Download: Billy Bragg “O Freedom”

(from Mr. Love And Justice out now on Anti)

Billy Bragg has been mixing pop and politics and hoping to save the youth of America since he started out as ‘one-man Clash’ in 1977. After projects with Wilco and Woody Guthrie, he will present the U.S. premiere of his vocal version of Beethoven’s ‘Ode To Joy’ in Santa Monica. This interview by Dan Collins.

You were one of the first musicians I remember being outspoken about gay rights. The first time I heard your music was 1991—I was really young and I turned on MTV in Oklahoma and saw the video for ‘Sexuality,’ where you had that lyric ‘If you’re gay, I won’t turn you away.’ At the time I thought it was totally icky and gross…
Ha ha—it kind of is icky and gross, but in a nice way! You have to talk about these things, particularly back then when the first notions people had about HIV and AIDS was that you get it from talking to gay people. And it was an awful time when the disease first came to prominence. So that was a message I thought very strongly that I had to put out.
Do you think songs like that actually change people’s minds?
You’ve got to hope. What I’m basically trying to do is give people a different perspective, whether I’m writing a love song or a political song or a song that’s a bit of both. And you’ve got to hope that they will build on that perspective—that the perspective will challenge their own worldview enough to explore a little bit about what you’re talking about. Things that may initially sound a bit icky may years later make sense to them. That’s the way music has affected my life. The music hasn’t itself changed my life, but the ideas it’s given to me have led me to form my own opinions about things.
You seem equally at home writing about the personal and the political. Are there songs where you think you achieved both?
Yeah! There’s a song on my most recent album called ‘I Keep Faith.’ When I perform in front of an audience, I talk to the audience about my faith in their ability to change the world. I feel very strongly that singer/songwriters CAN’T change the world, and that ultimately the responsibility lies with the audience. And ‘I Keep Faith’ allows me to put that idea in front of the audience. But if my son comes to the concert, and while I’m saying this to the audience, he says to my wife—his mum—‘Mum, why doesn’t Dad just tell everybody this is about you?’ Then she has to say to him, ‘Well, it is about me, but it is also about what Dad is talking about. It’s about both of these things.’ I think the best political songs are also love songs, and the best love songs also have that urge to make a difference.
I was thinking about that after the death of Michael Jackson. The Minutemen had a song in the ’80s called ‘Political Song for Michael Jackson to Sing.’
A great band! A great band! Much much missed!
Agreed! But in Michael Jackson’s mind, he probably thought of himself as a political songwriter. After all, he did ‘We Are the World’ and ‘Black or White.’
I have no problem with someone like Michael Jackson writing a political song, but they need to then come up with the actions to match that. People have to walk it like they talk it, and that’s the bottom line. Otherwise you’re just exploiting that situation for your own material gain. When I hear a political song, I always look for the actions that go along with that.
Your 2002 album, England, Half-English, is very powerful and one of my favorites. There is that sense of nationalism. But I wonder, isn’t there a danger in nationalism as well? Doesn’t it lead to tariffs and wars and hate?
The reason I made that album is because the far-right were beginning to pick up seats. And for all the worry that we have talking about nationalism, if we don’t talk about it, then we leave it to the fascists and the racists to define who does and who doesn’t belong. For better or for worse, the country I live in is called England. I was born here. I speak English. Why should I have to deny that just because a bunch of racist thugs have abused the name of the country? We need to take these things back, although as you said before, some people may—when they first hear it—find it a bit icky. I’m not joking! Some of my own fans initially didn’t feel comfortable with me talking about these things. But I spent time explaining where I was coming from—in fact, I wrote a book about it, ultimately.
In the United States, a lot of lefties like myself have big problems with the way we have treated African Americans and Native Americans and immigrants in the past. But we do have reverence for our founding fathers, despite their faults. Is there an era of English history where you look back like that?
Same era, really. It’s around that time that we chopped off the king’s head and began to have a different kind of idea about how our country should be governed. The period we refer to as the Civil War in the 1640s was actually a period of revolution. The sort of country the founding fathers were trying to live in, we were trying to create then—but it didn’t quite come off. There was a time when we were getting really near to having a proper democracy—200 years before we really achieved it. And that would be a good time to look back to be inspired. The army in the Civil War actually had a rank that was called ‘Agitator,’ which was someone who went out and agitated for change—for more democracy. That idea of the English Commonwealth—our Civil War was fought about the principal of bringing the King to account. Was the King above the law, or was the King within the law? And that idea of accountability is still a very important concept both in your country and my country.
Is there a way in the U.S. to embrace a leftist nationalism like that?
If you care about your country and want it to be a fairer country, if you share in Martin Luther King’s dream, if you want universal healthcare—you’re a patriot, as far as I’m concerned. Patriotism comes in many types. They’re not all defined by Pat Buchanan. I thought George Bush represented a small clique of people in the United States of America—I think Barack Obama represents a much wider slice of the American people. And there’s a nationalism in that.
Perhaps the problem in America is that we’ve watered down our folk-heroes. We’ve watered down Martin Luther King, we’ve watered down Helen Keller…
Woody Guthrie, we’ve watered down! There are extra verses to ‘This Land Is Your Land’ that they don’t teach you in school.
Have country, folk, and bluegrass musicians pushed aside their rebellious, progressive roots? I interviewed Earl Scruggs a few months back, and he really shied away from talking about his anti-war stance during the sixties.
Well, he wasn’t someone who chose playing bluegrass as a career option out of a career portfolio of things he could do. He was an ordinary working man who happened to play bluegrass, and it worked for him. He was trying to reflect his own experiences, and I have a lot of respect for people who try and do that.
Do you say that because the same thing is not true for you? You do seem to have a large portfolio of things you can do. I was pretty impressed that you’re doing this Beethoven thing in August.
Well, whether collaborating with Woody Guthrie, Wilco, or Beethoven and a symphony orchestra, it’s all the same sort of deal, really. It’s all about doing something that’s more interesting than just working the way you normally work.
You were lucky enough to record some of Woody Guthrie’s unreleased songs a decade ago with Wilco.
To write new music to some songs that he wrote. Because he—like me—doesn’t read music. He’s not musically trained. When he writes a song, he just writes the words and keeps the tune in his head. Which I do. If I died tomorrow, those tunes would be lost forever, but the words would still be there. And that’s what we got from Woody. We got complete lyrics to work with. I did a gig in 1992 in Central Park—an 80th birthday celebration for Woody Guthrie. His daughter Nora was there, and she saw something in the songs I sang and the way I performed them that reminded her of her father. And she began writing to me and sending me lyrics and asking me if I was interested in this project. And eventually, in the late nineties, it all came together rather wonderfully with Wilco.
Supposedly you guys had some creative friction during the making of that album.
We made a film of the whole process called Man in the Sand. And there is part of that film that reflects how Jeff Tweedy and I had differences of opinion about the production of the record. The basic deal was that whoever wrote the song would produce that song. And that was a pretty good deal, I thought. And that’s how we worked. But in the middle of the process, after we’d been in the studio working together really, really well, Wilco sent some mixes of my stuff that they suggested, and I just had to say, ‘Look guys, we have a deal. I’m not going to mix your stuff. I’d rather you didn’t mix my stuff.’ And that’s how we left it. The real proof of our working relationship is that when it came time to release Volume 2, they went back and recorded half a dozen new songs—at their own expense—which made that second album a much more Wilco-like album. If they really had a falling out with me or I had a falling out with them, they wouldn’t have made a contribution. I would work together with them tomorrow at the drop of the hat.
Maybe you can play both albums together at Coachella sometime.
It’s Woody’s Centenary in 2012, and if Nora Guthrie doesn’t manage to get us to play together, I think she’ll be very angry! Both me and Jeff, we do what Nora tells us to do because we’re part of the family now. I hope we can come together to do some shows.
Did you ever write ‘This Machine Kills Fascists’ on your guitar like Woody did?
When I was in a punk band, I wrote ‘This Guitar Says ‘Sorry.’’
What was it like playing folk to punk audiences?
When I started, it was still punk. It was just one guy with an electric guitar playing punk. It was only when I started coming to America that people compared me to Woody Guthrie. In England, everyone said I was a ‘one man Clash!’ I would still try to live up to that today!
When I created a Billy Bragg Pandora station, it came back and played a lot of Elvis Costello.
Elvis to me was the ultimate singer-songwriter, because it had a backbone to it. It had an edge to it. It wasn’t apologetic like so many of the others. It was hard-edged punk rock singer-songwriter. Elvis kind of makes it okay to get on stage with a symphony orchestra.
Or to play with Burt Bacharach! Or to grow a long beard!
I’m not sure I’ll be singing Burt anytime soon, but I will be singing Beethoven.
I’m looking forward to it. But why the Ninth Symphony?
Well, I was involved in an event to celebrate the reopening of a London concert venue called the Royal Festival Hall. It had been built in the fifties and they refurbished it. And as part of the reopening ceremonies, they were having a weekend of events which culminated in a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth—the fourth movement, the final bit. ‘Ode to Joy.’ They asked me to write some lyrics for it. Fortunately, it happens to be one of my favorite pieces of classical music. So I duly wrote a new English-language lyric.
Can you give our audience just a little taste of one of the lyrics to your libretto to ‘Ode to Joy’?
The chorus is ‘Brother, Sister, stand together! Raise your voices now as one—though, by history divided, reconcile in unison.’
Do you think you have a unique gift for delivering lyrics like that un-ironically and unapologetically?
I really took my queue from the line in Beethoven’s original, which is ‘Alle menschen werden brüder…’ ‘All men become brothers.’’ When you see that that was the original intent of the lyrics, that verse to me is a very strong. My lyric is not a translation at all, but I took the original sentiment from Beethoven and Friedrich Schiller.
When you played Beethoven for the first time, you played for the Queen of England!
She came to the gig. I wasn’t playing for her. It was being performed, and she kind of came to the gig and sat in the royal box. And it was very funny, because when we were in a higher box on the other side of the theater, you could kind of see what she was doing. And when they were singing my lyrics, she was kind of following them with her finger in the program! And afterwards, she sent a footman down to ask if she could have a copy of the score signed by Mr. Bragg.
You weren’t tempted to yell at her? ‘Off with her head! Another revolution! I’m an agitator!’
No, I wasn’t really. To be perfectly honest with you, my mum was there! It’s not often you get to do something that impresses your mum in rock ‘n’ roll!

BILLY BRAGG PERFORMING BEETHOVEN’S NINTH WITH DWIGHT TRIBLE, BANDA PHILHARMONICA, SUZIE GLAZE, ERNEST TROOST, JUSTIN BISCHOF, THE BAKER + TARPAGA DANCE PROJECT AND MORE ON SAT., AUG. 29, AT THE BROAD STAGE, 1310 11TH ST., SANTA MONICA. 7 PM / $55-$100 / ALL AGES. BEETHOVENBRAGG.COM. BILLY BRAGG’S MR. LOVE AND JUSTICE IS OUT NOW ON ANTI-. VISIT BILLY BRAGG AT BILLYBRAGG.CO.UK OR MYSPACE.COM/BILLYBRAGG.

Charlyne Yi is a comedienne and musician who has opened for Akron/Family, has had members of Man Man and the Vandals cover her songs, and pees while being interviewed. She does not know who Spike Jones is, has never been high, and is not dating Michael Cera. This interview by Dan Collins.

Tell us about your latest band, Old Lumps.
It’s scary! I feel like that’s one of the more serious bands I’ve been doing, just because we’ve been practicing, and it’s five of us… sorry, I’m out of breath! I’m running upstairs.
Do you work out often?
Lots of weights! Big ones! And now I’m going to pee with you on the phone, because I’m disgusting.
Wow! Okay… so, how would you describe the Old Lumps sound?
Pain! Emotional pain! I’m realizing that most of my songs sound the same now. I’m trying to define each song so they don’t sound like a mass of songs.
You’re also in Chandelier Teeth, and the Glass Beef, and Helen Hunt and the Twisters. How many bands are you in?
Ha ha, I think it’s only five, but the Helen Hunt thing is just random, whenever me and Kate [Micucci] happen to be free. We don’t practice really. They’re bands, but they’re not that serious. These are just like, ‘You want to play music? Okay, let’s do it!’ Helen Hunt and the Twisters haven’t performed in over a year. I think we’ve only performed four times.
Now that your movie career is taking off, do you think you could get Helen Hunt on stage to sing with you guys?
We have an idea that we would have, you know, one of those cardboard cutouts of her? And we thought it would be funny if that was our thing, and then one day when we were playing, she’d be hiding behind the cutout of her and she’d pop out!
You have a project called the Music Scientist, where you record demos at home, and fairly talented bands you hardly know record their own, more fleshed-out versions of those songs and post them on YouTube and whatnot. How did you get that project off the ground?
I don’t know! I wrote a lot of songs, but I don’t actually like singing. I was like, oh, this song would sound so much better if I was a man with a burly voice, or I wish I had more range, like an opera singer. I can’t hit any of these notes that I hear in my head. I can play them out on a piano, but never give the song justice. And so I wrote a song. And this band I listened to on MySpace, Twain, this guy had a really great voice. We didn’t even really know each other, but he had seen me perform, and I liked his music. And so I asked him, and he did it. And after I got one person to agree, I was like, ‘I’m going to ask everyone!’ It’s been pretty cool, to see what people come up with.
Shel Silverstein wrote ‘A Boy Named Sue’ and a bunch of other songs for Johnny Cash. Is there a really famous singer you’d want to write for?
Celine Dion! She has such a good range. I used to sincerely love her as a kid. She goes like ‘whooooooaaa’ a lot! I’d be funny to make her do that too much, where it’s overboard, and people are uncomfortable. I think it’d be really fun to make her sing something really sincere, but something really ridiculous coming out of her mouth. Maybe something really redundant, like ‘I LOOOOVE him! I LOOOOVE him!’ Like twenty times, singing the same thing! Besides that, I just want to hear her say really cheesy stuff, like complimenting a boy. ‘Your skin is so soft and silky, and I want to kiss it! I want to kiss it bad!’
You haven’t snagged Celene Dion yet, but you did have David Quackenbush and Warren Fitzgerald from the Vandals cover one of your songs. Did you know who they were when you got in contact?
No! But David came to a Glass Beef show, and I met him. I was like ‘Oh, I really like their music!’ And I just wrote him. ‘Hey, we’re doing this project, for fun. And there’s no money, and we just give away the song for free. If you have time and you’re into this idea—it shouldn’t feel like homework, it should feel like something you’re actually passionate about—then I want you to do a song.’ And he did it, hee hee! But no, I live in a bubble. I didn’t know who the Vandals were.
Do you identify with John Travolta’s character in The Boy in the Bubble?
I’ve never even heard of it, really.
That’s too bad! We’re all Scientologists at L.A. RECORD. If you had a child with undiagnosed autism who died, what kind of song would you write for his funeral?
I would burn his body, and then I would use it in my coffee and drink it, so we could be one. And I would play ‘Imagine’ by John Lennon, and I’d imagine that he was here with me.
When you were a child, what music did you listen to? What are your primal influences?
I listened to K-Earth 101 a lot! And Elvis. And Queen. But I don’t think I sound like any of that stuff at all. I wish that I could, but I think it’s impossible for me.
Do you get inspiration from other musical comedians, like Spike Jones and Eric Idle?
I didn’t even know Spike Jonze did music! That’s really funny, ha ha!
No, not the director guy! Spike Jones from the thirties. He did ‘Der Fuhrer’s Face.’
Oh, ha ha, I’m way off! I’ve never heard of Spike Jones! I like Loudon Wainwright III. His stuff is a mixture of sincere stuff and comedy, too! And someone else just introduced me to Jonathan Richman, which I think is the same thing. It hits you instantly, and it’s funny, but there’s this undertone of sadness in what he’s singing. I found that really interesting, because when I do music, I like to throw people off by doing something silly and then doing something serious. People are like, ‘Whoa, should I not laugh at this?’
There does seem to be tenderness at the heart of your tunes. You and Kate Micucci might be singing about a booger trying to find its way back to the nose, but it’s sad at the same time.
We did do a weird booger song! I think sometimes me and Kate hide a true song with comedy, because we’re embarrassed of talking about something. That was like a mix of, ‘Oh, let’s sing about this lonely person!’ And we were like, ‘What if it’s a lonely booger?’ And we start laughing, because we were kind of getting depressed about what we’re singing about! It’s sad, but it’s also kind of gross and stupid. It’s fun to not take music too seriously. I think music is a great way to do comedy and still do sincere stuff. And I think comedy can be really sincere, too. It’s fun mixing with that kind of stuff. I have been reading Harpo Speaks, a book that Harpo Marx wrote, and I find him the most interesting guy ever. I starting taking up harp because I was reading that book! Something I related to is that he liked to play music, and back in those days, it didn’t have to always be funny. Like Steve Martin would tap dance, and play banjo, and some of the stuff he was doing wasn’t necessarily hilarious. But I was like, ‘I love to watch this! It’s kind of funny, but I love this song!’
Steve Martin’s Wild and Crazy Guy was one of the funniest comedy albums ever, but the song ‘King Tut’ sucked ass. What’s the secret to making a funny song funny?
I have no idea! My songs I think are kind of funny, but I don’t even know if they are funny. I did this one song where I almost cry in the middle of the song, but I’m not really crying, but I try to trick people into thinking I am, and people start laughing! Nothing about the words is funny—it’s just about the way the song is delivered, and how uncomfortable it is to see someone almost break down in the middle of the song. I’m not sure if my songs are funny, and I don’t understand why people laugh at them! I have no idea.
Steve Martin would open for bands when he was getting his start, like the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band and Earl Scruggs. Have you opened for any acts that L.A. RECORD readers might know?
I have. It’s really scary! I’ve opened for Akron/Family, and I’ve opened for Sasha Smith. One time I opened for Man Man, and my set was broken up into two chunks of fifteen minutes. So I opened at the very beginning, and a band played, and it was supposed to be me again, and then Man Man. And when the band went off, they were like, ‘And now, ladies and gentlemen, Man Man!’ And it was supposed to be me next! And my friend from Man Man, Honus, carried me out, and I was like ‘I don’t want to go! People are going to boo me! Last time I went up, there was like 30 people there. Right now there’s hundreds of people who don’t know who I am from the last performance!’ And I go up there, and people are like, ‘Go back to Jersey! Get off the stage!’ And there was this guy who was like ‘I’m going to fuck you up! I’m going to go up there on stage and fuck you up!’ Thank god he didn’t go up there, but they booed me so I couldn’t talk at all! It’s rough sometimes.
Have you ever considered getting revenge by getting a band to open for your stand-up act, and having the audience boo that band?
I’ve thought of other ways to mess with them, in a non-malicious way. I opened for the Akron/Family in New York at the same place, and I thought, ‘I’m at the same place—I’m going to get booed again!’ And I thought if they boo me, I’ll be like, ‘Uh, the Akron/Family didn’t show up today, and so they asked me to fill in for them, and I’ll have to play each instrument alone, but just pretend they’re all playing at the same time. So it might take awhile.’ And so I’d just go do guitar, then go do drums… That was my back-up plan. But I didn’t get booed. So that’s nice!
Who do you think works harder, musicians or comedians?
I think both equally work as hard, just in different ways. Most comedians don’t get paid for 95% of their gigs, if not more! I’ve only been paid like twice in my life. It’s kind of disgusting, the realization that oh, I perform comedy for free—I’m like a big nerd! I just do this out of a hobby! I really like performing, and don’t get paid really! The way the venues work, most musicians get paid for their gigs, even if it’s a couple bucks. They get a cut of the door and stuff usually. But with comedy, you get a reaction with the laughter, and know immediately how you’re doing. With music, at a bar, people will talk over your music, and that kind of shocks! But then there’s the energy of the room. You’re like, ‘I think this is going well, but I have no idea why!’
There’s a lot of press recently about the renaissance in L.A.’s music scene, and we also have a bumper crop of funny comedians nowadays. But those scenes don’t connect nearly enough. How can we bridge that gap?
It’s weird. A lot of musicians I’ve met want to be comedy writers and perform comedy, and a lot of comedians want to perform music. Like my friend Paul Rust, he wanted to be in a band and stuff, and somehow we got mixed into comedy. And my friend from Man Man, he studied script-writing and stuff.
You not only co-wrote the script for Paper Heart, but you co-wrote the score! How did that happen?
Me and Michael Cera had never scored anything, had been writing music just in general, and sending these songs to Nick, the director. And he was like, ‘Why don’t you guys score the movie?’ And we were like, ‘That sounds awesome. But we have no idea how to do that.’ And so through the whole process of filming the movie and editing, me and Michael had separately been writing songs, and we would place them into the editing thing and see how the song would change the scene. And from that we ended up with this guy named Alden Penner from the Unicorns. I had never heard of them, but Michael was a really big fan of them, and sent me a CD of his solo stuff, which is music that Alden had just written in his bedroom. And I was really into that stuff, and so we contacted him and told him what we were doing, and showed him clips. And he was into producing it, and he had never produced a movie score either! So we were all new to this idea, and he flew up from Canada, and we all kind of experimented with the songs and tried to get them in different variations. It was fun!
You seem to have incurred the wrath of thousands of female Michael Cera fans by having a relationship with him.
It’s so strange! I have crushes on characters in movies, but I wouldn’t understand actually hating someone because of that. I don’t think that hate is true, because you can’t hate someone unless you actually know them. These people are crazy! How can you not like someone based on some weird form of jealousy that doesn’t even make sense? And me and Michael aren’t dating, actually, which is stranger. I’ve had people come up to me after shows who are like ‘Oh my gawd! That’s that girl that’s dating Michael!’ And one of them will come up to me and be like, ‘How old are yeeew?’ And I’ll lie to them and say I’m really old, and they’ll be like, ‘Ew, that’s so gross!’ Ha ha, okay!?! And how can they know and like someone if they don’t actually know them, if they only ever see glimpses of characters, or interviews. I’ve gotten weird hate mail regarding Michael. And I wrote them like, ‘Hey, we’re not even dating! I don’t know why you hate me; if it’s because of Michael, we’re not dating, so I guess you don’t hate me anymore?’ And they’ll just write, ‘Fuck you, you fucking bitch!’ I don’t take it personally. They don’t really know me.
You and Michael aren’t dating anymore?
No! How did you know that we were dating, if we were dating? People will say a lot of things! People said that I’m 33, and that was like a big issue, because people were like, ‘Why would a 33-year-old not believe in love in this documentary?’ It’s not even like a true documentary! There’s a lot of misconceptions about who I am and how old I am and who I’m dating. Two people came up to me and said, ‘Oh, where’s your husband?’ I don’t have a husband!
It sucks that people are judging you based on characters you portray! I mean, your breakout role was a stoner in Knocked Up, which isn’t you at all.
I enjoy acting, but I think it’s hard for people to cast me in things, because I don’t really fit a lot of things, and I don’t have much range. I’m not really a great actor. And after that movie, a lot of people wanted me to play a stoner, too. I didn’t know how I played a stoner! I think I did a really bad job, actually. I think I was just tired that day, and I sound like I’m stoned when I’m tired, and I was laughing at nothing! And I’ve never actually even been high.
Paul Reubens had to create a whole stage show for his Pee Wee Herman character before he could evolve past doing little roles in Cheech and Chong films and make his own mark. Do you think Paper Heart is a good way for you to present your best self to the public?
I think our movie has a lot of things I do in normal stage performances. I like mixing reality with fiction—whenever I bring an audience member up and make them do a half-hour show with me, that’s like them playing with me and taking them for this ride. It isn’t real, but it is real, because it’s a real person and they’re really interacting with me. In Paper Heart, I tried to play myself as much as possible, since I am playing a character named Charlyne Yi, and I am interviewing real people. But sometimes I am weird and I don’t come off natural, even when I am being myself. I think this is a good representation of me trying to be myself, ha ha! I don’t know if I always want to be myself in other roles, but I don’t know if I have a choice, because I don’t have range. I wish I had more range. That’d be awesome!

CHARLYNE YI’S PAPER HEART ON FRI., JUNE 25, AT THE L.A. FILM FESTIVAL AT THE LANDMARK 8, 10850 W. PICO BLVD., LOS ANGELES. 5 PM / $12 / ALL AGES. LAFILMFEST.COM. VISIT CHARLYNE YI AT MYSPACE.COM/CHARLYNEYI.

Earl Scruggs started out picking banjo for Bill Monroe but made his name and fame with Lester Flatt as Flatt and Scruggs until 1969. After that, he took his family and friends out as the Earl Scruggs Revue and covered Dylan and shared songs with the Byrds. He speaks now (with son and musician Gary) before his performance at Stagecoach. This interview by Dan Collins.

How old were you when you started playing banjo?
Earl Scruggs: Very small. My dad had an old banjo, and I loved music long as I can remember. I played before I even knew what radio was.
I guess you got your first big break when you joined Bill Monroe’s group. Why did you and Lester Flatt decide to quit and start your own group?
ES: We felt like if we worked for ourselves, we’d make more money. We did much better.
When the sixties hit, and the first big folk music wave came along, you and Lester embraced it in a way not all bluegrass musicians did. Do you think having sons who were young helped you find that passion?
ES: Oh, for sure. Aw, yeah!
Gary Scruggs: With the folk boom—some people call it the ‘folk scare’—my mother was instrumental in getting a lot of things done. Dad knew Joan Baez, and through that friendship, mother knew her manager, Manny Greenhill. And that helped Flatt and Scruggs get involved with the folk boom.
In ‘69, you and Flatt covered Bob Dylan’s ‘Rainy Day Women #12 and 35.’ Did you worry that this might be seen as promoting drug use?
ES: No, I just hoped it would be seen as promoting a good song.
GS: I’ve always thought of that song as more about being persecuted or criticized. The line, ‘They’ll stone you when you’re trying to keep your seat,’ always reminds me of Rosa Parks.
ES: That’s what makes Bob such a great songwriter—different songs can mean different things to different people.
And you also did a television special called Earl Scruggs: Family and Friends, and you played with Bob Dylan, Joan Baez, and the Byrds. Were they able to keep up with you musically?
ES: Well, they had their show, and we’d do theirs. We didn’t play together as a band.
But I have seen footage of you playing with the Byrds.
ES: Well, yeah. They were friends of ours. We had some songs we could do together.
Did you get criticism from the mainstream bluegrass camp for playing with rock and folk acts?
ES: That’s one thing I don’t pay any attention to. I do what I think’s best, and to heck with other people’s opinion! I respect their opinion, but I still gotta make a living.
Bob Dylan caused a lot of controversy when he ‘went electric’ at the Newport Folk
Festival in 1965. At what year did you start using electric bass and guitar in your band, and did it cause the same kind of controversy?
ES: In 1969, the year we formed the Earl Scruggs Revue—Gary played electric bass and Randy switched back-and-forth between acoustic and electric guitars, depending on the song we were playing. We also used a full drum set, and then added piano, so it was a big sound.
GS: You asked if it caused any controversy—there were some pretty harsh criticisms of dad from some of the hardcore bluegrass fans that didn’t like electric instruments and drums period. But the Revue wasn’t a bluegrass band, and we never claimed to be a bluegrass band. Overall, the positive response far outweighed the negative.
ES: Right. I never wanted to be categorized as just ‘bluegrass.’ The Revue played for a heck of a lot more young people than Lester and I ever did, and it was an exciting time. The Revue played on a lot of college campuses, and rock festivals, too. I gained a lot more fans with the Revue than I ever lost.
On the album that was released after that show, there’s a sound clip of your speaking out against the Vietnam War.
ES: Well, that’s way in the past now. I didn’t believe in what was going on at the time.
GS: I just want to be clear: Dad has never not supported soldiers and troops. He’s been a firm supporter of people who have sacrificed for our country. We were just against the Vietnam policies.
In fact, Earl, you supported the war effort in World War II by working in a factory, isn’t that right?
ES: Well… my dad died when I was four years old. I was left with a mother and a half-sister. I was making a pretty good living in the mill, so I worked in the mill because I had to make my salary every week. Then I learned I could make more money in the music business, so I left the mill and moved to the radio and the show business.
You invented a mechanism for the banjo, didn’t you? I was reading that there was a time when you would play with a big box over the neck of your banjo, so no one could steal your idea before you patented it.
ES: No, that’s what got out—that I was trying to conceal it. What it was was tillers. They worked like a cam[shaft]. I just took a brace and bit… you know what a ‘brace and bit’ is?
I don’t know what a brace and bit is.
ES: It’s a manual drill that you bore holes through wood with. I turned the banjo over and bored down through the inlay and everything, put two extra pegs on it—which were nothing but cams to push the strings—run it down to a D and then push it back up in the G position.
So it would sound like a slide almost. You could detune a note while it was resonating.
ES: Right. Very good!
I think that speaks to one of the qualities that’s unique to you, regardless of what genre we’re talking about. You’ve got precision, and you’re fast. But there’s a certain amount of soul as well. Do you think you cut a good line there between playing fast, but also having that spirit?
ES: Well, I don’t know what you’re talkin’ bout, ha ha.
I mean, I was reading about Todd Taylor, who has the Guinness World’s Record for playing the fastest banjo…
ES: I don’t participate in ‘speed.’ I think speed is alright, as long as you control it. But you can get it so fast you can’t pick it yourself.
Who do you think, out of all the musicians you’ve gotten to play with, is the person you’ve looked at and said, ‘Wow, that’s one of the best people I’ve seen play that instrument?’
ES: Well, let’s put it this way. All musicians—most of ‘em—are good. Even those musicians themselves are better on some tunes than others. So that’s what makes the world go round. They’re all good, but they play different tunes well.
What was the tune of yours that you thought you played the best?
ES: ‘Foggy Mountain Breakdown,’ I guess would be the most successful one.
That was the one that was in the movie Bonnie and Clyde.
ES: That’s right. I recorded it way on back, and then I had a request to do a music score for the movie.
GS: It was Warren Beatty Dad’s referring to.
ES: …and he found that record I’d recorded earlier, and told me, never mind, he’d found what he wanted. So he used the old recording of ‘Foggy Mountain Breakdown.’
Did that open a lot of doors for you, and increase your popularity?
ES: It sure did. It was like The Beverly Hillbillies. It went nationwide.
You’ll be playing in Indio, California at the end of this month, at the Stagecoach Festival. Will Steve Martin be in your touring band this time, playing second banjo?
ES: I don’t know if Steve will be around or not.
GS: Dad did a re-recording of ‘Foggy Mountain Breakdown’ in 2001, and Steve was one of the featured performers on that, including Paul Schaeffer, Vince Gill, Leon Russell, and a bunch of people.
Did you see Steve Martin perform back in the late sixties and early seventies? I know he opened for the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band quite a few times.
GS: We did quite a few concerts with the Dirt Band, some of which we opened, some of which they opened. It was co-billing most of the time. And Steve was involved a couple of times then.
ES: Steve Martin at the time was a stand-up comic. I don’t know if you remember that—he had a thing with like an arrow stuck through his head. He did real well.
I’ve got a recording of you playing with the Dirt Band, and you’re covering Mike Nesmith, who’d been in the Monkees. Did you like his music a lot?
ES: Well, I liked what we was doing at the time. I didn’t care whose music it was. If it sounded good, I’d say ‘Let’s do it.’
GS: That was ‘Some of Shelley’s Blues.’
That’s right, and Gary, you sang on that one! How long have you guys been playing as father and sons?
ES: Oh, since they were in school. We had Earl Scruggs, Family and Friends, on the road about eleven, twelve years.
What was your relationship with the Carter Family?
ES: Mother Maybelle Carter was my musical hero early on. I loved the way she played guitar and I was a big fan of the Carter Family. She moved to the Nashville area and lived near where we lived. We became friends and visited one another quite often. I never met A.P., but I got to know Sara a little from when she was in town to visit with Maybelle.
GS: Flatt & Scruggs recorded an album with Maybelle in 1961.
ES: We sure did—Songs Of The Famous Carter Family was what it was called. My wife, Louise, was also a big Carter Family fan and she suggested we do an album of Carter Family songs and I asked Mother Maybelle if she would like to record with us for it. Maybelle had pretty much retired from music and was working in a nursing home, sitting with people who needed some help or needed some company to help pass the time. Anyway, we recorded the album and did some shows together. I was glad to see Maybelle back at it, singing and playing her guitar and autoharp.
GS: And you got Maybelle involved with the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s original Will The Circle Be Unbroken album.
ES: Yes. The Dirt Band had asked me to take part in it and also to help get some of the other artists involved—Mother Maybelle, Roy Acuff, Jimmy Martin, and Doc Watson. It was a lot of fun for me to be back in the studio with her.
I was interviewing Chris Darrow from the Dirt Band a few weeks back, and he was saying that he and Steve Martin and a bunch of people who went on to be in popular bands later all got their start playing bluegrass at Disneyland when they were really young, like it was a boot camp for musicians. Now Disney pushes out people like Britney Spears. Do you worry that there’s no place for young musicians to learn to play bluegrass or banjo?
ES: No, no no, there’ll always be good banjo pickers. We may not be as many at times as others, but as long as they play well, they’re gonna get out there!

EARL SCRUGGS WITH THE REV. HORTON HEAT, REBA, THE CHARLIE DANIELS BAND AND MANY MORE ON SAT., APR. 25, AT STAGECOACH AT THE EMPIRE POLO FIELD, 81-800 AVENUE 51, INDIO. NOON / $79-$499 / ALL AGES. STAGECOACHFESTIVAL.COM. VISIT EARL SCRUGGS AT EARLSCRUGGS.COM.

LIMITED NUMBER OF RESERVED SEATS JUST MADE AVAILABLE FOR STAGECOACH: CALIFORNIA’S COUNTRY MUSIC FESTIVAL

ON SALE THIS FRIDAY, MARCH 27

A limited number of reserved seats have just become available for STAGECOACH: California’s Country Music Festival, Powered by Toyota set for Saturday, April 25 and Sunday, April 26 at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, CA. Beginning this Friday, March 27 at 10:00 AM (PT), STAGECOACH fans will have access to these reserved seats starting at $299. Beyond a guaranteed spot at the Mane Stage, these seats also include access to the VIP area with all the amenities (extra shaded areas, couches, additional upgraded restrooms, and food and beverage vendors including a full bar), along with a commemorative STAGECOACH chair.

STAGECOACH: California’s Country Music Festival–set for Saturday, April 25 and Sunday, April 26 at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, CA–will once again play host to an impressive lineup featuring some of the top talent in the country music world today including headliners Kenny Chesney, Brad Paisley, Reba and Kid Rock.

The updated STAGECOACH line-up (as of 3/25) is as follows: Kenny Chesney, Brad Paisley, Reba, Kid Rock, Little Big Town, Miranda Lambert, Poco (Richie Furay, Jim Messina, Rusty Young, Paul Cotton), Charlie Daniels Band, Darius Rucker, Earl Scruggs, , Lady Antebellum, Reverend Horton Heat, The Knitters, Jerry Jeff Walker, Ricky Skaggs, Ralph Stanley, Kevin Costner & Modern West, Pure Prairie League, Lynn Anderson, Doyle Lawson, Jim Lauderdale & The Dream Players, Peter Rowan Bluegrass Band, Danielle Peck, Dale Watson, Zac Brown Band, The Duhks, Waddie Mitchell, Randy Houser, Hot Club of Cowtown, James Intveld, Sacred Cowboys, Maxim Ludwig and the Santa Fe Seven, John Linn Band, Christ Stuart and Back Country, The Infamous Stringdusters, and Greensky Bluegrass.

Reserved ticket prices start at $299 for a full weekend of entertainment. In addition, a limited number of general admission tickets, camping and RV packages are also available. To view a complete breakdown of available ticketing and onsite camping/RV options, please visit www.Stagecoachfestival.com.

STAGECOACH is produced by Goldenvoice, The Messina Group and Moore Entertainment Group. For up-to-the-minute information on STAGECOACH, visit www.stagecoachfestival.com. STAGECOACH is sponsored by Budweiser, PlayStation and CMT.