Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Don Miggs aka Gutter Sinatra. I love it. You know
what I didn't tell our liaison here And you'll be
performing at the Shu Community Theater in Fairfield on January
twenty first is I go way back? Good friends with
Steven Kellogg, who you're opening for. What's your relationship like
with Steve Fairfield? A Fairfield show that's close to home
(00:23):
for him. There's gonna be a hometown called Big Crowd.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
It should be great. I mean, you know, first of all,
I'm from New York, so I have like a lot
of history spent in your neck of the woods. My
sister lives in Stamford. I made a record when I
was in a band called Meggs in Stamford and love
it there. But Stephen and I met out on tour
and the first time I was opening for him several
(00:49):
years ago, and the very first time we ever met,
I had one of my teeth I took we were
in Washington State. I took a bite out of a
hero and lost one of my front teeth and I
had the first time I meet him, I had I'm
missing a tooth and I had to go on stage
missing a tooth. I looked like a pirate. Yeah, it
(01:13):
was kind of unbelievable. But we became fast friends and
then made music together a bunch over the years, and
then we were Yeah, we were together this summer and
just he said, man, we should tour together. And I'm like,
I'm doing this gutter Sinatra thing. He said, I'd love
(01:33):
to do that. So we're putting together this tour and
I couldn't be more excited. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Yeah, Well he's got a great sense of humor. I mean,
he's dipping his toe in the stand up comedy pool recently,
so I would imagine he have you seen that show?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
That show is unbelievable?
Speaker 1 (01:50):
A couple of clips of his.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Want to go see it? I was like, I was like, no, no, no,
this isn't going to be good. This is like a
heart on your sleeve guy. You can cry cry it
a good you know, all state commercial. And now we're
going to go see him make us laugh in. My
wife and I went and we were like fingers crossed,
and he was funny and earnest and like, listen, you grow.
(02:15):
You you have the wife who is your sweetheart as
a kid, and you have four girls. If you don't
have a stancy humor, you're jumping off the building.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Yeah, there are a great bunch man. Those girls go
on the road with him. Two of his daughters are
in the band. You know, he tourists with them too.
I've been a fan of his for a long time. Now,
You're exactly right. I mean his music is heartbreaking music.
So when he first announced that he was going to try,
you know, I do stand up comedy, so I also
get a little defensive all because there anybody could do
(02:46):
it right, because it's that easy. What do you make
your friends laugh? So you think you could do it?
And yeah, and I kind of got that one. Then
I saw a few of his clips and it was
funny stuff. I loved his routine about lou Graham, about
hot blooded. I don't know if you saw that one. Yes,
of course dissected the song. So is that what's going
on with you too? Because I kind of remember Miggs.
(03:07):
I don't know if maybe you played down New Haven
way of course? Yeah. And is Gutter Sinatra like kind
of the same as what Steven's doing with stand up
just like a new thing. You're doing, a new act.
You're trying on. Tell me about Gutter Sinatra?
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Well, you know what during COVID, we the World shuts down,
known as Anything to Do. I'm done with my band Megs.
I'm in this band called Whole Damn Mess, which we
were having some success. Things had gone well, and I'm like,
now what do I do? Nobody's doing anything? So I
started making these songs that no one else wanted to do.
(03:45):
As a songwriter and a producer, most of my job
is like, you know, I've worked at Dolly Parton and
Billy Corgan and Steven Tyler, and I've you know, I've
done a bunch of like the name drop. I'm right,
I'm working and writing, producing and doing stuff with these people.
And I had this group of songs that nobody wanted
and I'm like, but I love these And it's sort
(04:07):
of like if Johnny Marr were going to do yacht rock,
and I'm like, I think I want to put a
record out. And so I started doing the record by myself.
And then I got my friend Bob clear Mountain, who
was mixed some of the biggest records of our time.
And yeah, so he's just me playing and singing and
him mixing it. And we did a song a day
(04:29):
and it was kind of the coolest experience, and then
I put it away. Paul Damn Mess started having success again,
and I started getting more success as a producer and songwriter,
and I'm like, well, this thing was nius, but there
it is. And then about a year ago, someone said, man,
I love these songs, and I started writing a whole
other bunch of songs that weren't going to be for
(04:51):
anybody else, and so I started recording those and just said,
I think it's time to put this record out. After
the fires in the Palisades and I've lost his home
and his studio, I thought, this guy's in his seventies.
He's going to be dead at some point, probably sooner
than later. Even if he lives twenty years, that's still
(05:11):
sooner than later. I said, I got to put this
record out because I'm so proud that I got to
make a record with this election. So I put it
out and it has started to do fairly well, and
I got a couple offers to go tour, and I'm like,
I don't think I want to do it, and then
Stephen said, why don't we just get a bus together,
you bring out three piece with you, and so I
(05:33):
have like drummer from Olivia Rodrigo and the guitar player
from the Monuskin Singer's Band, and like all these great players,
I'm like, I think they're want to do this thing.
And so Gutter Sinatra just means like, I'm a dude
that came from the wrong side of the tracks and
base short and New York on Long Island probably should
(05:56):
have been dead by forty and I'm not. So it's
like I want to make day.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, I think we could. All I can say the same.
There's no reason for me to still be here at
fifty eight. I don't know how I am hey.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
And but you know what, every day I get up
and I'm just like here, yeah, so let me try
to let me make the best of every moment I got.
And so I literally get up and try to like
chase fun all day long and go to bed tired
and do it again tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
You do know that the knee jerk reaction is though,
and again WRO I'm with Don Miggs. He's going by
the nom de plume Gutter Sinatra, and I'm intrigued by
this music. You know, the knee jerk reaction when you
hear it. I know For me, it was oh, this
is a guy who's doing Sinatra tunes like with an edge,
(06:44):
not a yeah. That was my knee jerk reaction was
but that might have been colored done by knowing what
Steven was up to these days. So I thought, all,
this is going to be a fun show, and not
thinking I was getting original music. Then when you drop
Bob Cuntain, you know, like I said, I'm fifty eight
years old, I've been in radio for thirty years. I
just start picturing all the time, all the records I
(07:08):
have that his name is on some of my favorite
records of all time.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
So it's intriguing me too, and men the same exact thing.
And like when I thought, hey first was when I
was doing this, I thought the same thing, I can't
really do this. And then I have a friend, you
know who Paul Anka is. He wrote my Way of
Course songs. Yeah, yeah, And Paul and I started We've
written some songs together, and I was like, I'm going
to see this thing gutter Sinatra and he was like, oh,
(07:35):
that's cool, You're gonna do versions of Sinatra songs, said
the same thing, and I'm like, no, this is my
I see Sinatra as a storyteller because he didn't write
those songs. He told these amazing stories, and I'm like,
I have these songs that aren't all true. They're all
stories that I tell myself or I tell people, and
(07:57):
I'm going to sing them. And so it felt like
it was like the gutter version of his kind of
like cool thing. I don't feel as cool. I mean,
I wear a suit, but I don't look as cool
as he does in it. I try to do this
thing that just feels like like elevated punk is kind
of what I've been saying to myself.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
I can't wait to check it out. No, what you
look like, don is you look like you could play
Dean Martin. You could be you know, you got a
Dean Martin look. You're yeah, yeah, yeah, good looking dude.
He got the salt and pepper hair, a little disheveled.
You definitely have a Dean Martin. Uh, look to you.
Interestingly About Paul Anka, I actually saw his tour when
(08:40):
he did a covers record when he you know, people
thought it was novelty, but he actually did really good
arrangements of popular songs from the eighties and nineties of
like rock classics. I'm sure your.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Smells like he did smell Zike. Yeah, spells like Tin
Spirat he did too.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah, he did jump from Van Halen. Uh. He did
Black Holes song from Soundgarden, and you look at it
and you think, oh, this is novelty. But the arrangements
were so impeccable, like it worked. So, I mean, you
can drop all the names you want around here. This
is intriguing how many songs are on the record.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
The record has ten songs and it is a vinyl,
which is because it needs to be a vinyl because
it's Bob Clear Mountain. And the only thing I cared
about was putting on the back of the vinyl that
it was mixed by Bob Clear Mountain, like all the
records that we looked at when we were kids.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah, they're serving you up right too. It says gutter
Sinatra's music you expect to start blaring out of an
abandoned nineteen seventy seven Ford Bronco. It's Jackson Brown meeting
up with Beck for coffee. I love it, man, I'm intrigued.
And opening for Connecticut's own Steven Kellogg at the Sahu
Community Theater, which is a great room and a hop
(09:50):
skipping a jump for you on January twenty first. I
can't wait to check out the show Man and hopefully
we can chat backstage. I think it's great stuff.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
I would love to Yeah, please come and let's talk,
and I'd love I'd love for you to give me
some tips on on on comedy because I swear. I
tell my wife I have two good minutes in me
on stage and then I'll get bombed. But I got
two strong minutes almost.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Yeah. Well, I mean, all you really need are five.
You need three more and you gotta set that of
the day.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
I can't do it.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
No, I think you can. But we'll chat backstage at
the Theater in Fairfield on January twenty first. Don Miggs
aka Gutter Sinatra. I love it, dude. I'm glad we
chatted today and I look forward to hear it. I
asked our liaison to get me a copy of the record.
I haven't gotten it yet, maybe because you know, vinyl's
harder to ship. But I'm glad to hear it's on
vinyl two because I got the turntable going in my
(10:46):
living room.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Do you have the turntable going? I'm telling you right now,
you send me your address and I'll send you a
vinyl be it'll be there in no time.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Yeah, I can't wait to hear it. I already checked
out a few of the songs from dropbox. I'd love
to have him in hand, especially I didn't the clear
Mountain thing was lost on me. So you're keeping good company.
And Kellogg is included in that he's going to be
tickled when he hears we chatted. We really do. We
go way back. We go back about twenty years. So
I look forward to seeing you that night. Thanks for
(11:16):
taking time this morning, man, Take care you soon see you,
Don
Don Miggs aka Gutter Sinatra. I love it. You know
what I didn't tell our liaison here And you'll be
performing at the Shu Community Theater in Fairfield on January
twenty first is I go way back? Good friends with
Steven Kellogg, who you're opening for. What's your relationship like
with Steve Fairfield? A Fairfield show that's close to home
(00:23):
for him. There's gonna be a hometown called Big Crowd.
Speaker 2 (00:25):
It should be great. I mean, you know, first of all,
I'm from New York, so I have like a lot
of history spent in your neck of the woods. My
sister lives in Stamford. I made a record when I
was in a band called Meggs in Stamford and love
it there. But Stephen and I met out on tour
and the first time I was opening for him several
(00:49):
years ago, and the very first time we ever met,
I had one of my teeth I took we were
in Washington State. I took a bite out of a
hero and lost one of my front teeth and I
had the first time I meet him, I had I'm
missing a tooth and I had to go on stage
missing a tooth. I looked like a pirate. Yeah, it
(01:13):
was kind of unbelievable. But we became fast friends and
then made music together a bunch over the years, and
then we were Yeah, we were together this summer and
just he said, man, we should tour together. And I'm like,
I'm doing this gutter Sinatra thing. He said, I'd love
(01:33):
to do that. So we're putting together this tour and
I couldn't be more excited. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Yeah, Well he's got a great sense of humor. I mean,
he's dipping his toe in the stand up comedy pool recently,
so I would imagine he have you seen that show?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
That show is unbelievable?
Speaker 1 (01:50):
A couple of clips of his.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Want to go see it? I was like, I was like, no, no, no,
this isn't going to be good. This is like a
heart on your sleeve guy. You can cry cry it
a good you know, all state commercial. And now we're
going to go see him make us laugh in. My
wife and I went and we were like fingers crossed,
and he was funny and earnest and like, listen, you grow.
(02:15):
You you have the wife who is your sweetheart as
a kid, and you have four girls. If you don't
have a stancy humor, you're jumping off the building.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
Yeah, there are a great bunch man. Those girls go
on the road with him. Two of his daughters are
in the band. You know, he tourists with them too.
I've been a fan of his for a long time. Now,
You're exactly right. I mean his music is heartbreaking music.
So when he first announced that he was going to try,
you know, I do stand up comedy, so I also
get a little defensive all because there anybody could do
(02:46):
it right, because it's that easy. What do you make
your friends laugh? So you think you could do it?
And yeah, and I kind of got that one. Then
I saw a few of his clips and it was
funny stuff. I loved his routine about lou Graham, about
hot blooded. I don't know if you saw that one. Yes,
of course dissected the song. So is that what's going
on with you too? Because I kind of remember Miggs.
(03:07):
I don't know if maybe you played down New Haven
way of course? Yeah. And is Gutter Sinatra like kind
of the same as what Steven's doing with stand up
just like a new thing. You're doing, a new act.
You're trying on. Tell me about Gutter Sinatra?
Speaker 2 (03:25):
Well, you know what during COVID, we the World shuts down,
known as Anything to Do. I'm done with my band Megs.
I'm in this band called Whole Damn Mess, which we
were having some success. Things had gone well, and I'm like,
now what do I do? Nobody's doing anything? So I
started making these songs that no one else wanted to do.
(03:45):
As a songwriter and a producer, most of my job
is like, you know, I've worked at Dolly Parton and
Billy Corgan and Steven Tyler, and I've you know, I've
done a bunch of like the name drop. I'm right,
I'm working and writing, producing and doing stuff with these people.
And I had this group of songs that nobody wanted
and I'm like, but I love these And it's sort
(04:07):
of like if Johnny Marr were going to do yacht rock,
and I'm like, I think I want to put a
record out. And so I started doing the record by myself.
And then I got my friend Bob clear Mountain, who
was mixed some of the biggest records of our time.
And yeah, so he's just me playing and singing and
him mixing it. And we did a song a day
(04:29):
and it was kind of the coolest experience, and then
I put it away. Paul Damn Mess started having success again,
and I started getting more success as a producer and songwriter,
and I'm like, well, this thing was nius, but there
it is. And then about a year ago, someone said, man,
I love these songs, and I started writing a whole
other bunch of songs that weren't going to be for
(04:51):
anybody else, and so I started recording those and just said,
I think it's time to put this record out. After
the fires in the Palisades and I've lost his home
and his studio, I thought, this guy's in his seventies.
He's going to be dead at some point, probably sooner
than later. Even if he lives twenty years, that's still
(05:11):
sooner than later. I said, I got to put this
record out because I'm so proud that I got to
make a record with this election. So I put it
out and it has started to do fairly well, and
I got a couple offers to go tour, and I'm like,
I don't think I want to do it, and then
Stephen said, why don't we just get a bus together,
you bring out three piece with you, and so I
(05:33):
have like drummer from Olivia Rodrigo and the guitar player
from the Monuskin Singer's Band, and like all these great players,
I'm like, I think they're want to do this thing.
And so Gutter Sinatra just means like, I'm a dude
that came from the wrong side of the tracks and
base short and New York on Long Island probably should
(05:56):
have been dead by forty and I'm not. So it's
like I want to make day.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
Yeah, I think we could. All I can say the same.
There's no reason for me to still be here at
fifty eight. I don't know how I am hey.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
And but you know what, every day I get up
and I'm just like here, yeah, so let me try
to let me make the best of every moment I got.
And so I literally get up and try to like
chase fun all day long and go to bed tired
and do it again tomorrow.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
You do know that the knee jerk reaction is though,
and again WRO I'm with Don Miggs. He's going by
the nom de plume Gutter Sinatra, and I'm intrigued by
this music. You know, the knee jerk reaction when you
hear it. I know For me, it was oh, this
is a guy who's doing Sinatra tunes like with an edge,
(06:44):
not a yeah. That was my knee jerk reaction was
but that might have been colored done by knowing what
Steven was up to these days. So I thought, all,
this is going to be a fun show, and not
thinking I was getting original music. Then when you drop
Bob Cuntain, you know, like I said, I'm fifty eight
years old, I've been in radio for thirty years. I
just start picturing all the time, all the records I
(07:08):
have that his name is on some of my favorite
records of all time.
Speaker 2 (07:12):
So it's intriguing me too, and men the same exact thing.
And like when I thought, hey first was when I
was doing this, I thought the same thing, I can't
really do this. And then I have a friend, you
know who Paul Anka is. He wrote my Way of
Course songs. Yeah, yeah, And Paul and I started We've
written some songs together, and I was like, I'm going
to see this thing gutter Sinatra and he was like, oh,
(07:35):
that's cool, You're gonna do versions of Sinatra songs, said
the same thing, and I'm like, no, this is my
I see Sinatra as a storyteller because he didn't write
those songs. He told these amazing stories, and I'm like,
I have these songs that aren't all true. They're all
stories that I tell myself or I tell people, and
(07:57):
I'm going to sing them. And so it felt like
it was like the gutter version of his kind of
like cool thing. I don't feel as cool. I mean,
I wear a suit, but I don't look as cool
as he does in it. I try to do this
thing that just feels like like elevated punk is kind
of what I've been saying to myself.
Speaker 1 (08:18):
I can't wait to check it out. No, what you
look like, don is you look like you could play
Dean Martin. You could be you know, you got a
Dean Martin look. You're yeah, yeah, yeah, good looking dude.
He got the salt and pepper hair, a little disheveled.
You definitely have a Dean Martin. Uh, look to you.
Interestingly About Paul Anka, I actually saw his tour when
(08:40):
he did a covers record when he you know, people
thought it was novelty, but he actually did really good
arrangements of popular songs from the eighties and nineties of
like rock classics. I'm sure your.
Speaker 2 (08:51):
Smells like he did smell Zike. Yeah, spells like Tin
Spirat he did too.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Yeah, he did jump from Van Halen. Uh. He did
Black Holes song from Soundgarden, and you look at it
and you think, oh, this is novelty. But the arrangements
were so impeccable, like it worked. So, I mean, you
can drop all the names you want around here. This
is intriguing how many songs are on the record.
Speaker 2 (09:14):
The record has ten songs and it is a vinyl,
which is because it needs to be a vinyl because
it's Bob Clear Mountain. And the only thing I cared
about was putting on the back of the vinyl that
it was mixed by Bob Clear Mountain, like all the
records that we looked at when we were kids.
Speaker 1 (09:29):
Yeah, they're serving you up right too. It says gutter
Sinatra's music you expect to start blaring out of an
abandoned nineteen seventy seven Ford Bronco. It's Jackson Brown meeting
up with Beck for coffee. I love it, man, I'm intrigued.
And opening for Connecticut's own Steven Kellogg at the Sahu
Community Theater, which is a great room and a hop
(09:50):
skipping a jump for you on January twenty first. I
can't wait to check out the show Man and hopefully
we can chat backstage. I think it's great stuff.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
I would love to Yeah, please come and let's talk,
and I'd love I'd love for you to give me
some tips on on on comedy because I swear. I
tell my wife I have two good minutes in me
on stage and then I'll get bombed. But I got
two strong minutes almost.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Yeah. Well, I mean, all you really need are five.
You need three more and you gotta set that of
the day.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
I can't do it.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
No, I think you can. But we'll chat backstage at
the Theater in Fairfield on January twenty first. Don Miggs
aka Gutter Sinatra. I love it, dude. I'm glad we
chatted today and I look forward to hear it. I
asked our liaison to get me a copy of the record.
I haven't gotten it yet, maybe because you know, vinyl's
harder to ship. But I'm glad to hear it's on
vinyl two because I got the turntable going in my
(10:46):
living room.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Do you have the turntable going? I'm telling you right now,
you send me your address and I'll send you a
vinyl be it'll be there in no time.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
Yeah, I can't wait to hear it. I already checked
out a few of the songs from dropbox. I'd love
to have him in hand, especially I didn't the clear
Mountain thing was lost on me. So you're keeping good company.
And Kellogg is included in that he's going to be
tickled when he hears we chatted. We really do. We
go way back. We go back about twenty years. So
I look forward to seeing you that night. Thanks for
(11:16):
taking time this morning, man, Take care you soon see you,
Don
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