Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Phil, this is a special naked.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Lunch, very special because we have one of my oldest
friends here, mister Eddie Gordootski, who I know from the
world of sitcoms, but he's also very proficient in the
world of music.
Speaker 3 (00:15):
And in even comic books and graphic novels.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
Eddie is an icon in all the worlds and at
every concert I've ever run into, it only really gets
going if Eddie is there. And Eddie came up. Has
come up multiple times on the podcast, including recently when
we had Brian Posain and he was the powerhouse who
offered me to be part of the brainstorm for a
show called The Big Bang that I.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Couldn't be at. So he is a kingmaker, a huge talent,
a beloved figure in music. Literally, I don't know a
great artist who you're not beloved by.
Speaker 5 (00:53):
Well, now, Phil, I want to say something, and this
might be apocryphal, but I think that you'll print the legend.
You know, this is about when you and I met,
And you remember we met during back in the last century,
during the writer's strike one in like eighty eight or
whatever that was, and it was you, myself and Alan
Kershebaum and you guys are old friends, and you kind
of very nicely, very kindly took me in. And the
(01:16):
three of us were picketing, and none of us ever
thought we'd never work again, you know, it was terrified.
And the idea came up, let's go get lunch. And
so we went to Gallagher's. And this is back in
the day we could get a you could eat a
ribbi for lunch and not be afraid you'd have a
stroke or sleep for the next We were young, we were,
and but also we three guys who didn't have jobs.
(01:38):
And you know, we're going, we're gonna go by a
steak in the place had the steaks in the window
and you could pick them out as if they were lobsters.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
They were aged like we are.
Speaker 5 (01:44):
Yeah, and and and this is the parts of the pocos.
We actually did that. And I remember being worried about it,
and and and you said anyone can have money, not
everyone can have steak for.
Speaker 1 (01:57):
Lunch, that that's gonna be on your tombstone.
Speaker 5 (02:01):
And I felt like, all right, this is the person
I could be friends with.
Speaker 3 (02:04):
And we've been friends ever since. Everybody, Let's build.
Speaker 6 (02:08):
The beans to the fat food for thought jokes on tap,
talking with our mouthsful, having fun, beas cake and Humble Pies,
serving up slice lovely, the dressing all the side.
Speaker 7 (02:25):
It's naked lunch.
Speaker 8 (02:29):
Clothing option.
Speaker 9 (02:31):
It's not a house the spies.
Speaker 10 (02:37):
Why must be teenage Jim Loveday.
Speaker 4 (02:44):
Now, speaking of friends, let us talk. Can you introduce
your friend who was? Really as much as we've begged
you to be on the podcast before, you're only here
because of this amazing woman, Sharon. Can you tell us
about Sharon?
Speaker 5 (02:56):
Yeah, Hi Sharon, Hi, Eddie, Hi, everybody.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Hi, I'm filmed. That's David.
Speaker 9 (03:02):
I'm a big fan of yours.
Speaker 3 (03:04):
Oh sweet, where are we calling you today?
Speaker 9 (03:07):
I'm on East forty eighth Street.
Speaker 4 (03:09):
Oh great, not far, not far from where everything in
music happened.
Speaker 1 (03:15):
Right, You're just across town from the Brill Building.
Speaker 9 (03:18):
That's right, it was just across town. Uh my dad
and where all New Yorkers New.
Speaker 11 (03:23):
Yorker is Yeah?
Speaker 3 (03:25):
Yeah, yeah, Well.
Speaker 4 (03:26):
Your dad, by the way, we need we need Eddie
to explain your dad. We all love our dads, but
everybody who loves music should love your dad. So Eddie,
can you explain who Sharon's dad was?
Speaker 5 (03:39):
Well, there's there's the history that everyone should know. And
there's also a personal history, but I'll give you the
history everyone should know. Sharon's dad is a guy by
the name of Doc Palmis, not his birth name. Surprisingly,
and Doc is a figure that should be lionized, recognized,
and just I'm a champion, and and the fact that
(04:02):
he's not that this has to happen, someone has to explain.
Who is almost like a cardinal sin. He is one
of the great songwriters. He wrote by himself, and he
wrote in ten with a number of people, probably most
famously mort Schumann, and he wrote songs that you know
so well. I mean, just to give you a couple
Viva las Vegas, Uh, save the last dance for me,
(04:24):
this magic moment.
Speaker 8 (04:25):
I mean, I.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Got a teenager in love, well, a.
Speaker 5 (04:28):
Teenager love and there's a great story about that, but
I want to save that for a surprise that we
hopefully have coming up. But Doc, aside from being there's
a lot of great songwriters and a lot of great songwriters,
the story is kind of dull because they they kind
of needed to write songs because their life wasn't as
exciting as they needed to. You know, I'm kind of
like rock Sanne or Cyrano things. But Dodg's life was
(04:51):
was amazing. Doc was larger of love, larger than life
in so many ways. He suffered from polio early in
life and was and crutches are in a wheelchair and
didn't allow himself to be considered handicapped. He was not
going to be, as he says in his journals, he
didn't want to be one of those smiling, happy cripples.
(05:12):
He wanted to be out there and make his name
of the world. And he did. And there's so many things.
And I don't want to really just make this me
on my soapbox talking about him, but I think we'll
tell some stories as we go along. But I will
tell you the couple of things. One is when John
Lennon was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame, and
he was John Lennon, for God's sake. He didn't necessarily
(05:33):
want to come until he found out he could be
seated at Doc Pomis's table. And you know, Bob Dylan
in a book he wrote recently dedicated the book to Doc.
And these are people that Doc's career kind of tapered
off when the wave of people who wrote their own
songs came along, but those people realized what a genius
Doc Pomis was and how he was different than other
(05:55):
songwriters because his level of personal storytelling in song writing
paved the way for the next generation of songwriters.
Speaker 1 (06:03):
That's that's a good setup, Sharon and Sharon.
Speaker 9 (06:06):
That was great, Eddie.
Speaker 4 (06:07):
And by the way, Sharon, and because this is all true,
you and Eddie and some other an amazing you.
Speaker 5 (06:14):
Got to mention Cheryl Cheryl at.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
The record company, Yes, who does an amazing job and
all those reissues, but can you tell us what this
project which is out now, tell us about it and
what it means to you.
Speaker 9 (06:28):
Well, we've been doing my dad's archive for a long
time and it's about to land in kind of an
amazing place, hopefully at the end of the month. And
I have all these hundreds of acid take demos that
nobody's ever heard before, and I felt like they needed
to be heard before they disappear in some musty closet
for years in an institution. So I reached out to
(06:51):
Omnivore and they jumped at it, and we just put
it out a couple of weeks ago, and I'm hoping
people discovered news songs that my father wrote. It's not
necessarily all the famous ones. It's unknowns, it's under you know,
it's not all fabulous. It's just kind of cool, interesting
songs with many partners. And yet there's like the original
(07:15):
version of Teenager in Love on there, which I'm sure
we'll discuss with Dion in a minute, because it wasn't originally.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
By the way, when you say Dion, that's the Dion
the Wanderer. Yes, if he we hope he joins us
and if you know, well we will see.
Speaker 7 (07:33):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (07:33):
The project is called just so everyone can find it
and get it, and we'll put a link. It's doc promise.
You can't hip a square the doc pomise songwriting your demos.
Speaker 3 (07:42):
Hip a square, yeah, meaning you can't make a square guy.
Speaker 1 (07:46):
Look, oh my god, rock and Roll Hall of Famer.
Absolutely one of the coolest cats in music history. Dion,
thank you so much for joining this discussion.
Speaker 9 (07:56):
Thank you, Dion's you to be here, my joy, thank you. Well, yeah,
my dad loved Dianne so much. You have no idea.
They were like brothers. And uh, Dean, I think you
recorded about seven of my dad's songs at least something
like that.
Speaker 8 (08:14):
We weren't like brothers. He was more like my father.
I tell you to be honest with that. I looked
up to him, you know, so he would he was
kind of a mentor to me. But yeah, in a
way we but we loved each other, I know that.
And I was you know, when you you you're close
(08:35):
to somebody or somebody else is in the room, that
just makes the world better, you know. You know That's
the way I always felt when I was with Doc.
Speaker 4 (08:45):
And how did he make your world better? Like this
record sort of early on has a demo of a
track called I Think It's It's It's great to be
a teenager in love.
Speaker 9 (08:56):
It's great to be young and in love. Yeah, right,
that was the original title. And then my dad realized
it's horrible to be young and in love. Why must
I be a teenage? It was torture to be young
and in love?
Speaker 12 (09:12):
In maing the song shining and.
Speaker 4 (09:28):
And Dion your impact, I will tell you I remember
thinking about it. Uh many years ago I met you
when there was I think a Paul Simon benefit at
Madison Square Garden where if I remember correctly, this is
a long time ago. But if I think I remember
it was Paul Simon, Billy Joel and lou Reid where
your back up sort of Belmont's uh and honoring you
(09:49):
as a hero of all time?
Speaker 7 (09:50):
Is that right?
Speaker 1 (09:51):
Is that a good memory?
Speaker 8 (09:52):
Yes, I'd say Bruce Springsteen and James Taylor and there
were who oh yeah, Billy.
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Joel, any famous people.
Speaker 4 (10:05):
I don't have to pay him, you know, but here's
you know, I think it's fair to say that Doc
pomis his genius and more Truman, that Teenager in Love
is a big record in music history, even in forget music.
I believe the word teenager, like the whole concept of
a teenager was forwarded by a record that big? Was
(10:25):
it big in your career?
Speaker 8 (10:28):
Huge till this day? The whole audience, you know, the
at the age I am. I mean, how do you
sing a song like, uh, you know, a teenager in love?
But the song has a life of its own, and
I don't you know, I figure everybody out in the audience,
(10:49):
if they live to be one hundred and twenty one,
they'll still be teenagers in love. Yeah, So I do it.
I do it just as it's just beautiful the way
it works with But it's just a I don't know,
it has a life of its own. I don't. I
don't take it that person. You want to know something,
It was a People come to me and say, is
(11:10):
it because I do a lot of rock and roll
and blue stuff, and they go, was it a is
it a stretch to do the blues? I said no,
it was a stretch to do Teenager in Love. I
was like that that song cannot be written by a teenager.
I don't think teenager would ever write it. But I'm
(11:31):
glad it was written, and I'm glad I did it,
and I'm glad you get me.
Speaker 5 (11:35):
It was one thing I always say Deon is we're
talking about the past, but you're an artist who has
continued to make records that You've made some great records
in the past few years, ones with With with female partners,
and a blues record, and a few others. And you're
one of the few people and I have to include
Van Morrison and Tony Bennett in that list of people
(11:56):
who even in like the their seventies or eighties, have
the vocal power that they had in their youth. And
your voice sounds as great and as pure as it
ever did, and it's just it's just a talent.
Speaker 8 (12:08):
That's an amazing thing. I don't know. I just look up.
I thank god. I'm grateful it does. I feel like
I enjoy singing more today than I did back then.
I just have more places to go. And I don't know.
It's just it's a gift, you know.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
And I'm sorry.
Speaker 4 (12:26):
And there is an album coming out we all should
look forward to The Rock and Roll Philosopher, a companion
to your upcoming book. With our previous guest on the podcast,
Joe Bonamas, I think you work with His label is
putting out this has put out this latest soundtrack, so
please explore not just Doc Pomis, but all of Dion's
work too.
Speaker 8 (12:47):
Yeah. I In fact, there's a story in the book
The Rock and Roll Philosopher. You know, there's well, there's
many stories in it. One of the stories, UH is
about lou Reid, And when lou Reid was actually dying,
he was in the hospital. He he he asked his manager,
(13:10):
he said, you know, just get me a give me
the link, Just get me the link to UH Troubled
Mind that Dion sang. Please, I just want to hear
that song. And Uh, his manager you know, found it
and they played it in the room and he said,
(13:31):
now I could die in peace.
Speaker 9 (13:35):
So my dad bro, that's a that's a like a
bluesy song that my dad and more.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
Oh, no one will put that in the episode. That
Dion's version of that right here?
Speaker 7 (13:45):
No, no, please can I he's more.
Speaker 10 (13:56):
Trouble She didn't stay long she lived me.
Speaker 8 (14:11):
I gotta tell you, though, I was when I heard
that story. I hadn't sang Trouble Mind in years, and
I loved it. When when Doc sang it for me,
you know, and I recorded it, I was I was
a kid, you know, it was I forget. It had
to be the early sixties, right, So I when I
(14:32):
heard the story about Lou, because we were good friends,
I you know, and Lou loved Doc pomis he just
so I picked up my guitar in the house and
I start singing Trouble Mind. And as I'm singing it,
it kind of warfs into another song called New York
Is My Home. And I felt like it just came
(14:52):
It's the same chords as Trouble Mind exactly. I didn't
change it, it just I just started singing. I think
it came out of Heaven. I think Lou and Doc
got together up there and just sent it.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
And by the way, for all the Lou Reed fans
out there, I have a memory that when Lou made
a record about life and death, I think Magic and Loss,
that was partly inspired I think by Doc uh and
he did a song about life and death called What's Good.
I remember that was great, which little Jimmy Scott sang.
Speaker 10 (15:25):
On Last La and Asa and last Black Space with a.
Speaker 7 (15:34):
Last big and that's what last night.
Speaker 8 (15:39):
With the.
Speaker 7 (15:41):
Last night for it would be coming, but last forever.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
Sharon, can you please tell us a little bit about
little Jimmy Scott and who he was.
Speaker 9 (15:50):
Yeah, so I could also say that Lou was a
really dear friend of ours my family, and when he
was making that record Magic and Loss, he was in
the hospital busines iting my dad every day and working
on the record brought him What's Good as well. So
my father heard that song. Yes, so Jimmy was an
(16:10):
old friend of my father's. They went back to their
singing careers together, and my dad was on a mission
to help Jimmy's career get back on track, and he
even wrote a letter to Billboard magazine in like nineteen
seventy saying, please help this guy. He's working in the
Cleveland shipping department. He can't cut a brake. He was
(16:33):
this unbelievable singer, everybody's idol, and nothing happened. But I
asked Jimmy to sing at my dad's funeral, and seymour
Stein and others were at the funeral and they signed
him on the spot at the funeral. So it was
pretty unbelievable. And lou Reid was spoke at the funeral,
and I know, Phil, you're all about food and my
(16:54):
dad was. My dad was too. If you've seen him,
he enjoyed food, but he he lou Reid and his
in one of his you know memorial to my dad
said Doc was always gonna take me to katzes for worst.
I don't know if you know what. Okay, So my
(17:17):
dad liked super Jewish, jewy jew food, like.
Speaker 10 (17:31):
Don't forget who's taking you home and in whose arms
you're gonna be.
Speaker 3 (17:38):
So dum say the last dance for me?
Speaker 13 (17:45):
Oh I know, oh, I know that the music is
fu sparkling.
Speaker 2 (17:50):
I want I want to hear now a little history
because I don't know much about your dad. So if
you could, if you guys could all give me just
a little back round.
Speaker 1 (18:01):
Where do you want to start, Sharon, Well, maybe start
with what you were saying. He started out as a singer.
Speaker 4 (18:07):
He was a great singer too, and and and and
did that first before he became the great writer.
Speaker 8 (18:13):
Yeah.
Speaker 9 (18:13):
So the crazy thing is he had polio, yeah, you know,
from the age of six, so he was he couldn't walk,
his legs were completely paralyzed. So he spent a lot
of time in bed, reading and listening to the radio. Yeah,
and he was inspired by somebody called Big Joe Turner.
I don't know if you.
Speaker 11 (18:32):
I've heard that name.
Speaker 5 (18:33):
One of the great but what the father of Kansas
City blues. He started off in the forties singing with
Pete Johnson, who was the king of boogie woogie piano
and later became like one of the fathers of rock
and roll. When he signed to Atlantic Records, didn't really
change his style at all, but went from you know,
you know, singing, you know, I got a guy living
up on the hill and to a shake, rattle, en roll,
(18:53):
which with the same song, which is the backbeat, was
in a slightly different place, and it went from being
you know, jump blues to rock and roll, and you know,
he was a good singer, but there there were better singers,
and but he was so much in that world that
he started like writing songs. And the most amazing thing
is his big break came from a pants advertisement.
Speaker 9 (19:14):
Oh but what I was gonna that's true, But what
I was gonna wait, I was just going to say
that when he heard Big Joe, he decided that's what
he wanted to be and do. So he like willed
himself to go to a club in the village to
go down there on crutches embraces down subway steps.
Speaker 4 (19:31):
Wow, which is amazing in twenty twenty five, but imagine
what that was like. The guts, the balls, the bravery.
Speaker 5 (19:37):
It took, well, just the balls to do it. Being
a white guy doing it, but a guy who has
to put on leg braces and having to go laboriously
up and down to an elevated train to get there.
Speaker 3 (19:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 9 (19:50):
Right, So he had no money and his parents were like,
you know, middle class Jewish people that had no idea
that he was having this secret life. And he goes there.
The proprietor said, you know, pay up for some drinks
and he had no money, so he said, I'm a
blues singer. And that was like an invention on the spot.
And he goes up on the stage and it was
(20:11):
Frankie Newton, who Eddie could tell you it was an
amazing trumpet player. And anyway, he knew the one Joe
Turner song and they said, okay, come back again, and
so he went home and wrote more, I love.
Speaker 12 (20:23):
My good pot, love my good bye.
Speaker 13 (20:26):
I love my good, love my good bye, love my
good time, I.
Speaker 5 (20:36):
Love my good that's what a name. Also, he had
to use a different name because in case anyone talked
to Abottom or there's any notice of the newspaper, didn't want
your parents to or his parents to see the family
name in the paper.
Speaker 3 (20:48):
So that's why he invented that name.
Speaker 5 (20:50):
Well, Doc came from a blues singer on you know.
Speaker 9 (20:55):
Doctor Clayton.
Speaker 5 (20:56):
Yeah, doctor Peter Clayton, who was was a great blues
singer who was a big influence BB King. And then
Pomis was just a word they kind of came up
with it. It was kind of cool sounding pomis.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
I mean it sounds legendary.
Speaker 1 (21:09):
Yeah, but like when you.
Speaker 9 (21:10):
It sounded like a hip midnight character.
Speaker 3 (21:13):
What does told me?
Speaker 9 (21:15):
But he was like his name was Jerome solan Felder,
kind of a funny. And his parents just thought he
would end up selling pencils in the street or they
were totally terrified, like what would their son do? So
he kind of defied, you know what? And anyway, so
that's his early career was singing as a singer, blue
(21:36):
singer in all the local clubs. And then his band
consisted of Mickey Baker, Mickey guitar Baker who played on
a lot of the demos, right, Dianne later, you.
Speaker 8 (21:46):
Know, I gotta tell you, Sharon, the Big Joe Turner,
that's who we bonded. That's how we bonded. Really, Enroll
got me into the business. I was. I was a
kid when I heard it, and I loved Big Joe Turner,
you know, shake, rattle n' roll. That was like that
was it. You jumped out of your car and you
(22:07):
danced in the street, and I doc and he loved
the big We just we got singing blues a lot.
But you know then then there was a business out
there of trying to reach the teenagers, and so we
did a lot of these young teenage songs. Well I
was a teenager. I didn't, but but I love the blues,
(22:27):
you know, and that's how you know we that both
Big Joe Turner resonated with us both, I mean it's
started us off and Dion.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
Just to show you how that gets passed on, how
what Big Joe Turner meant to you and to Doc Pomis.
I just remember very vividly. I got to work with
and know Neil Diamond very well, and he told me,
I said one day, I said, one day, what's the
moment where you felt like you might make it in
this in the business of music? And he goes, and
I don't know if you'll have this memory or maybe
(22:55):
you've discussed it with him. He told me it was
when Dion agreed to meet me. I think it was
in Central Park. He said, I had a meeting with
Dion to pitch him a few songs, and he goes,
the fact that Dion thought I was worth meeting was
the moment I thought maybe I have something.
Speaker 7 (23:13):
Well.
Speaker 8 (23:14):
He came to my apartment on Second Avenue and fifty
seventh Street and he knocks on the door and Barry
and Cynthia lived right next to you know, Barry Man
and Cynthie Wells. So he has his guitar and I
opened the door and we talked a little. I said,
(23:34):
I said, let's take a walk. So we we took
a walk to Central Park. We sat on this rock
and we we made music for like an hour, and
you know, and he sang me these songs. I said,
I said, you know, you sing these songs much better
than I could sing. Why don't you sing them? You know?
(24:01):
And he did.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
And that that changed his life, like Big Joe Turner
changed yours.
Speaker 5 (24:06):
You talk about Big Joe Turner, though, I want to
say one thing, and you said a thing about how
you know, Doc made every room better. And Sharon told
the story about little Chimvy Scott how helped little Chibby Scott.
That's the thing that keeps coming back on the Doc
Palmis story about the measure of the man he was.
Big Joe Turner was down on his luck in the
later part of his life, and Doc discovered that the
(24:26):
Blues Brothers would recorded Joe's song Flip Flop and Fly.
There was a check for seventeen thousand dollars sitting in
a draw and there wasn't anyone withholding the money that,
you know, Big Joe just had no idea what mailbox
money was and didn't give him an address, you know,
And he helped Big Joe get this money. But that
was what Doc did. He was just an advocate for
people and his story is just so much more than
(24:47):
just the average songwriter's story. He was. He was a
force of nature and someone that just like helped everyone.
Speaker 11 (24:53):
How great I loved learning about this man. When did
he pass?
Speaker 5 (24:58):
What year was it?
Speaker 7 (24:59):
Sharon?
Speaker 9 (25:01):
Okay, but he died in ninety one. But the crazy
thing was phil that I don't know if you wanted to,
I'm just saying. Then he had the real building's really
successful career, yeah skipping.
Speaker 3 (25:13):
Or I don't know, no, no, no, we're you like
you can't know.
Speaker 9 (25:16):
I mean, then, so he becomes a hit songwriter because
he meets my mother and he needs to support a family,
because living in fleabag hotels, et cetera as a blues
singer with one suit of clothes isn't gonna you know.
Speaker 4 (25:28):
Let's stop with your mother for a second. If you
if you can explain one of the greatest songs, another
of the greatest songs of all time Save the Last
Dance for Me. People, everyone knows that song, I think generations. Uh,
and if they don't, they need to. But can you
explain what that song really, what its meaning is is
more profound than you might at first even know.
Speaker 9 (25:51):
Well, you know, a lot of people think it's unbelievable
that somebody that couldn't dance wrote and perhaps one of
the greatest dance love songs of all time. At the
wedding of my parents, my father met my mother, both
living in the same fleabag hotel in Lower Manhattan. They
she came to New York, she was graduated Catholic University.
(26:14):
She came to seek fame and fortune and New York
as a singer actress. And my dad was living in
this funky hotel as a you know, blue singer, and
she was beautiful, et cetera. And they fell in love.
They got married. Oh, they got married, but he wrote
he couldn't dance with her. So this story goes, I
(26:36):
found the wedding invitation after he died that said, may
I have this dance on their wedding invitation? Save the
Last Dance for Me? So we're sort of putting the
pieces together that that's what inspired the song completely was
their wedding. I don't you know, I don't know for
one hundred percent sure that it happened that way, but
(26:56):
it's it's pretty evident that he wrote it and he
was inspired by their wedding because he couldn't dance. His
father danced with my mother, his brother danced with my mother.
Everybody danced with my mother, but he couldn't.
Speaker 5 (27:09):
But don't forget who's taking you home?
Speaker 9 (27:10):
And in his arms, he knew he was taking he
knew he was taking her home.
Speaker 8 (27:14):
So sweet. I always I always felt that being your
mother was Catholic. I'm Catholic, and in our faith, you know,
and well even in the Jewish faith, you there's there's
a thing, you know, eternal life. You get this glorified body,
and if you have a disability, of course it's gone.
(27:34):
You know, if you're blind, you can see. And he
couldn't walk. But he I felt like that's the last dance.
He's going to have it there, you know, we're gonna
they're going to meet up with this glorified body. And
I always felt that that song had a had a
meaning with a higher reality. You know that he's dancing
(27:55):
with his mom right now.
Speaker 2 (27:57):
I mean, it's just such a gorg just lyric and
melody together. You can't think of one part of it
without the other. It's just such a beautiful whole, complete,
uh emotional feeling.
Speaker 5 (28:14):
But above and beyond the hints, you know, Like I
was listening to you when you were talking to Peter
garral And a few shows back, and you mentioned a
song that I love that Elvis Presley sang in Viva
Las Vegas, and that the demo is on there for this,
and and I'm amazed that all these people that are
that are mangling the Great American Songbook haven't discovered Uh
need someone to lean on.
Speaker 9 (28:41):
I need somebody.
Speaker 8 (28:47):
What a song?
Speaker 5 (28:48):
And the demo of it is on there, and it's
just like such a beautiful song. And there's like a
hundred unnoticed gems in this in this How many songs
did he write?
Speaker 9 (28:59):
You know? Honestly, we keep learning of new songs. I'm
aware of well over twelve hundred, whoa, But we keep
learning of new songs. You know, Cheryl uncovered about six
that I had never heard of. So it's just I
think there's no real way of knowing.
Speaker 4 (29:17):
Another one that everyone's heard of, This Magic Moment, which
I years later, I think I got to I worked
with I wrote Taylor with Taylor Hackford, Ahmed Urgan's Memorial,
and I finally met Benny King and got to thank him.
He was such an amazing singer, like Dion, just one
(29:38):
of the greatest voices of all time. But this magic Moment?
Is that another one that is meaningful for you?
Speaker 9 (29:45):
Oh yeah, I mean that was one of my favorite
songs my dad ever written. And Lou Reid when we
did the tribute album to my dad after he died
on Rhino, Dion is on it. Dion did turn me loose.
I asked Lou what would you like to sing? He
picked this Magic Moment, so he did that for the record.
And that's where Bob Dylan does. Joe Turner covered song
(30:08):
Boogie Wigee Country Girl's big sad music.
Speaker 6 (30:11):
The rum isn't me boogioge Boogie Woogie Boogie looget Huntry Girl.
Speaker 8 (30:19):
But I mean what I mean boo get good Girl.
Speaker 9 (30:26):
Yeah, and that song, Uh, this Magic Moment has been
covered by everybody from Ben obviously to this Jay and
the Americans to even Lake Street Dive you know it's
been It's so many covers it's hard to even count.
Speaker 10 (30:41):
This magic moment, so differently.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
Spectacular song another This is so great for me because
I really, I guess I'm like most people out there.
Speaker 5 (31:01):
We should tell people to watch the documentary.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
You guys, I watched AKA Doc Promise which Sharon, Were
you involved in making that?
Speaker 9 (31:11):
Yeah? It was my I conceived of the project and
I produced it. But I I was trying to do
it by myself for years. And then I got really lucky.
A guy called me from Canada. He said, I just
read the biography of your dad. I'd love to make
a film. His name was Will Hector, and I'm willing
to spend a million dollars on it. And nobody gives
(31:33):
you that phone call. And then we put an incredible
team together, Peter Miller and so forth.
Speaker 11 (31:39):
And where can people see it?
Speaker 9 (31:40):
It's on it's still streaming. It's this is from a
long time ago. It's on Amazon, on Prime and Apple,
I believe, but Prime.
Speaker 1 (31:49):
It really holds up. I just watched it last week.
Speaker 11 (31:51):
It's really powerful called AKA doc.
Speaker 9 (31:54):
Pom uh Dion is spectacular in it. I got absolutely,
I got lou reed to read my dad's journals.
Speaker 5 (32:02):
In it, and and the footage from the funeral is
just so moving.
Speaker 9 (32:07):
Oh yeah, the funeral was pretty incredible. And I know
you guys love comics, obviously you're a comedian. And my dad,
my uncle, my dad's brother is a well known attorney,
and his best friend was Jackie Mason. Uh, Jackie was
at the funeral. But Jackie couldn't come into the room
(32:29):
of the synagogue because he's a special kind of Cohen
or Cohen, I don't know what, some kind of super Jew,
like a special thing where he can't be in the
room with another time.
Speaker 4 (32:40):
That's actually the least popular superhero in the in the
Marvel universe, I believe super Jew.
Speaker 9 (32:46):
So so Jackie was given a like a special hearing
device on the street, so he stood outside of the
you know, the funeral parlor with a hearing with hearings.
Speaker 5 (32:57):
Well, that's the thing about your dad. He was he
was kind of the the king of the demimon in
New York at that period, like not just musicians, but
like he had a handout for every hook over the
hard luck story. He doesn't yeah no, but he also
he also like was he knew all the comics from
that period, like Nipsey Russell tried to find him an
apartment at one point, and he was instrumental in getting
(33:19):
Rodney Dangerfield on the Jerry Lewis Telethon really early, and
like before it went have been his first like TV appearance,
and they all kind of got together in the lobby
of this hotel to watch him and he bombed, you know,
and so he comes back in and like, oh, yeah,
this is horrible more but but he was there trying
to be supportive of any kind of artist.
Speaker 4 (33:39):
And by the way, there's so much I think I
know a lot about a lot of music. Eddie goes
deeper with everything than anybody you know. And in fact,
one of the great things, in addition to the music
and the packaging and Cheryl's work and researching, there's liner
notes by a procession of the great writers, including Eddie.
And I wondered if you would read one of my
(34:00):
favorite paragraphs or two from your notes.
Speaker 5 (34:04):
For this anything particularly you want me to read or
any I was.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
Thinking, well, if you read these two a lot of knowledge.
Speaker 5 (34:12):
Okay, Well, I kind of have to back up a
little bit there because it's otherwise the sentence won't make sense.
Uh all right, I'll just I'll just start. You edit
out what you don't like. I have remember to go slugs,
I get excitable.
Speaker 8 (34:26):
I like you excited.
Speaker 5 (34:28):
Doc Palmas lived the kind of larger than life three
act existence that writers love to embellish. We all have
our favorite books and films where the main character conc's
adversity to triumph, not just surviving but thriving, inspiring us all.
Sometimes when the facts don't line up as they should,
shrewd writers will change the course of history, as in
the movies ed Wood and Dolomite is my name, given
those characters the third act they deserve. Doc Pomas didn't
(34:50):
need any such jerry rigging of the narrative. Here's a
guy who took everything Theathaniel West of it. Let me,
let me weld Pitkin in a Horatio Alge and reverse
story a cool million, and still managed all right, took
everything Nathaniel West through at Lemuel Pitkin and the Horatio
Alge and reverse story a cool million, and still managed
to write songs of optimism like this Magic Moment Sweets
(35:10):
for my Sweet and seven day weekend. He suffered in
dignities that would have made Joe falter and in his
darkest hours came up at the anthems of despair like
Lonely Avenue, can't get used to losing you, and a
teenager in love. He was a link in the living
chain that connected Ray Charles Dovis Presley to Lou Reed.
He shows that teen angsten punk rock could both have
roots in the blues. He was a true hard luck
here and a patron saint to the forgotten, the discard
(35:31):
at the gambler with a losing hand, the hooker needing
a hand up, the junkie, the crippled, the broken hearted.
The music would have been enough, but he was so
much more.
Speaker 1 (35:38):
That is beautiful.
Speaker 9 (35:39):
That is beautiful. Thank you so much. Eddie was so beautiful.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
It is beautiful.
Speaker 3 (35:44):
And by the way, did you say Lonely Avenue? Yeah,
oh yeah, he wrote lonely age.
Speaker 7 (35:48):
Oh yeah.
Speaker 14 (35:49):
Now my room has got two vanders, but the sun
jan never come through. And as I broke off baby
Man and my Little Girl, when it's said what I feel,
(36:11):
so it's sad.
Speaker 3 (36:12):
And so that's that's on a new album that I
just listened to, the Jump Baptiste album.
Speaker 9 (36:17):
That's right.
Speaker 3 (36:18):
He duets he duets with Randy Newman.
Speaker 9 (36:21):
Yeah, I know, I love that you've heard that.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
That's I did hear that. It's fantastic.
Speaker 13 (36:28):
Now my room, it's got you window what the sun
never comes shining through. You know, it's always long. It's
tru since I broke it off with you. I live
on Alone Avenue, Lone Avenue.
Speaker 8 (36:53):
In that reading, I was the recipient of of what
you just read. That's why I said he was like
a father to me. I don't know how much older
he was than me, but and I looked up to him.
But when I first met him, he and you know,
I'm this insecure kid. He he encouraged me. Uh at
(37:14):
every step, every step he had my back. He encouraged me.
If I did a little something, he liked it. He
wouldn't he would like, you know, yo, you know keep
that do that and uh and and I love what
that that that reading you just said. He wasn't a survivor.
He was a thriver to me. He you know, people
(37:37):
complain all the stuff, you know, if they you know,
they have a leak in their pool, they complain. But
this guy he was he wasn't. He went but beyond
thriving he was victorious. He was like, he was like
a king to me, you know. So, But but I
(37:58):
was the recipient of of you know what you just read.
He the way he encouraged people that I actually was,
you know, the recipient of that.
Speaker 9 (38:10):
Well, I think you both had the deep blues connection
on such a deep level too.
Speaker 8 (38:15):
You know, oh, absolutely absolutely we we yeah, we we would.
We would jam on those blue songs for sure, you know.
And you remember this. But when you moved out to
when doctor Long Island was my wife and I I
(38:35):
don't know, we were young. We came out that you
were a little girl. We were swimming in the pool
out there and uh, Long Island. We had a man barbecue.
I still remember it. That was great.
Speaker 9 (38:47):
Well, my dad, you know, we were I grew up
in his Williamsburg apartment that his parents gave him their
apartment and they left. So and then a bullet came
through the window of my and so my father had
maybe one hit under his belt, and he's like, we
got to move to the suburb. And they picked the
first suburb, Lynn Brook, which was Brooklyn back where yea.
(39:12):
They bought a house that they couldn't afford, and then
he put in a pool and it was like he
was living high on the hog and like Dion and
the drifters and everybody was coming and he was good
for like ten years. It was an amazing run. And
then you know a lot of things went down, and
this is you know, I don't know I should I
(39:34):
say the flip side of this?
Speaker 1 (39:36):
Sure, sure, okay.
Speaker 9 (39:38):
So he has this incredible run, you know, all these
hits and stuff like that, and life is great. And
then my mother and he get divorced, which is always
you know that that start Mort Schumann leaves him to
move to France. Because Mort becomes a huge star in France,
like he wrote, Jacques rel as well alive and and
(40:02):
Mort became like huge. He was like Elvis. When I
used to visit Morty in France, he had a French accent.
Speaker 7 (40:09):
He went.
Speaker 9 (40:09):
He went from being a guy from like Brighton Beach
to mom, you know, Chumont.
Speaker 1 (40:16):
And it's like Jerry Lewis and Mort Schumann are the
only examples of like people who became geniuses by going.
Speaker 11 (40:23):
To France's room.
Speaker 3 (40:25):
Yes is that a quote from from Jerry?
Speaker 8 (40:29):
Oh my god?
Speaker 9 (40:31):
Well, Mort, you know, and like I stayed with him
in the south of France, and everybody was topless at
his house. And I was a teenager and I would
call my father and go, Dad, he doesn't even have
any resemblance to being from New York anymore. Whatever. So
that and my parents got divorced, and the royalties dried up.
People the singer songwriter suddenly happened Bob Dylan, the Beatles,
(40:55):
et cetera. So he like, had no royalties. We had
no money. So my dad needed to figure out a
way to support two kids, private school, blah blah blah.
So he became a professional card player, oh, a poker player. Uh,
And that's how we survived for about ten years. But
(41:18):
so that's a whole nother.
Speaker 5 (41:19):
And then eventually he was hosting the games because he
figured the house always, you know. And then and I
told this story that and you can correct me. You
can correct me if I'm wrong, Like, you know, the
mob knew where, or people knew I don't want to
say the mob. You know, people knew where like the mob. Yeah,
people knew where, Like the big games were, and there
was money walking out the door. And one night, someone
(41:41):
who won a lot of money in one of Doc's
games washed up in the East River, Oh, and was
made all the news. And then so Doctor John and B. B.
King showed up at Doc's house and said, Doc, you
got to go back to writing music because it's going
to be you next time, you know. And so he
went back and he wrote this song called There's got
to be a Better World somewhere for BB King, which
(42:02):
the Grammy.
Speaker 8 (42:11):
Must be.
Speaker 5 (42:14):
Somewhere, And that's what I was saying that, you know,
sometimes you have to like make up a third nfe
like in ed Wood, which is a great movie. But
Doc really did it. He had this third act. And
I hope that Cheryl does another set of the demos,
the ones that need it for Johnny Adams and the ones.
Speaker 9 (42:32):
That we're gonna do. We're gonna do it Doc and
Doctor John Box called Paradox and We're gonna.
Speaker 1 (42:40):
That's great, and am I imagining it.
Speaker 4 (42:42):
When I got to New York in my college years,
there was a band Minkdaville, the guy named Willie Deville,
and I think they wrote some of Doc wrote some
of my favorite songs ever that and by the way,
a little bit in the tradition of Dion. They were
just great New York r and b based Soul Records.
Speaker 9 (43:00):
Hour that hour, just.
Speaker 7 (43:11):
Just just do what lits do.
Speaker 10 (43:34):
Don't you says do?
Speaker 8 (43:38):
Don't you.
Speaker 9 (43:41):
Say?
Speaker 1 (43:41):
Don't you kiss me?
Speaker 5 (43:42):
Once or twice and say it's betternize and then.
Speaker 10 (43:45):
You run.
Speaker 4 (43:47):
Dion For you, I will say, like talking about the
acts of Doc's life, like we should since we have
you on the podcast, and we're so honored to have
you on the podcast. I think like you to me
are an example of you've had so many acts, like
you had those early hits with a little help from
Doc and you know you then go into you when
(44:10):
we mentioned Bob Dylan, I think some of the best
things I've ever heard were like you were sort of
like reacting to Dylan and made these records that some
of them we are are your I think you're publicists
and our friend Bob Merlis, you know sort of I
think you know has always told me about you know,
to check out this record, that record. So for me,
(44:31):
I just want to say you're the ongoing acts that
you have in your career. All of my favorite music
by you is stuff I've discovered in the last twenty years,
including the music you've been making the last twenty years,
like I'll just tell you because I last met you.
I had dinner with you and Joan Jets sometime in
nineteen ninety one, I think, but not since then, but
(44:53):
I want to tell you since then. I have like
a series of songs on my phone that I listened
to at night, and one of them is this a record?
Speaker 7 (45:00):
I think?
Speaker 8 (45:01):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (45:02):
Diane Warren wrote for you a song called it uh
and the Knight Stood Still, which for some reason that
makes me always think of my wife. So it's one
of my favorite songs of all times. And these records
(45:42):
you're doing the last ten years are just extraordinary. And
people who don't know everybody from Bruce Springsteen and Patty
uh uh, you know everyone is on Charlie Rich Yes, yes, exactly,
and Dionne, I'd be remiss.
Speaker 5 (45:59):
I have to say hello to you from a mutual
friend who killed me if I didn't say hello. And
it's also there's a great story you just had in
Rolling Stone that you mentioned him Don Rio, who is
a dear, dear friend. I knew i'd get that reaction.
And the story you told in Rolling Stone about Phil Spector,
Bruce Springsteen and Don Rio was one of the great
stories I've ever heard, can I hear it? It's a
(46:21):
little long, so.
Speaker 8 (46:23):
It's in the audible book Lass Offer it really is,
but oh it's about twenty minutes long. But you know,
Don Rio was producing the Share Show and he brought
me out and I was doing it with Frankie Avalon,
(46:44):
Frankie Valley and Pat Boone and Tony Orlando was doing
his show next store, and I was staying with It's crazy.
I was staying with Don Rio out in Malibu and
Neil Diamond had a house next door, and we would
be jumping Jackson in the morning, all this kind of stuff.
And that was the month that Bruce Springsteen and the
(47:07):
East Street Band came out to do the Roxy October fifteenth,
I think was nineteen seventy five. So I'm doing the
Share Show and I went from there to doing this
album with Phil Spector, you know, because Warner Brothers signed
Phil Spector as a producer and I had a ten
(47:34):
album deal with Warner Brothers Records. When they showed when
they showed Phil Spector the roster, he said, I want
to produce Deeon. So we went in and we started.
You know, first we got all the songs together and
then we went into the studio and you know, Springsteen
(47:57):
and Little Steven and Clarence, they all wanted to come
over and meet. You know. First of all, they loved
the Wanderer. I had big Buddy Lucas with the horn
playing on the Wanderer. Yeah, so he loved my stuff
and they loved Who didn't love Spector? We all you know,
he was a legend. He was you know, the guy was.
We all love the cinematic, you know, is the way
(48:17):
he produced. And when they came, it was just it
was insane. When he got so threatened by Bruce Springsteen.
It was just crazy. You know, what do you mean
this gun around? You know, this this magnum.
Speaker 3 (48:32):
You know, why was he threatened?
Speaker 5 (48:34):
Who was the alpha dog?
Speaker 7 (48:35):
I see?
Speaker 1 (48:36):
You know, I don't know if you know, Phil Spector
had a side that was not I heard.
Speaker 3 (48:41):
This, I've heard this, But but he wouldn't just be
thrilled that Springsteen's coming in.
Speaker 8 (48:47):
No, it didn't work that way, you know, he was.
I think he was threatened because he he just it
was like water and oil. He just you know, he
started pointing the gun, you know, you want and how
to make a fefin record. I'll show you at him
wow point, And I'm thinking, yeah, like Phil, like you know,
(49:08):
Springsteen needs some help on making especially Yeah, but he
made one to run and it was kind of a
wink to Phil spect It wasn't a spector.
Speaker 1 (49:19):
That's a hell of a wink, a wink that fifty
years later still works, you know.
Speaker 8 (49:24):
So, but the idea is, you know, Don Rio is
a great guy man. He is a great sitcom right,
and a good friend. He wrote I think he was
the author of Clarence Clement Hero Clarence.
Speaker 5 (49:39):
Is all co running with him.
Speaker 11 (49:41):
Yeah, Oh I didn't know that.
Speaker 5 (49:42):
And his first job was with him Jimmy to Ranty.
Speaker 7 (49:45):
Wow.
Speaker 5 (49:45):
So you got to get him on the show.
Speaker 3 (49:47):
Yes, great, Dion for you.
Speaker 4 (49:49):
Bruce springsteens sort of a religious figure on our podcast
where it's like we could have called the Jews who
worship Springsteen.
Speaker 13 (49:55):
Uh.
Speaker 4 (49:55):
And since you're one of the influences who helped set
the stage for Bruce, what do you think of how
he's carried the mantle forward Because you were the king
of the New York streets and he sort.
Speaker 1 (50:05):
Of you know, he's one of the kings too.
Speaker 8 (50:10):
I think he's Uh. You know, one thing is the
music and the other thing is the person. Right. You know,
there's a big difference between being successful and being fulfilled,
you know. And Doc Palmis was fulfilled. He's just he
was completed in himself. He wasn't like, you know, he
(50:33):
wasn't desperate to you know, he had to have a
hit rate. He just always seemed calm in himself for me,
you know, and and and Springsteen is somebody to really
look at because you get guys like Elvis Presley, who
maybe I always felt Elvis should have went on tour
with the Rolling Stones, you should have got a you know,
(50:54):
an acoustical guitar and just played in the band, had
some fun rock and roll. But I know it just
I don't know, it just went south. Springsteen, I think
if you look at his career and the decisions he
makes along the way, like doing Broadway or you know,
(51:16):
you know, just different writing a book, just he makes
decisions that the early rockers didn't, who were very destructive,
and some of them, you know, died very broken and
never coming to the full knowledge of the truth or fulfilled.
So I think his his career in a way, if
you look at him he went north. I think he's
(51:37):
made great decisions, you know, and I think he's very smart.
And I'm a good friend, you know, and I've been
a you know, on the on the receiving end of
his kindness for a long time, you know, and we
help you, you know, both ways.
Speaker 4 (51:53):
And by the way, Stephen, Stephen who's been on the podcast,
talked about you to me over the years, and what
he said is like the greatest one of the greatest
sins was because he was a backing musician for some
of the great you know, sixties acts in the seventies
and he said he.
Speaker 8 (52:09):
Was my guitar player. He yeah, he was my guitar
player in the seventies, Stephen. You know, the one thing
about the one great thing about that era and Doc
Palmis is when when Doc was writing songs, greatness and
(52:30):
commercial music were the same. They were one and the same. Today,
you want commercial music, you have to go here. You
want greatness, you have to go there. They were the same.
It was. It was like a renaissance, you know.
Speaker 1 (52:47):
One hundred percent. By the way, you mentioned Broadway and
and uh, Sharon, for you, is there talk?
Speaker 4 (52:52):
I mean, is there as you're you're making sure, this legacy.
With the help of people like Eddie, this legacy continues.
Do you think about a movie a Broadway show?
Speaker 1 (53:03):
Like, what do you Those things aren't easy to do,
but are you already thinking that way?
Speaker 9 (53:09):
Yeah, for sure. I mean movie and Broadway show both
are something that we've had a lot of interest in.
Eddie can speak to that.
Speaker 5 (53:18):
Well, I've we've written, I've written a script and fantastic script.
Speaker 1 (53:24):
Well, and you know he doesn't write any other kind.
Speaker 5 (53:26):
No, it's and I will say this, and actually this
is a stupid thing to say, but I'm going to
say it. There's a remember the story that when when
Preston sturg just wrote the first movie he directed, Uh
it was Miracle of Morgan's Creek. Was not the first
love that it was right after he had written Easy
Living I this it was or you know, and he
(53:47):
was a very popular script writer, and he said, I
really want to direct, and so I'll sell the script
to you paramount for a dollar if you let me
direct it. I I love I, as you can tell.
I just really believe in doc Palmis. I'm not you know,
I would sell this script for like minimum, right is
skilled minimum. If the right person wanted to make it
because I just want the story to get out there.
Speaker 1 (54:10):
Is there anyone who could play him? Is there any
There's a lot of people.
Speaker 5 (54:12):
I mean, I'll tell you the truth, and and and
and some of the choices are kind of odd because
obviously it's a physically demanding role. But I watched them,
you know, and it's funny someone you wouldn't think of immediately.
I watched Seth Rogan on the Emmys and and I
thought he could do it, you know, and if if
he wanted to play something a little more serious than
he usually plays. You know, he has a kind of
(54:33):
a likable quality, a nebbishy quality, which I think there's
a certain crusty uncle nebishy quality that's very you know
in there. And there's a guy who was in this movie.
I went and saw the new h jj plast movie
last night, Baltimore's Baltamron's, which I really really like.
Speaker 11 (54:50):
Yeah, Monica is raving about it.
Speaker 5 (54:51):
And the guy who plays the lead in that, Yeah,
he could do it, okay, And and you know, obviously
he's not a star.
Speaker 8 (54:57):
You know.
Speaker 5 (54:57):
It's like, you know, there's the thing of like you're
not going to get Timbo Alime or the guy with
big arms from the bear. You know who's going to
bring you know, who might bring people into the a
big crowd into the theater. But you at a certain
way you have to go, who's really going to play
this role and make it great? And you know, you
have to be honest with yourself and those actors I
(55:17):
think could do it. You know, you get a good
director who has a certain amount of cloud. But I
think it's a story. It's a story about more than
a songwriter. As Diana said, he's he's a man who
believed in people and he made everything he was a
part of better. And I think right now, when when
people want to make empathy a dirty word, I think
more than ever, we need a story about a guy
(55:39):
like Doc Palmis.
Speaker 11 (55:40):
That's great, Eddie.
Speaker 3 (55:42):
I hope, I hope this comes to fruition that that
would be wonderful.
Speaker 9 (55:47):
Oh me too, Thank you. We've been at it not
too long and I think we're I think we're going
to get there, I really do.
Speaker 8 (55:53):
That's great.
Speaker 2 (55:54):
Well, it's certainly from everything I've heard today, and and
you know you've reawakened that my love of music. You know,
I think, like most people we listen to songs we
don't know who wrote them. You know, they don't say
they don't announce the singer you recognize, but they don't.
It doesn't on the radio, it doesn't announce written by
Doc Pomas never says it.
Speaker 5 (56:15):
Well, you know, I mean you can talk about this
in terms of your experience with writing for TV shows.
One thing I've never liked, and I don't think you
have either, even though you have a big personality. I
have a big personality. I don't know when writers are
peaking at you from behind the curtain, like you go
where the actresses the line and that was a Phil
Rosenthal's You write because you're writing to put.
Speaker 3 (56:38):
To give, although I would announce it Jeering, Well, you
said out it broke, sure.
Speaker 5 (56:43):
But I think that you know, a songwriter is saying
those things. You know, someone said to me. I was
talking to them and they was talking about a famous
song of theirs, and they said, people always ask me
about this song, and they said, tell me about this
this song. Said, well, if I had more words, I
would have put them in the song.
Speaker 8 (56:59):
You know.
Speaker 11 (57:00):
That's great, that's great. Uh, you have any more stories
that you'd love to tell about doc.
Speaker 9 (57:07):
You know, there's no end to be quite frank, really
is there?
Speaker 10 (57:12):
Really?
Speaker 3 (57:12):
Is there a super funny one that any of you
want to tell.
Speaker 9 (57:16):
Oh, my gosh, I mean my my thing about. I
have Phil Spector's stories till I'm blue in the then.
Speaker 11 (57:25):
Bruce Springsteen, that's a good story.
Speaker 8 (57:27):
Yeah.
Speaker 9 (57:28):
He threatened to kill my husband too.
Speaker 1 (57:30):
But we was that or bad idea.
Speaker 9 (57:35):
It was a bad idea, but we actually I love
my husband, but we Actually my father really liked phil
because and a lot of people we called him Philip.
He liked to be called Philip. I don't know if
you prefer Philip Philip.
Speaker 11 (57:50):
But my mother called me Philip.
Speaker 3 (57:51):
Yes, okay, but I don't need you.
Speaker 9 (57:54):
To know, okay. He preferred everybody call him Philip. And
when he was getting too out of control, my father said, Philip,
get your stuff together and you know, come back in
another time when you're well. So my father was a
bit of a father figure to him. And Philip would
sleep on our floor in at lind Brook occasionally and
(58:18):
they wrote many songs together, often in the lobby of
the So my dad lived by week in the Forest Hotel,
which is like where Rodney Dangerfield and a lot, and
like Johnny Carson would bring his hookers or whatever it was,
like the side and allegedly sorry, and that was.
Speaker 8 (58:38):
To them.
Speaker 9 (58:39):
So and that is where a clown was murdered. That
was the Ringling brothers, Barnum and Bailey, an actual clown
and the famous clown that was on the Cereal bus.
He was murdered by a like a pimp and he
was seeing a prostitute. Because see this hotel. Allegedly this
hotel was on the block of where Madison Square Garden was,
(59:02):
the old Madison Square Gardens. Boxers stayed there, but he
gret you know, every kind of person stayed at the hotel.
And my dad was a lobbyist, like not in the
political sense, but he hung out in the lobby.
Speaker 8 (59:17):
That's the only kind of lobbyist I like.
Speaker 9 (59:20):
And he would write songs in the lobby, so he
would have the Electric worldser and he and Phil would
sometimes write. And Damon Runyon Junior lived in the Pentos
and Damon Runyan's father, Damon Runyon, had lived there, and
so my dad was obsessed with Damon Runyan esque kinds
of character. So that was the vibe. And I'm sure
(59:41):
you were hung out in the in the bill and
in the forest, right Dion does that?
Speaker 8 (59:48):
Yeah? Absolutely. You know your father's approach to talking to
people eyeball to eyeboy, like taught me a lot, because
I tell you the truth I had of people I
was young. You know, I didn't know how to negotiate
some of these relationships, you know. And when I went
into the studio, would Phil although he was a friend
(01:00:10):
from the you know, the the Fox Theater, when he
would pull up in a limousine with his cape and
his cane and his you know, he was a character
back then when I was doing this album with him,
and he would rent and rave and bang on the
on the studio windows to you know, there was like
(01:00:33):
sixty musicians in the in the studio, you know, with
Hal Blaine and just you know, Bobby keys on horn
and whoever was all these musicians and get ten guitar players,
you know, Bonnie Kessel and a bunch of and he
would just rent and rave and just do this like
(01:00:54):
Don Rickles thing. I don't know. He would for twenty minutes.
Anytime anybody into the into the control room, he would
he'd have another to have to do another twenty minutes
and I got kind of sick of it, and I
was about to uh, you know, and he just came
off an album with John Lennon and Harry Nilssen. Then
they were getting drunk and they you know, that was
(01:01:16):
a real hard album getting through. But man, I was sober.
I was like, I've been cleaning sober for fifty seven years,
but at that time, I was about seven years soside
some wisdom, and I just picked up on what your
father told me. I because I went the into the
control room and there was Chaer and Greg Alman, Bruce Springsteen,
(01:01:40):
a little Steven and Jack Nicholson and and his and
his girl Angelic, Yeah, Angelica Houston. He was dating John
Houston's daughter, and you know, and he had you know,
I knew if I walked into that control room and
had to say something I had, I was going to lose.
(01:02:01):
You can't challenge somebody in front of all these people.
But I did what I knew your father would do.
I said, Phil, come over here, and he didn't want
to come. He said, go back into the go back
into your your your sound booth, we'll record, don't worry
about it.
Speaker 7 (01:02:19):
Can't go.
Speaker 8 (01:02:20):
I said, no, Phil. I got him outside and I
brought him into an office because it was a nighttime
there was empty offices over in the studio. Then I
sat him down and I looked him straight in the eye.
This is this is Doc Palmis one oh one, and
I just said, Phil, I love you. I'm a friend.
(01:02:42):
I want to be treated like I treat you. You
know who I am. I said, let's go. I got
to walk out of here with my balls. I said, Phil,
let's go make a record. Stop this crap, you know.
And he always you know, when you look some when
you get somebody alone and look at them eyeball to eyeball,
(01:03:05):
you don't have to like demean them, you don't have
to make ultimatums. And this I learned from Doc.
Speaker 9 (01:03:12):
You know, he was he was a Karen guy in
that respect. He did, but he didn't he didn't suffer
fools and exactly what you're saying. But I just I
just actually thought of a very specific Phil Spector's story.
If we have time, it's very fast, do it. Okay.
So my father was in La one of the rare times,
(01:03:32):
and he went to Phil's mansion, where not the last mansion,
but another mansion and my and when once you got there,
you didn't want you to leave. Apparently he went there
and my father didn't know that he was producing Leonard
Cohen at the time.
Speaker 1 (01:03:49):
So an album called Death of a Ladies Man that
along with Dion's records, it's a tribute to the artist
that you can hear the songs a little through the
wall of is very thick.
Speaker 9 (01:04:02):
Okay. So anyways, he's at his house and there my
father is getting ready to leave and he looks in
the corner and he sees a guy in a three
piece suit in the in all the bodyguards, and he thought,
he goes, this is Cohen, and he thought it was Cohen,
his accountant. Like he just didn't even know it was
(01:04:23):
Leonard Cohen the whole time he was there. He when
he finally when Phil finally let him leave, he was like,
I was there with his accountant Cohen.
Speaker 8 (01:04:32):
I just figured it was.
Speaker 9 (01:04:34):
Not He had no idea it was Leonard Cohen until later.
Speaker 1 (01:04:38):
That is amazing. And by the way, I only had
one real meeting with Phil Spector.
Speaker 3 (01:04:44):
It was at the White House.
Speaker 4 (01:04:46):
There was a Christmas concert and I was writing the
show and he was Nancy Sinatra brought him to the
White House, and I think Phil Spector will be back
in the White House very soon, very That's my That
is my prediction about the world right now.
Speaker 5 (01:05:00):
Along with a Doc Palmis story. You know, since it
was we're talking about Doc, and this is since we
were talking about what kind of man he was. I
always liked this story, and with the Big Joe Turner story.
Big Joe Turner, like any performer who's had a long career,
had periods where he was rediscovered and always he's the
greatest thing. He was like the King of New York
again for a minute. And there was a he was rediscovered.
(01:05:20):
I guess it might have been in the seventies, and
this club owner was paying him X amount of dollars
per night. But then once the article was in the
New Yorker, Whinney Bellier or whoever it was, there were
long lines and so the guy was getting an extra
set a night out of Big Joe so they could
turn the house over. And it's doing like three sets
a night. It was like working a much too hard.
(01:05:42):
And Doc heard about this and just thought it was
just horrible. And he drove by it and saw there
was this line and it's like the third set of
night and Joe was not in great health at this time,
so he had his drive because Doc was already I
think it was already in the wheelchair. He always on crutches.
He just pull over at that phone booth and they
pulled over the phone booth and Dot called it a
bomb scare to the club. Oh, so that show wouldn't
(01:06:05):
have to do the late night set because he wasn't
getting paid in the extra money for it.
Speaker 3 (01:06:09):
That's a pal.
Speaker 5 (01:06:11):
It's the only story.
Speaker 9 (01:06:12):
I do it for you.
Speaker 8 (01:06:13):
I'm going to do it right now.
Speaker 5 (01:06:14):
But it's the only story I know with a bob scare.
You go, what a good guy.
Speaker 4 (01:06:19):
Well, that's it. We can't hate that story. So I
want to say, it's such an honor each and every
one of you. Is such an honor to have you,
uh and uh, you know, uh, thank you so much
Sharon for starting this ball rolling.
Speaker 7 (01:06:37):
Sharon.
Speaker 3 (01:06:37):
I hope, I hope my daughter says nice to me.
Speaker 9 (01:06:40):
Oh, that makes me so happy. Thank you for I
love my father. And I can tell from watching your
daughter that and your daughter's name is Lily. My daughter's
name is Lily. Oh, how nice I think she will
do the same for you.
Speaker 3 (01:06:54):
I think she would because she's a sweety pie like you.
Speaker 9 (01:06:57):
Oh, thank you so much, Dian.
Speaker 3 (01:07:00):
What a pleasure to meet.
Speaker 11 (01:07:01):
You, sir.
Speaker 8 (01:07:03):
Yeah, I have three daughters and uh uh that's why
I love Sharon. Yeah, reminds me of my daughters.
Speaker 2 (01:07:14):
Uh.
Speaker 8 (01:07:14):
Yeah, it has been great. I just I just love
sitting uh, sitting around with you guys and talking about Doc.
Uh you know, just a great, great focus for conversation
because it's just uh he was the best of humanity
has you know, like uh, the being a man and
(01:07:36):
uh the strength and and the beauty and truth and
goodness and and his uh his his love for people,
and he was he had the gift of encouragement, not
only uh songwriting.
Speaker 9 (01:07:51):
Thank you so much for saying that, and then thank
you for doing this.
Speaker 2 (01:07:55):
And Eddie, of course, well thanks for having me and
thanks for the education you guys, Eddie, Phil.
Speaker 8 (01:08:01):
David, love you guys.
Speaker 7 (01:08:03):
I love you.
Speaker 3 (01:08:04):
I what a pleasure, Dia, So everybody and Sharon and Eddie.
Speaker 1 (01:08:09):
Uh and now because if Eddie, he brought donuts and
you can't have them, so we're we're trying to fax.
Speaker 8 (01:08:14):
You a donut.
Speaker 9 (01:08:16):
Wow, Yeah, what are you gonna eat right now.
Speaker 7 (01:08:21):
I don't care.
Speaker 1 (01:08:22):
Yeah, not when the cameras are on.
Speaker 8 (01:08:24):
Oh, I ain't a sharing and sharing with the nobody else.
Speaker 7 (01:08:34):
And I'm going to keep her on to my set.
Speaker 5 (01:08:37):
Damn Dan, Dan, she.
Speaker 7 (01:08:40):
Gonna be.
Speaker 15 (01:08:46):
Naked Lunch is a podcast by Phil Rosenthal and David Wilde.
Theme song and music by Brad Paisley, produced by Will
Sterling and Ryan Tillotson, with video editing by Daniel Ferrara
and motion graphics by Ali I'm ed executive produced by
Phil Rosenthal, David Wilde, and our consulting journalist is Pamela Chella.
If you enjoyed the show, share it with a friend.
But if you can't take my word for it, take Phil's.
Speaker 3 (01:09:08):
And don't forget to leave a good rating and review.
Speaker 7 (01:09:10):
We like five stars.
Speaker 8 (01:09:11):
You know.
Speaker 15 (01:09:12):
Thanks for listening to Naked Lunch, A lucky Bastard's production.
Speaker 1 (01:10:10):
Phil Hi, Sharon Eddie and Rock and Roll Hall of Famous.
Speaker 7 (01:10:16):
Uh uh dion.
Speaker 1 (01:10:18):
Why should people tune into Naked Lunch this week?
Speaker 9 (01:10:21):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (01:10:22):
Speaking for myself, I'm getting an education in the great
doc palmise from three of the world's experts.
Speaker 5 (01:10:30):
If you love music and you love a certain song,
sometimes it's a great thing to find out where it
came from.
Speaker 3 (01:10:37):
Yeah, I just love that
Speaker 8 (01:10:40):
We're talking about my dad nice and I love sitting
around with real people talking about real songs and the
beauty of what music could, how it could fit your
heart and change your life.