The Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast

Fred Mollin - The Interview

• ALEX GADD • Season 3 • Episode 64

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In this week's episode, I'm excited to welcome Grammy-nominated producer, musician, composer, and songwriter Fred Mollin. Fred has written a new memoir, 'Unplugged: Stories and Secrets from a Life Making Records, Scoring Films, and Working with the Legends of Music' and he'll share some of his favorite stories with you,  from his experiences producing iconic hits like Dan Hill's 'Sometimes When We Touch' to his work scoring for TV series, films, and creating an incredibly successful series of Disney lullaby albums. Don't miss this captivating interview filled with insights, personal stories, and a deep love for music, this week, on the Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast!

00:00 Introduction to the Rock and Roll Show Podcast

00:24 Meet Fred Mollin: Grammy-Nominated Producer

05:17 Fred Mollin's Early Life and Musical Beginnings

08:09 From Long Island to Toronto: Fred's Big Break

13:03 The Making of 'Sometimes When We Touch'

16:27 The Harsh Realities of the Music Business

27:14 Fred Mollin's Transition to TV and Film Scoring

35:48 Memorable Encounters

47:45 Jimmy Webb: A Lifelong Collaboration

01:01:33 Instrumental Lullabies: A Surprising Success

01:06:49 Concluding Thoughts and Reflections


Get Fred's book at his website, https://fredmollinunplugged.com/shop/ols/products

or at Amazon: https://amzn.to/4h7Ov61

And check out The Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast PLAYLIST featuring music from the acts we discussed on the show this week!

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Alex Gadd:

Welcome to the Rock and Roll Show podcast. We're here to share the thrill of experiencing music of all kinds together with friends, old and new, and to get to know our guests a little bit better through their musical experiences. I'm your host Alex Gaddd, and I do this because I love talking about music with people. Finding out what music someone's into and how they got into music in the first place allows us to get to know and understand one another a little bit better. This week, our guest is Fred Mollin, a Grammy nominated producer, musician, composer, songwriter. He's worked with artists as varied as Billy Joel, Johnny Mathis, Chris Cornell, Gloria Estefan, Jimmy Webb, and many, many others. And he is worked on projects across music, film, and television. And now he's written a wonderful memoir titled, Unplugged: Stories and Secrets from a Life Making Records, Scoring Films, and Working with the Legends of Music and I can't wait to talk with him. So stick around for my conversation with Fred Mollin coming up right now. Fred, thank you for joining us.

Fred Mollin:

Well, good to be here. Thank you.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah, it's great to see you now. You are at home. I believe

Fred Mollin:

I'm in Nashville, in my little home studio, mix room area. And, it just, when I moved in, uh, in 2001, I thought I'd be here two months out of the year and, and I never left. So, um, and we never did anything to. Change the room.'cause we found out that the room sounded so good. So it's got the old, it's got the old really funky, uh, sort of rec room walls and, uh, it happens to work like a charm. So, yeah, that's where I am.

Alex Gadd:

love those Happy a accidents and it does look like my childhood basement. It's

Fred Mollin:

I'm telling you, it's not, we're on the main floor, so I don't, not a basement dweller, but it's, it's really a, it's a fun room. We get a lot of work done here.

Alex Gadd:

I like that. Also, I've heard so many stories about rooms and recording studios that shouldn't work, but sound great. I mean, the Sound City was the classic

Fred Mollin:

Mm-hmm.

Alex Gadd:

a Dr.

Fred Mollin:

Mm-hmm.

Alex Gadd:

drum room.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

An am you know, it was a Vox amplifier factory before that. And

Fred Mollin:

That's right.

Alex Gadd:

You never know where you're gonna get, uh, the great sound from, but once you get it, you definitely don't wanna mess with it, is what I understand.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. You're dead, right? Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

Yep. So your travels is one of the first thing you wrote this book. I've read it, it's, it's very compelling and it covers an incredible breadth of experience personally as well as in music. And so, did you have a conscious thought about sharing your own life story as well as your professional life story, or was that it, is that just how it worked out as you, as you wrote the book?

Fred Mollin:

Yeah, I think it's how it worked out. You know, I, I started to, um, about five years ago, I went on my walks and, and I, I decided because I didn't wanna forget certain stories and some of the details, I, I would, uh, take my walks and talk into my phone and dictate into the notes section of the phone. And I would tell my stories, you know, uh, uh, literally speak them into the phone and then I'd take them, once I got home. I would go through them on a computer and I'd make changes and corrections and, and I'd, I'd do a better version. But so much of it was really spoken. The book was spoken, so it's, it is very conversational. But because of that, because that's the way it started, it couldn't help but sort of morph into some personal stuff as well.'cause I realized, you know, I'm, I think I'm writing a memoir here. And so the next thing you know, I was really serious about trying to write this book about my life and music. But certainly, um, there obviously had to become some personal, I had, there had to be personal moments. And, about a year ago, year and a half ago, I really put full steam into writing the book. And at that point, Alex, then I was like, Hmm, boy, this is definitely, it's more than my life and music. It's really about me. But, uh, uh, but I do underline. A bit, because mostly it's about the people and the projects that I've been so, uh, blessed to work for and work on.

Alex Gadd:

I got that. But I really think that by sharing your personal story, it informs the stories about how you worked with other people and in, in a way that a lot of musical memoirs don't. And so I really enjoyed that aspect of it.

Fred Mollin:

Thank you so much.

Alex Gadd:

uh, I thought it was pretty brave of you to, to put it all out there.

Fred Mollin:

I, I,

Alex Gadd:

not in a bad way, just in a, in a confessional way. I mean, I'm sure it probably, it felt to me like you speaking the stories into your phone probably almost felt like therapy for yourself, working through your own stories.

Fred Mollin:

I think you're very right. Yeah. I think it's very correct because I think that there was, there was a certain amount of, um, it was like, yeah, it was like talk therapy.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah. So let's go back to the beginning. You're, you're a kid on Long Island, you don't like high school. I'm not gonna spoil the book as much as possible. I'm gonna leave the good, the good meat of the stories in the book for the people to read. Uh, the book again is Unplugged. We'll show the cover and, uh, please go out and buy the book. It came out this past May. You can buy it on Amazon or at Fred's. Website, which we will put up in the comments of this podcast, but you're, you're out on Long Island, you're in high school. You don't dig high school at all. It's the sixties and you just wanna make music. You've seen The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. I'm summarizing very quickly. Your first 14 years of your life, your older brother is out there acting and you're seeing that performing and, and it, my, you, please correct me if I'm wrong, but this is what I took away, is that music was one thing and performing was another at first for you, and then they started to morph together and you got a vision for what your life could be. I is that generally right? Because at 16 left school and you went to pursue a life in music.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah, I mean, listen, I, uh, I'm 72 in 1969, I was 16 and I was growing up in a nice sort of middle class part of Long Island in Merrick, long Island, beautiful little suburb. And I was a nice Jewish boy. And, uh, you know, Jewish boys of that sort of, you know, geneRatatouilleon and in that neighborhood didn't quit school. Um, and I quit because I hated school. I, I liked it, you know, for a few years in junior high school. Um, I must admit I had a couple of good years. My eighth and ninth grade, I got to 10th grade. And they had made some different territories for different, uh, parts of, of Merrick. And I happened to fall into a territory where all my friends were not there for high school. So I didn't have my friends, I had a lot of bullies who were really first class bullies. I had hair down to my ass and uh, and I was absolutely just burning to make my way as a singer songwriter I started playing in rock bands and then at 16 I wanted to be the next James Taylor, you know, or the next Neil Young or whatever. And I just literally, couldn't wait for that 16th birthday when you would legally be able to go to the school and say, I'm leaving. And my mom, who was very much the wind beneath my wings. Uh, she and I both walked to my school, which is Calhoun High School, which I'd had about four months into, and I'd hated every day of it. And, uh, we walked in and signed the papers and I was free and I never went back to school.

Alex Gadd:

So when you did that, you said, you wanted to be a singer songwriter and you pursued that for a while. You went into the city, you played, you gigged, you hung around, but very quickly you ended up, and, and very quickly, not at the time, but in a, in a 50 plus year career, you went from that to producing records for a guy up in Toronto.

Fred Mollin:

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

Can you just in, in, in a high, like a high level progression for how you got there? Not all the steps'cause that's what the book's for, but it's a pretty interesting, jump you made.

Fred Mollin:

yeah. There, there was a big jump. I, you know, at, at 16 I really wanted to have a record deal and be the next. Singer songwriter. And I didn't really, in truth, Alex, I'm gonna be really honest, I don't think I had truly what it took to be the next great autobiographical singer-songwriter. But I did try, and then my brother, who's seven years older than me, and uh, was moving to Toronto at that point to try underground theater. This was 1971. He said, you should come visit Toronto. It's fantastic. And you'll get, you'll get gigs and, and you'll have opportunities. And I went to visit and, and back, and by the way, back in 72, when I officially crossed over to Canada, you could actually immigrate at the toll booth. So I immigrated and became a landed immigrant, which is a green card basically, um, in 1972. And I got to Toronto and I literally, the minute I got there, I had a record deal. I had college gigs, I had a girlfriend. I was like, you know, I'm never leaving. I called my parents and said, Hey, I love you guys, but send my stuff up here.'cause I'm, I'm a Canadian now. And, uh, Toronto was such an exciting place at that time. It was so wide open and so amazingly open to people like me. And I did in fact pursue my life as a performer, uh, singing songwriter, a performer. And along the way, uh, around 1973, I started to play similar, uh, clubs and stuff with a guy named Dan Hill who was only a year younger than me. And Dan was a very good singer songwriter. The girls loved him'cause he wrote very emotional songs. and we just became great friends. And literally it was Dan, who one day said to me, Hey, I'm doing a demo.'Cause he wanted to get a record deal and he said, would you help me produce my demo? He said, would you, would you produce my demo? And I said, oh my God, of course I would. So in 1973, I went to the small studio in Toronto and, it was only a guitar and vocal demo. So, I mean, how much production really is that? But I felt like, I, I sort of knew my way around recorded music. I was really, you know, on many levels of music, student of recorded music, so I knew my stuff. Plus I'm a good musician, so I felt I could be a good producer. But it just turned out that we did this little demo and then at the same time, Dan was very bright. It still is. Um, he had grown up with a kid in Toronto who was incredibly gifted, whose father was a big musical director, and Matthew McCauley was Dan's best friend. And Matthew was incredibly gifted musically and deeply bright. And Dan decided to not tell each of us like he actually went and didn't tell Matt didn't tell me, but told us both separately that we were going to produce this demo. And I got to the studio to produce this demo, you know, oh, I'm feeling, I'm feeling so good about myself. And there's this guy sitting there besides the engineer and he is wearing a white peasant shirt and he's got a big mustache and beard and you know, and I'm looking at him going, okay, who's this? A friend of Dan's, I guess. And as we're producing this demo of Dan's new songs, he really started to take over. I was like, wait a second, I'm the producer, and of course, record producer means director. You know, I'm, I'm the record producer here, and I'm thinking to myself, this guy's really, really stepping all over me. And so at first we were too, like roosters in a cage, but by the end of the day, we had become such great friends that it became a partnership in record production for the next, I guess the next, six or seven years when, and then Matt eventually left the record business. But we produced, um, all of our stuff together after that. And to this day, he's still my closest friend and he still does my strings for every record I do strings with. So, Dan did a beautiful thing for me. He gave me my best friend all my life, and he gave me one of the greatest partners I could ever have imagined in producing. And, uh, but yes, I made that leap that day. And then the next thing you know, Alex. All the, the work we had done that day in the studio as the, as, uh, co-producers of Dan's demo wound up getting the interest of a label called GRT in Canada. And then Matt's parents made a deal where they would finance the records, but GRT would release them and we became real record producers. We did first, the Dan Hill album. The second album was called Hold On, both of which went gold in Canada. Then the third album in 1977 was an album called Longer Fuse, which had the song Sometimes When We Touch, which Matthew and I produced for Dan. And to this day, of course, it's the biggest hit I'll ever have.

Alex Gadd:

Wow. And that song, I mean, when I was a kid driving around with my folks listening to adult contemporary radio stations was everywhere. That was a, a King Kong song.

Fred Mollin:

You're right, it was a King Kong song. Yeah. And, and to this day, it, it does create a lot of incredible shadows that, uh, uh, we never expected. Of course. You know, but it is really, I think it, there's no way I could ever have produced a bigger record. And of course we didn't know. We thought it would be a hit, by the way, but we didn't think that, you know, all these years later, it would still be considered one of the most iconic, uh, ballads in pop music. And it's one of the most played records in the history of radio. Yeah,

Alex Gadd:

what I found out reading the book. That's amazing.

Fred Mollin:

yeah,

Alex Gadd:

I think it's because it's so suggestive of that time. Not that it's, not that it's stuck in that time, but it's so reminiscent. Like if I think back to Adult Contemporary Radio, the stuff that I didn't wanna listen to at the time.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

I was a 10-year-old kid

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

I wanted to rock and roll and I was listening to Cheap Trick and Springsteen and

Fred Mollin:

Sure. Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

Um,

Fred Mollin:

so was I, by the way,

Alex Gadd:

Yeah, I know. But, um, I do look back on it now with a real fondness that I couldn't appreciate as a teenager or as a, maybe in my twenties. But looking back on that time now, that music and, and the other music that was played around that time with some of the other people that you've worked with, producing it and, and playing it, so evocative of, of a feel being in New York, in a car on I 95 coming from Connecticut to the city to go to, uh, Rosh Hashanah dinner with my grandparents

Fred Mollin:

by the way. Happy New Year to us. Yeah, yeah,

Alex Gadd:

I

Fred Mollin:

yeah.

Alex Gadd:

this year's a sweet one for

Fred Mollin:

Thank you. You too.

Alex Gadd:

Alright, so you do that. You're in Toronto now. You have this worldwide hit. It's a monster. You're Rolexes Rolls Royce, Private Jets. I know that isn't what happened. That would be the expectation. Reading the book I read. did. Sometimes When We Touch, I thought, okay, this guy's gonna take me on the jet setting tour through the industry, and that was not what happened.

Fred Mollin:

No, I mean, we had, well, first of all, it was, it was incredibly helpful to our career. Um,

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

Clive Davis.

Alex Gadd:

Calling card for

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. Based on that, Clive Davis at Arista, uh, signed us to a, a producing deal and moved us to LA and there was a lot of really big stuff that happened because of it. But in the book, the first chapter of the book is about Sometimes When We Touch and it also talks and it's, I think it's a good, sort of. Metaphor for what the business can be because we had this incredibly big hit and, when the royalties were sparked to, to sort of poised to start really pouring in about a year later. The record label we had signed to way back in four years ago, GRT of Canada, GRT in itself went bankrupt and we found out while, while we were already moved to LA by Clive Davis, and Matt got a phone call from his parents saying, GRT is going bankrupt. Please send someone to the office so we can get our money before they close the doors. And it was too late. They had padlocked the door and we never saw, the first two to four years, which really would've been the big album royalties and the big, record sale royalties. We didn't see those. They were all taken away from us because we were so down the line of people that the bankruptcy owed money to. So, you know, I'm 23 years old and it was just such a harsh lesson because we had already spent the money. I had just married, I had married Dina, and we had moved to LA and bought a house, and we were furnishing the house. And the next thing you know, all this money that we were expected to come in was not coming in. And, listen, it was a, a terrible lesson to learn, but it, but on some levels, a powerful lesson to learn, which is, you don't spend your money till you have it. And the record business, you know, This was a very dramatic situation where the label went bankrupt. Record labels are not known to be great accountants for you. They do everything they possibly can to make sure you get the least money you can. Really the only people who pay properly are ASCAP and BMI and CSAC because they take the airplay money and there's nobody to screw around with that. But record labels like film companies, I mean, you know, you,

Alex Gadd:

Yeah.

Fred Mollin:

you've gotta have an auditor, to make sure you get the right money. But that was a rough, sort of smash to reality when we realized, oh my God, this may be the biggest hit we'll ever have. And all our money has basically been taken away. So, it's a good piece of the book. It talks about the making of, Sometimes When We Touch, as well as the aftermath, but I, I'm so proud of that record because it obviously meant so much to so many people,

Alex Gadd:

As you should

Fred Mollin:

and, and that's good enough for me. It really is.

Alex Gadd:

I would, I would think so. I mean, I, I, I understand the disappointment in, in losing out on the gold ring, but, you've done something that will live forever. I mean, will outlive you and will be forever known and associated with you. But also it was a calling card, and that's an interesting transition because it did get you a job. With Arista,

Fred Mollin:

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Alex Gadd:

You up at the Chateau Marmont

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

you got a, so you got yourself settled in la but you learned another tough lesson from Clive Davis and, and I want to get the tough lessons out of the way because everything else builds from those tough lessons

Fred Mollin:

your tough lessons, um, hopefully are not too many. And, they're learning curves.

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm. Yeah. So you go to work for Clive Davis, you do session work as he or his people ask you to, and you get lined up to do a project and he asks you to do another project.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

a little bit about that?'cause that is one of the best stories in the

Fred Mollin:

Well, you know, it's funny'cause actually I, I've been finishing a new, Jimmy Webb album and I've worked with Jimmy forever. And, uh, uh, I just finished the tracks with him yesterday and at some point one of the session players was asking me, you know, um, do you have any, bad stories? You know, and I'm like, yeah, I've got a few. And do you have any people who you, who you really could say in your life were pricks and I, I, I say, well, the truth is Clive Davis, um, you know, Clive did a wonderful thing for us. He moved us to LA and uh, gave us the opportunity to produce after Sometimes When We Touch, uh, not exclusively, which was lovely. But, we did some records for Arista and that was just a fantastic, and we were in the middle of an album. This was 1978 and we had just moved to LA and, uh, Matt and I were, you know, in High Cotton. We were very, very happy characters. And, we were Clive's boys and he had given us an album to start, which was, a Randy Edelman album. And Randy is a lovely guy. And, uh, we met him and we got along famously with him. And he was most well known at that point. He was a singer songwriter who hadn't really done that much, but he had written a song called Weekend in New England, which became a Barry Manilow big hit for Clive. And so he signed Randy to Arista and he gave Matthew and I a chance to produce Randy's new album. And we had a lovely time doing it. And we were only about halfway through the album. We're living at the Chateau Marmont on Arista's money, and. I'm with my, soon to be married wife, Dina. And, um, got the phone call at around nine in the morning, and it was Clive. And he was initially lovely on the phone and he said, Fred, he said, I've got a great opportunity for you and Matt. And I'm like, wow, great. You know, and he said, I'd like you to produce Melissa's new single. We found a song that's gonna be a smash hit. And he is talking about Melissa Manchester, who had had some success. And I really liked her. I really thought she was really good. And, Clive's saying he's got a hit for her and he wants us to produce it. And I'm like, oh my God, Clive, this is lovely. And he said, so, he said, just basically stop working on Randy and I'll have you meet Melissa tomorrow. I want you in the studio within two or three days. And I was such an innocent that I just simply said to him, okay, well this is wonderful. And you know, we're in the middle of Randy's album. I said, will you call Randy and let him know we're just being postponed, or should I do it? And all he said was, you don't get it. And he hung up on me And then he called Harry Maslin and Harry produced Don't Cry Out Loud, which was Melissa's biggest hit. And it was all because I just simply asked, would you tell Randy that we're being po? You know, I was just being a sweet person and he was being, he was being a prick. Now, the lesson I learned was when you're working for someone, if they ask you to do something, you just do it or you don't work for them. It's one or the other. And I worked for Clive and I should have just said, Hey, this is great. Thank you so much. And.

Alex Gadd:

take care of

Fred Mollin:

Uh, you know, but I'm not that cold hearted, you know,

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

I felt like Randy would really be hurt if all of a sudden Matt and I were taken away from his project. But, Clive made it very short work. He just said, you don't get it. Hung up. And, and then a month later we were kicked out of our Chateau Marmont and, and we lost our job with Clive,

Alex Gadd:

yeah. That's tough. But that leads me to one of the more interesting sections later in the book where you talk about the type of producer you were and it, and that story speaks to the type of producer you were. So could you just talk a little bit about that? What type of producer are you and, and how does that play itself out? Time and time again in, in working in the studio with the incredible variety of artists that you have over the years.

Fred Mollin:

It's so funny, Alex, I'm really not selfless in a lot of my life. But I'm very selfless when it comes to working with my artists that I direct and produce. And I just, it means so much to me to give them their dream and to facilitate their vision. So I'm really, you know, in film and TV there, what they call an actor's director who's someone who basically really works closely with the actors and loves them and, and just gives them every chance to do their best work and is not an authoritarian. And that's what I am when I make records. I'm there to fulfill the artist's vision and also to give them a joyful time. And, for some reason I'm very selfless in that part of my life. So, as a record producer, I'm involved in, working closely with the artist to pick the songs we're gonna do, and, you know, very involved in the casting of musicians and. Engineers and studios and I get very involved in, in every aspect musically. Then I also put the vocals together and I oversee the mix. So I really am a director. That's what a record producer is, but I'm very involved in all of these things, but I'm really involved. But the artist is my boss, there's lots of kinds of producers out there. I happen to be, and happily I am someone who just wants to give the artist their vision and their dream, and that's what I do.

Alex Gadd:

Is that at least partially because you are also a musician, or is that just your nature as a, as a worker? I know you're a very hard worker. You have a, an incredible work ethic, which comes out time and time again in the book,

Fred Mollin:

Thank you.

Alex Gadd:

is that, is that part of it, is that you respect all of your colleagues, or is that specific to the artist? Because you're a, a musician as

Fred Mollin:

You know what? That's a great, that's a great point. It's because I'm a musician and I am an artist, although someone who sublimated his art to help others. So probably yes, it's because I do have an empathy and an understanding, of what they're up against. And I also feel that they're kindred spirits. So, yeah.

Alex Gadd:

It's very interesting and I, I really, that spoke to me in the book and again, the personal tales you told are different and, and talk about different aspects of your personality, but it all comes back to the fact that you seem very in touch with empathy as part of your core essence.

Fred Mollin:

I wanna say that I wish I was more an empath in my personal life. I know I can do better. In my years as a record producer, I know that I do a good job. Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah. Yeah. And that led to going back to Toronto thinking you were gonna get a lot of work because you had gone to LA as a, on Clive Davis' dime. It didn't work out quite that way. The, that work wasn't as, as available you right out of the box when you got back to Toronto. Now you're living in Toronto looking for work. And out of that came a very interesting left turn for me in the book when you started doing TV work and, and scoring TV shows. So, was that not a natural fit for you, but something that made itself apparent to you? And you said, I'll take it in what I think the term You used was learn as you earn.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. Learn as you earn. Yeah. Learn as you earn. Uh, you know, I think my whole career can be defined by. When the phone call comes and they say, do you wanna try this? I say, yes.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah. Saying yes is a big part of life.

Fred Mollin:

And I may not have any real experience in that decision, but I find a way to make it work'cause basically I'm just a working person. I mean, I, I've never had that luxury where I had this incredible lottery win where, I didn't need to work for the rest of my life or anything. I needed to keep working. I had two kids. I had a wife. I, I, I wanted to basically give them a beautiful life. And, and so my, work ethic came into play'cause I wanted to keep working. And you're right. Dina and I, after we lost the Clive Davis gig and the money was not there from Sometimes When We Touch, I kept busy in la and then I lost Matt as a partner. Because he decided not to do it anymore at that point. And, I was on my own and we sort of missed Toronto'cause it's such a sweet city and at the same time a powerful city. And I didn't wanna raise my children that we were gonna have in L.A. So in 81 we went back to Toronto. And you're right, I thought by the time I would arrive in Toronto based on these successes I'd had, they would welcome me, you know, with a hometown hero welcome. And I'm telling you, it was crickets. There was nothing going on. I really had a couple small gigs and one or two albums and, uh, at the same time we were gonna have our first kid. And I'm telling you, it was, that was, I was at the bottom of the barrel. I was like, man, I was like all the way up here and now I'm all the way down here. And by 1980 we had moved back And by 1983. I was really worrying how I'm gonna make money to, to, uh, take care of my first kid who was coming in in 84. And literally it just, I started to get a couple of inquiries from people saying, Hey, would you ever consider doing the music from my little TV movie? Or Would you do this? Or, and, and again, I just said, of course I would. And so really literally from 83 to about 85, I just tried to make music for TV and film when I got these calls. And, I had no experience and frankly no interest in being a TV and film composer, but I needed to make a living. But then by around 85, I started to realize I can do this. And I got a Kurzweil 250, which is a beautiful wooden key, 88-key a beautiful instrument. And I was able to sort of recreate the sounds that I would get normally out of an orchestra, out of this instrument. And I started to basically become this guy who they would call when they couldn't afford a real orchestra. And I would sort of do a synthetic orchestra for certain TV and film things. And honestly, it started to pay and I started to like it. I liked the challenge of it. And then by 87 I started to do some bigger stuff, including I got the phone call from Paramount Pictures to do the Friday the 13th, the TV series, which was a wound up being a 72 episode, one hour series. Was a wonderful experience for me and incredibly challenging. And after that, I became a full-time film and TV composer very successfully for the next boy, 14 years, 15 years.

Alex Gadd:

That led me to just wondering, I don't know that you spoke about it in the book, but you started off playing guitar as a kid and that was your thing and, and you note that you were a pretty good rhythm guitar player but you ended up making your living on a keyboard. How did you make that transition?

Fred Mollin:

You know, I'm a good natural musician. I play a lot of instruments, and I just became a proficient keyboard player. I just, out of, again, out of necessity, Alex, I had, I had to pay the bills, had to take care of the family, and so I just became a really good. Keyboard player and, and a good, I knew how to use samplers and synthesizers and, again, it was a very different number of skills and I was, I was able to take'em on, uh, um, so much of it was about the fact that I had these jobs and I had to make sure I could do these jobs.

Alex Gadd:

And yet you never swayed from being in music. Like no matter what, you always were able to stay true to your passion, which

Fred Mollin:

Oh, yeah. No, I, I I could never have.

Alex Gadd:

part about this story.

Fred Mollin:

No, I I, and by the way, yeah, yeah. I, I never could have imagined me having to do something other than a life in music.

Alex Gadd:

For me who, who never was as good a musician as you were, um, but always loved it as much as you seem to have. I gave up on really pursuing it, and so I read your book and I feel so good through the Transitive property, enjoying it on from your story. So I really appreciated that about the book as well,

Fred Mollin:

Thank you.

Alex Gadd:

That leads. So TV scoring became a thing and, and you got some help from your friend Matt's dad, correct.

Fred Mollin:

Oh, yes. When I did my first, I did my first big, orchestral score very early on, like 1982 I think it was. Again, they asked me to score this movie and I was, you know, I didn't know even how to do it. And luckily, Matt's father, who was a big musical director in Toronto, um, who I had gotten very close with'cause of my closeness with Matt, I hired Bill to basically mentor me and teach me how to do everything. And that was pretty great.

Alex Gadd:

That's great. that really pays off again, Dan Hill, putting you together with Matt in that studio pays off again.

Fred Mollin:

Dan, I'm telling you Dan was such a tremendous, um, initiator, you know?

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm. So that leads you to ending that period of your life. You kind of tapped yourself out from doing TV scores. you ended up making music both original and cover songs for Disney for a little while.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

where my, uh, awareness of you came up. And just to share a quick story I, that I did share with you when we

Fred Mollin:

I.

Alex Gadd:

earlier, I had little kids around the turn of the century and I was really not a fan of children's music. And in 2007 when Ratatouille came out, got at a companion or an inspired by a CD called What's Cooking Music Inspired by the movie Ratatouille. And we listened to this record and it's all songs about food and they're either original or old cover songs I couldn't tell, which is a compliment to you if you actually wrote them, is that they sound like old folk songs jazzed up. Um, and. They were, they had titles like Cheese Please and you know, shoe Fly Pie and Saving the Bones for Mrs. Jones. Great songs,

Fred Mollin:

Yeah,

Alex Gadd:

upbeat kind of swing

Fred Mollin:

I,

Alex Gadd:

sound. And we loved this music and I love this music'cause it took me away from having to listen to Barney or The Wiggles or you know, other stuff that

Fred Mollin:

yeah,

Alex Gadd:

had been listening to. So you really did save me in the later half of my children's youth,

Fred Mollin:

that makes me feel good. That's great.

Alex Gadd:

you really helped me out. And fascinatingly, when I got my Apple Music subscription, I went to"favorite" those songs and add them to my library'cause I had a CD of it. And I found that the singer on two of those songs was Chris Stapleton.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. Yeah,

Alex Gadd:

that is just a lucky, a lucky find for me. But you a lucky find for you, too.'cause at the time he was just singing demos, right? He

Fred Mollin:

yeah, yeah,

Alex Gadd:

gig.

Fred Mollin:

yeah. He, he, he was struggling and my girlfriend at that point, had said, boy, this kid's really good. You should use him on one of these things, you know? So we did.

Alex Gadd:

She had a good eye for talent. cause

Fred Mollin:

She did.

Alex Gadd:

He is a monster talent.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. I mean, he was great. Great.

Alex Gadd:

And so one of the most interesting things about the book for me is, and I read Steve Lukather's autobiography memoir, which

Fred Mollin:

I love that one.

Alex Gadd:

like this,

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

many good stories about your intersections with hundreds of top, marquee names throughout your career and throughout the business. If we could just take five minutes, I just wanna do some name association with you if that's okay.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah, yeah,

Alex Gadd:

So course the guy behind me, Bruce Springsteen, my favorite, one of your favorites, you only ran into him once professionally, is that correct? Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

yeah. I was doing, uh, producing Rita Wilson. Tom Hanks' wife and I produced her first album and I think it was 2011. We did a two album set called AM/FM. And Rita turned out to be an incredibly great natural singer, and I loved working on that record and got to know Tom Hanks really well because of that record. And, uh, they had become great friends with Springsteen and his wife Patty. And at one point Rita said, Hey, you know, Patty wants to sing backgrounds on one of the songs, would you go to New Jersey and would you record her? And I'm like, of course I would. So we got to, this was, whatever, 2012 I guess it was. And, uh, um, and so I flew into New Jersey and went to the Springsteen, studio and home. And I recorded Patty doing a background on a song called Walking in the Rain. And, she's a terrific singer So she was easy to record and she was lovely. And the boss was there, he was around. And so we hung out and we just got along beautifully. But I never worked with Bruce professionally. I've certainly produced Patty but I really loved my time there and, to be able to be sitting with Bruce and, and actually it was right after Clarence Clemons had died. So he was having a sadder time, you know, but I remember it was a, I remember it was really a, a just a great opportunity for me to have some time with him, which was really very, very memorable.

Alex Gadd:

And then, mean, one of the most fascinating things is you interacted with George Martin, so if you could just share a little bit about that, because he said one of the most fascinating things, and that is. His quote about signing the Beatles and

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

signed The Beatles. I

Fred Mollin:

I, you know, this is one of my great stories. I can tell anytime we're sitting at a bar, um,

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

I had it wound up, of course, first of all, I, my whole life changed when the Beatles played Ed Sullivan, February 9th, 1964. I was 11. My birthday was the next day. And like so many of us, we watched that performance and our lives were changed, and our direction in our lives was clear. And mine was make a life in music. You know, get a beautiful guitar, write songs, have the girls scream for you. That's my life. I want that. You know, George Martin or Sir George Martin, he became a sir, um, was the producer of The Beatles for many, many of the albums, especially at the beginning, and was also an a and r man for part of EMI in England. And he was the man who signed the Beatles. And at the same time, after he signed The Beatles, he mentored them. So on so many levels for so many, the first three or four albums produced by George Martin. And literally they learned so much from him and I considered him to be a God.

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

And so years later, after 1964, obviously, um. And now I'm, you know, sort of, I had produced the first Jimmy Webb album in 1978 called Angel Heart. And then two years later I produced an album for the band America. Uh, we did an album called Alibi, and it just so happened that George Martin had produced the previous album for Jimmy Webb and it produced the previous albums for America, including many of their hits, and that both Jimmy and America were needing new producers and I on, on Angel Heart and as well, uh, on America. Both Matthew McCauley and I produced both of those records, and because of that, we were stepping into the shoes of someone I considered to be God. So I was incredibly, uh, uh, humbled to be producing these folks after George Martin had produced them. And so now we cut to, probably, I think it must've been. If I produced, uh, Alibi in 80, I guess so probably sometime around 81. I had the great fortune because of my involvement with America and Jimmy Webb to have a couple of dinners over that next year with George Martin. And again, literally he's who to me. And one night I did get a chance to really fanboy him and to really ask questions. And he was so lovely and so polite. He was like a professor, you know. And, at one point I said to him, you know, I just want you to know this. I feel so embarrassed. Uh,'cause I was such a fanboy at that point, that dinner. I said, I just want you to know that what you did changed the world. And he looked at me very quizzically and, and I was like, the Beatles. Changed the world. It wasn't, they changed besides changing music. They changed everything.

Alex Gadd:

Everything.

Fred Mollin:

Style, they changed politics, you name it, they changed the world. And I said, because you signed them, you changed the world.

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

And he looked at me, he was like, oh, Fred, please. He said, I, I didn't change the world now. I'm like, no. I said, you did? And he goes, Fred, and this is the great part. He goes, Fred, you know, the truth is he said in those days, Fred, in 1963, he said, the guitar bands, he called them guitar bands. The guitar bands were very out of favor. Nobody wanted to sign them. And he said, I had a very small situation on Parlophone, but I did have a chance to sign artists that I wanted to sign. And he said, when I met with them after I had done their audition music. He said I wasn't going to sign them based on their music. I didn't feel there was anything there, but I spent time with them and they made me laugh. And he said, I just found them to be so charming and so funny that I figured, what the hell? I'll make a record with them and at least we'll have a lot of laughs.

Alex Gadd:

Wow.

Fred Mollin:

thinking to myself, is that the greatest decision ever

Alex Gadd:

Right.

Fred Mollin:

the world of music

Alex Gadd:

wasn't

Fred Mollin:

and in the world

Alex Gadd:

Yeah.

Fred Mollin:

guy said, I think I'll sign them'cause I think I'm gonna have a good time working with them.

Alex Gadd:

Right. Or what if he'd had no sense of humor and didn't find them funny?

Fred Mollin:

He would never have signed them

Alex Gadd:

Amazing.

Fred Mollin:

And there would be no Beatles. There would and there would be no Beatles. Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

and a lot would be different.

Fred Mollin:

Uh, absolutely.

Alex Gadd:

Can't even imagine.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. So that, that made me, I mean, I was like, oh my God, you know? What a great, you know.

Alex Gadd:

story.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

I am obsessed with Canadian rock and roll and so you being Canadian dual citizen,

Fred Mollin:

Yeah,

Alex Gadd:

Kim Mitchell, you've run across from Max Webster. Huge kid.

Fred Mollin:

worked with Kim. Um, he, he was he a guest star on a TV series I co-hosted, um, and his guitar player I produced, yeah,

Alex Gadd:

And then you, you would spend some time early in Brian Adam's career on a plane going to Japan with

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

you kept in touch with him since then?

Fred Mollin:

I try to keep in touch with Brian and Jim. I haven't been in touch with'em in quite a while. We, we really enjoyed each other. And, I was, I was around for Brian's big, the big break when he had Cuts Like a Knife. And, and, uh, we,

Alex Gadd:

record.

Fred Mollin:

yeah, we had, we had been in Japan right before that album came out, and, um, we just had a wonderful time together. So if I run into him, I know it'll be lovely to see him again. Um,

Alex Gadd:

that happens.

Fred Mollin:

Uh, boy, boy, I, I was a great fan.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah, I loved him. Did. And then you ran into Mike Myers early in his career.

Fred Mollin:

I had a, in 19, i, I, I think in the book, I say 1987 was my favorite year.

Alex Gadd:

You

Fred Mollin:

There was so much going on that was so beautiful. I had my second child, a daughter, and uh, I was kicking ass in my TV and film composing, doing like three TV series at once. And I liked my hair. I mean, you name it. I liked everything. Then I also got a chance to be a co-host sort of a Paul Schafer, to Ted Woloshyn's Dave Letterman on a show called It's Only Rock and Roll, which was a rock and roll variety show that we hosted on CBC. And it was so much fun, uh, to do that show. And, halfway through the series that one year we needed to find some other new talent, to help us on some of the skits that we did. And in Toronto, Second City was very powerful and that's where a lot of the great, you know, John Candy and all these wonderful people came from Eugene Levy, et cetera. And in 1987 there was a whole, obviously a whole bunch of new people in Second City. And we, um, as the co-stars of the series were brought in to assess these people who were auditioning to be on our TV series. And one of them was Mike Myers, who was only, I think 18. Uh, boy was he talented, and Both, both Ted and I just looked at each other and said, oh my God, this kid's great. You know? And our producer, John Brunton, we all just looked at him and said, this kid's got everything. You know, he's a good looking kid, and he's just so fast and so funny. So we hired him for the show. And so within that year of doing that TV series on CBC, I wound up doing all these different skits with him where I'd be the straight man to him playing Wayne of Wayne's World, where he created that character. And, uh, we did a bunch of these. It was very, it was just lovely. And within a year and a half, especially after the show was canceled, he got a phone call from Lorne Michaels saying, Hey, would you come to Saturday Night Live? And interestingly enough, when you go to Saturday Night Live, anything you bring to the show or create during the show is owned by Lorne Michaels. So actually Wayne, he brought to the show, but Lorne owns Wayne And when I saw Mike years later when he was doing Austin Powers, I ran into him at the Four Seasons in New York in 1999, I think it was. And he gave me a big hug and he said, oh my God. He said, you bought my first furniture for me. And you know, and I said, will you sign a few things for my kids? And he did. And then he said On Austin Powers, Fred, I got really, I, I got really smart. And I said, what do you mean? He says, he said on Wayne's World, he said, Lorne owns everything, the movies, he owns everything. And I said, yeah. He said, on Austin Powers, I own 70% of every part that movie.

Alex Gadd:

Good for him.

Fred Mollin:

And I just.

Alex Gadd:

how it should be

Fred Mollin:

And I said, that's wonderful. And so we had a wonderful get together. Saw him a couple years later as well, gave me a big hug. He's really a dear guy and so gifted, you know, great. Will be gifted.

Alex Gadd:

the big connections in your professional life that became family, almost Jimmy Webb. So for those who don't know, Jimmy Webb is one of the ultimate songwriters wrote songs with, for a ton of people. My, my first awareness of Jimmy Webb came with the songs he wrote with Glen Campbell and for Glen Campbell, uh, that even Springsteen tried to emulate with his Western Stars album. It was literally him saying, I wanna write a Jimmy Webb

Fred Mollin:

That's right, that's right. Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

impressive. But you've worked with him, as you said at the beginning, most of your professional life.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. I just finished working with Jimmy yesterday, which we're doing a new album and, I've worked with Jimmy since I was 23 years old. We've been together as a, a producer and artist since I was 23 and I'm 72 now. So he's beyond family. To me, he is probably, certainly, should be on the Mount Rushmore of the great songwriters because, he wrote the music and lyrics. He wrote Wichita Lineman, which people consider to be the greatest pop song ever written. He wrote MacArthur Park. He wrote, arranged and produced MacArthur Park. He wrote, By The Time I Get to Phoenix, and so many other great songs. And he is considered to be one of the greatest songwriters that ever walked the planet. So probably along with Jimmy, maybe Paul Simon, maybe Randy Newman. Maybe Bert Backrack, although Bert didn't write lyrics. So really, you know, the, the guys who wrote lyrics who were that good really were Paul Simon and, and maybe Joni Mitchell and, and Jimmy. But Jimmy never had a real successful career as a singer songwriter Performer. But I love his, his voice, and I love the way he performs his songs. But I've been producing him forever. And, he's very dear to me. He's part of my family. And, he just became such an inspiration to me at a very early age. I remember, listening must have been, I was 16, probably listening in the car with my dad and hearing MacArthur Park and going, holy shit. Like this is, this is, this is a symphony, this is genius. And then when I realized he wrote Galveston, Witchita Lineman, and By the Time I Got to Phoenix, which by the way, you know, Glen Campbell was sort of a square, he was sort of a Republican, you know, we didn't really like him, but those songs were so brilliant. And Dylan, is on record. Bob Dylan is on record saying the greatest song in the history of songwriting is Wichita Lineman.

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm. I get

Fred Mollin:

to this day, you know, uh, um. Uh, I don't think anybody, even including the people I've mentioned, I, I think Jimmy is, is America's greatest songwriter and uh, I've just been so completely blessed to be his guy.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah, that's an incredible Did do I have it right that you were asked who you wanted to produce very early in your career and said, and you could have had your way, and you said, I wanna produce Jimmy Webb. And everyone looked at you like, are you crazy?

Fred Mollin:

Clearly you read the book alright. Well there's a great moment In 1978, Sometimes When We Touch had been a monster hit and 20th Century Fox was the label and the head of Fox was a guy named Harvey Cooper. And Matt and I were summoned to his office after, Sometimes When We Touch, was a hit in 78. And we went to LA and we went to his office and it was a real Hollywood moment.'cause I remember Harvey was smoking a cigar and it was really like, visiting, sort of a grand Puba. And Harvey said, man, he said, listen, I'm gonna make you guys the biggest thing ever. He said, just tell me who you want to produce. I'm gonna find a way that you can produce them. Now if I had been thinking with my wallet, I would've said, you know, James, Taylor, Elton John, you know those kinds of people.

Alex Gadd:

Sure.

Fred Mollin:

And I just said, Jimmy Webb. And he looked at me, Alex, and he said, why? Because Jimmy's solo albums had not done well, And I had said, because he's the greatest songwriter that ever lived, and I love his voice, and I think Matt and I could produce a really great record for him. And he said, oh boy. Okay. Well, he said, all right. And he gets on the intercom and says, Dolores, get Jimmy Webb's manager on the phone. He got Jimmy Webb's manager on the phone, talked to him. Next thing you know, the next day we're meeting with Jimmy Webb's manager in the same office. Harvey's going, these two guys are the brilliant beyond brilliant producers for the next decade. He said, I want you to understand Matt and Fred are monsters and they want to produce. Jimmy and Willie looked at me and looked at Matt and said, okay. He said, why don't you come over to Jimmy's house tonight and meet him?

Alex Gadd:

Oh my God.

Fred Mollin:

And we met him and we shared some, uh, illegal substances and we just became great friends and Jimmy said, oh my God, you guys have to produce me. And we, had a deal with 20th Century Fox then.'cause Harvey said, okay, well I'll sign Jimmy. The day of the first day of tracking on the album, Harvey got fired and all, All of a sudden, and they had made a big deal about not signing the contract until the day of the tracking. And so an emissary from 20th Century Fox Records came to Sunset Sound. The guys in the band are already on the floor. Steve Lukather, Dean Parks, Jeff Porcaro, uh, Lee Sklar. I mean this is the greatest players ever then. And were already to start working on the first day of tracking. And the emissary from Fox comes in with the contracts and they walk into this little ante room off of Sunset Sound Studio two where Jimmy and and Willie are. And the next thing you know, Willie's coming into the, uh, the studio and saying to me, Fred, please come in here. You know, I'm like, look at me when the guys are tuning up, we're getting ready. And Willie says, we're fucked. Now. Don't forget, I'm like 23 or 24. Um, and I said, well, what's going on? He goes, he said, Harvey's gone. There's a new person running the label. And they have decided that they're not gonna make this record unless Jimmy signs his publishing over to 20th Century Fox, which at that point Jimmy was so powerful that for them to ask for his publishing was insane.

Alex Gadd:

Right.

Fred Mollin:

They just said to the guy and they just, they called the head of, of the, the new head of the label, and they called him, they said, fuck you.

Alex Gadd:

Good.

Fred Mollin:

And they said, we'll never sign this. And they said, well, you we're not making a record with you. And so that was it. Now, meanwhile, I got the guys on the floor. Getting ready to work on the first song and to say I was crushed would be a a absolute, uh, I mean, there's, there's just, I don't think there's any way I can remember how I felt. I remember feeling like my whole life was over. And, uh, Jimmy and, and Willie, his manager, sat in the little anteroom and talked by themselves and Jimmy decided to finance the album himself. So I was able to go to the players and say, Hey, little different here. We're not working for a label anymore. We're working for Jimmy. He'll pay you. Um, and we started to make the record that became Angel Heart, which then eventually was picked up by, by, uh. Um, a label called Lorimar, which was distributed by CBS, but that was the first Jimmy Webb album. And it started, of course, very, very, very dramatically. But luckily Jimmy decided to finance the record himself. You know, there's, there's just a lot of drama in show business, isn't there? I mean, it really is.

Alex Gadd:

it's, it's business. I mean, there's no doubt it's business in the end. It's not a bunch of happy, good time

Fred Mollin:

No, I mean, it, I mean, I just think about it. It's, it's a dramatic way to make a living.

Alex Gadd:

But you've done it. And so the book goes into so many more. I don't wanna spoil all the stories, but you have an incredible working relationship with people like you did with Johnny Mathis, with Bill Medley, Al Kooper. I mean, the, the, the stories are wonderful. I don't wanna spoil them all. Go out and read Unplugged. There's also a fascinatingly large. Picture section in the middle of the book, much larger than many other memoirs, and it really does go to accentuate how broad and varied your career is. I loved the pictures, but the one thing that stood out to me that when you were 14, you're in your band and you're playing a Gretsch Tennessean, was your Bar Mitzvah present?

Fred Mollin:

Yes, yes.

Alex Gadd:

Right. And then I see another picture in another band, and you're playing a Rickenbacker. Do you have a gear obsession like I do? And I'm not nearly as accomplished as you and I have a gear obsession.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. Oh God.

Alex Gadd:

obsession?

Fred Mollin:

I mean, you know, in Nashville, all the cats that I play with and, and produce all my session players, we all have a tremendously large collection of guitars and, and, uh, you know, guitar is the next sexiest thing to a woman. So, um, we're just, I'm just always, I mean, if you really want to get me going, let's talk about guitars. You know,

Alex Gadd:

Well, do you still have either of those first two guitars?

Fred Mollin:

I still have my rickenbacker that I traded. I got a Grech Tennesseean from my Bar Mitzvah,

Alex Gadd:

Right.

Fred Mollin:

um, because we decided not to have a big Bar Mitzvah, but instead I'd have a guitar and amp. And then a year and a half later I heard The Byrds and I wanted to play a Rickenbacker. And I traded in the Gretch Tennessean and got a Rickenbacker 12 string.

Alex Gadd:

you still have

Fred Mollin:

Still have that one.

Alex Gadd:

Those are amazing,

Fred Mollin:

Yeah. And by the way, I've had my, my guy work on it lately, and it's, it plays great. It sounds great. The neck's a little bit too narrow. But it's still a, a wonderful instrument. Yeah,

Alex Gadd:

Yeah. Good. And I, I assume you have a bunch of keyboards as well, right?

Fred Mollin:

I do. You know, I, I've been getting rid of a bunch because there's no, no reason to keep a lot of them, but I keep my original Kurzwell K 250, in a place of honor in the studio because it's, it really did change my life and it made my life, successful in my TV and film years.

Alex Gadd:

So foundational. I only have one more thing I'd love to do, if you don't mind. This podcast started off as conversations about live music only. It's broadened to be able to talk to authors and, and producers and musicians such as yourself. Can you just go through your first live concert? Just share that experience with us.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah, I, I remember it so well. Um, my mom and I,'cause again, I grew up in Long Island, uh, in South Shore of Long Island, and my mom. Came with me to, a show at the Westbury Music Fair. Westbury Music Fair is still around. I think it's called something else now.

Alex Gadd:

They

Fred Mollin:

I think it's,

Alex Gadd:

all

Fred Mollin:

it's called something else now though, right? It's called some Other.

Alex Gadd:

the something at Westbury, but it's,

Fred Mollin:

Okay.

Alex Gadd:

the

Fred Mollin:

And it, it was a rotating stage and a theater in the round. And I remember this must have been 1965, so I was, uh, in 65, I was 12 and my mom took me to see the Who at Westbury Music Fair. And the opening group was Orpheus, who I also loved, by the way. But The Who, I was a big fan of, and they were just promoting an album that had, I Can See For Miles on it, and it was called The Who Sellout.

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

So they were, I think, in my opinion, they were at their peak and. It was absolutely life-changing, mind blowing. It was only Keith Moon, John Entwistle on Bass and Townsend on guitar, and Roger Daltry singing. But I had never heard sound that was so all encompassing coming from these three guys.

Alex Gadd:

Yeah.

Fred Mollin:

And then, I mean, and the songs and the way they did them, it was so, I mean, it changed my life. And then literally at the end, they destroyed their instruments, which I had heard about, I think. But I didn't expect to see it. And Pete Townsend smashing his guitar and Keith Moon's throwing the drums over, I was just, my mother was just, I mean, I, I'll never get a chance to ask my mother what she thought, but you know, I'm sure she was flipped out, but it was such a thrilling concert that I've never heard sound like that to this day. That was my first Rock concert.

Alex Gadd:

Isn't that great? I

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

Story. They were my fourth concert ever, but it was 10 years later or 15 years later,

Fred Mollin:

Alex, you wouldn't have believed what they were able to do. I just could not believe it. This was, this was literally magical. I couldn't, I couldn't believe it.

Alex Gadd:

they're incredible.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah.

Alex Gadd:

Is there anything I didn't ask you that you think might be useful to the, my audience, your fans? Um. That you'd like to share?

Fred Mollin:

Well, it's interesting. I, I, you know, the only thing, um, that I think we didn't touch upon, which happens to be one of the, the most successful parts of my life was when I got a phone call about, doing an instrumental lullaby album for Disney.

Alex Gadd:

Mm-hmm.

Fred Mollin:

And literally it became one of the most successful, projects, of the history of my career. You know, so

Alex Gadd:

Let's talk a little bit

Fred Mollin:

Sure, sure,

Alex Gadd:

How did that come about? You were, was it, this was well before you did the Pixar related music.

Fred Mollin:

Yeah, so in 1999, I think it was, I was still doing my TV and film years in Toronto and I got a phone call from Jay Landers, who's been one of my most loyal characters in my life. Great friend, and someone who supported my music for so many years. And Jay was head of a and r for Walt Disney Records at that point. And he called me and he said, Hey, we're thinking of doing an album of instrumental lullabies with arrangements that were, you know of. Well-known Disney songs, but instrumental and very sort of meditative versions that would help a child go to sleep. And like I said, my whole life is basically when someone says that, I go, well, I'll try that. Sure, that sounds good. You know, I just say yes to everything. And so I said, well that sounds like fun, you know? And he said, okay. He said, so I'll give you a song list and then you can add some other songs to it. But basically just make it an instrumental music album. Create your arrangements and we wanna make a record that will help little children go to sleep. So in the middle of my TV and film career, I recorded that album in Toronto called Disney's Lullaby album. And the interesting part, Alex, is that I know Jay knew my background. But Disney Records didn't know my background. And my background was Friday the 13th, part seven part eight movies, the Friday, the 13th TV series, all sorts of other stuff, Outer Limits, you know, forever night, like a lot of sci-fi and, and dark stuff. So clearly no one looked at my resume, because they would not have hired me. And luckily Jay didn't pay attention and Jay just said, oh, you're the right guy for the job. And so I did this first album, um, and it came out, I guess in 1999 or 2000. And, it has gone, uh, well certainly it went gold and it's heading towards platinum as a, as a cd, but apparently there's over 240 million streams of my Disney lullaby music, and it has been the absolute most successful, music as an artist I've ever had. And The nice part is. It begat like other, I think we did seven other albums of instrumental lullaby music. And what's lovely is it did such good things for young children and for the parents. So it's funny, I, I live an interesting career because some people come to me and they, they know me as the horror guy who did the horror TV series or whatever, or movies. And some people know me as the lullaby guy and some people know me as the record producer and some people know, you know what, it's so fascinating to me'cause it's sort of like I had about four lives in one. But I must tell you, the Disney Lullaby series, has been such an absolute blessing for me. And at the same time, apparently. A well needed musical, uh, situation to help young children sleep. And even my own children, um, I'm a granddad. My daughter's two kids, they've gone to sleep with my lullaby music for years. And I love that part. It makes me feel good that I did something nice and at the same time, it's just so funny. I was buying a new car about, must have been about seven months ago. And, you know, I was at the dealership and I'm looking around and this gal who must be about probably 30, is the new saleswoman and she's showing me around, no, she's a little bit, I'm just not really getting along with her that well, but I'm letting her show me around. And at one point she looks at me and she goes. Are you the Fred Mollin who did the Disney Lullaby albums? And I said, yeah. And she goes, oh my God. She says, I went to sleep with those records for the first seven years of my life. I still listen to them. And I said, do I get a better deal now? And she was lovely. And uh, and she was terrific to, to deal with, but it, it, it made a difference in a lot of people's lives. So I guess when it comes down to it, I, I just feel like whenever my life and music can actually intersect with a person's life, in, in a positive manner, I, I, I just feel, again, so fortunate, so that's probably why I wrote the book. I was, I felt like, you know, there's a lot of stories here and I think it's, it's a worthy story.

Alex Gadd:

I do too.

Fred Mollin:

Fred,

Alex Gadd:

thank you so much for your time. The book again is Unplugged Stories and Secrets from a Life making records, scoring films, and working with the legends of music. It truly does hit on all of those things. Our guest today has been Fred Mollin. Thank you so much, Fred, and thanks to all of you for joining us. I'll be back next week, and if you like what you heard today, I'd appreciate it if you would like and either subscribe or follow to make sure you get notified about each new episode, and please tell your friends. Also, a reminder that I release a playlist for every episode, so look for the Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast playlist on Spotify every week featuring songs from the bands and the musicians that we talked about on the show today. Please look for that. Additionally, I want to know what you think, so please leave me a comment. I'll try to respond to all of them. The Rock-N-Roll Show Podcast is a World Highway Media production. I'm your host, Alex Gadd, and until next time, remember that life is short, so get those concert tickets.

Fred Mollin:

Hey, man, I, I had a blast. Thank you.