity.
Another fortuitous coincidence was that my first gig as a professional was in a blues band so I understand the idiom. It wasn't a ridiculous leap to deconstruct and reconstruct this material into a way I was comfortable with.
But it is no way “a tribute”, you won't see those words anywhere there.
The entirety of Johnson is 40 - 45 minutes and that's an opening act. My shows are usually two to two and half hours, so of necessity I'm going to have to fill it out. The blues guy I know best is myself. My big initial influence was electric blues – and English people who did their own version of that. So all throughout my career are examples of my modernised or twisted take on the blues idiom.
My first band the Nazz, whose career was done by 69, and on the second record we rip off John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers featuring Eric Clapton.
In concert we may play a few songs people are actually familiar with.
In many ways the diversity of your career allows you to do pretty much what you like these days.
I don't believe I have much in the way of radio success, that is a great advantage to me because people send me notes saying, 'This show will be total shit unless you play this song'. This is helpful.
You've been quite good about revisiting your earlier work and playing albums in their entirety: you're soon doing The Healing and Todd albums.
I have a devoted audience because through this process of not playing what people expect me to play I have weeded out all the dilettantes. So now the audience I have is particularly devoted and will come to see anything I have to present. And if it is in package form will purchase anything I have to present. But a lot of it depends on a certain recognition that they need to get every once in a while and deeply desire.
They come about through Rundgrenradio . . . the guy who runs it plays the music and does interviews with anyone even tangentially related to my career, and it has a substantial hardcore following and go to for information. They decided they wanted to dabble in promotion and polled their audience and they [The Healing and Todd] were the records they wanted to hear.
No one was expecting the level of production that went into the first one, it is more a theatrical representation of the record . . . so now the expectation is high.
I'm interest in the fact that you also do what we might call re-creations of music – for example the Beatles on Deface the Music, the covers on Faithful and your own music in With A Twist . . . why??
The Nazz's first song was Open My Eyes – which was the Who and Beach Boys mashed together – and on the B-side was Hello It's Me, it was a dirgy version where I played vibes, and for some reason the record got flipped and it became a minor hit.
Years later when I wasn't a radio staple I was doing the Something/Anything album and the album consisted of me playing most of the instruments. It turned into a double album and by the last side there was enough of me playing by myself and wanted to do live-in-the-studio performances with no overdubs.
So I did half a dozen songs and one was a reworking of Hello It's Me with a more modern groove, background chorusses and a horn section. I did it because I thought it was a different way to do it, I was in a singer-songwriter phase.
In never thought about radio play but the biggest single became Hello It's Me and other bands covered it, like the Isley Brothers.
That's the song that if I don't play we have people walking out – and I mostly don't play it because it is too out of context of what it is I'm doing. If there was a context then I'd play it.
So I just thought I heard it in a more personal way and that's why I redid.
The moral of the story is I not only improved it in how the song could be interpreted, but it turned out to be a gigantic financial boon.
The New Cars must have been a different experience again?
Yeah, the thing that hit me the first time we played in front of an audience, we were eight songs in and people were still singing along. Which is completely different from my shows. If there are people at my shows who haven't fully kept up they are going to be stumped at several points in the show trying to remember where, if ever, they have heard this song. Plus I have this nasty habit lately of whatever my newest record is, I play the whole thing. And then give them the crumbs of older material.
That [New Cars] was an experience I haven't had on stage, that power of familiarity. You are not trying to sell anything, when they hear the first note they are fully committed and the song is sold.
It's part of your performers tool kit, you want to get the audience going and you are going to over indulge yourself and play some old jam . . . but you know at the end you have to play something they are familiar with, and it doesn't matter if it is Louie Louie.
You have had a long and diverse career in production. What attracts you to a project?
It's the material – which I think goes along with the priorities of most listeners. The thing they care most about is a decent song. They don't want to hear the most incredible version of the world's crappiest song. They would rather hear a half-assed version of the world's best song.
You are always striving to hear what it is in the material that might be attractive to a listener, and that's the most time-consuming aspect for me of the process.
Early in my production career I didn't vet the material too much, I figured we'd get in the studio and the combined talents would work out the problems. And for a lot of things that did work.
I had overconfidence in my own songwriting and if people didn't produce the goods I would just take over.
But if you develop some recognisable style, if you apply that to production you put your paw prints on everything you do, instead of letting the act put on their display, warts and all if necessary.
If their songwriting is weak and some label has decided to put the record out anyway then they are just going to have to live with the weak songwriting.
In the Seventies a review in Rolling Stone could make or break you, but you can't second-guess the taste of a critic let alone the buying audience, you have to have another vision of what you are trying to accomplish. I consider more timeless aspects of music . . . it's the phenomenon that gets Sinatra's Capitol recordings of Fifties rediscovered.
Some records don't get recognition but grow in stature.
You have to think like a musician – which can be hard if you are working with people who got paid a whole lot of money before they did anything which became the model. 'Here's the seven-figure advance, now make a record'.
But what did musicians do before we had a record industry, which is only about 100 years old? How did they live?
First, they were probably better musicians than today – but you got you paid for your performance so you had to hone that and be sharp -- today we are getting back to that – and the material had to stick in people's head somehow.
If they could just forget about you, you'd have no follow-up business.
The problem happened when the music industry discovered that music could be commoditised and success was no longer measured in the size of the audience you paid for or even, go forbid, how the local critics responded.
It became about figuring out what the buying patterns were, and it was all the Arbitron rating system, people in a room with a dial and an aggregate score.
If a number went below a certain point the record would never get released.
But most people are so unsophisticated they don't now what a chorus is (Laughs)
So basically you still listen for a good song?
The material doesn't have to be super-confident, it just has to be done with brio or some perceptible emotion. It also doesn't have to be technically perfect.
The thing people care the least about – which is the thing some artists, to my mystification are most obsessed with – is the actual sound quality.
Most people don't have studio-referenced sound quality. Since people started listening with earbuds, how can anybody figure out how to mix? There is no uniformity to how people listen.
Most sound systems come with distortion, like superbass, which most musicians try to keep out of their records. If there is any muddiness in the bottom end of the mix you've made you will rattle the walls and will sound horrible.
Is music still important? It seems like just another entertainment thing in the marketplace today.
As it became portable it became just a lifestyle accessory. It always has been in some aspects, there are always bands or acts meant for the musically naïve, like Taylor Swift. As people get older their experience grows, and seeing it performed live they realise that human beings do this, it's not all machines.
Like when you listen Sinatra's Capitol albums, they were mostly all one take, no overdubs, a 50 piece orchestra and the singer all locked in – and it is the performance they will strive to perform live from there on.
The Sony Walkman changed everything: random access, skipping over songs, that ate away at the album being principle form.
This is why the Internet model for selling music will eventually fail . . . people will realise that some songs are priceless, some songs are worthless and some songs are worth exactly 99 cents.
There is another new model out of Disneyworld: the new Mickey Mouse club singers who grow up with their audience. For some artists that is a close link with their audience for an album, and a guaranteed sales figure.
I used to do two solo albums, Utopia and three production jobs every year. Then variety and eclecticism was a selling point, now it seems there are too many artists are trying to cram into the same space, all of the Linkin Parks . . .
Some of what you have done is very amusing – I'm thinking of Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell – but humour and wit seems to be missing in music these days.
Yeah, it is pretty humourless, although it is there in some aspects of hip-hop – Flavour Flav is a pretty funny guy. But I'd like make a record like Absolutely Free, just a pastiche of guys musically goofing in the studio.
Of course Zappa asked 'Does humour belong in music?' Like Led Zeppelin said, 'Does anybody remember laughter?'
They do, the audience is prepared for it, comedians are filling sports arena now. If you have a choice of going into comedy or music these days I'd say your odds are 50:50.
Of course, if you are in a band you have to develop a sense of humour as a survival mechanism.
It's pretty deadly if you wind up in a situation with someone who has no sense of humour. It can make for some long and uncomfortable bus rides.
You've got to have a sense of humour in this day and age, it's too easy to f
Todd Rundgren laughs as he predicts the end the current model of on-line music sales which will disappear like the Sony Walkman and vinyl singles: “Because some songs are priceless, some songs are worthless . . . and some songs are worth exactly 99 cents”.
He should know. In a 40-plus year career he's made songs, and whole albums, in each category.
However although he has appeared on over 40 albums under his own name or that of his bands (the Nazz in the 60s, Utopia from the mid 70s), been producer for everyone from the New York Dolls and Patti Smith to Meat Loaf (Bat Out of Hell), Shaun Cassidy and the Psychedelic Furs, Rundgren allows himself another dry laugh as he describes his position in the marketplace of music.
“I'm a fringe artist.”
Given his long career – which admittedly has only troubled the American top 20 singles charts with I Saw the Light and Hello It's Me in the early 70s – you'd think this innovative musician who was also in the vanguard of video and internet technology would be a household name.
But if he's known for anything today it's as the man who acted as father for actress Liv Tyler – daughter of Aerosmith's Steve Tyler – when she was a child.
An amusing and almost detached observer of his own career, he notes a rare experience when he fronted the New Cars in 06 – the old Cars with him in for lead singer Ric Ocasek – and discovered a very different audience response from what he was use to. He admits people come to his shows expecting and wanting Hello It's Me “and I mostly don't play it because it's too out of context of what I'm doing at the time”.
Rundgren's wayward career has taken him from soul-pop through expansive prog-rock, from guitar hero to abandoning the guitar entirely. Yet he is currently out playing a programme of blues by the legendary Robert Johnson (1911-38) delivered in the style of the late 60s power-rock bands like Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. His new album is Todd Rundgren's Johnson – a title more risque to an American audience.
And he picks up a local rhythm section players when he comes to Australia and New Zealand later this year – and his visit is a surprise, even to him.
Just like the traveling bluesmen of old, just being a troubadour?
(Laughs) There has certainly been no up-tick in my record sales that would cause me to be popular Down Under, but my association with Hal Wilner brought me to Australia in January to do a Sydney summer festival and this was a fairly significant event, so I got a lot of direct exposure and coverage by the press. That was the necessary foot in the door to try and pursue some sort of tour.
The record only requires a quartet and a lot of people are familiar with the material, so it is plausible to pick up a rhythm section: my principal guitarist will rehearse the rhythm section before I get there.
And why versions of Robert Johnson at this time?
I went through an era where I almost eschewed electric guitar, my focus went elsewhere and I wanted to become a better singer and performer. So for a number of years I would front a large band and never play the guitar, never play any instrument, just dance around and sing.
I got back into the guitar some years ago and in a big way. I wanted to do an arena rock-style record – the record was Arena – but like so many artists of my generation – and maybe everyone these days – you get your material distributed independently. No one I know has any major company, five-record deal.
So it came time to do distribution for Arena and the company that made the deal also happened to administer the Robert Johnson music publishing. They made as a requirement to distributing Arena that I record an album of Robert Johnson tunes as well. They claimed to me that they were getting many requests for Johnson songs to be used in films and tv shows, essentially the mechanical license.
While they had the publishing they had no recorded versions so they required I make a record. I agreed to do it mostly because I wanted to get my record out and thought I would figure out how to deal with this later.
To my chagrin when I got around to doing it, it turns out Eric Clapton had been making a second career out of tributing Robert Johnson. After U2 did a song I was crestfallen, what was I going to do?
One of my heroes [Clapton] has already done it so anything I did would pale by comparison if nothing else. And the whole process will be creepy for me, constantly trying to outdo Eric Clapton.
It took a year and I came to the conclusion I was not directly influenced by Johnson, Eric Clapton was – and I was influenced by Clapton.
So I am not attempting to compete in my authenticity.
Another fortuitous coincidence was that my first gig as a professional was in a blues band so I understand the idiom. It wasn't a ridiculous leap to deconstruct and reconstruct this material into a way I was comfortable with.
But it is no way “a tribute”, you won't see those words anywhere there.
The entirety of Johnson is 40 - 45 minutes and that's an opening act. My shows are usually two to two and half hours, so of necessity I'm going to have to fill it out. The blues guy I know best is myself. My big initial influence was electric blues – and English people who did their own version of that. So all throughout my career are examples of my modernised or twisted take on the blues idiom.
My first band the Nazz, whose career was done by 69, and on the second record we rip off John Mayall and the Bluesbreakers featuring Eric Clapton.
In concert we may play a few songs people are actually familiar with.
In many ways the diversity of your career allows you to do pretty much what you like these days.
I don't believe I have much in the way of radio success, that is a great advantage to me because people send me notes saying, 'This show will be total shit unless you play this song'. This is helpful.
You've been quite good about revisiting your earlier work and playing albums in their entirety: you're soon doing The Healing and Todd albums.
I have a devoted audience because through this process of not playing what people expect me to play I have weeded out all the dilettantes. So now the audience I have is particularly devoted and will come to see anything I have to present. And if it is in package form will purchase anything I have to present. But a lot of it depends on a certain recognition that they need to get every once in a while and deeply desire.
They come about through Rundgrenradio . . . the guy who runs it plays the music and does interviews with anyone even tangentially related to my career, and it has a substantial hardcore following and go to for information. They decided they wanted to dabble in promotion and polled their audience and they [The Healing and Todd] were the records they wanted to hear.
No one was expecting the level of production that went into the first one, it is more a theatrical representation of the record . . . so now the expectation is high.
I'm interest in the fact that you also do what we might call re-creations of music – for example the Beatles on Deface the Music, the covers on Faithful and your own music in With A Twist . . . why??
The Nazz's first song was Open My Eyes – which was the Who and Beach Boys mashed together – and on the B-side was Hello It's Me, it was a dirgy version where I played vibes, and for some reason the record got flipped and it became a minor hit.
Years later when I wasn't a radio staple I was doing the Something/Anything album and the album consisted of me playing most of the instruments. It turned into a double album and by the last side there was enough of me playing by myself and wanted to do live-in-the-studio performances with no overdubs.
So I did half a dozen songs and one was a reworking of Hello It's Me with a more modern groove, background chorusses and a horn section. I did it because I thought it was a different way to do it, I was in a singer-songwriter phase.
In never thought about radio play but the biggest single became Hello It's Me and other bands covered it, like the Isley Brothers.
That's the song that if I don't play we have people walking out – and I mostly don't play it because it is too out of context of what it is I'm doing. If there was a context then I'd play it.
So I just thought I heard it in a more personal way and that's why I redid.
The moral of the story is I not only improved it in how the song could be interpreted, but it turned out to be a gigantic financial boon.
The New Cars must have been a different experience again?
Yeah, the thing that hit me the first time we played in front of an audience, we were eight songs in and people were still singing along. Which is completely different from my shows. If there are people at my shows who haven't fully kept up they are going to be stumped at several points in the show trying to remember where, if ever, they have heard this song. Plus I have this nasty habit lately of whatever my newest record is, I play the whole thing. And then give them the crumbs of older material.
That [New Cars] was an experience I haven't had on stage, that power of familiarity. You are not trying to sell anything, when they hear the first note they are fully committed and the song is sold.
It's part of your performers tool kit, you want to get the audience going and you are going to over indulge yourself and play some old jam . . . but you know at the end you have to play something they are familiar with, and it doesn't matter if it is Louie Louie.
You have had a long and diverse career in production. What attracts you to a project?
It's the material – which I think goes along with the priorities of most listeners. The thing they care most about is a decent song. They don't want to hear the most incredible version of the world's crappiest song. They would rather hear a half-assed version of the world's best song.
You are always striving to hear what it is in the material that might be attractive to a listener, and that's the most time-consuming aspect for me of the process.
Early in my production career I didn't vet the material too much, I figured we'd get in the studio and the combined talents would work out the problems. And for a lot of things that did work.
I had overconfidence in my own songwriting and if people didn't produce the goods I would just take over.
But if you develop some recognisable style, if you apply that to production you put your paw prints on everything you do, instead of letting the act put on their display, warts and all if necessary.
If their songwriting is weak and some label has decided to put the record out anyway then they are just going to have to live with the weak songwriting.
In the Seventies a review in Rolling Stone could make or break you, but you can't second-guess the taste of a critic let alone the buying audience, you have to have another vision of what you are trying to accomplish. I consider more timeless aspects of music . . . it's the phenomenon that gets Sinatra's Capitol recordings of Fifties rediscovered.
Some records don't get recognition but grow in stature.
You have to think like a musician – which can be hard if you are working with people who got paid a whole lot of money before they did anything which became the model. 'Here's the seven-figure advance, now make a record'.
But what did musicians do before we had a record industry, which is only about 100 years old? How did they live?
First, they were probably better musicians than today – but you got you paid for your performance so you had to hone that and be sharp -- today we are getting back to that – and the material had to stick in people's head somehow.
If they could just forget about you, you'd have no follow-up business.
The problem happened when the music industry discovered that music could be commoditised and success was no longer measured in the size of the audience you paid for or even, go forbid, how the local critics responded.
It became about figuring out what the buying patterns were, and it was all the Arbitron rating system, people in a room with a dial and an aggregate score.
If a number went below a certain point the record would never get released.
But most people are so unsophisticated they don't now what a chorus is (Laughs)
So basically you still listen for a good song?
The material doesn't have to be super-confident, it just has to be done with brio or some perceptible emotion. It also doesn't have to be technically perfect.
The thing people care the least about – which is the thing some artists, to my mystification are most obsessed with – is the actual sound quality.
Most people don't have studio-referenced sound quality. Since people started listening with earbuds, how can anybody figure out how to mix? There is no uniformity to how people listen.
Most sound systems come with distortion, like superbass, which most musicians try to keep out of their records. If there is any muddiness in the bottom end of the mix you've made you will rattle the walls and will sound horrible.
Is music still important? It seems like just another entertainment thing in the marketplace today.
As it became portable it became just a lifestyle accessory. It always has been in some aspects, there are always bands or acts meant for the musically naïve, like Taylor Swift. As people get older their experience grows, and seeing it performed live they realise that human beings do this, it's not all machines.
Like when you listen Sinatra's Capitol albums, they were mostly all one take, no overdubs, a 50 piece orchestra and the singer all locked in – and it is the performance they will strive to perform live from there on.
The Sony Walkman changed everything: random access, skipping over songs, that ate away at the album being principle form.
This is why the Internet model for selling music will eventually fail . . . people will realise that some songs are priceless, some songs are worthless and some songs are worth exactly 99 cents.
There is another new model out of Disneyworld: the new Mickey Mouse club singers who grow up with their audience. For some artists that is a close link with their audience for an album, and a guaranteed sales figure.
I used to do two solo albums, Utopia and three production jobs every year. Then variety and eclecticism was a selling point, now it seems there are too many artists are trying to cram into the same space, all of the Linkin Parks . . .
Some of what you have done is very amusing – I'm thinking of Meat Loaf's Bat Out of Hell – but humour and wit seems to be missing in music these days.
Yeah, it is pretty humourless, although it is there in some aspects of hip-hop – Flavour Flav is a pretty funny guy. But I'd like make a record like Absolutely Free, just a pastiche of guys musically goofing in the studio.
Of course Zappa asked 'Does humour belong in music?' Like Led Zeppelin said, 'Does anybody remember laughter?'
They do, the audience is prepared for it, comedians are filling sports arena now. If you have a choice of going into comedy or music these days I'd say your odds are 50:50.
Of course, if you are in a band you have to develop a sense of humour as a survival mechanism.
It's pretty deadly if you wind up in a situation with someone who has no sense of humour. It can make for some long and uncomfortable bus rides.
You've got to have a sense of humour in this day and age, it's too easy to f
Chef jam video's
64SWAMPRAT | July 06, 2010
Todd Rundgren:guitar, Mark Hart:guitar, Donnie DeCarlo:guitar, Jim Ennis:bass, Neehar Menon: keys, percussion, Steve Schimoler: drums, Dave Lowe: drums, Billy Cokely: drums
broke down and busted
Todd Rundgren:guitar, Mark Hart:guitar, Donnie DeCarlo:guitar, Jim Ennis:bass, Neehar Menon: keys, percussion, Steve Schimoler: drums, Dave Lowe: drums, Billy Cokely: drums
broke down and busted
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
RundgrenRadio tonight
RundgrenRadio.com airs TONIGHT Tuesday July 6th beginning at 8:30pm ET. Tonight's show will feature "Healing" and "Todd" covers songs from fans and professionals! Oh yeah, some of our usual banter will be included and the chat room open
Monday, July 5, 2010
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Friday, July 2, 2010
toddfest west
Hi all--
Time is flying by -- I can hardly believe that Todd/Fest West is at the end
of this month!
As usual, it will be a fun and casual gathering of Todd fans near and far.
Bring yourself, your friends/family, TR memorabilia/video/photos/whatnot,
musical instruments, suntan lotion, food/drink for the potluck, and of
course, your smiles and good energy! Pls let us know if you'd like to plan
an activity -- parodies, sing-along, trivia, games, etc.
RSVP by 7/19/10 if you'd like a personalized laminate, but you can otherwise
RSVP up til the day of the event.
Steve Lafond will once again be creating the laminates and is looking for a
recent Todd photo for this project. He's looking for a high quality
(300dpi) JPEG image of Todd to use -- so, if you've got a recent shot or two
or three that you'd like considered for the laminate pls send to
steve@tohf.com
Again, the details:
What: ToddFest/West
When: Sat, July 31, 2010 -- noon until the festivities die down
Where: At John Hanavan's wonderful home in Oakland, CA, not too far from
Rockridge BART -- exact location given to those who RSVP
Pls let us know if you need hotel/transportation suggestions.
debbie@infogirl.net
Time is flying by -- I can hardly believe that Todd/Fest West is at the end
of this month!
As usual, it will be a fun and casual gathering of Todd fans near and far.
Bring yourself, your friends/family, TR memorabilia/video/photos/whatnot,
musical instruments, suntan lotion, food/drink for the potluck, and of
course, your smiles and good energy! Pls let us know if you'd like to plan
an activity -- parodies, sing-along, trivia, games, etc.
RSVP by 7/19/10 if you'd like a personalized laminate, but you can otherwise
RSVP up til the day of the event.
Steve Lafond will once again be creating the laminates and is looking for a
recent Todd photo for this project. He's looking for a high quality
(300dpi) JPEG image of Todd to use -- so, if you've got a recent shot or two
or three that you'd like considered for the laminate pls send to
steve@tohf.com
Again, the details:
What: ToddFest/West
When: Sat, July 31, 2010 -- noon until the festivities die down
Where: At John Hanavan's wonderful home in Oakland, CA, not too far from
Rockridge BART -- exact location given to those who RSVP
Pls let us know if you need hotel/transportation suggestions.
debbie@infogirl.net
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
For Lack of Honest Work available for preorder
here is a cheap site with free shipping to preorder the 3 cd bootleg set.
http://www.deepdiscount.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/productID/987D0B82-917A-4A0A-A328-F839BD37CD2F/
Todd Rundgren - "For Lack Of Honest Work” Box Set - Now Available For Pre-Order!
Experience Todd Rundgren live through the decades with this 3-CD box set.
Fans can now order the box set via Collector’s Choice Music online store and shipping July 1.
Order @ http://www.ccmusic.com/item.cfm?itemid=MIW101061
Fans can also order the box set via Amazon - http://www.amazon.com/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC
"For Lack Of Honest Work" Box Set is also now available for pre-order in the following countries!
United Kingdom - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659828&sr=8-1
Germany - http://www.amazon.de/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659972&sr=8-1
Canada - http://www.amazon.ca/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659628&sr=8-1
Japan - http://www.amazon.co.jp/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659690&sr=8-1
Keep updated on worldwide release dates, FULL show releases and spread the word about this release.
http://www.deepdiscount.com/index.cfm/fuseaction/product.detail/productID/987D0B82-917A-4A0A-A328-F839BD37CD2F/
Todd Rundgren - "For Lack Of Honest Work” Box Set - Now Available For Pre-Order!
Experience Todd Rundgren live through the decades with this 3-CD box set.
Fans can now order the box set via Collector’s Choice Music online store and shipping July 1.
Order @ http://www.ccmusic.com/item.cfm?itemid=MIW101061
Fans can also order the box set via Amazon - http://www.amazon.com/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC
"For Lack Of Honest Work" Box Set is also now available for pre-order in the following countries!
United Kingdom - http://www.amazon.co.uk/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659828&sr=8-1
Germany - http://www.amazon.de/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659972&sr=8-1
Canada - http://www.amazon.ca/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659628&sr=8-1
Japan - http://www.amazon.co.jp/Lack-Honest-Work-Todd-Rundgren/dp/B003PIUIEC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1276659690&sr=8-1
Keep updated on worldwide release dates, FULL show releases and spread the word about this release.
Monday, June 28, 2010
Audio: interview of New Zealand interview
Legendary rocker and producer of Bat Out Of Hell, Todd Rundgren - Audio
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/Legendary-rocker-and-producer-of-Bat-Out-Of-Hell-Todd-Rundgren/tabid/506/articleID/14248/Default.aspx
http://www.radiolive.co.nz/Legendary-rocker-and-producer-of-Bat-Out-Of-Hell-Todd-Rundgren/tabid/506/articleID/14248/Default.aspx
Sunday, June 27, 2010
Video: MULADHARA-THE DANCE OF THE KUNDALINI/SVADHISHTHANA w/ backing tracks From the album INITIATIONS along with Fire of mind and Outra Pana
M Risen posted this a while ago on Youtube. it is one of my favorite non commercial pieces that Todd has created. actually i have many other favorites. Starting at the 4minute mark you get the hear the backing tracks that were used to create this piece. Very intersting to hear how todd pieced together this song.
MULADHARA-THE DANCE OF THE KUNDALINI/SVADHISHTHANA-BAM,BHAM,MAM,YAM,RAM,LAM,THANK YOU,MAHM FROM "A TREATISE ON COSMIC FIRE", FROM TODD RUNDGREN'S 1975 LP "INITIATION" ONE OF TODD'S MOST EXPERIMENTAL TUNES, WAS RECORDED AT BEARSVILLE STUDIO AND TODD'S SECRET SOUND STUDIO WITH HELP FROM SYNTHESIZER WIZ ROGER POWELL IN THE SUMMER OF 1974. COMPRISED MOSTLY OF TAPE LOOPS AND PATCHES EDITED TOGETHER TO MAKE INDIVIDUAL MUSICIAL SEGMENTS THIS IS TRULY THE ROOTS OF TECHNO MUSIC. RECORDED MOSTLY ON MOOG AND ARP SYNTHESIZERS. THE BACKING TRACKS ARE FROM REELS THAT WERE FOUND IN BEARSVILLE STUDIOS TAPE VAULT BY TODD WHEN HE VISITED THE STUDIO IN 1998.
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THE FIRE OF MIND-OR SOLAR FIRE FROM "A TREATISE ON COSMIC FIRE", FROM TODD RUNDGREN'S 1975 LP "INITIATION" ONE OF TODD'S MOST EXPERIMENTAL TUNES, WAS RECORDED AT BEARSVILLE STUDIO AND TODD'S SECRET SOUND STUDIO WITH HELP FROM SYNTHESIZER WIZ ROGER POWELL IN THE SUMMER OF 1974. COMPRISED MOSTLY OF TAPE LOOPS AND PATCHES EDITED TOGETHER TO MAKE INDIVIDUAL MUSICIAL SEGMENTS THIS IS TRULY THE ROOTS OF TECHNO MUSIC. RECORDED MOSTLY ON MOOG AND ARP SYNTHESIZERS.
outro pana with that amazing guitar work
RARE RE-MIX OF PRANA LOCATED ON THE FLIP SIDE OF THE "REAL MAN" 45 RPM SINGLE. YOU MAY BE SAYING TO YOURSELF, THIS IS PLAYING TOO SLOW? THIS IS PLAYING AT THE CORRECT SPEED AS THE ENTIRE SIDE 2 OF INITIATION WAS SPED UP 1/2 A STEP TO FIT ONTO ONE SIDE OF VINYL AS COMFORTABLY AS POSSIBLE, SLOW IT DOWN A HALF STEP ONE DAY TO LISTEN TO IT AS IT WAS INTENDED. THE GUITAR IS MIXED FURTHER UP IN THE MIX AS WELL AS THE DRUMS BEING MORE PROMINATE.
MULADHARA-THE DANCE OF THE KUNDALINI/SVADHISHTHANA-BAM,BHAM,MAM,YAM,RAM,LAM,THANK YOU,MAHM FROM "A TREATISE ON COSMIC FIRE", FROM TODD RUNDGREN'S 1975 LP "INITIATION" ONE OF TODD'S MOST EXPERIMENTAL TUNES, WAS RECORDED AT BEARSVILLE STUDIO AND TODD'S SECRET SOUND STUDIO WITH HELP FROM SYNTHESIZER WIZ ROGER POWELL IN THE SUMMER OF 1974. COMPRISED MOSTLY OF TAPE LOOPS AND PATCHES EDITED TOGETHER TO MAKE INDIVIDUAL MUSICIAL SEGMENTS THIS IS TRULY THE ROOTS OF TECHNO MUSIC. RECORDED MOSTLY ON MOOG AND ARP SYNTHESIZERS. THE BACKING TRACKS ARE FROM REELS THAT WERE FOUND IN BEARSVILLE STUDIOS TAPE VAULT BY TODD WHEN HE VISITED THE STUDIO IN 1998.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
THE FIRE OF MIND-OR SOLAR FIRE FROM "A TREATISE ON COSMIC FIRE", FROM TODD RUNDGREN'S 1975 LP "INITIATION" ONE OF TODD'S MOST EXPERIMENTAL TUNES, WAS RECORDED AT BEARSVILLE STUDIO AND TODD'S SECRET SOUND STUDIO WITH HELP FROM SYNTHESIZER WIZ ROGER POWELL IN THE SUMMER OF 1974. COMPRISED MOSTLY OF TAPE LOOPS AND PATCHES EDITED TOGETHER TO MAKE INDIVIDUAL MUSICIAL SEGMENTS THIS IS TRULY THE ROOTS OF TECHNO MUSIC. RECORDED MOSTLY ON MOOG AND ARP SYNTHESIZERS.
outro pana with that amazing guitar work
RARE RE-MIX OF PRANA LOCATED ON THE FLIP SIDE OF THE "REAL MAN" 45 RPM SINGLE. YOU MAY BE SAYING TO YOURSELF, THIS IS PLAYING TOO SLOW? THIS IS PLAYING AT THE CORRECT SPEED AS THE ENTIRE SIDE 2 OF INITIATION WAS SPED UP 1/2 A STEP TO FIT ONTO ONE SIDE OF VINYL AS COMFORTABLY AS POSSIBLE, SLOW IT DOWN A HALF STEP ONE DAY TO LISTEN TO IT AS IT WAS INTENDED. THE GUITAR IS MIXED FURTHER UP IN THE MIX AS WELL AS THE DRUMS BEING MORE PROMINATE.
Video: unloved children
upped my imharpo
i love the guitar solo with the "FOOL".... and yes this is the REAL "FOOL"
i love the guitar solo with the "FOOL".... and yes this is the REAL "FOOL"
Friday, June 25, 2010
News Article: New Zealand shows
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/entertainment/news/article.cfm?c_id=1501119&objectid=10654336&pnum=0
Hello it's me (and Johnson)
4:00 AM Saturday Jun 26, 2010
Todd Rundgren is also known as the man who acted as father for actress Liv Tyler. Photo / SuppliedTodd Rundgren laughs as he predicts the end of the current model of on-line music sales, which will disappear like the Sony Walkman and vinyl singles: "Because some songs are priceless, some songs are worthless ... . and some songs are worth exactly 99 cents."
He should know. In a 40-plus year career, he's made songs, and whole albums, in each category.
However, although he has appeared on more than 40 albums under his own name or that of his bands (the Nazz in the 60s, Utopia from the mid-70s), been producer for everyone from the New York Dolls and Patti Smith to Meat Loaf (Bat Out of Hell), Shaun Cassidy and the Psychedelic Furs, Rundgren allows himself another dry laugh as he describes his position in the marketplace of music.
"I'm a fringe artist."
Given his long career - which admittedly has only troubled the American top 20 singles charts with I Saw the Light and Hello It's Me in the early 70s - you'd think this innovative musician who was also in the vanguard of video and internet technology would be a household name.
But if he's known for anything today it's as the man who acted as father for actress Liv Tyler - daughter of Aerosmith's Steve Tyler - when she was a child.
Rundgren's wayward career has taken him from soul-pop through expansive prog-rock, from guitar hero to abandoning the guitar entirely. Yet he comes to New Zealand playing a programme of blues by the legendary Robert Johnson (1911-38), delivered in the style of the late 60s power-rock bands like Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. His new album is Todd Rundgren's Johnson - a title more risque to an American audience.
And he's candid about why he's gone in this direction. It wasn't by choice.
After years of not playing guitar to concentrate on singing, he decided to record a stadium rock album - Arena - and needed a distributor.
"The company that made the deal administered Johnson's music publishing and a requirement to distributing Arena was I record an album of Johnson tunes. I agreed because I wanted to get my record out and thought I'd figure out how to deal with this later."
In the meantime, however, Eric Clapton started making "a second career" out of paying tribute to Johnson - an influence on musicians such as Keith Richards, John Mayall and Clapton - "so anything I did would pale by comparison. It would be creepy, trying to outdo Eric Clapton."
Ironically, he concluded he could do justice to the old bluesman's music by playing it in a power-rock format like Clapton's Cream so he wouldn't be competing with Clapton in the "authenticity" stakes.
And so that's what he touring now - with pick-up musicians in different regions to make it economic. Just like bluesmen of old.
"The entirety of Johnson is 40-45 minutes and that's an opening act. My shows are usually two to two-and-a-half hours, so of necessity I'm going to fill it out. The blues guy I know best is myself. My big initial influence was electric blues and English people like Clapton who did their own version of that."
So his show is one part electric Johnson and a large dollop of Todd as guitar hero.
Such conceptual projects have long been Rundgren's method of working and, recently, he has taken to playing his earlier albums in their entirety. Again not his idea.
An American fan started Rundgren Radio which broadcasts his music and related interviews and, through listener surveys, learned what albums fans wanted Rundgren to play. So after decades of simply going his own way musically, he now occasionally meets the marketplace demand, and the theatrical shows, playing his classic albums A Wizard, A True Star and Something/Anything sell out.
"I have a devoted audience because through not playing what people expect I have weeded out all the dilettantes. So now the audience I have will come to see anything I have to present, but it depends on a certain recognition they need to get every once in a while and deeply desire. So I go and do that."
An amusing and almost detached observer of his own career, he notes a rare experience when he fronted the New Cars in 06 - the old Cars with him in for lead singer Ric Ocasek - and discovered a very different audience response from what he was used to.
He admits people come to his shows expecting and wanting Hello It's Me "and I mostly don't play it because it's too out of context of what I'm doing at the time".
"So the first time [the New Cars] played we were eight songs in and people were still singing along. Completely different than my shows. If there are people at my shows who haven't fully kept up with my career they're stumped at several points trying to remember where, if ever, they've heard this song.
"But with the New Cars, there was that power of familiarity, when they hear the first note they are fully committed and the song is sold."
As someone who has sat in a studio with artists as diverse as Meat Loaf, XTC (he produced the fraught sessions for their glorious Skylarking) and Grand Funk Railroad, Rundgren observes his role as producer, "goes along with the priorities of most listeners, a decent song".
"People don't want to hear the most incredible version of the world's crappiest song. They would rather hear a half-assed version of of the world's best song. You are always striving to hear material that might be attractive to a listener.
"Material doesn't have to be super confident, it just has to be done with style or some perceptible emotion. The thing people care least about is the thing some artists, to my mystification, are most obsessed with: sound quality.
"There is no uniformity to how people listen anymore."
Opinionated, slightly cynical and funny, Rundgren - who produced Bat Out of Hell remember - says he doesn't hear much humour in music these days outside of hip-hop ("Flavor Flav is a funny guy").
"I'd love to make a record like [Frank Zappa's] Absolutely Free, just guys musically goofing off in the studio. And the audience is prepared for it, comedians are filling sports arena now.
"If you have a choice of going into comedy or music your odds are 50:50. And if you're in a band, you have to develop a sense of humour as a survival mechanism.
"It's deadly if you wind up with someone who has no sense of humour. It can make for some long, uncomfortable bus rides.
"You've got to have a sense of humour in this day and age. It's too easy to fail."
LOWDOWN
Who: Guitar hero Todd Rundgren
Where and when: Powerstation, September 24
Trivia: In 1980 with his band Utopia, Rundgren wrote and recorded the album Deface the Music on which he paid homage to the Beatles by writing songs in their changing styles.
Hello it's me (and Johnson)
4:00 AM Saturday Jun 26, 2010
Todd Rundgren is also known as the man who acted as father for actress Liv Tyler. Photo / SuppliedTodd Rundgren laughs as he predicts the end of the current model of on-line music sales, which will disappear like the Sony Walkman and vinyl singles: "Because some songs are priceless, some songs are worthless ... . and some songs are worth exactly 99 cents."
He should know. In a 40-plus year career, he's made songs, and whole albums, in each category.
However, although he has appeared on more than 40 albums under his own name or that of his bands (the Nazz in the 60s, Utopia from the mid-70s), been producer for everyone from the New York Dolls and Patti Smith to Meat Loaf (Bat Out of Hell), Shaun Cassidy and the Psychedelic Furs, Rundgren allows himself another dry laugh as he describes his position in the marketplace of music.
"I'm a fringe artist."
Given his long career - which admittedly has only troubled the American top 20 singles charts with I Saw the Light and Hello It's Me in the early 70s - you'd think this innovative musician who was also in the vanguard of video and internet technology would be a household name.
But if he's known for anything today it's as the man who acted as father for actress Liv Tyler - daughter of Aerosmith's Steve Tyler - when she was a child.
Rundgren's wayward career has taken him from soul-pop through expansive prog-rock, from guitar hero to abandoning the guitar entirely. Yet he comes to New Zealand playing a programme of blues by the legendary Robert Johnson (1911-38), delivered in the style of the late 60s power-rock bands like Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. His new album is Todd Rundgren's Johnson - a title more risque to an American audience.
And he's candid about why he's gone in this direction. It wasn't by choice.
After years of not playing guitar to concentrate on singing, he decided to record a stadium rock album - Arena - and needed a distributor.
"The company that made the deal administered Johnson's music publishing and a requirement to distributing Arena was I record an album of Johnson tunes. I agreed because I wanted to get my record out and thought I'd figure out how to deal with this later."
In the meantime, however, Eric Clapton started making "a second career" out of paying tribute to Johnson - an influence on musicians such as Keith Richards, John Mayall and Clapton - "so anything I did would pale by comparison. It would be creepy, trying to outdo Eric Clapton."
Ironically, he concluded he could do justice to the old bluesman's music by playing it in a power-rock format like Clapton's Cream so he wouldn't be competing with Clapton in the "authenticity" stakes.
And so that's what he touring now - with pick-up musicians in different regions to make it economic. Just like bluesmen of old.
"The entirety of Johnson is 40-45 minutes and that's an opening act. My shows are usually two to two-and-a-half hours, so of necessity I'm going to fill it out. The blues guy I know best is myself. My big initial influence was electric blues and English people like Clapton who did their own version of that."
So his show is one part electric Johnson and a large dollop of Todd as guitar hero.
Such conceptual projects have long been Rundgren's method of working and, recently, he has taken to playing his earlier albums in their entirety. Again not his idea.
An American fan started Rundgren Radio which broadcasts his music and related interviews and, through listener surveys, learned what albums fans wanted Rundgren to play. So after decades of simply going his own way musically, he now occasionally meets the marketplace demand, and the theatrical shows, playing his classic albums A Wizard, A True Star and Something/Anything sell out.
"I have a devoted audience because through not playing what people expect I have weeded out all the dilettantes. So now the audience I have will come to see anything I have to present, but it depends on a certain recognition they need to get every once in a while and deeply desire. So I go and do that."
An amusing and almost detached observer of his own career, he notes a rare experience when he fronted the New Cars in 06 - the old Cars with him in for lead singer Ric Ocasek - and discovered a very different audience response from what he was used to.
He admits people come to his shows expecting and wanting Hello It's Me "and I mostly don't play it because it's too out of context of what I'm doing at the time".
"So the first time [the New Cars] played we were eight songs in and people were still singing along. Completely different than my shows. If there are people at my shows who haven't fully kept up with my career they're stumped at several points trying to remember where, if ever, they've heard this song.
"But with the New Cars, there was that power of familiarity, when they hear the first note they are fully committed and the song is sold."
As someone who has sat in a studio with artists as diverse as Meat Loaf, XTC (he produced the fraught sessions for their glorious Skylarking) and Grand Funk Railroad, Rundgren observes his role as producer, "goes along with the priorities of most listeners, a decent song".
"People don't want to hear the most incredible version of the world's crappiest song. They would rather hear a half-assed version of of the world's best song. You are always striving to hear material that might be attractive to a listener.
"Material doesn't have to be super confident, it just has to be done with style or some perceptible emotion. The thing people care least about is the thing some artists, to my mystification, are most obsessed with: sound quality.
"There is no uniformity to how people listen anymore."
Opinionated, slightly cynical and funny, Rundgren - who produced Bat Out of Hell remember - says he doesn't hear much humour in music these days outside of hip-hop ("Flavor Flav is a funny guy").
"I'd love to make a record like [Frank Zappa's] Absolutely Free, just guys musically goofing off in the studio. And the audience is prepared for it, comedians are filling sports arena now.
"If you have a choice of going into comedy or music your odds are 50:50. And if you're in a band, you have to develop a sense of humour as a survival mechanism.
"It's deadly if you wind up with someone who has no sense of humour. It can make for some long, uncomfortable bus rides.
"You've got to have a sense of humour in this day and age. It's too easy to fail."
LOWDOWN
Who: Guitar hero Todd Rundgren
Where and when: Powerstation, September 24
Trivia: In 1980 with his band Utopia, Rundgren wrote and recorded the album Deface the Music on which he paid homage to the Beatles by writing songs in their changing styles.
interview: Ameriblues.com
http://www.ameriblues.com/2010/06/interview-of-todd-rundgren-by-monica.html
Today we meet up with Todd Rundgren, who has a new CD being released this summer that showcases Robert Johnson songs. For now, Todd has labeled the mini version of his songs already released as, "Todd Rundgren's Short Johnson". Todd's first professional music experiences are blues based, as he performed with the band, Woody's Truck Stop. From there, for those of you familiar with his music, a collection of Todd's hit songwriting was compiled with songs like, "Can We Still Be Friends?", "I Saw the Light", "Hello It's Me", and my favorite, "Bang the Drum All Day".
As a songwriter, one is more in tune with the mechanics of the song. If one is writing a hit song for the radio, as Todd has done, one is quite aware of specific rules that need to be followed in the songwriting process. Listeners expect things in a song, a standard format that is repetitive. The goal in this being to have the users sing along, catch the song in their head, and be listened to and requested or be a branding tool for various markets. Now the blues doesn't do any of these things. Your first verse may not be like your second verse, and your second verse may not be like your third verse. Todd speaks of how he had to untrain himself to tackle this project, which led him back to his initial professional musical days of the blues.
Todd shares with me his icons. He speaks of his personal legend, Eric Clapton and how this CD pays tribute to Mr. Clapton moreso than Mr. Johnson, and how intimidating it was to start this project. He speaks of his gratefulness of The Beatles and how he may never be where he is today as a professional musician without them, which was a thought I never had. And, though Todd has reached great musical heights, he is very realistic in knowing his strengths and weaknesses with music.
Todd spoke of how musicians can be a combination of entertainers, musicians, and celebrities. Todd put on a great show that I saw in the Pittsburgh area, so entertainer: check. His guitar playing placed him with one of his icons, Ringo Starr in his All Starr Band, so musician: check. And as a celebrity, well he didn't act like one at all. Celebrity: No. Famous: Yes. We laughed a fair amount and I truly enjoyed speaking with him. So, two out of three ain't bad! Probably, three out of three would be bad! BTW, yesterday was Todd's birthday and anniversary. So, hit him up on FACEBOOK and offer some well wishes and let him know you can't wait for the CD to come out this summer! Here's what we talked about.
Monica: Hi Todd! How are you doing today!
Todd: Not so bad!
M: Hey Todd-How does a Pennsylvania person get to live in Hawaii?
T: (He laughed.) It’s a long trek but worth it!
M: Did you learn how to surf?
T: No. Actually, I’m not a very good swimmer, so I enjoy the ocean from the standpoint of being near it. I don’t go in it very much.
M: You seem to like to do a lot of different things. You seem to have been all over music. Electronic music, progressive rock. Do you find it rewarding or frustrating to venture into so many different things?
T: I’ve always maintained a distinction in my own mind between the role of a musician, the role of an entertainer, and the role of a celebrity. They are all distinct things. You could be all three. You could be only one of the three as well. The thing that drove me initially was my appreciation for music. When I first started out the idea of being in a band and making a living at that seemed like a very unlikely career choice, because I grew up in the fifties and early sixties before The Beatles. Very few people made music, You would either have to go music school and learn how to read and play. At least Classical music, at least be able to read music and play standards. So you could get a gig by sitting around a union musician’s office waiting for someone to ask for five pieces for a wedding.
Then The Beatles happened. Anybody who could find three friends who could make a little bit of noise with an instrument could not only make a living at it, you could become world famous. It completely changed the way that I thought about music. The way a lot of people thought about music. The difference for me was that I already felt I had a commitment to music, before I realized that you could become famous and successful at it. The Beatles demonstrated that to a lot of people. So a lot of bands in the mid sixties started to form around that basic concept.
And, I decided I wanted to get into a band with my friends or with anyone that had the equipment and could play. And all through my high school years I was in various sorts of bands. I never saw myself in those days as a front man. I just wanted to be a guitar player and devoted myself to any sort of music that would advance myself as a guitar player. I believe I was a junior in high school when I met a kid in the neighborhood who had developed this appreciation for the blues, and was a very convincing harp player. He was the one that introduced me to the Paul Butterfield Band and Junior Wells, James Cotton and other phenomenal harmonica players. And through them, guitar players like Buddy Guy and Howlin’ Wolfe and various other musicians. The great advantage I had was at the time they were still alive. You could see them and see them play in a club. I always had a thing about music and all the different forms that it could take. I never felt..
M: There’s a learning curve when you take on something new. It seems you never were frustrated. You just took it on.
T: Some people have a fascination with music that derives from the feeling that they get from it. People who become musicians are interested in the mechanisms behind it. The mood, the scales, the way you turn the notes into a mood and things like that. There’s the average person’s appreciation of music, and then there’s the appreciation that a musician has for music, in addition to whatever feelings it conveys to them. I guess very early on I was fascinated by how was music transcribed.
When I was very young, I tried to teach myself how to transcribe music with what little I knew about it. In the end I never really developed the skill, for instance, to come up with the melody in my head and write it down on scoring paper. Or, even more difficult for me is looking at a score and being interpreted into notes. Then I ended up doing everything by ear. That also makes you more adept at music than the average person...this ability to take a snapshot in your mind of music, and be able to analyze it at your leisure. I always had that aptitude. That’s what led me in the direction of music. As I said, most people never really thought that making music is a practical living until The Beatles came along, and demonstrated how successful you could be at it.
M: I don’t think music and the arts are promoted enough even today. You talked about The Beatles and you did play in Ringo’s All Starr Band, did you thank him?
T: Well. When Ringo asks you to play, you realize that if you're of that generation, which is the generation that I came from, you almost owe your living to The Beatles, because they were the ones that went out and demonstrated what kind of success you can have with just a quartet. Yeah. I freely admit that, and I believe that most of the people that I know will admit it as well. They never would have gotten the idea to make music their career if it was not for The Beatles.
M: I agree. You stated that the kind of music you play depends on your mood. So why are you doing a blues album now? What were your thoughts?
T: It is a little bit ironic.
M: You started out with blues...
T: When I first went to high school and to find a gig, unfortunately had to get in a band that was a local act from Philadelphia called, Woody’s Truck Stop. They were a white blues band in the same mold as the Butterfild Band. Same kind of lineup. Two guitar players, keyboard, bass, drums and a harp player. That was my first real gig. It lasted probably about nine months before the rest of the band decided they wanted to go to the country and drop acid and become a Grateful Dead style jam band, and I decided that I wanted to go in a different direction.
I started to incorporate more British influences. The acts that influenced me besides The Beatles were: The Who, The Yardbirds, Cream, Jeff Beck. Bands that were coming out of this English Blues tradition that has a whole history of it’s own. It is related to what happens here in the US. In England there was a lot of towns in England that are sea faring towns that also became towns of great musical influence, for instance, Liverpool.
The thing about Liverpool is all the British Merchant Marines sailors would go back and forth to the United States and out of those ports of call out of the Southern United States, like for instance, Mobile, Alabama, which is a big shipbuilding community like Liverpool. They would find all of these recordings that were not available in England, and indeed not available in most of the US because they were blues records by black artists and were considered race records. There were a lot of places that would not play this music, and then it would not be stocked in record stores. Ironically all of these blues records are finding their way to the ears of young British musicians. But not to the ears of young American musicians. So we started hearing about all of this music through bands like the Yardbirds and Cream and other blues influenced groups like the Jeff Beck group. They were white like we were.
So we started to play it like they played it, which was a derivative style and not necessarily authentic in the way that black Blues music was. That was the path that we took. It was so much more about guitar playing than about anything else. It become a platform for a lot of us to hone our guitar skills.
To answer you question, I was originally in a blues band but never recorded any blues music while I was in that band. About two years ago I was finishing up a record called “Arena”. I made a deal with a company who not only distributed records, but also had publishing catalogs, and one of them was the Robert Johnson catalog. They had no masters of Robert Johnson’s songs. Those were owned by somebody else. So, part of the deal they made with me was for my distribution of my record “Arena” was that I would do an album of Robert Johnson covers, so that they would have songs they could use for mechanical licenses and things like that.
So, I agreed to it without thinking about what the challenges were. When I got around to confronting those challenges, it took me quite a long time to figure out how I was going to approach it. I finally figured out that I should just go back to the way that I would have done it in the sixties. Think like a white English guitar player. Figure out a way to structure all of these songs so that I have an excuse to play guitar.
M: Why do you play guitar more so than piano? I see you play.
T: Well, I went through a phase of being a piano player, and I use a lot of keyboards on my own records. I’ve pretty much stopped playing piano live, because I’m not very good at it in a live context. I’m fumble fingered. I tend to concentrate on what I’m singing, and then forget what I’m playing and get lost. I did a double bill tour with Joe Jackson, who is an accomplished piano player, and the comparisons were just too unflattering. So I came to the conclusion that I should stick with the guitar live. Just avoid the embarrassment. (He laughed.)
M: You know that’s probably next, a keyboard hero game on Wii like Guitar Hero.
T: It’s very competitive That‘s how it was in the sixties. Top Gun. Everyone knew that Eric Clapton was the top gun and he kind of got unseated by Jimi Hendrix. That’s kind of the way it went.
M: Do you really think Clapton was number one? Don’t you think BB King? If you want to be the best in guitar you have to pick who you think the best is and emulate it. So who was the best to you that you wanted to model after?
TL Originally it was Eric Clapton. But as a kid it was Duane Eddie and things like that. The guitar instrumentals of the fifties. For a while there were very few guitar players to emulate or model yourself after. Then when The Beatles came out, everyone wanted to play like George Harrison. But George Harrison was not an improviser. He would work out these very meticulous, very musical guitar parts. They were like transcriptions. It was a good way to develop technique, but not a way to free yourself for the improvisational aspects that blues kind of demands.
The blues, unlike jazz...the improvisational aspects of the blues is not like the improvisational aspects of jazz. Jazz is trying to take something that is very structured and elaborate on it and find different ways to listen to it. Blues is improvisational, because blues players never remember what they played the last time! They never memorize anything!
The thing I learned from Robert Johnson is, his takes never played the same thing. They don’t go to any trouble to try to get something down to a particular way. They play it once. And, they kind of play it remembering part of what they played. They are just trying to think up the rest of it. They never had the discipline to remember something literally or they may be a little drunk. It’s a difficult thing when you are used to playing the same thing all the time to teach yourself to be forgetful. It’s something that comes naturally to someone born of the blues. Something that the rest of us may never learn how to do. We may never learn how to be forgetful or learn not to care about a particular melody line or something.
M: You know I have to agree with you. When you think about the open jams and you are up there with a bunch of people you never met and you’re not sure how things are going to come out, you can just divert to the feeling of the music.
T: That’s essentially it. Jazz is the void of emotion. Equally intense in terms of emotion. What a Jazz player is trying to accomplish is nothing like a Blues player is trying to accomplish. A jazz player is purposefully trying to break rules, and a blues player never knew what the rules were in the first place.
M: They are playing for feeling and it turns out well. Honestly, it does! It just works.
T: It’s a tough idiom to understand once you develop a certain level of sophistication and understanding about music. It’s really difficult to go back and develop that naivety, and in that sense, I don’t even try. I take that secondary more derivative approach, which is I’m a guitar player and I hear the music as an opportunity for me to get liberated. As a guitar player, that’s my approach to it.
M: I did catch your show in Greensburg, PA. It was a really great show. There was a great song that you did. Something about Jalapeño Peppers?
T: What’s that? (He laughed.)
M: I don’t know. I just knew that I had to learn it.
T: You’re talking about "Hot Tamales"?
M: Yes, that would be a great song for a female!
T: He makes food references and other references all the time because of all the sexual innuendos. That’s true blues. Come on in my kitchen. There’s a whole lot of them. It’s funny kind of music, because it’s idiomatic. There are cultural references that have gone out of fashion. And, if you sang literally what the lyrics are to a Robert Johnson song, people would just be scratching their heads thinking, “What the hell does that mean?”
M: Oh...you know what it means!
T: Half the time you have to do that anyways. I had no idea what a nation’s sack was.
M: What is it?
T: It’s a little kind of voodoo bag that a woman makes to keep her man faithful. It has little things in it that she gives him to maintain his favor. Obviously, there is no such thing anymore. It was one of the lyrics I couldn’t figure out a substitute for. I did it literally. There are other kinds of weird combinations that you had to try to straighten out a little bit for a contemporary ear.
M: Sounds like you had fun doing this.
T: I did. Once I finally got over the stigma of the fact that one of my personal heroes, Eric Clapton, had already devoted a significant part of his lifetime to tributing the music of Robert Johnson...that was the thing holding me back the most from getting the project on. I finally said, "The hell with it, and I have to start this", and not be so self conscious about the fact that I am not tributing Robert Johnson directly. I’m tributing Eric Clapton more so than Robert Johnson. I’m tributing my guitar influences.
M: I find that when I talk to a lot of blues guitarists, that they keep going back to where they find a root. I find it interesting that you said that you wanted to go back to where you started, and take a listen to where your roots are. You didn’t take a look at how it evolved through these years. I find that interesting.
T: There is argument about authenticity in the day. Can a white man sing the blues? Can a white man play the blues? Is it even feasible? There would be purist of all stripes of all colors that would maintain both sides of that issue. Certain people can get by with not being born black, but do it with such commitment and sincerity. And, that was Eric Clapton. Nobody would argue with Eric Clapton’s right to play the blues. No one is going to say that Eric Clapton can’t play the blues because he is white. He became an influence of guitar players of all colors, even other black guitar players. For a very long time, when a lot of us white guys were discovering the blues and putting our own spin on it, there were still those that thought it should be played a certain way. Or you had to do a funny thing to your voice and sing gruff to sound more bluesy. The whole point, as you pointed out, is if the music doesn‘t transport you, then it doesn‘t matter who you are or what color you are. You, as a musician, must be transported by what you are playing.
M: I find it amazing that you touched on a question that I was going to ask. You said there are great musicians, entertainers, and celebrities. What is most important to you in your musical career?
T: There are people that are incredible musicians that are incredibly boring to watch. For whatever reason, they may be feeling the hell out of it, but just don’t convey that in any sense. This is part of the original argument of white vs. blacks. It was originally to entertain each other. To feel no shame in expressing yourself.
For white people, it was kind of the other way around. You don’t want to give yourself away. Be reserved to people. Don’t guess what’s going on inside of you. To get yourself to essentially to change your nature and be able to express yourself in the same way as someone who was brought up to express themselves, is not an easy thing. It doesn’t necessarily compromise what you feel about what you are playing.
I, essentially in becoming a performer, I got famous not by being a blues performer, but as someone who wrote their own music and the band emulated The Who, which was somewhat of a carnival. The great thing about The Who, was that everyone in the band was worth looking at, because the lead singer is swinging his microphone all around. Pete is jumping all over the place, and Keith is going freakin’ crazy and there was a Frankenstein character just staring and his fingers are going all over the place. They were just a great band to watch. This was how you got your money's worth. We developed our show on this. That never left me. That’s something that would come naturally to someone born into the blues. To demonstrate your feelings would come naturally. For a white guy, I had to see a bunch of other white guys like The Who flailing around, for me to figure out how to express myself.
M: Your stage performance was great in Greensburg.
T: In a sense you are trying to do more than just move your fingers. You are trying to put your entire being to reach maximum impact before trying to reach the entire audience. That was the whole…things have changed a little bit...when people think of live performance and production, they hire a choreographer and dancers instead of developing their individual performance. And, such, maybe the competition isn’t what it used to be. It used to be the kind of show you put on that was your competitive edge. Now, records sales make up for that I suppose.
M: Do you miss those big productions? You used to have the backup singers, and costumes...
T: I really enjoy when I can afford to do that. There are different kinds of shows. That’s where the bar is. The more of a spectacle you can put on for people, creates memories for your audience. They will remember those shows. Even if they never see you again, you left them with something really worth remembering. The reality is you can’t always afford to do that. I’m lucky if I can take a lighting guy on the road now a days! (He laughed.)
M: Your lighting was beautiful. That stage was beautiful.
T: It’s definitely worth it. It’s nice to have someone who makes the lights go on and off at the right time. It’s tough when you are standing there when all the lights are on.
M: Like a deer in the headlights?
T: That’s part of the impact of the show I think (We are both laughing.).When the lights work it makes the whole thing seem like you care more! (It's a shame you can't hear him say this!)
M: It was beautiful.
T: Terrific!
We talked about a few more things, since he is a fellow Pennsylvania guy. Oh, one more thing, Happy Birthday Todd!
Copyright © 2010 Copyright Monica L. Yasher. All Rights Reserved.
Photograph Copyright © 2010 Maureen Ceidro. All Rights Reserved
Today we meet up with Todd Rundgren, who has a new CD being released this summer that showcases Robert Johnson songs. For now, Todd has labeled the mini version of his songs already released as, "Todd Rundgren's Short Johnson". Todd's first professional music experiences are blues based, as he performed with the band, Woody's Truck Stop. From there, for those of you familiar with his music, a collection of Todd's hit songwriting was compiled with songs like, "Can We Still Be Friends?", "I Saw the Light", "Hello It's Me", and my favorite, "Bang the Drum All Day".
As a songwriter, one is more in tune with the mechanics of the song. If one is writing a hit song for the radio, as Todd has done, one is quite aware of specific rules that need to be followed in the songwriting process. Listeners expect things in a song, a standard format that is repetitive. The goal in this being to have the users sing along, catch the song in their head, and be listened to and requested or be a branding tool for various markets. Now the blues doesn't do any of these things. Your first verse may not be like your second verse, and your second verse may not be like your third verse. Todd speaks of how he had to untrain himself to tackle this project, which led him back to his initial professional musical days of the blues.
Todd shares with me his icons. He speaks of his personal legend, Eric Clapton and how this CD pays tribute to Mr. Clapton moreso than Mr. Johnson, and how intimidating it was to start this project. He speaks of his gratefulness of The Beatles and how he may never be where he is today as a professional musician without them, which was a thought I never had. And, though Todd has reached great musical heights, he is very realistic in knowing his strengths and weaknesses with music.
Todd spoke of how musicians can be a combination of entertainers, musicians, and celebrities. Todd put on a great show that I saw in the Pittsburgh area, so entertainer: check. His guitar playing placed him with one of his icons, Ringo Starr in his All Starr Band, so musician: check. And as a celebrity, well he didn't act like one at all. Celebrity: No. Famous: Yes. We laughed a fair amount and I truly enjoyed speaking with him. So, two out of three ain't bad! Probably, three out of three would be bad! BTW, yesterday was Todd's birthday and anniversary. So, hit him up on FACEBOOK and offer some well wishes and let him know you can't wait for the CD to come out this summer! Here's what we talked about.
Monica: Hi Todd! How are you doing today!
Todd: Not so bad!
M: Hey Todd-How does a Pennsylvania person get to live in Hawaii?
T: (He laughed.) It’s a long trek but worth it!
M: Did you learn how to surf?
T: No. Actually, I’m not a very good swimmer, so I enjoy the ocean from the standpoint of being near it. I don’t go in it very much.
M: You seem to like to do a lot of different things. You seem to have been all over music. Electronic music, progressive rock. Do you find it rewarding or frustrating to venture into so many different things?
T: I’ve always maintained a distinction in my own mind between the role of a musician, the role of an entertainer, and the role of a celebrity. They are all distinct things. You could be all three. You could be only one of the three as well. The thing that drove me initially was my appreciation for music. When I first started out the idea of being in a band and making a living at that seemed like a very unlikely career choice, because I grew up in the fifties and early sixties before The Beatles. Very few people made music, You would either have to go music school and learn how to read and play. At least Classical music, at least be able to read music and play standards. So you could get a gig by sitting around a union musician’s office waiting for someone to ask for five pieces for a wedding.
Then The Beatles happened. Anybody who could find three friends who could make a little bit of noise with an instrument could not only make a living at it, you could become world famous. It completely changed the way that I thought about music. The way a lot of people thought about music. The difference for me was that I already felt I had a commitment to music, before I realized that you could become famous and successful at it. The Beatles demonstrated that to a lot of people. So a lot of bands in the mid sixties started to form around that basic concept.
And, I decided I wanted to get into a band with my friends or with anyone that had the equipment and could play. And all through my high school years I was in various sorts of bands. I never saw myself in those days as a front man. I just wanted to be a guitar player and devoted myself to any sort of music that would advance myself as a guitar player. I believe I was a junior in high school when I met a kid in the neighborhood who had developed this appreciation for the blues, and was a very convincing harp player. He was the one that introduced me to the Paul Butterfield Band and Junior Wells, James Cotton and other phenomenal harmonica players. And through them, guitar players like Buddy Guy and Howlin’ Wolfe and various other musicians. The great advantage I had was at the time they were still alive. You could see them and see them play in a club. I always had a thing about music and all the different forms that it could take. I never felt..
M: There’s a learning curve when you take on something new. It seems you never were frustrated. You just took it on.
T: Some people have a fascination with music that derives from the feeling that they get from it. People who become musicians are interested in the mechanisms behind it. The mood, the scales, the way you turn the notes into a mood and things like that. There’s the average person’s appreciation of music, and then there’s the appreciation that a musician has for music, in addition to whatever feelings it conveys to them. I guess very early on I was fascinated by how was music transcribed.
When I was very young, I tried to teach myself how to transcribe music with what little I knew about it. In the end I never really developed the skill, for instance, to come up with the melody in my head and write it down on scoring paper. Or, even more difficult for me is looking at a score and being interpreted into notes. Then I ended up doing everything by ear. That also makes you more adept at music than the average person...this ability to take a snapshot in your mind of music, and be able to analyze it at your leisure. I always had that aptitude. That’s what led me in the direction of music. As I said, most people never really thought that making music is a practical living until The Beatles came along, and demonstrated how successful you could be at it.
M: I don’t think music and the arts are promoted enough even today. You talked about The Beatles and you did play in Ringo’s All Starr Band, did you thank him?
T: Well. When Ringo asks you to play, you realize that if you're of that generation, which is the generation that I came from, you almost owe your living to The Beatles, because they were the ones that went out and demonstrated what kind of success you can have with just a quartet. Yeah. I freely admit that, and I believe that most of the people that I know will admit it as well. They never would have gotten the idea to make music their career if it was not for The Beatles.
M: I agree. You stated that the kind of music you play depends on your mood. So why are you doing a blues album now? What were your thoughts?
T: It is a little bit ironic.
M: You started out with blues...
T: When I first went to high school and to find a gig, unfortunately had to get in a band that was a local act from Philadelphia called, Woody’s Truck Stop. They were a white blues band in the same mold as the Butterfild Band. Same kind of lineup. Two guitar players, keyboard, bass, drums and a harp player. That was my first real gig. It lasted probably about nine months before the rest of the band decided they wanted to go to the country and drop acid and become a Grateful Dead style jam band, and I decided that I wanted to go in a different direction.
I started to incorporate more British influences. The acts that influenced me besides The Beatles were: The Who, The Yardbirds, Cream, Jeff Beck. Bands that were coming out of this English Blues tradition that has a whole history of it’s own. It is related to what happens here in the US. In England there was a lot of towns in England that are sea faring towns that also became towns of great musical influence, for instance, Liverpool.
The thing about Liverpool is all the British Merchant Marines sailors would go back and forth to the United States and out of those ports of call out of the Southern United States, like for instance, Mobile, Alabama, which is a big shipbuilding community like Liverpool. They would find all of these recordings that were not available in England, and indeed not available in most of the US because they were blues records by black artists and were considered race records. There were a lot of places that would not play this music, and then it would not be stocked in record stores. Ironically all of these blues records are finding their way to the ears of young British musicians. But not to the ears of young American musicians. So we started hearing about all of this music through bands like the Yardbirds and Cream and other blues influenced groups like the Jeff Beck group. They were white like we were.
So we started to play it like they played it, which was a derivative style and not necessarily authentic in the way that black Blues music was. That was the path that we took. It was so much more about guitar playing than about anything else. It become a platform for a lot of us to hone our guitar skills.
To answer you question, I was originally in a blues band but never recorded any blues music while I was in that band. About two years ago I was finishing up a record called “Arena”. I made a deal with a company who not only distributed records, but also had publishing catalogs, and one of them was the Robert Johnson catalog. They had no masters of Robert Johnson’s songs. Those were owned by somebody else. So, part of the deal they made with me was for my distribution of my record “Arena” was that I would do an album of Robert Johnson covers, so that they would have songs they could use for mechanical licenses and things like that.
So, I agreed to it without thinking about what the challenges were. When I got around to confronting those challenges, it took me quite a long time to figure out how I was going to approach it. I finally figured out that I should just go back to the way that I would have done it in the sixties. Think like a white English guitar player. Figure out a way to structure all of these songs so that I have an excuse to play guitar.
M: Why do you play guitar more so than piano? I see you play.
T: Well, I went through a phase of being a piano player, and I use a lot of keyboards on my own records. I’ve pretty much stopped playing piano live, because I’m not very good at it in a live context. I’m fumble fingered. I tend to concentrate on what I’m singing, and then forget what I’m playing and get lost. I did a double bill tour with Joe Jackson, who is an accomplished piano player, and the comparisons were just too unflattering. So I came to the conclusion that I should stick with the guitar live. Just avoid the embarrassment. (He laughed.)
M: You know that’s probably next, a keyboard hero game on Wii like Guitar Hero.
T: It’s very competitive That‘s how it was in the sixties. Top Gun. Everyone knew that Eric Clapton was the top gun and he kind of got unseated by Jimi Hendrix. That’s kind of the way it went.
M: Do you really think Clapton was number one? Don’t you think BB King? If you want to be the best in guitar you have to pick who you think the best is and emulate it. So who was the best to you that you wanted to model after?
TL Originally it was Eric Clapton. But as a kid it was Duane Eddie and things like that. The guitar instrumentals of the fifties. For a while there were very few guitar players to emulate or model yourself after. Then when The Beatles came out, everyone wanted to play like George Harrison. But George Harrison was not an improviser. He would work out these very meticulous, very musical guitar parts. They were like transcriptions. It was a good way to develop technique, but not a way to free yourself for the improvisational aspects that blues kind of demands.
The blues, unlike jazz...the improvisational aspects of the blues is not like the improvisational aspects of jazz. Jazz is trying to take something that is very structured and elaborate on it and find different ways to listen to it. Blues is improvisational, because blues players never remember what they played the last time! They never memorize anything!
The thing I learned from Robert Johnson is, his takes never played the same thing. They don’t go to any trouble to try to get something down to a particular way. They play it once. And, they kind of play it remembering part of what they played. They are just trying to think up the rest of it. They never had the discipline to remember something literally or they may be a little drunk. It’s a difficult thing when you are used to playing the same thing all the time to teach yourself to be forgetful. It’s something that comes naturally to someone born of the blues. Something that the rest of us may never learn how to do. We may never learn how to be forgetful or learn not to care about a particular melody line or something.
M: You know I have to agree with you. When you think about the open jams and you are up there with a bunch of people you never met and you’re not sure how things are going to come out, you can just divert to the feeling of the music.
T: That’s essentially it. Jazz is the void of emotion. Equally intense in terms of emotion. What a Jazz player is trying to accomplish is nothing like a Blues player is trying to accomplish. A jazz player is purposefully trying to break rules, and a blues player never knew what the rules were in the first place.
M: They are playing for feeling and it turns out well. Honestly, it does! It just works.
T: It’s a tough idiom to understand once you develop a certain level of sophistication and understanding about music. It’s really difficult to go back and develop that naivety, and in that sense, I don’t even try. I take that secondary more derivative approach, which is I’m a guitar player and I hear the music as an opportunity for me to get liberated. As a guitar player, that’s my approach to it.
M: I did catch your show in Greensburg, PA. It was a really great show. There was a great song that you did. Something about Jalapeño Peppers?
T: What’s that? (He laughed.)
M: I don’t know. I just knew that I had to learn it.
T: You’re talking about "Hot Tamales"?
M: Yes, that would be a great song for a female!
T: He makes food references and other references all the time because of all the sexual innuendos. That’s true blues. Come on in my kitchen. There’s a whole lot of them. It’s funny kind of music, because it’s idiomatic. There are cultural references that have gone out of fashion. And, if you sang literally what the lyrics are to a Robert Johnson song, people would just be scratching their heads thinking, “What the hell does that mean?”
M: Oh...you know what it means!
T: Half the time you have to do that anyways. I had no idea what a nation’s sack was.
M: What is it?
T: It’s a little kind of voodoo bag that a woman makes to keep her man faithful. It has little things in it that she gives him to maintain his favor. Obviously, there is no such thing anymore. It was one of the lyrics I couldn’t figure out a substitute for. I did it literally. There are other kinds of weird combinations that you had to try to straighten out a little bit for a contemporary ear.
M: Sounds like you had fun doing this.
T: I did. Once I finally got over the stigma of the fact that one of my personal heroes, Eric Clapton, had already devoted a significant part of his lifetime to tributing the music of Robert Johnson...that was the thing holding me back the most from getting the project on. I finally said, "The hell with it, and I have to start this", and not be so self conscious about the fact that I am not tributing Robert Johnson directly. I’m tributing Eric Clapton more so than Robert Johnson. I’m tributing my guitar influences.
M: I find that when I talk to a lot of blues guitarists, that they keep going back to where they find a root. I find it interesting that you said that you wanted to go back to where you started, and take a listen to where your roots are. You didn’t take a look at how it evolved through these years. I find that interesting.
T: There is argument about authenticity in the day. Can a white man sing the blues? Can a white man play the blues? Is it even feasible? There would be purist of all stripes of all colors that would maintain both sides of that issue. Certain people can get by with not being born black, but do it with such commitment and sincerity. And, that was Eric Clapton. Nobody would argue with Eric Clapton’s right to play the blues. No one is going to say that Eric Clapton can’t play the blues because he is white. He became an influence of guitar players of all colors, even other black guitar players. For a very long time, when a lot of us white guys were discovering the blues and putting our own spin on it, there were still those that thought it should be played a certain way. Or you had to do a funny thing to your voice and sing gruff to sound more bluesy. The whole point, as you pointed out, is if the music doesn‘t transport you, then it doesn‘t matter who you are or what color you are. You, as a musician, must be transported by what you are playing.
M: I find it amazing that you touched on a question that I was going to ask. You said there are great musicians, entertainers, and celebrities. What is most important to you in your musical career?
T: There are people that are incredible musicians that are incredibly boring to watch. For whatever reason, they may be feeling the hell out of it, but just don’t convey that in any sense. This is part of the original argument of white vs. blacks. It was originally to entertain each other. To feel no shame in expressing yourself.
For white people, it was kind of the other way around. You don’t want to give yourself away. Be reserved to people. Don’t guess what’s going on inside of you. To get yourself to essentially to change your nature and be able to express yourself in the same way as someone who was brought up to express themselves, is not an easy thing. It doesn’t necessarily compromise what you feel about what you are playing.
I, essentially in becoming a performer, I got famous not by being a blues performer, but as someone who wrote their own music and the band emulated The Who, which was somewhat of a carnival. The great thing about The Who, was that everyone in the band was worth looking at, because the lead singer is swinging his microphone all around. Pete is jumping all over the place, and Keith is going freakin’ crazy and there was a Frankenstein character just staring and his fingers are going all over the place. They were just a great band to watch. This was how you got your money's worth. We developed our show on this. That never left me. That’s something that would come naturally to someone born into the blues. To demonstrate your feelings would come naturally. For a white guy, I had to see a bunch of other white guys like The Who flailing around, for me to figure out how to express myself.
M: Your stage performance was great in Greensburg.
T: In a sense you are trying to do more than just move your fingers. You are trying to put your entire being to reach maximum impact before trying to reach the entire audience. That was the whole…things have changed a little bit...when people think of live performance and production, they hire a choreographer and dancers instead of developing their individual performance. And, such, maybe the competition isn’t what it used to be. It used to be the kind of show you put on that was your competitive edge. Now, records sales make up for that I suppose.
M: Do you miss those big productions? You used to have the backup singers, and costumes...
T: I really enjoy when I can afford to do that. There are different kinds of shows. That’s where the bar is. The more of a spectacle you can put on for people, creates memories for your audience. They will remember those shows. Even if they never see you again, you left them with something really worth remembering. The reality is you can’t always afford to do that. I’m lucky if I can take a lighting guy on the road now a days! (He laughed.)
M: Your lighting was beautiful. That stage was beautiful.
T: It’s definitely worth it. It’s nice to have someone who makes the lights go on and off at the right time. It’s tough when you are standing there when all the lights are on.
M: Like a deer in the headlights?
T: That’s part of the impact of the show I think (We are both laughing.).When the lights work it makes the whole thing seem like you care more! (It's a shame you can't hear him say this!)
M: It was beautiful.
T: Terrific!
We talked about a few more things, since he is a fellow Pennsylvania guy. Oh, one more thing, Happy Birthday Todd!
Copyright © 2010 Copyright Monica L. Yasher. All Rights Reserved.
Photograph Copyright © 2010 Maureen Ceidro. All Rights Reserved
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
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