"Cigarette and Smoke"
My first album
My first album, "Cigarette and Smoke."
I started playing in rock bands when I was 12 years old. Very raw. I had studied clarinet and played in orchestras, but guitar was a different experience. It was simply banging out the chords and making as much energetic noise as possible. The Clash is one of my favorite bands. Anything with blues at its foundation was what moved me the most.
ZZ Top, Paul Butterfield, Jimi Hendrix.
I read a quote from Nilsson saying that there was only one band, The Beatles. I can't say that I feel that way. I did love "Rubber Soul", "Blackbird", "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" and more, and George Martin, their producer, was an amazing talent. Something about The Rolling Stones appealed to me more. My record collection is probably more than 75 percent Rhythm and Blues. Blues eventually led me to Jazz.
I spent a lot of time in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. I remember playing guitar with a piano player there who suggested I listen to the classic album "Undercurrent" by Bill Evans and Jim Hall. That was a turning point, the introduction of melody and music theory to my blues roots. Having said that, I'm still primarily a songwriter, and I only explore chords and melody in search of structure and framing to which I can attach a song, which brings me to the lyric half of songwriting.
The Broadway method of songwriting was to fit lyrics to a melody written by a composer. The Rock school, was often lyrics first and throw some chords underneath it. Music and lyrics come from totally different parts of the brain. Music is a very physical thing and lyrics are very heady. A cat can walk down the piano keys and it sounds beautiful, but a lyric that sounds natural and yet poetic takes a lot of hard work. That is, except for the occasional song that just comes spontaneously pouring out of you. Of course, Mahler's 9th Symphony is a lot more complex than a cat walking down a piano keyboard, and the lyric to "Should I Stay or Should I Go" by The Clash probably did not require months of lyric edits and re-writes.
The first album for any artist can be a bit traumatic. So many choices to make that will define you as an artist. Choices you hadn't even thought about, perhaps, drums, no drums? four-piece band live in the studio? all samples? background vocals? reverb? how much or none at all? etc. I'm not sure it's accurate to say that most artists would like to forget about their early recordings. It's very important that the recording engineer and producer are in sync with the artist. Think of Lou Reed's "Walk on the Wild Side" without that famous bass line or the background singers singing the famous "doot-da-doot" lines.
There's a lot of great music out there. Have you heard the new trio called Tiny Habits? Gorgeous harmonies.
They met at the Berklee School of Music in Boston. I went to Berklee and it was life-changing. My harmony teacher sent me down a path that I'll happily be on for my whole life. I played my song for Chet Baker,
at a show recently, and said that it was jazz. Someone said, "Ugh, I hate jazz!" OK, let's not use labels to describe music, or people either. There's a beautiful chord called a minor major 7th. It's slightly uncomfortable. It's supposed to be. Just like many moments in real life. That's what music is for, to articulate the human experience, the good, the bad, and all points in between.
This is going to be a long story.
Are you with me so far? Good.
Here are the songs from my first album. There were many other early songs still unreleased, that maybe should have been on that album; "Until the Sun Comes Up", "Katy Caught the Fever", "Back Down to Earth", "Nothin' to Get Excited About", "Waiting on the Green Light" and more.
This songs I did release were;
"Katie's Mood", a song for my first love that was so over my head harmonically that I don't know how my 21 year old self wrote it. Victor Feldman played Vibrophone and piano on it. He was a legendary member of one of Miles Davis' early bands.
James Gadson of Bill Withers' fame played drums. I'm sorry my younger naive/honest self returned the master tapes to Columbia Records. They are long gone now.
Katie's Mood
Her blond silk hair
Her black silk dress
Wrapped up in her warm caress
Trying to be patient with her changing moods
But what'chou gonna do
When first her head's thrown back and laughing
And then she's off alone to brood
Caught up in Katie's Mood
Her soft sad eyes
Her silent blues
Man, if you open to her she'll open to you
Trying now to understand her simple needs
Can't you see
There are things she knows already
So unclear to you
Caught up in Katie's Mood
Real Good Thing
It's a lesson I have a hard time learning
Learning to live together
Learning to give and hoping it lasts forever
And hoping that goodbye don't get to be a regular thing
I don't want to lose my Real Good Thing
No, I don't want to lose my Real Good Thing
I'll make a confession
I never really believed you'd get to me
I've never been much on making plans
 Ah, but I believe I wanna keep you near if I can
So don't talk about leaving
Believe me when I sing
I don't wanna lose my real good thing
No I don't wanna lose my real good thing
Half of love is learning how to give without being afraid of not getting it back in return
And half of love is knowing when you've got a good thing
I know I've got a good thing
That much I've learned
So I'm hoping that goodbye don't get to be a regular thing
I'm hoping it don't come to have a familiar ring
I'm hoping you believe it, believe it when I sing
I don’t wanna lose my real good thing, no I don't wanna lose my real good thing
Mavis Staples recorded a version of this song in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, with Jerry Wexler producing. It was inspired by Average White Band. It has a beautiful simplicity in the lyric and a nice musical flow in the chord changes. I'm more interested in abstract ideas now, but abstract doesn't necessarily mean "better", as if there were a 1-10 scale on what makes a song "good." A song has its own DNA and you try and capture it with as little interference as possible.
Back in This Sleepy Town
I still love this song. I learned these chords from Portland, Maine songwriter Jeff Rice back in my early years. Stevie Wonder's killer 70s albums like "Talking Book" were a big influence on me. The great guitarist Buzzy Feiten and the LA saxophonist Tom Scott added a lot to this recording. I recorded a live album in Tokyo as yet unreleased, with this song on it, sung about an octave lower than my younger self's original version. Rearranging these complicated chord changes into different keys required a lot of late night homework at my kitchen table, "woodshedding" as it is called.
Broken Down Rock n Roll Man
I remember Bonnie Raitt saying she would have recorded this song except for the jazz-like changes in the B section. This was one of my earliest examples of a percussive guitar style that I developed influenced by a guitar player I used to see on Bourbon Street in New Orleans whose name I've forgotten. Maybe also influenced by Lowell George and Little Feat, who was a big influence on Bonnie as well.
Lose Myself
Bruce Willis recorded this song on his album "Return of Bruno". Buzzy Feiten brought it to him after playing on it on my album. Playing on it is an understatement. Half of record production is the contribution of the players in the recording process. The bass lines of many of the Motown hits were created by James Jameson and he deserved a big percentage of the writing credits.
Sleep On It
When Chaka Khan recorded this and another song of mine on her first solo album, doors swung open.
The problem was, this RnB side of my music required a band, and touring solo is exponentially cheaper than with 5 or more musicians, roadies, and entourage.
Wasn't I Your Friend
Average White Band recorded a version of this and a New Orleans singer Angelle Trosclair, as well. This features the same guitar percussive style that I used on "Broken Down Rock n Roll Man." I haven't used the style much in recent years except for on a McNally Water's song "Wanted by the State of Mississippi." Audiences seem to love that song for the funky guitar groove making the lyrics somewhat secondary.
Don't Let Johnny Walker Do Ya Talkin' For Ya
My Mose Allison influence is showing here. It was a fun groove and guitar line. There is a famous Steely Dan song written about the same girl I wrote this about. I regret my young man immaturity in my handling of this love affair. Youth is wasted on the young. All that precious beauty handed to me and me in my callous inexperience handling it so poorly.
Just Like Paradise
This was the closest thing to a hit of my own that I've had. It by far my biggest song on Spotify. It was in the top 40 charts in my cities, and people still write to me how much they love the song. If I still had the master tapes I'd go back and re-sing it and strip off the overdubs. I did a folky version of this with the great Petra Haden. The late great Charlie Haden is her father. I had seen her singing with Bill Frisell and loved her style. People have suggested that I should be on the Yacht-Rock circuit with this song. I don't want to be on that circuit, thank you!
Just Like Paradise
The whole city is sleeping
Not me, I'm wide awake
Lookin' down at the lights
Man, there's people down there livin' a life
Makes mine look like paradise
I see you standing in the porch light
Sad and waving goodbye
There behind the screen door
On a summer night
And me behind the wheel of that old black Ford
The one we drove into the ground
Pedal to the floor, tryin' to give it more
Tryin' to break away from that town
Now here I am and
The whole city is sleeping
Not me, I'm wide awake
Lookin' down at the lights
Man, there's people down there livin' a life
Makes mine look like paradise
Just like paradise, just like paradise...
We were driving through a rainy night
Your face lit up in the passing headlights
And I could see that you were far away
Dreaming of another time and place
That's when it hit me
It's the things you love the most
You end up pushing away
And it ain't the times you lose
It's the dreams coming true
That make you most afraid
The whole city is sleeping
Not me, I'm wide awake
Lookin' down at the lights
Man, there's people down there livin' a life
Makes mine look like paradise
The whole world seems so small
From up here high above the street
Lookin' down at the light
And my troubles fade into the night
Like the lights into eternity