Fred Mollin

Fred Mollin has a new book, "Unplugged: Stories and Secrets from a Life of Making Records, Scoring Film, and Working with the Legends of Music."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
My guest today is Fred Malin, record producer, composer, Songwriter's
got a new book, Unplugged.

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Fred. Why this book and why now?

Speaker 3 (00:25):
Well, you know, Bob, I felt that the hard drive
up here gets a little full, so I wanted to
make sure I remembered stuff. And that was probably the
first reason why I started putting stories together on paper.
And I also wanted to leave something, you know, for
my kids and grandkids, et cetera. That would be sort
of a story of, you know, how to survive through

(00:47):
a life of music.

Speaker 2 (00:50):
Okay, and how long did it take you to do it?

Speaker 3 (00:54):
Started, you know, sort of dictating stories into my iPhone
about six years ago and then got serious about a
year and a half ago.

Speaker 2 (01:03):
Okay. One of the most striking things in the book
is you dropped out of high school at sixteen. How
did you convince your parents to let you do that?

Speaker 3 (01:13):
Well? I had a very understanding mom and a good dad,
but who didn't quite understand as well. And you know, Bob,
I think we're the same age. But they saw it
coming and so my mom realized that I hated school,
especially by the time I was sixteen years old, and
she knew that I wanted to make my life in music,

(01:34):
and she believed in me, and she was a very
very much the wind beneath my wings. And we walked
to the high school together in Merrick Long Island and
Calhoun High School and on my birthday and we said goodbye.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
What did the administration say?

Speaker 3 (01:50):
Oh, I don't think they gave a shit.

Speaker 2 (01:53):
Yeah, but you're in a middle class suburb. Did anybody
else drop out at sixteen?

Speaker 3 (01:59):
No? You know, listen in nineteen sixty nine, growing up
in Merrick Long Island, which is a very sort of
middle class suburb of New York. You know, I do
have a vivid memory, Bob of me sort of sitting
outside of our house but not particularly close by, but
close enough to hear a conversation that my mom was

(02:20):
having with a neighbor. And this is right after I
quit school, and the neighbor was saying to my mom,
you know, Peg, I'm so sorry about Fred. And I
was thinking to myself, you know, they must think I'm
going to the circus or that I'm dead, But I
felt more alive than ever.

Speaker 2 (02:40):
Okay, you drop out a high school with the vision
of making any music. Now you're not busy all day,
what are you doing? Well?

Speaker 3 (02:50):
I had a part time job at a bookstore because
I'm a bookworm, and there was a lovely lady in
America who had a paperback bookstore, and I would make
some money there. But also, you know, i'd be knocking
on doors in New York trying to get a record
deal as a singer songwriter, and really wasn't quite in
my opinion, I don't think I was as good as

(03:11):
I needed to be in that particular way. And then
shortly after I went and spent a really interesting year
in upstate New York with my older brother Larry and
a bunch of poets in a commune.

Speaker 2 (03:25):
Wait, wait, wait, let's go back those in the book
you tell some tales you're knocking on doors. You actually
have an audition with John Hamm and tell us about that.

Speaker 3 (03:36):
I God bless you for reading even a few books.
That's just wonderful. You know. I was fifteen and I
had a fourteen year old dear friend, Sam Kashner, who's
become a very esteemed novelist and a biographer. And Sam
wrote a scrawled letter literally I saw the letter later

(03:58):
to John Hammond, and his secretary read the scrawl somehow
made it out, and John Hammond agreed to let me
audition for him with my buddy who I was fifteen,
he was fourteen, and we took the train to New
York and went to Black Rock and I had a
loaned out Martin I was using and I played a

(04:20):
few songs for John Hammon, and it was just I was,
you know, ten feet off the ground, because if anyone
doesn't know, John Hammond was the esteemed day and our
man who discovered Bob Dylan, Billie Holliday, and Bruce Springsteen.
So yeah, it was pretty cool and he was very
kind to me. Bob. He said, I like what you're doing.

(04:41):
He said, I want you to come back in about
two years. I want you to have some life in
front of you.

Speaker 2 (04:47):
Okay, when you were performing for John Hammond, did you
think you were worthy of a record deal?

Speaker 3 (04:55):
I hoped I was. I don't know if I don't
know if I believe that, but I hoped I was.

Speaker 2 (05:00):
Okay, you know, you talk about your mother being the
wind beneath your wings in that era, we are the
exact same age, or close to it. And no one
wanted their kid to be an artist because an artist starve.
Were you convinced you were gonna make it?

Speaker 3 (05:17):
I had a drive, and at that point, my drive
was very focused on, you know, the people, and when
I was sixteen, the people I really admired, like Neil
Young and James Taylor and Joni Mitchell and all these
kinds of people that were really breaking the rules and
becoming these autobiographical singer songwriters. And I felt like I
was obviously young, but I thought that might be part

(05:38):
of the interest that people might have in me. And I, yeah,
I was, you know, I just hoped. I don't think
it was you know, I don't think I was arrogant.
I think I was just really hopeful.

Speaker 2 (05:48):
Okay, you drop out of school, you put all your
eggs in one basket. It is almost impossible to make it.
What was going through your head? You were definitely gonna
make it because you were good enough, or you were
gonna work long enough and hard enough to make it.
What was happening?

Speaker 3 (06:06):
I think all the above. I think I was. I
think I had talent, and I think I had I
was co writing songs with my older brother, and I
thought they were cool. But yeah, I mean, I just
I had a lot of belief in myself and I
had quit school because of that belief.

Speaker 2 (06:24):
Okay, you were knocking on doors New York City before
you went up state. What kind of reaction did you get.

Speaker 3 (06:32):
Oh, I didn't get much reaction at all, you know.
I mean it was, first of all, I didn't know anybody.
You know, I don't come from a show of business family,
and I didn't have anybody at age sixteen that I
could network with. So, you know, I knocked on some
doors and most of them were closed. And I did
get one song published by Warner Brothers Music when I

(06:54):
was sixteen that my brother and I had written, and
I remember the person who signed that song was a
guy who was in the Belmonts with Dion. His name
was Fred Mulano, so he was on the Buddy Holly
death tour. I found that pretty fascinating. But yeah, outside
of that song being published that year where I was

(07:15):
sort of working part time at a bookstore and then
the rest of the time trying to knock on doors
didn't really work.

Speaker 2 (07:20):
So how did you decide to go move up north
with your brother who was considerably older.

Speaker 3 (07:27):
Yeah, Larry is seven years older, and at that point,
at sixteen, we had become each other's best friends, and
he had become very creative. He wasn't supposed to be.
He was in Georgetown University, actually in the same dorm
room as Clinton, and two years later he found acting.

(07:48):
And then Quinton went to Ithaca College, which destroyed my father.
But Larry became my best pal because he wanted to
be a poet and he wanted to write, and so
he wrote songs together. And when he moved from a
poetry commune where he was living after he finished school
in Ithaca, New York, in Trumansburg, actually a little bit,

(08:11):
I guess north of Ithaca, he then decided to go
to Canada, to Toronto.

Speaker 2 (08:16):
Wait wait, wait, wait a little bit slower. Sure you
got to visit him, Yes, you try to go back
to school for a minute.

Speaker 3 (08:23):
Oh in Ithaca. Yeah, I went to visit Larry and
we did this hang for about six months where I
stayed at this commune, this poetry commune. It was lovely
and at the same time, you know what, I was
turning seventeen and there was some not pressure but maybe

(08:44):
even internal pressure. But I should try to go back
to high school to get my high school diploma. And
so I stayed with a friend of Larry's in Ithaca
and tried Ithaca High School for that, you know, for
that shot. And I only lasted two days. It was
so poisonous. I just said gotta go and I went back.

(09:06):
And then shortly after Larry went to Toronto, and I
followed him.

Speaker 2 (09:10):
Okay, were you a bad student or not interested?

Speaker 3 (09:17):
Was I a bad student? I really hated school. So
I hated math, and I hated you know, social studies
was okay, English. I could have taught the class because
I was a you know, a bookworm, but no I
a science class. I mean, these things still give me
the chills.

Speaker 2 (09:37):
So you have kids, would you have let your kids
drop out? And what'd you tell them?

Speaker 3 (09:43):
Well, you know, I have two great kids and two
grandkids now. But when I was raising my kids, if
they had shown me that kind of drive and musicality,
I would have said, go for it.

Speaker 2 (09:55):
Well, you know, no one really likes homework. So when
they would be there with math and science, would you say, no,
you gotta do this, you got to get your degree.

Speaker 3 (10:05):
I was so busy at that point when they were
going through their school at that point. They didn't come
to me with those things. They just got their work done.

Speaker 2 (10:13):
Okay, you're living in Ithaca, and next door is Bob
Mogu tell us about that?

Speaker 3 (10:21):
Well, isn't that a great great story?

Speaker 2 (10:23):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (10:24):
I mean we were in this lovely old house where
this poetry commune was, and sometimes we didn't have enough
running water for showers. And Bob mog and his wife
Shirley lived down the road and Ithaca, the neighborhood of Ithaca,
as well as Trumansburg where we were. Trumansburg's a very
small upstate New York town, and we had all sort

(10:47):
of known each other through different sort of community outreach things.
And Bob had heard that I was a musician, and
someone said, oh, you should really invite Fred to your studio,
your workplace, and I did. I got to go to
his Trumansberg studio and try to play with one of
his you know, mile high tall synthesizers, and he was

(11:11):
kind to me, and surely especially they would let us
take showers at their house when we couldn't shower at home.
And then, yeah, that was just a I have a
great photo. I think I might have put it in
the book of the of the Mailbox that says Mogue.

Speaker 2 (11:28):
You will also say that Mog goes to work for
kurtzwhile and you end up using that connection to get
an instrument at a deep discount. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (11:37):
When I started to make my way without planning it,
I fell into film and TV composing in around nineteen
eighty five, and I needed to have this. You know,
there was there, there were fair Lights, there were Saint Clavier's,
and there were Kurzwele's and Bob Mogue was now the
chief scientist at Kurzweil. So I reached out to him

(12:00):
and he was really happy to hear from me. He
had known that I had become a record producer. Now
he heard I was become a TV film composer film
and TV composer, which I told him all about. And
I said, Bob, I need a great deal on occur
as well, and he said, oh, no, don't you worry,
You'll get my deal, and away we went.

Speaker 2 (12:21):
Do you remember how much that was?

Speaker 3 (12:23):
I think it was around twelve thousand, down from like
twenty four or something, so I.

Speaker 2 (12:29):
Know it's ancient history, but what exactly was the difference
between the fair Lights Sinclavier and the kurts Wow.

Speaker 3 (12:37):
Well, first of all, the price, the sink Clavier and
the fair Child were very expensive in the I think
I think a sinclavier could have cost one hundred grand.
I don't even remember anymore. It was very stupid high.
But you know, these were the first digital sequencing instruments
and sampling instruments, and everyone you know was using them

(13:00):
in film and TV composing, and Kurzwew was this very
unique one, but it was affordable.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
So tell us a little bit more about the Kurtzwaw.

Speaker 3 (13:14):
Well. Kurzwaul was developed by Ray Kurzweil, who was an
incredible scientist, and if you read all about him, his
his work on the reading machine for the blind alone
should get him a Pulletzer or whatever they give you
these days, a Nobel. But he also created this wonderful
instrument which has onboard fantastic samples of piano and synth

(13:37):
and all sorts of orchestral sounds, and you can keep
adding sounds and you can create your own sounds. So
the nice part about it for me was it was
sort of an inspiration machine. It had it was very
easy to use, so I could literally record something like
a piano pass and then hit track two right on

(13:58):
the same keyboard air and then overdub and then hit
track three, and I would have twelve tracks. And then
I started to mity things all, you know, I start
to get very involved in film and TV. But it
was a wonderful I still keep my Kurzwell two fifty
here in the studio because occasionally you need a certain
sound that is a curswew sound.

Speaker 2 (14:24):
Okay, how'd you get out of the draft?

Speaker 1 (14:28):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (14:28):
I was real fortunate. I had moved to Toronto and
I became a member of draft Board one hundred, which
was a draft board that they would only grab people
from in case of absolutely you know, if everyone else
couldn't go, they would go to draft Board one hundred.
Then on top of it, Bob I got a really
high lottery number the next year.

Speaker 2 (14:50):
Okay, Toronto, I've been many times. I'm going next week
as a matter of fact. But you're there in the
early seventies. Is it provincial? What's Toronto like?

Speaker 3 (15:01):
In the early seventies, Toronto was really a wonderland. I
had made friends on my first visit to Toronto in
seventy two, made friends with Tony Kosnek, who was living
in a house close to my brother, and it was
again a very free and lovely time in Toronto was
really blooming and you know, just a lot of artistic

(15:21):
things were happening, and Tony was making a record and
he wanted me to be in the band, and I
was again as a seventeen year old fresh out of
Long Island, Toronto was just exciting to me and working
with Tony was thrilling. In the band was Paul Schaeffer,
who was our piano player, who was fresh out of
Thunder Bay, Ontario. And the guitar player quit and I

(15:46):
had to become the bass player, and Paul actually had
to teach me how to do a better job on bass.

Speaker 2 (15:53):
Let's go back at step. What instruments did you play?
How did you learn how to play growing up?

Speaker 3 (16:00):
Well, I think I was always a drummer because I
would drum on the tin can garbage cans as a child.
And then when the Beatles hit, I grabbed guitar and
became very studious as far as just immersing myself and
trying to play guitar because I was absolutely you know,
just my whole life changed with the Beatles. So I

(16:22):
really was a guitar player who played some drums and
had to learn how to play bass for Tony.

Speaker 2 (16:30):
Okay, So continue the narrative from there.

Speaker 3 (16:33):
Well, you know, the one thing that was really fascinating
was when I got there, the Canadian government had passed
a Canadian content ruling that from this day on, everything
on the radio and television had to be thirty three
and a third percent Canadian. This had never happened before. So,
in other words, a Canadian radio station before seventy two

(16:57):
could play all the UK and American music they wanted,
and played two Canadian songs a day if they wanted.
And all of a sudden, now there was this incredible
gold rush on for Canadian artists to be signed and
Canadian music to be on the radio.

Speaker 2 (17:14):
Okay, And how did that affect what you were doing?

Speaker 3 (17:17):
I think it just opened up the doors all of
a sudden, you know, all the doors that were closed
to me in New York. Toronto was such an open
city anyway. And then on top of it, there was
a frenzy almost to sign anybody who could play guitar,
anybody who could write songs, because they had to fill
this thirty three and a third content all of a sudden,

(17:39):
and Tony was one of the recipients of that. You know,
there was also you know, the government would give you
grants to record records. I mean, it was really quite
a country. But at the same time it helped me
immensely a few years later when I started to produce records.

Speaker 2 (17:55):
Just stopping here for a second, you know, we're living
in an era of political turmoil and there's friction between
Canada and the US. Having lived so much in Canada,
what is the difference between Canada and the people in
Canada and the people in US.

Speaker 3 (18:13):
Well, I think, you know, first of all, I'm a
dual citizen, and I've been a Canadian citizen for many years,
but a landed immigrant for many years before that. But
I feel more Canadian than I do American. I find
it to be very much. I just feel very Canadian.
I feel very lucky to have been sort of allowed

(18:37):
in the country. I feel lucky to have had my
life there. The weather is terrible, but the people and
the history and the living history that we love there
shows it to be a much more compassionate and a
much more I don't know, tolerant place.

Speaker 2 (18:55):
So tell me about joining a comedy troupe in Toronto.

Speaker 3 (19:00):
Yeah, you know, I think, first of all, you know,
in those days especially, you just take every opportunity you
can get. And my brother and two colleagues who were
doing underground theater at that point in Toronto, decided to
try to create their own improvisational comedy group and they
called it homemade theater. But they needed someone to do

(19:20):
music and that was me. So I was the fourth
member of this improvisational comedy group and I would do
the music for each of their improvisational skits and it
was really quite fun. And then it actually turned into
a situation where the other improvisationally comedy group, Improvisational Comedy Group,
came around from Chicago Second City, and they opened up

(19:44):
in Toronto and they had a real facility and a bar.
So we sort of lost our uniqueness, but we loved
all the folks who had become part of the Second
City Toronto troupe.

Speaker 2 (19:57):
But this was not really amateur. I had success. You
were working for the government, you were getting paid. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (20:05):
No, I mean, you know again, Toronto was a very
wide open place at that point, very accepting of all
new ideas and all creativity, and we were, you know,
we were embraced, and yes, we worked for the government. Eventually,
Homemade Theater had their own television show on CBC for
three years, which was a show for children called Homemade Television,

(20:29):
and we were so completely improper on so many levels.
We should never have been on that show. But we
were sort of like Monty Python for kids.

Speaker 2 (20:38):
So in the back of your mind, we were saying, well,
you know, I'm not on the right track anymore.

Speaker 3 (20:45):
Well, you see, he has a lot of derailment, isn't there, Bob.
I mean there's a certain amount of you know, he
starts out wanting to be the Beatles, and now he's,
you know, a singer songwriter, and now he's this, now
he's that. You know. I just took all the gigs
I could because I could try to do them. And
at the same time, when we were doing Homemade Theater,
I was still doing my gigs as a singer songwriter

(21:07):
in certain clubs, and I was starting to produce records
because I had fallen into that. So there was a
lot of things going on, Bob that were paying the
bills in a way that was good enough, but I
could keep doing all of them.

Speaker 2 (21:22):
Yeah, Okay, how did you end up producing records? And
how did you end up giving up being a singer songwriter?

Speaker 3 (21:31):
Yeah? How did I give up the dream? Well, first
of all, I want to be honest and say that
I don't think I had what was needed to be,
you know, in the pantheon of the James Taylors and
the Neil Young's and the Joni Mitchells, et cetera. I
think I was good, And I think what was really

(21:51):
obvious to me, though, is I fell into producing a
friend's demo, and because I sort of knew a little
bit about what producing is, which of course were is directing,
I sort of fell into this and we got a
record deal from the demo, and that was Dan Hill,
a Canadian artist that I had been playing gigs alongside of.
And all of a sudden we had a first album

(22:15):
of Dance released in Canada and it went gold. We
had a hit record in Canada. It got released in
the States, it didn't do anything. We had a second
album of Dance, which again went gold in Canada but
didn't get well received in the US on twentieth Century
Fox Records and by that time, I had really said,
you know what, I'm not going to go in front

(22:36):
of the camera. I'm going to go behind the camera.
I like arranging music, I like producing records. I want
to do this and I liked it.

Speaker 2 (22:45):
So tell us about making the hit with Dan Hill?

Speaker 3 (22:49):
Sure, I mean our third album, which was going to
be called Longer Fuse. This was nineteen seventy seven in Toronto.
Had been told by Harvey Cooper, who's a lovely man
and we still stay in touch, who was at that
point head of twentieth Century Fox Records in LA. He

(23:10):
was politely told that if he didn't have a smash hit,
he'd be dumped. And we were just kids, you know.
I was twenty three, my partner was twenty two. Dan
was twenty two, And just the long story short is
that Dan went to LA and tried to co write
for the first time and wasn't really successful in that.

(23:32):
But ATB Music was taking his music in the US,
and so they said, why don't you try writing with
Barry Man. And of course Barry was, along with his
wife Cynthia, while you know, probably two of the most
revered songwriters in the history of radio. And so they
didn't do well working together, but Dan left him a

(23:53):
lyric and Barry then that night put music to the
lyric and sent us a little cassette that he had
done on his boombox where Barry sang and played piano.
And here we are sort of with this sort of
damocles over our head, no knowing if we don't have
a hit, we're going to be dumped. And we hear

(24:16):
this demo that came in from La and it's sometimes
when we touch and it's really like an Elton John
Your song, Like it's really beautiful and super hooky, and
you know, we just looked at each other and here's
a great thing.

Speaker 2 (24:30):
Bob.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
Then, back then in seventy seven, these kinds of things
were possible, Like you could say, you know, this could
be a hit, and you really thought it could be
a hit. You know, it wasn't that you had one
percent chance of having a hit. You actually had a chance.
And this was the song we knew that could be
the hit, and we did cut the track of it.
Dan had a terribly hard time doing the vocal We

(24:54):
probably had ninety six different vocal moves in the comp
done meticulously on faders onto twenty four track tape, and
no matter what, I don't think anything could have stopped
that particular song, especially with women. Women really loved it
and it was a absolute smash all over the world.
We didn't get to number one. I think we got

(25:16):
to number two and some of the charts, and then
I think Jimmy Sorry, Billy Joels just the Way You
Are or Saturday Night Fever or some song from that
might have kicked us out of number one. But it
became an iconic record, which I'm very proud of. Although
I have to be honest, you know, that wasn't my wheelhouse.
Elton John was or James Taylor was. But I found

(25:40):
that sometimes we touched, you know, was so commercial and
so emotional that I couldn't believe it couldn't be a hit.
And some melodic too.

Speaker 2 (25:48):
By the way, Okay, you're working in Canada. You got
a guy who's got a couple of stiff records. In retrospect,
were you world class or you just had a great
song and you managed to get it down.

Speaker 3 (26:04):
I think we wanted to be world class, and I
don't think we really were the way I had hoped
we would be. But I think when it came to
making Dan's records, especially the third album, which had sometimes
when we touch on it, I think we did damn well.
I think became pretty close to being world class producers.

Speaker 2 (26:24):
So ultimately you picture all this money coming in and
then the label goes under tell us about that.

Speaker 3 (26:35):
Yeah, well there you go. Isn't show business great?

Speaker 2 (26:40):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (26:40):
I again one of the how many hits are you
going to have that are that long lasting and that iconic?
And the answer is probably very few in your lifetime.
I was so fortunate to have that hit. And then
I was young enough that we sort of spent the
money before we had it, and we at that point
had moved to LA and we got word one day

(27:01):
in the studio that the Canadian company GRT that had
signed Dan and then we're distributed by twentieth Century Fox
in the US were going bankrupt and all of the
money that had started to come in from you know,
early late seventy seven, seventy eight, when the record hit,

(27:22):
all that money and the album sales and everything were
basically heading towards GRT or probably had been received by GRT.
And we actually sent somebody there who watched grt's office
be padlocked and I never saw and my partner and
I and Dan as an artist, never saw probably seventy

(27:44):
percent of that of money. Ever, you know, later on
down the line we would see money. But you know,
as producers and as the artist, you don't get money
from radio play. You only get it from mechanicals, from
the actual record label. So that was a pretty big blow.
And we couldn't get the money because we were so
low on the list of people that were owed money

(28:06):
that I guess we would have gotten pennies. So what
happens next with you and Dan, Well, we did a
fourth album by the time we found out that the
royalties weren't coming in from times sometimes that we touch,
and that album did come out. But after that, there

(28:28):
was just some things that happened, which again happened in
show business. My partner, Matt McCauley's parents had financed Dan's
original record so that was their production company that did
the albums, and so Dan's lawyers found a way out
of their contract and Dan then re signed with Columbia,
leaving Matt and I no longer involved in producing him.

(28:50):
Matt and I had moved to la under the umbrella
of Clive Davis, and you know, we stopped working with
Dan and there was some lawsuits Buteen Matthew's parents and
Dan and I was out of that loop. But you know,
things happen, you know, crap happens.

Speaker 2 (29:15):
Okay, we talk about how well or poorly streaming pays
today in a year. How much money do you make
for sometimes when we touch?

Speaker 3 (29:25):
Now, well, you know I can't divulge that, but it's
not the kind of money you would hope. Sorry, is
it six figures? No?

Speaker 2 (29:37):
No? Okay, So how do you get to deal with Clive?
And what is the experience with Clive?

Speaker 3 (29:46):
Well, you know, a lot of good things come out
of having a hit record, like sometimes when we touch,
and so once we did. I had produced a demo
with matt of a guy named fran mckendrey, which Arista
then signed, and then Clive took notice of us and
realized we had a big hit and said you should
work for Arista as staff producers. And I really wanted

(30:06):
to move to la at that point because I thought
that's where everything was happening. And so Matthew and I
and not Yeah, Matthew and I moved at the same
time in seventy eight, Clive Davis put us up at
the chef to Marmont for six months. We've produced a
number of interesting projects for Clive and then I had

(30:27):
a falling out, which I talked about in the book.
And I don't mind discussing that if that's what you're
looking for.

Speaker 2 (30:34):
So tell us. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (30:36):
Well, you know, we were sort of Clive's fair haired boys,
and we were doing some nice projects, including an album
for Randy Edelman, and Randy had been signed to Arista
because of his writing a song called Weekend in New
England for Barry Manilow, and so we did a new
album with Randy once we got to LA in the

(30:58):
summer of seventy eight, and in the middle of the album,
we got a phone call. I should say I got
the phone call. It was an early morning phone call
at the shot to Marmont. I got it, and it
was Clive saying, hey, listen, I want you to stop
working on Randy. I've got a smash hit from Melissa
Manchester and I would love you and Matt to produce it,

(31:21):
but you have to stop everything on Randy. And that
sounded wonderful and I literally just said okay, Well, will
you call Randy and let him know that things are postponed?
Or should I? And he said, you don't get it,
and he hung up, and then he called Harry Maslin.
Harry Maslin had a hit with Don't Cry Out Loud,

(31:44):
and I love Harry, so, you know, I pat him
on the back. He did a great job, but we
lost out because I didn't understand. What I should have
said to Clive was whatever you say.

Speaker 2 (31:58):
So how did it literally end with the STA.

Speaker 3 (32:02):
Shortly after? You know, we were asked to, you know,
find a home in LA and finish off the projects
and then say Levy, bye bye. That's life.

Speaker 2 (32:13):
So you go back to Toronto. Do you feel like
you have your tail between your legs? What's your state
of mind? Well?

Speaker 3 (32:20):
I spent the next couple of years in LA. I
married my wife from Toronto in LA and then we
did We had a nice time, and I was busy
as a producer, but nothing particularly exciting. And my partner
at that point, Matt McCauley, decided not to produce anymore
because he had married someone quite wealthy and so he

(32:43):
didn't have the same passion I had for working with
artists and making their records sound great, so we decided
we want to have kids. So in the winter of
eighty one, Dina and I moved back to Toronto. And
I wouldn't say I had my tail between my legs,
but I was certainly hopeful that I had become a

(33:04):
hometown homecoming hero. And I don't think I was. I
think it was sort of, oh, you're back, you know,
So it was it was a little bit of a
rude awakening, you know.

Speaker 2 (33:18):
So how did you restart?

Speaker 3 (33:21):
It's amazing what drives people. We had our first child
in eighty four, so I spent a couple of years
back in Toronto, you know, getting a few projects here
and there. One of them was great fun, which was
producing Ronnie Hawkins, and just for the laughter quota, that
was really I mean, I'm good for the next two

(33:41):
hundred years. So you know, I did some cool stuff,
but it, you know, but it was intermittent. It wasn't
like people were knocking down my door to get the
guy who came home. But I think the thing that
really drove me was my first of all, my passion
to keep working musically. And secondly, we had our first
child in eighty four, and I just looked at my

(34:03):
little baby and I just said, I cannot let this
kid be worried about money. So I got to find
an answer, and I would, you know, I just put
it out there. I fell into a couple of TV
movies that I scored, and you know, that's when I
went to Robert Mogan asked for her as while at
a discount, and all of a sudden, by eighty five,

(34:25):
I had fallen into composing for TV and film in Canada,
doing us work a lot of the times because they
needed Canadian content for certain parts of these Canadian American productions.

Speaker 2 (34:38):
So at first your thrilled just to be paying the bills.
But then you wake up and you're a film and
TV composer. You talk about it in the book that
it's basically a lot of work alone. What's your state
of mind? Then?

Speaker 3 (34:56):
Well, I think initially the money was good and the
back end of airplay is wonderful. It gets paid by
at Skapper BMI. And in those days, you know, it
was in Toronto, probably there were about ten other composers
I'd be vying against, you know, and competing against, and

(35:20):
it was just really challenging. Bob. I mean, I liked
the challenge of all of a sudden writing music for TV.
I felt that it was a good instinct.

Speaker 2 (35:31):
I had.

Speaker 3 (35:32):
It helped my keyboard chops because I would do everything
on the keyboard and improvise and use the Kurzweilds multi
track sequencer. And I was started doing orchestral scores, just
learning while I earned, and the earning was good.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
Okay, there's a hierarchy. It's an international business. There are
household name composers. Once you're doing this, you're saying that's
my goal.

Speaker 3 (35:59):
No. I had such a tremendous respect for the true
top echelon, you know, the John Williams and the Jerry Goldsmith's,
and you know, and of course Randy Newman's brilliant scores
and Thomas Newman, all these wonderful people who I wouldn't
even want to consider myself a film and TV composer

(36:19):
compared to them. But I think where I was working,
which was in TV mostly TV series, dramatic series with
sometimes a lot of horror elements or sci fi elements,
I think I was pretty good for what I did,
but I had no belief I could ever step into
those big shoes.

Speaker 2 (36:41):
So you do this for a number of years. Are
you muddling along or you feel like, oh I'm mistending
what's going on career wise?

Speaker 3 (36:52):
These are good questions.

Speaker 2 (36:54):
You know.

Speaker 3 (36:54):
My again, the money was really good, and it was
stable money in the sense I didn't have to depend
on a record label and their unique ways of making
sure you didn't get paid how much you really earned.
You know, you got your money from as gap every quarter,
and you got good money for doing the shows by
the productions. So all of a sudden, I was lifted

(37:17):
into a really good level of success financially and had
two kids by eighty seven, and I was just enjoying
everything about life. And even though that it was a
lonely occupation, you know, I worked out of the house,
so everything worked out really well. And I don't think

(37:38):
I muddled along. I think I really tried to do
better each time. But again, you know, I have a
certain amount of belief of what I'm good at and
what I think I'm not quite as good at. But
I think I was good at what I did, and
I tried to please my producers.

Speaker 2 (37:56):
So you start off going to John Hammond's office trying
to be James Taylor singer songwriter. Now you're doing film scores,
definitely faceless behind the business, maybe an end credit in
many of these cases. Sometimes up front now you say,
oh man, I'm thrilled to be in music, or how

(38:17):
the fuck did I get here?

Speaker 3 (38:22):
I think if you look at my career, there's just
these incredible sort of left turns, you know. And when
I fell into TV and film, what really made the
difference was I was a new dad, and my record
career had really been very, very minimal compared to what
I hoped it would be. When I moved back to Toronto,

(38:42):
and all of a sudden, the money was coming in
and I just became a human jukebox throwing music into
the computer, and you know, and I was doing three
series at once generally for about fifteen years.

Speaker 2 (38:55):
So there are other rock musicians who've gone into this
scoring and done even Mark Mother's Law of Devo never
mind Danny Elfman, etc. Is there a natural connection or
is just pure hard work?

Speaker 3 (39:12):
Well? I think someone like Danny or Mark Mothersbow, I
think those are wonderfully talented guys who clearly I think
it was very suitable for them to do that work.
For me, I was doing it against the fact that
I like being around others. I like to work in
a team. When I produce a record, I like to
be with other musicians, and I like to work with

(39:33):
my artists and my engineers. And so when you're doing
TV and film score, you're basically by yourself, staring at
the screen all day under deadlines. So for me, I
think what I would like to be able to say
is I think that people who worked especially on certain projects,

(39:54):
if you were a songwriter or understood good songwriting and
you were a film composer, you could write really hooky
music because that's what you felt in your head. So,
for instance, if you're writing a theme song, like for instance,
Danny wrote the Simpsons theme song, that's because he's a
wonderful songwriter and he knew how to make a simple

(40:17):
phrase da da da. He just knew. And by the way,
that reminds me of the Jetsons. I think he sort
of got that good help from the Jetsons. Hey, here's
George Jetson's meet the Simpsons. It's sort of liked that,
and I think that, you know, but it takes someone
like Danny, who who was an Oingo blanco artist and
a great songwriter. I thought, unique songwriter, and I think

(40:39):
that may be a skill that I had which made
some of my music for certain TV series better because
I could write music that actually had more melodic hooks
and more interesting production because that was my background.

Speaker 2 (40:53):
Okay, you go on in the book saying if you
missed a deadline, you were out. Are the composers really
that fungible or they say, oh yeah, we like Fred.
You know, hey, he's got something going on, he's overloaded.
What was really the situation there?

Speaker 3 (41:11):
Well, first of all, I was doing three series at once,
and you never wanted to tell anybody else you were
doing those other two series, so you know, you're always exclusive,
and even though contractually you weren't, but you you know,
it was like having three girlfriends. You don't want to
tell the other two. But you know, Randy Newman once
told me, and I've spent a little time with Randy,
but only a little. And when I was in the

(41:32):
midst of my big TV in film years, he just
said to me one day, he said, you know, Fred
were just lowly dogs in a film. And I said,
you know, you're right, because we really are just part
of a team. And what really matters, is you know,
to get to that broadcast date without any problems. And yes,
if you got sick and you fell off the treadmill

(41:53):
or something happened and you fell off the treadmill, they
wouldn't blink an eye. It was like, Okay, gotta go.
Someone else has been hired and a way and you're done.
So that kind of sort of damicles pressure was really hard,
but I got through it. I don't think I ever
fell in the fifteen sixteen years that I did it.

(42:13):
I don't think I ever missed a deadline.

Speaker 2 (42:15):
How much of getting the gigs is hustle? How much
is waiting for the phone to ring?

Speaker 3 (42:23):
Well, you know, in TV and film you have an agent,
and I've had different agents, and they're all people I've
really loved and they've done good things for me. But
their job basically was to let me know what was
out there, and then they might make a phone call
about it and I might have to audition a demo
of ideas musically, and that would be then I'd be
competing against other composers. So the phone didn't ring generally

(42:48):
with a phone call saying hey, Fred, you're the right guy.
But certainly it did happen to some degree, but it's
a combination of everyone's efforts. Keeping your ear to the
ground and being tenacious.

Speaker 2 (43:00):
Yeah, okay, you meet a woman, you chase your to Paris,
you leave your wife. Oh, Bob, you go to therapy,
and you stop composing. Walk us through this.

Speaker 3 (43:17):
Well, now, Bob, come on, now you know phem the book? Yeah,
I know, we're only human. Well, I make it a
very short part of the book. You know, the truth is,
the book isn't about me. It's really about the people
I've worked with and the projects I've worked with, and
my life in music. So you know, the actual personal
stuff is only there to help the depth of it.

(43:37):
But I did. I'll tell you what happened simply. In
nineteen ninety eight. I had been scoring film relentlessly, TV
and film relentlessly since eighty five, so you know, that's
a long haul, and I continue to do it till
two thousand and one, actually, But by ninety eight I

(43:58):
was starting to get pretty pretty burnt out. And I
met this lovely girl who was quite young, I mean,
you know, legal but young, and my marriage had been
sort of becoming quite you know, not ugly, but not comfortable,

(44:21):
and I clearly was having a midlife crisis and I
fell in love with someone and left the family to
be with that girl. And it was interesting two years
that we were together. And I don't recommend it for people,
but I mean I sort of had to go through
what I went through. That relationship ended because I couldn't

(44:44):
find a way for the new relationship to ever work
out and be part of my children's lives, and there
was my responsibility was the children first, And so that
ended that relationship. And you know, I tried to get
back with my wife. We both tried. I failed and

(45:06):
decided by two thousand and one that I needed to
move out of Toronto. I needed to go to Nashville
and go back to making records, which is what I
frankly thought I did well. And I was pretty tired
of the life of a TV and film composer.

Speaker 2 (45:29):
Okay, let's go back a couple of chapters. If you're
working around the clock, how'd you meet this woman?

Speaker 3 (45:35):
Just happened to meet her. And I have a home
in Martha's Vineyard that I had for years that again
was you know, bought by the great money I was
making a TV and film and you know, she was
a friend of the family. Basically of this family we
knew and we just met her one time and there
was some initial sparks.

Speaker 2 (45:55):
And when was the last time you had contact with her?

Speaker 3 (45:59):
I saw her with her child on Martha's vineyard, probably
about eleven years ago.

Speaker 2 (46:05):
Okay, you buy a condo in Toronto, do you go
to therapy multiple times a week? What do you learned
when going to therapy?

Speaker 3 (46:13):
The first thing you learn is that in Toronto, your
medical is free. So I had a great psychiatrist and
I saw him five days a week for probably five months,
and it was absolutely wonderful. I mean, I really got
myself back together, you know. I mean, by the way,
I was still working the whole time, but I just

(46:36):
I had Brian McDermott as my doctor and he was lovely.
And after that, you know, as I said, then it
just came. I just came to the realization that I,
you know, I spent two years from ninety eight to
two thousand and one, and then that relationship ended. And
once once I decided to make a change, I also
wanted to make a change and go back to making records.

Speaker 2 (46:57):
Walk us through that a little bit in detail. You
have a career, you can continue to work, you have
a desire. That must have been a very hard decision.

Speaker 3 (47:11):
I don't remember it being a hard decision. I remember
it being something that was so pleasurable in my head
that I could be living in Nashville, which I had
spent some time in and really loved it, working with
the greatest musicians that have ever been in the same
place together. And I loved making records, and I wanted

(47:33):
to see if I could go back to making records
full time. So I was excited. It really wasn't a
hard decision. And plus Bob, I was so tired of
my years of TV and film score I really had.
It was like a fastball pitcher who lost his fastball.
I really could not pitch that that way anymore.

Speaker 2 (47:51):
For getting divorce and splitting up the assets after seventeen
years of doing this, theoretically, could you have retired and
lived off the money that you'd made. Was it that lucrative?

Speaker 3 (48:05):
No? No, but it could have taken good care of
me if I hadn't gotten divorced.

Speaker 2 (48:12):
Possibly, And so just on a divorce, how do you
heal the family.

Speaker 3 (48:23):
With my son? It took longer and with my daughter.
For whatever reason, she got it and she was easier.

Speaker 2 (48:30):
And your ex wife we're.

Speaker 3 (48:33):
Still great friends. My daughter now lives in Tarzana and
she moved from Toronto with her husband and her two children,
and my ex lives in the guest house than I
see her all the time. She's great.

Speaker 2 (48:46):
So your ex never got remarried.

Speaker 3 (48:49):
She's with other men, but never married.

Speaker 2 (48:52):
Okay, why move to Nashville.

Speaker 3 (48:56):
It's because it's so close to the ocean. Yeah, no,
I wish it was. Why Nashville, Well, because there were
one hundred studios and the greatest musicians in the world.
So for me to make records with them really upped

(49:16):
my game and gave me such pleasure that to this day,
every day I'm in the studio is a blessing. I
just love it.

Speaker 2 (49:23):
That's why. Okay, Nashville has evolved in the last twenty
five years. You know, in the first decade of the century,
a lot of people in La saying, hey, yeah, you know,
I'm going to start over in Nashville. Now seemingly everybody
moved there. There's a lot of traffic. What was it

(49:45):
like moving in two thousand and one to Nashville being
a Long Island Jew.

Speaker 3 (49:51):
Well probably you know, as goofy as it was for
Long Island Jew to be in Toronto or you know.

Speaker 2 (49:56):
There are a lot of Jews in Toronto.

Speaker 3 (49:58):
Well, yeah, they weren't Long Island though. Believe me, it's
a different Jew.

Speaker 2 (50:03):
You know.

Speaker 3 (50:03):
I can tell you that when I moved to Nashville
in two thousand and one, it was a sleepy town
still and I had been there over the years and
had always enjoyed it. It was quite foreign to me,
but fun, and I just, you know what, I was
welcomed there. I've never had one moment of in my

(50:26):
face anti Semitism ever in Nashville.

Speaker 2 (50:29):
You know. Okay, so you're now in Nashville, how do
you get work?

Speaker 3 (50:35):
Well, I would bring work there. You know. I never
fell into the world of country music. I did a
few projects here and there, but when I got to Nashville,
I was already doing work for Disney Records, So I
had kids music I was doing, which was a lot
of fun, generally attached to a big Disney animated feature.
And I was also doing some singer songwriters that I

(50:57):
liked who liked me. I had just come off of
doing a Christopherson album, a Jimmy Webb album, and a
Barry Man album. And so I guess my cred was
good with the kind of artists that I wanted to produce.
So I brought work to Nashville. Nashville did not give
me the work.

Speaker 2 (51:16):
Okay. So when you're doing the Jimmy Webb, Chris, Christopherson,
Berry Man records, you're still living in Toronto.

Speaker 3 (51:23):
No, No, I'm well, okay, I'm sorry. Yeah, did Tennessee
Pieces for Jimmy in nineteen ninety six, did the Austin
Sessions for Christofferson in nineteen ninety seven, and did Barry
Man's Sole In Inspiration in nineteen ninety seven. So yes,
I was living in Toronto and hadn't left my marriage yet.

Speaker 2 (51:42):
Yeah, So tell us how you got those records off
the ground.

Speaker 3 (51:47):
Well, you know, the longest client I have as a
producer is Jimmy Webb. I've been producing Jimmy since nineteen
seventy eight. He was a hero of mine, and I
actually loved his soul albums and his solo voice, and
once we had some times when we touch. It gave
me the ability to reach out through twentieth Century Fox Records.

(52:10):
They reached out to Jimmy in seventy eight and we
met my partner Matt McCauley, at that time was still
working with me and Jimmy. Matt and I just fell
in love with each other, and Matt and I produced
an album called Angel Heart seventy eight, and then when
Matt walked away from producing, by nineteen eighty, I still

(52:32):
was working with Jimmy and continued to this day, and
I've been his musical director at times and his record
producer over seven albums.

Speaker 2 (52:41):
Okay, you're a wet behind the years guy. This guy
has gigantic kids. How do you convince him to work
with you?

Speaker 3 (52:51):
Well, we had the big hit, we had some times
when we touch and we had Harvey Cooper at twentieth
Century Fox Records telling Jimmy's manager that we were geniuses.
I don't believe we were. I think we were really
good and we were very precocious, Bob. I think that
that's how we I think we perceived ourselves as really good, surprisingly,

(53:13):
really good as a team to produce, but also I
think we were just really good for our age. So
it was thrilling that Jimmy Webb looked at us, and
don't forget, Jimmy's biggest hits happened when he was twenty
twenty one and twenty two. He looked at us like,
you know, I get these guys.

Speaker 2 (53:32):
They're like I was, Okay, Jimmy has these iconic songs. Yes,
he has these solo albums that have not been as
commercially successful. Is that because his voice is not as good,
the times have changed, the songs are not as good.

(53:52):
You've been working with him for almost fifty years. Give
us your take.

Speaker 3 (53:56):
Well, again, this is an interesting question. I think a
number of things hurt Jimmy, which shouldn't have because I
think he is probably one of America's greatest songwriters, along
with the top five greatest songwriters. I think his voice
was really good. It was raw and lovely. And I

(54:18):
think that the problem was is that Jimmy was perceived
by the public in those days, and I'm talking about
the early seventies as the guy who wrote for the
Fifth Dimension, the guy who wrote for Glenn Campbell, who
was Republican, the guy who wrote for Richard Harris, who
was a British theatrical guy, and it just seemed to
be his perception by the public. The perception by the

(54:42):
public was that he was a square and a Republican,
and of course it couldn't have been further from the truth,
but that perception hurt him. And then on top of it,
then he would do his solo albums, which were really creative,
soulful singer songwriter records. They weren't produced so well. I mean,

(55:03):
Jimmy produced the first couple himself, and they're raw. You know,
I love them, but they're raw, and you know, I
just think that he They people couldn't make the translation
that Jimmy Webb, this wonder kind who did MacArthur Park,
could be again a vital singing, singing songwriter, autobiographical songwriter,

(55:26):
and they were wrong because he's one of the greatest.

Speaker 2 (55:30):
How he ended up working with Chris Christophers and what
is that experience.

Speaker 3 (55:33):
Like, well, that was one of the great experiences. You know.
I had done ten easy pieces for Guardian Records, which
was a part of EMI Records. And Jay Landers, who's
been a great support to me all of my career,
literally as early as seventy eight. You know, Jay called me,
you know, sorry, I called Jay let me go. Back

(55:55):
in ninety six, and I'm going to tell you a
story which is true because everything I'm saying, you're getting
the truth out of me. And I like that. Jimmy
was having a very hard time in his life in
ninety six, going through the worst divorce I've ever seen.
He had six children, he had an irs attachment that

(56:16):
was millions of dollars, and he was extremely depressed and
there was absolutely alcohol, etc. That were causing problems because
he was so depressed. And I loved him, he was
part of my family. And I convinced him to come
to Toronto, get out of ground zero, come to Toronto and

(56:39):
we would make a quick little album of Jimmy doing
his most famous songs, but for the first time him
doing them, and to do them in a very sort
of intimate, unplugged manner. And I had to really convince him, Bob.
He was very, very adamant. He did not want to
do it. Finally I convinced him because I told him
that he should do it for his kids, just to

(57:01):
have it on record, and we went to Toronto. He
went to Toronto. I put him up in a hotel,
got him out of the fire, so to speak, and
we made ten easy pieces, which is really one of
the greatest projects I'll ever be involved with, and that
because it was such a cool idea. I called Jay Landers,
who was at Emi at Guardian, and Jay said, I

(57:24):
love Jimmy. If you'll do it for twenty five thousand,
I'll give you the green light. And I said, I'll
take it. And at that point I was doing my
TV and film score years. I was making good money,
so God, if I needed to not get paid, it's fine,
I do it anyway. So I brought Jimmy in. We
made the record and it got incredible response review wise.

(57:46):
It didn't sell initially, but then Jay was able to
then go, who do you want to do next? Let's
take a look, and we sort of talked about different people.
Barry Man definitely, who I had also spent my adult
life I'm working with, and he said, what about Christofferson?
And I said, oh, yeah, that's a cool idea. And

(58:07):
I had known christ Dopperson's work. I didn't like his
old records that were like the monument albums from the
seventies because they put him with the same Nashville musicians
who were doing Conway Twitty the same day, and the
music sucked and Chris was crooning, and he's not a crooner.
And I also remember Bob. I'm sure you know this

(58:28):
is that Chris loved Bob Dylan so much that in
the early days when he was in Nashville, he actually
got a job as a janitor at CBS Studios just
to be close to Dylan, who was making Blonde on Blonde.
But that's how much he revered Dylan. He would literally
empty out ashtrays just to catch a little bit of
the music. So we presented this to his manager and

(58:51):
then to Chris, and I said, I'd like to make
a record that sounds a little bit like a Blonde
on Blonde vibe of all of your great hits. So literally,
you know, bring four or five great players in just
you know, let it be sort of somewhat free in
the arrangements, and you know, if you need to talk
through the songs, you talk through the songs. But I

(59:11):
wanted him to be something he would want to aspire to,
and blonde on Blond were the three keywords for him.

Speaker 2 (59:20):
You make the record, you have an ongoing relationship with
Jimmy Webb. Was it one and done with Chris? Christoph
person or do you have contact with him after.

Speaker 3 (59:31):
I had some contact with Chris after. He has always
told me, and I know he's passed on. He he
always told me that the Austin Sessions was his favorite record,
and I've seen it in Prince I know it is
true that he said it to other people. And we
tried to stay in touch here and there. I actually
had him guessed on a couple projects that we were doing,

(59:53):
and I loved him. I mean, the guy was just
one of the most amazing people. My memories of Chris
are so full of love and such and I have
such gratitude that I had the chance to work with him.
But we never made another album again.

Speaker 2 (01:00:06):
No, Okay, Berry Man with his wife Cynthia Well have
iconic kids in the league of Jimmy Webb. You work
with Barry Man. What is the magic there?

Speaker 3 (01:00:20):
What is the magic of Barry's writing?

Speaker 2 (01:00:22):
Yeah?

Speaker 3 (01:00:24):
Well again, you know, tenaciousness, a drive. He's a sort
of a Brooklyn guy who you know, had to get
out of Brooklyn and like Carol King and Jerry Goff
and Barry Man and Cynthia while were products of the
even though they didn't work at the Brill Building, it
was during the Brill Building years. They were actually at

(01:00:46):
sixteen fifty Broadway, but you know they came out of
a place where they got a phone call sitting at
the publishing office in New York, Connie Francis needs a
follow up to such and such, and they all all
these right would sit together and then they'd go into
their cubicles apart and try to write the follow up
for Connie Francis. Let's say that kind of training along

(01:01:10):
with a gift, which Barry had and Cynthia had, and
Carol and Jerry had, and all these wonderful writers from
you know, from those Brill Building days, what training that
was if you had a gift, it was amazing. And
so that's the magic that Barry had. Its just it
was a combination of just being in the right place

(01:01:30):
at the right time for what he did, which was,
you know, he could just sit the piano and just
come up with a great melody, and Cynthia could write
a great lyric and it was just bang, bang bang.
In a sense, they were doing what I was doing
in my TV and film years, in the sense it
was an unrelenting you know, every day, you know, just
writing music, writing you know, and that's thrilling on some levels,

(01:01:52):
but even more thrilling for them because they were seeing
their records go to the top of the charts, and
they were also working with other people and it was
you know, I imagine it was great fun. Although interestingly enough,
and Barry is truly extended family to me, when I
asked him one time, you know, if that was the

(01:02:14):
happiest time of his life, he said, that's the worst time.
And I said why. He said, because as good as
your hit was, you had to get the next one.
And the pressure was terrible.

Speaker 2 (01:02:25):
Just staying with some of these iconic writers. Most of
these people have a very hot era and then they
don't have the same level of success. Why do you
think that is?

Speaker 3 (01:02:39):
Well, you know, this is again it's a great question,
and I write it. I write about it in my book.
That especially the what I call the autobiographical singer songwriters,
you know that we've mentioned before, the Paul Simon's, the
James Taylor's, Neil Young, all these wonderful writers who Jackson Brown, etc.

(01:03:02):
You know, they give so much in the early part
of their lives, and I think it's an understandable thing
that they just probably get somewhat written out after ten
or fifteen albums of brilliance. It may just be that
the well is dry comparatively. And you know, you had

(01:03:27):
a great piece about the Elton John Brandy Carlisle album.
To me, that's the great example, because Elton John is
a god to me. But I don't think there's any
gas in the tank anymore to be able to write
the brilliant songs he wrote. And I think it's just
it's an emotional situation, but it's also just the fact

(01:03:48):
that you you know that part of you may not
be there anymore. So I know that it's different when
you're looking at someone like a Burt Backerack or a
Barry in Cynthia. You know they can still craft a song.
But I don't know. I don't know if a great songwriter,
you know, who gave us so much can continue to

(01:04:09):
give us that much every single time into their seventies
and eighties. I don't think that's possible.

Speaker 2 (01:04:14):
Okay, needless to say, you're a ficial.

Speaker 3 (01:04:17):
Are people gonna hate me now? They're gonna hate me
now for saying that.

Speaker 2 (01:04:20):
No, I don't. I have my own theories about it.
I wanted to hear your theory my theory, and I
don't say yours is wrong, but these artists tend to
be maladjusted, alienated people, and they believe that this success
will make their lives work. And when they have their
success and their lives still don't work, they can't do
it anymore. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:04:42):
I think that's a great element of it, you know.
And I think what's another great element is that And
something you just hit on is that I think the
great singer songwriter is the autobiographical singer songwriters. They generally
had some sort of real sadness or trauma which they
work out through their writing of songs. And like you said,

(01:05:04):
once that trauma's gone down the road, maybe it's not
quite there anymore. But you know, I actually sat with
Sting one day and I only sat with him once
in my life, and we were sitting at a bar
with Rita Wilson and a few other people, and he
and I sort of, you know, started talking about something,
and I just, you know, I didn't know why I
felt so bold, but I just said, you know, I

(01:05:26):
have a feeling that, you know, we were talking about songwriting.
I said, I have a feeling that your background contains
some trauma or real sadness that your songs help you
work through. And he said, you're right, And I said, well,
you know, I think it's very common that, you know,
James Taylor had a rough teenage years. You know, we

(01:05:46):
know all this. Joni Mitchell had polio, I mean, you
name it, they had it. Neil Young had epilepsy and
other stuff. And all I'm saying is and Jimmy Webb
his the wind beneath his wings was his mom and
she died when he was fourteen. And so all of

(01:06:07):
these things make the Jimmy Web songs brilliant, and sometimes
they make these other people's songs brilliant. That's why James
Taylor can write a fire and rain that still is amazing.

Speaker 2 (01:06:20):
Today, let's witch back to you. Yeah, you're a film composer.
You go to Nashville, you're making records. The business changed
along the way. Okay, needless to say, there's Napster, there's

(01:06:42):
the iTunes store. Now they're streaming an on demand thing.
In the old days, the record companies would pay more
to record, the records fee for producer. You make a record,
the odds of consumption being so large that there's a
big win or low. So what is your perspective and

(01:07:06):
how does it work out financially.

Speaker 3 (01:07:10):
Well? When I make records, and certainly ever since Napster
and then of course streaming, well, first of all Napster,
then downloading, and then streaming, we saw that the album
as a way to make money in royalties was going
to be really jeopardized. I'm not in it for the money,

(01:07:32):
so it does not cause me a lot of duress
that a record I'll make ninety five percent of the
time now will not sell. But if it makes people
happy or if it gets a certain amount of streams,
I guess I'm okay. I just have to live with
what it is. You know, you can't really fight technology,

(01:07:53):
and I can't be a naysayer about it. I wish
things would have gone back to the way they were
when music wasn't free, but it's just the way it is.
And so you know, Bob, it's my love of music
that makes me do what I do. It's not about
making money. If I wanted to make money, I would
have done something else.

Speaker 2 (01:08:12):
Okay, so you make these records, how much does it
cost to make them?

Speaker 3 (01:08:18):
You know, every record is different. Sometimes we have a
great budget. I meaning a great budget could be, in
my opinion, one hundred and fifty thousand. Sometimes you have
a budget of thirty five or forty thousand, you know.
I mean, you make them work, You make your deals
with the studios. You you know, everyone wants to work.
That's what happens now. You know, in the old days

(01:08:38):
of Nashville there were triple scale players. That's never going
to happen again. Everyone gets a single scale. You know.
That's just the way it is. And you know what,
I used to get great production fees. Every production fee
now is different. Sometimes it's good, sometimes it's you know,
I want to make this record, so I'll do it
for that. It's not what powers me. What powers me

(01:09:00):
as the music.

Speaker 2 (01:09:02):
And in most cases is it a label paying or
is there a vanity project or a deep pocket.

Speaker 3 (01:09:11):
It's all the above.

Speaker 2 (01:09:12):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:09:12):
I mean, if you look at my schedule over the
past year, you know, I did a wonderful album with
Bill Medley of the Righteous Brothers just came out in
February of Bill doing iconic old country songs done in
a very sort of intimate and Americana style, and I'm
so proud of it. That record was commissioned eventually by

(01:09:35):
Curb Records. I had the idea for it, and we
were trying to shop it, and then my Curb got
involved and said I want this record, So that was
a Curb record with Curb paying the bill. But then
the next album I did might have been a project
for Brooke Morriber, who's a great New York artist, completely
self financed. So it really runs the gamut.

Speaker 2 (01:09:56):
And are most of these records you do idea, you pitch,
where someone comes to you again.

Speaker 3 (01:10:05):
It just there's no rhyme or reason. Certainly I have
ideas and I'll pitch those, and I'll have certain artists
that I might know. I might suggest a concept to
them or again, or an artist just happens to email
me or call me, or a record label emails me
or calls me. It just where you take it, wherever

(01:10:25):
it comes from.

Speaker 2 (01:10:26):
Okay, you are in living in music city. You are
not the only producer there. What's your special sauce that
someone should work with you as opposed to anybody else.

Speaker 3 (01:10:40):
Well, of course you know I'm the best. That's the
first reason. No, that is so not true, because there
is no best. I think I'm really good at what
I do. But I think I'm particularly good at making records.
But I'm an artist producer. I try to fulfill the
artist's vision. That's my job. Ego is not involved in

(01:11:01):
making a record, but I want to make the record
that the artist wants to make. And sometimes the artist
knows exactly what to do, and sometimes they need my
help on every level. But we do it together until
I fulfill their vision. And that's what makes me a
producer people want to work with in all different genres.

Speaker 2 (01:11:19):
You know, there's been an evolution in producers. Without going
through sixty years worth of history for a while, they're
engineers to this day became producers and that is not
that that's an important skill, but not the same skill.
So are you someone who's gonna say, give me the demos,

(01:11:39):
maybe move the chorus to the front, maybe need a
bridge here, or you that kind of producer?

Speaker 3 (01:11:45):
And that's exactly the kind of producer I am. But
it's not me telling them what to do. It's me saying,
what do you think about this? I like this idea?
What do you think If they say it's great, we
do it. The artist has the final decision every time,
and so if they say, oh I love that, Fred,
then we make that change on the bridge. But yes,

(01:12:06):
I'm a musician and I'm I'm an arranger, and so
my engineering skills are zero. So I have wonderful engineers
that I work with, and they really allow me to
be even a better producer and a better person with
the artist.

Speaker 2 (01:12:21):
Okay, I call you, Fred, I want you to produce
my record. I want you to produce my record, but
your book for a year solid? Who do you tell
me to go work with?

Speaker 3 (01:12:31):
Hmm? It would depend on the genre, you know. But
that's a good question. I have people I love, who
are you know, the right the right call for the job.
One of my great pals is Kyle Lenning out of Nashville.
You know, Kyle can do country really well. He can
do pop really well, you know, in the sense of
singer songwriter stuff. I like Kyle. You know, if I

(01:12:54):
was too busy to do something, I would give Kyle
a call. He'd be someone. There's other people as well.
No one comes to mind immediately, and luckily I haven't
had I mean, I guess or unluckily I haven't been
booked a year in advance in a while.

Speaker 2 (01:13:10):
Okay, if you just said I'm going to rely on incoming.
Are enough people looking for you to keep you busy?
Or do you have to hustle to a degree.

Speaker 3 (01:13:22):
What I'd like to say is is that I wouldn't
use the word hustle, but I would use the word
I'm still driven. So I'll create concepts and make those calls.
And sometimes I don't like to just wait around for
the next thing I want, you know, I'd like to
be purposeful. I mean my home listen, I look at you,
and I look at everything you're doing on how many

(01:13:43):
hours in the day, and how many of those hours
are you working. I like to be purposeful too, you know,
And so I try to make things happen if things
aren't happening.

Speaker 2 (01:13:54):
Okay, So in terms of music today, you're in music City.
A lot of you know, countries cut there. It can
be cut a few other places, but it's not only country.
What's your view of the music scene today. Let me
set it up a little bit. We're of the same

(01:14:15):
Vintage music really drove the culture in the sixties and said,
if you want to know what was going on, you
turned on the radio, you got the music, you got
the news. Okay, we had in the early nineties hip hop.
You know, fuck the police that we found out what
these rappers were saying was true. Now we have a
mortgage board of sounds. Where's the excitement and where is

(01:14:37):
the business going?

Speaker 3 (01:14:40):
Well, I had a feeling you'd ask me that kind
of question, and I don't really have an answer. I
think that where we're going for me is not a
direction that I particularly enjoy, because I like, again the
quality of someone's personality and gift to come off on

(01:15:03):
record or live. And when I see a lot of
records that do really well now, especially in the pop realm,
are generally you know, the seven songwriters on one record,
there's four programmers and two this and that, you know,
and it's much more about you know. It doesn't feel
melodic to me. So I can't tell you where it's going.

(01:15:24):
But I know one thing, and that AI can't possibly
be helpful to give us the kind of soul of
a Ray Charles or a James Taylor or Paul Simon.

Speaker 2 (01:15:36):
I would agree with that you're in Nashville. To what
degree is there cross pollination in a community in music?

Speaker 3 (01:15:46):
I don't feel there is. I feel that the country
world really is quite there's a fence around it. I've
never been able to cross into that fence. But that's
okay because I don't really love a lot of pop country,
so I don't really feel like I should be a
part of it, although I could have done it, especially

(01:16:07):
ten or fifteen years ago, but I think the cross pollination.
I don't feel as there within the country world, and
that's pretty well their own world, and it's a boys
club to a great degree. But I also feel that
there's so much music being done in Nashville that's not country,

(01:16:28):
that's everything else that that area is quite fluid and
quite lovely.

Speaker 2 (01:16:34):
So let's say I came to you, I'm a developing artist.
You know, are you so network? That's got a bad connotation,
But is the community such they say, oh, this is
a guy you should co write with, or this guy's
got a band. Do you tend to know everybody in
your world?

Speaker 3 (01:16:53):
In my world, yes, I don't know the worlds that
are the more processed, you know, pop stuff that's out there.

Speaker 2 (01:17:00):
And to what degree are you actively following the scene,
whether it be the music itself, where the business, or
you and your own little niche and your sort of focused.

Speaker 3 (01:17:12):
I'd like to believe I have one foot looking around
and listening to everything, and clearly my other foot is
just very much about the music that propelled me, that
came before me and during my years.

Speaker 2 (01:17:29):
And what do you have coming down the pike for you?

Speaker 3 (01:17:33):
Well, right now, I've got an interesting project, which is
the Gena Cecilia album on Blue elon small label that
does a lot of cool things. And Gina is a
wonderful blues singer that I met and we had some
mutual friends and we did a gig together. I occasionally
do a Fred Mallin and Friends night at a Nashville club,

(01:17:56):
which completely saves me and replenishes my performer part. And
she sang a couple songs and we did a couple
of Sam Cook songs, and I said, We've got to
make a record together of Sam cook songs, you know,
one of my greatest inspirations. And no one has really
done a good covers album of Sam and we just

(01:18:17):
did one. It's coming out next month. The singles out already,
but it's just a beautiful record of of of really
cool covers of the great Sam Cook stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:18:27):
Anything else you can talk about.

Speaker 3 (01:18:29):
Yeah, sure, I mean I'm there's another Jimmy Webb album.
We're signing a deal next week to finally do the
first album of Jimmy of new material of Jimmy's since
two thousand and four, So there's a lot of songs
to choose from, and Jimmy and I are both absolutely
thrilled to be back in the studio.

Speaker 2 (01:18:48):
So tell me a couple of artists in a dream
that you would like to produce.

Speaker 3 (01:18:55):
Well, I'd always want to produce James Taylor. I mean,
you know, I still think there's there's gas in that tank.
That's amazing. I would always I always wanted to produce
Elton John. I'd love to pitch Elton John on One
More Album, which is an album of his favorite songs,
covers of his favorite songs. I think that will be
the record to do. And I also would love to

(01:19:17):
do Mark Knopfler in the same way I did Jimmy
Webb and Barry Man and Christopherson. And I've talked to
Mark about it and he's into it, but he wants
to wait a little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:19:27):
Let's just assume you were producing James Taylor.

Speaker 3 (01:19:32):
And by the way, I have to interrupt, I've got
to say it now here it is. I wrote a
letter to Bob Dylan. I'm sorry, I just hold that thought. No, God,
I have to tell now. I have to tell you
that a year and a half ago, the Bob Dylan
book came out, Philosophy of Modern Song, and in the
chapter about by the time I get to Phoenix, he

(01:19:54):
picked the version that I did with Jimmy on ten
Easy Pieces, and I was app gobsmacked that Dylan would
know that. And I wrote to Jeff Rosen, Dylan's manager,
and I said, oh my god, you know, I'm so
touched and Jimmy and I are so touched, and can
you please thank Bob. And in the letter I said him,
by the way, and I was joking. I said, you know,
when Bob needs a new record done, you know you

(01:20:17):
want me to produce it, I'll be open twenty four
to seven. He wrote back right away saying, Bob knows you.
He wants to know where you'd want to do it
and when. And I literally had to take my car
off the highway because I was hyperventilating because I saw
it on my on my email on my phone. And
then the next question was from Jeff Rosen do you

(01:20:39):
hear covers or do you hear Bob's original material? And
I talked about doing it in Nashville with the New
A team, so he'd come back to the to the
Blonde on Blonde, you know, to where he started with
Blonde on Blonde, and they loved the idea. And sadly,
Bob's been on the road now for probably ten out
of twelve months, and so nothing has come to pass

(01:21:02):
on that. But you know, that was one of the
great moments. And I have the letter. I printed out
the letter on the email and hung it in my
studio that Bob will work with you wherever you want,
whenever you want, because yes, I would do anything to
produce Bob as well.

Speaker 2 (01:21:18):
Yeah, I have to move on because there's no response
to that. Yeah. So, assuming you work with James Taylor
had a long career, what would you bring to the
picture that another person would not.

Speaker 3 (01:21:32):
Well, you know, as much of a fan as I am,
I'm also understanding of what brings out the best in him,
and I would be the one to sort of say, Okay,
you know, let's let's make this. You know, you're Joni
Mitchell Blue, you know, let's make it something that's so
profound and so musical and so emotional, and I just

(01:21:54):
think I could take the emotional angle as well as
the musical angle, and and and give him a lot
of joe and a lot of protection.

Speaker 2 (01:22:02):
Well, Fred, I want to thank you for taking the
time to speak with my audience. If you want much
more depth on the stories that have been told in
news stories, you can read his new book, Unplugged. It
was great talking to you.

Speaker 3 (01:22:17):
Thank you, Buddy, I appreciate it.

Speaker 2 (01:22:19):
Until next time, This is Bob Left says