August 1, 2025 • 28 mins
Join host Buzz Knight as he sits down with AJ Croce, a captivating storyteller and musician. In this episode, we explore the stories behind the songs, the creative process that fuels their artistry, and the experiences that have shaped their musical journey. From early inspirations to pivotal moments on and off stage, discover how music continues to connect lives, spark conversation, and inspire new directions. Whether you’re a devoted fan or simply seeking fresh perspectives, this episode promises an intimate look at the songs—and stories—that move us all.
A Note to our Community
Your support means everything to us! As we continue to grow, we’d love to hear what guests you might find interesting and what conversations you’d like us to explore next.
Have a friend who might enjoy our conversations? Please share our podcast with them! Your word of mouth recommendations help us reach new listeners that could benefit from our content.
Thank you for being part of our community. We’re excited for what’s ahead! Check out our newest podcast called “Comedy Saved Me” wherever you get your podcasts.
Warmly
Buzz Knight
Founder Buzz Knight Media Productions
Support the show: https://takinawalk.com/
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Taking a walk, And I said, is it true that
he grows Sam Cook and Floyd Dixon home? And he
lightens up right away. Man, I used to drive all
the time. And that was my introduction to rach Arks.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm Buzznight, the host of the Taking a Walk podcast.
Now imagine stepping onto a winding path where every note
tells a story and every story finds its rhythm. On
today's episode of Taking a Walk, We're just not going
to stroll through any musical landscape. We're going to journey
alongside Aj Crochey, a masterful songwriter he and whose life
(00:36):
and music are woven with resilience, reinvention, and a touch
of legacy magic from the echoes of his father's legendary
songs to the bold, bluesy footprints he's made on his own.
Aj invites us to walk with him through the moments
that shaped his sound and spirit. So lace up, tune in,
(00:57):
get ready to discover how music, memory, and a good
walk can lead to unexpected destinations.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Taking a Walk.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Well, Aj, welcome to Taking a Walk. Thanks for being here.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Hey, thanks so much. You know I got to take
a walk every day, so I dig it.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
So if you could take a walk with somebody living
or dead. It doesn't have to be in the world
of music, but we like when it can be. Who
would you take that walk with? And where do you
think you would you would go on that walk?
Speaker 1 (01:34):
That's a that's a good question. There are so many
people I would love to walk and talk with. But
I would probably say that the first name that comes
to mind would be my father, because he died when
I was very young, and I think that being able
(01:56):
to get his perspective on life would be kind of magical.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
I dare say it would be, Oh my god. And
his career was really a short career considering the amazing
amount of work that he put out right.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Yeah, you know it was three albums in eighteen months,
and all of it written, recorded, and toward it in
that time.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Do you have a sense, as you studied your dad's
life if he was caught by surprise at the quick
pace of his stardom?
Speaker 1 (02:44):
It was? It took I think it took about, you know,
a dozen years for him to be an overnight success.
You know, he started playing in the late fifties and
through college and he graduated and he went you know,
he was in groups in in college and then in
folk groups and then you know, went in sixty four
(03:09):
did a State Department tour of you know, of the
Middle East, which was a very common thing back then
in North Africa. And I think he felt like he
was going to be able to you know, that was
going to be what he was doing. You know, he
did everything he could to avoid a steady job. He
(03:31):
he you know, he went, he got two master's degrees
and then and then took odd jobs and he joined
the army in sixty four sixty five, and then you know,
he my mother met in sixty three and they started
writing together and performing together, and in sixty seven they
(03:55):
got a break. They got signed to Capitol Records. They
released an album that no one bought, and it was
kind of over and they didn't even They toured for
maybe two weeks. You know, that was it, and then
it was back to work. And I think that he
had up to that point had really become a good player,
(04:20):
became a good writer, but he hadn't really found his voice.
And when my mother was pregnant with me, and it
was this is kind of a rare thing to be
able to see in an artist, but he recorded everything
all of the practice that for a concert he'd play
on the weekend at a little bar. It could be
a roadhouse or a coffee house, it didn't matter what
(04:42):
kind of place it was. He kind of tailored the
set to that group, and they were covers, mostly covers.
He might throw something of his in there. But it
was when my mother was pregnant with me. I think
he felt like he had maybe one more chance before
he had to really get a serious job. And I
(05:04):
was archiving a bunch of his music, maybe twenty five
years ago, and I came across a cassette and it
was all of the songs that he was planning to
perform that weekend, and then it was all these great
old blues songs and early country stuff, Jimmy Rogers and
(05:29):
Mississippi John Hurt and Bessie Smith and all of this stuff.
And then I flip it over and on the other
side this beginning of time and a bottle, And this
was the epiphany for him. It was all of a sudden,
all of those covers that he had done, and the
album he did with my mother and an early solo
(05:50):
attempt at a recording called Facets self produced, was it
was all really standing on the shoulders of giants in
the way that you know, you could really see where
the influences were from. And it wasn't that original until this.
And at this point, all of a sudden, with time
(06:11):
and a bottle, it became like the floodgates opened, and
you know, in the next six to eight months, everything
for the first two records were written. So Don't mess
around with Jim Operator was finished. A lot of these
things had been started, like leaving New York City after
moving there in sixty nine. My folks moved there trying
(06:33):
to make a living play music, and and on the
way out my dad started New York It's not My
Home and Box number ten, but they were unfinished, and
it just went on, you know, and so it became this.
It was, you know, it was kind of magic. It
was like lightning had struck.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
I'll say, yeah, we're going to talk about Croachy plays
Croachy and certainly the Heart of the Eternal tour as well.
But let's talk about the Heart of the Eternal. What
inspired you know, those songs and sounds and how does
it reflect where you are as an artist today?
Speaker 1 (07:19):
You know, I think it's really very representative of who
I am as an artist. It draws from a lot
of different places. I was conscious in selecting the songs
with Shooter Jennings because I had a lot to choose from,
a lot, you know, probably twenty five songs that I
was really proud of to choose from. I didn't want
(07:42):
anything to be too similar from the next, but didn't
want it to be too different. There are kind of
pairings in the sense that you know, certain couple each
song has has a partner in the sense that they
kind of live in the same world. So on. On
(08:02):
that album, Uh, there's a couple songs that are kind
of rock and roll songs, one sort of psychedelic soul
influence that I got a feeling, the other being, hey, Margherita,
both of those are kind of living in the same world,
just as uh, just as Complications of Love and Finest
(08:22):
Line are kind of living in the same sonic world.
I like to be able to have things that can
be very different from the song before it, but but
will kind of take you on a on a little
bit of a of a journey, you know. I like
to think of of an album in its entirety because
(08:45):
it helps me to to have a well rounded story.
But I don't know that anyone else outside of outside
of me is ever going to listen to it that way.
Where we live in a world of singles, it's like
the nineteen fifties or early sixties again. You know, people
are they're not even getting two sides. They're getting one
(09:07):
song and that's it. You know, people download one song
and if they like it, they'll download another, and then
you've got a smaller group of people that want to
hear everything that a particular artist does. I love those people,
but it's like, you know, it's few and far between
compared to the number of people that hear a song
on the radio or a friend shares it with them
(09:27):
and it becomes part of a playlist. I think that's
it's it's all valid, it's all important. But all of
those are facets that I consider in recording it. You know,
it was a really fun record to record. It was
super relaxed. We had been on tour for two and
a half years when my band went in to record this.
(09:51):
You know, my rhythm section, bass player and drummer, we
had played with me for over a decade. At that point,
we had played every one of these songs live. I've
accept the last song which we played live, but it
was in a different form and and it was just
(10:12):
very comfortable. You know. I've never had a lot of
time in the studio budget wise, so we recorded the
the basic tracks in four days. I had overdubbed. If
I was playing guitar and needed to play piano, I'd
go over play the piano part of the orgon part,
whatever it was sung, whatever instrument I started on. I
(10:33):
was singing live because I want people and you know
that come to see me perform. I want them to
be able to connect with the album as if it's
actually organic. It's me singing. There's no pitch correction or
or any tricks in that way. I wanted to feel
alive and yeah, so it was. It was a unique,
(10:58):
unique project. It was it was fun.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
I want to talk about some of the folks you've
worked with in your career, but before getting there, I
think about that unbelievable list of people that you've collaborated with,
and it's a diverse group, and you're very diverse in
your approach. Do you intentionally choose these collaborations because of
(11:26):
those folks and their diverse outlook? On things.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Absolutely. I think you know, diversity is a spice of life,
you know it is. It's the thing that makes music interesting.
I think that it's not necessary. You can you can
hear great artists who have very very limited knowledge of
(11:51):
music outside of what they do. That's what they know,
and it can be magical and they can be the
greatest in the world or one of the greatest in
the world in their field. But I love it when
music is brings in a lot of different elements. And
I think because every chord's been played, every melody has
(12:12):
been written, every combination of words have been spoken and sung,
I think that we I've come to a place for
myself as an as a as a creator of music
that the best way to create something that's unique and
uniquely representative of me is to incorporate lots of different
(12:36):
genres and finding interesting ways to incorporate all of these
different sounds and textures and scales and chords and put
them in in a together in a way that hasn't
yet been put together that way.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
We'll be right back with more the Taken a Walk Podcast.
Welcome back to the Take a Walk Podcast.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
When you pull back and think of the list of
people I'm going to talk about. You must sometimes want
to pinch yourself thinking of being alongside. All right, I'll
start with Leon Russell as an example. I mean, what
was that experience?
Speaker 1 (13:20):
Like, well, I'm not really starstruck. They're just they're people,
you know. And and with Leon, you know, it was funny.
We'd played on a couple festivals in the nineties together
and we really connected on he and he and Willie
Nelson were on tour and I and I they were
(13:42):
doing a duo show. It was the best I'd ever
heard these guys. And I had had the opportunity to
play with Willy, sit in with him and play keys
and stuff, and he was always super supportive. And so
I go backstage onto Willie's bus, which was dangerous in
those days, and uh, you know, you don't get a
(14:03):
contact tie from gummies. So so anyway, he, uh, Leon
and I started talking about piano players and we spoke
for like, we just talked about our heroes for for
an hour. You know, I think we bored. Will he
have to death and and and you know, a little
(14:24):
while later, I got a call that he wants to
write and so you know, we have the same influences.
I wasn't thinking about him as this iconic songwriter, piano player,
studio musician, or or producer or any of the hats
many hats and very cool hats that he's worn. I
just thought that, you know, here's a kind of a fellow,
(14:50):
you know, traveler. You know, he's inspired by all kinds
of music and and his and uses uses it in
the same way that that I have, you know, in
a different in his way. You know that's magical.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Could you possibly nail your favorite ly on Russell's song?
I know that's probably impossible.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
You know, there's there's so many good ones, but and
we wrote a bunch together, we wrote probably ten songs together.
But I really, you know, a song for you is beautiful.
There's something about the self titled Leon record and Carney
(15:34):
in particular that really resonate for me. And and again,
you know, I loved his music. I still love his music.
But he was not like my what he was not
Ray Charles for me or Ray Charles for him. You know,
we both had that connection to to Ray and and
and to Little Richard and to Johnny Johnson and to
(15:58):
the boogie guys. Those were you know, they were kind
of our piano playing heroes, regardless of songwriting or anything.
But Leon wrote so many great songs, and those two
albums just have so many cool things, and I love
how raw it is and just just it's just great
because how much fun the band is having.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Oh man, I'll say. Then you think about his record
company executive period, which is incredible as well, right, I know, Freddie.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
King was on his label, and and JJ Kale and
and then of course the studio the church which he has,
which is you know, or had and and that's that's
pretty amazing. And and his son Teddy Jack's very talented
as well.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
You know, I find when I listen to his catalog
or my wife and I just you know, just have
a night of just you know, swinging through playlists and whatnot.
You then like read this cover something that you knew
was great, like you know, Magic Mirror, and you go,
oh my god. Then we just play that, you know,
fifteen times in a row because it's just so amazing.
(17:11):
All right, you brought up Ray Charles, So let's talk
about that collaboration and how magical that had to be.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
That was pretty magical and it you know, obviously he was.
He was a hero of mine. I got turned on
to him when I had lost my sight, and you
know it was it was funny. I When I was
about sixteen, I started touring around southern California with a
with a blues piano player named Floyd Dixon. Floyd was
(17:40):
just an eccentric kook who had a tendency to drink
a little too much. He wrote, Hay Bartender wine, wine wine,
one Scotch, Wimberg and one beer, and a great boogie
woogie player. And and he told me this story about
hanging out with Rage Charles and Sam Cook back in
(18:01):
the late fifties, and they were on Central Avenue and
Sam Cook and he had had too much to drink.
So they had the brilliant drunken idea to get Ray
Charles to drive him home. And so they get into
Floyd's Cadillac and they tie a string to raise left
wrist and a string to raise right wrist, and they go, Okay, Ray,
(18:21):
you you've got a mile of green light. Step on
it right. So five years after I hear that story,
I'm out on the road with Ray Charles, and I'm
not starstruck. But he was a huge you know influence,
and so I'm a little and I had heard a
(18:45):
lot of stories about him being challenging or difficult offstage
or whatever. And I see him smiling on the side
of the stage after the show, and he's sitting there
and you've seen this, the way he looked, and he
seemed approachable. And I come over and I a Ray,
is it true I heard this story from Floyd Dixon.
(19:05):
And here's Floyd Dixon and his smile disappears, and he's
just like mm hmmm. And I said, is it true
that you drove Sam Cook and Floyd Dixon home? And
he lightens up right away. He goes, man, I used
to drive all the time. And that was my introduction
to Ray Charles. He you know, he was super encouraging.
(19:27):
He dug what I did. He thought that he was
grateful that I always that I had had a piano,
because because it made sure that he had that he
had a great piano too, because he didn't always ask
for a great piano, even though he could. Anyone would
have given him whatever he wanted. It was just an
old fashioned way of doing things, you know. So he
(19:49):
always had the wurlitzer and a keyboard or something but
on tour that was that was a dream, you know.
And I'd heard all these insane stories about his tour manager,
Joe Adams, who I was terrified of meeting, and you know,
he would fire a bus driver and drive drive the
rest of the tour. He would fire a pilot and
(20:09):
fly the plane.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
You know.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
It was like, and I meet him and he couldn't
have been more of a gentleman than the whole you know.
It was just I felt like after that, I must
have been twenty one years old when I did that.
I'm like, Okay, if I never do anything amazing in
my career, I've done this.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Well, You've continued doing amazing things. Hard of the Eternal
Wonderful Project. We had John Oates on this podcast some
time ago, and he spoke so wonderfully of collaborating with
you on reunion. Talk about your view of collaborating with
(20:50):
the amazing John Oates.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
John was such a surprise. We met. We met at
the Rhyme and we were both performing. It was a
John Prime tribute a couple of years back, and after
after I played, he came over and said, hey, you
want to get together. I'd known that he lived here
in Nashville, but didn't know, had never met him. And
so he comes over a couple of weeks later. He
(21:16):
had just gone to see his his father, who was
one hundred years old in Philadelphia, and and he comes
over and he says, you know, I saw my dad
and you know he's one hundred and he he said, John,
I'm ready for my reunion. You know I've had I've
(21:36):
had a great life and I'm and i'm I'm grateful,
but I'm ready to see the people I have. You know,
I love and lost and ready for my reunion. And
that was all it took. The two of us took that,
and he said, I've got an idea. I didn't want
to call it reunion, but I don't know exactly where
to go with it. Kind of hear it as a
(21:59):
kind of a gospel thing, but he was playing it
in four to four and I said, well, we got
to play it in three or in six, and it's gospel.
And so I started played the opening part to it,
and that was that we wrote it. Bam. It just
kind of wrote itself. And John is such a talented musician.
The thing, there's very few musicians that I write with
(22:23):
who understand the possibilities as far as not just you know,
the way it feels, but also theoretically what is going
on in the music. So it's a place where I'm like,
you know, we want to go to the four, but
I don't want to. I don't want to stay on
this four again. We're going back to this and so
(22:46):
we play a mine or two instead, which was his
suggestion in kind of the leading up to the chorus.
And it's basically the same chord the way it's played,
but it has a different tonality. And and I there's
not a lot of collaborators that I have who have
that ability, you know. Of course Leon was one, and
(23:09):
and I've had you know, I've been able to collaborate
with some great, great folks. But but John really understands
the music and the possibility of of of a song,
and you know, he's he's a master of what he does.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
You both share this incredible passion for the history of
what you're doing as well the history of your craft.
So I think that's what's remarkable about both of you.
There's another force of nature that you collaborated with them
on the latest project, Heart of the Eternal, What was
(23:49):
it like working with Margot Price.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
You know, I wasn't familiar with Margot. I knew her
name and have friends who play with her, but I
had never met her before. And she came in she
was in Los Angeles and stopped in the studio I
think the second day of tracking, just to say hi,
(24:13):
to shoot her and she heard what we were doing,
and she apparently dug it and said, hey, if you
want someone to join in and you know, sing on anything,
let me know. And I had. I had written this
song initially on guitar, and then the day I was
(24:33):
leaving for Los Angeles, I was played it on piano
for my girlfriend and I said, what do you think
of this? She's like, where has that song been? And
I said, well, you know, I've had it for a while.
You heard it on guitar, but it just came alive
on the piano. And so I looked at the lyrics
to this, and I realized that if I broke the
(24:54):
verses in half, that it was a real conversation, almost
a question and answer or to statements. And it's such
in athereal piece of music that there was something kind
of ghostly about it, beautiful, gentle and forceful at the
same time confident. Maybe anyway, I felt like having those
(25:21):
facets kind of fit, you know, I think that I
think it worked for for us to do that in
that way. It just it was really unique, completely unexpected,
and you know, we met. We met twice and I
haven't seen her since.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
It's a wonderful collaboration. It really is well in closing
what's next after this album and tour? What are the
new collaborations or creative projects that are on your horizon?
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Man, I'm not sure, you know. I have a lot
I've gotten, you know, another album, you know, worth of
songs that I'm that I'm continuing to write, even that
I wrote with John co wrote with John and Gary Nicholson,
who's been a longtime collaborator. I got a message from
(26:11):
Ben Harper the other day and that could be an
interesting collaboration. He's living in France right now and wanted
to maybe collaborate long distance. I have a project that's
been sort of a real passion project for several years.
It took many years to sort of organize the concept
(26:34):
for its origin stories, using a lot of almost the
World Music project in a way, because there's a lot
of really unique instrumentation, a lot of interesting stories, and
they're coming from folklore, coming from mythology, coming from science,
coming from religion. And the similarities of these origin stories
(26:56):
from each continent is so amazing and so similar that
you realize how similar we all are. And I think
it's such a beautiful project that when when the time allows,
I will And you know, that was initially started with
a group called Anti Ballast, who's, you know, kind of
a world music band. I think five languages are spoken
(27:18):
in that group. It started in Mexico City, but the
lead singer and percussionist is from Nigeria and the band
all kind of met in Brooklyn and and but they're
you know, they all play with a lot of different groups,
So I just think there's going to be a lot
of collaboration when this thing comes together. I think it'll
(27:38):
be really interesting.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Oh man, I have so enjoyed speaking with you, AJ Crochy,
And for those that want to check out the Music
Save Me podcast, you should check out that version of
the AJ Croche with Lynn Hoffman on Music Saved Me.
That's also fabulous. But Aj, congratulations on the new project,
the tour and everything, and thanks for your generosity and
(28:03):
all you continue to give us.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Man, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (28:09):
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Taking a
Walk podcast. Share this and other episodes with your friends
and follow us so you never miss an episode. Taking
a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
and wherever you get your podcasts.
Taking a walk, And I said, is it true that
he grows Sam Cook and Floyd Dixon home? And he
lightens up right away. Man, I used to drive all
the time. And that was my introduction to rach Arks.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
I'm Buzznight, the host of the Taking a Walk podcast.
Now imagine stepping onto a winding path where every note
tells a story and every story finds its rhythm. On
today's episode of Taking a Walk, We're just not going
to stroll through any musical landscape. We're going to journey
alongside Aj Crochey, a masterful songwriter he and whose life
(00:36):
and music are woven with resilience, reinvention, and a touch
of legacy magic from the echoes of his father's legendary
songs to the bold, bluesy footprints he's made on his own.
Aj invites us to walk with him through the moments
that shaped his sound and spirit. So lace up, tune in,
(00:57):
get ready to discover how music, memory, and a good
walk can lead to unexpected destinations.
Speaker 1 (01:08):
Taking a Walk.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
Well, Aj, welcome to Taking a Walk. Thanks for being here.
Speaker 1 (01:12):
Hey, thanks so much. You know I got to take
a walk every day, so I dig it.
Speaker 2 (01:18):
So if you could take a walk with somebody living
or dead. It doesn't have to be in the world
of music, but we like when it can be. Who
would you take that walk with? And where do you
think you would you would go on that walk?
Speaker 1 (01:34):
That's a that's a good question. There are so many
people I would love to walk and talk with. But
I would probably say that the first name that comes
to mind would be my father, because he died when
I was very young, and I think that being able
(01:56):
to get his perspective on life would be kind of magical.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
I dare say it would be, Oh my god. And
his career was really a short career considering the amazing
amount of work that he put out right.
Speaker 1 (02:18):
Yeah, you know it was three albums in eighteen months,
and all of it written, recorded, and toward it in
that time.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
Do you have a sense, as you studied your dad's
life if he was caught by surprise at the quick
pace of his stardom?
Speaker 1 (02:44):
It was? It took I think it took about, you know,
a dozen years for him to be an overnight success.
You know, he started playing in the late fifties and
through college and he graduated and he went you know,
he was in groups in in college and then in
folk groups and then you know, went in sixty four
(03:09):
did a State Department tour of you know, of the
Middle East, which was a very common thing back then
in North Africa. And I think he felt like he
was going to be able to you know, that was
going to be what he was doing. You know, he
did everything he could to avoid a steady job. He
(03:31):
he you know, he went, he got two master's degrees
and then and then took odd jobs and he joined
the army in sixty four sixty five, and then you know,
he my mother met in sixty three and they started
writing together and performing together, and in sixty seven they
(03:55):
got a break. They got signed to Capitol Records. They
released an album that no one bought, and it was
kind of over and they didn't even They toured for
maybe two weeks. You know, that was it, and then
it was back to work. And I think that he
had up to that point had really become a good player,
(04:20):
became a good writer, but he hadn't really found his voice.
And when my mother was pregnant with me, and it
was this is kind of a rare thing to be
able to see in an artist, but he recorded everything
all of the practice that for a concert he'd play
on the weekend at a little bar. It could be
a roadhouse or a coffee house, it didn't matter what
(04:42):
kind of place it was. He kind of tailored the
set to that group, and they were covers, mostly covers.
He might throw something of his in there. But it
was when my mother was pregnant with me. I think
he felt like he had maybe one more chance before
he had to really get a serious job. And I
(05:04):
was archiving a bunch of his music, maybe twenty five
years ago, and I came across a cassette and it
was all of the songs that he was planning to
perform that weekend, and then it was all these great
old blues songs and early country stuff, Jimmy Rogers and
(05:29):
Mississippi John Hurt and Bessie Smith and all of this stuff.
And then I flip it over and on the other
side this beginning of time and a bottle, And this
was the epiphany for him. It was all of a sudden,
all of those covers that he had done, and the
album he did with my mother and an early solo
(05:50):
attempt at a recording called Facets self produced, was it
was all really standing on the shoulders of giants in
the way that you know, you could really see where
the influences were from. And it wasn't that original until this.
And at this point, all of a sudden, with time
(06:11):
and a bottle, it became like the floodgates opened, and
you know, in the next six to eight months, everything
for the first two records were written. So Don't mess
around with Jim Operator was finished. A lot of these
things had been started, like leaving New York City after
moving there in sixty nine. My folks moved there trying
(06:33):
to make a living play music, and and on the
way out my dad started New York It's not My
Home and Box number ten, but they were unfinished, and
it just went on, you know, and so it became this.
It was, you know, it was kind of magic. It
was like lightning had struck.
Speaker 2 (06:57):
I'll say, yeah, we're going to talk about Croachy plays
Croachy and certainly the Heart of the Eternal tour as well.
But let's talk about the Heart of the Eternal. What
inspired you know, those songs and sounds and how does
it reflect where you are as an artist today?
Speaker 1 (07:19):
You know, I think it's really very representative of who
I am as an artist. It draws from a lot
of different places. I was conscious in selecting the songs
with Shooter Jennings because I had a lot to choose from,
a lot, you know, probably twenty five songs that I
was really proud of to choose from. I didn't want
(07:42):
anything to be too similar from the next, but didn't
want it to be too different. There are kind of
pairings in the sense that you know, certain couple each
song has has a partner in the sense that they
kind of live in the same world. So on. On
(08:02):
that album, Uh, there's a couple songs that are kind
of rock and roll songs, one sort of psychedelic soul
influence that I got a feeling, the other being, hey, Margherita,
both of those are kind of living in the same world,
just as uh, just as Complications of Love and Finest
(08:22):
Line are kind of living in the same sonic world.
I like to be able to have things that can
be very different from the song before it, but but
will kind of take you on a on a little
bit of a of a journey, you know. I like
to think of of an album in its entirety because
(08:45):
it helps me to to have a well rounded story.
But I don't know that anyone else outside of outside
of me is ever going to listen to it that way.
Where we live in a world of singles, it's like
the nineteen fifties or early sixties again. You know, people
are they're not even getting two sides. They're getting one
(09:07):
song and that's it. You know, people download one song
and if they like it, they'll download another, and then
you've got a smaller group of people that want to
hear everything that a particular artist does. I love those people,
but it's like, you know, it's few and far between
compared to the number of people that hear a song
on the radio or a friend shares it with them
(09:27):
and it becomes part of a playlist. I think that's
it's it's all valid, it's all important. But all of
those are facets that I consider in recording it. You know,
it was a really fun record to record. It was
super relaxed. We had been on tour for two and
a half years when my band went in to record this.
(09:51):
You know, my rhythm section, bass player and drummer, we
had played with me for over a decade. At that point,
we had played every one of these songs live. I've
accept the last song which we played live, but it
was in a different form and and it was just
(10:12):
very comfortable. You know. I've never had a lot of
time in the studio budget wise, so we recorded the
the basic tracks in four days. I had overdubbed. If
I was playing guitar and needed to play piano, I'd
go over play the piano part of the orgon part,
whatever it was sung, whatever instrument I started on. I
(10:33):
was singing live because I want people and you know
that come to see me perform. I want them to
be able to connect with the album as if it's
actually organic. It's me singing. There's no pitch correction or
or any tricks in that way. I wanted to feel
alive and yeah, so it was. It was a unique,
(10:58):
unique project. It was it was fun.
Speaker 2 (11:02):
I want to talk about some of the folks you've
worked with in your career, but before getting there, I
think about that unbelievable list of people that you've collaborated with,
and it's a diverse group, and you're very diverse in
your approach. Do you intentionally choose these collaborations because of
(11:26):
those folks and their diverse outlook? On things.
Speaker 1 (11:30):
Absolutely. I think you know, diversity is a spice of life,
you know it is. It's the thing that makes music interesting.
I think that it's not necessary. You can you can
hear great artists who have very very limited knowledge of
(11:51):
music outside of what they do. That's what they know,
and it can be magical and they can be the
greatest in the world or one of the greatest in
the world in their field. But I love it when
music is brings in a lot of different elements. And
I think because every chord's been played, every melody has
(12:12):
been written, every combination of words have been spoken and sung,
I think that we I've come to a place for
myself as an as a as a creator of music
that the best way to create something that's unique and
uniquely representative of me is to incorporate lots of different
(12:36):
genres and finding interesting ways to incorporate all of these
different sounds and textures and scales and chords and put
them in in a together in a way that hasn't
yet been put together that way.
Speaker 3 (12:50):
We'll be right back with more the Taken a Walk Podcast.
Welcome back to the Take a Walk Podcast.
Speaker 2 (13:01):
When you pull back and think of the list of
people I'm going to talk about. You must sometimes want
to pinch yourself thinking of being alongside. All right, I'll
start with Leon Russell as an example. I mean, what
was that experience?
Speaker 1 (13:20):
Like, well, I'm not really starstruck. They're just they're people,
you know. And and with Leon, you know, it was funny.
We'd played on a couple festivals in the nineties together
and we really connected on he and he and Willie
Nelson were on tour and I and I they were
(13:42):
doing a duo show. It was the best I'd ever
heard these guys. And I had had the opportunity to
play with Willy, sit in with him and play keys
and stuff, and he was always super supportive. And so
I go backstage onto Willie's bus, which was dangerous in
those days, and uh, you know, you don't get a
(14:03):
contact tie from gummies. So so anyway, he, uh, Leon
and I started talking about piano players and we spoke
for like, we just talked about our heroes for for
an hour. You know, I think we bored. Will he
have to death and and and you know, a little
(14:24):
while later, I got a call that he wants to
write and so you know, we have the same influences.
I wasn't thinking about him as this iconic songwriter, piano player,
studio musician, or or producer or any of the hats
many hats and very cool hats that he's worn. I
just thought that, you know, here's a kind of a fellow,
(14:50):
you know, traveler. You know, he's inspired by all kinds
of music and and his and uses uses it in
the same way that that I have, you know, in
a different in his way. You know that's magical.
Speaker 2 (15:07):
Could you possibly nail your favorite ly on Russell's song?
I know that's probably impossible.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
You know, there's there's so many good ones, but and
we wrote a bunch together, we wrote probably ten songs together.
But I really, you know, a song for you is beautiful.
There's something about the self titled Leon record and Carney
(15:34):
in particular that really resonate for me. And and again,
you know, I loved his music. I still love his music.
But he was not like my what he was not
Ray Charles for me or Ray Charles for him. You know,
we both had that connection to to Ray and and
and to Little Richard and to Johnny Johnson and to
(15:58):
the boogie guys. Those were you know, they were kind
of our piano playing heroes, regardless of songwriting or anything.
But Leon wrote so many great songs, and those two
albums just have so many cool things, and I love
how raw it is and just just it's just great
because how much fun the band is having.
Speaker 2 (16:20):
Oh man, I'll say. Then you think about his record
company executive period, which is incredible as well, right, I know, Freddie.
Speaker 4 (16:30):
King was on his label, and and JJ Kale and
and then of course the studio the church which he has,
which is you know, or had and and that's that's
pretty amazing. And and his son Teddy Jack's very talented
as well.
Speaker 2 (16:47):
You know, I find when I listen to his catalog
or my wife and I just you know, just have
a night of just you know, swinging through playlists and whatnot.
You then like read this cover something that you knew
was great, like you know, Magic Mirror, and you go,
oh my god. Then we just play that, you know,
fifteen times in a row because it's just so amazing.
(17:11):
All right, you brought up Ray Charles, So let's talk
about that collaboration and how magical that had to be.
Speaker 1 (17:19):
That was pretty magical and it you know, obviously he was.
He was a hero of mine. I got turned on
to him when I had lost my sight, and you
know it was it was funny. I When I was
about sixteen, I started touring around southern California with a
with a blues piano player named Floyd Dixon. Floyd was
(17:40):
just an eccentric kook who had a tendency to drink
a little too much. He wrote, Hay Bartender wine, wine wine,
one Scotch, Wimberg and one beer, and a great boogie
woogie player. And and he told me this story about
hanging out with Rage Charles and Sam Cook back in
(18:01):
the late fifties, and they were on Central Avenue and
Sam Cook and he had had too much to drink.
So they had the brilliant drunken idea to get Ray
Charles to drive him home. And so they get into
Floyd's Cadillac and they tie a string to raise left
wrist and a string to raise right wrist, and they go, Okay, Ray,
(18:21):
you you've got a mile of green light. Step on
it right. So five years after I hear that story,
I'm out on the road with Ray Charles, and I'm
not starstruck. But he was a huge you know influence,
and so I'm a little and I had heard a
(18:45):
lot of stories about him being challenging or difficult offstage
or whatever. And I see him smiling on the side
of the stage after the show, and he's sitting there
and you've seen this, the way he looked, and he
seemed approachable. And I come over and I a Ray,
is it true I heard this story from Floyd Dixon.
(19:05):
And here's Floyd Dixon and his smile disappears, and he's
just like mm hmmm. And I said, is it true
that you drove Sam Cook and Floyd Dixon home? And
he lightens up right away. He goes, man, I used
to drive all the time. And that was my introduction
to Ray Charles. He you know, he was super encouraging.
(19:27):
He dug what I did. He thought that he was
grateful that I always that I had had a piano,
because because it made sure that he had that he
had a great piano too, because he didn't always ask
for a great piano, even though he could. Anyone would
have given him whatever he wanted. It was just an
old fashioned way of doing things, you know. So he
(19:49):
always had the wurlitzer and a keyboard or something but
on tour that was that was a dream, you know.
And I'd heard all these insane stories about his tour manager,
Joe Adams, who I was terrified of meeting, and you know,
he would fire a bus driver and drive drive the
rest of the tour. He would fire a pilot and
(20:09):
fly the plane.
Speaker 3 (20:11):
You know.
Speaker 1 (20:12):
It was like, and I meet him and he couldn't
have been more of a gentleman than the whole you know.
It was just I felt like after that, I must
have been twenty one years old when I did that.
I'm like, Okay, if I never do anything amazing in
my career, I've done this.
Speaker 2 (20:30):
Well, You've continued doing amazing things. Hard of the Eternal
Wonderful Project. We had John Oates on this podcast some
time ago, and he spoke so wonderfully of collaborating with
you on reunion. Talk about your view of collaborating with
(20:50):
the amazing John Oates.
Speaker 1 (20:52):
John was such a surprise. We met. We met at
the Rhyme and we were both performing. It was a
John Prime tribute a couple of years back, and after
after I played, he came over and said, hey, you
want to get together. I'd known that he lived here
in Nashville, but didn't know, had never met him. And
so he comes over a couple of weeks later. He
(21:16):
had just gone to see his his father, who was
one hundred years old in Philadelphia, and and he comes
over and he says, you know, I saw my dad
and you know he's one hundred and he he said, John,
I'm ready for my reunion. You know I've had I've
(21:36):
had a great life and I'm and i'm I'm grateful,
but I'm ready to see the people I have. You know,
I love and lost and ready for my reunion. And
that was all it took. The two of us took that,
and he said, I've got an idea. I didn't want
to call it reunion, but I don't know exactly where
to go with it. Kind of hear it as a
(21:59):
kind of a gospel thing, but he was playing it
in four to four and I said, well, we got
to play it in three or in six, and it's gospel.
And so I started played the opening part to it,
and that was that we wrote it. Bam. It just
kind of wrote itself. And John is such a talented musician.
The thing, there's very few musicians that I write with
(22:23):
who understand the possibilities as far as not just you know,
the way it feels, but also theoretically what is going
on in the music. So it's a place where I'm like,
you know, we want to go to the four, but
I don't want to. I don't want to stay on
this four again. We're going back to this and so
(22:46):
we play a mine or two instead, which was his
suggestion in kind of the leading up to the chorus.
And it's basically the same chord the way it's played,
but it has a different tonality. And and I there's
not a lot of collaborators that I have who have
that ability, you know. Of course Leon was one, and
(23:09):
and I've had you know, I've been able to collaborate
with some great, great folks. But but John really understands
the music and the possibility of of of a song,
and you know, he's he's a master of what he does.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
You both share this incredible passion for the history of
what you're doing as well the history of your craft.
So I think that's what's remarkable about both of you.
There's another force of nature that you collaborated with them
on the latest project, Heart of the Eternal, What was
(23:49):
it like working with Margot Price.
Speaker 1 (23:53):
You know, I wasn't familiar with Margot. I knew her
name and have friends who play with her, but I
had never met her before. And she came in she
was in Los Angeles and stopped in the studio I
think the second day of tracking, just to say hi,
(24:13):
to shoot her and she heard what we were doing,
and she apparently dug it and said, hey, if you
want someone to join in and you know, sing on anything,
let me know. And I had. I had written this
song initially on guitar, and then the day I was
(24:33):
leaving for Los Angeles, I was played it on piano
for my girlfriend and I said, what do you think
of this? She's like, where has that song been? And
I said, well, you know, I've had it for a while.
You heard it on guitar, but it just came alive
on the piano. And so I looked at the lyrics
to this, and I realized that if I broke the
(24:54):
verses in half, that it was a real conversation, almost
a question and answer or to statements. And it's such
in athereal piece of music that there was something kind
of ghostly about it, beautiful, gentle and forceful at the
same time confident. Maybe anyway, I felt like having those
(25:21):
facets kind of fit, you know, I think that I
think it worked for for us to do that in
that way. It just it was really unique, completely unexpected,
and you know, we met. We met twice and I
haven't seen her since.
Speaker 2 (25:36):
It's a wonderful collaboration. It really is well in closing
what's next after this album and tour? What are the
new collaborations or creative projects that are on your horizon?
Speaker 1 (25:49):
Man, I'm not sure, you know. I have a lot
I've gotten, you know, another album, you know, worth of
songs that I'm that I'm continuing to write, even that
I wrote with John co wrote with John and Gary Nicholson,
who's been a longtime collaborator. I got a message from
(26:11):
Ben Harper the other day and that could be an
interesting collaboration. He's living in France right now and wanted
to maybe collaborate long distance. I have a project that's
been sort of a real passion project for several years.
It took many years to sort of organize the concept
(26:34):
for its origin stories, using a lot of almost the
World Music project in a way, because there's a lot
of really unique instrumentation, a lot of interesting stories, and
they're coming from folklore, coming from mythology, coming from science,
coming from religion. And the similarities of these origin stories
(26:56):
from each continent is so amazing and so similar that
you realize how similar we all are. And I think
it's such a beautiful project that when when the time allows,
I will And you know, that was initially started with
a group called Anti Ballast, who's, you know, kind of
a world music band. I think five languages are spoken
(27:18):
in that group. It started in Mexico City, but the
lead singer and percussionist is from Nigeria and the band
all kind of met in Brooklyn and and but they're
you know, they all play with a lot of different groups,
So I just think there's going to be a lot
of collaboration when this thing comes together. I think it'll
(27:38):
be really interesting.
Speaker 2 (27:40):
Oh man, I have so enjoyed speaking with you, AJ Crochy,
And for those that want to check out the Music
Save Me podcast, you should check out that version of
the AJ Croche with Lynn Hoffman on Music Saved Me.
That's also fabulous. But Aj, congratulations on the new project,
the tour and everything, and thanks for your generosity and
(28:03):
all you continue to give us.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Man, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (28:09):
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Taking a
Walk podcast. Share this and other episodes with your friends
and follow us so you never miss an episode. Taking
a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
and wherever you get your podcasts.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Special Summer Offer: Exclusively on Apple Podcasts, try our Dateline Premium subscription completely free for one month! With Dateline Premium, you get every episode ad-free plus exclusive bonus content.