Music In My Shoes
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Music In My Shoes
E68 Conversation with Lenny Kaye and Kevn Kinney
Join us as Lenny Kaye of Patti Smith Group and Kevn Kinney of Drivin N Cryin, join us in studio for an insightful conversation. This episode highlights their inspiring friendship between them, showcasing their mutual influence on each other's artistic journeys.
• Discover the moments that bonded Kevn and Lenny in the music scene
• Reflect on Patti Smith's 'Horses' and its historical significance
• Explore the relationship between poetry and rock music
• Hear about the spontaneity and magic of live performances
• Discuss the importance of versatility in artistic expression
• Understand how early experiences shaped their identities as musicians
• Learn about their perspectives on musical collaboration
• Delve into memories of the legendary CBGB club
• Reflect on the journey of understanding and evolving through music
"Music in My Shoes" where music and memories intertwine.
Learn Something New or
Remember Something Old
Please Like and Follow our Facebook and Instagram page at Music In My Shoes.
You can contact us at musicinmyshoes@gmail.com.
He's got the feeling in his toe-toe. He's got the feeling and it's out there growing.
Speaker 3:Hey everybody, this is Jim Boge and you're listening to Music In my Shoes. That was Vic Thrill kicking off episode 68. As always, I'm thrilled to be here with you. Let's learn something new, new or remember something old. I'm really excited about this episode Joining us in studio. Okay, in the studio with us today. Friend of the show, kevin Kinney yes, and Lenny K, music journalist, underground garage man and happens to be the guitarist for the Patti Smith Group. Welcome, gentlemen, welcome.
Speaker 3:We appreciate you being here so the first thing I have to ask is how did you two become friends? You know, kenny, kenny, I'm calling him Kenny.
Speaker 1:I took Kevin and Lenny and mixed it into Kenny.
Speaker 3:Oh, I like that. All right, that's our new group. That's our new group. Him, kenny. I took Kevin and Lenny and mixed it into Kenny. Oh, I like that. I like that, that's our new group.
Speaker 4:That's our new group, Kenny.
Speaker 3:So how did you two become?
Speaker 4:friends, I believe that you came to visit me once when I lived on the Bowery, when you were looking for record producers for Driving and Crying. I think so, yeah, and you kind of visited me, but I believe the first time we really had a hang was when Patty and the band played in Atlanta at that wacky festival in the middle of somewhere. Oh right yeah, and Bob Dylan was also on the bill. That's right, and we stood by this side of the stage and we were bonded forever.
Speaker 2:That's right, it's kind of. We're kind of I really don't remember, but we have a mutual friend called Tom Clark. I think I've talked about Tom before.
Speaker 3:I've actually seen you and Tom Clark play.
Speaker 1:Yeah, at Eddie's.
Speaker 3:At.
Speaker 2:Eddie's yes, yes, jimmy, you were there too, I was there, yeah.
Speaker 2:So me and Tom, we had a pissing match one day when I was playing at the Mercury Lounge and I went over to Tom's bar and I said yeah, you know, I got Lenny Case sitting there and he goes oh yeah, yeah, he's just my best man. Yeah, well, that's pretty cool. But I've been a huge fan of the Patti Smith group, of course, and of Lenny's writings, and he's a fantastic writer. He's written some great articles and books and that was all before really you got into science fiction.
Speaker 3:Patty Smith, you did a lot of journalism.
Speaker 4:Yeah, but I still do. I mean, I've always written and I've always played music because I feel like there's a lot of combination between the two. A great sentence has rhythm and melody, a great guitar solo has a narrative arc and I'm really happy to kind of move back and forth between the things. But it was writing that brought Patty and me together, because she called me up one day after she read an article I wrote for Jazz and Pop magazine in 1970 called the Best of Acapella, which was kind of like the twilight of doo-wop, and it spoke to her from the music she listened to when she grew up in South Jersey. And so she started visiting me in the record store where I worked and asked me to be a part of her first poetry reading at St Mark's. And out of that little acorn a great oak grew.
Speaker 3:You're not kidding, You're not kidding at all. I mean, that's a pretty cool accomplishment to start off that way and then to have Horses, which is celebrating its 50th anniversary. I know crazy. It makes it to number 26 on Rolling Stone's top 500 albums of all time, and I just find that just amazing.
Speaker 4:You find it amazing, I find it astonishing. I mean, you know, a rogue piece of work like that still sounds completely like nothing else. Before or since that we actually had a rock band Because we didn't set out oh yeah, let's have a rock band and do this. We had some weird cabaret trio with Richard Soul and we had a lot of weird improvisation, kind of following Patty's stream of consciousness, and it was just kind of remarkable that by the time we had a rock and roll band, when we added our drummer, jd Darity, we sounded like ourselves instead of some other random generic rock band. But who knew? I mean, really the best thing you can do in this life is just follow your instincts and try to make sure that what you do is pure. Just follow your instincts and try to make sure that what you do is pure, and I've been pretty fortunate to be able to do that my creative life, no matter what I do One question I have being part of her first poetry reading you did at St Mark's.
Speaker 1:Was that rehearsed? Was that just you improvising with her poetry? What was that like?
Speaker 4:We had about two rehearsals. She was living in a loft on 23rd Street with Robert Mapplethorpe and she was kind of involved with Sam Shepard, the playwright, who suggested she wanted to shake up her first poetry reading, you know, because she knew that Gregory Corso would be in the audience and if it was boring he'd be hooting and hollering things from the balcony. So we were friendly. She would come over and I'd put on our favorite records Bristol Stomp by the Dovelles or my Hero by the Blue Notes, and we'd dance around and Sam suggested that maybe she could recruit the guy from the record store because he knew I played a little guitar. So I went over to her loft and she would recite her poems and I just played totally simple chords, kind of rhythmic. I wasn't a virtuoso. Let's try this minor seventh diminished twelfth. I just kind of chugged along behind her and followed how she breathed, which I think I still do. That's kind of what we do. And we did this poetry reading. It was pretty well received by the hundred people that were in St Mark's Church, some Warhol people, some from the rock writing world, some of Robert's friends. But it wasn't meant to be a thing. We did it once in February of 1971, and we didn't perform again together until 1973 in November Wow, when she did another poetry reading and she called me up and said instead of doing Mac the Knife, let's do Hank Ballard's Thrill Upon the Hill.
Speaker 4:Then we started getting gigs at opening up in folk clubs and just doing whatever it is we did. We never really tried to make it anything more than what it was. We knew that people were fascinated, especially when Patty would go off on these flights of fancy and me and Richard Soule would be running the chords of three chords behind her and dark and light. Without a drummer you could slow things down and then speed them up and we had an effect, but we really didn't know how to even deal with it. So, you know, it was just like trial and experimentation and not trying to force it into being anything.
Speaker 4:That to me is really key. You know, we just let it organically happen. A lot of our early songs, like Free Money or something, they were just like cycles of chords that as we played them live, the arrangements would kind of, you know, emerge, gloria, you know we didn't sit in the practice room and say we're going to go. You know, and everybody hit that it just started and then we all kept remembering it. It was a beautiful process and hopefully you know, it's a way that we've continued having the band for all these years, because we try not to be too smart for ourselves, we just try to do what seems natural and forward motion.
Speaker 3:So let me ask you this Do you know how good horses is? Do you know how good Horses is? Do you know Like and I know that sounds kind of funny, but the connection that people have had, because it's connected with both critics as well as the regular, you know, just fan base and to people like myself not that I listened to it in 75, but I started to hear it in the later 70s and the connection that it made to all these different people, do you ever say like, wow, I say wow.
Speaker 3:Do you come across?
Speaker 4:as really humble with everything. I say wow all the time because to me when I listen to Horses I hear a very young band straining at the bit, not really sure what we're doing. A lot of the songs grew. I mean, birdland started out as a three-minute poem with a musical accompaniment and we wanted to record it live and John Kell kept saying, if you want to do it live, you really got to do it. And he just kept pushing us and the song got longer and longer and really happened in the studio.
Speaker 4:I feel I hear our innocence, our sense of possibility. But I think and I hear a really weird record. I mean I listen to Horses, I think what the hell? But I think what it represented to people say, like Kevin or Michael Stipe or any of the many people who have come up to me over the years and bought me a beer, thank you. Is that sense of you can do something your own way, that thing that Patty says about the sea of possibilities. All you got to do is dive in and swim around and find out who you are. And I think that empowers a lot of people. I mean I love all our records the Black Sheep of Radio Ethiopia and our hit record Easter.
Speaker 4:And this is the 70s stuff, because I also think that the music that we've made in the now 30 years since Patty's returned from Detroit and, of course, her record with Fred Sonic Smith, is also beautiful. People have the Power has been sung all over the world as an empowering anthem. You know, it's all exploration, but what I like most is the people who've been touched by horses and influenced by it. Don't sound at all like horses and that's what I like. You know it's like. You know Bono comes up to me and oh yeah, you know you too doesn't sound anything like us, but they took that spirit of illumination and applied it to themselves and it made them become. I mean, michael Stipe is often talked about when he heard, or Peter Buck when they heard horses. It allowed them to be themselves and that's a great honor. I wouldn't want people to do any of the songs on horses sideways. It's a pretty bizarre record, but in the end Patti is a magical person.
Speaker 4:I've been privileged to stand to the left of her for more than half a century now. I've never, ever seen her sing a false note. I've never seen her just go into show. I mean she likes to put on a show, but it's never like divorced from the emotion behind it and she always tries to get a moment during the show that's unique to that particular show that the people can take out of there and take to heart. And really all I have to do is try to get that door open before she rushes through it.
Speaker 4:With whatever she's doing, it's a great privilege to watch her, I mean in anything. I mean two nights ago she did a poetry reading at U of Penn. She asked me to come down because she thought she could use a little companionship. And you know she's reading from her beautiful books I mean an incredible, incredible writer, and you know. And then we illustrate it with a couple songs, kind of the same thing we did back in 1974. And you know she's present, she is really present and you know, as we know, the present is a gift.
Speaker 3:That it is. So you mentioned Bono. I have to be honest, the song Dancing Barefoot Right. I forgot about the song until U2 released it. It was like a B-side of a single and all of a sudden I remembered how much I liked that song. I guess I just hadn't heard it or whatever, and that is just. I could listen to that song all the time I love it.
Speaker 4:It's a beautiful song. I mean, I'm very proud. You know, we don't have a lot of hits. Really, the only real hit we had was Because of the Night, which is, you know, you can't beat that chorus.
Speaker 3:I'm sorry. So what's the story with the song? So Bruce Springsteen wrote some of it, didn't have all of it, couldn't finish it.
Speaker 4:He was piling up the songs for what would become Darkness at the Edge of Town and Jimmy Iovine, our producer. This was his first production before he became Mega. Jimmy had worked with Bruce on Born to Run and so they were friendly and I kind of knew Bruce. I saw him play in 1969 in Asbury Park in a group called Child. He did a 10-minute version of Season of the Witch on a black Les Paul. That blew me away. So I was in his fan club, even though he didn't even put out a record for another three years.
Speaker 4:My friend and I once went to the surfboard factory where he was living. My friend was a guitar player from Newark hey, where can we go, jam? And he told us someplace. He was living in a room three by five. But we're friendly and he's in one studio working on Darkness and we're in another studio at the record plant and Jimmy always wanted us to do a hit. You know, but you know I'm out in the studio playing some chords and he rushed those are great, keep it going. And it turns out to be Ghost Dance, which is not a hit by any means, except for the people.
Speaker 4:But he knew that there was this song that Bruce had a great chorus on and some mumbled lyrics about you know, I work all day in the hot sun, you know Bruce lyrics and he finally talked Bruce into letting Patty have the song and you know, write the lyrics and write the lyrics in her voice. And she resisted it because she wanted us to write our own songs. But one day, as she likes to tell it, when she was waiting for a phone call from Fred because we didn't have cell phones in those days, it was expensive, so they had a once a week. He was in Detroit, she's in New York and he didn't call for phones in those days. So you know it was expensive. So they had a once a week. He was in Detroit, she's in New York, and he didn't call for like a few hours. And so she put on the cassette and oh, she says it's a darn hit song. And so she wrote the lyrics and by the time she finished them, freddie called and the rest is history. Or as I like to say, herstory.
Speaker 3:There you go, you know. The song is number 358 on Rolling Stone's top 500 songs of all time. I mean again for people that weren't looking to do you know any great things. There's a lot of great things that happen.
Speaker 4:Well, it's a real honor and it's a privilege. Both Patty and I try not to look at the scorecards of where our song falls in something or other, because personally I like all our songs and those are the most obvious. I mean to me, when I listen to Radio Ethiopia, I think, man, that is more akin to certain of our aesthetic sensibilities than having a, you know, top 40 anthem, but it's great to play it. One of the things about Patty and us is that we refuse to be defined. You know, I mean we have a little bit of everything. You know, punk rock, well, you know, that's kind of one of the places we came from. You know, we also came from free jazz. We also came from great dance music Motown and the Rolling Stones and Pink Floyd and though not really, you know, noticed Grateful Dead, really noticed Grateful Dead.
Speaker 4:I mean to see the Grateful Dead kind of morph these songs and get them to the place we always called it out there like Sun Ra, where you kind of release yourself from melody and then you release yourself from rhythm and you're just playing sound against sound. If you listen to the tale of Radio Ethiopia, you know the Abyssinia part. You know we didn't have that script, we just came upon it and kind of wrote it wherever it would go, and that, to me, is the magic of music. And you know we don't want to be defined, as Patty said in the liner notes to horses. You know, beyond gender, beyond politics, beyond definition, because I remember when I was a kid listening to Mayo and the Red Crayolas album on the International Artists, and they had a quote on the back and it says definitions define limit.
Speaker 4:And yeah, so I'm known for know, nobody could tell I'm known for garage rock. Okay, I understand that. But I love all kinds of music and I access all that kind of music when I play the guitar or sing a song or whatever, because as soon as you define yourself, it's over. You've figured it out. I never want to be figured out. I want to keep surprising myself, because that's how you grow.
Speaker 3:Yeah, you know, it's funny. You say that when I first started thinking about doing the podcast, I was like you know what am I going to talk about? What's that box that I'm going to be in? And a good friend of mine, chris Cassidy, said you don't need to be in the box because you like so much. Just talk about the things that you want to talk about. Regardless, if you think that's what people want to hear, just talk about the things, and if you're entertaining, they'll listen.
Speaker 4:And there's so much of it out there. I mean, Kevin and I are driving here. Were you crying or just driving? No, we're laughing.
Speaker 3:One of the things, kevin and I do.
Speaker 4:I thought that was a funny joke. No one thought it was funny. It was almost funny, Jim. It was almost funny.
Speaker 3:Ha, ha ha. Thank you, lenny.
Speaker 4:I appreciate that.
Speaker 4:Oh you know. So yesterday I'm driving to the airport to come down here and I'm listening to WFMU, the greatest radio station in the world, and they play this Donny Hathaway song called I Love you More Than you Ever Know, which I didn't know. I never even thought much about Donny Hathaway, except as a duet with Roberta Flack. So you know, Kevin, and I listen to Donny Hathaway and just like whoa, you know, there's so much out there. You know, oh, I'm only a rock and roll person or I'm only a garagic person, when really, you know, you find something great. I go down every single rabbit hole. Mostly, I really love Jamaican music. That's kind of my go-to whenever I'm home. I'm especially into this new genre that I've discovered called Jamaican gospel, which is really bizarre. Check out Lucy Myers sometime. I will. She will move. She will make you a Christian.
Speaker 1:You know, I just discovered Jamaican mento music recently. Isn't that so cool? It's like proto-reggae.
Speaker 4:Oh yeah, you know ska blue. I mean it's just a really interesting. You know, it's just an interesting music. I've never been to Jamaica but I'm hoping to go in December for the first time.
Speaker 3:Oh, that would be good. Yeah, so, speaking of interesting, the two of you are playing with Peter Buck, which I find is interesting.
Speaker 4:Kevin, I've seen you and Peter Buck play. It's a menage a trois.
Speaker 3:What should we expect? What is it that adding Lenny? What makes it different? What is that all about?
Speaker 2:Like Lenny was saying, I just like to combine things. I like organic, we are certified 100% organic, gmo free, or whatever. I like organic, we are certified 100% organic, gmo-free, or whatever I like to. Just I just did a tour with my friend, bobby Bear Jr, in these residencies. I do, it's just about. I like people who are certified organic and just have good spirit. I have no idea what's going to happen tonight. I know that the basis for what I'm going to do every time I have a guest at Eddie's is to just listen. So I'm going to do a song, lenny's going to do a song, I'll do a song, lenny will do a song, and then I'll feed, he'll do a song and I'll think of something while he's playing that might complement it, or something like that. So I have no idea what's going to happen. I just love to live in the moment and just let it expand. Let it go. Lenny's going to play some guitar. He has no idea what he's going to play. I don't know what I'm going to play.
Speaker 4:It's just so. But, kevin, we have the dancers, we have the dancers, we have dancers, choreograph. We have the the dancers, we have the dancers, we have dancers, choreograph, we have the special effects.
Speaker 2:We have the dancing waters.
Speaker 3:I don't know if they're canceled or not, but that's one of the reasons why I go to the shows, go to your shows, because I have no idea what's going to happen when.
Speaker 2:I go, and neither does the band. My band has no idea what's going to happen either, whether it's Driving and Crying, or it's Kevin Kinney.
Speaker 3:I don't know if you're going to be acoustic. I don't know if you're going to be with a full band Kevin Kinney band.
Speaker 2:I think what Lenny said earlier about horses was spot on. It was just the essence of what the evening is the essence of the music People who love horses. You won't hear John Caffrey of Beaver Brown Band doing Springsteen. Remember that.
Speaker 2:It was really bad, but you assimilate the essence of the evening. Whatever happens between now and the showtime was going to affect the show. So I had an epiphany about music and local bands coming to your town when I went to see U2 at the Sphere and I love U2. I think they're one of my. I went to see U2 at the Sphere and I love U2. I think they're one of my favorite bands to see live. It's a spiritual moment.
Speaker 2:But when I saw them I was disconnected watching them in Vegas because he wasn't speaking to my people about what was happening in that moment and I felt weird being in Vegas and there's people from all over the world here and I didn't get that emotional connection that I get when he comes to Atlanta or when people come to your town and they're singing to everybody in Philly and they're singing to everybody in California. There's a beauty to that. It's important to come out and see live music in your towns. And then we've got Lenny K in Atlanta. Last time he was here we did a few things at the Fox. We did a little thing, but Lenny's got some great songs. He's constantly writing and recording too. Keep moving the ball forward, keep looking to the future, writing songs from his heart and sharing his story. We'll be sharing our story on stage.
Speaker 3:And I know it will be good, because it always is good.
Speaker 2:Well, you know, I always remind my fans. The only guarantee that I give at every show is that at some moment you will be disappointed. There will be a brief moment where you'll be like, oh, tonight will be different.
Speaker 4:Tonight will be different tonight will be different will be fantastic, if only those flash pots go off at the right time.
Speaker 2:If it doesn't, it's over. And then you add Peter Buck to the mix, who is just Peter Buck. He's not going to do any blistering guitars, but just having his essence in the room and strumming. Like I've said a million times before, there's G. All of us could strum a G chord and it would all sound different. It's just the essence of your soul coming through your fingers.
Speaker 1:And talk about somebody that didn't set out to start a traditional rock band. The beginning of REM it was like they were all just going in new directions and it came out sounding like a new kind of rock band, but that's not really what they were trying to do.
Speaker 2:I don't think any of us knew what we're doing.
Speaker 4:That's just the beauty of it is. Every time I think I know what I'm doing, it doesn't end well Right.
Speaker 3:Well, speaking of Peter Buck, last time you were on the show you started to talk about how a lot of your rock star friends have great shoes and one of the people. Do you remember the conversation? I think so. One of the people you mentioned was Peter Buck. So when I saw the two of you up in Chattanooga back in January, because of the way the seats and the way the stage was elevated, I found myself constantly trying to check out Peter Buck's shoes. He's got good shoes.
Speaker 2:Lenny also wears good shoes.
Speaker 4:I'm styling some blue suede boots. There you go. Those are nice.
Speaker 3:I still have the same podcast shoes that we talked about last time on.
Speaker 2:I still have my plantar fasciitis shoes on.
Speaker 3:That's exactly what you said last time.
Speaker 2:But it's funny. But I will be wearing regular shoes tonight because I saw Cat Power about eight months ago and she wears some Jimmy Choo shoes or whatever. I said wow, I don't know how you wear these. She goes 80 minutes. I got 80 minutes, and that's how I am. I'll wear my nice shoes tonight.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I think it's really cool to have people of different types of music backgrounds and driving and crying. At one point it was this southern rock band, not southern as what you think of southern rock, but a rock band from the south, the Kudzu we're the Kudzu circuit, yeah, and Patty Smith group. We talk about REM. But to eventually have three of you from those bands morph to play in a couple of nights, I just think that's cool. I like stuff like that. I really enjoy it and I think the fans do from the shows that I've been to.
Speaker 2:If you're open-minded and you don't want to just hear straight to hell or something, if you're open-minded, that's you know you will be very I think you'll enjoy yourself.
Speaker 1:Now, you've always said you have to play Straight to Hell at every Driving and Crying show. Do you have to play it at this show?
Speaker 2:I mean Peter likes it, and you know. I mean I don't have to do anything. And I'm a Satanist so, yes, so, natchez, that's you know, but yeah, yeah, so, but yeah.
Speaker 3:So, lenny, 50 years ago you had Patti Smith Group television, ramones, talking Heads, blondie, all at CBGB. What was that like? And again, at the time, no one's big, no one's famous. What is it like for all of you kind of making it at the same time?
Speaker 4:Well, I wrote this book. It's called Lightning Striking 10 Transformative Moments in Rock and Roll, and what I believe is that sometimes the locus of energy happens in a locality, a geographic time and space. It's something that Brian Eno calls scenius. It's not really genius. All about the people on the stage, it's the environment, it's the audience, it's what they're wearing, it's what they're rebelling against, what they're hoping to achieve. Usually it's someplace off the point, someplace underground, if you might, or one of them, and it's so out of the way. It's on, you know, a derelict row. It's nobody there, and all the bands there are kind of mongrels. They don't know what they're doing, so they all gather in this place. That gives them a place to play, and then they play for each other in a weird way. You know, in the first year there was never more than 20, 25 people watching television, make mistakes, ramones, get on that stage and have a fight and storm off and come back. It's a place to hang out. I mean, I get asked this question what was it like? You know, because it's all hindsight Then. Then it was just I'm going to go down to my local, have a drink. Try to pick up the girl at the end of the bar, stand outside yak with my friends, not even going in to see from Sire Records singing doo-wop records, when all of a sudden he hears the opening notes of the Talking Heads', love Goes to a Building on Fire and he says, oh, excuse me. And he rushes in and signs them. You know, it was just a bar that you happen to be in, which is kind of great because it's you know, you have time to develop. I worry these days because as soon as anybody does anything, they put it on the Internet, they get it out there and you don't have that time where nobody's figured out.
Speaker 4:One thing about CBGB was that all the bands were completely different. Tom Verlaine once said that each band was like a separate idea. And what was the United thing about it? Well, we were all kind of misfits and everyone took a long time. Patti Smith group we were playing once a month in some folk club, to General Bewilderment. But when we got to CBGB's and played there for seven straight weeks in the spring of 75, three nights a week, with television four nights a week we really started understanding what it was we were doing, getting a grasp on it. And it's just an important place thing to have a place to play.
Speaker 4:You know what can I say in retrospect? It was a hot, hotbed of energy and all of these kind of scenes, as I call it, have a lifeline of about five years. You know where? You know you get this amorphous uh, solar energy coming together, dust particles that form a planet for a year or two, and then it kind of starts filtering out and it gets a name like, well, say, punk or the British invasion, or rockabilly or whatever, grunge. And then it becomes defined and, as we just talked about, that's kind of where it starts. You know, by the time it gets out there and is known as grunge or punk, or, you know, new wave or whatever the heck it would be, it's over and then it's time to start again.
Speaker 4:And if you look at the places that I chose for my book, they're all kind of off the point. I mean, seattle didn't have much of anything. I mean Jimi Hendrix did come from there, but all these bands, they had time to get away and kind of understand what they wanted to be, and that's an important thing. So yeah, I mean yeah, it was a golden age. I look back on it and think, man, I was really glad to be there, in the same way that I wish I could have been there on 45th Street Excuse me, 52nd Street in New York when Bebop was being born. You know that must have been great to walk along that little strip. The Three Deuces in the Onyx Club, and you know, I think I'll see Charlie Parker tonight. Or Dizzy Gillespie is over here. Or you know, the folk revival era in New York and Greenwich Village. It's just great when you get these conglomerations of energy and they turn into something, and sooner or later they need to turn into something else.
Speaker 1:One of the amazing things you just mentioned the folk revival and punk. They were separated geographically by a few blocks, right From CBGB's down Bleeker Street.
Speaker 4:I mean CBGB's. Now, of course you go to the East Village and it's like, you know, really pretty nice, but you got to remember what CBGBs. Now, of course you go to the East Village and it's like really pretty nice, but you got to remember what CBGBs was. It was on the Bowery, which was Skid Row. After 5 or 6 o'clock, all the restaurant equipment stores which was what was lining it closed and it was desolate and you think, oh yeah, 40 blocks uptown is the heartbeat of New York City. But you're there, there's a Bum's Hotel above CBGB. So you're standing on the street talking to your people and a bottle comes soaring out the bathroom. It was just a dump that actually allowed anything to happen. And that's what I'm. That was Hilly's great thing. He didn't try to like manipulate it or he just said the only thing you have to do is play original music. He didn't want cover bands and, you know, created a legend.
Speaker 3:It sure did I mean. Again, if you go to the top 50 albums of all time, three bands from that time are in the top 50. And you got the Ramones at number 47 with their debut album, talking Heads at number 39 with Remain in Light from 1980, and we mentioned the Patti Smith group. I just find that absolutely fascinating, that three bands from CBGB, this dump. As you said, I didn't say it you know, it's just a dump.
Speaker 3:But the fact that there are so many people still, because this was recently redone, I think in 2023. So this isn't an old list. This is still what people think.
Speaker 4:Well, it's really nice that that music lives on, but my inspiration for that was the San Francisco scene. I'm living in New Jersey, I'm finishing up college, I'm really intrigued by the hippie world and I have a Fillmore poster on my wall. This is beginning of 67. It's got Grateful Dead, jefferson Airplane and Quicksilver Messenger Service, three bands who were just, and you have all the other ones, big Brother and the Holding Company that was a locus of energy. There too, it's great to see. Look at Seattle again Nirvana, soundgarden, pearl Jam, just to take my three favorites, alice in Chains. These are, and they're all coming out of this little heated core of creativity.
Speaker 4:I like to see that happen. Liverpool, okay, let's like to see that happen. You know Liverpool, okay, let's go to another obvious one. You know the Beatles, jerry and the Pacemakers, and you know. Then they go to London and meet the Rolling Stones. It's like a crucible of energy that all of a sudden breaks free from its geography and becomes worldwide, changes the face of music in a very quick way. I mean Memphis, sam Phillips, sun Records, elvis and Carl Perkins, and you know, I mean it's great.
Speaker 4:Detroit. Here's another one Detroit, mc5, stooges. Great detroit here's another one detroit, mc5, stooges and, uh well, you know for me savage grace or src. But I just love when you know I hate to use my own title but lightning strikes you can't predict it it's usually not where you're gonna. When they try to do like a kind of scene, like they tried in the 60s with boston, the Bostown sound, you know it's artificial. You can't predict where it's going to happen.
Speaker 4:And I look around now. I mean there's a ton of great music. I like modern music. I'm not one who says, oh, it's better, then you know it's not. You know music lives in the present and when I put on TikTok radio, as I often do, I'm very much bemused by the songs and the attitudes and the sounds. You know sounds of the music. But I look around for where that locus of geographic energy is and I believe that the internet has kind of diffused it, so it's all over the place. Maybe you know, and maybe somewhere on the internet there's a little cluster of like-minded musicians who are formulating the future. I look for it. But I'm much more interested in listening to Jamaican gospel.
Speaker 3:There you go. So, kevin, driving and Crying. You had mentioned recording a new album. Have you started that? Where are you in that process?
Speaker 2:Well, we played the Earl the other night. That's part of our process. I wish we could do it more. My only regret to sometimes, in having a band that's kind of has popped in Atlanta, we have contracts for shows that are coming up and I try to do the Earl. I had to do it in a different name Cesar Romero's, camaro, things like that because we got things coming up.
Speaker 2:I wish I could do more of those shows, because all these bands that we're talking about Patty and the Ramones and all these bands, the RCBs that had records, those first records are always really great because you get to practice them, you get to do whole shows and you're doing them over and over again. The Cars first record they played those songs for years and years and sing, and then you do your second record and you're like you can't do. I wish I could play every Monday. I got to do my solo thing, but I wish I could play every Monday with Driving and Crying to work out the new record and just do the same 10 songs over and over and over again. We don't really have a practice room so we don't really do that. So we're in the process of doing it. I might you know we have to do some. You know I wish we could do. I mean I'm a little bit frustrated in that I can't do more, just do whatever I want to do anymore as far as, like you know. But you know we're going to start March 8th in Nashville and go and do that. But I think it's going to be great. I'm going to keep it short, short and sweet. It's hard to. What I wanted to call it was. My working title right now is Avoiding the Obvious for Dummies. My working title right now is Avoiding the Obvious for Dummies.
Speaker 2:But going back to what Lenny was saying about the punk rock, everyone talks about CBGBs because that was where the record companies were and a lot of those bands got signed. But at the same time in Milwaukee we also had a very vibrant scene of 20 bands that were all different. We had a bar called Zach's and the Starship and Chicago had one and Kansas City had one, nashville had one, and it was just a really great thing. And then the flashpoint was when we were like, oh, there's something happening, these people are getting signed or whatever. It was inspiring Because I remember when Radio Ethiopia came to Milwaukee and Sparks opened up, I mean that audience. It was pretty sold out. It was a great thing. None of those people were from New York, they were all from Milwaukee and they were very excited about this because they also had similar. We all had similar practice rooms and we all had similar experiences growing up in America and breaking through, wanting to be heard and being frustrated and trying to find art when you can find it and read. And so we're like there's Patti Smith, she's doing, she's doing poetry and there's like music and it's really beautiful and they're not.
Speaker 2:I watched the Grammys the other night and people were like oh, how disappointing is it? So the Grammys have always been crap, exactly, you know. They've always been crap. Why are you surprised those Grammys really sucked? They've always sucked. Why are you pretending they didn't? Why are you surprised that those grammys really sucked? They're like they've always sucked. Why are you pretending they did they? When are you? What are you expecting?
Speaker 4:you know so, uh, I'm so happy that the rolling stones got best rock album finally.
Speaker 2:Oh, it took him 50 years and just to be kind of like the the rolling stone list thing, it's like I just I mean I'm glad that they're acknowledging certain things, but just it's really just white businessmen's list. You know what I mean.
Speaker 1:I don't find it.
Speaker 2:I don't find it's endearing at all. You know it's like I don't know what lists are, but it is to me. You know, of course, all of us horses would be top two, top four, reckoning top ten.
Speaker 4:I mean, it's like I don't know.
Speaker 2:Who cares about Rolling Stone? I don't really.
Speaker 3:I hate Rolling Stone magazine, but for me I think it's that I think a lot of times we forget history and I think that as newer people come up, all of a sudden everything becomes. You know, taylor Swift or whoever.
Speaker 2:Always been there, though Always been there.
Speaker 3:I like to me. Pat Boone's always been there, yes, but I like the fact that all these years later, things that I can relate to, they still are acknowledged and whether you agree with it or where it should be or it shouldn't be, for me the fan, because I'm not a singer If you heard me, you wouldn't want to hear me again.
Speaker 2:I don't know about that.
Speaker 3:That's what they said about Bob Dylan.
Speaker 2:That's good that people get acknowledged.
Speaker 3:I think that's where I'm coming from as a fan. For me, it's still good to see that they are giving good music. That, I think, is good music is still getting its credit all these years later.
Speaker 2:It's like when somebody gets an award for Hall of Fame, like the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, that's really a validation for fans, Because fans, when Cheap Trick got in I mean I know Cheap Trick as the band was finally relieved they were in. But it was more of a relief for Cheap Trick fans. They're like, ah, and every time they have a new list of people who are going to be in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, they always list the 60 people who aren't in it, like Brownsville Station, and I was like what, why is that not in the Hall of Fame? I think the Hall of Fame should only have people who you are never going to hear of.
Speaker 4:That's my whole when I was on the nominating committee, even though I've been removed. I tried to get Johnny Holiday in there, because he's the only. I mean he was gigantic in Europe and had more to do with spreading the gospel of rock and roll to people who don't speak English, but I never got any traction for that. And now I'm, you know, now I'm I mean I wish it was the Rock and Roll Museum and in a certain way I wish it was more about rock and roll than trying to be every pop music. Now I feel like the Hall of Fame is more like the Chinese menu one from column A, one from column B.
Speaker 3:You have to have this genre.
Speaker 4:Here's the metal entrant and here's this, and sometimes it's divided by how many records you sell, which is like most of my, you know. I mean I'm amazed that the Ramones are in there, but why aren't the Seeds? But you know, I mean we're all one and I really sometimes I think it's more of a badge of honor not to be in there because, kevin, actually you said that last time you were on the show, did I?
Speaker 2:Yes.
Speaker 3:You actually did say that.
Speaker 2:I was disgruntled. Yeah, I mean yeah.
Speaker 4:I don't know. I mean, they're all bowling trophies. I got a couple of gold metallic records from Europe. Horses never went gold. As far as I at least, I don't have the bowling trophy, but to me I used to have a couple trophy. But you know, to me I used to have a couple of them up on my wall and then one day I looked at them I said, you know, I'm taking them down because I'm not one for what I did in the past. I mean, nuggets has bought me more beers around the world than anything and I don't have a piece of metal to hang on the wall but it still lives on and that, to me, is the greatest compliment.
Speaker 4:You can have A rogue record that I put together with no sense. It was A ever going to come out. Tried not to make it comprehensive, I just put my favorite records there and it seems to have survived the decades. So what do you know? Survive the decades, you know. So you know. What do you know? It's all out there. You know many of the records I've made over the years which I thought were great when I was a working record producer.
Speaker 4:You know, nobody's ever heard. You know I do a song when I play solo called Naked is the Day by the Weather Prophets. Nobody has ever heard that record but to me it's one of the greatest songs ever and perhaps you can convince me to play it tonight.
Speaker 3:There you go.
Speaker 2:You heard it here first. Well, that's what's great about listening to Lenny talk Right now. It's like I want to go find some reggae gospel. I mean, he's so inspiring to so many of us people because he's still doing it and he's not he never. I wrote a song called Ian McClaglin about. You know some people they do one thing and talk about it their whole life and some people just keep on doing it. That's what keeps us alive, and at the end of the show I go Lenny K. I know, end of the show, I go Lenny K. I now have some of the people that are friends of mine keep going Steve Wynn, lenny K, alejandro Escovido, all these people who, just they have history, of course, but they're constantly moving forward and turning me like.
Speaker 2:Lenny has wrote a chapter in his new book about death metal, about and it was like you know I was like I was like like I remember we were doing something in New York and you're like oh, I'm going uptown to see some Swedish death metal band and I'm like Lenny Case. I said what are you? What you know, opeth? That is so inspiring to me to just keep on learning and being open minded.
Speaker 4:You gotta you know yeah, you gotta keep your neurons flashing, I mean, that's why I never think that it's over for music. I don't want to be like one of those people who says, oh, bebop, why, jazz was really jazz when it came out of New Orleans, or whatever. If you can find the key, that's the thing. Music's I've never been able to slot. I can appreciate them from afar, but I remember the moment I understood bebop. I was always like, oh yeah, charlie Parker's a genius Great, so you acknowledge that. But do you hear his genius? And then one day I'm listening to the Columbia Station, his genius. And then one day I'm listening to the Columbia station and they're playing records by this pianist named Dodo Marmarosa, and Dodo was in California during the mid 40s and played with Charlie Parker. He later went a little insane and pushed a piano out a third story window to see what it sounded like when it hit the ground did he record it?
Speaker 1:I hope I don't think so.
Speaker 4:But he had a song called bopmatism. And I'm listening to the radio and all of a sudden I said, wow, this is really catchy. And then, all of a sudden, I got an insight into what the sound of bebop must have been on 52nd Street, the punk rock of its day, you know, except they used flatted fifths or whatever the heck they are. But you know, all of a sudden I got it. And then you know, there's the rabbit hole yawning to understand. You know Charlie Parker's work and you know all these great, incredible players and the ones that are not legends. You know Red Mitchell and you know, just to see what it was like in that moment in time to the excitement of musical discovery and I think that's what you're talking about, kevin it's like, yeah, I'm in some strange rabbit hole where, you know, lucy Myers is my heroine. But I got to say, you know, it's like when you find something that turns you on, like Donny Hathaway turned me on yesterday. I was like whoa, I have to listen to more of him.
Speaker 3:Doesn't he have a Christmas song?
Speaker 4:Yes, he does. I've never heard it. I'm just starting to dig that excavation.
Speaker 3:Because I'm like, wait a minute. I know that name and I've been thinking this Christmas, yes.
Speaker 4:I mean, it's all out there. I mean, that's one of the great things about the internet is that, if I happen to be on a byway of Algerian music, a couple of years ago this great Rai, master of Algerian music, passed away. I couldn't tell you his name, but you know, instead of going out to Brooklyn to go to the Arab record shops or, you know, trying to find it at your friend's record shop in Athens.
Speaker 2:Right, yo-yo, lo-yo-lo, yo-yo, yeah, todd's, todd's.
Speaker 4:Todd's Todd's store. You know I said, okay, what does this guy sound like? I mean, when I did my crooner book you Call it Madness about the crooners of the late 1920s and early 30s, bing Crosby and Rudy Valli and Russ Colombo a book, I have to say that nobody who knew me understood why I did it and nobody who knew Bing Crosby or those guys were off-put by the wacky writing style. But I heard this scratchy 78 on one of those FM stations all the way to the left of the dial driving home one night. You know, potted out and the announcer started talking about Russ Colombo. That he, you know, was the Battle of the Baritones with Bing Crosby.
Speaker 4:He died in a dueling pistol accident with his best friend. He was supposed to be married to Kara Lombard and when he died his mother was ill with a heart attack and was blind. So they didn't tell her and for 10 years they wrote letters to her Hi, mom, I'm in Italy, oh my Lord. And I thought, wow, that's so great. And if the internet was there I would have woken up the next morning, gone on oh, that's Russ Colombo, interesting. And gone on to something else.
Speaker 4:But I had to go to the library get the newspaper on microfilm from September of 1934, read his story and look at all the surrounding advertisements, and suddenly I'm in this world where I spent eight years plowing around his story and look at all the surrounding advertisements, and you know, and suddenly I'm in this world where I spent eight years plowing around and it was a great. You know, I mean, but you know so sometimes it's too easy to get this stuff. It's really fun when you, I mean the Jay Bacon gospel, I there's one guy who I know has it, and my friend who owns the record store in the town that I mean the J Bacon Gospel. There's one guy who I know has it and my friend who owns the record store in the town that I live. He bought a big collection and there's a couple on tabernacle records. There you go. I mean, anyway, I love the hunt and I love the research and I love music. I mean my astrology— it definitely comes across love music it definitely comes across.
Speaker 4:I wake up, I get to play music, I get to hang out with my musical pals, I get to listen to music, I get to write about it and I'm a fan of it.
Speaker 2:Some people have podcasts dedicated to it To help educate other people to turn these things on. So thank you very much.
Speaker 3:You're welcome and I know we could sit here all day and we could tell stories all day long.
Speaker 4:Kevin and I have to practice for our very well-choreographed show.
Speaker 3:I'm looking forward because I'll be at the second show. I'm looking forward to the dancing, and I do have to do a shout-out because my boss let me come take an extended lunch so that I could actually come out and sit with all of you. So, eric, thank you very much.
Speaker 4:Thank you, Eric. I do appreciate that, Eric.
Speaker 3:Well done you the man, you the man. That is a shout out. I really appreciate both of you coming by. I mean this has been fantastic, you know, hearing about things from the past and the present and talking a little bit about the future, and thank you both.
Speaker 4:Thanks for having us. Thanks for having us.
Speaker 3:Yes, it's been wonderful having you here on Music In my Shoes. That's it for episode 68 of Music In my Shoes. I'd like to thank Kevin Kinney and Lenny Kay for joining us today. That was pretty awesome. I'd like to thank Jimmy Guthrie, show producer and owner of Arcade 160 Studios located right here in Atlanta, georgia, and Vic Thrill for our podcast music. This is Jim Boge, and I hope you learned something new or remembered something old. We'll meet again on our next episode. Until then, live life and keep the music playing.
