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THE JOURNEY ZONE
http://www.journey-zone.com
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Steve Smith Interview with Jrnydv.Com
Jonathan Cain Interview with ElectricBasement.Com
Neal Schon Interview (Source Uncertain)
Gregg Rolie Interview with ClassicRockRevisited
Neal Schon and Jonathan Cain Interview with JourneyDigest.Com
Josh Ramos Interview with GetReadyToRock.Com
Jrnydv.Com's Interview with Steve Smith
Date of Publication: June 3, 2003
Date of Interview: May 16, 2003
Location: The Bottom Line, Greenwich Village, New York City
Interviewers: Dave Golland and Svetlana Rogachevskaya
Steve Smith occasionally passed a hand rapidly over his bald head as we spoke. But the most striking thing about interviewing him was how direct and straightforward he was. Steve Smith looked me in the eye as he answered each question--quite impressive. Unfortunately, as with our Gregg Rolie interview last November, we didn't have all that much time. In this case, we spoke before the gig, and Steve had to go and get ready to perform. But we're getting better at asking the questions most important to our readers and following up incisively. We look forward to speaking again with Steve the next time he comes to town. As a token of our appreciation, we presented Steve with a Jrnydv.Com laminate identifying him as an "Honorary Editor."
Jrnydv.Com: Let’s start with some background and technical subjects. How have your experiences at Berklee come into play during your career?
Steve Smith: Well, going to Berklee gave me a foundation that I built on to have a career. I had a foundation before Berklee as far as studying privately. When I first started playing I started with private lessons, and that gave me a great foundation to then go to Berklee. And I’d played a lot of gigs locally when I was in high school and junior high school, but going to Berklee was the finishing school that I needed in order to become a professional musician—and it also helped me get my start in the music business, because the other students that I met helped me to get work—yeah, everyone was helping each other get gigs.
And are you today in contact with the same people from your class?
SS: I’m in contact with a lot of the same people.
Is there a liberal arts base there as well, or is it strictly a music school?
SS: It’s a music school. Strictly a music school. But you could get a degree, a Bachelor’s degree, and there were academic courses, but nothing else besides music [as a major] is offered.
What is your opinion of public education in regards to music and the arts in the United States, and how does it compare with the rest of the world?
SS: Well, I can’t compare it to the rest of the world. I really don’t know what they do in other countries. Music education is virtually nonexistent in the public school systems. Which is just really unfortunate. It would be great if they did have a strong music education program that focused on US music. That’s one thing that I’m very interested in and I think in our own culture, we don’t generally know the roots of our own US music. We take a lot of things for granted, as far as what we accept what we hear in music, and people in general are pretty un-informed. Not just non-musicians, but many musicians as well. Most people really don’t have too much knowledge of the background of what shaped US music.
When you say US music, you mean—
SS: All the music that comes from the United States is really unique to the world. It started essentially from slavery in the United States. Because before that, there was no music in the United States other than what the different immigrants brought with them from Europe or Africa. But there was a melting pot, something that happened in the United States because of the meeting of European and African music. The ingredients came together in all the countries that had slavery. Like Cuba, Puerto Rico, Brazil, and Trinidad, and every one of them developed a completely unique new music.
Do you discuss any of this in your clinics?
SS: It’s all in my DVD [Steve Smith Drumset Technique and History of the U.S. Beat, available through Hudson Music]. And in the United States it had a particular sound when it took off. And this is what we completely take for granted. Musically the blues, and then jazz, and then from jazz, rhythm and blues, and then eventually rock’n’roll. And soul, and funk, and everything that came out of that. It’s all sequentially developed. Even country music—it’s all coming from the same root.
Do you think if your instrument was not drums you would understand these things as well? Because you’ve obviously benefited from the fact that yours is the one instrument that is common throughout all these genres. Would you have researched these things had you studied saxophone or piano?
SS: I think if I studied those instruments, and I approached them the same way that I approach the drums, I would have still done some sort of historical research. Because if you play the piano, most piano players start with classical music. And the reason is that’s the roots of the piano. The piano was invented around the time that this kind of music existed, so the original repertoire was classical. So it makes sense to learn that. And then you work your way forward in time. I just take the same approach with the drums.
My studies brought me back basically to the end of the 1800s where the drumset was invented. The snare drum and the bass drum were already invented, and they were used separately in marching bands. But it wasn’t until the end of the 1800s that the bass drum pedal was invented, and that was the beginning of the drumset. So I take my study back to that point. I think it would be awesome to offer that perspective in schools. But sadly, it’s not. As a result, we have people that are completely influenced by music that’s in the media and in the culture, and they have no way of knowing how to judge it. They only judge it really if they like it or they don’t like it in the moment. And it’s not based on anything.
Only by what they feel right then and there.
SS: Yeah, right then.
They don’t know why—
SS: Right. And they don’t have anything to compare it to. Since I have a lot to compare it to, most of it sounds pretty bad. Because I know what makes good music and good musicianship. And so when I hear what’s being passed off as music, it’s pretty poor. Really at this point in time in music, in the music business, the main thing that people are selling are fashion and looks in videos. The music really doesn’t play as much a role anymore.
You know, that’s interesting in that we were watching American Idol and we thought most of them were lousy most of the time. Yet they seem to get millions upon millions of votes every week.
SS: Well don’t doubt yourself, I’m sure they are lousy!
Did you put your kids through public school in San Francisco?
SS: Well actually my daughter just graduated from Novato's San Marin High School, a public high school. My son went to a private school, and my daughter did for a little while, but she didn’t like it, so she wanted to go to public school. So no, they didn’t really get any music education.
I’m sure they got a lot from you!
SS: Yeah, they did. They get a lot just from what I listen to around the house or what I talk about. They know a lot.
What precautions do you take to avoid carpal tunnel syndrome?
SS: I don’t have any issues with carpal tunnel syndrome because of the way that I play. My technique is well developed. It’s just that when I play, I play very relaxed and I don’t hurt myself because I try not to break any of the rules—meaning the natural laws that govern the body—physics. And the reason people have carpal tunnel is because they have bad technique. It’s that simple. There’s nothing wrong with their genetics, or their joints, or this or that. It’s all because they’re holding the sticks too tight, they’re hitting the drums too hard, and they’re breaking the rules of physics. In other words they’re not allowing action-reaction. It would be as if you took a basketball and you jammed it into the floor instead of dropping it and letting it bounce. Most drummers in today’s culture—it’s like taking a baseball bat and smashing it into the ground, absorbing all the energy, all the shock. And they’re hurting themselves. That’s not a very good way to play the drums, obviously. People are mystified by it—it’s so simple! They break sticks, they break heads—even cymbals—it’s because of poor technique, which is not allowing the stick to rebound off of the drum, off of the cymbal, which—if you had good technique—you would naturally do. Good technique really just playing relaxed and allowing the stick to bounce, and not forcing things.
It seems that many are just so focused on how they look, and not how they sound.
SS: If they’re focused on how they look, they’re not thinking about their technique. It’s true! They might go for so much of a showmanship look that they’re not doing something that’s really—technically—a good thing to do.
Okay, let’s get into some Journey-related topics. Do you know anything about the circumstances surrounding Aynsley being fired?
SS: The only thing I know about Aynsley leaving the band is that the band wanted a different feel. It seems pretty simple to me. It’s that they wanted a drummer that was more compatible at that time with Steve Perry’s rhythm and blues background.
And you’d studied extensively the background, getting ready for the job?
SS: I had a natural ability to play the feels of US music simply because I was brought up in the United States. It’s as basic as if you’d want somebody to play Cuban drumming, you don’t ask somebody from the United States to do it. You get somebody from the culture.
But you specifically had gone back and listened to Sam Cooke?
SS: I studied the music of the past, sure, but it also very naturally was something that I could do. To play the music of my culture. And so even though I have a jazz background, it might look strange that I then chose to play rock. But the best rock drummers in my opinion all have jazz backgrounds. Because that was the original way to play the drums. And then rock came later. So I followed the same path that most of the early drummers followed—whether the drummer for Elvis, D.J. Fontana, or Mitch Mitchell with Jimi Hendrix or Ginger Baker with Cream. They were jazz drummers first, and then the played rock. And that gave them a certain ability on the instrument, and a certain feel. And I had that same background, but I also was playing the music of my culture and my times, and so I was able to play with an R&B-ish feel, if that was necessary. And I think that was the issue. Aynsley’s feel wasn’t really what Steve Perry liked. He wanted more of a rhythm and blues kind of feel. So somehow they found that I filled the bill. I could give Steve Perry the feel that he wanted. I could interact with Neal in a jazz-rock sort of way which he was into. And it was easy for me to play with Ross and Gregg—it just all seemed to work out.
Let’s talk about why you left Journey in 1986. Many argue that it’s necessary nowadays, in order to add musical special effects to live shows, like enhanced vocals and multiple keyboards, to have a click track. Have your feelings on the click track issue changed at all since the Raised on Radio period? Are you warming up to the concept or do you still feel that it’s making you paint a house rather than be an artist? My understanding is that during Raised on Radio you and Steve Perry butted heads because he wanted to work with a click track.
SS: When I play on pop tracks and work on a pop album, I do that with the conception of pleasing the producer. And I do it, and it’s not something that I love to do for my main musical experience in life. But I do it because I can do it and I’m paid to do it and it pays well. And it has a certain challenge that I like, but then it’s not what I want to do with myself as a main diet, as a main thing.
So you’re not using it with Vital, obviously.
SS: No, we don’t use anything like click tracks live. We sometimes use them in the studio. The point isn’t the click tracks. It’s just the idea of playing pop music is really what I’m talking about, whether you use the click track or not. But most of the time everyone uses a click track. But the main thing is the timing has to be so precise, which I can do, but there’s something about the mentality of so much focus just being on timing, and not on interaction, not on spontaneity. And I understand the genre no longer supports that kind of musicianship. Early rock’n’roll still supported that jazz-type aesthetic, that listening and answering interaction.
Call and response.
SS: Yeah. And when you listen to Cream or Hendrix or Led Zeppelin or any of those you would still feel those aesthetics going on. Now it’s like computer music. It’s just like everyone plays his part, they put the pieces together, and you have your product. That, to me, feels like building a house. It doesn’t feel to me like organically making music. So I don’t choose to live my life doing that. So I will do it from time to time because it’s challenging and it pays well. It’s simple. But what I really want to do is play with high level musicians, where I can improvise every night.
The issue with Steve Perry wasn’t so much that I didn’t want to play with a click track as I couldn’t play with a click track well during that time. It was new for me, a new experience. I’d never played with a click track. And you have to develop the skill to play with a click track and I had yet to develop that skill. And I did develop it later, within a couple of years, ‘cause then I focused on it because I needed to develop that skill to be a professional working musician, because It’s an industry standard now. Back then it was completely new. And I couldn’t really do it. It felt real uncomfortable. And so basically, what Perry did was, instead of abandoning the concept—because we had played a lot of records without a click track and we could have played that record without a click track, but Neal and Jonathan and Steve were very focused on fusing that new technology into the music. Hindsight, they’ve all said it wasn’t the greatest idea, because when we talked about it later, they’ve all said it would have been better to just play organically with the band and let it live where it lived.
But the problem was they wrote all the music with the technology. And that was a big shift—a paradigm shift—of how we did business. We used to write organically. But that record was written in Jonathan’s music room with machines—without Ross and me there. So by the time we came into it, it was hard for us to get ourselves not only invested but physically into it to the point where we could own the parts. It was the first time that they had written for us. And we didn’t have the skills to do what I can do now. If that happened now, I could go in and play it and it would be fine. But I didn’t have those skills developed at that time. So after a while, the easiest way for them to make the record was to get professionals for whom this was old business—this was comfortable for them. And that’s when Steve brought in Larrie Londin and Randy Jackson. They had done a lot of this already. You know, I’m to the point now where I’m doing that. You know, they have me come in and play, and the poor drummer sits on the sideline. So I know what that’s like, and it’s a drag in a band situation. It really was the end of the band at that point.
It was just three guys writing and two session players.
SS: Yeah. And when we did the Trial by Fire record, we did it organically as a band. Cause we’d learned that that’s the way we worked the best. And even though Jonathan and Neal and Steve had some ideas, they didn’t demo them. They brought the ideas in organically so we—Ross and I—could get a foothold in from the very beginning, of what our contribution was going to be. Because that really was the strength of that band, that everyone had a good personality, a musical personality, that we could offer something that would be superior to what somebody could think of as a drum beat. So they left it open so that we could go in and help create the music. And that was a great idea and I thought it was successful, and that it worked really well.
But I loved working with Steve Perry. He’s just a fantastic singer. And he really had great time, great feel, and a really soulful voice, and I always loved working with him as a musician. He was one of the greatest.
Have you kept in touch with him since Trial by Fire?
SS: No, I haven’t. I did for a little while but then we just sort of fell out of touch. After the VH1 thing we talked a couple of times and that’s the last time I talked to him.
What did you think of Behind the Music?
SS: I thought the first one was horrible—the one-hour version. The one and a half hour Director’s Cut I thought was pretty good. But the one-hour version I thought was really bad.
Were the Behind the Music episodes historically accurate, or were they overly representative of a single perspective?
SS: I didn’t think they were that accurate. I’d have to see it again to remember what it was that was not really right. There were a few things that were not really right. [at this point SS turned off the tape for a moment, and we talked off-the-record, then continued.] You know, we get into too many details, they made it sound like we didn’t want to wait for Steve Perry. And that was not the case. We were willing to wait for Steve Perry.
Are you talking about ’97?
SS: Yeah. Yeah, that—
So you were willing to stay with the band, then?
SS: Well, the concept as I gathered it in those days wasn’t to have an ongoing band. I’m not interested in that.
You were talking about a reunion tour?
SS: Right. That’s what I was interested in. and everyone was really interested in—it’s like the Eagles, the way they did that, like a one-year comeback. I mean I don’t want to do this anymore. That’s not what I’m into. But I would do the one-shot thing. And everyone was willing to do that. The only thing we needed was some kind of commitment from him, that he really wanted to do it. And that never happened. And it finally became obvious that he didn’t. But he just would never really say it.
Did he really have a hip problem?
SS: Absolutely. He really did. But there was never a real commitment from him to do it. And so it finally got to the point where, the way I see it, those guys wanted to work. They wanted to carry on. So they made the decision to carry on without him.
What singers have you liked working with the most, in your whole career?
SS: I haven’t worked with that many vocalists. I’ve worked on their albums. I mean, the guy in Savage Garden’s a great singer [Darren Hayes]. Mariah Carey, Bryan Adams, Tina Arena, this singer from Australia that’s really good. Zucchero, like “sugar” in Italian. He’s a great singer, like a blues singer. And it’s interesting working with all these singers. Most of them I never really play with, because I’m just playing the drum tracks either before or after they’ve sung. The one singer that I did a country record with was Ray Price. He’s a very good country singer and he actually did a country record where everything was live. That I loved. Because it was organic. Nothing was laid down other than the whole band. The whole group played live. That was really prime. And there’s an energy that goes along with that. There’s an intensity because you can’t make a mistake. And everyone knows that they can’t make a mistake. It’s not like when you’re overdubbing, when there’s a lot of room for error. You can screw up and it doesn’t matter, because you can go back and fix it. But this creates a certain kind of creative tension, when everyone’s playing, and there’s like twenty-five people in the room—there were strings and horns, and a rhythm section and everyone had to get it right.
How do you feel about Journey tribute bands?
SS: I think it’s a great thing, because it keeps the music alive.
Do you have any advice for tribute band drummers who want to emulate the Steve Smith Journey sound?
SS: One word of advice is if you’re going to learn the drum parts for the Journey songs, start with the recording, but then change it.
Be original, be organic.
SS: Yeah, play what feels right for you to play. I think that the parts that I played on the record, I didn’t even stick to those parts live. Some of them I did, but a lot of them I didn’t. So after awhile it doesn’t feel all that great to just keep playing the same parts over and over. Be creative. Because that’s the way I would do it. I mean if I was playing in a band, I wouldn’t be playing all those parts exactly the same every night.
What do you think of Deen Castronovo?
SS: Well that’s the same advice I told Deen. I love Deen. He’s a great guy. He’s a very good drummer. Really, I love his drumming. And I think he’s done an amazing job of learning all of my parts. But like I told him, even I wouldn’t be playing all those exact same fills from the record. Loosen it up, man! But he’s a great drummer. He really is.
Can we expect a new Vital Information album anytime soon, and are there any more albums in the works for the Tone Center label?
SS: Well there are two new Tone Center records coming out in the next few months: Buddy’s Buddies: Live at Ronnie Scott’s, Set One, and then a separate one, called Live at Ronnie Scott’s, Set Two. So those will be coming out soon. At some point there will be a new Vital Information but I don’t know when right now. We’re so busy with touring. And then when this tour’s done, everyone’s going off and doing tours with other people. Frank’s going out with Chick Corea, Tom’s going out with Billy Cobham, and a lot of things are going on that I don’t know when we’re going to do it. But eventually we will.
It’s great that you’re doing that tour diary. I think it lets the fans feel what it’s like to be going all over Europe and paying overweight charges and all your eight o’clock lobby calls. Thank you for doing that. And thank you very much for speaking with us this evening.
SS: Sure.
This transcript ©2003 Jrnydv.Com. All rights reserved.
Jonathan Cain's Interview with ElectricBasement.Com
Date of Publication at Jrnydv.Com: June 12, 2003
Date of Original Publication: June 11, 2003
Journey has been to the mountaintop, leapt over it, and
come out standing more times than most of their
contemporaries combined. In the summer of 2003, a full
thirty years after their initial formation, Journey is ready
to make the leap yet again. You simply have to admire
the incredible drive that this group has.
Take Journey's most recent studio offering, "Red 13," for
instance. Conceived as a simple EP to fill the space
between full album projects, "Red 13" is a Pandora's
box of riffs and rhythms meshed and mashed with deeply thoughtful lyrical passages delivered
so emotionally impactful that it easily rates as some of the best work to be branded with the
Journey trademark. Within "Red 13's" twenty-five minutes exist all the sonic credentialization
required of a group continuing to ascend along an already incomparable artistic arc. If you have
witnessed the band performing live in recent years then you already know that the live show
maintains that same high standard. Journey is every bit as vital today as it has ever been and
shows no signs of ever reversing course.
Though Journey are intent to leave further sonic imprints on contemporary Rock and Roll, this
summer the group has joined up with both Styx and REO Speedwagon on what is easily the
best Classic Rock package of the season. In the early days of this traveling Hit-fest,
Journey-man Jonathan Cain found a free hour to phone in and give some insights on the tour,
the record, and his group's place in both the history and future of Rock and Roll.
DAVID LEE I know that you are calling to talk about the tour with REO SPEEDWAGON
and STYX but your publicist sent me this EP that you had out a little while back. . .
JONATHAN CAIN Yeah, that has been out for a while, a little while anyway.
DL It is an EP but about as long as a full album of music was in the good old days of
vinyl?
JC Yeah. We just thought that rather than making a big ol' formal record we would put this
together. We had these songs and we thought that they all kind of fit together in a cool way.
That actually came out as a sort of pre-qual to the tour that we did with Peter Frampton and we
thought that the fans would like to hear something new. We had done "Arrival" and basically
had done everything that the record company had really wanted us to do and Neil just wanted
to do something that he wanted to do so we just kind of Rocked.(laughs) We did it without
worrying whether it was going to be commercial or not.
DL Beside having done it all by yourselves it sounds like you, personally, were having
a really good time with it, I mean, that intro piece is all you and I haven't heard you do
anything quite like it for a long while?
JC I think that as a unit it was just good for us to come to some common ground and we all
had a great time. We got to jammin' and I think that Neil was especially hot. I played more of
an engineer/listener role and there is a lot of Neil on there obviously. I did feel strongly about
one song and that was "Walking away from the Edge." That was kind of a cool song for me to
write and I think that it said a lot about substance abuse and things like that. Not that we
wanted to be writing these big, political songs but that one, it was like, I had some friends that
has some hard battles with it (drugs) and it was kind of neat to hear that finally get finished. It
was just a demo that I had hoped would end up on the "Arrival" album and it didn't end up there.
I thought that it was a cool song and I just loved the vibe of it so it was kind of nice to see it
finally come out.
DL So though it was a heavy topic it was still a fun piece to do?
JC The band had fun, I had fun, there was no pressure at all on anything. It was easy and fun.
DL You used the word"fun" a lot and I think that it is really obvious that you guys are
having fun in the band now which I am going to guess wasn't always the case in the
past? The "Raised on Radio" tour for instance, you all seemed very stiff on the shows
that I caught from that tour.
JC It was exactly that, I mean, I really missed the other two guys and it was just one of those
things where you make some mistakes along the way and that was a huge mistake, to go out
there without those two guys. It is great to be able to look back and say, "Yeah, we were wrong
about that." It was kind of out of my control then but I think that we are in total control of our
destiny now, in a big way. It is cool and we are real fortunate to be able to still make music and
it is our core fans who support us. It is like we get another life or something so it is very good
now.
DL And this tour, it seems like everyone is past the point of high career tension in their
individual bands?
JC This has been an interesting challenge to play with two other bands and making the whole
thing work. I think that it has brought a new respect for what we all do, you know? It is a deeper
respect for what we all do and for what we have all accomplished over the years. I certainly
have a greater respect for REO and Styx and for what they and their fans are all about.
Yesterday I was playing golf with REO's bass player, Bruce, and he said, "I still have your
songs in my head!" (laughs) I got a kick out of that because I had to admit that I had a few of
their songs in my head too!(laughs) It is very cool!
DL Between the three of you, what is it like sixty huge radio hits or something?
JC Oh yeah, no filler in any of the sets, that is for sure.
DL Is there occasion for various musicians to jam on this tour?
JC There is not enough time. It is so packed. I mean, everybody wants to do their thing and
unfortunately we haven't got there yet. There is a lot of music to be played and it is not one of
those loose festival things, we have got curfews and unions and these halls are pretty strict
about getting on and off the stage so. Again, unfortunately, it just doesn't work. We did have fun
at a VH1 Classics jam session that we did in New York. We played each other's music and
that was fun. We jammed on some old songs and did each other's tunes acoustically,
unplugged I guess, and that was a good way to start the tour, it really was. Unfortunately I don't
think that they are going to air that because it was just sort of an informal taping and they didn't
even know that it was going to happen at that point but we all got together and played three
songs each, like, "Wheel in the Sky" and then we did "Blue Collar Man" and then "Keep on
Rollin'" and then we jammed on some Stones songs and it was pretty good. That certainly
broke the ice and like I said, I think that it was really a good way to get to know each other
before we actually set out on tour. Styx is out promoting a new record and we are interested to
see how they are going to do that.
DL Yeah, "Cyclorama."
JC Yeah, on Sanctuary. You see, we are at the point where we are going to kick back and see
what the next move is as far as our music is concerned.
DL Journey hasn't sign to Sanctuary, did you?
JC No, no but we are certainly interested to know what happens there because any time you
have a band of your ilk that does stuff like this you will want to sit back and see the results and
that is what we are doing. I know that there have been things where labels have given bands a
lot of money and the record companies haven't done so well because of the whole process that
goes on. I think that the answer is going to be, not a lot of front money, you don't take the
money up front, you just make the best product that you can and then the trade off is the
promotion. The days of front money are kind of gone, I think. That is fine too because bands
like us, we work for a living anyway, you know? It is nice to have a record company that
believes in you, that is more important than anything really. I think that all successful bands
realize that. Creed was a good example of that, I mean, look of the tremendous job that they
did for that band. That is quite an accomplishment for an independent label.
DL Why not release your own records directly to the public?
JC You have to look for the right company really because it takes and army to make it happen
anymore today.
DL It has to be doubly hard with the fact that no one ever retires anymore, everyone is
still out there and there are more and more new bands crowding the scene every day?
JC Yeah, there is a lot of music out there and it is available in every way. Every time you turn
around there is a new way to get it like this new Apple thing. You just wonder where it is all
going. It certainly has changed a lot, the strategy and stuff. You have to look at it all and say,
"What can we do to be a little different?" You have to reinvent yourself constantly but then to
what degree? At the end of the day this is what you are and that is the hardest part, where to
draw the line. The band Journey has always sounded like Journey because of the people
involved and we have managed to continue evolving. We are less of a Pop band now than we
were and I think that we have finally realized that we are a good Rock and Roll band and we
enjoy that.
DL As you sit here in 2003 you are married and have kids and have success, is it a
completely different place that you need to draw inspiration from for a song as
compared to when you first started out in this business?
JC It is just the art of communication really. Take the song, "Walking away from the Edge," I
felt very strongly about those ideas and the idea of choice and being able to stand up to
demons and temptation and just the frailty of human nature. It is stuff like that where you really
feel that you have something to say and whenever I feel that I have something to say, that is
when I start writing. You recharge your battery and you wait but then when it is ready to come
out it is almost like grapes on a vine, when it is ready to come, it comes and that is where I am
at.
DL Continuing on with the grape analogy, has their been a farmer that you have
worked with that helped you know when those grapes are ready for the picking?
JC I see what you are going for, good question, I guess that the thing that you would wonder
about is that when you are hot and you are really on a roll but then things just kind of come to
a halt, you wonder what would have happened if you just kept on going. You sit down and write
a song with somebody and it is a pretty good song and then that is it. You move on but you are
always thinking, "Well, what if we had taken that for another week? What if we hadn't
stopped?" I have had writing experiences like that and that is what I wonder about. "Could I
have dug a little deeper?" There is that sort of Lenny Kravitz thing, you know, "Once you dig in.
. ." that is probably the only time where I would say, "How much did I really have going on with
that guy? Was there more we could have done?" Certainly when you are on your own and you
are writing your own songs you get in that groove and something just says, "That is enough."
Or something comes up and you just have to stop and you go back and it is tough to find
where you were. I know that when I did a solo album back in '96 I just started writing songs
about who I am and then Steve Perry called me back into Journey and we did that. The whole
thing seems like a faded memory to me now. It is like, "Well, what ever happened to that
thing?" When you get into a mode and are focused, each time it is different and you write
different kinds of things.
DL For example?
JC Well, when I wrote songs for that album the songs were totally spiritual and heartfelt which
was different from some of the other things that I have written but I still loved them. People have
told me that they enjoyed them and that is what it is really about. I have been in smooth-Jazz
land for the last four or five years myself, God knows why I went there but there I am, and so it
was sort of a calling, the music calls you and you go. I played the piano until I was blue in the
face and did have a lot of fun and didn't have to worry about coming up with a hook or a lyric or
a this or that, it was coming right out of my heart and through the keyboard and that was a
great experience. I have experimented with a lot of different stuff. I wrote a Christmas song last
year for my daughter's school and had a lot of success with it. I always wanted to write a
Christmas song and now I have got one!(laughs) I think that it is a great song that could, some
day, be a standard. So, I am accomplishing little things that I have wanted to do. I recently did
a Disney tribute album. You know, growing up as a Dad I have sort of admired the movie tunes,
especially the animated love songs, they are classics and I spent the whole summer doing
that. When you have to watch "The Lion King" twenty times you end up falling in love with
some of this music so everything from "Cinderella" to "The Emperor's new Groove" is on there. I
really dug in and found some new things and it was a big challenge for me musically. It is not
all the same kind of thing and I think that it helps you grow and when you go back to what you
really do it is all fresh again.
DL Do you have a particular piece that you have struggled to finish over the years? A
piece or a project that you just have never really felt was complete enough to call it
finished?
JC I am sure there are a few lying around that I would have to go back and listen to. I rewrite
songs that I believe in constantly, over and over again, until they say something to me. In those
kinds of things it is like they just didn't hit me the first time but yet you say, "I have a great idea
here so I will go back and hit it again later." You know, great lyrics are hard to come by. It
seems to be the hardest part for me and I admire people like Stevie Nicks who can just whip
them out one right after the other. Don Henley is another one but then again I do hear the
stories about how they struggle too and they are just as bad as I am!(laughs) I like to complete
things, I don't leave a lot of stuff lying around. I stay on it and stay in the hunt so I work hard
and try not to let things slip away. I just found a song that I started writing with John Waite
about fifteen years ago and it was jut covered by Mickey Thomas of Starship, it was just a
demo for the Bad English record. So, you know, the beauty of that is that if it was never
finished then it would have never seen the light of day and I have got hundreds of songs just
sitting there. That is the scary part, you have these songs completed and done and no one has
recorded them and that is why I always go back to my solo records to at least get them out
there and give them a chance to be heard. My latest idea is that I think that I am going to do a
disco version of "Open Arms."
DL (Laughing) Seriously?
JC In Spanish! It is going to be like a Salsa thing, I think that it is going to be great. I woke up
one morning and thought to myself, "This could be a hit!" Mariah Carey recorded a version of it
in Spanish and it was this beautiful translation and so I have this new keyboard and it sounds
like a Disco box and I am going to stick it up and see if I can't get someone to demo it for me.
Don't be surprised if you hear it on dance radio.
DL I will dust off my disco ball immediately!(laughs)
JC We heard "Separate Ways" and "Who's Crying Now" already! That is the other thing, you
are constantly trying to keep your catalog rolling and hustle the songs that you have but you
have to make sure that they are being represented in all of the right places.
DL Music is a different kind of art form where people other than the original artist can
come along and change the artwork. I mean, you wouldn't think of anyone making a
living by painting over another artists canvas in some way, how do you feel about the
versions of your songs that have been done by other artists?
JC It is great. It is flattering. "Open Arms" has been recorded now by Colin Ray and Mariah
Carey and "Faithfully" has been recorded by a couple different Country artists and Faith Hill
sang it when she first came out and then it ends up on American Idol as well and sold 100,000
the first week! Cha-Ching!(laughs) Here I am beating my head against the wall and then I am
getting royalty checks so thank you very much! Yeah, you know, half the battle is just showing
up. Would "Open Arms" be a hit today? I don't know. Some of these songs that were hits back
in the day you have to wonder if they would have even seen the light of day today. I certainly
think that there were some great songs on "Arrival" that never even got looked at, why? What is
up with that?
DL No turntable guy in Journey!(laughs)
JC Yeah! I don't know but like I say, I am grateful and feel fortunate that I have had the career
that I have had and I look forward to seeing the next phase. You have to make the next phase
happen and be open enough when the time is right but for now we are happy to be out here
representing our catalog with two other fine bands. I miss my family, sure, but hey this is what
we do. The fans are cool and loyal and we thank them for that.
DL It has always seemed that you guys genuinely do care about the people who are
listening to and buying your music, the placards that you put up in front of shows
announcing who is playing in the band for instance, a lot of bands don't do that kind of
thing.
JC When you are coming out here and doing business you are selling a product and you are
representing a product and it would be like selling a cereal and not putting what is supposed to
be in it in the box. You have to be forthcoming in letting people know that Steve Augeri is the
singer for Journey and I don't feel any sort of thing like, it is a bummer that we have to do that. I
don't know what the word would be but I certainly don't want people to feel fooled. Here is the
flip side to what you just said, do you want people walking out and demanding their money
back? No, but they will if you are not forthcoming with what the trip is. I have been to see some
really old bands like The Platters and The Coasters and yeah, the originals are not there but do
I like it any less? I mean, the original guys are all dead!(laughs) Do I still like the music?
Absolutely! Are the Temptations still the bomb when they perform? Sure they are and do you
know why? Because they have a standard of excellence that was maintained on their records
and if you went to see the Temptations in Las Vegas I will guarantee that they will kick your
butt. That is their legacy. Will there be a Journey when we are all dead? I don't know but I can
only hope that our songs are still around. They have lasted this long so we will see but it is a
testimony to the energy of the whole thing and it is up to us, I guess, to steer the band in the
right direction. Back when I joined the band there was a high musical standard set by these
guys and I had always thought that Journey had a lot of soul for a Rock band. People will ask
me "Why do you think that Journey is still around?" and my answer is that we are a Soul band.
We are more than a Rock band, we are more than a Pop band. Soul, to me, is making music
that seems effortless, a sort of pure soul that you can hear in our records. When Neil plays the
guitar it is effortless and when Steve delivers a lyric it is just there, he sings from his heart and
that is Soul, to me. I think that Journey always had that. We had it on the records and I
continue to preach it out here with these new guys. We are a Soul band. When we all walk out
onto the stage I want Deen Castronovo and Steve Augeri to walk the talk and to represent an
R&B spirit and I think that is how we walk.
Neal Schon Interview (Source Uncertain)
Date of Publication at Jrnydv.Com: June 13, 2003
Date of Original Publication: June 11, 2003
Neal Schon Takes Five
Songs and a secret from man on a journey
He was a musical child prodigy, soloing with Santana while still a teen. Guitarist Neal Schon, 49, went on to create Journey, a band as commercially successful as it was critically disparaged for ushering in the arena rock era. Not content to have his living room lined with gold and platinum albums, Schon co-founded Bad English and cranked out his own string of solo discs and collaborative projects with the likes of Jan Hammer. He kept returning to Journey, however, and is now leading the band on the road with support from Styx and REO Speedwagon. Pop music critic Gemma Tarlach spoke recently with Schon about how that wheel in the sky keeps on turnin' more than 30 years after he first set foot on stage.
Q. You've got the tour with Journey, the new EP "Red 13," a few solo albums in the pipeline and a supergroup spin-off, Planet S, with Sammy Hagar, Joe Satriani and others. What do you see as your most important project these days?
A. My main project is having fun every day. And living (laughs). But right now, my main musical project is Journey. I'm not done with it. I've got some great ideas about things I still want to do with the band.
Q. Great ideas? Like what?
A. It has to do with a DVD, and that's all I can tell you. The idea is so cool that I'm afraid if I tell anyone, someone else will get to it first. I want us to be first. We were the first band, you know, with a sponsor. Budweiser was our sponsor, and critics completely nailed us. Now, if you don't have a sponsor, people are like, "Why don't you have a sponsor? You must not be big." The EP is another experimental piece, musically and to test the waters on how we could distribute our music. I don't know about CDs anymore. I don't think anyone is selling many CDs anymore, unless you're on "American Idol." But I also wrote the four songs (on the EP) with a harder edge, something new to play live. Everything else we'll play are greatest hits fans know already.
Q. You're playing those greatest hits, night after night, year after year. How do you satisfy yourself creatively onstage while still giving the fans what they want?
A. You just try to play to the best of your abilities. Of course it's not as fresh as it once was. The audience keeps it fresh for me. They want to hear that, you give it to them. But I could do without playing those songs, believe me. From night to night, I play the same songs but never the same solos. I would have gone nuts a long time ago if I played every song the same every night.
Q. With Styx, REO Speedwagon and Journey all on the bill, what can fans expect at the show?
A. Full sets from all three bands. Styx and REO flip-flop who goes first and do 70 minutes each, then we close the show with an 80-minute set. When we go out by ourselves on the road we play 2 1/2 hours - that's easier, maybe not for (lead singer) Steve (Augeri) to sing, but for me to play. I get time to warm up. This way it's like being in a boxing ring. You get hit after hit after hit. You've got to come out swinging or else. We're also filming and recording every night of the tour.
Q. Really, every night, huh? Does this have anything to do with that DVD idea of yours?
A. (long pause) I really can't tell you. It's top secret.
Gregg Rolie Interview with ClassicRockRevisited
Date of Publication at Jrnydv.Com: June 17, 2003
Date of Original Publication: June, 2003
One day as I was going about my daily duties of keeping Classic Rock Revisited alive and well I received an email from Ron Wikso. Ron is a well respected member of the classic rock community and has played drums with the band Foreigner. Ron took a moment to invite us to do a concert review of the Gregg Rolie Band as they were playing a West Coast gig and I have a reporter named Dan Wall who keeps me up to date with the concert scene from that part of the world. Ron was a fan of the site and scores major points for self promotion!
Once I saw the name Gregg Rolie I knew I had to interview him. I grew up a huge fan of Journey and later discovered the seductive sounds of early Santana, of which Rolie was a rounding member and lead singer on some of the biggest hits Carlos & Company ever had. Below is the transcript of our conversation. Gregg spoke openly and honestly about the early days of both bands and discussed in detail why he left Journey. We also talked about what is was like to play at Woodstock and the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame. Gregg is in once and should end up being elected again once Journey is paid the respect they deserve.
Gregg has a CD titled Roots that is a throwback to the Santana days. The album deserves a listen as it actually is very, very good. "Give It To Me" is among the top songs in his catalog and considering his repertoire consists of "Black Magic Woman" and "Anytime" that is saying a lot. Check out this interview and then check out www.greggrolie.com to get a copy of Roots.
- Jeb Wright, June 2003
Jeb: I really have been enjoying Roots.
Gregg: I have gotten some rave reviews about it. I have a small label so it is limited in scope to how many people know it is there. Everywhere it has been played I get the same response. It is growing but it just takes some time.
Jeb: You have REO’s Dave Amato on lead guitar.
Gregg: Ron, my drummer is a friend of Dave’s. Ron told me that Dave could play this stuff and it turned out that he played it great. Dave kept asking me, “Are you sure you have the right guy?” He was not used to the amount of playing on it. REO does not do the same amount of solo work and it is totally different material. In that way it was much like me going from Santana to Journey. It was like going from night and day. I had to rethink the way I did music -- that was later on when it got into all vocals and less solos. When Journey started it was a lot easier to comprehend for me but then it got more difficult. He was having the same kind of flash.
Jeb: I have met Dave every time he comes through with REO. I saw his name and then listened to the CD and was really impressed with the ease he played this style of music.
Gregg: He really did pull it off well. His acoustic work was terrific. It was different for him but he has told me that he is glad that I pushed him to do it. He is just a great guy as well.
Jeb: Classic Rock Revisited will promote this new CD even if it is not totally new. It is damn good and people should know about it.
Gregg: It is new to a lot of people. That’s the way to look at it. Only ten to fifteen thousand people have heard it so it is still new.
Jeb: The title Roots shows that you are going back to your pre-Journey days. A perfect example is “Give It To Me.”
Gregg: We thought that track was going to be good. As I wrote it I knew it had a thing. As you are writing songs you tend to think one is going to be better than the other and then it turns out the other one just smokes the one you thought was going to be good. This was one of those type songs. We knew it would be good but when we put the horns on it and started doing other things it just started popping. When I put the heavy flange on the vocals the song really stood out.
Jeb: Were you consciously trying to write songs for the title of the album or was the title an afterthought?
Gregg: Roots really has more to do with my approach to the music than it does with the style of music. When I started out with Santana we played anything and everything. We would play it and we would try all of it. Later, we would decide what fit and what didn’t fit. I approached my music for that album the same way. I first started out to do a completely acoustic album. “Domingo” was played on a keyboard and not on a guitar. The whole album was going to be acoustic. It was going to be really low key.
I went to the Hall of Fame induction and played with the whole Santana band and it was a lot of fun. When I got back from that I started writing all kinds of stuff and I just let it fly. At that point I named it Roots and everybody thinks it is going back to my roots with Santana, which it fine. It really is not that way at all.
Jeb: Some of that could be because of the song “Give It To Me.” That sounds like Santana.
Gregg: It is really on steroids, isn’t it?
Jeb: I kept moving the track back as I kept listening to the thing over and over.
Gregg: (laughs) Well that is good.
Jeb: Do you even know how many records you have sold in your career?
Gregg: I don’t know, something like 60 million. It is pretty phenomenal. I have been very fortunate.
Jeb: A lot of people in your position get guilty of throwing something together for the strong fan base and selling a few thousand units but your album is not like that at all. It is a complete piece of music. This is a well-written and well-produced record but our society is such that only a few thousand have heard it. Does that drive you nuts?
Gregg: It is just the nature of the beast. I think the industry is killing itself. There are more lawyers and accountants running around than musicians. There are only a handful of music people left in the business that can hear their way out of a paper bag. There is one very legitimate aspect to all of this and that is that it is a very contemporary game. It is a young man’s game. Those are the breaks. I wasn’t screaming too much when I was doing real well with Santana and Journey as a younger man. It is pretty hard for me to sit here now and yell and scream about it. However, I really do think the industry is chocking itself to death and closing off the biggest buying public in world history.
I love playing live and I have a great band. I am going that way with it. We sell our Cds at our shows. I am not after a major label deal. I would much rather go play live anyway. If you put a good show together with a few good bands and people are going to show up.
Jeb: How do you stay focused and objective within the songwriting process? You are a professional musician so you can easily write something good. How do you differentiate between something that is good and something that is special?
Gregg: It is so hard to answer that question. You almost have to get feedback from other people. Songs that I may just go nuts over others overlook. I may like a certain musical aspect or a certain groove within a section of the song and the whole rest of the tune may not be very great. In general, I do have a good sense of it all. I have always liked popular music. I have never looked for the real ethereal type of music because I get bored with it. As I songwriter I am always looking for something that will snap your head back. If I get one out of ten then I figure I am doing great. You can’t really tell what is good and what isn’t.
I will give you a good example. When we did “Anytime” in Journey we put down the musical track but we decided that we would have to cut out some of the musical track because it was so expensive to record. We had to cut some back because we had 16 tracks and we only needed 10. We almost cut “Anytime” off the record. The music track on it’s own was okay but it really didn’t do anything. We put the vocals on it and the whole thing just turned out to be phenomenal. It is my favorite track on the whole album. Until you are done you just can’t make that judgment. In Journey, way back when Neal and I put it together was way different. There were way more time signatures and various other things. It became a vocal band and that was not our focus. We listened to the music track and it was simply okay but it didn’t move us much. We forgot the vocals were the main part.
Jeb: Did you leave Journey because they were getting too commercial?
Gregg: I left Journey because I had built two bands up and I had lived out of a suitcase to long. I wanted to start a family. I was done with the road. I really hated it. I have now turned that around, huh! Being a gypsy is a young man’s game. A lot of people can make that their main focus and that is all they want to do. There had to be more for me to fulfill my life. I opted out. I wasn’t happy there. It was more for me than for anybody else. I now have a great family. Now they are always throwing me out. They go, “Go out on the road Dad. It’s about time you left so we can party.”
When I listen back to some of the stuff from Evolution I can see the differences now that I couldn’t see then concerning my perspective of playing and the way that Perry would sing. I can see that it was never going to mesh. We came from different styles and a totally different place. On the song “I’m Crying” I play organ the way that I would play it for myself and it just doesn’t match his vocal very well. I listen back to it now and I can see that is was not going to go on. At the time I thought it was great but now I don’t. They just don’t match up. They are both good ideas but they just didn’t mesh on that particular song. I can’t say that about 90% of it because it meshed well. There is a bluesy feel to it. When I left and it turned into Escape -- which is great but it is just not me.
Jeb: Journey went more pop after that. It got so pop later on that everybody but Steve didn’t like it any more.
Gregg: Yeah.
Jeb: I always thought that you must have had more integrity and that you didn’t want to sell out.
Gregg: They call it selling out and all that but if it was that easy wouldn’t everybody sell out? That is just a cop out. A lot of people like the heavier stuff we did and that might be there outlook about the whole situation. Journey went after something was all vocal and was totally based up on vocals. They wrote some really good material during that time period. It can’t be taken away from them so more power to them.
Jeb: Going way back, what where you doing before Santana?
Gregg: I was going to collage in the bay area where I grew up. Santana got started from a friend of mine who heard Carlos play at the Fillmore on Tuesday, which was local night. He heard him and then he went and found him. Carlos was working at a place called Tick Tocks, which was a hamburger stand in San Francisco. He told him that he had a friend who played keyboards and that he had to come down and jam. He came down to Mountainview, which is 20 miles south. We played in some guy’s garage until the cops came. We ran off when they showed up. Actually Carlos was first to run off. I don’t know if that was habit from living in the mission district or what but he beat feet into this tomato patch. I followed him and that is where I actually met him, sitting in that tomato patch. From there we started Santana. We sat out there until the police met. That was back in 1966 or 1967.
From there I was going to college and I kept thinking about the band. When I was at school I was thinking about the band and when I was with the band I was thinking about all the schoolwork I wasn’t doing. I had to give up one of them and it was a pretty easy choice.
Jeb: Was music your major or were you going in a different direction?
Gregg: I was going to be an architect.
Jeb: How do you tell Mom?
Gregg: They were very much like myself or I am like them. They never discouraged me. I went to my Dad and I said, “I don’t know what I should be doing?” He looked at me and said, “How old are you?” I told him that I was 18 and he laughed at me and said, “You’re 18 and you are worried about what you are going to do with the rest of your life? You are going to make many changes. Go out and give yourself a time limit. Pursue what it is you want to pursue. Don’t do it halfway. Do it or don’t do it. If you want to go to school then I want you to go to school. If you want to be in this band then go do it.” It was advice. It was very cool. It is also very accurate. Look how many careers people have nowadays. If you have just one career then I think you are a loser. You have to be able to do more than one thing.
I told him I would go pursue it for five years and then I would go back to school and become an architect. I would have been cool with that. It took off in three years and I never looked back.
Jeb: Did Santana start out the usual 4-piece band and then grow or did you have a more eclectic approach from the beginning?
Gregg: It was bass, keyboards, two guitars -- it was the guy who went and got Carlos in the first place. His name is Tom Frazier. He was going to be the lead vocalist. We also had drums, keyboards and congas. There were no timbales when we first started. That configuration changed. Tom wasn’t as serious as the rest of us so he left. We didn’t have a vocalist so I became it. Somewhere along the line we went through some percussionists. For a while we were a five piece. It ended up being a six piece with Chepito playing timbales.
When Santana started out people thought we were nuts. We had conga drums and all this stuff and a lot of people thought we were crazy trying to go out and play and get signed. They are probably working in Alaska at a filling station about now.
Jeb: They made that career change you were talking about.
Gregg: (laughing) When I look back a Santana I am very proud. It was very unique. It was a melting pot of rhythms and ideas. It is not Latin, rock, jazz or blues. It is all of the above and it was all created by a bunch of guys in the bay area. It is really just Santana music.
Jeb: What kind of an experience was it playing at Woodstock?
Gregg: As I look back on it now it was the mother of all videos. There were no videos then. There were only television shows with musical guests. There was no music television. Now MTV is ruining things. It is getting like Shindig was when I was a kid. They have game show hosts on there now. It is really pretty funny. Woodstock was different.
We flew into Woodstock in a helicopter and everyone was amazed but me. I really wasn’t because I had nothing to draw from. It looked like ants on a hill. It just didn’t connect for me. We played and I looked out. We had played for ten thousand people before so when you play large gigs and you look out all you can see are hair and teeth anyway. What grabbed me is when we drove out that night. It was amazing. There were endless people. If I had driven in then I might have been really scared and never made it. If you had a spot in Woodstock you had a career and Santana was right in the middle of it. We had a long piece and it set the whole thing in motion and we really took off.
Jeb: So there was no taking of the brown acid?
Gregg: No. I remember hearing the announcements though. “Child being born in the tent. Named her Paisley!”
Jeb: This lead to Abraxsis.
Gregg: The Abraxxis album is the favorite album that I have ever done. It still has legs. There are pieces on there that are just incredible.
Jeb: I would consider that album to be among the top rock albums ever made.
Gregg: It has been voted that by Billboard and all kinds of people. They all say it is in the Top 100. “Black Magic Woman” is among the Top 100 songs as far as most airplays.
Jeb: That’s pretty impressive.
Gregg: Yeah, when we did it -- I kind of remember how it was. We were just trying to do our music the best we could. We wanted to make our music feel.
Jeb: Who chose the song?
Gregg: I chose it. It took me a while to convince everyone that it would be a good song for us to do. Fleetwood Mac had done it and it had not been out too long. I just knew I could sing it and I just love the song. I am a big fan of Peter Green as well.
The way we used to practice was that whoever showed up started playing and whoever filtered in played on whatever was there. I kind of made myself first a lot. I used to start playing it and they would go, “Don’t you know anything else?” One time in Fresno we did it at a sound check and it really clicked. We had never approached anything unless it connected for people in some kind of way. This time it connected with Carlos and he said, “Man, what was that?” and I go, “That was that thing that I have been playing for a year that you hate.” He had never really heard the song because I had just played the changes. He came up with the front-end arrangement with the little keyboard ditty -- that was him. He came up with that little line. I would have never put that B in that D minor. He threw it in there and I thought, ‘Are you kidding?” That is just the way we did everything. When they brought “Oye Como Va” in I wondered what I was supposed to do with it. I was listening to the Rolling Stones. That ended up becoming one of my favorite organ parts of all time so you just can’t be closed to things.
Jeb: You sang that song as well didn’t you?
Gregg: It was a group vocal but I sang on it. You can hear that Norwegian/Spanish vocal in there somewhere.
Jeb: Did you speak Spanish?
Gregg: Just the swear words. I learned a foreign language like everyone does -- all the worst words first.
Jeb: I spoke Neal Schon a while back and he said that he met you and would not quit hanging around until you let him into Santana.
Gregg: He was about 15 years old when he played in the club called The Poppycock. They really went out on a line because he was so young. We stayed there until like 3-4 in the morning. The band was called Old Davis. I could not believe the way this 15-year-old kid could play. It was like Clapton on steroids. He amazed me. We started hanging. I brought him around when we were doing Abraxis. He was still in high school. I always wanted to see a guitar player with Neal’s style play with Carlos but it was not my place to say anything. We had a guitar player and we were a democratic band. It would have been pretty insulting to the guitar player if I had said anything. Finally, Carlos goes, “What would you think if we had Neal come in?” We had jammed with Neal for hours and hours. Carlos liked the idea of having harmony guitar parts.
Jeb: At what point did you and Neal start thinking of leaving Santana?
Gregg: Santana feverously fell apart from too much to soon. None of us were on the same page, musically, any longer. Without getting into too much detail, it was just not going to fly. I quit playing music and went up to Seattle and started a restaurant with my Dad. I got a call from Neal and Hebie Herbert, our manager. They asked me to come back and play so I went and played with them for a couple of weeks. It was really just going to be rhythm section for the bay area or so they said. I don’t know if that was really the intent. Within two weeks we were writing songs and we became a band.
Jeb: It was that simple.
Gregg: It was that simple. I wasn’t doing anything and they asked and I said okay. It started getting really good. We had a guitar player named George Tickner who played things that were really different. Neal really dug it. He soloed all over it. It was very colorful. It grew and went through the changes that bands go through. We ended up being a reliable entity.
Jeb: Is the old story true that there was a radio contest that named Journey?
Gregg: Toby Pratt named us. The names were so awful from this real contest that we ended up using a name one of our own guys who worked in the office came up with. We had this contest so we couldn’t tell people we didn’t choose one of their names so we made up the name Toby Pratt. It turns out there was a real guy out there named Toby Pratt and I think we ended up having to give him something. The whole thing kind of backfired. We had names like Hippiepotamus and Rumpled Foreskin. There was an endless amount of bad names so Journey became it.
Jeb: People tend to forget that there was that Journey sometimes.
Gregg: The success of the later half of the band kind of makes the early days overlooked.
Jeb: Was it Herbert who came up with the idea for Perry?
Gregg: It was between him and the label. They had a vision that we needed a front man. To Sony’s credit, which was CBS Columbia Records at the time, we got a few shots at putting albums together. You don’t get those kind of shots nowadays. You get one or two and then you are done. The story I know says that the record company demanded that and that Herbie found somebody. Everybody was cool with it. We had a guy named Robert Fleishman first but he didn’t work out. Herbie had a tape of Steve Perry. At first Neal and I were like, “This guy is really singing. We need someone who is screaming. This guy is crooning.” Herbie just said, “This is your singer so get used to it. You guys are wrong.” History has obviously backed up what he said.
Jeb: Perry must have clicked with you at some point.
Gregg: We were backstage doing stuff after Robert had left and Perry was there. Things just flew out. Him and Neal were writing songs that were great. “Patiently” was one of them. It was really good. It just had a thing. It was one of those things where you either know it is there or not. It was pretty obvious. It was too hard to deny it.
Jeb: You got to come up out of the 60’s and experience the rise of the counter culture clear up to its pinnacle Woodstock. You also got to come out with another band and experience the stadium scene. From your perspective, how was one different from the other?
Gregg: I think there are a couple of ways to look at it. Santana was during the era of building the very industry that Journey was a part of. We were in the beginning stages of that. Look at the PA system at Woodstock in comparison of where it went. It was in its infancy. At the time it was state of the art. Actually there was not even the term ‘state of the art’ when we did that. There were good speakers and bad ones and that was it. The whole industry kind of followed suit. It became much more sophisticated. It became a huge business as opposed to good business. It became more organized and business like. In Santana we all got together and had a ton of fun. It was so loose. The organization skills were not there yet. Not many people even sold t-shirts at that time. You could say that there was then a huge growth curve. Otherwise it was playing music for people. That part stayed the same. The industry grew leaps and bounds.
Jeb: If you had to choose which band would it be. That is actually an unfair question so I will say this: I have followed your entire career and I would guess you would give a nod to the Santana years over the Journey years.
Gregg: Do I like that better? It is a real fair question. I like them each for various reasons. When I did Roots and I just started letting it fly, what music came out? It was that stuff. It is who I am and it is what I was weaned on. I do have a tendency to lean that way. There was a time where I would have told you that I would have never played with another conga drummer as long as I lived. When I quit Santana I had had enough rhythm. Years later what am I doing? I love it. There is a thing about the rhythm and then simplicity that has driven me since I was a kid. It is more innate for me. There are parts of Journey that I love and there are aspects that are equal. There are different accomplishments with both groups that I had been lucky enough to experience in one lifetime.
Jeb: I was born in ‘66.
Gregg: Me too!
Jeb: Now we have covered that!
Gregg: Aw, crap!
Jeb: I grew up with Journey. I remember back in 1982 when MTV came out and they used to play Closet Classics. One of the songs they used to play all the time was “Black Magic Woman.” I remember thinking that looks like the guy in Journey.
Gregg: It was the best-kept secret at CBS. There are so many people who don’t know that I sang all those songs. A lot of people don’t realize I was the lead vocalist in that band. After the band broke up is when Carlos became the leader of that band. It was about the guitar after that. To his credit he has done that for 30 years. I don’t think I could have played the same stuff for 30 years. I am glad that I did other things. I am really glad that I went on to do Journey. I got to play a whole different style of music. When I take the songwriting skills that I learned in Journey and put them with the rhythmic gut wrenching stuff room Santana then I think I got the best form both of them. That is now how I approach my songwriting. It not only has to be good; it has to have that stuff in it.
Jeb: Carlos Santana VS Neal Schon… Who do you prefer?
Gregg: It depends on the song. They are both great. Carlos always had this knack… Carlos is such a pure guitarist that if he only had his fingers and some nylon strings you would still know who he is. Neal on the other hand can play anything. He is more of a technician. He is better at the melodic stuff then he would like to give himself credit. I think that is really his forte. He likes to burn but he has a real knack for melody. Even within the burn there is melodic stuff in there. Go back and listen to the album Gringo I put out. It has Carlos and Neal playing back to back on the song “Fire At Night” and you tell me, which one is better.
Jeb: Can you ever step outside of yourself and really look at all you have accomplished? What haven’t you done?
Gregg: I have never written a Top 10 hit. No wait -- I have never written a # 1 hit. If you are talking about living life then I have lived it large. I have done it good.
Jeb: Can you ever step aside and say, “I was at Woodstock. I have a ton of Gold & Platinum albums. I am in the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame.”
Gregg: I have never looked at it that way. We just put a short promotional video together that has a lot of the aspects of my life on it. I was looking at it and I went, “Jesus, I have done a lot of stuff.” I just don’t look at it that way. I am always just looking for the next note or the next good song or the next gig. Anybody who gets successful takes it a day at a time. It is not such a design thing. I have been really lucky.
Jeb: What is it like to sit up on the stage of the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame and play a song?
Gregg: It was pretty cool. I almost didn’t go.
Jeb: Why wouldn’t you go?
Gregg: I was busy building a hot rod. The guy I was building the car with told me that I really should go. The guy that really talked me into it was Ron Wikso. He says, “I don’t know Gregg. There are a lot of people who get a Grammy buy very few people are going to get into the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame. This is a pretty big thing.” He was absolutely right. I am glad that I did go. The most important thing was that I would not have written the Roots CD if I didn’t go. I had a ball doing it. It was fun to play there. It was also scary. We were playing to 3000 seats filled with the top people in the industry.
Jeb: You guys were elected before it was even cool to be elected!
Gregg: I was really honored by it. To think that you in there with guys like Elvis, the Beatles and the Stones. I would have never thought I would get to be in anything like that in my life. When I look back at being a teenager and loving playing I would have never thought about anything like that. To be one of those guys is pretty lucky.
Jeb: What are you going to do when it comes around again?
Gregg: I’m not even going to think about it. I am just going to go on about my life. I am enjoying what I am doing. I have a phenomenal band.
Jeb: Will there be another album out soon?
Gregg: We will always come up with new stuff but right now we are just going out to play. I want people to hear this music and the only way they are going to hear it is if I go out and play. Radio is too tight and too expensive. To sit and bitch about it is not going to do me a bit of good. If somebody does not want to play it on their radio station because Procter & Gamble told them not to then we will just take it to the streets. The band knocks people out.
Josh Ramos Interview with GetReadyToRock.Com
Date of Publication at Jrnydv.Com: July 1, 2003
Date of Original Publication: June 26, 2003
10 Questions with Josh Ramos (Ramos/Two Fires/The Storm)
Guitarist Josh Ramos is about to unleash his band, Ramos with their debut album due on Frontiers - a crackin' melodic rock album for the summer! He has also been involved with Two Fires & The Storm with Kevin Chalfant and appeared on last year's Hardline album. (Thanks to John at Cargo for passing the questions on)
> 1. What are you currently up to? (E.g. touring/studio, etc.)
Well, I,m just excited that my C.Ds all done, it was a pretty long year, anyway I,m starting to do shows with Kevin Chalfant, he recently acquired the name (The Storm) Gregg Rolie, Ross Valory and I gave him the permission to use the name for shows, we,ve been playing back east, Chicago, Wisconsin, Indiana,etc, it,s been going really good.
> 2. What has been the highlight(s) and low point(s)of your career to date?
The high points have always been when I,m playing live, and recording and touring with The Storm, or Two Fires, or HardLine, the low points are when I,m not playing and everything is in limbo, that sucks
> 3. How did you first get into the music business? Who have been your main influences on your career to date?
Well, first of all, I love music, and playing the guitar, I remember as a child going to church and listening to the guitar and bass, that was heaven to my ears, even before I started playing I knew that thats what I wanted to do in my life,be a musician, as I kept playing, refining my art, I started playing in bands, one thing led to another, my band LeMans out of Chicago caught the ears of Mike Varney, who,s responsible for discovering Yngwie Malmsteen, Tony Macalpine, etc, he was putting together a 2nd Album of the best unknown guitarists, I got ahold of him and sent him a tape of my band, he liked what he heard and put us on the Album, then we moved to San Francisco and started opening up for major bands, I soon left LeMans and started playing locally around Marin County, a town north of San Fran, Neal Schon, Gregg Rolie,Carlos Santana, all these Rock stars that I looked up to live there, Neal would come and see me play.
Soon I joined The Storm, Gregg and Kevin were working on songs and they needed a guitarist to do the parts, I had worked with Kevin in The View, this other band that he was working with, I came down and laid down some guitar tracks on the song (Show me the Way) from the first Storm C.D,, Gregg loved the way I played, he said it reminded him of Neal, because we both play with a street feel, after a couple of weeks after recording my tracks I get a call from Gregg saying that we have a meeting with Beau Hill, vice President of Interscope records, and Herbie Herbert, Journeys Manager, I thought I was just helping Gregg and Kevin with there demos, but apparently they wanted me in the Band, so the rest is history, so basically Mike Varney, Kevin Chalfant Gregg Rolie, Herbie Herbert all had a hand in my success.
> 4. The new album Living In The Light, is just about to be released. When did you decide to go out under your own name and how did you assemble the line-up?
I,ve always wanted to record a solo C.D, it,s been a dream of mine for a very long time, finally after recording with Two Fires, Robert Fleischman, Hardline, I was ready to do my own thing and make my dream of recording a solo C.D a reality.
I knew I wanted to use Atma Anur on drums,he played in Journey for a while, I always use drummers that come from a fusion background, meaning progressive music, because they play with more excitement and play what I hear in my music, Russ Greene came from a Journey tribute band, so I knew he could play like Jonathan Cain, Micheal T Ross who I play in HardLine with played additional Keys, Stu Hamm, I was able to get because he sometimes plays with Atma, he had asked if he could play on my C.D, I could,nt beleive it, I was thrilled, Stu plays on (Tell me Why) and (Winds of Change)I love what he plays in the intro of that song,he,s an amazing player.
Scott Snyder, the bass player on the rest of my C.D is a friend and plays in the same band Accomplice as Micheal T Ross, he,s also a good player, and finally Mark Weitz, I started with a different singer but it did,nt work out with him, finally after many auditions I found Mark, actually during Mastering for the 2nd HardLine C.D the guy that was mastering the C.D suggested a friend of his that we should check out, he was right, Mark just blew me away, thats the kind of voice I pictured in my head when I was writing my songs, I,m really happy at the way everything worked out.
> 5. Could you take us through a few highlights on the new album please?
well, The fact that I have written and recorded my own ideas is a highlight, and all the things I have learned in the past, working with great producers like Beau Hill, and Nigel Green on the 2nd Storm C.D, as far as writing, what to play, and what not to play, and the fact that sometimes less is more, things like that.
> 6. Were you at all tempted to use Kevin Chalfant as the vocalist in Ramos or did you purposely want to create something different to Two Fires/The Storm?
Exactly, I wanted it to be different than both those bands, other wise it would have just sounded the same, I needed my identity and my creativity to come thru loud and clear, and it also helps to work with other people, can you imagine if actors always worked with the same actors, thats what I mean.
> 7. Will the Storm ever get back together again? I know many fans miss that band!
I know that Gregg Rolie is busy with his band who also includes Ron Wikso, the drummer in The 2nd Storm C.d, called The Gregg Rolie band, and Ross Valory is a full time member of Journey, that leaves Kevin and I, and like I said before Kevin and I are working in a different incarnation of The Storm. I would love to have that band together again, but I don,t think so, maybe if there was a huge outpour of fans out there wanting us to get together, and the money of course.
> 8. Two Fires what has been the highlight of the two albums released so far? Do you ever get frustrated that its almost impossible to take the band on tour or do you prefer being studio based?
YES, I get very frustrated at the fact that we have never toured, we,ve only played The Gods fest for those 2 years, I don,t know what happens, I always thought that when you release a C.D your record company helps you get a tour together to promote your C.D, but thats never happened with us, and then I read about all these other bands on tour in Europe, I just don,t get it, maybe someone out there can help us.
> 9. What do you do in your spare time outside of music?
I live in a very beautiful area, the ocean is right there, I love to go on long drives and visit winerys and just enjoy life, I also do voiceovers, I,m trying to do some more of that kind of work too.
> 10. Message to your fans...
please live your life as if it was the last day of your life, take it all in, because it,s gone all to soon,hope to see you all someday on tour, Josh
Last Updated 02 July, 2007 (DHG)
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