Larry Gold

This is a very special episode of Questlove Supreme. The episode takes us to Philadelphia where we recorded in Milkboy Studios formerly known famously as "The Studio" which was owned by one of the true musical treasures of Philadelphia, Larry Gold. Larry is an anomaly in the sense that his talent is not only essential to an iconic music movement (Gamble and Huff catalog) almost 50 years ago. His career peaked again 30 years later as he added his strings and string arrangements to some of the biggest songs and albums of the early 2000's. We are talking "The Boy is Mine" "Cry Me A River" , and from Graduation and 808's & Heartbreaks to MJ's "Scream" and a WHOLE lot in between. Let us not forget his work with the Root's and owning a studio where they would call home for over a decade. Needless to say there is a lot to talk about and learn from our friend Larry Gold. Enjoy

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Of course. Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
Suprema subrema roll call, Suprema suprema role called subprema subprema
role called suprema surema role call. I may have moved, Yeah,

(00:23):
you could say I roomed. Yeah, when I'm back in
the studio. Yeah, ain't no place like home. Suprema subprima
roll call, Suprema subprema roll call. My name is Fante.
My favorite movie is Belly. Yeah. I just learned that
the plural of cello is celli bro cam sma road call,

(00:49):
subrema suprema ro call. My name is Sugar. Yeah, I
keep it mellow. Yeah. When Larry Gold, yeah playing eache
ron Roma road call. My name is pill Yeah, just

(01:11):
here to say hello. Yeah, and I'm feeling great. Yeah,
mellow as a cello, cello road down prima roll It's
like yeah, and my boot Larry Gold my favorite to jewe. Yeah,
that never gets old. Roma roll call. They say I

(01:42):
play the cello. I'm very nice, fellow, but I'm not.
I'm last named Gold and I'm very bold. Roll some
prima prima roll call, prima primo. See was that really was?

(02:08):
It was a bit intimidating, especially with all the cello
shod everybody used. It flashed through my head, you know cello.
I don't know with Larry gold As you did the
word mold boldld, I was going to leave that go
even though she could have gone that way right. My

(02:31):
favorite part of taping this podcast is um when guests
of the show start expressing fear when I tell them
two minutes ahead of time but they're about to start.
We never, of course, you know, we never tell the
guests that they're doing the freestyle. Uh like it was
looking at her phone. Oh we know, we see this.

(02:55):
Let's us know, like you know, your enthusiasm for doing
the show, like you know what you're there, We'll give
you an It definitely is intimidating. You got an eight,
you could man eight fun. I didn't get that in school.
You gotta. Ladies and gentlemen, Welcome to another episode of
Quest of Supreme Um your host Quest Love and we're
here with teams Supreme Fine Tilt, Yeah, Sugar, Steve, Boss

(03:20):
Bill and like, yeah, how are you doing? Uh, we're
man down now? Didn't he didn't make it? I think
that we might have have affected uh, two of our
guests with the Love the Quest Love Supreme Diet here. Yeah,
so we fed, we fed uh unpaid Bill. He had

(03:43):
impossible cheese steaks. He has some drink. Uh, he had
some David's chicken from Chinatown. And this is all in
the same night and and now he's out of commission.
So I think the I had a rough morning too. Yeah. Yeah,
we went to Barley and I had a ribby and

(04:08):
the truffle mac and geese, and the mac and geese.
It came back to say, what's up? Really? Yeah, it
was I just yeah, oh, I'm sorry. I haven't. I haven't.
I mean really really rich rich dairy ship. Right, that
was good, but but yeah, this morning not it reminded me.
But do you all hear that that's the dopeness of
the Philly because that's all Philly food. That's like the

(04:28):
Bill got sucked up. He couldn't take it, got sucked up.
He couldn't because it was as hell. Yeah, that's why
I went to McDonald's. Actually that that that speaks more
about me, Like I'm killing of a choices lord, ladies

(04:49):
and gentlemen. So let's say that you remember that moment
where you were in your feelings when you first heard
those strings on love my part, Yeah, that rush, you
felt like, whoa, the roots are growing up here and
I might be cutting onions. I don't know. Our our
next guest today, I'll say, has his both his feet

(05:13):
planet in the the history of Philadelphia and also the
future of Philadelphia as centrical part of the foundation of
what we know as the Sound of Philadelphia. Of course,
if you're familiar with the any other works from the
Sound of Philadelphia, be a gambled and hugh of creations
or even things produced by Tom Molton or John Bell, Yeah,

(05:37):
Tom Bell, or any any of the Sound of Philadelphia luminaries,
Dexa Y and zl whoever, Yes, Mick Fadden and Mike
Fan and white Head just they the the the secret sauce,
the special sauce of the Sound of Philadelphia, I will say,
are the less strings. It gives a touch of class,

(06:00):
a step further than what I think Barry Gordy thought
he was doing with the Motown sound, trying to make
it palatable to America, and our guest today was a
part of that. But not only that, we can also
say that he had his hand in the second resurgence
of the sound of Philadelphia as owner of the much

(06:22):
fabled the studio here and and uh, what part of
town are we Liberties? Okay, we'll call it Northern Liberties,
North Chinatown, but North Chinatown Northern Liberties, And at this
very studio, I will say that pretty much any and everybody.
This is where I first met the great Bruce Wadeen

(06:45):
when he was doing Jennifer Lopez. Yeah. But uh, this
has been home to the roots, uh for at least
ten albums. It's it's it's a list. And not to mention,
you've done string arrangements for everyone, justin Timberlake. Just take Yeah,
I've done good, You've done good. He's done good for himself.

(07:11):
Thank you. I'm fine. I was I was trying to
figure out when did we first cross paths. I remember
my version of the story was, well, I know that
Fatiene danceler, uh, Daddy Kendrick Um told me about the studio.

(07:32):
But at that time, you know, I was I was
married to the sounding setup that I had at Sigma
both of our old homes, and then uh, an incident happened.
That's what I remember. An incident happened, and James Poyser
called me. Yeah, So an an incident happened. Um without

(07:52):
putting out the business of one of the former members
of the Roots, Um, no, I don't want you know.
I mean, we've we've we've made no bones about our
feelings about Maleix situation. Uh. Much left to Malik be Um.
But an incident happened at the studio that kind of

(08:13):
got us all kicked out. Um. Yeah, yeah, it got
us all kicked out. Well here's the thing though, sort
of overnight as it was instantly and for me, uh,
I kind of played the the sentimental card you remember,
and and uh Chris Tucker's money talks when he was

(08:36):
sort of like what mom, statement, come right back? What
would my mama say? Like it was that situation with
me and Joe Tarci at the owner of Stigma and
get them out. I want them back here. And I
was just like cool man, you know my daddy and
my plea was like, at least I didn't want an
inconsistent sound like I recorded seven right maybe of the

(09:01):
music in Sigma, and I wanted to a consistent sound throughout.
So he he was like, all right, well, I'll let
you guys track the music here, but you know, Mali
can never come back here. So uh so that's all.
The vocals were then done here in this very room
that we're in. So I'll say that adrenaline all aside too,

(09:23):
almost an adrenaline you got me? Uh that everything? And
then eventually, once we started working on phrenology, we just
moved here. You know. He made this an offer we
couldn't refuse. I think the first song I cut here
was that was the impronounceable, the plump. Yeah. That fans

(09:49):
are still waiting for you to give them the lyrics too.
I gotta find it. It's somewhere in this building. Whatever
it was. I was cussing out the Angelo, so I'll
give you that much. This was this is was four
days after he stood us up or break you off.
I remember that night. Yeah, yeah, I think one of
the lines I remember is meanwhile your heroes running scared

(10:11):
some some something like oh no, no, no, it was
it was a distract for you. Anyway, Larry, how are
you doing? I'm sorry, anyway, how's it going? Well? Yeah?
Are you a Philadelphia native, did you? Yeah? I grew
up a few blocks from here in North Philly. Really yeah.

(10:36):
My dad had a toy store um little you know,
toy and hardware store, and we grew up upstairs. Really
we're part of th or O r F thirty, the
thirty block of Frankford Avenue, which is the Heroine district
right now in Philadelphia. It's real hardcore really yeah. So yeah,

(10:59):
as you know, let's put it this way. I had
many cellos cracked open on the whale from the sup
of the elevated really. Oh yeah, I had. I had
to run home sometimes carrying your carrying the cello. So
it's always been I guess we should note that I

(11:19):
had to find out through a New York Times story
that I guess you could say the Kensington section or
it's the Kensington section, even though there's a whole group
of twenty year olds now moving, um, further north than
where you guys were when you were. Fist is becoming gentrified. Goodness. Yeah,

(11:39):
they try to sell me a grid there for a
lot of money. No, fist Down is gentrified, which like
thirty years ago, fish Town was sort of like benson Hurst.
Oh yeah, that's the only place in the world I've
ever been called a niggers it wass Yeah, And now
like some of the world, us restaurants and you know,

(12:01):
Steven's like it's it's upscale. However, further north northeast, northeast
of there and Kensington, it's at least like getting hit
with its third wave of you know, we we had
a little yeah, we had a thing like in two thousand,
sink we have the worst problem right now therese I
was thinking. I was like, well, I think we hit

(12:22):
a low point in town here right now. You know,
the school system sucks, you know, I mean, we're no
you know, the property taxes are so high that you
can't really raise them anymore without people suffering, you know.
I mean it's, you know, time to deal with the
cities again, you know, to take a good look at everything.

(12:42):
You know, Hey, people aren't getting an even break it,
you know, and that's that's the thing. Yeah, I feel
like we have to come back now. Well, I mean
that was kind of the solution before. It was like
nothing's happened in this town. Hey, let's make something happen.
And well you did, you know you did. I don't
know if that's going to see that. That's my little

(13:06):
You represented Philly music for the period of time I
remember early in the nineties, Um, when you guys were
first starting, one of the big executives said to me,
have you heard the Roots? And I said, um, the Roots?
He said there for Philly And I felt like an
ignorant sun up, a fool, you know, I had not

(13:26):
heard of them. And then I remembered you played Columbia's
Ope freshman party and my daughter went to see you
when she was a freshman there, and she called me
on the phone and said, they're extraordinary, Dad, you gotta
go introduce them. Introduced from you know. And so you

(13:46):
guys were representing Philadelphia long before Neo Sault. Wow, thank you,
I appreciate that. So where does your musical introduction start? Like,
how did you were your plans? Were your plans to
be like Curtis Institute classical cellist? Early early on, I
got I got caught by the fever of popular music

(14:07):
though really as a kid. So how did you ease
out of that? And did you disappoint people? When he
told Okay, explained well, first of all, he explained, a
lot of people hold Juilliard in the highlight of like, Okay,
well that's the that's the pinnacle of music education for
classical music. But can you explain how hard. And I

(14:28):
think Curtis has a harder, way harder curriculum. It's it's
it's not particularly a curriculum, it's just Curtis has always
been about. When I was there, there were seventy five kids.
Now there's about a hundred and fifty Julie are there's
thousands that take lessons, right, it's a different it's a
different kind of entity, you know. I mean, Curtis might

(14:51):
be up to two by now. I don't know. They
built a new building and they got a lot of
money and it was a very it was a very
private school. Yeah, curtis Is. It's in Philadelphia, way hard
to get in the Curtis. Then, for me, at least,
like I saw the audition, I feel that this is
a performing arts school. Yeah, yeah, conservatory, but but performing
arts mostly um instrumental arts. You know, it's now operatic

(15:15):
and a lot of other things. And I think they're
teaching teaching improvisation starting next year. They brought somebody in
and I think they're gonna Like everyone else in this world,
things have changed since the sixties. In the sixties, you
were put in a box. If you got out of
that box, nobody knew what to do with you, you know,
I mean it was like it was a weird time,

(15:37):
you know, when I wanted to be in popular music
and classical music that wasn't even really possible in the
early sixties. What year did you attend, uh, Curtis, I
was fifteen, so that would be in nineteen sixty three.
So by this point are you seeing your other I
was already making a little bit of a living. I

(15:58):
met some of them in those days. The Union in
Philadelphia was run by you know, South Philly musicians, and um,
that's the nicest way I could say that. You know,
you know back you mean some friends of art, Yes, yes,
some you know back all right, back in the early sixties.
I made a when I first started playing on records,

(16:19):
I made a brilliant discovery. There was a white Union
and a Black Union. I did not know that. Well,
I'm telling you that. And Mr Gamble, I know, was
here yesterday. Kenny was here. Yes, he would have told
you that, um, which I found amazing. And um, I
don't know much about it, but I know that by
the time the mid sixties rolled around, they formed one union. Okay, okay,

(16:43):
So I would say I think sixty six or something
like that. Um, there was one union. Technically I'm a
union guy, yeah, I know, but I never go to
the meetings and like, what who does the union benefit? Well,
because they always ask in the old days. In the
old days, it was a real sort of like mob

(17:04):
kind of a thing because they would go into a
restaurant and if you had live musicians, they would make
sure they were union players. So I mean collect yeah, exactly,
if you go back to the twenties and the thirties
and the forties, yeah, it was a way to collect dues,
a way to have easy jobs, you know, I mean
did in a way to make sure your musician Union
people were represented in these clubs or these places. Um.

(17:28):
I always thought the I think the union is a
good thing because I think people take advantage of other
people without them at times. Okay, but I always I
also think that the union gets to like, um yes, yes,
I felt okay, so and doing that we both know that.
So in doing the Hamilton's recording, this is when I knew, like,

(17:50):
oh god, man, these union people get on my nerves
like they literally have a person over your shoulder micromanaging
with the stop watch and it's lie. They're always reminding you,
like T minus three hours and nineteen minutes folks, And
it's like, you can we get rid of this person,
but then don't get down to like they'll say T

(18:11):
minus nine minutes before first twenty minute break and they
have to make this loud declaration no matter what you're doing,
it blows the vibe. But like their job is there
too protect But then I found out once uh, you
speak to maybe a label president or whatever and you
slide whatever, then maybe they could just sit in the

(18:34):
in the break room or whatever. Like this happens with
like the cast albums I've worked on. So I just
I realized that, Okay, maybe to protect you so that
you know, I don't underpay you or that sort of thing.
You join the union, then of course I had to
pay you union scale or double scale or triple scale

(18:55):
or whatever your prices. So I see that benefit. But
and it goes into your healthy share. Yeah. And and
also supposedly, you know here we are talking about this
is bullshit. But I mean and supposedly like I'm I'm
on a pension from but they're sucking around with the
pension man, you know, I mean so I don't know
what to say about all these people. But from a

(19:15):
nine union perspective, union just looks like heaven. I'm just
gonna tell you, like all my life, i mean, even
in black radio has never been unionized, like it's a
whole thing. So it's like I've always looked at you
all like wow, protection, the ability, well some of it,
some of it's good, you know what I mean? I see.
Do you remember the first, uh professional gig that you

(19:39):
did in a studio? M I don't. I knew you
were going to ask me this, and I really it was,
you know one it was like Cameo Parkway. It was
probably in nineteen sixty three or before sixty two. And
I started playing on records. Whenever they used two cellos,
there used to be um, I guess is like maybe

(20:00):
four violins, one viola, one cellow. Then they expanded they
went six violins to viola's two cellos. So as soon
as they did that, the head guy took a liking
to me. He really like he was a really good
jazz violin player. He grew up legit, but he was
more like jove a Nudi. He had a real sort
of that sound you know that most legit players have

(20:21):
a great sound, but it's more formal. Um he his
was much looser. I liked him. He was a great guy.
His name with Don Ronaldo. He's on every record Gamble
enough ever made. Don Ronaldo strings and horns, called Don Ronaldo.
That was the name of the of the strings and horns.
In other words, it was always said, no, none of

(20:42):
our individual names. It was Don Ronaldo's strings and horns.
So he was um an executive at the Union. He
got me into the Union. I was probably fourteen or something.
He was supposed to be sixteen, and he gets started
getting gigs. Okay, this is something that I should know
that I don't know. Can you explain the difference between

(21:04):
the violin, the viola, and the cello and the basse.
So those four string instruments. The bass starts the first
string on the base. The lowest string is like an
E low e on the piano, low el piano. The
lowest string on the cello is a sea above that

(21:27):
see right, a sea above that. The next on the viola,
the lowest string is an octave above that cello cea
a C right. Then on the violin, the lowest string
is the G above that sea, which is the G
below middle middle C. Okay, And so so it's differ.

(21:50):
It encompasses the whole bottom of the piano and the
whole top of the piano. The violin goes from that
g all almost to the end of the piano. A
great violinist can go all the way to the end.
So violin has more range. Viola has half the range. No,
but viola can go very high too, but not as
high sounding as the violin. It would be an optave

(22:13):
under the violin even at its highest Okay, Okay, So
the violin gets up where the birdies go. So the
what we know as the sound of Philadelphia was was
mostly six violins, two viola's, two cellos doubled, and sometimes
we performed it performed well. Sometimes we performed it three times,

(22:37):
and the best takes were you know, I mean you
didn't have you see, you didn't have the luxury in
those days of like you had to know you had
a good performance and then you doubled it onto two
your moot. You in the early days with sixteen track
or eight track, you had to already bounce it to
move it. Double it, so you had to have a

(23:01):
good track to begin with, and then you were going
taking that old track and the new track, the old
track out of phase and the new tracking them together,
moving them together. Is there a risk that, you know, what,
it would be naturally out of phase because it was
two different performances to you know, no, two performances are
exactly the same, so there wouldn't be like, but is

(23:24):
there a risk of say, maybe the bases now out
of tune and his A is slightly off, And now
that's that risk. And a lot of times if you
go listen to the strings, their attitude, you know, but yep,
so were the vocals a lot of that stuff, so
a lot, a little bit attitude, you know that. But
it all works together in in in the song. But

(23:47):
a lot of times you're listening solos, so you're if
it's attitude, you do it again, I'm here, So so
you might end up doing your double a couple of
more times than you would. But people compromised much easier
back in those days. They were just looking for a
feel on those records. It was more short. They were
elegant and and um and there were certain producers that

(24:10):
wanted to pristine. You take someone like Bert backer Reck
who came into the city a few times, you know,
and everything had to be precise and exactly, you know
what I mean. But there were an awful lot of
people that that was not the case. They were like
unmade beds, you know. They would as soon as they
got the feel of the record right, that was it.
They didn't care what was in June or attitude as
long as it felt right. As long as it felt right.

(24:32):
So you're trying to tell me, I'm trying to think
of okay, so like Stairway to Heaven that's already twenty
four track or sixteen twenty four track, But even you're like, yeah,
I had nothing to do with let zappin just those

(24:53):
A song like Stairway to Heaven that I when I
hear it, I'm just imagining it's fifty of you in
a room doing me strings and it's really just twelve fourteen.
Well it's it's ten doubled, damn ye. So the first

(25:13):
c Phil Ramon couldn't get over that. That's what it was, too, mean,
you know what I had. I always had my problems
with Joe Tarzia, but I have to say he was
a fucking good engineer. You know, I always thought they
were a little bit too aggressive for me, and and maybe,

(25:33):
you know, maybe other people felt that way, you know,
just as people in a way when I love, like,
don't move the microphones more. No, no, no, no, just
aggressive his people, you know what I mean. They didn't
fit into my hippie self, you know, they they rubbed
me the wrong way a little. But he was a
great fucking engineer. They made great records here. He told

(25:54):
a lot of my friends how to make magnificent records.
You know Donna Mary who did all those Spinners records,
and you know some of the young people eventually did
some of the records we all know as the Philly Sound. Um,
Joe did a lot of Joe sat next to Gamble
making his records, you know, so those stair where that

(26:15):
was Joe Tart in heaven Um and he he had
a slate floor at three oh nine that he put
the strings on the slate floor, so he was getting
a lot of bounce out of the sound of the strings.
So strings would be cut on three or nine Broad
Street a lot of times. Yeah, because they realized that Um,

(26:35):
first of all, it was right next door to where
Kenny and Leon lived mostly, which their offices were and
where they wrote the songs. So and here they built
a really nice studio that, you know, it was for
the seventies, was sort of state of the art. It
had shag carpet, you know, a lot of the studios
in the seventies were like that. And it had a
slate floor and hardwood, and it had a lot It

(26:59):
had a real lives dolm off the floor. But then
when it hit hit the walls, it was pretty dead.
Like they had the drums right. They cut a lot
of the drum tracks over there. See in my mind,
I thought they were cutting upstairs and not not a lot,
not not. By the time they built three O nine Okay,
now I wish Kenny was here, but I think I

(27:20):
think three he opened three on nine South broad which
was already a recording studio. When it opened up, there
was a record first of all, that was where cameo
Parkway had an enormous studio three times the size of
this room. Wow, that was when when the early days,
when I first went in to make a record, there

(27:41):
were thirty two thirty four musicians and singers in the
room at the same time. The strings were in one corner,
the horns were in another corner. That rhythm was all
in the center at once. How do you uh when
you've recorded that way? And this is before we used
to do that sometimes MFSP too, but that was in

(28:02):
a much smaller room. This was a big room. And
that's because you can't overdub in that later, But how
many times would you have to go over a song
so that the engineer make sure, I mean, so the
engineer can ensure that they have a perfect performance. I
think I think when I was there, it seemed like

(28:24):
the engineers were very efficient getting getting a sound out
of all of these musicians at one time. You know, um,
it might have taken an hour to get the sound,
and then they might have recorded a couple of songs.
You might have to run the song four or five times,
just six times. But you know, I mean they were
making most of the amps. The guitar was you know,

(28:45):
there were I don't think direct boxes. I don't even
think Joe Targi invented a direct box that was used
all over the world after that, you know, um, early
six late sixties, like we gotta get show. He should
be here now, I'm sorry, Steve, I interrupted you. I

(29:06):
was just wondering. So, like, uh, let's say the first
set of horns or and strings, just the two tracks, well,
it all went down to two tracks like an Ampex
two track okay as or Scully. This is like the
best of my recollection. Besides playing and everything. I was
already an audio freak. My father had bought me the

(29:29):
first web Corp port portable tape recorder that I was
turning over. I was already fascinated by popular music all
through this whole time. I wasn't going to give up
at Curtis because getting in the Curtis was my main goal,
you know. So, but I was fascinated by popular music,
and I was watching these guys and um and yeah

(29:50):
they headed down to a science man. They really did.
They were fast efficient, But it's not like they were
making each instrument like we do. What they did. Like
track with the strings, there was one mic for three violins,
another mic for three violins. The cellos had separate mics
and the viola had one mic. So that's that's the

(30:11):
way they those were mike and then when it went
and when it went to horns, you had all ribbon
mics on the horns, each horn out of mica. When
they played a chord, the engineer had to get a
balance on the on the chord. Yeah, and the strings too,
and and they had to run it down enough times
where the engineer fell comfortable. But they were also you know,

(30:31):
they're also singing live. They might not sing at that
time we did the tracking and those early days because
what they did was then they went to another machine
to put the vocals on. They took the instrumental and
went to the second machine and laid down the lead
vocal on the background vocals so they could put them
way out front. And if you listen to some of

(30:52):
those old records, the vocals are like this compared to
their music. I mean, they're way out front. How would
they add the I guess the Okay, there's there's the
string section, but then there's also what you call them
chamber or like the the susophones and the trumpets, and

(31:14):
that they were all their live too. If you were
going down the two tracks there, they were the only overdubs.
I think they did early on with vocals to another
machine so the strings and all the horns will be
at the same time, and that's why they had big
studios in those days. They baffle things off. I was
gonna say, the bleeding must have been horrible for and
they but they got an overall sound. In other words,

(31:37):
if you listen to some of those records, they made
them bigger a mirror because everyone was in the same room.
Because the strings had some horns in them. The horns
had some strings in them, they can talk, you know
what I'm saying. Everybody had a lot of every all
the other elements sort of. I mean, you tried to
do the best you could isolate things, but it was
impossible to isolate things. That's any what are That's like

(32:01):
the ultimate restriction. It's just like you have to record
everything at the same exact Yeah, that's too much pressure.
It was pressure. Well, I'm just used to I mean,
I've made complete records that sound like you knows, ensembles
jelling together and you know, but when I'm just playing
drums by myself for like ten minutes, imagining what's going
to sound like later and that sort of thing, but

(32:23):
I can't even imagine that. But like when you did
the Hamilton's record, that's everybody altogether too wasn't it or
did you do that in part? No, that that all
the rhythm tracks were done together, and then yes they
all they they did. But then in the middle of it,
I guess we realized that this is going to be thriller.

(32:45):
Like there was a point was just like, okay, Hamilton's
this is whatever, just record top to bottom that sort
of thing. But then which is the way Broadway cast
albums are usually, Yeah, but then there was one point
where it was like, Okay, they might have to spend
more money, and that's that's the thing. Like Atlantic Records
realized early that this could change the game, and so

(33:09):
they were like, Okay, we're willing to invest more money
in this and makes each individual song and that, you know,
any other Broadway record like in fourteen albums hours like
you spend five hours tracking, three hours over dubbing, and
then you know that it's just one big giant mix
and then that's it. But um, yeah, we spent three

(33:32):
to four months mixing and really sweetening up that that
record that it still sounds like the sound of Philadelphia
even though different people are at the Helm. So there
are songs that Norman Harris produced that had nothing to

(33:55):
do with gam on Huff that still used the same players,
that still used the same studios, and you can't tell
a difference. But they were part of the original gamble
and huff sound to begin with. Though you you picked
the name, Norman Harris was definitely part of that original
rhythm section. You go back and name a song, um

(34:16):
early and early Gamble on Huff song, and it was
either it was either Rolling Chambers. He was in a
group with the Chambers. One of them played drums and
the other one played guitar. UM. I think Dennis was
his name. I'm really digging deep, you know, um and
make a long story short. I think Norman Harris played

(34:36):
on a lot of those records, so he was part
of that sound. And he was also Norman Harris was
like a genius R and B dude. But how many
I'm trying to figure out teams because this is another
thing that you see on credit. You'll see string arranger,
rhythm arranger, background, vocal arranger, which I feel like these

(34:56):
are like little titles handed out from the producer said
no one has to so that they the producer can
protect their turf. And so it's all right. So when
you're dealing with. Okay, so someone brings, uh, you used
to be my girl the O j's uh, the I'm

(35:19):
assuming that the rhythm track is done first. I I
don't exactly know for sure if I'm if I'm not
mistaken that song was done with the old rhythm section.
So it was UM Norman and Ronnie and UM Leon

(35:40):
and UM I left somebody out. I'm sorry you're getting specific.
I just wanted to know that the factory process. So
it starts with the rhythm tracks first vocals, Oh, the
rhythm track, then the vocals, vocals, and then strings and horns. Okay,
So then someone gives a tape to who would do
the actual writing of what After the fort gamble and

(36:04):
huff went string wise after after after the vocals were done,
a cassette was handed to somebody and they went home
and wrote an arrangement with no machines. You used the
piano and you came up with lines, or you came
up with cordial things. You know, when you wrote string,
string and horn parts, how many days do you have
to do with it? Depended? Sometimes I did it in
the studio. At times when they added a song or two,

(36:28):
you know, I mean they would they would forget I mean,
Dexter did it at times in the studio too. Um,
not the best way to do it, but um, yeah
I would it. Maybe a week, you know, you might
have five to five days to a week to do
a couple of arrangements. Do you have a particular memorable

(36:48):
favorite of yours that you worked on that back and
note that day, Back in that day, mcfannan and White
had really gave me the opportunity. Um, I think they
hired an arranger who didn't show up one day, and
I think Tommy bells around and Tommy said, you know,
let Larry try it. You know, yeah, I think I
think I think Tommy said because I think Tommy was

(37:11):
a little upset that they were hiring people that he
didn't think really knew what they were doing at times,
you know, I mean, but he could answer you better
than I can. Yeah, I was gonna say, I mean,
how can you you know, because you know you could
someone who can come up with a look. It's like
all I do is write strings. Okay, most of my
life that's all I did. And when I work on

(37:32):
a record, sometimes people give me a string line. And
when when people give me a string line. It's gonna
be hard for me to link that string line go away,
because first of all, they liked it enough to get
it to me. Yeah, I mean that, Yeah, they might
be married to it. Well, sometimes that happened with Gamble
and Huff, you know, with when mc fat and white

(37:53):
they were married to something and they would tell me that,
you know, um. But and a lot of times in
today's market, I at it and I have to deal
with it. And a lot of times I think I
can do better, and I throw away and I hopefully
do better. You know, how does one I was about
to say, And at least in the seventies and eighties,
there's a lot of trust that one has to put
in an arranger because it's not like you have a

(38:15):
technology today to to play on synthesizers or whatever that
what you have planned for me. So it's almost like
I have to sit there in real time that listen
to you. You know. So the producer, the producer came
out into the studio and you had your string players
there and they put your phones on like we have.

(38:37):
And when you play me what you got, let me
how good it is? Goldie. Let's see what you did?
So I dare you, has there ever been in a
case where an arranger had something and they were sort
of like it was a little too Stravinsky for me,
like you went darker, Like how how do you know? Well,

(38:58):
in the Philly sound, I don't know whether Vinsky played
in too much. Again, Well, let's pick something adventurous, all right,
So let's say Nights over Egypt, which has uh quite
a h an adventurous beginning at least progression. Yeah, and
in the first thirty seconds. So that's Texter. He wrote

(39:19):
the arrangements too. Oh okay, I didn't think that the
actual Dexter wrote his own string. I want to tell
you something. Back in the day. Yeah, back in the day,
Ronnie Baker wrote arrangements, string arrangements. Norman Harris was brilliant,
real great string arrangements. Uh, Earl didn't. But everybody else,

(39:41):
Ronnie Kersey wrote good arrangements. Everybody suited, dude. Everybody grew
up right in music from high school. You know, everybody
got into you know, had that as a skill. So
I mean, and I learned a lot. Hey, look, man,
the best arranger ever passed out of passed through Philadelphia.
I think he's dead down. But uh it was Bobby Morton,
who is an old school from the thirties arranger, you know,

(40:03):
who played vibes. You know. I mean on an average week,
how often would you work A couple of days, a
couple of days. It depends. During the disco times, it
was like four days a week, maybe five days a week.
So was there from people from really good from people
from all over the world though, you know, I mean

(40:24):
we did. People don't realize this, but we did. Like
all of Jacques Morales records y m c A what
oh yeah, wow, non credited, The Ritchie Family was MFI. Yeah.
But okay, so yeah, okay, Jacques Morale, I remember, you know,

(40:47):
I mean my memory is good when I wanted to
be and not so good when I obviously when I
don't want it to be. But I remember there was
a some fancy Paris nightclub where they danced naked, um
and it was the High Pointed Disco music and um.
This guy named I think Ben Alelo or something, and

(41:09):
Jacques Morali was the producers and they brought over and
they did the first records they did was Richie Room
and it was called the Ritchie Family and it was MFSB,
you know, done with their melodies that they brought in
a little more European flair and that that Richie did
for him and they put vocals on him and they
did pretty good. And then the next group I think
they came back with after they had a lot of

(41:31):
success with that was the Village People. Wow, you know,
and I remember they came to Philly and they had
a suitcase full of cash. In those days, some of
these people are literally a suitcase full of cash to
pay the musicians. Really step in our office. Here you go,
step in our office. It was but that was not

(41:52):
talking about not in union work. What other non Philadelphia
international jects were you part of? There were a lot
of there were a lot of things. I mean for
a while there Norman Harris was working from Motown. So
if you go back and look at some of those
records in the in the mid seventies through the late

(42:12):
end of the seventies, I don't know whether it was
maybe the Tempts, the Four Tops some of those, right,
we did we did a bunch of those records too.
Really yeah, wow, m it's amazing, Well it's not, you know,
if you think about it, I think Barry Gordon wanted
to pick up on Philly was really kicking. But then

(42:35):
you know those mid seventy years to the late years,
I mean it's hard to find a place that sold
more records than Philly. Do you guys recalled doing any
work with Bernard Right and Rogers cheek people at all? No,
I went to I went to power you did, um

(43:02):
I did. I went to power station to play on
a few things, but I'm not going to remember the
name power stations. We we took a bus there and
all mfs be played all day, maybe one or two days,
and we came home and I don't remember what record was. Okay.
I also smoked a lot of pot on that little

(43:24):
which I always do and we all know that. So
when D is there a particular date that you can
pinpoint that you noticed, like like, okay, this might be
an end of an era, or we're not used as much,
or Yama d X seven is now like the synthesizes.
Guess what you just did? The top three right there?

(43:47):
You know, the Yamaha was definitely a problem. Well it
wasn't a problem, but um I got I started getting
calls for some arranging them when they would ask me
if I would use the Yamaha the D seven was
it what the X seven to use them for the
strings instead of paying the string players. Um, And I

(44:09):
thought to myself, you know this is and that was like,
you know, it was sort of getting into late seventies
when I felt like it was court curtailing and plus
the records started sucking too. How the records weren't nearly
as good. I was not looking forward to go to
work in your point, you know, all day long, you know,

(44:30):
I mean so, but it was making a living, you know.
And and I started looking around at that moment the
end of seventies. I mean, even Gamble will tell you.
I started working for Sesame Street towards the end of
the seventies. Yeah. I found a few people, um that
I connected with a matter of fact, the gentleman here
yesterday and I had a nice conversation we find playing

(44:53):
on the disco frog. I did not know that, Yeah,
I thought, like you did. Remember we one time discussed
I did you need a little super guy? Oh yeah,
we I thought you remembered that. Oh my god, that
was done in Philly. Oh dude, I just turned into
an eight year old yeo. That was Esther Mohawk, who

(45:15):
did the theme for teeny Little Spo was an old
hippie who was signed by Frank Zappa back in the sixties.
Oh man, that's crazy. That's what we did. That's what
we did started doing in the tail end of the
seventies through the eighties. We did Jerry and I. First
of all, we were friends from early on. I knew

(45:35):
him when he was playing with Frankie Beverly in the
sixties a little bit. He was a hippie and um,
great keyboard player, um and yeah, and we all through
the eighties we were at Sigma and we did a
lot of commercials. We did a lot of different things.
I was gonna say, did you do any like the
local all of them? A lot of news. Well, actually,

(45:56):
know what I'm working on right now, k y W.
I'm doing a big orchestral arrangement for your k y W.
The new upgrading. Yeah, so it's the new in and
out like everything it's but I mean it's just someone
else wrote something where I'm putting gonna put the strings on.
But but we did like New Jersey transit. I mean,

(46:17):
I I used to get like Bunny Sigler to sing,
I would get I did one commercial with Lou roll
saying I didn't. I did, Yeah, I mean I had
a good time with it. And people were willing to
pay decent money in those days. And you and let
me smoke reefer in the studio that was most important.
When did you decide to establish your own business and

(46:41):
well studio the what told you that Phil you needed one? Well,
the eighties were, as you well know, in um, I
went from doing all of that in the seventies to
having nothing left of gamble on huff. I mean, they
they sort of just shut down complete um but they'd

(47:02):
never they did, but they but they didn't. It was
always there to make to make one record a year,
or you couldn't. You couldn't count on that to make
a living like we did for a while. I mean
there were a lot of people that that did real
well and you counting on it to make a living.
So in a way, to me, it did shut down.
And what happened was the eighties. As as you guys

(47:25):
know far better than I do, I've just been on
the journey of black music. But rap started okay, and
I happened to be okay. Um, we were doing this
stuff with the Sesame Street. We were doing okay, and
all of a sudden, this artificial intelligent music things started appearing,

(47:46):
and more readily, I mean drum machines. We always bought
whatever was new and tried around and and we would
fool around with it, and even the d X seven
we had it. I remember sitting in the living room
when I was playing the string sounds instead of they're
kidding me, aren't they, you know, thinking that all you
could do was these heavenly pads, you know, which is okay,
But every record gonna have heavenly pads on it in

(48:08):
the eighties. Yes, So make a long story short. Uh.
We ended up we Jerry and I ended up moving
into with Studio four early on, and they ended up
starting to do more rap, and I met um Lawrence Goodman.
I think Kenny actually at Penny actually told Lawrence Goodman

(48:31):
to introduce himself to me, and he came to Sigma.
We were still at Sigma, and he was tired. Okay,
he'd have to tell you himself, but I think that
he wasn't getting any publishing royalties and he wanted to
know if Jerry and I could copy some he would
bring a record and saying, can you make something that
sounds like this, you know, for work for hire? You know?

(48:52):
Oh yeah, So I think we did that for a
little while for him at Sigma, and then we moved,
we left and went somewhere else. And yeah, we went.
We went to Victory what was your victory, Victor o

(49:12):
Cajun And we started when we did Steady b in
Cool c We did a whole bunch of albums there
with them, you know. Um it was a living sent
arrangements or ye sinclavir arrangements. I bought this. I bought
a sinkle of her like eighty three or eighty four.
I took the session me. I took some of the
money's at barned money at the bank. Somebody co signed

(49:35):
a loan for me, and I brought that fucking expensive thing. Man,
he might not remember. I'm willing to bet so. Since
back when Salt and Pepper were Super Nature m hm,
and they were at Studio four, you got it him here,
I bet you that they commissioned them to play the

(49:57):
Revenge of the Nerds. All right, So you remember there
first records the show, Yeah, and their music was the
Revenge of the Nurse song. I'm almost willing to bet
because all the credits on the show, Stopper says it
was done a studio for and Ornes in Clavia. So yeah,

(50:19):
well that was my sinclavier on this. I'm almost willing
How did this except you got to understand that, you know, Hey,
look when I had Jerry as my partner, I didn't
even play, really. I mean I dreamed, I composed like
I always had done. But he was a much better
keyboard player than I could have ever dreamed. Debate and
and so he played. So that was my impetus and

(50:41):
even buying it to begin with, because I realized. First
of all, we went up to New York and they
gave us a morning with it, and he and I
in the morning we created some pretty hot tracks, you know,
just fucking around, you know, we thought. We looked at
each other and and the bass you could feel the bass,
you know, And you know when you had a Lyne

(51:03):
drum machine, and somehow this had simpty. It had all
the things that were coming into being at that moment.
So was it like a computer. I still have it,
I still use it to this day. It sounds like
shit but you still use it to arrange. I still
use it. That's from then, It's true. Then it's now

(51:25):
like um, forties some years thirty some years old. Wow,
oh that's crazy person with Stevie. Right, but you can't
do chords when it can you? Yeah, it's not it's not. No,
it's it's no. It's it's got sixty four voices. It was.
It was a genius thing when it was invented. So

(51:47):
is it a keyboard like was it's aboard? But it
just sounds like uh orchestral, Yeah, it comes with Yeah,
it comes with orchestral patches. Right, it's been perfected now
I'm leaf. But back then you have to pay a
lot of money to get something that sounds and also
to have memory enough to be able to do it,
you know, in other words, to record a song inside

(52:09):
a little box. You know. I think that back in
those days we had um, I don't know, eight megs
of memory or something, which was unheard of. A Lynn
drum machine had one meg. Yeah it did. And so
this was eight nightmare, right, it was a night you
had to move open up the back and move the chip.
Right you guys, remember, I mean I remember well I mean,

(52:31):
I collect him now, but I think I wasn't depended
on it for work. But I've talked to enough eighties
drummers that you know, have had nightmares with that machine,
you know, moving the chips and that sort of thing
and keeping in sync. Yeah, sync was always a problem,

(52:51):
even though they said everybody would tell me nightly, like
the song start fluxuating fast fast, you know that sort
So that was a nightmare for him. So when did
the studio open? In the studio opened? When did the
roots come here? Okay, so the studio opened two years

(53:14):
before then, so nineties six. And why I opened the
studio was because I sort of was at that place
in Society Hill was my I was at Sigma. I
thought Sigma was going to go bankrupt, because I don't
I shall maybe I shouldn't even tell this story. But anyway,
we make a long story short. I was told to

(53:35):
get all my equipment app because I owned my equipment
in my room there. So I left Sigma, had to
leave over the weekends sort of, and I moved into
what was Cajun Okay, that was bought by another dude.
Cajun was owned by at one point, Remember he was
a really good engineer. When I first opened here, he

(53:58):
came here and he got reat sound out of this room.
He was a really good engineer. And I'm not I'm sorry.
I'm not going to remember. I might as we continue conversation, conversing,
I might remember, but I'm not going to remember his
He was a very good engineer. At one point, boison
Man purchased kids. They did while but while while these

(54:22):
guys owned it, Jazzy moved in there too. Jeff moved somehow, somehow,
Jeff and Studio four in case him Before Studio four,
I think he and James Poyser I met out there,
and I think that was the early nineties. Really, I
think so and I and and Victor right. They were

(54:48):
They were a touch of jazz out there. Then they
were um and I met them. I did. I did
that White Head Brothers record, and that must have been
in early nineties and that's when I met James. Oh wow,
they did. Uh I'm not a player. I don't want
to be a They took Pete Rocks uh number one

(55:14):
soul brother do do? Yeah? Yeah that I love that.
But did you know the six record? No? I didn't know.
They Oh like Atlantic or something. They I think Philly International.

(55:34):
I had to deal with Manhattan Records. Ken the white
Head Brothers. Yeah, and they were the sons of John
white Hood of Okay John Whitehood. Um, and I've been
messing around with them since they were really little, really little.

(55:54):
They were on the little Kenny Uh, the youngest one
is Kenny right. Yeah. He would come and hang out
my studio like thirteen years old. Okay, So you know
the cliche of whenever musicians uh going to music store
and like store managers forbade them to play like Stairway

(56:15):
to Heaven that sort of thing, or like the opening
chords of Purple Haze, like Kenny on the low. Um,
he could shred like Hendricks. Like. I was like, whoa,
this is the white Head brother guy. Like, but this
back when he was like fourteen, like he was a
he was a great guitarist wredder, but sort of strugged

(56:37):
it off, like you know whatever. He was a talented
young kid. He was. He really he could play piano
really well too. Um yeah, I mean it was it was.
We did a whole bunch of records that never came out. Um, gamble,
they were signed. You were right, they were signed to
that that label, and there were that I don't know
how many records I helped through those years, is okay.

(57:00):
But then they got signed to Motown and um they did.
They started the album in California and they came back
to my studio with maybe one or two songs done,
and we ended up doing the rest of the album
at the studio with the synclavier, and um yeah, I

(57:23):
mean I don't I think I got associate producer credit
on that, which I think, yeah, or co producer you know,
that was about right, he really, you know, I mean,
um yeah, And we did that beautiful black Princess song
which had a beautiful string arrangement on it, and uh,
I got so much notice from that, you know, because
it was an old Philly kind of song, you know,

(57:44):
and and Kenny sang it so good. Um so I
wore that album out back there, seeing a lot of
a lot of people did and I got I got
real noticed from that. So you asked me why why
I opened this place. Is I knew that I still
had a little bit in me to be able to
help young kids make good, good products, you know, you know, so,

(58:06):
but you need you need major talent let's face all facts. Guys,
you know you need good people on every little level.
So I want I wanted to ask you about that.
So um in doing a string arrangement, um, and you
have your chair order if it's like you know, first viola,
second viola whatever, Um, how important is it? Because I mean,

(58:28):
if you have I don't know if it's forty pieces
or whatever, how exact does have to be? Say the
fifth cello is a little out or or whatever. I
don't know, Like with so many people, how is it
that one person can make that big of a difference,
Like if you hear someone is a little flat, Like
can you hear that? Does it? Does it really make
a different? It's sure you could hear it. Yeah, I

(58:50):
mean you wanted to sound melifluous. I use that word before.
You know, you wanted to sound organic. I mean a
little bit of here and there, that sole part of life,
you know. But when something's really wack, you know it's wacky,
you know, you know when there's a wrong note. You
know there were there were arrangements we did you know

(59:10):
which you know I some of them. I wrote some
of them. I didn't write where I could swear there
was just something note rubbing somewhere down the line, you know.
But it was all live, you know, and I had
to get over it, you know, wasn't it. Did you
have like certain um favorites that you have in terms of, hey,
I need a viola. I know this guy I did
for years, and now I'm I'm relying on a younger people. Now,

(59:33):
you know, I'm bringing in you know, different people, And
and I still only use like maybe like this week,
I'm doing a date for I'm doing a record for
some young kid in Indiana, and I'm only using ten musicians.
You know. I still do that, and I double and
sometimes if I wanted to be a little even bigger,
you know, I'll even triple it, or I'll write another
part for it so so that it sounds like it's

(59:56):
more than it is. I was always using about Vince Montana. Yeah,
he was a good friend. Yeah, he used to come
to the studio an awful lot this this place. In
other words, even and by the time I opened this place,
Ronnie Baker was dead and Norman Harris was dead. Earl
Young used to come here all the time. Yeah, And
Vince came here all the time, and Leon come used

(01:00:17):
to come here all the time. And Kenny comes and
uses the studio at times. I mean he doesn't really
work that much, but I mean he has come and Vince.
Was he a keyboard player? Okay, yeah, I just knew
him from a goody goody. It looks like love. That's like,
I love that song I played in the South. So

(01:00:38):
I played all those records with him, and you know,
I even went out live with him. But he Yeah,
I don't like talking ill of people, you know, so,
but he was always a pain in my butt. He
always made ship hard, you know. I mean it should
life should be trying to make it Louis easier, you know.
But he would always like stir the pot man they needed.

(01:01:01):
Yeah he did, he did, and he didn't. The third
tier of your story, of course, is you as an arranger.
And this is I mean just the names alone are
straight humble braggs. I mean, it's Al Green. I'm just saying,

(01:01:25):
come on, I had good friends here, you know, you
know sometimes about the relationships. Let's go through. Let's cut here.
He a Green record. Here, we cut the rhythm tracks
Electric Lady and sent the strings Alaric. So there's uh,
Al Green there's Amos Lee, there's Aunt Fiddler angele q

(01:01:46):
Hi you know that, and as be Amphitnie Hamilton's Aretha
Franklin Uh Backstreet Boys, Um Papell, Gilberto Brandy, uh Sparks,
the Boy is Mine case you did? I did the Boys? Well,
that was when when I opened the studio. Here Rodney

(01:02:08):
was my first client. I was about to say I
first met here. We go back now. He was fifth
when I was working with Kenny Gamble, That's right, that's right,
when I was working with not Kenny Whitehead. Wrong, Kenny Um.
Rodney loved that album. So he came up and introduced
his He made his father drive him from Atlantic City,
pleasant Field, New Jersey, appear to introduce himself to me.

(01:02:30):
And he was this little kid, you know. And I
told Alan Rubens at the time we were working on
some project, that he always had me working on different things,
whether they were good or bad. And I said, you
should let him produce a couple of tracks. Do me
a faith. I know he's fourteen years old, but do
me if. And Alan Rubins was my my age. You know,

(01:02:52):
he's a nice guy. Had worked for him my whole
love you w W M O t remember that that label. Okay,
make a long story short, the Double Dutch Buds and
you know who represented Rodney Jerkins who first time that was.
That was the early nineties during Ella Dolf Half Life.
Brought Rodney to the studio. He was fifteen fourteen, and

(01:03:16):
he was like brass, like, this kid's gonna around the
world one day. And I was looking at you like
so well, I guess what. He came to my studio
and I had that one of my world twers there.
He sat down and started playing me as Stevie Wonder songs.
And know what I said, I said, you're my friend,
you know, and the beautle it was really well thought
of and you know, and and he looked at me,

(01:03:36):
big smile on his face, and he loved He and
Kenny got along really well. And um, yeah, so that
was the beginning there. And then I opened this place,
y asked me. And I thought, by meeting all these
really talented young people, I had a feeling that somehow, um,
there was gonna be a resurgence of the Philly Philly sound.

(01:04:00):
I had a sneaky suspicion before it, well, it was
already happening, meeting people like Rodney and meeting having Kenny
white Head. They're having it records right now. Then, come on,
it was happening, you know. And I gotta say that, Larry,
I mean, what really makes the studio special? And even

(01:04:22):
though it's now Milk Boy here and and it's a
little different, I'm not here all the time either, you
know anymore, But I'm just saying that the vibe of
this place the luck. First of all, you made the
first studio I've ever seen that has windows in it.
I like that next to casinos. I've never seen a
business that shut you out from daylight. I've never been

(01:04:45):
in a studio that gives you any sort of time
or day indication whatsoever. So when you go into the
reception area, that right, yeah, it's just like you know,
I mean, I shot my album cover of Philadelphia Experiment
that's on the rooftop here. It's just it feels like home,

(01:05:06):
you know. I mean, I've spent the night here millions
of times, and you know, I mean y'all have not.
I mean, thanks to the John and kind of made
it home, putting you know, poles and graffiti and that
get to that. I thought we were going to skip
that that's the main attraction what we need. Richard Nichols here,

(01:05:30):
But there's more. There's Bubba Sparks, there's Case, there's Changing
Faces there, there's Charlie Wilson, there's uh Christina Aguilera, there's Chromeo,
there's Cocoa, there's Common, there's uh oh Daily, Damn Dailey
was here too, Darryl Hall, John Notates, Dave Coz was here,
Uh Jazzy, jeff Don l Jones, Uh, Drew Hill, Eddie

(01:05:53):
leverte erl oh Man, you know, the funniest to break off.
But not even that. Whenever Gerald LeVert came to the studio,
he was here a lot too. It was it was
just it was a part like I really missed that guy.
You know what I mean. While we're talking about Gerald,
you did the strings for Answering Service. Yeah. Man, the

(01:06:15):
intro on that man I used. I think I almost
broke that tape. Just re wanted those strings on that
intro over there. That was beautiful. He was a good friend.
He was really a good kid. I met him at
Sigmund the eighties when he had that um backward. He
used to work with what Jim South's right, They did

(01:06:36):
that record together. Jim Salomon used to play a shout
out to Jim Salmon. He used to be my dads drummer,
Eric Bana. I didn't know that, yo, I didn't know that.
In the seventies, Jim used to drum from my dead
Eric Robs and Eric about dude flowetry, Uh, Glenn Lewis
and the ire first album India. I Re sorry the

(01:06:59):
jazzy fat Nass. He's Jennifer Lopez whom used Bruce we
Dian and he sts with our presence for a few weeks.
I remember Front two rps and it was so clean here.

(01:07:21):
We all were suits, had catered the best catered food
in the world, like there was, and they did that.
I didn't. I did buy flowers and I brought butt
nice hand soap. There. Wait a minute, you're playing on

(01:07:45):
Karen Young's hot chat. Yeah, this goes that This morning. Yeah,
I was just listening to that. This morning was made.
Was made in the studio that was in Fabric Row
off a fourth Street in Philadelphia and South Philadelphia. That's
not the or anymore. Jesus, Wow, I don't even realize,

(01:08:05):
like I'm just going through mere I played on thousands
of records played. They're not listed there. It says member
of MFSB. At some point it says in the in
some of those everything you know, but yeah, I did
all Kid Cutties records. He doesn't tell them what about
um Lanta del Ray's premiere album. Yeah, so are you?

(01:08:30):
Is it still like, I mean, how often are you doing?
Are you to the place now where you could just
say like, all right enough, I can't do any more
arrangements or I like doing it, So that's still yours?
Still get up at five am? Two, I don't get
up at I do get up. I do get up
really early in the morning, but I don't come here

(01:08:51):
as obsessively as I used to you. I mean I
would get here at six in the morning and you
guys would still be up recording from the night. We
would creep and you would you would laugh a lot
about it, and I go into my room and work. No,
we just don't want to interrupt you. So the thing
is like usually when the sun comes out, I'm like,
all right, I better run in the bathroom real quick

(01:09:12):
because I know Larry's about to start his scales. But
it's kind of that creeping in the house where you know,
like there's a creek in the floor, that sort of thing,
wake up your mom and dad, that sort of thing.
So I had like a system of I know where
the special planks are that will give me away, and
the squeak of the door and all and stuff. So

(01:09:32):
that was my everyday ritual, like five five am, like,
all right, let me do my business before I hear.
And so you will still practice your scales every still. Well,
I mean there was there was a period of time
when I was so busy that I really didn't But
now I'm back. I'm back here, but I I I
reversed it. So now I go home, like and I

(01:09:53):
start playing around three to four in the afternoon, and
I play into until I have to fall asleep at Wow.
So I enjoy it that much, you know. I mean,
I'm still playing, and I and a lot of times
I just start somewhere and I end up somewhere else.
And but I'm actually playing a little better than I
remember and playing in a while, you know. I mean,
I'm about as good as I was when I was

(01:10:14):
maybe fourteen right now. But um, I'm I'm with that.
That's where how the peaks of valance and the dips
start like, but I where when you don't play, you
lose your technique and you have to rebuild your technique properly.
And I'm you know, I'm seventy one now and they're
really a lot of bones ache and a lot of
things are changed now then when you're little, you know.

(01:10:34):
But it's cool. I'm I'm really liking it. I was
gonna say, how much in playing the cello, how much
I guess does the physicality play like its age? Like,
is it a like hands things? It's always all handsome
kind of off ritis or anything that. Yeah, and you
have there's certain looseness. I mean, will tell you any
any good musician. You the approach to playing. You want

(01:10:57):
it to be real natural, you know, and you don't
even want to think about the physicalness of it. Yeah. Well,
I was gonna say, how do you adjust that now?
Only recently, Sheila, I told you about the trick that
chilia you taught me, right, alright, So I'll say that
I'm at the very beginning stages of what I mean,

(01:11:18):
I want to put it out there whatever. I don't
know if it's arthritis or a carpeal tunnel. Yeah, it's
just a lot of tightness. So you know, I've been
open to CBD oil and all these things to to
to help with the aches and pains. Sheila told me
to go to Trade of Joe's and get the big
gass uh uh bag of rice, like the the family

(01:11:45):
supply of right, like the big giant supply. Um. If
I have a frigerator or freeze big enough to store
it in there to make it cold or whatever, do that.
And then right before I drum, just put my entire
arm inside the back of rice and do like hamd
rotation motions, uh, actually warming up your hands. And that's

(01:12:08):
something I've never done before. You know, I'll just come
on and start playing drums or whatever. But now it's
like I'm starting to notice, like certain angles of my
elbows will start to hurt and that sort of things.
So are you asking other drummers too? Like I just well,
I mean I came to Sheila. I mean, no one,
there's something really weird about between forty five and fifty

(01:12:28):
five that I feel like a lot of people are
a little too ashamed still able to talk about it.
So you know your ankles ever feel like this starts
to swell or that starts, no but there's no one
really need to talk to you, you know, because the Yeah.
But you know, the other day I was, I was,

(01:12:50):
I watched Bernard pretty sure. Sure it still looks good.
I don't know how old he is. His whole process
of playing is is not like big. It's very small. Well,
every every drum teacher ever had told me from the gate, like,
don't use your arms, use very little hand osen. But
of course, you know you want to show off and
show everyone that you like rock it out, what your

(01:13:11):
cock out like this one. And now I wish i'd
listen because you know, even to hold the remote controls
like you know, and any kind of wrist wraps anything
like that don't really do you know for real? And
that's the thing. I don't know if this is. I

(01:13:31):
believe in CBD oil as do I. It's you know,
that's not just you know everybody. Everybody says though when
it when it has some th AC in it, which
doesn't really get you high, all right, No, but they
mix it with th HC. Another I like, the pharmaceutical

(01:13:53):
brand that my brother is using right now is a
combination of CBD and th HC. Same Oh, is that
the same thing? Well that you can get options, right,
that's what if you know, friend, you've changed that you
live in New York, medicals legal, I got, I got
friends many because I've changed, Like lie is a little surprising,

(01:14:19):
just made I had I had ninety two on the
rocks like yeah, you go to the shot Larry like
it was it was like, yeah, he had. Well you
know they took so long to give us service they

(01:14:39):
got they Yeah, yeah that was no I do nineteen
forty two because there's no sugar in nineteen forty two.
So now you've been sticking to it, man, you've been sticking.
Proud of you. Man, I've been trying trying to be here.
I want to be bar Party. I wanted to be two.
Thank you. So is there anything that you have yet

(01:15:00):
to achieve? Like do you want to do an orchestral album?
I don't know. I mean, I I don't look at
life that way right now. I'm you know, I mean
I had a recent about a year and a half ago.
I almost um died and it took me about six

(01:15:22):
months to recover from the trauma injury UM and I
recovered where you didn't play at all, I couldn't play
you know, like well, I started playing a couple of
months in and then I got an infection because I
was bending my leg. Um. It's a complic I don't
want to talk about it right now. It's a it's
a complicated thing. I got gang green and they had

(01:15:45):
to remove a part of my leg and they destroyed
the nerves. And they didn't destroy they they cut the
nerves in my leg. So I had I had to
sort of relearn something, some stuff um, and they didn't
want I started playing about them month or two when
I came home from the hospital. I was in the
hospital about two two in some weeks, and I came

(01:16:06):
home and I started playing and my leg blew way
up and I got some infection and I had to
go on. So I was told I had to be
reclined for another few weeks. And then I started playing
again and that's it helped me. And then smoked a
lot of pot because I wasn't I wasn't going to
do the opioids. Yeah, in in the in the hospital,

(01:16:26):
they had me high as a cud on dilauded, you know.
And then as soon as they were letting me go home,
because you get sick in the hospital sometimes from hospital stuff.
You know, they want to get your home as fast
as they can so you don't get sick from infections.
Make a long story short, they cut your dilauded like
to nothing. They don't want to send you home with
pills anymore. It's not it's not very popular. So I said,

(01:16:50):
I said, hold, hold the pills. I'm going to buy
a bag of pot. And we proceeded to go right
and buy a bag of pot. And and I was,
you know, I was up most of the time with pain,
but I was smoking it like crazy, like I was
a hip, young hippie again. And I got real into it.
And then I looked at Vigging, I said, we're gonna
buy a half a pound. We're doing the old days.

(01:17:12):
We're gonna have the freezer folds. How are you feeling
the pot these days? Because you know, pot didn't change
since at first you started, like how you feeling in it?
First of all, I was just I didn't I didn't
miss There were a few years where I was like
drinking stuff and doing other stuff. And but then when
I got back, I went right. I knew a guy

(01:17:32):
I have a friend at Humboldt County I just got
a bound the marijuana. Man, Damn, you got straight to
the plug, straight to them. Yeah, and then and guess what,
let's here for miracles. It helped, It helped me, It
helped me. Heal, well, I'm glad you're here man, me too.
And I'm still smoking about a bag of a week,
you know. So he's doing you, Steve, Yeah, anything left

(01:17:56):
from the pound pound the town's gone, alright, just checking,
just checking right now, all right, Larry, I thank you
so much for doing this. I appreciate it too, though.
That was my album. Thank you for having me. Thank you, Larry. Yeah,

(01:18:19):
the song that he did, right, but I mean the
song that uh we did with um uh she's singing on?
Who did DNA also manage that song? That's song that's on? Yeah, Yeah,
that's good. That song was initially love of my Life. Yeah,

(01:18:43):
where I loved my life was when things small apart
man then the side, well, yeah, when Common decided he
liked what you know is loving my life, then we
had to give this. I did not want to give
up that song. I just still have a question real
quick for go so clar Fisher. I was always curious
to just to hear from another string arranger, like what

(01:19:07):
you thought about his arrangements and what made him like
I always put so whenever I give him something his
words are he would always say make it like no,
but you when we did What's the Dialer Song? When
we did Can't Stop This? Oh my god, you know
we did. We did a lot of nice records. I

(01:19:27):
think I think I might have went and ruin and
cried a little bit. It was I mean, it was hard.
It was really hard to mix that song. There was
one point where me and Russ started crying because, I mean,
the thing is like we keep it keeps to remind
you that dial is no longer here, Dill is here.
And then like I was just like, all right, I
don't want to hear I told I told Russ like

(01:19:50):
I don't want to hear what Larry did because I
know that when them strings get at it, it's going
to make it even sadder. So I was just like,
call me forty five minutes before you want to print
the final and then I'll come in and listen to him.
But that's why some of those records were so great, though,
you know, I mean, you guys weren't afraid of feelings
and you know, I mean, and and they were selling

(01:20:12):
them to you know, I mean, it was really a
nice time in my life. You gave me a nice
um renaissance, you know, you gave us a home. Yeah,
that's that's you know once again, Well lazy doman On
behalf of like yeah Fontigolo and half a Bill and

(01:20:33):
Sugar Steve, whats Love? What's Love Supreme? We will see
you on the next go round. Thank you. What's Love
Supreme is a production of my heart Radio. For more
podcasts for my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,

(01:20:56):
Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.