The GNP Crescendo Record Company in 2021 released a brand new, never-before heard recording that is essential and required listening for any student of the blues.

     Live In Los Angeles 1954 captures the father of the electric blues, Muddy Waters, at the peak of his powers, in a riveting performance that easily explains an immense reputation that continues to this day.

    Muddy and his band were appearing at one of deejay, impresario and visionary GNP Crescendo founder Gene Norman’s legendary blues and jazz promotions at the Shrine Auditorium, which drew unprecedented crowds to hear some of the best talent the Chicago music world had to offer. On this particular occasion, Waters’ ensemble featured pianist Otis Spann, guitarist Jimmy Rogers, Elgin Evans, and harmonica legend Little George Smith.  

    Their twenty-minute set on September 25, 1954, includes the blues classics made famous by Muddy, “Hoochie Coochie Man” and “I Just Want To Make Love To You,” along with exciting romps through “Baby Please Don’t Go” and “I’m Ready.” There’s also the bonus of a brief interview with Muddy.

   The tape of the performance has lain in the Crescendo vaults for decades, until dusted off by producer Neil Norman for this special issue. The sound quality is sensational for a recording of such vintage, and the package is presented on 10-inch vinyl in a deluxe tip-on sleeve, with art in the mode of the iconic early 1950s Gene Norman Presents logo.

    Few albums have been as influential as Muddy Waters' debut album The Best of Muddy Waters, a humble piece of vinyl released by Chess Records label in 1958 that served as The Big Bang for rock 'n' roll and the ensuing half century of modern popular culture.

    In 2017, Geffen/UMe celebrated the 60^th anniversary of Waters' first LP on Chess by reissuing The Best of Muddy Waters on vinyl in original mono for the first time in 30 years while also making it available for download and streaming for the first time ever, giving new and familiar listeners a reminder of the blues man's truly incandescent music.

    Universal/Spectrum in the U.K. has also released a 2 CD compilation Can’t Be Satisfied: The Very Best of Muddy Waters 1947-1975. 

    I witnessed Muddy Waters and his bands in the sixties and seventies in Los Angeles and Hollywood bookings.  

    Last decade I spoke with two Muddy Waters fans who also caught Muddy on stage.

          “I saw Muddy Waters at the Ash Grove club in L.A. on Melrose Avenue in 1971,” remembered deejay and poet Dr. James Cushing.

    “His set began with his band doing a couple of instrumental numbers. And his lead guitarist was playing a Fender Jaguar through a wah-wah pedal. Muddy was seated and played slide.  When I was exposed to his voice and slide work solos in person, I got from that moment the same thing a bunch of privileged white suburban kids got which was sense of total authenticity and integrity.

    “This was popular music in which the bull shit quotient was as close to zero. Muddy did a song from 1949, before I was born, the same decade as World War 2.

    “I heard a voice where history is speaking to me. I jumped on a table in the room because I couldn’t control myself to do otherwise. I had just learned in the most dramatic possible way that adulthood was not a drag. That it was possible to imagine an adulthood that was not as uselessly fucked up that my alcoholic parents had modeled for me,” Cushing confessed.     

  “Muddy and Chess Records are the bricks from which rock ‘n’ roll is built. All their music was consciously produced studio creations that were worked out by Muddy with Phil or Leonard Chess in order for maximum sales.

    “In Chicago you have Jewish Polish emigrants form Chess Records. In New York there’s Blue Note, started by Austrian Jewish emigrants, and in Hollywood then you have Capitol Records in Hollywood with Stan Kenton, which has a more complex label history with songwriters as principals and the movie industry.

     “Those were the three great centers of American music in the late 1940’s and early ‘50’s. And they need to be seen, I think, as examples of American cultural diversity at its best.”

    Veteran music business legend Marshall Chess is the son of Leonard and nephew of Phil Chess, the dynamic duo who founded the monumental Chicago-based blues label.

    After departing from Chess Records in 1969, Marshall formed and served as President of Rolling Stone Records for seven years.  He helped create the Rolling Stones famous tongue and lip logo and was involved as Executive Producer on 7 Rolling Stone #1 albums during the 1970’s.  

I’ve interviewed Marshall Chess a few times this century. In one discussion we focused on Muddy Waters.  

Q: Around 1969 in West Hollywood at Fairfax High School, the Father and Sons album on Chess with Muddy, Otis Spann, Sam Lay, Buddy Miles Paul Butterfield, Michael Bloomfield, and Donald “Duck” Dunn was the big hit in the school with LP collectors and stoners. It’s been reissued by Universal. The version of “Long Distance Call” is totally amazing!  

A: Man, and live, you couldn’t see it, Muddy did this dance on ‘Got My Mojo Working’ that was unreal! Like Nureyev. He put down his guitar and did a pirouette. The place went wild! You can hear it on the record. You can hear the crowd when that happens.

Q: The Muddy Waters’ legacy.

A: You know, what is the magic then and the magic now of Muddy Waters and he was a genius. No, I mean, like any genius artist, you look at a Rembrandt or Picasso, it's great. You get magic, you know, you look at it, you look at a great film, Magic. How do you describe that? He had something, and the way he carried himself that wasn't just in his music, man. The memorable way he carried himself like a leader, like a chief, these are my impressions. As a kid, he was like the leader. A very special man. And my father, they had this tremendous, powerful relationship. Muddy called me Young Chess. He and the other Chess artists always asked me “did I get some?” I eventually did. Of course, at that age it's making me remember this shit. Muddy loved women and radiated sexuality, you know, like a champ, by the way.

   Muddy liked to drink. Muddy on stage and in the studio was the best. He was organized. He was a fuckin’ leader. I always say this. People say ‘what do you mean?’ He was a fuckin’ leader. Muddy was the reincarnation of a tribal chief, of a President, of a King. Such a powerful presence. I just loved him and he treated me so good. He used to call me his white grandson.  His wife Geneva used to send me fried chicken wrapped in foil. Muddy once wrote a poem to a girl for me that I gave her when I was in high school. I always say this and people laugh but most of what I discussed with these guys was about sex. That was the main thing on their mind.

   In the fifties and very early sixties there were clubs, during that early blues heyday of Muddy, and Wolf, they were places where people went primarily on weekends to find women. And women to find men and to party. And the music was very much party music. It was like a psychological influence on the people in these little clubs. And it was what these guys wanted to do. Drinkin’ and make love.

    It then began to die out as R&B and Motown happened. It’s a period when I was in a few of those clubs that were hot and steamy and smelly and funky and the music was loud. Those were the clubs where Muddy Waters put the coke bottle in his pants and Wolf got down on his knees, howling, drinking whiskey out of a bottle. Those were a whole different audience then when the white blues market discovered it.

    Look at their lyrics. With the TV programs recently on Muddy. The American Masters documentary, it’s all very gratifying. We always knew it. Gratification is the best word. Not for all of them. Muddy, Wolf, Chuck Berry…

  They are like Beethoven and Bach. They should be right up there.

Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon, 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972, 2015's Every Body Knows: Leonard Cohen, 2016's Heart of Gold Neil Young and 2017's 1967: A Complete Rock Music History of the Summer of Love.

    Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for the same publisher.  

     Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s It Was 50 Years Ago Today The Beatles Invade America and Hollywood. Kubernik’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters was published by Otherworld Cottage Industries during 2020.  

  In 2023, ACC ART BOOKS LTD published THE ROLLING STONES: ICONS. Introduction penned by Harvey Kubernik. The volume spans six decades of tours, album covers, and eminent names in photography.

    Kubernik’s writings are in book anthologies, including, The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. Harvey wrote the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival.  

    During 2006 Kubernik spoke at the special hearings initiated by The Library of Congress in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation. In 2017 Harvey appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio in their Distinguished Speakers Series, and lectured in 2023 at a Grammy Museum Reel to Reel event.

To celebrate 50 years since the start of Tina Turner’s iconic solo career, Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll is a huge compilation of 55 tracks through Rhino Entertainment that compiles an incredible anthology of Turner’s legendary solo career through her singles.

From her cover of “Whole Lotta Love” to the Kygo remix of “What’s Love Got to Do With It” in 2020, this is the first time her singles collection has been released as one set.

It will be released on November 24 as a 3-CD and 5-LP sets and digitally with a cut-back 12-track vinyl version. All configurations come with a foreword from Bryan Adams - her longtime friend and collaborator.

Turner’s first release as a solo artist was the 1974 album Tina Turns The Country On! whilst still touring and releasing albums as the duo Ike & Tina Turner Revue. The album spawned no singles, but in 1975, upon the release of her second album - Acid Queen - her cover of Led Zeppelin’s “Whole Lotta Love” was released, which kicks off this set and goes on to include duets with other legendary performers like David Bowie, Bryan Adams, Eric Clapton and Rod Stewart as well as some of the most unforgettable and celebrated pop and rock singles of all time such as “What’s Love Got To Do With It,” “Private Dancer,” “We Don’t Need Another Hero,” “The Best,” “Steamy Windows,” “I Don’t Wanna Lose You,” “Disco Inferno.”

To celebrate the legacy of the undeniable and inimitable Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll, this collection also features a new version of “Something Beautiful Remains,” retitled to simply “Something Beautiful.”
The track has been reworked by producer and long-time collaborator of Turner, Terry Britten. It is a fitting final tribute to the power of her legacy that Britten made shortly after her passing. He stated, “Dear Tina, the experience of working with you could never be repeated, but in my heart something beautiful remains. Love, Terry.”

Turner is revered around the world, inspiring millions through her own personal story, her singing, her dancing and beyond; her music legacy is a collection of some of the best-known songs of all time.

Turner has sold over 200 million records and has had 10 UK top-hit singles and nine UK top 10 albums. She was the first female artist to have a top 40 hit in six consecutive decades in the UK. Her albums combined are 20 times platinum in the UK and nine times platinum in the US, whilst also achieving huge sales throughout the rest of the world. She has won eight Grammy® Awards and has been nominated for 25. She was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1991 and has stars on the Hollywood Walk Of Fame and St. Louis Walk of Fame.

Her 1988 Break Every Rule tour broke the world record for the largest paying audience at a solo concert, with 184,000 at the Maracanã in Rio de Janeiro, and Rolling Stone Magazine named her No. 17 in 100 Greatest Singers of All Time and No. 63 in the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time.

Yet, regardless of all the success and fame throughout her career, Turner remained relatable and adored for the person she was. In Bryan Adam’s personal foreword, he sums up perfectly the effect she has had on him that reflects on so many around the world…

“From obscurity to the stages of the UK and Europe, I credit Tina for changing the course of my life and I’m so grateful to have had some of her precious time. She was a force of nature, no one had her energy or her voice, I suppose it’s fitting to say, it’s only love, and that's all.”

I fondly remember a fall 1975 interview I conducted with Tina Turner for the now defunct Melody Maker around a dinner I had with her at Chasens restaurant near Beverly Hills as she was just embarking on her remarkable solo career.

Clad in white jumpsuit, Tina is sharp, articulate and candid. Tina was impressed when I told her I had lived with my family first in downtown Los Angeles, then in Crenshaw Village and graduated from West Los Angeles College in Culver City, which was very near Inglewood and Bolic Sound Studio, where she recorded with Ike and close by their house at the time in View Park.

Our interview was published in the October 11, 1975 issue of Melody Maker. The headline read Tina Turner: Acid Queen.

"I've talked to a lot of reporters lately because of the Tommy movie and we decided to call the album, Acid Queen, to help capitalize on my role in the movie," suggested Tina Turner in our interview inside Bolic Sound Brownsville, Tennessee, is the birthplace of Tina and she's come a long way since she started her career singing as Annie Mae Bullock in talent shows and the gospel choir in Knoxville. In the mid-Fifties, Annie Mae moved to St. Louis with her sisters, and subsequently met Ike Turner. Tina soon joined Ike's group, the Kings of Rhythm.

In 1959, Ike wrote a number entitled “A Fool in Love” for a singer who never showed up for the recording session. But Tina was familiar with it and stepped in, since studio facilities were paid for in advance. It became a gem on Sue Records.

“River Deep, Mountain High” was a smash hit in England and the Come Together LP, which contained the hit Beatle tune and their cover of “Honky Tonk Woman,” climbed high on the national charts.

Subsequent successes have included the million-selling “Proud Mary” single, a gold album What You Hear Is What You Get (Live At Carnegie Hall), and the hit single and album, Nutbush City Limits.
"We toured for years with all the English groups and I always liked what they were singing about,” enthused Tina, who in 1966 at Colston Hall in Bristol, England in a hallway corridor taught Mick Jagger an interpretation of the sideways pony dance in front of Marianne Faithfull, Brian Jones, and Keith Richards.
"I've wanted to do an album like Acid Queen for some time," she explained. "There's a lot of Mick Jagger's songs that we haven't gotten around to doing. The concept of the album came from my producers, Denny Diante and Spencer Proffer. At first the album was going to be called, The British Album, with the whole album full of British songs.”

Two of the recordings we discussed in our 1975 encounter, “Acid Queen” and “Whole Lotta Love,” are now heard in the 2023 retail offering, Queen of Rock ‘N’ Roll.

"But Ike sent out word that he wanted the album out immediately,” said Tina, “so after I did a commercial for Dr. Pepper, earlier in the day, I did the vocals at nine o'clock in the evening and hardly got a chance to learn the songs.

"The album was a bit rushed, but I've done it this way before. We've done a lot of albums without spending that much time on them. All that was left was for me to cut the vocals 'cause Ike, Denny and Spence got everything else together.

"We were in Seattle a few years ago in a record store and I heard this bass riff opening on ‘Come Together.’ I said ‘I had to do that song,’ the same with 'Proud Mary.’ I've been trying to get Ike for two years to record it. We've always done other people's songs successfully and it's not uncomfortable doing songs by the Who, Led Zeppelin and the Stones.

"Ike and I haven't got the time to develop as songwriters 'cause we spend so much time in the studio and on the road. And there's a lot of good music to be covered."

She's very much a solo force these days, and for the first time there are press kits with pictures of Tina sans Ike. "It's still the Ike and Tina show," she reinforced. "Ike and I are singing a bit more together on stage, and maybe all the Tommy promotion has put a bit more of the focus on myself.

"We've been trying all these years to get to the point where the whole show is sharp. When we went into Las Vegas we changed the show around and the Ikettes added six songs to the repertoire. They're much better now. All these years we've wanted the whole package to be good.

"Ike selects the songs and there's a tremendous amount of preparation for our tours."

Her Tommy cameo appearance seemed to get the most applause from theatre patrons. Ike & Tina's previous celluloid performances. The Big TNT Show, Gimme Shelter, and Soul To Soul, just mirrored the show act.

"Tommy was a whole new trip for me, getting into a room and turning into a mad woman. At first, I didn't want to play the part of a prostitute. But it was a challenge and it called for drama. That's what acting is all about.

"Travelling across the country now people are beginning to know me as the 'Acid Queen.’ The audience is screaming for the song when we perform live."

Sexuality has become a trademark of the Ike and Tina spectacle. Her use of bold expression, unlike most performers, goes beyond the tease category. Some felt the show exploits sex. Whatever, no-one talks when she performs.

The show is toned down for the supper club circuit; a slight degree of hesitation, but there's always a huge amount of suggestiveness.

"I never felt we've used sex as a gimmick in our program. It's important today because, people who pay to see a show want a little of everything.

"The sexual portion of our show isn't planned; it just happens. It works out well visually and it always seems to get the most audience response. Everybody needs an image. There are a million groups out today; flipping, smoke bombs, dancing – fortunately, everybody can't be sexy. We've discussed it a thousand times. The miniskirts and see-through dresses.

“People's minds do wander. We may do a song like 'I've Been Loving You Too Long,’ and work with it. Every time we do it, the song changes. Sometimes I really have a lot of fun with that song because people expect something to happen.

"For years we've gotten reviews that seem to dwell on the sexual aspect of the show. I've never felt people gaining sexuality after seeing our show. But I like them to remember what they have just seen. I've never really thought of our show as being aggressive. Even as wild as I am I know that I maintain my femininity. People have always told me that.”

Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll 5 LP Tracklist

Side 1

1. Whole Lotta Love (1975)
2. Acid Queen (1976)
3. Root, Toot Undisputable Rock’n Roller (1978)
4. Viva La Money (1978)
5. Sometimes When We Touch (1979)
6. Music Keeps Me Dancin’ (1979)

Side 2

1. Let’s Stay Together (1983)
2. Help (Edit) (1984)
3. What’s Love Got To Do With It (1984)
4. Better Be Good To Me (1984)
5. Private Dancer (1984)
6. I Can’t Stand The Rain (1985)

Side 3

1. Show Some Respect (1985)
2. We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome) (1985)
3. One Of The Living (1985)
4. It’s Only Love (with Bryan Adams) (1985)
5. Typical Male (1986)
6. Two People (1986)

Side 4

1. What You Get Is What You See (1987)
2. Girls (1987)
3. Break Every Rule (1987)
4. Paradise Is Here (1987)
5. Afterglow (1987)

Side 5

1. Tearing Us Apart (with Eric Clapton)
2. Addicted to Love (Live in Europe) (1988)
3. A Change is Gonna Come (Live in Europe) (1988)
4. Tonight (with David Bowie) (Live in Europe) (1988)
5. River Deep, Mountain High (Live in Europe) (1988)

Side 6

1. The Best (Edit) (1989)
2. Steamy Windows (1989)
3. I Don’t Wanna Lose You (1989)
4. Look Me In The Heart (1990)
5. Foreign Affair (Edit) (1990)

Side 7

1. Be Tender With Me Baby (1990)
2. It Takes Two (with Rod Stewart)
3. Nutbush City Limits (The 90’s Version) (1991)
4. Love Thing (1991)
5. Way Of The World (1991)

Side 8

1. I Want You Near Me (1992)
2. I Don’t Wanna Fight (1993)
3. Disco Inferno (1993)
4. Why Must We Wait Until Tonight? (1993)
5. Proud Mary (1993)

Side 9

1. Goldeneye (1995)
2. Whatever You Want (1996)
3. On Silent Wings (1996)
4. Missing You (1996)
5. In Your Wildest Dreams (with Barry White) (1996)
6. Cose della Vita (with Eros Ramazzotti)

Side 10

1. When The Heartache Is Over (1999)
2. Whatever You Need (2000)
3. Open Arms (2004)
4. Teach Me Again (with Elisa) (2017)
5. What’s Love Got to Do With It (Kygo remix) (2020)
6. Something Beautiful (2023 Version)

3CD/Digital/Streaming
CD1

1. Whole Lotta Love
2. Acid Queen
3. Root, Toot Undisputable Rock ‘n’ Roller
4. Viva La Money
5. Sometimes When We Touch
6. Music Keeps Me Dancin’
7. Let’s Stay Together
8. Help
9. What’s Love Got To Do With It
10. Better Be Good To Me
11. Private Dancer
12. I Can’t Stand The Rain
13. Show Some Respect
14. We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)
15. One Of The Living
16. It’s Only Love (with Bryan Adams)
17. Typical Male
18. Two People
19. What You Get Is What You See
20. Girls

CD2

1. Break Every Rule
2. Paradise Is Here
3. Afterglow
4. Tearing Us Apart (with Eric Clapton)
5. Addicted to Love (Live in Europe)
6. A Change is Gonna Come (Live in Europe)
7. Tonight (with David Bowie) (Live in Europe)
8. River Deep, Mountain High (Live in Europe)
9. The Best (Edit)
10. Steamy Windows
11. I Don’t Wanna Lose You
12. Look Me In The Heart
13. Foreign Affair
14. Be Tender With Me Baby
15. It Takes Two (with Rod Stewart)
16. Nutbush City Limits (The 90’s Version)
17. Love Thing
18. Way Of The World

CD3

1. I Want You Near Me
2. I Don’t Wanna Fight
3. Disco Inferno
4. Why Must We Wait Until Tonight?
5. Proud Mary
6. Goldeneye
7. Whatever You Want
8. On Silent Wings
9. Missing You
10. In Your Wildest Dreams (with Barry White)
11. Cose della Vita (with Eros Ramazzotti)
12. When The Heartache Is Over
13. Whatever You Need
14. Open Arms
15. Teach Me Again (with Elisa)
16. What’s Love Got to Do With It (Kygo remix)
17. Something Beautiful (2023 Version)

1LP
Side 1

1. What’s Love Got To Do With It
2. Let’s Stay Together
3. Private Dancer
4. We Don’t Need Another Hero (Thunderdome)
5. Nutbush City Limits (The 90s Version)
6. River Deep, Mountain High (Live in Europe)

Side 2

1. Steamy Windows
2. I Don’t Wanna Lose You
3. I Don’t Wanna Fight
4. When The Heartache Is Over
5. Proud Mary
6. The Best

Harvey Kubernik is the author of 15 books, including titles on Leonard Cohen and Neil Young. His 2017 volume, the acclaimed 1967 A Complete Rock History of the Summer of Love waspublished by Sterling/Barnes and Noble.  His Inside Cave Hollywood: The Harvey Kubernik Music InnerViews and InterViews Collection, Vol. 1 was published in December 2017, by Cave Hollywood.  Kubernik’s The Doors Summer’s Gone was published by Other Cottage Industries in March 2018.

    In November 2018, Sterling/Barnes and Noble published Harvey’s book, The Story of The Band From Pig Pink to The Last Waltz, writtenwith his brother Kenneth Kubernik.

    Harvey Kubernik’s 1995 interview, Berry Gordy: A Conversation With Mr. Motown, that initially was published in 1995 in Goldmine and HITS magazines has just been licensed for inclusion in The Pop, Rock & Soul Reader edited by David Brackett to be published in 2019 by Oxford University Press.     

    This century Harvey penned the liner note booklets to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special and The Ramones’ End of the Century.

    In November 2006, Harvey Kubernik was a featured speaker discussing audiotape preservation and archiving at special hearings called by The Library of Congress and held in Hollywood, California.

May I suggest checking out the just issued New Moves by the Chess Project, on Czyz Records, distributed by Orchard, akin to the similarly styled 2008 UK limited edition Chess Moves endeavor, both spearheaded by record business veteran Marshall Chess, scion of the Chess family, and former president of Rolling Stones Records 1970-1978.

New Moves is a collection of reinterpreted born in Chicago Chess classics done by a trio of musicians Marshall has known for decades. Some were by his previous association with the New Jersey-based Sugar Hill Records, who owned the Chess catalog, before it was sold in 1983 to MCA Records, now Universal Music Enterprises.

The epicenter of New Moves was Keith LeBlanc’s studio in Meriden, Connecticut.

Marshall Chess and Jamar Chess teamed with producer LeBlanc to dive into their family’s hallowed Chess Records vault; offering reinterpretations of Chess’ blues legends, many of whom Marshall worked with firsthand.

Featuring The Chess Project - a band hand-recruited by LeBlanc with Marshall and Jamar - the album highlights world class musicians who’ve backed artists like James Brown, Aretha Franklin and Tina Turner as they reimagine Chess on the new collection New Moves, (Czyz Records), gems first recorded by Howlin' Wolf, Muddy Waters, Memphis Slim, Little Walter, Sonny Boy Williamson and more.
Listen to The Chess Project’s New Moves here: https://orcd.co/newmoves

https://music.apple.com/us/album/new-moves/1701872084

New Moves is an album nearly two decades in the making, conceived by Marshall Chess and Keith LeBlanc whom he met while working at the hip-hop label Sugar Hill Records (who helped launch artists like Sugarhill Gang, Grandmaster Flash and Melle Mel).

The original idea was to use samples of the original Chess blues masters combined with new original instrumental tracks created by LeBlanc.

Legal issues using the original samples surfaced so the idea evolved to one which has become New Moves, a collection of reimagined recordings with songs selected by Marshall and production by LeBlanc. This transformation provides a starring role for longtime Rolling Stones backing vocalist Bernard Fowler.

The New Moves roster also includes world class percussionist Keith LeBlanc, Skip “Little Axe” McDonald (Grandmaster Flash and The Furious Five) on guitar, Eric Gales (Santana, Gary Clark Jr., Lauryn Hill), Paul Nowinksi (Keith Richards, Patti Smith) and MonoNeon (Prince, Ne-Yo) on bass, Reggie Griffin (Kenny Babyface Edmonds, Chaka Khan) on keys, and Alan Glen (Jeff Beck, Peter Green) on harmonica, and Mohini Dey, an up-and-coming young bass player from India.

The Chess family are clearly no strangers to a trailblazing path. After spending his early years alongside his father Leonard and uncle Phil in Chicago studios and record pressing plants, Marshall Chess made his mark at the family label in the late '60s with his own label Cadet Concept producing the albums Electric Mud (Muddy Waters) and Rotary Connection (self-titled).

Marshall continued his innovative work as the founder and head of Rolling Stones Records and President of music publisher, Arc Music.

The Chess family continue to be pioneers in the industry today; as this new collection is co-executive produced by Marshall’s son, Jamar Chess: a Billboard "30 Under 30" alum, 2019 ASCAP award-winner, and co-founder of Sunflower Entertainment and Wahoo Music Fund One.

Marshall and Jamar have founded the special project label Czyz Records- an ode to the Chess family’s original last name - which is the record label behind New Moves.

NEW MOVES - THE CHESS PROJECT TRACKLIST

1. Boom Boom Out Go The Lights
2. Moanin’ At Midnight
3. Nine Below Zero
4. So Glad I’m Living
5. Tell Me
6. Booted
7. Mother Earth
8. Goin’ Down Slow
9. High Temperature
10. Smokestack Lightning
11. Help Me

  “Last decade Keith built a studio in his house,” Marshall Chess explained in a December 2023 Zoom interview. 

   “I loaned him some money for equipment. We did the album Chess Moves, using the original tracks of the blues artists. We got permission from Universal in the UK and it came out for about a month and local L.A. office squashed it,” Chess lamented  

    “Meanwhile, Keith really learned how to be an engineer with his studio. And wanted to do another one where I picked the tracks. So, my son Jamar and I got going. 

   “In the meantime, Alistair Norbury, president of BMG repertoire and marketing asked me what I was doing now, and I had a demo of what Keith and I were working on. 

    “I played it for him. ‘Can I buy it.’ He loved it. So, Keith, Skip, Bernard myself and Jamar are all partners in an equal new deal. Then my back collapsed, I had operations, Brexit, and then Covid hit, and the BMG offices were closed in London.  

   “I called Alistar at BMG. I love the guy. I wanted to buy it back and he gave it back to me. They are still in on it as music publishers. I made the deal 15 years ago to sell our Chess (Arc Music Publishing) to Fuji Entertainment who subsequently sold it to BMG.  

    “An Australian publisher read the 2023 article on me in The New Yorker, heard the album, and made a deal with us. There is a song on New Moves, ‘Hi Temperature,’ a globally relevant track about climate change. 

   “As far as the songs selected for New Moves, this album almost all of the songs are personally related to songs I’ve used in my life for my own psychological therapy. I learned that my father [Leonard] would always look for things in lyrics like love, pain, sorrow. ‘My wife cheated on me.’ I learned that from him. I realized many years ago when I made compilations of blues artists that there was a therapeutic value of the songwriters and recording artists. 

   “These people, they couldn’t go to therapists or psychologists. They were all coming up from the south and their girls are all getting fucked by men city slickers and they were all having problems. And they heard other people with the same problems. You hear it in these psychological blues lyrics: ‘Another Mule Kickin’ In Your Stall.’ 

    “That is exactly why I picked these songs. I’ve been divorced. I’m man enough to say I’ve had girlfriends cheat on me. All of that happened to me. In the old days back at Chess, all of these musicians, between takes, would be talking’ about pussy if my father didn’t have them do extra takes on a recording.

    “Then there’s some cuts, like Howlin’ Wolf’s ‘Goin’ Down Slow.’ That’s me. I’m age 81,” volunteers Marshall. “My father was a workaholic and I wanted to be around him. He was my hero.         

   “My father and I never did sports together.  I probably went to ten White Sox [baseball] games and four Bears [football] games. My father never went to one, but he was working. My uncle Phil [Chess] got a college scholarship playing halfback in football. Phil did give scholarships to numerous athletes over the years.”   

    Marshall Chess is prominently featured and interviewed in the Born In Chicago blues documentary. A Ravin' Film presented by Shout! Studios and Out The Box Records. 

   It’s directed by Bob Sarles and John Anderson and produced and edited by Bob Sarles. Christina Keating serves as co-producer and story editor. Contributors are Marshall Chess, Barry Goldberg, Nick Gravenites, Harvey Mandel, Sam Lay, Charlie Musselwhite, Elvin Bishop, B.B. King, Buddy Guy, Bob Dylan and Keith Richards. 

    “The Chess brothers and their record labels were instrumental in popularizing the blues music of Chicago’s South Side,” emailed Born In Chicago co-director and co-producer Bob Sarles in summer 2022. 

    “Marshall Chess has kept that flame burning to the present day. His story about The Rolling Stones’ visit to the Chess Records studio is a highly entertaining part of our documentary.” 

     Marshall and Jamar Chess are also now reaching the TikTok generation and internet audience, reminding them of the family legacy with their own podcasts and the inviting Chess Records Tribute YouTube channel. 

   Marshall spiels Chess history coupled with vintage photos and video content. It’s a stellar collaboration with Richard Ganter, author of Chess Record Corp A Tribute, published in 2020 by Upfront Publishing. The awe-inspiring book includes complete R&B chart entry history of Chess Records and the Chess family archive contributions. Foreword by Marshall and Introductions by Ganter.

   “It's already the greatest blues channel on that's out there,” enthused Chess. “We’re working with Richard on our YouTube channel to promote his book and Chess history. So, I became the voice you've hearing. I'm telling stories, whatever. And the reason I did it, though, is I have my son Jamar and my two granddaughters. 

    “I thought that they'll never read a book about this great Chess record label, and, this channel with my voice and everything. It will blow their fucking minds when they're 16 or 18. That's why I did it. You can find out how Afro-American blues from the Delta took the world by storm. 

    “I learned how to do it, so we keep doing it now. And, we found that people like the stories that we're doing, folk tales. I'm going to do all these little stories. Because that's what people want, like Will Rogers did, because no one else is alive. They're not alive. People are coming to the channel over and over. We’ve got to where it's 400 videos. What blues music freak wouldn't want to look at those 400 videos we’ve found. You know I mean? So, just check it out. 

    “See, Chess Records, we were the first. That's why I say Chess is so much more than blues. We were the first with gospel that did that all over the South. We had all the Black comedy. Moms Mabley, Pigmeat Markham.  

    “Watching the Chess heritage going into the digital world and the sound which was made still penetrates. Is it reaching a new demographic. We've got two years of data on the YouTube channel. And, now we've got it for an audience from streaming. It looks like people who listen to blues are males over 50, like 85 percent. 

   “But the internet has opened it up to all this. People don't know the blues in Bulgaria. And they're finding out they're able to hear and see it. And there's a certain thing with the blues, with certain people, they hear it. That's why it keeps never going away. There's a new and growing world. Even though the audience is older, it keeps replenishing like jazz. It's similar, it keeps replenishing.”   

youtube.com/@ChessRecordsTribute

Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon, 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972, 2015's Every Body Knows: Leonard Cohen, 2016's Heart of Gold Neil Young and 2017's 1967: A Complete Rock Music History of the Summer of Love.

Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In 2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble.

Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s It Was 50 Years Ago Today The Beatles Invade America and Hollywood. Kubernik’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters was published by Otherworld Cottage Industries during 2020.

In October 2023, ACC ART BOOKS LTD published THE ROLLING STONES: ICONS. Introduction is penned by Harvey Kubernik. The volume spans six decades of tours, album covers, and eminent names in photography.

Kubernik’s writings are in book anthologies, including, The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. Harvey wrote the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival.

During 2006 Kubernik spoke at the special hearings initiated by The Library of Congress in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation. In 2017 Harvey appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio in their Distinguished Speakers Series, and lectured in 2023 at a Grammy Museum Reel to Reel event.

Kubernik was a West Coast /Director of A&R for MCA Records (now Universal Music Enterprises) during 1978-1979.

Harvey is a native of Los Angeles, California. His parents Marshall and Hilda hail from Chicago. Marshall’s mother Revetta and Hilda both graduated from Chicago’s Von Steuben High School. The landmark institution which graces the cover of Chuck Berry’s Sweet Little 16 LP, originally issued by Chess.

     Columbia Records and Legacy Recording, the catalog division of Sony Music Entertainment, will release Bob Dylan - The Complete Budokan 1978. A deluxe box set celebrating Bob Dylan's 1978 world concert tour and the 45th anniversary of the artist's first concert appearances in Japan, The Complete Budokan 1978 presents two full shows originally recorded on 24-channel multitrack analog tapes at Tokyo's Nippon Budokan Hall on February 28 and March 1, 1978 and offers fans 36 previously unreleased Dylan performances.

    The Bob Dylan World Tour 1978 marked the artist's first international concert dates since 1966 and his first live shows since the Rolling Thunder Revue blasted through North America in 1975-76. A major international musical event, the year-long tour found Bob Dylan performing 114 shows in Asia, Oceania, North America and Europe, to a combined audience of two million fans.

   The tour launched in February 1978 with eleven historic performances: Dylan' first-ever concerts in Japan which included eight shows at the revered Nippon Budokan Hall in Tokyo. Two of the Budokan shows--February 28 and March 1, 1978--were recorded on 24-channel multi-track analog tape with 22 performances excerpted from those shows appearing on Bob Dylan At Budokan, a 2LP set first issued on Columbia Records as a Japan-only release in November 1978, followed by a global release in April 1979 in response to widespread demand. The Complete Budokan 1978 marks the first time any of Dylan's complete performances from his 1978 world tour have been officially available.

   For his 1978 performances, Dylan (rhythm guitar, harmonica, vocals) led an ensemble featuring Billy Cross (lead guitar), Ian Wallace (drums), Alan Pasqua (keyboards), Rob Stoner (bass, vocals), Steven Soles (acoustic rhythm guitar, vocals), David Mansfield (pedal steel, violin, mandolin, guitar, dobro), Steve Douglas (saxophone, flute, recorder), Bobbye Hall (percussion), Helena Springs (vocals), Jo Ann Harris (vocals), and Debi Dye (vocals). The original Bob DylanAt Budokan album was produced by Don DeVito, who also helmed Dylan's Street-Legal, recorded and released during the 1978 world tour, featuring the same musicians.

Chief engineer Tom Suzuki says, "We mixed the record with the keyword 'passion' in mind. The result is a mix that surpasses the original 1978 release, providing a crisper and clearer sound where each instrument and Bob Dylan's voice are distinctly audible."

   Heckel Sugano says, "The completed album documents the remarkable sound of the legendary Budokan shows that are forever etched in history. We tried to faithfully reproduce the sound the Japanese audience would have heard in the concert hall."

      Fifty-years and hundreds of Dylan books later, many still consider it one of the very best: Rolling Stone called it “Monumental, endlessly illuminating.” Greil Marcus noted it as: “Extraordinarily useful… I have always admired Gray’s reach, tone, and acuity but the research here is just amazing.” While The Observer, said: “Wonderful… The best book there is on Dylan, now better than ever.”

    The original Song & Dance Man covered Dylan’s work through 1970’s Self Portrait, but was expanded in a new edition in 1982, and again in 2000 – growing to over 900 pages and covering Dylan’s work through 1997’s Time Out Of Mind. But Song & Dance Man has been out of print for over a decade, during which time Bob Dylan won a Nobel Prize for Literature, continued delivering critically lauded records, and earned a new generation of fans while sustaining older ones in his seventh decade as an artist. The 50th Anniversary Series puts every word of Song & Dance Man back into print, but in an accessible three-volume format: VOLUME 1: Language & Tradition – Explores the ways that Dylan’s early writing relates to folk music, blues, rock and mainstream literature. This is the groundbreaking approach to Dylan as an artist rather than a folk-singer or a pop star that earned the book’s early reviews & reputation.  Michael Gray is a critic, writer, public speaker & broadcaster recognized as a world authority on the work of Bob Dylan, and as an expert in Rock ‘n’ Roll history.

    He is the author of Song & Dance Man: The Art of Bob Dylan, The Bob Dylan Encyclopedia, Outtakes on Bob Dylan: Selected writings 1967-2021, Mother! The Story of Frank Zappa, Hand Me My Travelin’ Shoes: In Search of Blind Willie McTell, and others. He has spoken at the Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame, at Universities across Europe and the United States.

    Over the last 48 years I’ve conducted interviews with Bob Dylan’s friends and musical associates. These encounters remind me, and I hope you as well, about the still fascinating, evolving expedition of Dylan.  

Johnny Cash: I became aware of Bob Dylan when the Freewheelin’ album came out in 1963. I thought he was one of the best country singers I had ever heard. I always felt a lot in common with him. I knew a lot about him before we had ever met. I knew he had heard and listened to country music. I heard a lot of inflections from country artists I was familiar with. I was in Las Vegas in ‘63 and ‘64 and wrote him a letter telling him how much I liked his work. I got a letter back and we developed a correspondence. We finally met at Newport in 1964. It was like we were two old friends. There was none of this standing back, trying to figure each other out. He’s unique and original. I keep lookin’ around as we pass the middle of the ’70s and I don’t see anybody come close to Bob Dylan. I respect him. Dylan is a few years younger than I am but we share a bond that hasn’t diminished. I get inspiration from him.

Jackson Browne: What Bob Dylan did for me, everybody and our generation it will never have to be done again, you know. The way he opened up our thinking and our feeling and our view of the world only has to be done once. Maybe it’s done in other fields like film and painting and other art. As a people we’re constantly growing, expanding but the changes that Bob Dylan brought to rock ‘n’ roll and songwriting are permanent. They’re part of us. People who are just being born into it now are being born into a world that wasn’t that way until Bob Dylan made it that way. It’s a particular skill to write something in a few words that speaks volumes. It is very difficult to say how I feel and how I think about Bob Dylan in a few words.

Howard Kaylan: All of us, as singers and performers, keep those great songs in the pipeline so they are not forgotten. It doesn’t have to be a great Bob Dylan song or a Tim Hardin song or even a great Leiber and Stoller song. If it’s great and forgotten you kind of feel like you are a missionary as far as getting those things to the public.

Al Kooper: No one talks about Bob’s piano playing because they don’t know. Bob had a very unusual way of playing in that he didn’t use his pinkies. So, both his pinkies were up in the air when he played the piano and that’s very interesting to me.  It was very interesting looking to watch that. I used to really get a kick out of that. I played organ on “Like a Rolling Stone.” (Pianist) Paul Griffin was a big influence on me as well. Paul came from the Baptist church. On Highway 61 Revisited we did the tracks to ‘Tombstone Blues’ and ‘Queen Jane Approximately’ in one day.

D.A. Pennebaker: I think that it will take 50 or 100 years to really digest Dylan. He’s like John Brown. He’s out there singing a song and he’s gonna sing it until he drops. And it’s like he doesn’t have to understand it completely. That’s what he’s going to do. The concerts now are like transfigurations but they’re interesting because you can’t sit on a talent like that whatever you do is going to be interesting.

Marianne Faithfull: I had never seen a person like Bob Dylan Never in my wildest dreams could have imagined anyone like Bob in 1965. His brain, but I was frightened. I didn’t know they were probably more scared of me. I don’t know. He played me the album Bringing It All Back Home himself on his own.   It was just amazing. And I worshipped him anyway. That was where I got very close to Allen (Ginsberg).  I spent some time with Allen and Bob during Dont Look Back.

Allen Ginsberg: I don't think I would have been singing if it wasn't for younger Dylan. Ginsberg. I mean he turned me on to actually singing. I remember the moment it was. It was a concert with Happy Traum that I went to and saw in Greenwich Village. I suddenly started to write my own lyrics, instead of Blake. Dylan's words were so beautiful. The first time I heard them, I wept. I had come back from India, and Charlie Plymell, a poet I liked a lot in Bolinas, at a welcome home party played me Dylan singing “Masters of War” from The Freewheelin' Bob Dylan, and I actually burst into tears. It was a sense that the torch had been passed to another generation. And somebody had the self-empowerment of saying, 'But I'll know my song well before I start singin’.  Dylan said that Kerouac’s Mexico City Blues had inspired him to be a poet. That was his poetic inspiration. So, I think what happened is that we followed an older tradition, a lineage, of the modernists of the turn of the century and continued their work into idiomatic talk and musical cadences and returned poetry back to its original sources and actual communication between people. We were built for it.

Robbie Robertson: Who would think in their wildest imagination that Tin Pan Alley was a real place and the Brill Building and Donnie Kirshner’s thing. All of it was actually in a place you could go. And the doors were golden when you walked in. And inside there in all these rooms were people who wrote songs and sent them out to the whole wide world. Then, the other door was Bob Dylan who it wasn’t about that. It was about emotion, and energy, but it was really about saying something. It wasn’t about “these words could be anything.” No. No. It was specific.’  So, to me it was rebelling in a beautiful way against this other thing. There was a thing that happened between Bob and The Band on stage that when we played together that we would just go into a certain gear automatically. It was like instinctual, like you smelled something in the air, you know, and it made you hungry. (Laughs). It was that instinctual. And the way we played music together was very much that way. And whether, we were playing in 1966, or 1976, or when we did the tour together in 1974, we would go to a certain place where we just pulled the trigger. It was like “just burn down the doors ‘cause we’re coming through.” And it was a whole other place that we played when we weren’t playing with him. So, it was like putting a flame and oil together, or something.

Bette Midler: I came to New York to meet Dylan. I was 19 when I first hit New York and the first thing I did was go down to the Village and look for him. Those first albums of his completely blew my mind. I had a very hip girlfriend and we used to go to her house and listen to Dylan and Joan Baez. I even went out and bought a guitar so that I could accompany myself on ‘Blowin' In The Wind.’ Nine years later we recorded a duet version of 'Buckets Of Rain' for my album, Songs For The New Depression. I spent a lot of time lookin' for him. He didn't let me down at all.

Billy James: As an actor, I appeared on Broadway and then television. I saw Dylan in the Village. I met James Dean around the NBC TV studios in New York. I was a publicist at Columbia Records. In 1961 did a taped interview with Bob Dylan for the company. Worked for Columbia as a talent scout as well. I went to Bob’s solo acoustic recording session and continued as a writer for the Columbia label. I introduced Phil Spector to Bob Dylan at the Fred C Dobbs Coffee Shop on Sunset Blvd. I remember arranging a local press conference in 1966 before Dylan performed at the Hollywood Bowl. I have a memo from 1965 where they passed on signing Lenny Bruce. I was with Bob when he did a press conference on December 17, 1965 at one of the studios. I do remember where some fool asked him how many protest singers there were. Also in attendance was an ex-Columbia PR guy and ex-Laurel Canyon neighbor, David Swaney. One of the ways I have bracketed my life as a grownup is to describe my relationship with four people: James Dean, Bob Dylan, Jim Morrison, and Jackson Browne. “Regarding the early Bob Dylan that I met I wrote an article for the weekly edition of Variety when I worked at Columbia Records. My headline ran ‘Folk Fans Find a James Dean.’”   

Chrissie Hynde Bob Dylan's "Forever Young” has got such a beautiful lyric. I just love it. He's the pride of our generation. The song is genius. I'll tell you another great Dylan album, that was not one of his most popular ones, was Shot Of Love. The song, ‘Lenny Bruce.’ Time Out Of Mind. It’s one of his best albums. He just sings magnificently, for a start. They're just great songs. Bob always writes impeccable songs, but my suspicion is that he's a little impatient in the studio. On this one, he really stuck it out and got gorgeous vocals. The singing is fantastic. The songs are so well crafted and they just got the great sound for each song. You don't feel like he just got a band in, wheeled them in and played all the songs and left. Each song is very carefully thought out. Obviously, that's a lot in the production and I'm sure that's Danny Lanois who masterminded that. Jim Keltner is the perfect drummer for any band if you ask me. He's great with Bob Dylan. Keltner is a genius drummer. I love that guy.

Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon and 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972.   Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble. Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters.

Kubernik’s writings are in several book anthologies. Including, The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. Harvey wrote the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival.  

    During 2006 Harvey spoke at the special hearings initiated by The Library of Congress held in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation.

   In 2017 Harvey Kubernik appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, as part of their Distinguished Speakers Series.

    Kubernik’s 1995 interview, Berry Gordy: A Conversation With Mr. Motown appears in The Pop, Rock & Soul Reader edited by David Brackett published in 2019 by Oxford University Press. Brackett is a Professor of Musicology in the Schulich School of Music at McGill University in Canada. The lineup includes LeRoi Jones, Camila Paglia, Johnny Otis, Ellen Willis, Nelson George, Nat Hentoff, Jerry Wexler, Jim Delehant, Ralph J. Gleason, Greil Marcus, and Cameron Crowe.  

From the moment he encountered the microphone for the first time, Jim has focused his energy on entertaining and communicating via the FM airwaves.  Never at a loss to combine meaningful music with substantive social and political issues, Jim has earned a well-deserved reputation as both pioneer and on air personality.

Ladd is a longtime fixture on KLOS-FM (95.5) Monday-Thursday 10:pm to 2:00 am. Sunday 9:00 pm-12:00 am.  

Born in Lynwood, California, Ladd landed his first on-air assignment in 1969 at radio station KNAC-FM in nearby Long Beach. 

    Ladd has been heard on the Southern California radio airwaves for over 40 years. He held an initial stint on KLOS-FM (95.5) 1971-75 that was then followed by a venture to a floundering yet stimulating maverick station, KMET-FM.  

   Within a year KMET became the#1 rated station in Southern California; in fact, for eight of the nine years he spent with the station, Jim was the #1 rated air personality in his time slot.  These were the glory days of FM rock radio and KMET was the very pinnacle of the medium.

   Ladd subsequently returned to KLOS-FM 1985-86, moved to KMPC on the AM dial from 1988-89, an audio residency at KLSX-FM 1991-95, before rejoining KLOS- (95.5) FM again in 1998.  

   Jim has been the #1 rated nighttime rock personality many times in the 1998-2009 period in all of Southern California. In spring 2010, Ladd’s KLOS program still has the current #1 show at night. 

    He’s also contributed mightily to the resurgence of every station at which he's worked.

   Jim first garnered national prominence as host of the hour-long nationally syndicated radio program "Innerview,” which aired weekly on over 160 stations nationwide for twelve years. Jim has done in-depth pieces with almost every major rocker in the music world, including: John Lennon, Alice Cooper, Pink Floyd, U2, Grateful Dead, Joni Mitchell, Stevie Nicks, Crosby Stills Nash &Young, The Eagles and Led Zeppelin.

   In 1987, he accepted the invitation of Roger Waters (a founding member of Pink Floyd) to take part in the making of his solo album, “Radio K.A.O.S.” Playing himself as a rebel DJ on the album, Jim was also a featured performer on Water's highly touted world tour, as well as starring in all three MTV music videos.

   Jim served as co-host of DIR Broadcasting Corporations' nationally televised pay per view concerts, which included The Who's history making 25th anniversary performance of "Tommy,” broadcast live from the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles.

   In June of 1990, Jim flew to England to co-host the Westwood One world wide radio satellite broadcast of "Knebworth 1990," an eleven-hour outdoor festival featuring Paul McCartney, Robert Plant, Jimmy Page, Phil Collins, and Pink Floyd.

   Ladd was part of another truly historic moment in rock that year, as co-host for the Global Satellite Network's radio broadcast of “The Wall in Berlin."  The largest theatrical rock event ever staged, it played to 300,000 people at the Berlin Wall, and was seen by a world wide television audience of over a billion people.

   Jim’s vocal work has also been utilized in major motion pictures such as: “Tequila Sunrise," “Rush,” "She's Out Of Control" and "Say Anything.” And more recently, provided a voice over for The Doors’ documentary, “When You’re Strange.” 

   In June of 1991, Jim Ladd published his first book entitled: “Radio Waves. Life and

Revolution on the FM Dial” (St. Martin's Press).  A candid, revealing, behind-the-scenes account of a life in FM radio, “Radio Waves” was released in paperback in May of 1992.

  In August of 1992, Jim was the host for the worldwide broadcast premiere of

Roger Waters long awaited solo album "Amused To Death," live from the studios of Q107 in Toronto Canada.

   Ladd then went on to write and host “Headsets,” a series of nationally syndicated weekly radio specials for the Global Satellite Network. In addition, Jim went on to host the nationally syndicated television show “The Extremists,” a weekly program featuring profiles of the worlds most extreme athletes.

   Jim was honored by being nominated by both “Radio and Records” and “Billboard” magazine, as “Rock Radio Personality of The Year for 1998.”

   On November 21^st 2000, Jim Ladd was named “Air Personality of the Year” by

The Los Angeles Music Awards.

   This decade Jim was honored when Tom Petty and The Heartbreakers released their album “The Last DJ” where Jim is credited as being the influence for the central character in the title song. 

   On May 6^th 2005, Jim Ladd received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in recognition for the first thirty-eight years of his ground breaking radio career.  

   In 2007 on February 2^nd Jim was recognized for his contributions to broadcasting when he received the Media Arts Award from the Hollywood Arts Council.

Jim Ladd and Harvey Kubernik interview 

Q:  What song or band made you want to go into radio? 

A: I was watching “The Tonight Show” when John Lennon and Paul McCartney were the guests in late 1967 or ’68. The regular host Johnny Carson was not on and his substitute was Joe Garagiola. His first few questions were, ‘How come they call you guys the mop tops? ‘Why do you grow your hair long? Which one is Ringo?’ He was so clueless. I loved Joe when he called sports and earlier was a baseball player. His questions impacted me to the point I was so pissed off. I didn’t know anything about media but I could recognize that you are blowing the chance of a lifetime. I’ve got questions for these guys. I want to hear what John Lennon and Paul McCartney has to say. So that impacted me a great deal and I swore that something should be done about that. And years later I got to start ‘Innerview.’ 

    “The other thing is The Beatles and The Doors. I always put The Beatles on their own shelf. But The Doors are the ones who really walked me into the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle. 

    “Their first album twisted my brain. I can visualize in my mind, I had been in the hospital with tuberculosis and I had gotten out after four months of isolation. I walked into my friend’s hippie apartment. I can see the turntable in my mind, and I’m listening to ‘Back Door Man.’ And I went, ‘Whose that?’ And he said, ‘It’s a new band called The Doors.’ I sat down, lit up a joint and kept putting the album on over and over. I could not stop listening to it. Of course, when I got to ‘The End,’ that was it for me.

Q: You saw The Doors play live in 1970 at the Long Beach Arena. You still talk about it on the radio on occasion. You have never recovered from that experience.   

A: I was waiting for that show. I was working at KNAC-FM. My mind was blown completely, and by that time they were doing ‘Morrison Hotel.’ I had been a Doors’ fan since the first album but never saw them. And I went there. This was the days before special effects, pyrotechnics. There was none of that. It was just this band on stage. And they were completely and utterly mesmerizing. It was also, to this day, the tightest band I had ever seen. Right before me, and I thought at the time I knew how to do a segue. They did a medley that would go from one song to another. And until Jim (Morrison) started singing, I didn’t realize it. They were that good. 

Q: What were you like as a teenager? 

A: I kind of was rutterless until The Beatles were on ‘The Ed Sullivan Show.’ And the moment that happened I knew I wanted to be involved in music. 

   “I was in a band right after I saw The Beatles. A garage group. The English invasion blew my mind. Once I viewed The Beatles on ‘Ed Sullivan’ that moment my life changed. That was it. I went from listening to The Beach Boys to holy crap! ‘Something is really different now. The world has changed.’ There was not a lot of music in my house. I’d listen to The Beach Boys but then The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Jefferson Airplane. John Hammond, Jr. 

   “I’m at my parent’s house, listening to this brand new thing called FM radio. A station called KMPX that I am tuning in from San Francisco. I hear ‘Back Door Man.’ And the DJ says, ‘That was John Hammond. Thank you.’ I was so taken with it I got in the car and drove up to Berkeley and found a record shop across the street from U.C. Berkeley and said, ‘I’m looking for this blues singer named John Hammond.’ ‘Oh yeah. We got him.’ So I go over to the record bin and the only thing I can find is this thing called ‘Big City Blues.’ But it’s a white guy leaning up against a motorcycle! In a leather jacket who looks like Mick Jagger’s younger brother. So I go up to the clerk, ‘Hey. I’m looking for a blues singer.’ I thought he had to be black. So, that’s how I got into the blues. 

   “I had grown up on AM radio. KHJ, KYA. But this new FM radio thing was different. 

I am hearing albums and bands I had never heard of. 

Q: Did you want to be a DJ? Was there a plan?  

A: There was no plan. I wanted to be in a band. I thought I was going to be a cross between Jim Morrison and Bob Dylan. The problem is, I can’t sing. (laughs). God let me talk. He did not let me sing. And one day when I was driving to a band rehearsal, smoking some hash with a guy in the band, he says to me, probably because he wanted me to stop singing, ‘you know, you have a great speaking voice. Have you ever thought about being in radio?’ Never thought about it. 

     “Next thing I know I go to Long Beach Community College and took a class in radio and television communications. And I immediately fell in love with it. I liked doing it and seemed to have some sort of aptitude to do it. 

    “In 1969 I’m living in a commune in Long Beach, directly across from the ocean in Crab Hollow, right down the street was KNAC. So I started to go there. And a guy, the late Don Bunch, was kind enough to kind of let me come in, empty the ashtrays, file records and hang out. It was a MOR (middle of the road) station. But at night they let him do rock. The station told him, ‘They are gonna do this underground radio thing. So get me an audition tape.’ So I said, ‘what’s an audition tape?’ So he explained to me what it was. I cut the audition tape and I’m sure, based on the fact that I had long hair, I was hired. Because they were gonna take the station to 24 hours of underground music. I got $1.65 an hour.  

Q: Did you know at that moment there was more to being a DJ than time, temperature and announcing the records? 

A: Immediately. I got the idea, from listening to other people, that I could take these songs and combine them in a way that would say something. That would tell a story that would be a narrative. And that’s what I started to do almost from the very first night. 

Q: Did you then or even now, have a philosophy about doing radio? 

A: The only philosophy that I promised myself and I try to stick to it this day, is give it everything I have every night. And to try and do something positive. Because I look at myself as being really lucky. Really fortunate. Don’t take it for granted. And you better go in there and deliver. When nowadays it’s even more important because it is the last free form show. So there's a lot of weight on me. If I’m gonna go into the station then that show better rock. And I better not phone it in. 

Q: How does your nightly radio show come together? 

A: I usually get up about 1:00 in the afternoon. I eat my first meal at about 5:00 or 6:00 and go to work. I come home and eat my second meal of the day and go to sleep around 5:00 am in the morning. ‘Cause it takes a long time to wind the adrenaline down.   

     “Usually on my drive into the radio station that is where I think about what song I will play first. That’s always important and it sets the tone of that night’s show. What do I want to start with? Sometimes that will change 4 minutes before I go on air. I usually have an idea. 

    “The nightly show I never do anything in advance. A blank sheet of paper at 10:00 pm. It’s all stream of consciousness. All live and I’m my own engineer. All the mixes are live I’m doing. I play vinyl. I play mp3’s

   “The preparation work comes in when I am going to interview somebody. That’s where the homework comes in. I spend an inordinate amount of time doing preparation for the interview.  

Q: Where did the “on air editorial” raps begin that are woven around the music? 

Like when did this social messenger aspect of your radio work emerge?  

A: It came from, and it is to this day, the Sixties ethic. Coming of age during the era of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the Vietnam war protests, the women’s rights movement, gay movement, the movement to legalize marijuana, concerns about the environment. If you were in the Sixties, and you were serious about what was going on and paying attention, it became part of your person. Not your professional person. You as a human being and you had to be involved in the world. 

Q: I remember 1972-1974 you were constantly discussing the Watergate crisis and those government hearings on the radio airwaves. Was that a tipping point for you to veer more into this political arena? 

A: I saw Watergate as a direct threat to the constitution and America. It pissed me off. It also, by the way, I thought was one of America’s finest moments. Because watching the Watergate hearings, watching Richard Nixon, the President of the United States have to resign without a military coup, taught me that when push comes to shove, the constitution works. That was also a proud moment in American history. 

Q: You have had some run-ins with station management over the decades. 

A: I’ve been told to shut up constantly. I was hauled in to the General Manager’s office at KMET and threatened I would be fired if I mentioned paraquat and the spraying of it on Mexican marijuana fields. 

     “I was against the spraying of paraquat on marijuana fields. The other DJs as well. We ignored it and went about our business. And our business was to protect the listeners who may get a hold of some of this stuff and ruin their health. 

    “I first heard DJ Pat “Paraquat” Kelley in the afternoon in a news report, and by the time I got to the station, there was a thing in our log book about writing our Congressman. A public service announcement. The program director was on our side. 

    “So I went on the air and read it, played an appropriate song, the request line rings, and the guy says, ‘You know what Jim? Rather than telling people to write to Congress, why don’t you have them call the White House.’ There was a public telephone line open 24 hours a day. I called the number and got the White House. I then announced later, ‘At midnight tonight, 3 in the morning in Washington, D.C., I’m going to give out the telephone number of the White House.’ We politely called them in masse to protest the spraying of paraquat on Mexican marijuana fields. This was the KMET audience.  

Q: All through the 1970s, especially around the music, record business, and FM radio stations, marijuana was around the environment.       

A: It was part of our culture. It was part of our daily life and routine. We smoked in the studio and on the air. In fact, when we moved into some new studios at Metro Media Square, Rachel Donahue, another DJ, God bless her, had the station with the architects build a vestibule that went between the air studio and the music studio. That was strictly a place where we could go to step in and light up. And they built it. 

Q: I know we’re going back over 30 years, but did smoking marijuana impact or inform your radio work?      

A: I don’t do this anymore, but back then I’d have a little ritual and go in and do the first half hour of the show and get my legs on the ground. And then I would go out and take a hit or two of pot and do the rest of the show. In the KMET days, a lot of people did it. Some had it. And it was part of the culture.   

    “I also don’t have crazy stories about record company promo people leaning on me to play songs. I got a reputation really early that you don’t come and talk to me about your records. You certainly don’t come and talk to me if you are offering me something. The reason is that because I took this so seriously about my job. 

    “And, if I’m playing a Bob Dylan song and my audience has to know I’m playing that song because of what it says. And for no other reason. So I never got any of that because I let it be known really quickly that the only reason I ever choose a song is because the song is advancing the set that I’m playing. I do not want any other thought in my mind except what is that song saying.   

Q: Do you remember your first joint? 

A: I do. I have a good story about that. I was in an apartment in Northern California, still living at home. I went over to this apartment to smoke my first marijuana cigarette. Somebody had one. We locked the doors, pulled the shades, went into the bedroom, so paranoid the cops would be busting in on this one little joint. We put on the album ‘Freak Out’ by Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention. Oh man…

Q: And many years later, Zappa is a neighbor of yours in Laurel Canyon and you talked to him a few times for your longtime “Innerview” series. 

A: I went over to see Frank. I was in his house. He was a very bright guy. You really had to have your guns loaded. On that day, maybe the early ‘80s, it was common that I would pull out a joint and ask who ever I was interviewing if they wanted to smoke a joint. And Frank said, ‘I don’t do drugs. I don’t want drugs in the house. I have children here. What are you doing bringing drugs in my house?’ It completely put me back on my heels. I said I was sorry. It was his policy. I went back to my car put it away and did the interview. He thought that was cool. 

Q: How has FM radio changed the last 40 years? 

A: That’s a big question. The answer is it began in April of 1967 when Tom and Rachel Donahue walked into a radio station in San Francisco that was so poor it could not pay its phone bill. They had an idea. They brought in their own albums. And from those humble beginnings a multi-billion dollar industry grew out of it. It went from people who did it strictly for the love of the art form, who saw that we needed a connection between the activists on the street, the musicians who were signing the songs about the issues the activists were doing, and we needed a way to combine those two things and broadcast it to the tribe. That’s where we came in. A lot of it was going to be fun and about parties. A lot of it was going to be serious about ending the war. The 45 single gave way to the album. The single might be a nice catchy love tune but on the album you might find a song about ending the war. 

   “The nice thing about rock ‘n’ roll is that you can give me any subject you can think of that has to do with life and I’ll play you a set about that. Because rock ‘n’ roll has talked

about it. Unlike swing or country music, rock ‘n’ roll deals with life, religion, sex, drugs, everything you can find. That’s where I was able to take a subject that was in the news that day that disturbed me, come on the air and talk about it and then play four or five songs that would expand the discussion. 

Q: In 1980 the government voted to de-regulate the airwaves. There used to be a limit on how many radio stations a company could own. That changed. How did the new conglomerates, corporations and the expanded ownership impact radio then. The ramifications of this are still evident in 2010.  

A: We were the canary in the coal mine. That was the worst thing that ever happened to FM radio and American media as well.  Prior to President Ronald Regan, for the entire history of American broadcasting, going back to radio inventor (Guglielmo) Marconi, as soon as there was a Federal Communications Commission, they had what was called the 7 and 7 rule. That meant that one person or corporation could not own more than 7 radio and 7 TV stations. That’s all you could own in the country. 

    “Then Ronald Regan comes along and has the brilliant idea of de-regulating radio. Now this came obviously from the lobbyists who got to the legislators. 

    “And after Regan, and by the way, also President Clinton, who is to be held accountable for this. It was instead of American media and the airwaves being looked upon as the public trust, the public’s airwaves, it now became all right for large corporations to buy up as many radio and TV stations as they can get their hands on. And that is where the threat to the first amendment comes in because fewer and fewer people own more and more information outlets. 

Q: Is it harder now to do your own thing on the radio?   

A: It’s a great question and the answer is a definitive yes. Because every night when I go in I am very aware that this is it. Because I’m the one carrying the torch. Now I didn’t ask the carry the torch. I just looked up one day and I was the last guy standing. So I’m really aware of that. One of the worse things that happened because of de-regulation was initially they didn’t give a shit about us. But once we started making money that’s when it got serious for the owners. They brought in consultants and these people who didn’t care about the music. 

Q: Who is your nighttime audience? Years ago, and in 2010?  

A: During the KMET era the audience was virtually the same age as me. People sat and really listened to the radio and followed along. And I knew whom I was talking to. As FM aged, and the audience aged, they got married, got mortgages, and now, thank God, I have those same people listening. Now they may not be able to give me as much time as they did then. But here's’ the kicker. Their kids are now listening. That is something I never thought I would live to see. A parent and a child would listen to the same music. That blew my mind. 

    “5 years ago, a guy in a car called up with a request. And he said, ‘I’ve got my son who is 16. He wants to hear some Jimi Hendrix.’ I still have many people that call me who have been listening since KNAC. Now that’s extraordinary. I also have kids who are 16, 17 and 18 requesting Bob Dylan. That’s even more extraordinary. They know who The Beatles are and know their music inside and out. They love The Doors. 

Q: Why do your listeners constantly demand The Beatles, Doors, Led Zeppelin, Rolling Stones, Tom Petty, Neil Young and U2. Like, why after 40 years they keep requesting a lot of the same bands that are always a part of your sound rotation? 

A: Because the music is that good. They wrote extraordinary songs that speak to people in a way that pop music does not. The Doors get inside of you. The Beatles get inside of you in a way pop music doesn’t. The Rolling Stones’ ‘Gimme Shelter.’ The difference with these guys is that they have a way of writing a song that became popular but at the same time it’s talking about breaking on through to the other side. ‘Not To Touch The Earth.’ ‘Ship of Fools’ from ‘Morrison Hotel” which talks about the human race dying out. This is stuff that is still applicable today. 

    “A kid hearing The Doors’ ‘Peace Frog’ in 2010 for the first time is going to hear it different than I did because the Vietnam War is not raging. Or the 1968 Democratic Convention with people being beaten up in the streets. However, they are going to hear it in the context of their world. I can’t presume to know what that means. Today I can play that song in the context of today and make it work. So it is still relevant to me because even though it was written back then I can put it together with something new. 

    “The only thing today’s kids are missing is context. I have to keep in mind that the songs says something to me but it may say something completely different to someone in the audience. So all I can do it is play it in a way that says something to me and then how it is interpreted by them in the context of the set it may be different. If I put the songs together correctly people should recognize, ‘OK. Morrison is saying something in ‘Five To One.’ That’s why you have to listen to the lyrics when you listen to my show. 

   “Years ago, the recordings of ‘Helter Skelter,’ ‘Peace Frog’ and ‘Gimme Shelter’ were warnings and they are reality now. Sometimes the particular or current issue drama will change but the human condition that causes them is the same. The thing that caused war in Vietnam or war in Iraq is war.   

    “I have a lot of conservatives that listen to my show and I’m proud of that. I’m proud of the guy who comes up to me, and this has happened more than once, ‘Jim, I’ve been listening to you for more than 30 years and I’ve never agreed with one thing that came out of your mouth about politics. But I’ve listened for 30 years.’ Fantastic. Because we’ve reached some sort of dialog even though he’s a conservative and I am a liberal. I support Barak Obama. He’s only had a year. Look what he walked into. 

    “You really have to understand that when I go after a specific topic like war, it’s about the policy of it. Not the soldiers. Of course I support the soldiers. Who wouldn’t support the soldiers? Thank God they are fighting for us. 

Q: And you still play The Doors’ “Unknown Soldier.”

A: It might be more potent now because if you listen to that song it is written about a person, and that person’s war. So it’s any soldier at any time. Not just the Vietnam war. And when he sings ‘It’s all over. The war is over’ at the end. That’s because the soldier dies. And so for him, war is over. So that applies to any soldier in harm’s way. 

Q: In summer of 1971 you announced the death of Jim Morrison. 

A: I was at my parents when I got the word. So I went on the air and we were mourning his death when the story broke. 

  “The one I remember most vividly is the passing of John Lennon. I went on the air that might and it was one of the most painful things I ever had to do. That was the most painful and memorable. To this day I have never spoken the names of the ass hole that killed him. 

Q: Do you become the messenger when you have to announce deaths or traumatic events? 

A: It’s not easy. It ain’t fun. You have to understand, like in the case of Lennon, KMET-FM instantly became the public wailing wall. When George Harrison passed recently, KLOS-FM became the public wailing wall. People were calling, first off, to hear it wasn’t true. And then they want spill out their emotions to you. And tell you how much they love John or George. When they first heard The Beatles. You have to be ready for that while you are doing the show and create this thing. They need to say it to somebody. And you happen to be the person because you are playing all this Beatles’ music. 

   “These are songs that spoke to us in a very metaphysical way. And continue too. That’s the key point. This isn’t dated music. Because they didn’t write the trendy shit. They were writing about the human experience. ‘Eleanor Rigby’ today will move somebody to tears. Even though it was written and not done in the context of time. I can play The Beatles or Doors and out it together with something new like U2 or Kings of Leon or Green Day. And make it work today. It’s not dated. 

Q: How does advertising, sponsors, and promotions get integrated into your program? 

How do you incorporate these factors. The people who buy time.  

A: At some point you have to come to the understanding that those commercials are paying my salary. They are also keeping the lights on and paying everyone’s salary. I have a much better relationship today with the sales staff than I ever had before. For one thing, the sales department are hipper than they used to be. They used to be a bunch of used car salesmen. Nowadays the sales staff grew up listening to radio. They appreciate the songs more, and they are bit more in tune to the ethic of the show. I try and work with them more than I used too. Now you realize they are doing a job to keep me on the air. So I’m trying to do what I am. Commercials have to come up at a certain time. Because KLOS has two breaks an hour, so I’m going to play around a half and hour of time and plan out a set I can get maybe two sets of songs or one really long set.

    “Back in the day it was prevalent for long songs to be played. I still do it. You don’t hear anyone else doing that. We all used to do it back then. 

   “Every song that I chose, every segue that I do requires a multitude of decisions. Every time I play a song. I have to know what the song is going to say and will it advance the topic. 

Q: You program different length records and tempos for the mix. 

A: How does the song I am playing now end? Cold, fade out. How does the next song start? If it ends cold, and the next one fades up that ain’t gonna work. If it starts really loud and the other one is fading out, that ain’t gonna work. So I have to find songs that segue and have the lyrical content. And how long are they?    

A: Here is what I do. Think of me as a musician who plays a guitar, It starts with a note. And those notes build a chord. And the chords build a song. I use completed songs in the same way. 

    “After midnight I might go into AC/DC, then Joni Mitchell or Bob Dylan. Because the show has to have dynamics. Peaks and valleys. You do not want to be slamming heads for four hours. Maybe a Friday night more so. I want the show to take you to an emotional high, bring you down and contemplate the world for a moment. Think about the girl you lost or the one who got away. I’ve had hour discussions about God. The Rolling Stones have so many biblical references. Listen to ‘Beggar’s Banquet.’ 

A: I play them a lot. When they first came out I was at KMET. They were a new band. Second album came out and I was doing ‘Innerview’ at the time and needed a band that week. So Bono and The Edge came up to my house in Laurel Canyon, sat in my front room and I interviewed this new band. Which I knew very little about. But looking into their eyes I could tell these guys were the real thing and they were going to be around. And I was proven right. Bono, U2 as a band, and Bruce Springsteen, these guys are so heroic in the context that they could be sitting by the pool doing the best drugs in the world and never give a shit about anything. Yet they choose to do what they’ve done. I think they have not gotten anywhere near the due that they should with being the kind of people they are. I think these are great human beings. U2 fits right in. 

Q: Neil Young. 

A: For one thing, Neil Young never put on the spandex. He has been Neil Young from Buffalo Springfield to today. And he has followed his own path. He is his own man. He writes from the heart. 

Q: Jackson Browne

A: He walks the walk and is so quiet about it. No one has done more benefits than Jackson Browne or Bonnie Riatt. Maybe CSN&Y. They do their business of making the world better. 

Q: Led Zeppelin. 

A: First off, they are probably the most popular FM rock act ever. They are that good. Listen to the music. I go deep catalog with them. The people who are in to be trendy or celebrities they don’t last. It’s the real musicians who last. Because they are really delivering. Zeppelin delivers on all those levels. 

Q: Tom Petty

A: Again the songwriting. Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers are one of the best bands I’ve ever heard on record or live. They are just that good. Benmont Tench, Mike Campbell, Tom Petty. They are some of the best musicians on the planet. That’s why they are asked to play on other peoples’ albums. I liked Tom Petty from the first album. It got to me at KMET. And I play ‘em every night. 

Q: The Pretenders.  

A: They always had an edge to them that I liked. Chrissie Hynde is always edgy and takes on subjects I’ve never heard before. I think Chrissie has a lot of guts. 

Q: Bob Dylan. 

A: Bob Dylan is the greatest wordsmith ever. End of discussion. The unique interpretation of how he delivers that is one of a kind. The songs are so good they are covered. Think of all the people who covered his songs. Because that’s how good those songs are. 

   “When Dylan renounced being a protest singer and the voice of our generation. That hurt me and a lot of people. Now I know that was the smartest thing he ever did. Because if he hadn’t done that and gotten pigeonholed as a protest singer, we would have never gotten ‘Shelter From The Storm,’ ’Lady Lady Lay,’ or ‘The Groom’s Still Waiting At The Alter.’ He is so much smarter and more ahead of the curve than any of us. We just didn’t get it then. 

    “I’m an artist. That’s what I try to do as well by his example. I don’t want to get stuck in the past. KMET is one of the proudest moments of my life but I don’t want to live off that story. I want to live off the show I did tonight. And the show I’m gonna do tomorrow. That’s where I live. 

Q: You have hosted a blues hour.  

A: I have a show on Monday called “Mojo Monday” and the first hour of the show every Monday is an hour of the blues. Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon, John Hammond, Paul Butterfield Blues Band, The Allman Brothers. 

Q: You bring up global warming and potential nuclear destruction on your shift on occasion. You’ve also touted documentaries by Albert Gore and Michael Moore to the listeners. 

A: I love Michael Moore. I believe that we should support those who are doing good work. It’s hard to do good work. It may look all glamorous but I don’t even want to think about the death threats he gets. I don’t even want to think about the negative stuff. I get bad stuff but yet he is doing brilliant work and should be supported. 

Q: Is it too late to save the planet? 

A: We are in the process of waking up. In the very nick of time. We are catching up. Here’s the problem. The people that the establishment calls the environmental kooks turned out to be right. We’re the ones who turned out to be right. That happens a lot in social movements. I supported Earth Day in 1970 and encouraged recycling. Others embraced it like (DJ) Cynthia Fox has always been a huge community force. She just doesn’t read the PSA she goes out there. 

   “The news is out thanks to the internet. It takes a long time for big corporations who are started to build hybrid cars. Light bulbs that take less energy. Those of us who have been in the environmental movement for a long time are finally seeing it. We’ve been talking about it for 40 years. The point is never mind their motivations. Even if it’s just to make money or have a good PR campaign. As long as they are helping the planet then do it. Get it done. What we have to do sometimes is show these guys how they can make money in green. How do you make money and at the same time make the world a better place? That’s what we need to do. Make more money by being green. But do it.

(Photo by Angela George/Wikicommons)

    Frank Sinatra’s acclaimed 1967 album with Brazilian music legend Antonio Carlos Jobim, Francis Albert Sinatra and Antonio Carlos Jobim was reissued in an expanded 50^th Anniversary edition during 2017 via Universal Music Enterprises.  

    I’ve been listening to it lately.

    Francis Albert Sinatra & Antonio Carlos Jobim brought together two maestros from divergent musical worlds in a serene sigh of sun-dappled bossa-nova.

    In evening studio sessions at Hollywood’s Western Recorders between January 30 and February 1, 1967, Sinatra breathed new life into the album’s 10 songs, accompanied vocally on four by Jobim, who also played guitar on the album.

    The album’s tracks include seven Jobim originals and three American Songbook classics, delicately arranged and conducted by Claus Ogerman with a studio orchestra.     Ogerman’s studio credits were Wes Montgomery, Kai Winding, and Cal Tjader as a staff arranger for the Verve label on many Creed Taylor productions 1963-1967. He also arranged and conducted the Bill Evans Trio with Symphony Orchestra in 1966.

    The 50^th Anniversary Edition’s CD and digital configurations implement two bonus tracks: A medley of “Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars”/“Change Partners”/“I Concentrate on You”/“The Girl from Ipanema” from A Man And His Music + Ella + Jobim, and a previously unreleased studio session of “The Girl from Ipanema" from January 31, 1967.

    “The 1967 Sinatra/Jobim album is beautiful, all 27 minutes of it, and I’m glad it’s being reissued for a wider audience,” offered KEBF-FM deejay/poet, James Cushing, who hosted the program Jazz Classics in Morro Bay, California.  

    “The quiet that Jobim’s music contains rubs against Sinatra’s vivid bel-canto extraversion in a memorable way and it’s great to hear the two men singing together, as well. I’m OK with Claus Ogerman’s orchestrations, but honestly, a chamber jazz group of guitar-bass-piano would have done just as well if not better.”  

Musician and record producer/deejay David Kessel, the owner of www.cavehollywood.com also provides some unique anecdotes and historical reflections into the relationship his father and step mother had with Sinatra, Jobim and the world of Bossa Nova.    

   “My dad, jazz guitarist and record producer Barney Kessel had his first recording studio encounter with Frank Sinatra in 1949. He was in the band that cut three tunes in Hollywood on September 15 of that year. This included ‘That Lucky Old Sun,’ ‘Mad About You’ and ‘Stromboli.’

 “In the early 1960’s when Sinatra started his Reprise record label, my father was signed to the label. He did three albums, Breakfast at Tiffany’s, Bossa Nova, and Contemporary Latin Rhythms. All three albums had a Bossa Nova/ Cha Cha groove with a surf guitar vibe and cool cheesy organ and horn arrangements. He also released three singles and an EP. A total left field single was ‘Diamonds’ backed with ‘T.V. Commercials.’ Frank and company were well aware of the growing trend of the Latin infusion in pop music and the changing musical culture that was influencing young Americans and hipsters.

    “The Latin music trend in America started in the late 50’s and into the 60’s. You don’t normally think about it, but in 1960 Brian Hyland’s ‘Itsy Bitsy Teenie Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini’ smash hit was a Cha Cha. In 1962 ‘Sherry,’ a big hit by the Four Seasons was also a Cha Cha. In 1963 Eydie Gorme had a giant hit ‘Blame It on the Bossa Nova.’ All three songs helped make the Latin trend main stream and a part of our musical fabric. The kicker here is the release of Jobim’s composition ‘Girl from Ipanema’ in 1964 as a single by Astrud Gilberto and Stan Getz. It won a Grammy for best record of the year in 1965. This firmly established the Latin genre as a popular format.

     “I met Frank Sinatra in the late 1960’s at Jilly’s in Palm Springs when I was a teenager. He was the consummate gentleman. I was with my dad, stepmom B.J. Baker (both worked with Sinatra on many occasions) and my brother Dan. We sat at a table right next to Frank. He got up and said ‘Barney, Betty, boys, hope you enjoy your meal’ and then came over to us and talked for a few minutes. I was really impressed at what a warm, caring, professional guy he was.”

Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon and 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972.   Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble. Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters.

Kubernik’s writings are in several book anthologies. Including, The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. Harvey wrote the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival.  

    During 2006 Harvey spoke at the special hearings initiated by The Library of Congress held in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation.

   In 2017 Harvey Kubernik appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, as part of their Distinguished Speakers Series.

    This live concert performance, captured just five days before the US release of Are You Experienced, their album debut, is notable for being one of the last times the band performed in front of an audience as relative unknowns. Having already conquered the band’s UK base as well as Continental Europe over the previous ten months, the vast majority of the 17,000 plus Southern California concert goers were there to see headliners the Mamas & the Papas and were caught off guard by Jimi Hendrix’s electrifying musicality and showmanship. The authorized set can be enjoyed for the first time ever; amazingly, not a single second of this unique, two-track live recording has ever been released before in any capacity, either via official channels or elsewise.

     In a 2007 interview I did with Michelle Phillips of the Mamas & the Papas, she reflected on Hendrix’s culture-shaping performance at the landmark June 1967 Monterey International Pop Festival where the Jimi Hendrix Experience debuted in the US.  

    “Jimi Hendrix…I was so embarrassed and shocked. I had never seen anyone so sexually explicit on stage. I had never seen anybody treat their axe like that. We were always so careful about our instruments and when we traveled, we had the guitars in the plane with us. And then to see set fire to the guitar and to slam it to bits on the stage was very upsetting to me. It was a form of expression that I was not prepared for.” 

     “Monterey was a watershed moment for something very big, more than rock music, entertainment, or even culture,” enthused novelist Daniel Weizmann.

    “It was the tipping point for a new kind of consciousness. I believe the Shechinah was in the air in California in those years, the ‘dwelling place’ of divine energy, it’s feminine aspect according to Kabbalah, and so many elements of everyday life were evolving at a rate nobody could keep track of. The music was incredible but the music was more than electric sound, more than stimulation. It was a delivery system for a new feeling about living, a new way of being really. Dig it—these people, on the stage and in the audience, were children of the soldiers that stopped Hitler, this was ‘the love crowd,’ like Otis says. It was no accident, no coincidence. They were saying ‘We have a better way. We have the antidote.’” 

     “Monterey,” offers Dr. James Cushing, “we all accept it as the ‘first rock festival,’ but in some ways, it was the last -- in the sense that it was truly festive, with that festive pastoral spirit that puts feeling first, profit last. All the people were festive, and nobody got hurt. All the big festivals that followed were variations on controlled disaster, like Woodstock or the Isle of Wight, or uncontrolled, in the cases of Altamont or the Isle of Fehmarn.  

      However, the immediate prosperity the band enjoyed in the UK was not replicated in the US.

    “Their first two US singles were flops – “Hey Joe” didn’t chart at all, “Purple Haze” only reached #65 – and Are You Experienced wouldn’t be released domestically until late August.

     In their attempt to crack America, the Experience did a five-show stint at the Fillmore in San Francisco followed by a US trek opening for the Monkees.     “After seeing Jimi at Monterey, I suggested him for our 1967 tour,” recalled Monkees’ co-founder Micky Dolenz in a 2008 interview we did.         “I had seen Jimi as Jimmy James at a Village club in New York during 1966. At Monterey I immediately realized it was the same guy!    “I remember after the Hendrix Monterey show that night, I ended up somehow as this sort of mascot to Jimi and God knows who else. I had acquired instruments, amps, guitars and a generator for electricity, and long after the show was over, and the event had essentially ended, everybody was so pumped up it was tough to go away. And there wasn’t anybody who was forcing anyone out of the area. It was this ongoing kind of buzz that was happening, and people would gather in little groups and corners and tents, and keep going.      “There were jam sessions. I fell in with Jimi. And I sat there with a lot of other people, I wasn’t playing, there was no drum set, and people were playing on their knees. It was like ‘Kumbiah’ in a psychedelic way. We all sat there for hours until the morning.  Somehow, I got the idea, and everyone was hungry and thirsty, maybe it was the Boy Scout in me, but I wanted to contribute to the vibe, and I went out of the tent and somehow finding a case of oranges.     “I lugged this entire case of oranges back to the camp, the tent, and started giving out oranges, like I was ‘Little Johnny Orange Seed.’ I think I might have also heard at the time that oranges, or orange juice were helpful after an indulgence of chemicals…(laughs). I later crashed out at the Carmel Inn.”           Hendrix and Co. only lasted nine dates before dropping off due to unappreciative teenybopper audiences who were strictly there to see the headliner.

    In a scramble to book dates after this debacle, John Phillips of the Mamas and the Papas, who with Lou Adler co-produced the Monterey international Pop Festival, invited the Experience to open for his group at the Hollywood Bowl on August 18.

    John York played bass in the road band for the Mamas & the  Papas. During 1968-1969 he was a studio and touring member of the Byrds.  I interviewed multi-instrumentalist York in 2020 for Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child.  

    “I had my ‘Jimi Hendrix Day’ in my life…

     “I was playing bass for the Mamas & Papas in summer of 1967, including an August concert at the Hollywood Bowl. John Phillips, God bless him, had Jimi open the show. There was a middle act of a Beethoven string quartet. The drummer was Eddie Hoh and the guitar player was Eric ‘Doctor’ Hord in the Mamas and Papas. We all were at the sound check in Hollywood on a beautiful summer’s day. What struck me was that Jimi was a very shy guy.

    “Everything he had to do at the check was very gentlemanly. Every way he went he would be followed by half a dozen hippie chicks. If he was standing on one side of the stage they would go sit over there. And if he had to get up and go over to the other side of the stage, they would all of them would stand up and go follow him there. They would never say anything and sort of competing with each other. We all got a kick out of that.

   “In the evening, Denny Doherty and I walked to the very back of the Hollywood Bowl. To look down over the audience and can see the stage. All of a sudden Jimi went into his first song ‘Wild Thing.’ ‘Wow! What is this?’ He starts playing single notes that are so loud and so clear that it is heaven in the air. It was like you could see the notes hanging in the air. ‘Holy shit!”

    “So, Denny and I went down immediately to the stage area, we had all access passes so we were able to go to the edge of the stage. And they had these tall trees on planters that were on wheels. One on each side. In one moment when the lights went dark between songs we ran up on stage and hid behind one of these trees.

    “So, we were literally just a few yards from Jimi, Mitch and Noel. We stayed there for the whole set. We had never seen or heard anything like it. An amazing thing to experience. ‘Cause it was so early on nobody was jaded about this guy.

    “His rhythm section was completely amazing. Each one was highly innovative and playing the way they wanted to play. I don’t know the dynamic of the band was. Or that if he told them to play anything in particular. The drummer obviously came from a jazz background. The bassist was a converted guitarist. In a trio that worked. Because there was no other guitar player. I mean, it was kind of the way Skip Battin played with the Byrds. Skip gave you a lot of information and it was going against the way bass players were supposed to play.

   “Bass players were supposed to be almost invisible. Both those guys impressed me. The thing about it was that they were able to give Jimi what he needed. In order for him to float those notes, right? He needed these two guys who could make the background bubble and boil. They were on it every moment. They weren’t kicking back, being cool and letting him do everything. They were just churning under him so he was able to do whatever he needed to do without the energy dropping at all. It was remarkable.  And at the time, 1967, this is new. And very creative. The thing that touches me the deepest about Jimi is his guitar playing. A level of artistry that he was able to reach that was overwhelming.

    “The night of the Hollywood Bowl there was a big party at John and Michelle Phillips’ house in Bel-Air. The old Jeannete McDonald mansion. I had been there before. It was a party filled with people. There was a pool table and Jimi was sitting right next to me. Gradually people started speaking to Jimi.”

    Robert Marchese caught Jimi, Mitch and Noel at their August ’67 Hollywood Bowl booking.

   “When Jimi Hendrix opened for the Mamas & the Papas at the Hollywood Bowl on August 18, 1967, Mo Ostin and Joe Smith from Warner Bros. Records were sitting right in front of me. And beside them were two little white chicks, like ‘San Fernando Valley beach bunny blondes.’

   “And Hendrix started playing, and believe me, when Jimi started playing, they started cumming in their pants.   And, I leaned over into Mo’s ear and Joe’s ear, and said, ‘this is why you got millions of dollars staring you in your face. This is the first time these two chicks ever got turned on by a black cat. (Laughs). ‘He doesn’t carry a razor blade, plus he’s awfully good lookin’.”  

    “Jimi’s management and people on the road were really nice to me and I was always taken care of with backstage passes and dressing room access,” reiterated photographer Ed Caraeff to me in a 2020 dialogue.

    “At the Jimi Hendrix Experience 1967 and ’68 Hollywood Bowl concerts I went with Rodney Bingenheimer.

    “My philosophy and job was to blend into the room and getting out of the way. I didn’t wear loud clothes. Dark. No patterns. I never tried to get laid by bringing anyone or anybody. I never asked for an autograph or ticket. I usually shot behind the drums and amplifiers. 

And I would always bring my camera. Jimi was a professional and at ease in public setting. Jimi could play the guitar like no one had ever seen. Behind the back, with his teeth and so effortlessly. His fingers seemed to be twice as long as anyone and he could wrap them around the guitar.  

  Photos by Henry Diltz, Courtesy of Gary Strobl at the Diltz Archives.

“Rodney and I after the ’67 Hollywood Bowl Hendrix show went to the home of John and Michelle Phillips in Bel-Air where Jimi and I shot a game of pool.”  

    “The Jimi Hendrix Experience Live at the Hollywood Bowl August 18, 1967 is a major event for Hendrix fans and for anyone interested in the early days of psychedelia,” suggested Dr. James Cushing.

    “The sound is clear hi-fi mono, taken I assume from the Bowl PA system, so the vocals are quite distinct, although the bass is a bit blurry. 

    “The crucial fact of the concert is that Are You Experienced? was not released in the US until September, so Jimi’s big hits are not yet hits; applause is muted, and no one recognizes ‘Purple Haze’ or ‘Foxy Lady.’

    “In his spoken remarks, Jimi sounds a little dubious about the basic situation of playing at an 18,000 capacity amphitheater instead of the NY and London clubs he was accustomed to. ‘We’d like to continue on drearily with a song called ‘Foxy Lady,’ he mutters at one point; he prefaces ‘Purple Haze’ with ‘we’ve got two more records to do, thank God.’ He may be responding to the lack of enthusiasm from the Bowl crowd that’s mainly there for the Mamas & Papas. No offense to Denny, John, Michelle, or Cass, but their Andrews Sisters / Four Freshman harmony vocal sound was based in pop and represented the comfortable past, while Jimi was based in blues and represented the challenging future. 

    “The billing was essentially a mismatch -- not as bad as the aborted tour with the Monkees, but close.

   “The contrast between this performance and the one made two months earlier at Monterey is instructive. Monterey was a sparkling hippie dream which encouraged Jimi’s apotheosis. The Bowl is old-time show business, in which Jimi was an opening act. A year later, Jimi played the Bowl again from a position of stardom. He spoke and played as though he owned the place; in 1967, he sounds like a guest unsure of his welcome.

    “For me, the highlight of the concert is the 8-minute performance of Muddy Waters’ ‘Catfish Blues,’ a-k-a ‘Rollin’ Stone,’ ‘Still a Fool,’ or ‘Two Trains Running.’ Jimi’s blues solo is his longest and most adventurous of the evening, especially when he turns on the wah-wah pedal, and Mitch Mitchell displays his allegiance to Elvin Jones.”

   A September 2023 announcement from Legacy Recordings touts the Monterey Pop To The Hollywood Bowl and a new mini-documentary which details Jimi Hendrix's tumultuous journey upon his return to the US in June 1967, through August of that year.

    “It features new interviews from the Mamas & the Papas vocalist Michelle Phillips, longtime Paul McCartney guitarist Brian Ray and others, the impact of Hendrix's Hollywood Bowl performance by eye witnesses is discussed, and is placed in historic context.

     “The Jimi Hendrix Experience blazed through originals such as “Purple Haze,” “The Wind Cries Mary,” and yet-to-be-released classics “Foxey Lady” and “Fire,” as well as their own re-imagining of favorites by The Beatles (“Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band”), Howlin’ Wolf (“Killing Floor”), Bob Dylan (“Like a Rolling Stone”), The Troggs (“Wild Thing”) and Muddy Waters (“Catfish Blues”). The majority of the crowd had purchased tickets months in advance to see The Mamas & The Papas and were wholly unfamiliar with the jarringly different Jimi Hendrix Experience.

    “Brian Ray, longtime guitarist for Paul McCartney and Etta James, was among the audience members transfixed by what they witnessed.

   ‘“The audience was there to see The Mamas & The Papas,’ recalls Ray. ‘They haven't heard of Jimi Hendrix.  I'd never heard of Jimi Hendrix, and he couldn't be more opposite of the Mamas & the Papas as an act, culturally, physically, in every possible way he was the opposite. Here comes this guy and there's only three of them on stage and they have these afros and these wild, ornate, very theatrical clothes. Jimi proceeds to shred, and it's loud but it's musical, and then it becomes so physical. He starts playing the guitar under his leg, and now it's behind his back, and now he's playing it with his mouth, and now he's on the ground on his knees and he's like humping it, and it, to me was mind blowing. It was sort of every human characteristic; it was beauty, grace, it was sexual, violent, gentle, it was just everything all at once in one band coming out of this one guy.  I wouldn't say that the audience response was quite the same as the response I was having. My sister and I were going bananas, and the audience was like [soft clapping] and they were trying to figure it out.’

     “However, bewildered the audience may have been, their brief tenure opening for the Monkees had hardened the group, and they leaned into their repertoire with ferocity.

    “Backstage at the Hollywood Bowl weeks later, Phillips was won over by Jimi Hendrix.

   ‘“I absolutely loved him,” recalls Phillips in the liner notes for Hollywood Bowl August 18, 1967, penned by Jeff Slate.

   “‘He was a gentleman, he was lovely, he was funny.’ She softened her view of ‘rock and roll theatre,’ which was somewhat antithetical to the more stayed and pitch-perfect folk tradition from which her group emerged. This very concert wound up being the Mamas & the Papas’ last, while the Experience’s star was rising; they would return to the Bowl the following year as headliners. Phillips remembers, ‘In a couple of days or months, Jimi Hendrix was the hottest thing happening.’”

    The Experience Hendrix team of Janie Hendrix, John McDermott and Eddie Kramer prepared this album for its release. Kramer, Hendrix’s long standing recording engineer, recently restored the audio, and three-time Grammy Award winner Bernie Grundman served as mastering engineer.

    “Jimi Hendrix Experience: Hollywood Bowl August 18, 1967 will be availableon CD as well as audiophile grade, individually numbered, 150 gram vinyl, complete with many previously unseen photos by Ed Caraeff, Henry Diltz and Allen Daviau from that night. These include performance shots as well as candid backstage images of band members co-mingling with the Mamas & the Papas, scene maker Rodney Bingenheimer and manager Chas Chandler.

Jimi Hendrix Experience: Hollywood Bowl August 18, 1967 track list:

Side One

1. Introduction
2. Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
3. Killing Floor
4. The Wind Cries Mary
5. Foxey Lady
6. Catfish Blues
7.  

Side Two

• Fire
• Like a Rolling Stone
• Purple Haze
• Wild Thing

Jimi Hendrix: Guitar, Lead Vocals

Mitch Mitchel: Drums

Noel Redding: Bass, Backing Vocals

 (Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon and 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972.  He’s also written titles on Leonard Cohen, Neil Young, and 1967 A Complete History of the Summer of Love.

    Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble. Harvey and Kenneth are writing a book for 2024 publication by Insight Editions, Images That Rocked the World (The Music Photography of Ed Caraeff). In 2014 they collaborated on The Illustrated History of the Monterey International Pop Festival published by Santa Monica Press.

   Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters.

   His writings are in several book anthologies, including, The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. Harvey wrote the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival).

2023 has seen the re-emergence of David Chatfield’s Southern California-based Harmony Records, it’s subsidiary Sound Image Records (both founded in 1981) and related publishing companies, Chatfield Music BMI, Southern California Music ASCAP, and By Sound Image Music BMI.

   David is a 36-year voting member of the Recording Academy and member of the Producer’s and Engineers’ Wing of the Recording Academy.

   Recently, Harvey Mason Jr., Recording Academy CEO, commented that; "David is a prolific creator and we are proud of his long-time membership in the academy." 

   Chatfield is a native of Los Angeles, graduate of Grant High School, who holds a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science University of Southern California, a law degree from the University of LaVerne, as well as certificates from USC Law Center in the Practical and Legal Aspects of the Music Business, and earned six certificates from UCLA Music Business Extension including personal management, concert promotion, radio programming, music marketing and promotion.

During November 2023 I conducted an interview with Chatfield.

The record label owner, producer, arranger, manager, and lawyer discussed his Harmony Records company and current production endeavors.

Q: During December you’ll be releasing a single, “Rearview Mirror,” from the band Destiny Forever featuring John Stamos. John is an actor and musician and his If You Would Have Told Me: A Memoir was an instant New York Times bestseller, debuting at number 4. Three-time Emmy Nominee and People’s Choice Award winner Stamos is a skilled drummer who has been working with the Beach Boys since 1985.   

A: Destiny was John’s first band, a trio with brothers Philip and David Bardowell. They have reunited as Destiny Forever featuring John Stamos. The band’s first music is being released on Harmony Records, which I produced and arranged. The first song “Rearview Mirror” has been in development since March and I produced the tracks at Grammy Award winning ES Audio studio in Glendale.  John has a very unique commercial/progressive playing style on “Rearview Mirror.” Like many others of my releases, the song features my recognizable harmonic California Sound (TM.)

I’m sure drummers will be recording YouTube videos to teach others how he played the song.  John said the recording session was “one of my favorite days yesterday.” 

Q: There has been a lot of growth and momentum with your various musical and recording endeavors as well as building your Harmony Records label and its Sound Image Records subsidiary. I'd like to discuss your winter 2023-24 plans and activities.

You are also very active in recordings by the legendary six-time Grammy winner Puerto Rican guitarist/singer Jose Feliciano, a 2021 National Medal of Arts recipient awarded by President Joe Biden.  Jose also was awarded the Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. In 2023 guitarist Feliciano joined Bad Bunny at the Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival for a version of “La Canción” and “Yonaguni.”

A: I am remixing, remastering and releasing Jose Feliciano’s smooth jazz version of “God Bless the Child” (made popular by Billie Holiday and Blood, Sweat & Tears) to be released this November and I am currently remixing, remastering and releasing the featured song on the new Jose Feliciano EP coming in early 2024.

Q: The Jose Feliciano recordings are done in conjunction with Bob Conti, a noted producer/arranger, and percussionist, who was with Donna Summer for over a quarter of a century and toured extensively with Feliciano.  Bob has become a valuable part of your Harmony Records' vision. You've placed him as head of your International Music division. Tell me about the available and future Jose recordings you’re issuing. 

A: Currently streaming world-wide on all streaming services is my remix of “Sixty Years On”, featuring Jose’s great performance and Bob Conti’s great production of Elton John’s beautiful and meaningful song. The Video of “Sixty Years On” on YouTube is amazing, directed by Vladimir Gribul in Kyiv, Ukraine. Also streaming is Jose Feliciano’s performance of John Lennon and Paul McCartney’s “I Want To Hold Your Hand”, also originally produced by Bob Conti. The video of “I Want to Hold Your Hand” is the centerpiece of a peace and unity television special in planning for spring of 2024.

Q: Work continues on the musical group Steel Breeze. What a saga this band and yourself have been through together.

A: As chronicled by deejays Casey Kasem and Dick Clark, Kim Fowley and I discovered Steel Breeze’s demo of their hit “You Don’t Want Me Anymore” in a trash bag collected from Madame Wong’s nightclub in Los Angeles.

In late 2022, I started remixing, re-recording, editing and mastering dozens of Steel Breeze’s best (and many unreleased) songs. So far, the remixed recordings released have been streamed more than 3 million times by nearly 1 million listeners.

In November 2023, I am releasing a remix of “Who’s Gonna Love You Tonight”, recreating the feeling the song had when Steel Breeze played it on tour with The Who, Jefferson Starship, Joan Jett, Kansas, Hall and Oats, and several others. Also in November 2023, I will be releasing a new unplugged version of “You Don’t Want Me Anymore”. At the beginning of 2024 both an EP and a full album will be released with new focus tracks.

Q: You are also working on overdubs, remixing and remastering a group of songs for an EP for Tony Moore. One song has a planned released in 2023 and 4 more songs scheduled for an EP in 2024.

A: Tony Moore’s one man show Awake is currently running in the UK to rave reviews and will be the opening act for “British Lions” UK tour starting in January 2024. That tour sold out in 19 minutes! “British Lions” is a highly popular spin off from “Iron Maiden”. Tony Moore was an early member of “Iron Maiden” before joining “Cutting Crew” (“(I Just) Died In Your Arms Tonight.”

Q: You've just inked a multi-album relationship with Julian Shah-Tayler, a terrific singer/songwriter. Tell me about the recordings he’s done and will be doing for the label. I would also like to know about your collaborations with Julian.

A: Julian Shah-Tayler is a wonderfully talented singer/songwriter/performer who has great success both on streaming services (Spotify Number 4 on the New Wave Chart in 2022) and live performance, both in the US and Internationally. I recently traveled to Northern California to see Julian perform three different shows; one set featuring his original songs, one as “The Electric Duke” a tribute to David Bowie, and one as a member of “Strangelove: The Depeche Mode Experience.”

I have completed my work on a great song written and performed by Julian and produced by the well-respected engineer/producer Robert Margouleff (Stevie Wonder, Devo) called “Easy.

I am remixing some of Julian’s previous recordings and we are contemplating re-recording several more of fan favorites from Julian’s past releases and combining this all into a “Best Of” album. Robert Margouleff will be involved in what I believe will be a co-production with me of some of Julian’s best material. One or two singles should be released in 2023 with the balance of the album released in 2024.

Q: You have a long-term relationship with singer/performer David Aldo. Talk to me about his very interesting career.

A: David Aldo has had 7 #1 solo singles, was named Best Male Vocalist in South Africa and has toured the world opening for acts like Lionel Richie, and has fronted the Grammy winning and multi-platinum selling iconic group Blood Sweat & Tears. The South African born, now Los Angeles resident has built a career on hit singles, world tours performing with international superstars and being dubbed the “Artist To The Stars” by being the first call performer for celebrity clientele such as Donald Trump, Oprah Winfrey, Tom Cruise, Russell Crowe, James Caan, Clive Davis, Rod Stewart and Elton John as well as making his performances memorable around the world and from Beverly Hills to Newport Beach, California.

David’s single ‘When You Love Someone So Much’ debuted at No. 26 in South Africa on its first week of release and eventually reached the #2 spot on International Pop Charts in South Africa and other countries.

In the U.S., Canada and Australia the single “Grace” also garnered major radio airplay and debuted in the Top 30 in the United States. David’s single “Where’s The Good In Goodbye” became Aldo’s 6th international #1 single and “Grace” reached No. 1 shortly thereafter. David opened for Crosby, Stills and Nash and Natasha Beddingfield in New York. David has performed alongside Justin Bieber, John Mayer, Michael Bolton and David Foster to name a few.

David created the music for The Good News Girls TV talk show for Nigel Lythgoe (American Idol and Dancing with the Stars producer).

David supports multiple charities including “The Hisaoka Foundation” helping people living with Cancer, (having helped raise over 10 million dollars), and Project Child Save, bringing awareness and saving kidnapped children sold into the sex trafficking trade. David is endorsed by Taylor guitars, Ultimate Ears and Shure microphone systems.

I am releasing the tracks from David’s Sound Image recordings on Sound Image Records after remixing and remastering them. The first single, “I’ll Be There” is currently streaming world-wide. The second single, “Someday”, will be released in November 2023.

I am scheduled to remix and remaster releases from Sound Image Recording artists The Storm and Brickyard before the end of the year and am remixing a release and co-writing two more songs with South Bay artist KrisTEN on Harmony Records.

In addition to my work with Harmony Records, I have taken on a co-management role with Atlanta’s Billboard and TikTok charting artist Joie Grey who currently has more than 10million streams world-wide.

Photo below, from left to right: Destiny Forever member and former touring Beach Boy Philip Bardowell, Destiny Forever member John Stamos, producer David Chatfield, engineer Donny Baker, Destiny Forever Member David Bardowell.

     (Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon and 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972. He is the former West Coast Director of A&R for MCA Records, now Universal Music Enterprises. During 2006 Kubernik spoke at the special hearings initiated by The Library of Congress in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation. In 2017 Harvey appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio in their Distinguished Speakers Series). •

Last decade he published 1964 – 1974:  A Decade of Odd Tales and Wonders, a revised and much expanded memoir of the first ten years of his prodigious and prolific career in music.  Having pulled together the Afterword to this new book, I can tell you it’s a deeper exploration of that era, with many more visuals and artifacts -- and I should know.  I pulled together the Introduction to his 2013 Odd Tales and Wonders:  A Decade of Performance.

Travis had a few singles written between 1964-1974 released independently, a dozen featured in movies, including three movie title songs, and many more never before recorded or released that were part of his original live performance repertoire. 

Today, Travis, in complete control of his legacy and catalog, recording and releasing albums of audience favorites from 50 years ago, now has record labels contacting him to license and lease his master recordings! 

Travis’ first movie title song was “Demo Derby,” arranged and produced by Arthur Korb at Ace Recording Studios in Boston, and recorded by The Rondels.  That 28-minute action featurette opened in 1964 with Robin and the Seven Hoods and Viva Las Vegas, before being booked as the “second feature” that played on thousands of screens across the U.S.A. with The Beatles Hard Day’s Night.

So, while Travis was in Germany, his music was on the same screens with Frank Sinatra, Elvis Presley and The Beatles!  That rare Pike Productions recording of the Rondels “Demo Derby,” is still sold online, and the Otherworld Cottage Industries DVD release of the Demo Derby 50^th Anniversary Edition is still sold on wall.cdclick-europe.com/otherworldcottageindustries.

Harvey Kubernik Travis Pike Interview

Harvey:  Now in your 80^th year, with more than a half-century working in the entertainment industries, and more than a decade publishing books, including some of my music-related titles, you’ve moved to Nashville, Tennessee, and are restructuring your Otherworld Cottage Industries with an eye to securing a major music publishing entity to exploit your award-winning musical fantasy adventure Changeling’s Return.  Frankly, I was always impressed by the fact that for some sixty years, you’ve held all the rights to your music.  A true achievement. What prompts you to seek a music publisher now?  Are you planning to retire?

Travis:  I’m not retiring.  I’m restructuring to dedicate myself to writing my Long-Grin Saga, its music and poetry, which may run to five volumes. Having a major music publisher handle my catalog will free me to do so and provide access to new and established talent and markets for my music.  And realistically, at 79, if I am ever to experience “Changeling’s Return” on the big screen, I need a publisher with the connections and expertise to package that musical fantasy to production entities and talent to make it happen.

As you know, in November, 2019, I published an adaptation of my musical screenplay, Morningstone, retitled Changeling’s Return, a novel approach to the music, and a CD of its music titled Changeling’s Return, a novel musical concept, shortly before Covid struck.  In January 2020, theMidwest Book Review called Changeling’s Return “a unique literary and musical experience, significantly augmented by an accompanying CD of the same title,” and unreservedly recommended it for community and academic library collections.

Louis Wiggett’s Four-Star review in the February 2020, 100^th Issue of UK music magazine Shindig! reported ”Pike’s observant eye for narrative  transforms the original story into a hotbed of 21st century action, sitting somewhere between David Essex’s ‘spoils of rock ‘n’ roll’ par excellence Stardust, and the rites, intrigue, and horror of The Wicker Man.”

Mike Stax, in his Spring issue of Ugly Things magazine, dubbed it [Pike’s] “newest gift to the world, a novel that draws on his experiences as a musician, and also stirs in elements of the supernatural.  A compelling story with many surprising turns, and a powerful message about mankind’s impact on the environment and the urgency of changing course.” 

Harvey: And before any of them, I wrote in my Foreword to Changeling’s Return, that you made it possible for readers and/or listeners, to escape into a supernatural world of magic, myth, and music unlike any hitherto known . . . where “songs are spells, going ‘round and ‘round in your head, even when there’s no music to hear.”

Travis:  I particularly liked your “Changeling’s Return is Pike’s invitation to explore a world where mystery and destiny are forever intertwined. Having sipped from Changeling’s Return’s Cauldron of Inspiration, I emerged from its Stream of Consciousness with renewed hope. . .”

Harvey:  The novel won an eLit  Bronze Medal Award for Fine and Performing Arts, an E2 Media (UK)  2020 Award of Excellence, and Lee Zimmerman, in his November 30, 2020, Indie Spotlight review of Changeling’s Return in Goldmine magazine, reported “Pike continues to convey his magical tales through a symphonic surge and a cinematic sweep which fully convey the drama and drive to a dazzling degree. ” 

You originally composed Changeling in 1975 when rock operas were all the rage, and in 1976, it was optioned by Cine-Media International.  You adapted it into a movie musical screenplay that attracted producers, directors, movie stars, and was submitted and considered by some major studios, but never made it into production?  What happened?

Travis:   Difficult to say, but Cine-Media and most other independent productions raised money through limited partnership agreements, until Congress closed that “loophole,” making it nearly impossible to do so.  As for the major studios, if a Director of Acquisitions quit -- or was fired, a previously greenlighted project might be unilaterally scrapped, enabling the new powers-that-be to develop and greenlight their own properties. 

Harvey:  You provided the theme music for your first theatrical movie release, The 2^nd Gun, in 1974.  How did you land that gig?

Travis:  When my new friend, Hollywood Foreign Press correspondent Raoul Alteresco, introduced me to Gerard Alcan at a Christmas Party in the Hollywood hills, Gerard was producing a feature-length documentary about investigative reporter Ted Charach’s claim that the investigation of the murder of Robert Kennedy was botched, citing evidence that a second gunman fired the fatal shot.

Harvey:  Your song, “End of Summer,” became the music theme for The 2^nd Gun, subsequently nominated for a Golden Globe.

Travis:   The film was nominated, not the music.  Gerard described its music as the film’s Zeitgeist, and the way he wove it into the plot was extraordinarily effective, but I only licensed the music, without lyrics or vocals, to avoid linking that bitter-sweet ballad, composed for my German fans, to be forever associated with that tragedy, and today the song “End of Summer” stands on its own merit.

Harvey:  When we first discussed doing this interview, I was stunned when you said if you found a major music publisher willing to pursue the motion picture deal, you would be prepared to include music publishing rights for your entire fascinating and commercial back catalog.   

Travis:  It makes sense.  If any of my songs become hits by popular recording artists, or are instrumental in successfully launching new recording artists, interest in my catalog will be exponentially increased, including the music in Changeling’s Return.

Harvey:  You’ve got songs with hit potential. The 1968 Travis Pike’s Tea Party Alma Records 45 “If I Didn’t Love You Girl” has since appeared on three compilation albums since it was first released.  In 2004, The Backyard Patio, #7 of the Sixties Rebellion albums released in Germany, and in 2005, in a London Records compilation album Tougher Than Stains, and in 2016, released by UK deejay Rob Bailey in his le beat bespoke 7, compilationalbum and the following year, released on a 7” Mousetrap 30^th anniversary 45.

Travis:   More recently, 39-seconds of that original Travis Pike’s Tea Party recording of “If I Didn’t Love You Girl” are heard in the soundtrack of the 2020, 98-minute docudrama Delia Derbyshire – the Myth and Legendary Tapes about the woman who created the original 1993 theme to Doctor Who, produced by Andy Starke, and distributed by Anti-Worlds, that premiered on BBC-1 in May, 2021, written, directed and starring Caroline Catz (best known for her role in the Doc Martin BBC TV Series).

Harvey:  Wow!  I didn’t know that.  But I was there when four-time Grammy Award winning sound engineer and producer Geoff Emerick, who worked with the Beatles on their albums Revolver (1966), Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (1967) and Abbey Road (1969), came out of retirement to record The Syrups debut album.  Your youngest brother Adam was one of the Syrups and they covered your “If I Didn’t Love You Girl,” the sort of song Andrew Loog Oldham called “forever songs.”

Travis:  Adam and I recorded it again for Otherworld Cottage’s Travis Edward Pike’s Tea Party Snack Platter album.

Harvey:  Which begs the question, what moved you to team up with Adam to record your back catalog, a half-century after you quit performing live in 1969.?  Were you planning a comeback?   

Travis:   No. Our mutual friend, David Carr and I co-produced the Ventures in Space long-form VHS video celebrating NASA’s 25^th Anniversary for Award Records and Tapes, and in 1997, when I produced my epic narrative rhyme, Grumpuss, David arranged its music (and with Adam), recorded rehearsal tracks for the rhythmic gymnasts’ performances in my live benefit performance for the Save the Children Fund at Blenheim Palace, birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill, and home of the Dukes of Marlborough where I introduced my original epic narrative rhyme with a budget just shy of $1,000,000.

Harvey:  In 1997, tied to the Save the Children Fund (and with the support of Buckingham Palace), you produced Grumpuss as a fund-raiser for that UK charity.

Travis:   Yes, and in 1999, my Otherworld Entertainment Corporation VHS release of that epic narrative rhyme won an INTERCOM Silver Plaque Award for Special Achievement -- Writing at the Chicago Film Festival, and later received a coveted Jeanie Emerald Star Angel Award from the Southern California Motion Picture Council for my Contribution to Entertainment Industry and/or the Performing Arts -- and two decades after the VHS release of Grumpuss, when I released the original digibeta recording of that 1997 performance on DVD, it resulted in Otherworld Cottage Industries winning a LUXlife Global Entertainment Award for Best Audio Storyteller, 2018, and in 2020, an E2 Media (UK), Award, also singling out my Contribution to the Entertainment Industry and Performing Arts. Grumpuss has yet to be made into the CGI blockbuster I’d proposed in my original three-picture package, but my critically acclaimed performance did preserve its epic narrative rhyme.

David Carr, a classically trained pianist and arranger who collaborated with many musicians and songwriters, was an original a member of the British group, The Fortunes (“You’ve Got Your Troubles I’ve Got Mine”).  He arranged my music and lined up the talent for my recordings of songs from Long-Grin, and asked me to write, direct and co-produce the Ventures in Space NASA 25^th Anniversary long-form video for Award Records and Tapes, after which I asked him to arrange and conduct the Otherworld Festival Orchestra for Grumpuss.

Harvey:  He was working with me at KUBRO talent management in those days and told me you were talking about recording your music catalog featuring songs going back to the mid-sixties. 

Travis:   We were.  I had been buying all the gear to set up an in-house recording studio at Otherworld Cottage in Los Angeles, when on July 18, 2011, David suddenly died of a heart attack.  The studio equipment I had purchased gathered dust for nearly 18 months, while I wrote my first illustrated memoir, 1964-1974; A Decade of Odd Tales and Wonders, after which, I donated the gear to my brother, Adam, to use in his recording studio, and toward the end of 2012, with everything installed, Adam and I began recording my catalog in his studio.

In 2013, I published my rock ‘n’ roll memoir and our first CD, Odd Tales and Wonders, Stories in Song, generating a rush of reviews, articles, and interviews in print and electronic media, including comprehensive UK interviews by Andy Pearson in his fearandloathingfanzine, Lenny Helsing in itspsychedelicbaby, and yours in musicconnection, forgottenhits60s.blogspot, cavehollywood, goldmine, uglythings, recordcollectornews and more now posted on the otherworldcottagindustries website. 

Early the following year, I published your book, It Was Fifty Years Ago Today, THE BEATLES Invade America and Hollywood, and since then, you’ve interviewed me a number of times, but for all that, it was the Monday, November 7, 2016, Perlick Post that announced my return to the music scene, by reporting that “The Best music video of 2016 was actually shot in 1966,” calling attention to a movie clip of me and the Brattle Street East performing “Watch Out Woman” on Boston’s Charles River Esplanade in James A. Pike’s 1966 widescreen, color feature film Feelin’ Good I‘d posted on YouTube.    The follow up article in the Monday, December 5, 2016, Perlick Post, cited the Winter 2016 issue of Ugly Things magazine, featuring The Turtles, Music Machine, Unnatural Axe, and Wrongh Black Bag, Tim wrote “Ugly Things contains the story behind the incredible ‘Watch Out Woman’ video by TRAVIS PIKE, which immediately caused jaws to drop throughout the garage rock world back in October when it mysteriously appeared on YouTube.  Some notable Boston teen scene expert thought it might be a hoax – “How could I not know about a song/performance this great from back in the day?” –but pop culture historian Harvey Kubernik set the record straight by uncovering the strange-but-true story of Pike’s career.  Evidently, Pike’s period as a songwriter and singer in New England during the mid-60s is just the beginning of a colorful showbiz adventure . . .”  That, along with your article in Ugly Things,  led to the phone call from State Records (UK), which licensed it and “Way That I Need You” from that sequence.

Harvey:  I remember it well.  Mike Stax gave me six full pages in Ugly Things, touching on your club performances when you were stationed in Germany and writing the title song to the  Demo Derby featurette that opened with Viva Las Vegas, and the same night opened with Robin and the Seven Hoods, and went on to play thousands of screens across the US with the Beatles Hard Day’s Night.

Travis:   Lenny Helsing’s stellar review in Shindig! magazine sent it into orbit when he wrote “It's not every day a song comes along that has the '60s garage appreciation congregation all in a lather, but Travis Pike's ‘Watch Out Woman,’ an unreleased gem of the hallowed vintage of 1966, is such an accolade-deserving specimen.  It roars outta the speakers and moves rock 'n' roll obsessives - at least temporarily - into stop everything flip out mode since its discovery during the early part of last year via the internet, part of an unknown budget movie, Feelin' Good.  Travis' clear and confident vocals rip through an unstoppable thundering rhythm, goaded on by clanging lead guitar and pounding drums, the whole producing a superb blast of highly charged, ultra-durable beat mayhem.  Flipside, 'The Way That I Need You', decreases the pace, but this could've been like an unconscious template for 'Canyons of Your Mind', the Bonzos' still to be implemented timeless caper, but with serious attitude, heartfelt emotion and authentic fan-style screaming. You need this."

Harvey:  Several of your tunes and master recordings have appeared in films and on TV, including five of your ten songs in the 1966 pop classic feature film, Feelin’ Good, now posted on YouTube.  One of your Travis Pike’s Tea Party tunes, “If I Didn’t Love You, Girl,” has enjoyed an ongoing legacy since you wrote and recorded it nearly 60 years ago, and it was hailed in various UK and US music periodicals and outlets.  Lee Zimmerman, in his February 3, 2018, review of Travis Edward Pike’s best work for Goldmine magazine, wrote “All the songs are radio worthy and hold up surprisingly well, even some 50 years past their prime.  Timeless and tuneful, these re-recordings compare favorably with anything offered up by The Monkees, the Raiders, the McCoys, the Standells, and others of that ilk.”  Tell us about the 21^st century albums that now contain the bulk of your music catalog, and a bit about your favorites.

Travis:   There are two special songs in my Odd Tales and Wonders Stories in Song CD and one of them, track #9, “Loup Garou” (about a werewolf prowling the bayou), is the most popular of all my recent recordings with YouTube visitors.  I picked up some Cajun speech patterns from my neighbor in Los Angeles, who was originally from New Orleans, and worked them into the song.  Another standout on that CD is track #7, “The Sorcerer’s Waltz,” composed for an early, proposed animated version of Long-Grin, no longer attached to that property, but a waltz arranged and sang as I imagined it would be sung by Ron Moody’s “Fagin” in the movie musical Oliver.

Harvey: In 1964 you were living in Germany singing Little Richard and Chuck Berry tunes on stage, billed as “Teddy Pike, Twist Sensation aus USA.”

Travis:  I used to sing Little Richard’s “Lucille,” but that high-pitched screech owl howl was hard on my vocal cords, so frankly, I preferred singing Chuck Berry’s “Maybelline.” 

Harvey:  You have always been a storyteller. It’s the backdrop to your work and career, and you worked with well-respected screenwriter gatherings for several years in L.A. Is it all about telling a tale or describing a moment you want to tell and sing to us about?

Travis:   It certainly informs the novelty songs in my Stories in Song CD.    

Harvey:  In addition to those novelty songs, you’ve written and recorded folk-rock, hard rock, psychedelic, long-form orchestral pieces, and even one full blown march.  Tell us about the best songs from those other albums you recorded and published since 2013, and how you selected them.

Travis:   I’ll start with how I choose them.  I try, at least once a month, to list the number of plays each song in the six albums in my online repertoire are played on YouTube and select from the most popular with visitors.  Unfortunately, my websites have a history of being disabled and are only recently back online and will hopefully remain so for as long as visitors come to listen. 

“End of Summer” and “The Likes of You” are both popular on the Stories in Song album, but have unique histories addressed elsewhere in this interview, so I deliberately chose not to select either of them from the Stories in Song CD above. 

Historically, the Feelin’ Better CD, has songs from the movie Feelin’ Good, but two of its most popular songs on YouTube, Track #10, “Rock ‘n’ Roll,” a song I wrote for The Five Beats, is performed as I would have done it in Germany in 1964, and Track #11 “End of Summer” is sung with German and English verses, and neither song was in the movie.

Reconstructed Coffeehouse Blues features songs I wrote and performed between bands, when I played solo or with Danny Gravas at King Arthur’s ( a coffee house with a liquor license), in Boston’s Combat Zone, and it’s especially hard to select favorites, because songs I’d arranged as solos, were recorded with Adam’s skillful improvisations.  Track #4, “Mesmerizing Tantalizing Hazel-eyed Jane” and Track #5, “She’s Gonna Be a Woman Someday” (with a cameo performance by David Pinto on keyboards), were both chosen for being playful entertainment for one and all.  But Track #1. “Sing a Song of Blues” is the most popular song on the CD, a new song about difficulties  military personnel repatriation experience upon returning from a war zone, so if a “sixties” coffeehouse setting requires another protest song, Track #10, “Don’t You Care at All?” is a genuine Vietnam Era piece.  On the other hand, if blues is the hook, I would pair Track #9, “Shaggy, Shaggy Blues” with “Sing a Song of Blues.” 

The Travis Edward Pike Tea Party Snack Platter CD is next. I didn’t select Track #1, “If I Didn’t Love You Girl” because we discussed its inclusion on so many compilation albums, but the most popular song on that album according to YouTube visitors, is Track #7, “What’s the Matter with Your Mind?” It must hit a nerve with my fans because it’s the second most popular of all my songs on the Otherworld Cottage label.  Track #10, “You Got What I Need,” and Track #11, “Oh Mama” were the most popular of the songs in Travis Pike’s Tea Party repertoire.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EljYOQ9IxXE&list=OLAK5uy_l0LIH5paK5uZ1EydJ-SDQJsWD25lmTBAw&index=10&pp=8AUB

Outside the Box has three songs in my YouTube Top Ten, including Track #1, “Andalusian Bride Suite,” an art song, I composed in 1974, to which I added a vocal dedicated to my daughter, Lisa, and French Horn and Trumpet parts played 40 years later by her two sons, then in middle school.  Track #10 “Lovely Girl I Married” is another melody I composed in the sixties, but lyrically composed for my wife on our 50^th anniversary.  Track #11, “Star Maker,” is more current.  I used to know how to get a record played, and if played far, wide, and often enough, it would result in a hit.  But today, deejays have little control over  programming, and most follow instructions issued by remote programmers, with whatever agenda they believe will attract the most listeners. And there’s one more on this album that I must mention, because nowadays, everything is politics.  Track #8, “Gotta Be a Better Way,” has a rhythm that won’t quit and lyrics that don’t compromise.

Harvey:  What about the songs on the Changeling’s Return CD?

Travis:   The current Changeling’s Return CD features 18 tracks.  Surprisingly, the most popular is Track #6, “In This Place.”  It opens and closes acapella, evolving into a long-form processional, and then into a high-energy otherworldly dance.  The second most popular is Track #4, “The Likes of You,” a love song (possibly conceived in “Otherworld”), after my car wreck in Germany in 1964. Track #3, “Morningstone,” the title song in the earlier property, also made the cut.  Track #9 is “The Fool,” the result of a sip from the Cauldron of Inspiration, and  Track #12, “Witchy Stew,” is an appropriate reaction by visitors experiencing Changeling’s Return for the first time. Track #14, “Mystical Encounter” cannot be denied and Track #16, “The Fool in Concert” is a medley pondering the delusion or efficacy induced of that sip from the Cauldron of Inspiration and recalls the invitation to explore Changeling’s Return inherent mysteries and destiny, and Track #18, “Dog, Roebuck and Lapwing” is intended to reawaken its spellbound audiences.

Bob Marley And The Wailers' seminal first release on Island Records, Catch A Fire, universally regarded as the album that put reggae music on the global stage, is being re-issued via UMe on November 3rd to celebrate the 50^th anniversary of its original release in 1973.

   A hugely anticipated new biographical drama film, BOB MARLEY: ONE LOVE, celebrating the life and music of an icon who inspired generations through his message of love and unity, is in theatres on January 12, 2024.

      Produced by Ziggy Marley, Cedella Marley, and Rita Marley, and with Stephen Marley as the music supervisor, the film tells the inspirational story of how Bob overcame huge adversity to become one of the world’s most revered musical and cultural giants through the power and beauty of his revolutionary music. Produced in partnership with the Marley family, the film stars Kingsley Ben-Adir as Bob and Lashana Lynch as his wife, Rita. It’s directed by Reinaldo Marcus Green from a screenplay written by Terence Winter & Frank E. Flowers and Zach Baylin and Reinaldo Marcus Green. 

   CATCH A FIRE is the fifth studio album by Bob Marley and the Wailers and was the first to be released by Island Records UK. The album when issued originally had a limited release and was credited to The Wailers.

     Housed in a memorable sleeve in the shape of a Zippo lighter designed by graphic artists Rod Dyer and Bob Weiner, CATCH A FIRE’s future versions would feature the portrait of Bob Marley smoking a “spliff,” taken by Esther Anderson.

    Both LP and CD packages will also include a book comprised of classic images of Marley from photo shoots with long-time collaborators Adrian Boot, and Arthur Gorson, who shot images of Bob for two weeks in Jamaica, Dennis Morris, and Neville Garrick. The packages also incorporate press clippings from the era, while brand new sleeve notes have been written by renowned music journalist and author Chris Salewicz. The formats will utilize both iconic sleeve designs, the original famous Zippo lighter illustration version with Bob smoking a spliff. The D2C offering is a limited-edition run pressed on colored vinyl.

    The album has received enormous critical acclaim, including being listed on Rolling Stone's list of the “500 Greatest Albums of All Time,” the second highest placement of the five Bob Marley albums on the list, after the posthumous compilation album Legend. It is also rightly regarded as one of the greatest, most important, and influential albums, across all genres, of all time.

The complete track listing is as follows:

       “Catch A Fire" was one of the first two reggae albums I ever heard, along with the breath-taking sound-track to The Harder They Come motion picture,” underlined reggae music historian Roger Steffens, author of So Much Things to Say: The Oral History of Bob Marley published by W. W. Norton & Company in July 2017.

   “At that time, I was reading poetry in schools from September to May, doing a one-man show of living, mostly beatnik, American poets called Poetry for People Who Hate Poetry. Thus, it was the sublimely concise lyrics of Bob Marley and Peter Tosh and Bunny Wailer that gained my initial notice.

    (Photo by: Roger Steffens)

Marley, especially, was able to reveal difficult concepts with almost haiku-like precision, as in ‘Slave Driver,’ in which he reduces ‘crapitalizim’ to its essence: ‘Good God, I think it's illiteracy, is only machine to make money’ Another song of slavery was the fiery ‘400 Years,’ Peter's acknowledgment that the same ancient disenfranchisement continues to the present era.

   “The wry humor and patois quoting of ‘Kinky Reggae,’ led me to study the island's witty vocabulary. The calypso-ish banter of the song included the words "she had brown sugar all over her booga-wooga," which led most listeners to presume a lewd carnality, but the truth was more sociological than sexual.

   “In Jamaica, when they cut down the sugar cane, there is nothing left but a dark brown root, with no particular usefulness. And the cane filed workers usually wore cheap canvas shoes known as ‘booga-woogas.’ So, when you see a girl on the streets of Kingston with ‘brown sugar all over her boogie-wooga,’ you know she is a canefield worker in from the country. 

    “The album also changed reggae itself through the influence of Chris Blackwell, who added lead guitar to some tracks, a rare thing on Jamaican recordings. Bob liked it, and on his first solo album in 1974, he added Al Anderson, a lead guitarist from New Jersey, as the first member of his new touring lineup. It was Al who would go on to play the sensational licks on Bob's first international hit, ‘No Woman No Cry.’   

   “Finally, often cited is the unique packaging for Catch A Fire, which resembled a flip-top Zippo lighter, opening in the middle and revealing a lighted die-cut flame. Good copies of the original now sell for many hundreds of dollars. Formally thought of as mere ‘novelty music,’ reggae was being given a first-class Rock style release, promoted as simply ‘The Wailers,’ a complete band, like their Island contemporaries, Traffic.”      

    “When Catch A Fire first came out in Spring 1973,” remembers poet and deejay Dr. James Cushing, “I was living in a big dormitory at UC Santa Cruz, and the first few times I would play that album, I'd leave my door wide open. People would stop by and ask ‘what's this music?’ and they'd stay for the rest of the side. The music was guitars, bass & drums, but it wasn't ‘rock’; the players were all black, but it wasn't ‘soul.’ It was totally new and totally captivating.

    “Within a month, every party that quarter in my part of that dorm had to have Catch A Fire in the mix, especially side two with ‘Kinky Reggae,’ which the girls on the hall loved to sing along to. Marley and the girls would sing ‘He had a candy star / all over his chocolate bar’ and they'd all crack up... And the next day I would wake up having had dreams in which bits of ‘Midnight Ravers’ or ‘Stir It Up’ would play a prominent part, and coming out of the bathroom I'd say hi to one of the girls and tell her about the dream, and she'd say ‘Wow! I had a dream like that too!’" 

    During 1969, Jimmy Cliff’s “Wonderful World, Beautiful People,” “The Israelites” from Desmond Dekker & The Aces, and a hit single from Johnny Nash, “Hold Me Tight” earlier exposed reggae to radio airplay in Southern California and several Stateside areas. In the summer of 1972, Nash’s “I Can See Clearly” reached number one on the US Billboard and Cash Box charts.   

   Island Records’ Chris Blackwell, the visionary A&R man and label owner had signed a handful of reggae artists to bring the probing bass propelled messages from Jamaica to a global audience.  

   In June 1972, the Jamaican crime drama film, The Harder they Come, directed by Perry Henzell and co-written by Trevor D. Rhone, starring Jimmy Cliff premiered in Jamaica.

   It tells the story of Ivanhoe Martin, (Jimmy Cliff), a young singer who arrives in Kingston, Jamaica, desperate and eager to become a star in that country. He falls in love with a woman and quickly signs a record deal with a powerful music mogul, and soon learns that the record game is rigged. Angered and confident, Ivan becomes increasingly defiant, and finds himself in a battle that threatens not only his life, but the very fabric of Jamaican society.

     The well-received film yielded a reggae soundtrack courtesy of the Island company that further positioned these intriguing, enticing sounds to the world.     

         Needless to say, in fall of 1973 I was prepared to listen to Catch A Fire. I eventually witnessed eight Bob Marley & the Wailers concerts during 1975-1979. The first recital was on July 13, 1975 at the Roxy Theater in West Hollywood. 

  Pictured, L-R: Henry Diltz and Harvey Kubernik

(Photo by Heather Harris)

In May of 1976, Bob Marley & the Wailers played a multi-night engagement at the Roxy Theater in West Hollywood. Joining owner Lou Adler opening night were Jack Nicholson, Anjelica Huston, Warren Beatty, John Lennon, Ringo Starr, Robbie Robertson, Neil Diamond, Robert Hilburn, John Bonham, Bernie Taupin, Linda Ronstadt, Chris Darrow, Harry Nilsson, Carole King and Art Garfunkel.

   John Lennon and Yoko Ono sat a few feet from me and were beaming the entire set. I had a brief chat with John and thanked him for touting reggae and blue beat music during a handful of his interviews in the seventies.  

     This cosmic event was broadcast in Los Angeles on KMET-FM (94.7), immediately widely bootlegged, later officially issued as Live at the Roxy, a two-disc album, in June 2003.

  A few months after that show, I spoke with The Band’s Robbie Robertson about this monumental event. “I saw the Wailers at the Roxy. They were fine — really interesting — and Bob Marley is a great performer.” 

        I interviewed the Wailers in 1976 for Melody Maker. Our conversation was held in such a smoke-filled room in West Hollywood at the Island Records office on Sunset Boulevard that I forgot to turn on my cassette machine!  

    During their stay in L.A. I attended the band’s two-night stint at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium with music journalist and photographer Heather Harris.    

    I then went to see Bob Marley and the Wailers in 1978 at the Starlight Bowl in Burbank. Bob was the first person on the tour bus and at the sound check. Justin Pierce, music editor of The Hollywood Press, and Ed Kociela, the rock critic on staff from The Herald-Examiner and I all had full stage access as reporters.

    We watched the concert from the wings standing with Mick Jagger, who held daughter Jade in his arms the entire evening. Our circle included Peter Tosh, who was the opening act the very next day for the Rolling Stones at Anaheim Stadium. 

      Before the transformative evening concluded, a sweaty Marley ran to our area side of the stage and brushed me on his way to quickly huddle with Peter, who would join him for a surprise appearance on “Get Up, Stand Up.”  Tosh later told Roger Steffens, ‘I remember we go backstage and Bob clapped my hand and say, “Bwoi, the Pope feel that one. And three days later, the Pope die!” 

   In the liner notes to 2001 Deluxe Edition Catch A Fire reissue on the Tuff Gong/Universal label, Richard Williams, the former deputy editor of Melody Maker and esteemed author wrote, “the unity and integrity of the music are undiminished either by time or Blackwell’s post-production work, the music and the message sounding every bit as uncompromising and imposing as they seemed back then to ears that had never heard such sounds before.

   “Catch A Fire remains in full possession of the qualities that gave it such a pivotal role-alongside Jimi Hendrix’s Are You Experienced, Stevie Wonder’s Talking Book and Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On-in the way music grew.”      

    Bob Marley's immortality continues with Africa Unite, a majestic, posthumous album celebrating the vibrant fusion of Reggae and Afrobeats! Africa Unite is an extraordinary album that pays homage to the Reggae icon's greatest hits, beautifully reimagined and infused with the infectious rhythms of Afrobeats.

    It was issued last August. Africa Unite features inspiring collaborations between Bob Marley's classics and a stellar line-up of contemporary African musicians.

     Bob Marley, a Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee, is notable not only as the man who put Reggae on the global map but as a statesman in his native Jamaica; he famously brought together the country’s warring factions.

   Today, Bob Marley remains one of the 20th century’s most important and influential entertainment icons. Marley’s lifestyle and music continue to inspire new generations as his legacy lives on through his music. In the digital era, he has the second-highest social media following of any posthumous celebrity.

   The official Bob Marley Facebook page draws more than 74 million fans, ranking it among the Top 20 of all Facebook pages and the Top 10 among celebrity pages. Marley’s music catalog has sold millions of albums worldwide. His iconic collection LEGEND holds the distinction of being the longest-charting album in the history of Billboard Magazine’s Catalog Albums chart and remains the world’s best-selling reggae album.

    Marley’s accolades include inductions into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (1994) and ASCAP Songwriters Hall of Fame (2010), a GRAMMY® Lifetime Achievement Award (2001), multiple entries in the GRAMMY® Hall Of Fame, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (2001). For more information, visit bobmarley.com and facebook.com/bobmarley.

(Harvey Kubernik is the author of 20 books, including 2009’s Canyon Of Dreams: The Magic And The Music Of Laurel Canyon and 2014’s Turn Up The Radio! Rock, Pop and Roll In Los Angeles 1956-1972.  He has also written titles on Leonard Cohen and Neil Young.

    Sterling/Barnes and Noble in 2018 published Harvey and Kenneth Kubernik’s The Story Of The Band: From Big Pink To The Last Waltz. In2021 they wrote Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child for Sterling/Barnes and Noble. Harvey and Kenneth are writing doing a book for 2024 publication by Insight Editions, Images That Rocked the World (The Music Photography of Ed Caraeff).

   Otherworld Cottage Industries in 2020 published Harvey’s Docs That Rock, Music That Matters.

His writings are in several book anthologies, including, The Rolling Stone Book Of The Beats and Drinking With Bukowski. Harvey wrote the liner notes to the CD re-releases of Carole King’s Tapestry, The Essential Carole King, Allen Ginsberg’s Kaddish, Elvis Presley The ’68 Comeback Special, The Ramones’ End of the Century and Big Brother & the Holding Company Captured Live at The Monterey International Pop Festival.

On October 16, 2023, ACC ART BOOKS LTD is publishing THE ROLLING STONES: ICONS. 312 pages. $75.00. Introduction is penned by Harvey Kubernik. Spanning six decades, and countless tours and album covers, this portfolio features imagery from some of the most eminent names in photography, alongside the photographers’ own memories and reflections. Includes photographs by Terry O’Neill, Gered Mankowitz, Linda McCartney, Ed Caraeff, Ken Regan, Douglas Kirkland, Dominque Tarle and founding member, bassist and photographer, Bill Wyman. Each photographer has selected images for their chapter and written an introductory text about working with the band

    During 2006 Kubernik spoke at the special hearings initiated by The Library of Congress held in Hollywood, California, discussing archiving practices and audiotape preservation.

   In 2017 Harvey appeared at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, Ohio, as part of their Distinguished Speakers Series).  •