And The Writer Is...with Ross Golan - Ep. 124: Bruce Hornsby

Episode Date: April 5, 2021

Based out of Williamsburg, VA, today’s guest first rose to national prominence with The Way It Is, his 1986 Grammy-winning debut album with The Range. The title track became the most-played song on American radio in 1987 while Tupac Shakur’s timeless song “Changes” builds on “The Way It Is” and set the stage for many subsequent versions of the track, including Polo G’s current single “Wishing For A Hero.” In 1991, Hornsby collaborated with Bonnie Raitt, playing on her iconic hit “I Can’t Make You Love Me.” Additionally, Hornsby was a part-time member of the Grateful Dead from September 1990 to March 1992, performing over 100 concerts in America and Europe. He has written six full film scores for Spike Lee including his recent Netflix series She’s Gotta Have It, and contributed music to four others, including 2018’s BlacKkKlansman. Last year, Hornsby released his acclaimed album, Non-Secure Connection, which featured collaborations with James Mercer, Jamila Woods, Vernon Reid, Leon Russell, Justin Vernon and more. The 13-time Grammy nominee has solidified his status as a highly sought-after collaborator. Hornsby’s own 21 albums have sold over 11 million copies worldwide, and he has appeared on over 100 records including releases with Bob Dylan, Don Henley, the Grateful Dead, Ricky Skaggs, Bob Seger, Chaka Khan, Brandon Flowers, Bonnie Raitt, Sting, Mavis Staples, Willie Nelson and more. And The Writer Is… Bruce Hornsby!Artwork: Michael Richey White Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hey guys, welcome to Ann the writer is. I'm your host, Ross Golan. I've written with hundreds of artists and writers over the years, and my favorite part of each session is the first hour when we catch up about life, the industry, politics, composition, whatever. So this is a journey of learning why people write songs, how people write songs, and most importantly, who the people are who write the songs.

I'm producing this with the Great Joe London, big deal music publishing, and mega house music management. If you want to listen to the songs we discuss in this podcast, follow us on our socials, find out about special live events, or buy that merch, aka that hat I always wear, go to our website www.organtanthoridavis.com. Welcome to And The Writer Is. I'm your host, Ross Golan. Today's legend slash artist slash songwriter slash film composer

is an epically skillful pianist and emotionally deep lyricist. This multi-Grami award-winning Swiss Army knife of compositions first hit the way it is discussed institutional racism, homelessness, and civil rights cloaked by an evergreen chorus with a melody and factious enough to become a hit multiple times, including when it was sampled by the greatest West Coast rapper of all time, Tupac.

After the release of his eponymous album, by the same name the way it is, he won Best New Artist at the Grammys and since released another 20 albums, maybe played on 100 albums, sold millions of albums, and got another 12 nominations, all whilst working alongside the Great Spike Lee composing over six film scores.

He's recently released a new project just this year, collaborating with everyone from Boney Veras, Justin Vernon, and the Shins James Mercer. From O. Williamsburg, Virginia, this overachiever is a, genuine family man and the writer is Bruce Hornsby I don't know if I think that was accurate but it seemed close

well you had a lot of Hutzpoo there reading it but a lot of get up and go and at least I think one thing is accurate one bit was accurate overachiever I think it's safe to say that when I was in college

no one would have said oh that guy Yeah, he's really got it. He's going to be something, whatever, something special. There were certainly some people in my college university in Miami that were marked for greatness. I played in this woman's band, Carmen Lundy. It was always sort of a mark that you were moving forward, moving up the hierarchy in the city of Miami's musical circles, at least in the jazz-ish circles.

And so, Carmen Lundy was her name. I played on her senior recital. And you could just see that she was just bound for greatness. And she ended up achieving that. She's had a great career as a jazz singer. Before we get to the beginning of your story, what do you think the difference maker between those people that you felt were marked for greatness and what you ended up achieving?

Why do you feel like you had, why it worked out for you if you feel like you weren't marked for that same grade? Well, okay. Number one, I was a late starter. So when I was in the aforementioned time at music school of Miami, I'd only been playing the piano for three years at that time. I was a jock before then. I played music. I had a little band in sixth grade playing guitar.

When every kid played guitar, because they wanted to be the Stones or the Beatles. I got into piano late junior year of high school. So maybe I've been playing four years by the time I got to UM. So that's one thing. I'm just trying to catch up at that point in my life. And there was so much to learn. And so I was deeply involved. And I was a real grinder.

I was always in the practice rooms, always, again, trying to catch up. I was just willing to do the work. So, but that's one thing that would have, not would have kept me from being marked for greatness because i had such a late start that i really was not too fully formed then in any way uh that's that's one thing uh i don't know how i really put all this uh once i got deeply involved i do think that i was fairly tunnel-visioned about trying to, but from a certain point, probably about from my mid-20s on, I really sort of groked the idea of finding your own voice, finding yourself, your own style, maybe musically, in my case, pianistically, and finding your voice as a songwriter, trying to not be derivative, to not be generic, to not just sound like everyone else, to not just, to try to, do something with a little more depth and gravitas than just writing a hit song.

Okay. So that's a couple. That's just me just spouting off trying to somehow answer this tough question. I mean, it's a, yeah, it's a tough way to start. I feel like I should have asked you something that was funny or something to begin. We can get to funny. I can try anyway. You can do funny?

I'll try. Let's start from the beginning. You know, being born in the 50s, It's a different kind of music that you were listening to, I'm sure, than, you know, what kids are listening to now. So, you know, you're born in Williamsburg, a very classic town in the United States. Were your parents in music? Were they, did they play music? Did they listen to music?

Well, speaking of Williams, just to speak to your characterization of Williamsburg, I don't know if you ever heard of the legendary old rock critic writer, Paul Nelson. It was actually a book written about Paul. He was a deep guy, and he wrote for loads of magazines. And he did a piece about me, for musician magazine, the late great musician magazine, pretty extensive piece. And he came to Williamsburg. He was a venerable old sage at the time, an older gentleman, still letting his freak flag fly. He looked like an old hippie, basically.

Or maybe one of Kiroach's pals, you know, Ginsburg's pals in the beat era. And he, so I met him, and he was staying at the Williamsburg Lodge. And he said, man, this place is really creepy. He said, I walked around Colonial Williamsburg. And I just got the Hebes, you know. So I've always thought, okay, well, here's an outsider with possibly the truest perspective on it. It's hard to explain that town if you've never been there. Right.

It's a place that really explain Explain Williams Yes, thank you because people are going Well, what's he talking about? So thanks for getting moving me there. Yeah, Williamsburg is known for its restored colonial town.

Colonial Williamsburg, you can walk the streets and meet people with you can walk the streets in your tricorn hat and your powdered wig Maybe shoot a musket. That's something they've put in to draw more tourists to draw the try the accolades of the NRA. And so that can be either sort of inspiring if you're interested in history and want to see this

reenactment of it or it can be maybe a little creepy. So that's what that's what Williamsburg is known for. Although now it's known for Bush Gardens because Anheuser-Busch has a brewery here but mostly perennially historically it's been all about colonial Williamsburg and that's what the late great Paul Nelson

was casting aspersions upon so right you asked about my parents they were you know just think because you're you sound like you guys were listening to 18th century only 18th century music you know even though you're in we were not although we could

when you grow up up in a small town, not a lot to do. There's certain, for us, there was one thing that we would always do on a weekend of boredom. We would often go and watch the Colonial Williamsburg Orientation film, The Story of the Patriot, with featuring Jack Lord of Future Hawaii Five-O fame, as John Frye, Hauser-Burges' member. So we would walk around the town going, are we so meek and pusillanimous? are we such adultish people as to swallow this absurd distinction?

Is it disloyalty? Is it sedition to oppose the hand of tyranny? Never. We are a free Englishman with the God-given right to tax ourselves. And we shall not yield that right, not to Parliament, not to Townsend, not to the king himself. So that's what we did in our childhood. We learned that. Legendary. I feel like I want to put a melody to that.

We should sample that right there. Okay, possible. So you asked about my parents. Music, your music was always in our house. My mom's dad, Paul Sonja, was a musician for a living in Richmond, VA. And he was the house organist at the local mosque. If you'd go to the state J.C.'s convention, you'd see Paul, Pierre Paul Sonier, jamming out on Turkey and the Straw on the big theater, Oregon there.

He was also supervisor of music in the public schools. The public school system of Richmond featured Paul Sonier. And so my mom was a pianist and my dad played a little sax. His older brother Sherwood Hornsby had a band. We have a little poster over here advertising a dance featuring Sherwood Hornsby and the Rhythm Boys, little big band actions or Glenn Miller, Harry James vibe. And so, yes, again, it was always around my parents we can't find we haven't this this tape maybe lost uh at this point

but there for years existed a real to real tape of of of all of us little children of we little children singing uh different songs they have me singing hound dog at age three uh and pat boone with the wind and the rain in your hair uh charlie brown he's a clown he's going to get caught coasters. So there was always, there's proof in that tape that we were singing and performing music as little kids. And so my older brother got really deeply involved a little later. Again, I was more into every sport in its season, but Bobby Hornsby was the guy in, say, junior high school, who had soul bands and psychedelic bands. He had a band called Love Minutes Zero. It played, oh, I don't know, love, and

I don't know if you know the band, love. They were sort of... Yeah, of course. Yes. What's that? Yeah, of course. Okay. Of course, okay. And me, Moby, great, whatever. They played psychedelia,

Hendricks, et cetera. But then he had a soul band that played Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding and Sam and Dave and that sort of thing, too. So it was always around. when did you know i mean that's such a wide variety from glen miller to you know psychedelic the gamut was run yeah no doubt um when did you start playing because i assume piano was your first instrument just knowing you know the lineage that you come from and then also

your you know your knowledge of chord changes i would assume that that's just been in your blood the whole time were you playing from through all those sports seasons or was music introduced later as something you should perform? Yeah, the legend has it that I asked to take piano lessons when I was seven. So I did that. I took from Miss Garrison at Garrison's funeral home. You had to go to the third floor to the top of the house, and you'd walk by the caskets and embalming fluid.

So it was a little out for those eight-year-old kid to be doing that in that, Millew, but I only did that for a year. And then I stopped doing that. I just wasn't interested enough and just said, hey, can I stop? And this was fine. So that was my first foray into music, into keyboard specifically. But then about age maybe 10, 11, probably following my older brother's foot steps, because he was really into it.

But I was kind of into it, too. And I played guitar. I learned how to play guitar and had the aforementioned band playing everything from Cherry Cherry to get off my cloud to mushroom clouds are falling by love, I think. And so we played Battle of the Bands, 6th grade, 12 years old. But again, I was more into the games and sports. And then later on, still stayed into that athletic pursuit until my junior year, when my older brother, again, influential older brother,

had gone away to prep school in New England, in Connecticut. So he was instantly less provincial in his musical knowledge than we were, basically listening to the top 40 in the Soul Station back and forth in southeastern Virginia. So he came home and turned me on to Joe Cocker, Mad Dogs and Englishmen with the great Chris Stanton piano in Oregon and the great Leon Russell piano and arrangements, it just turned me out. I just thought it was that.

I'd get chills thinking about it right now. And then he turned me on to, and that was music that you didn't hear around here because it wasn't on the radio. And it was the underground. I guess you, they called it FM rock at the time. And also, he turned me on to, I'll never forget this, driving down,

the Colonial Parkway from Williamsburg to Yorktown, the hysterical triangle, as they call it, and James Town, Yorktown, Williamsburg. We're riding down there to visit our cousins, and he's in his GTO, and he's got his eight-track tape of Tumbleweed Connection by Elton John, and he puts in this song called Amarina. I'd heard your song on the radio, that I knew a little bit, and it was good. I was fine with that. But this thing just, again, turned me out like the Mad Dog. record did. And so

so much so that I wanted to investigate and I said to myself, okay, I want to learn how to do this. It got me again, it's fun. It's interesting what gives you chills in your body and that did again. So I went home and

I knew the basic chords on the piano because my brother taught me those chords because they needed a guy to play organ in their soul band for a minute while the real organ glare organist was out. somewhere. So I started just learning, learning, learning from my basic knowledge that I had, my little meat-headed cord not knowledge. And that just turned, that just, it just became my

pursuit. I was a hoop I was a hooper before that. I was a baller. And, but when I got into this, man, the, the music overtook the, the hoops, the basketball thing. and I got totally immersed in it, submerged in it. And that was, then it just kept on from there. Did it inspire you to write or did it inspire you to play? Well, not yet. Although we did write, we weren't very serious in school. We just pulled a lot of crap and pranks.

And we were really into Abby Hoffman steal this book. I don't know if you've seen the recent Netflix. I don't know who Abby Hoffman was? I don't know who's Abby Hoffman. Okay. This is great. This is a classic 60s American history for you. And it's sort of timely because, or it's absolutely timely because on Netflix right now,

it was just released, I don't know, a week ago and reviewed in the Times, Aaron Sorkin wrote and directed a new movie called The Trial of the Chicago. go seven. Okay. So Abby Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, they were the twin leaders of the Yippie movement. Okay. And Sasha Baron Cohen plays Abby Hoffman in the movie. And he's fantastic. It's very good this movie, I think. We just saw it last week. So now you know what I? I know who you're talking about. Yeah. Okay. So Abby Hoffman wrote a book. So back then, we as young, young clown. we loved all these these we loved jerry rubin and abby hoffman abby hoffman's first book was revolution for the hell of it and so we we were all in on that but when he put out his next one steal this book oh we totally we immersed ourselves in that and so oh we became we became a universal life church ministers you can send away for a buck and get your minister's card And we could have performed weddings and funeral services.

And we had a band booking company that booked only the shittiest bands in town. We would only book a band if they were terrible. And we would reserve the right to name them. So we had such bands as the uncommon cold, the benign tumor, the soul basketball, the psychedelic, the sound system, just inanity. Okay. And so we wrote, at this point, I was deeply into Leon. And Leon Russell had his great company called Shelter Records, record company.

I was a total shelter devote. I'd get every JJ K.O. record that came out, the Freddie King records, the three great blues records that Leon produced for Freddie King. So, and steal this book, Abby told us that you could, If you want to get free books and records, make some fancy stationary. It has the title of your magazine that you publish. And write to the publishers and the record companies saying, well, this is our magazine and we do regular reviews of books and records,

and please put us on your mailing list. So he wrote to Columbia Records, Warner Butter's and Shelter. And the only one who wrote us back and sent us. records was sheltered. So of course, at that point, now, if I wasn't into Leon before, I was all in now. And so this was, I don't know how I got off on the frivolity of our youth, but you led me there. So how did that happen? I think what's interesting, you know, 1968 and, you know, talking about the Chicago 7 and the Democratic Convention and the, yes,

The protests, right. My mother was there. I'm from Chicago. That's something to be proud of. Yeah. Yeah. I imagine that, you know, there's no way that politics isn't also infused in your music listening at that time. It was everywhere.

It was ubiquitous. It was, yeah. I mean, side question. Why is it that this generation in such a. a divided time. Why is it that music, popular music, doesn't, to talk about politics at all? It exists in, you know, it really exists in hip hop and it always has. That's what makes that genre sort of the folk music of our generation. Certainly. That's right. On a protest, folk as protest music level, absolutely. There were hits that were protest songs. But not so many

when you look back. I was just, because I said music of today, I was going to say, well, wait a minute, the popular music of today does it, but then you said it yourself. That's a key addition to that statement.

Because obviously, protest music now is kind of all over the place, but it's under the mainstream radar screen because the popular music of our day, just like any day, it tends to be more kid's stuff, you know it tends to be more you know tick talk and just more love love bow love songs whatever I don't want to to disdain to besmirch it but the protest music is not what they're looking for

and they never were looking for it really on hit radio so I don't think this time is any different if you went back and looked at the hits of the day in the 60s You'd see it was not dissimilar. Obviously, stylistically, it's totally different now. Styles have evolved, and that's what's supposed to happen in a great way. But you had Barry McGuire, the Eve of Destruction. Now, that was a protest song that was a hit. Dylan's songs, I don't think blowing in the wind times they were changing were hits,

but they were certainly known to a large underground populace. And I think that's the same way now. A perfect example, my song, the way it is, which was made, obviously famously, was remade by Tupac Shakur. His song changes in 98. Well, that song, if you go by the charts, changes by Tupac got to number 32 on the Billboard Hot 100. So that's not that great. but changes by Tupac by Tupac is an iconic song you know it doesn't need it it has its life totally divorced from from hit radio and it's again same thing back then same thing now

yeah I think a lot of people don't realize how many um and I use the word evergreen in the intro but how many evergreens were not hits you know I think there's this statistic where the only Bruce Springsteen song that everyone number one was the the man for man cover of blinding by the light yeah but that he never had a number one song at radio is joccing when you think about how many songs he has that are hits and you know when you look back and you see the top 10 songs of any specific week you will not know eight and a half of them yeah so that's the point that now these times in that sense the times haven't been a change in really in that in the music business

and but that's that's the way it always was and that's how i guess it always will be and who cares just so if look if you're really deeply invested you're going to find great music you may have to really dig for it but uh if you want it bad enough you'll find it that's i mean there's such amazing music out now. No doubt. And so, but you have to look for it. You went to school in the 70s to college. And at least what I found is that you had gone to music school at University of Richmond and maybe also Berkeley and University of Miami.

Is that right? Where am I wrong here? Just that there was no music school per se at. University of Richmond. I spent my one misguided year at real college at U of R. And I spent all my time in the modeling foreign arts center, fine arts building, practicing. And then I, which made me realize, well, I need to cast my lot with the musos. And so I went to, again, I was just a kid from small town, Virginia. I didn't, I had no mentor. I had to just figure it out, which is what, It's good.

You should be able. And so I'm sure I went down a few roads that were not productive, but then realized and came back. You're just trying things and trying to figure it out. So the only music school I really knew about was a guy I knew it had gone there as Berkeley in Boston, Berkeley with two E's as opposed to Cal Berkeley. And so I went there for two semesters and then transferred to University of Miami. I had designs. I had an idea I wanted to go to New England Conservatory, which was right down the street from Berkeley.

I'd gotten really deeply into modern classical music. When I lived in Boston, the Boston Public Library was an amazing resource. You could go and check out records, like you could check out books. And they had a voluminous collection of modern music. I'd say it's a 20th century music. So I got really into Ives and Satie and Stravinsky and on and on there.

And so I guess I felt that I wanted to go in that direction and wanted to go to New England Conservatory. So I auditioned and I made this tape. I tried to play very difficult music. It's laughable stuff that I can hardly play now. I was trying to play it then when I had no business. The tape was horrible. The guy called me up and said, look, I'm not letting you in, but I can tell there's something there and some promise there. So why don't you try University of Miami?

And, of course, I'd never heard of that either. So I lived in a farmhouse that for four months, that was in December, early January of my sophomore year of college. I ended up living out in a farmhouse with a crazy friend of mine and we're playing a piano bar cocktail lounge thing to make a buck. And I practiced eight hours a day for every day for four months and then four months later made a tape for University of Miami. And it's amazing how much you can improve if you're willing to put that much time into it every day. And so the tape was better.

They let me in and I spent two years there, which was a huge thing for me. I had a very tough teacher, Vince Maggio. I still consider him to be my teacher. It was really hard on me, but he was great. He was a teacher that could not only talk to talk, but could walk the walk.

He couldn't wait to move you off the piano to show you how to do it, and he could really show you. So I love Vince, as do most of his students, although, like I say, he was tough. He said to me at first, you are terrible,

but if you do this and this and this, and this and this, you won't be terrible, maybe. I mean, it's really good advice from a mentor, and I think people don't want to hear, you know, and again, I don't know if this generational or not, but my assumption is that people now more than ever don't want to hear that they were, that they're not good. Well, that there's a lot of placation.

And I remember a teacher of freshman year of college, my voice teacher is saying you sound like a white kid from the suburbs, you need to learn to yell. And this is in my, because I study jazz vocals, you need to like, and I didn't, you know, jazz vocals to me was Glenn Miller.

It wasn't, it wasn't, you know, Lewis Armstrong, if we're going back to that. Like, I didn't understand the idea of pain. Well, I still don't understand it. Who yells in jazz vocals? I think of yelling. I think of Joe Strumber, you know. I think of,

of Johnny Rotten. That's still good at life. Much rather something like him than what I sounded like that. But you want to have mentors that say you're not doing it right. Even now, do you now play your music for anybody who says, oh, you can beat this? Oh, sure. Yeah, I don't live in a vacuum.

And pretty much I don't think I really ever have. Mostly from idiots, idiocy. What I thought was good is not. So, hey, listen, this thing I just did. And then I realized, oh, yeah, it's pretty bad. But, yes, I think that it was always the same in this sense, though, I think it was always a tough blow to a kid's ego in 1974, the same tough blow that it is now.

So that was hard on me when Vince told me that. It took me a while to sort of, I recoiled in horror, and then I came back and decided, well, okay, let me see what's investigate this, see what he's talking about. Again, it's just a kid from small town south, just trying to figure it out. And so I, of course, in hindsight, you always say, oh, thank you for the criticism. But in the moment, I don't think that's ever changed. I don't think, I mean, I guess I'm trying to say that maybe the kids today, as you're saying, are more sensitive or have thinner skin. And that may be true.

I kind of think I had semi-thin skin then, too. What was the impulse to write music and record music? Because at that point, you're starting to get an education in music, but there's a big leap. You know, you graduate and, you know, the first time I can really find recorded music, we're talking 10 years later from after graduate. graduating college. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Well, that's when I got signed. It was eight years after I graduated from college. So what happened in those eight years, how do you go from, I'm a student who has a mentor who's saying, you suck, but you can get better, to being, as a songwriter, getting to the quality level of getting record deals? Well, they're just, they're two completely different disciplines, different aesthetics. They're just just different approaches, learning, you know, dealing with virtuosity on the instrument and then also writing songs of some depth and quality. There are different paths. There are different roads that you need to go down.

So I was a, when I got out of college, I was way farther along. on the playing end than I was as a writer. Because I had just been trying to do that. That had been my focus in college. Just get the instrument together or more together than you are now. So I really didn't get serious about the writing until we came back here. I graduated in 77 from UM. Came back here with a couple of my, with my brother and sister-in-law in the band.

And that ever-present older brother, he returns to the story. I played in his Grateful Dead cover band when I was a freshman in college at University of Richmond. He was a big deadhead. He was in a classic UVA freak fraternity that used to drop acid, paint their faces and go play intramural volleyball. It's just beautiful. They were lucky if they even hit the ball once. So I just love that, that, you know, I mean, we'll get to it later. fact that you were in a you know to be in a grateful dead cover band and then later play with the

grateful dead is just bananas like you can't write that kind of stuff i know it sounds like terrible writing if you do write that it really yeah painting yourself into the mural that you were looking at as a kid that's kind of what has happened what happened to me uh amazingly you go home you're you're writing with your brother and you're writing with your sister-in-law no no not right no i was a military pursuit. So we come home and we put this band together with a couple of my Miami friends who came up to play a guitar and drums. And so, okay, I guess I was a silently elected band songwriter. Nobody else was doing it. And I guess I had the knowledge, the harmonic knowledge to go to various places that other people may not have been able

to go. So I started writing songs. And about a year, about a year and a half into our band. So I guess around the end of 78. We had amassed a group of my songs, maybe about 10 or so. And we were playing them on our gigs. We were just playing your standard top 40 lounges. And we played the odd frat party to the odd rock and roll club in North Carolina where they wanted to hear Black Oak, Arkansas, and Black Betty Bamalam.

You know, they wanted that. We were not their people. They didn't like us. You're playing too much earthwind and fire, you know. So, but we, I was figuring it out gradually, gradually in my muddleheaded fashion and had written some songs that made it, that people liked enough that we were able to flip the audience at these lounges to the point where the people pop played in the clubs, we were filling the clubs with people who didn't want to hear us play Brick House or shake your booty. They wanted to hear my songs. And so that's a real trick. It's hard to do.

But it helped us continue to work and still develop this original music thing because the club owners don't care why they're there. They just want people in their club. So, okay, this place is crowded and you're playing some shit I don't know and don't even like it probably. But hey, there's people here so you guys keep the job. So that was a pretty good trick we were able to pull there, purely from people liking the music. So we liked at the- I mean, how did you know they liked it besides clapping at the end of your set? Were you recording it and selling it?

Was where people afterwards? How do you know people like your songs in that air? Because after a certain point, that's all we're playing and they keep coming. Okay. Okay. And then when you light into, for whatever reason, you light into, so I'd like to know where you got the notion. Rock the boat, don't rock the boat, baby, rock the boat, don't kick the, you know. When you go into that and they sort of blanch in horror sitting in their seats, sipping their beer, that's just that that makes you, that lets you know why they're there. And so that, I guess that's how.

No, so we, because we weren't selling anything. We weren't making any demos. But we liked, we liked Steely Dan. You know, we came out of jazz school, so we were into jazz influence pop. It sounds like you went through a similar crucible and jazz school with a tough teacher. So, right, so we liked Steely Dan, and we also like Mike McDonald, who had been in Steely Dan, and now he was the lead singer with the Doobie Brothers. So we play some of their songs, the Mike McDonald's songs.

It keeps you running. I know you're made that way. These are some songs we would do for mics. And the people liked those because they like this music because it was stylistically akin to what I was doing, sort of. So the Doobie Brothers were playing Hampton Coliseum, and we were playing across the street at the Hampton Steak and Ale. okay and uh lounge and we went over we knew the same people that booked their big concerts

whisper concerts booked our little shit ass lounge gigs and so we knew the duty brothers were staying the sheriff and coliseum so my drummer john molo big guy and he and i walk into the lobby of the sheridan carcinium looking for mike macdonald and there he is so we walked up to him and we said hey mike we're the baddest motherfuckers in this town and we're playing over here at the steak and ale so you should come hear us so he looks up at us and he goes well okay i'm going to the movies now but i will if i can sure enough he had brought he was a night off for the doobie brothers they were playing the next night he came over with some of the doobies roadies so we'd saved all our originals you know all my songs and just wore it out and he's there and he just

flipped and he comes up to me and says oh my god come back to the let's have a drink let's hang out the bar come up to my room let me play our our new record that's being released tomorrow it's called minute by minute which was of course yeah it was it was unbelievable i can't believe it happened even now but he was such a beautiful guy and it remains so uh of course and so that so he was our first I refer to him as my discoverer and founder. And so he helped us out. We went to L.A. He turned us on to some people.

That was during the era where Mike McDonald was singing on one third of the hit songs of the day. His voice was in the background, whether it was Pegg, Steeley, Dan, Lauren Wood, some song, and Christopher Cross, ride like the wind. He was all over it. So he would turn our tape. We made a demo tape. It was pretty bad. He turned us on, turned the tape onto producers when he would go work for them.

We slept on his floor for 10 nights, the next, two months later in Studio City, the aforementioned John Molo and I did. Anyway, long story shorter. We ended up coming out and showcasing for record companies and publishers the next summer.

Jeff Baxter wanted to produce us. He was leaving the Dubey brothers. You know, Jeff Baxter? I know of him. I've actually met Michael McDonald along the way, but never, Jeff. Okay, so Skunk Baxter, as he's called, took us into some rehearsal studio, parked us there for a month, and we played for all sorts of people. I found out later that most of the people hearing us refer to us as the band that looked like Rodeys,

because we were hardly, we were just a bunch of greasy guys who were into music. And so we did that and pretty much all, most of the labels passed on us. Only one was interested in. We didn't go with them, 20th century records. But the publishers liked what I was doing, songwriting as a songwriter. So I ended up signing a songwriting deal with 20th Century Fox, and I moved to L.A. from that.

And then three of the other guys moved, and my brother and sister-in-law, they stayed here in Williamsburg, because they didn't want to go out and scuffle and play on milk commercials and shitty publishing demos. whatever you can do to make a buck while you're trying to get your thing going. So that was 1980 and I went to David Giffin's house and played him songs.

I mean, this is crazy. You're shaking your head a lot of this story. I mean, well, it's like this is like my dream era because I was born in 80s. So I grew up listening to all the music from, you know, my parents from basically their childhood all the way through mine, but that era is the beginning of you know, so much of the music that I'm currently trying to bring back in a lot of ways.

And I'll have to interview you about that. Exactly. I mean, David Geffen and him's going from manager to label exec and and being part of the, you're talking about Studio City where I currently live and we're right off, we're right off Laurel Canyon and you talk about Laurel Canyon in the 70s and early 80s and David Geffin's influence on that. Incredible.

You know, you start, when you say that you're playing for David Geffen in, in his sort of, the first chapter of his prime or his second chapter of his prime, like, that's just such a legendary thing. I'm sure a lot of people who listen to this are currently talking to their David Geffens in this music business, but. Well, you know, that's a. That's why I'm shaking my head. It's crazy, man. I mean, like Michael McDonnell in the middle of a, like, what is this?

Well, and I guess as I hear you sort of marveling at all this, really, though, in the end, the reason this was happening, I'm not trying toot my horn, because I don't think the music was really especially great then, but it had to have something to get these, because that's what hooked Michael, okay, and to help me out. And then when I signed with 20th, One of the song runners there was a young girl, a young woman named James Foster, who was David Foster's little sister. So she turned my tape onto David Foster, and David wanted to sign me to his publishing company.

This was when he was just getting started as a producer. He had written after The Love is Gone, for Earth, When and Fire, an iconic hit for them. He produced a Hall-Nose record that wasn't particularly a big hit, but it was very good, made a little noise. So I signed with him. And so we've made this demo. The first session I did in L.A. was with The Cats. It had Mike Procaro on bass and Jay Graydon on guitar and David playing one playing electric piano, and I'm playing acoustic piano and Carlos Vega on drums. I don't know if you know these names, but these are just seminal names.

names from that era's studio scene, a studio session scene. And so David Geffen heard that tape, and he instantly said, I want to see this kid. Okay. So I went with my publisher at the time, Ronnie Vance. We went up to David Geffen was sharing, share, was, was living in Cher's house while she was somewhere else. Bel Air, Beverly Hills. And I would go up there, and David's there with his, one of his, he was starting his new label. Didn't have a name yet. Okay, it wasn't called Geffen Records yet. He had signed one at Donna Summer.

He subsequently signed later that fall. So this is June of 1980. He'd subsequently later signed Elton and John Lennon in the fall. And John Lennon then was assassinated of late. that year. I think it was December of 80. I'm not sure. But anyway, so we go over there. Carol Child's the A&R person and Ronnie Vance and I were sitting there and Dave Davis there. And so then he, so he says to me, play me a song. There was a piano there. So I started playing this song that I'd recorded, that we had recorded on this demo. And it was one of those moments

where the acoustics of the room were just glorious, you know, just the man with the voice of a thousand seagulls would have sounded amazing in this place, you know, would have sounded incredible here. So I just, I'm very aware of this, oh my God, this is, I don't think I've ever sounded this good. I'm saying to myself, as this going on. And I know when I saw ended, David Geffen jumped up and said to me, Brucey, I want you to make record. for me. And so I'm thinking, there's another chill I got

thinking about remembering that moment. And so I thought to myself, wow, is it this easy? Well, alas, it was not that easy. And I never sighed with Geffen. He then put my situation in the hands of Carol Childs and the

another subsequent hire a an R hire the legendary john david colladner so uh he's known he's maybe best known as as the the rabbi looking cat with a wedding dress and dude looks like a lady yeah that's harrowmith's video yeah that's him uh quite a quite a successful and great an r guy so we waltzed around David Foster and I waltzed around with Carol and Colladner for about three or four months recording songs. My younger brother, John, was, had moved. He'd gone to Stanford graduated that year and came, moved down to L.A. to write with me. He was going to be my partner. And we ended up being partners. That was 80. We wrote songs together all the way through 92. He wrote Mandolin Rain with me. He wrote Valley Road. He looked out in the window. Had some nice success with me a few years after that. So, but then they brought me into their office and said, Bruce, you're not, you're the kind of guy we want, but you're not ready yet. And I think they were right. You know, one of the things that's crazy is a lot of times people get to know,

in that era, a lot of times people would get signed off of their live show. And in this era, a lot of people feel like they need to get signed off the live show. And I'm always telling people, no, get signed off your songs. And how big your live shows are, if the songs aren't going to work, it won't matter. It'll take you forever to stay at a very medium level versus if the songs are huge. Well, I've got a standard line regarding all that. I think my story is an educational one because, okay, so we'll fast forward. So the Kevin people said, yeah, not yet, not quite.

Then I had Warner Butters, the great Lenny Warrenker, give me 10. demo money the next year made a demo. Eh, not right. This happened for years. Finally, I, uh, and all this time we're trying to, my brother and I are trying to find our own voice, like I mentioned, try to find an area that was unique to us, that would carve out our own niche, uh, musically, stylistically. And we were just pursuing that. I don't think we had it yet, really. We went down some goofy roads and came back.

And anyway, so, 1985 comes along. 1980, oh, 80? Okay, 84. We put together, I put together a band The Range. By this time, because I wanted to hide behind a name, I thought Bruce Hornshby was a pretty crappy stage name. So I thought I would do like Mark Knopfler did and hide behind a name, Dyr Straits for him, the Range for me.

So we were The Range, and it was sort of, We were trying to affect our modern-day version of the band. Before this whole area of music was titled under the umbrella Americana, it didn't exist then. We were trying to be, I guess, that. And our timing was probably pretty good because sort of in the zeitgeist of the time, Tom Petty was doing this. John Mellencamp was having incredible American rock records.

Bruce Springsteen, of course, was doing this. And so we were doing our version. There was 1984, and we're playing all around L.A., Adam Wong's, Hop Sings, the lingerie, all the clubs of the time. And we got a little head of steam. We got some interest in about five labels offered us a deal, offered us demo money. We took Epic, and we made a demo for Epic.

And they passed. And so sort of the lemmings consciousness of the LA show business music music business is such that, well, when all the other labels who had been interested heard that they passed, then they all passed too. You know, oh, oh, if they don't like it, must not be good. So here I'd gotten to a certain point and been busting it and trying to get writing these songs and playing accordion a lot, playing Hammer-Dulcimer. There's more folk. I had David Mansfield playing fiddle mandolin, the great David, and he was in the range for a couple of years there. And so I was up working for Sheena Easton,

so I'm licking my wounds. I'm out on the road playing morning train, playing for your for your eyes only, blah, blah, blah on the road. I love Sheena. She treated me great. I was sort of a teacher's pet because she liked my music. You'd hear warming up to my demo. everyone had just passed on.

So I'm thinking, wow, I'm ruminating about all this. Okay, what next? So I just really finally, out of frustration, frankly, with the way the band was playing my songs, I decided to make a tape. I just bought a Lynn Drum Machine, one of the early ones, and I made a tape, demo tape of two songs. mandolin raiden the way it is with the drum machine there was again

I just got it again so made this tape and I thought well no major label and I played piano on it and I hadn't done that for a while because I didn't hear anybody playing piano I was sort of following what was happening and thought well that's not having

so I play a DX7 or some idiocy and so but this was just me unencumbered by anything but what I liked and what I wanted to do. So when my brothers heard it, they said, oh, this is the most you that we've ever heard. This is so pure and deep in that way. And so I thought no major label would have any interest in this. Although I'd made in Roads, I knew these people. They passed me for years.

And so I sent it to Wyndham Hill. I knew this woman, Don Atkinson. I worked on a George Lucas little animated film called Twice Upon a Time. I'd done a song for it and she'd worked on it. So she was now working for Wyndham Hill, you know, the new age label. They were starting a vocal label. So I sent it to her and she called me back and said, wow, I love this. I can't stop listening to it.

Are you doing any more? I said, well, I just happened to be getting ready to cut two more songs. She said, can I come to the session? So yes, come down. She flew down from the Bay Area. Came to the session, and she took a little tape, a little demo, a little rough mix that we put down at the end of the night's recording. It was just me, when the drum machine and me playing everything, synth bass on an Oberheim, OBX, piano, little pad, little string pad, whatever. the next day will acerman at wendham hill called me up and said uh hi this will acriman we'd like to sign you

so it was as simple as that then my lawyer uh he heard it and he said this is too good for windham hill let me have some a couple i want to disseminate this around i said no fred i think this is fine but he taught me into it and he gave it to his great friend paul atkinson the former zombies rhythm guitar player beautiful English man who was the head of ANR at RCA and he gave it to Paul and Paul had been one of the ones he knew me he'd been the ones coming out to our shows

the year before and had offered us demo money we just hadn't picked them we'd picked to Epic so then if he then he had the same reaction he said he called Fred said I just can't take this cassette out of my car

and that's the point you have it's it's easy to It's easy in theory and extremely difficult in reality, but you have to create something that someone can't stop listening to that gets so under their skin. Again, simple concept, but really hard in practice. And so that's what this little tape was. It was that tape. Then the guy at Epic Records, who it offers the demo money, then he starts getting wind of this.

then he offered us a deal. So Wyndham Hill was out. It was between Epic and RCA and we picked RCA. So that's the story. But to me, like I say, it's a good story. It's an inspiring story for someone trying to do this. Of course, the music business is completely different. The major labels are not nearly the powerhouses that they were.

It's not the same at all. But still, the basic idea will always be the idea, which is it will always be the goal. You have to create something that gets under someone's skin, that they can't stop listening to it. It just moves them so deeply in whatever way. And until you do that,

then you're going to continue to try to do that. That's the goal. These songs, you know, the way it is in Mandolin Rain in particular, are so, you know, if I brought into a session, I got a concept, Mandolin Rain, everyone would be like,

what else do you got? Not because you couldn't... You're probably right. Okay, right. Like, it's not something that you just go and... Like, what inspires that kind of lyric? Did that lyric come first? Where did that song come from?

No, the lyrics came later, but the idea of Mandolin Rain is just the idea of the standard mandolin trill. sounding like mainfall. It's so smart. You can try to go into sessions all the time and a lot of people listen to this podcast are mostly just songwriters just trying to get cuts. And I don't know.

That's a different, that's a completely different area. I can't speak to that because I'm totally about not, I'm totally not about, what's that? Being an artist. I mean, the way it is, what's great about the way it is in different than Mandolin Rain in this sense is like that chorus, you could have written

that chorus could be part of a thousand different concepts. You know, it's the lyrics and it's the lyrics in the verses that really give it, it's gravitas, and yet, you know, you hear it, you know, you see people singing at karaoke. So it's something that they, the meaning and the depth

of the meaning is sort of is what you strive for as a writer where when you listen to it on the third time, wow, these verses are these verses mean something. Well, look, it's real easy and it's a standard thing to Monday morning

quarterback to, to in hindsight, look back and explicate why something was successful. I don't tend to to do that. I have my own explanation for why I think the way it is was it. Again, my own version of the Monday morning quarterbacking and that and that is this. So look, your your guess is as good as mine. My guess is that I call the way it is a novelty record and a radio sense. In the best sense, I call fast car by Tracy Chapman a novelty record. I call Seltonson Swing by Darcy

record in the best sense in that it's so different it's pure luck mind you but they're so different than the standard baby baby uh slick production even now the the the sort of modern r&b pop that that gets played as top 40 now i guess because i don't follow it at all but so i'm probably speaking completely from ignorance but okay but uh So I think it's, I think the way it is was successful because it's a nice sound. It's a different sound. There's a guy soloing on piano. See, I think the lyrical aspect of pop hits is overrated.

I think people really hear a sound that's intoxicating. And maybe by, like you were just saying, oh, by the third or third or maybe the 13th time, they're starting to clue into lyrics because it's just a sound that's drawn them in. So that's what I feel. Novelty in, again, the best sense. It's a sound that goes down easy, but it's a guy soloing on piano,

so wow, we don't hear that ever on radio. And so that's my, but again, that's just as full of beans as the next guy who's trying to, in hindsight, explicate why. All the things that happened after that album, you know, there's such a quantity of music that you release and you start working at some point in film and whatnot. Only for one guy.

I'm like Tom Hagan in The Godfather who had, he's a lawyer with one client, Don Corleone. I'm a film composer with one, one boss, Spike Lee. He's the only. I mean, Spike Lee is I am. A master what he does. No question. How did you end up getting sucked into that world? Again, it's just like every, it's just like, I hate to be simplistic about it,

but the reason is the same as all these other things, Mike McDonald, David Geffen, Paul Atkinson, my lawyer, whoever, Wyndham Hill. the reason that Spike started wanting to work with me is that he likes what I do it moves him it moves it's as simple as that and that's that's probably the reason for that most think these sort of things happen you know if somebody hears your music and they just love it they want to get to know you you know they want to investigate they want to know more about it and you so so that's the answer with Spike he was a fan of my music we had a mutual friend brand for Marcellus who decided to hook us up for dinner. The three of us went out to dinner. And I asked him to, this was 92, I asked him to direct a video for an upcoming record I was making, a song about the first interracial romance in my town here in Williamsburg

called Talk of the Town with Granford on Sacks. And he did that. And it just, I've been working with him now for 28 years. And so it's just continued. And it just became a deeper, a work relationship when he asked me in 2008 to start scoring for him. So, which led into my last two records, absolute zero and non-secure connection, because over half of the songs on those two records emanated from score music that I'd written

from Spike, hence the cinematic quality of it, at least to me. So how about that? I was able to deftly segue from 19. 92 to 2020. I mean, that was, it's brilliant. Incredible. You know, we'll go to the last segment. I'm going to list five things and just tell me what comes off the top of your head if you have, you know, this next little bit.

But we'll just start with the Grateful Dead. What, just what comes to mind? is what comes to mind where else can you play one song for an hour the Grateful Dead is the place to go for that I guess you want me to kind of riff I mean it's so cool

look the reality is you know you got to play with the Grateful Dead and with Garcia while he was still alive The Grateful Dead is a deep is a deep area of conversation and rumination and there's so much to talk about, you know, there's quite a vast library of literature now that deals with the Grateful Dead

Oeuvre, the Grateful Dead history. So I could just, that's a completely different podcast. But so in a nutshell, I guess I said there's a lot, but I wouldn't trade my time with the dead for anything. It was so deep. And I think they're vastly underrated as songwriters. I think their songwriter in canon is comparable to any of the great great song books in popular music history, American popular music history. That's my feeling.

And so that's a good enough sort of end statement. That's really truly how I feel. In non-secure connection, your newest album, you featured some of the best and most influential artists currently. So I just wanted to ask about that. You know, Justin Vernon, James Mercer, that'll be my next one on my list.

Well, again, people would say goes hand in hand with exactly what we were talking about. We've been talking about the whole time. There's one common thread, current running through this. Justin Vernon started shouting me out as one of his early influences one of the reasons he got deeply involved in music and then he called me or got in touch with me about working with him on a Grateful Dead tribute record

called Day of the Dead. It's still 10 CD indie rock massive magnum opus and we did Black Money River because he liked my version of it from a record of mine call Here Come the Noise makers a live record from 2000. So we started working together and we just kept on.

We had about five years there where we were just, I was playing Coachella with him and playing at his festival. And he was singing on my Dulcimer record. And then we wrote a song from Absolute Zero and then we wrote a song for his last record too. So it's just kept on going. But again, it all started the same way. He just was a real fan. And so he reached out because he wanted to.

again, investigate more deeply. Now, James Mercer is actually not part of this thread, because that was me reaching out to him. I'd written this song, I love the shins. My favorite Shins record is wincing the night away, and there's a song on there called Spilt Needles, which just turns me out.

I just think it's fantastic, melodically, angular melodicism. He's a great lyricism. a transcendent singer. I just love what he does. So I'd written this song called My Resolve for the non-secure record and a Sisyphian tale of the creative life.

So I thought I would try to make it into a duet and try to find a fellow creator, a fellow artistic striver who could relate to this. And I'd written, speaking of angularity, I'd written a very angular melodic melodic line, which was, and my inspiration was that song Spilt Needles. So I thought, well, there's a Shinsian factor here.

Let me reach out to James Mercer. I'd never met him. Just reached out through the channels, and he said, well, send me the song. And we said, yeah, I'm in. So as simple as that. He did his part, sent it to us. and we were mad for it and we'd done several

remote performances for the recent virtual Bonneroo Festival we did one for Stephen Colbert and I just love him he's a new great friend and so that's a little different that wasn't him reaching out to me all these other ones were but so now and then I'm

I'm allowed to reach out to people too and so that's how that's I mean this whole interview is just a giant ploy for us to eventually write together but we can get to that afterwards. Let's go with Kathy and your sons. Well, okay. It's a deep bond.

Tight family. I've been married for almost 37 years. I almost blew it. Got lucky and didn't. And we tried hard to have kids for several years. Tough, tough luck. A couple of incomplete. pregnancies, but through difficult times, but men, it's worth the weight. We had our twin

sons in 1992, and now they're almost 29, and one of them's in L.A. It's not far from you. He has aspirations to be an actor, kind of, but he's mostly a mountain climber. He's out climbing crazy mountains, scaring the crap out of his parents daily. And his twin brother, Keith, is a professional basketball player in Germany. He played for LSU. Russell, the Runtz. Russell was a runner at Oregon, the climber. So he had a couple of hot shot jocks and one of them still making a living as a pro in Germany. Oh, me? So, yeah, so, yeah, so proud of my family, obviously my sons and my first wife, she's truly special.

Let's go with Bobby, your brother. Well, I've referenced him a lot in this conversation. because he was the real muso early on in our family. And he still is. He's still very active regionally around here. He's in-demand, bass player. You know, Bobby Hornsby was claddened the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse. Oh, that's right.

That's not the right story. We were trying, he was trying, we locked ourselves out of a house in Virginia Beach. And he was pushing on the glass to get in and the glass broke. And he split the tendon in his left, in his. index finger and it was permanently locked. I'm driving him to the hospital and they operated on it. So he plays with just these three fingers base, which is quite something.

He's been doing this forever. Imagine not having the most important finger on your hand. Embo, completely immobile. You could not move it. It's just rigid like a rock. So, so yeah, he's, he's quite a guy again the original dead head

and so I guess he's been a big influence and and a true great brother for many many years. And then obviously we have to do John as well who you co-wrote. John Orgeby the same thing, but truly

a great brother. I'm the middle, I'm the emotionally disturbed middle child so I was probably, I was really close and had this close working relationship with my older brother, Bobby, and then later with my younger brother John as a collaborator, co-songwriter. And so we had a serious run there as collaborators from, again, like I said, 80 to about

93 when he just kind of got burnt out with it and just decided what he wanted to do something else. But, yeah, he's the, he's the one with the high academic. credentials, Stanford degree, UVA law, you know, he's that guy. So we admire and love him as well.

When I talk to people and I look at their discography, a lot of times there are moments where it seems like there was you know

long periods of self-doubt or questioning. And I'm sure all that is baked into a lot of the music that, you know, all musicians do. It never ends. It never ends. Never ends. But you always found a way, it's, you released an album essentially from 1986 all the way through some, some sort of music, not including the stuff you were doing for Spike, no, with no more

than two years in between releasing music. Yeah, I had I had a couple of three-year breaks between records, between the last range record in 90, Harbor Lights was 93, then 95, Hot House to 98, to Spirit Trail. But other than that, it's been pretty steady. So, yeah, that's true. Just really amazing. One more question before we sign out. I just wanted to talk. real quick about the Tupac cover. It's so it becomes so big and so part of his career. Like you said

it doesn't necessarily mean that it translated to radio play. Who cares? You know, it clearly you know, for anybody who listened to Tupac ever, it's a staple. It's a greatest hit.

How did it feel to see that song re-envisioned, you know, 12 years later or whatever it was. Exactly. Yeah. Look, it was an amazing feeling. Because I loved what he did.

I loved the message. It was a positive message and just a great record. I got a cassette out of the blue from the Shakur Foundation. They were going through his voluminous files of sessions after he was assassinated.

And they found this and they got in touch with me and they said, look, we found this. And this is going to be the single off of his greatest hits record. And so we just wanted you to know about this so we can negotiate the publishing splits. And it was a way dirtier version, a whole lot more of the N-word in there that got eradicated for the final greatest hits record. And again, I just thought it was a fantastic piece of music, a fantastic reimagining of what I had done. And then all these years later, just this year, the young Chicago rapper Polo G has redone that with a great song called Wishing for a Hero.

And I think his reason for doing this for remaking it was to make the statement that, well, it's now however many years, 22 years later after changes, and things still haven't changed. It's still the same. We ended up doing a remote duet, Polo G and I, for this, the aforementioned Bonnaroo remote thing. It should be out on the internet at some point soon. So it was classic, man. It may be the first rap performance ever with no beat. The piano is the rhythmic, the only rhythmic material.

But he is just nailed it. I love it. Look, it's so special at age 65. almost 66, but I'd still get to work with Polo G. The Polo G's and Justin Vernes and James Merchers and Jamila Woods, just on and on. So, yeah, some lucky bastard. You know, not everybody who, not everybody who's in your position wants to work with people in different generations. and not everybody is inspired by music that evolves in one way or the other.

And clearly, you know, thank you for doing. I think they're missing something so much music now is so creative and so interesting and gets under my skin. And so they're just missing something. Most of my friends, not all of them, some are still pretty engaged. with it. But most of my friends, I think, really are not interested in what's happening

now in indie music, in adventurous music. I don't think so. I hope I'm wrong, but that's my impression. So for me, I'm totally interested because it inspires me. Well, thank you for doing this podcast.

Because for me, I think it's also important for this next generation to recognize who the innovators were before they were even, you know, thinking about doing music. Some that, you know, obviously were influenced by you in real time and some that who didn't realize where those samples came from. Whatever the case is, it's important that we have these conversations

so you can know who Glenn Miller is and you can know who, you know, who, you know, Tupac is and understand this wide variety of music. So that way, when you pull from these different influences, you can learn how to be unique and find your own voice, which, as you said, it wasn't until you got back to the piano that people are like, oh, that's the guy. That's you. It wasn't somebody who's trying to be the new cool kid. It was just, you were naturally just being you. Exactly. It was, yeah.

I just appreciate this, man. This is awesome. really cool experience for me and for our listeners. Well, thanks. I think increasingly as I get older, I'm ambitious and musically, and I'm just trying to often make a sound that I've never heard before.

And that's not easy. So it leads me to some strange areas that really turn off a lot of my more maybe traditional listeners. Because mostly referencing the latest two records, especially the latest one, Not Secure Connection, is probably the weirdest record I've made.

And I'm influenced by modern classical music in this, a tonal music, Elliot Carter, Olivier Mishon, Arnold Schernberg, on and on. That's what, because I love that.

I loved it from, I mentioned it when I was, when you were talking about Berkeley, the Boston Public Library. I was immersing myself in all this, and I've continued to through the years. And now it's really, more, it's coming out,

unfortunately for a lot of my fans who really hated, it's coming out in my music. And so again, but I think it's I think it's just key to try to make a sound that you haven't heard before. That's fucking hard to do, but sometimes when you can do

it, it's a fairly euphoric feeling to go, you know what? I don't think anything I've ever heard sounds like this and I really, that's very intoxicating. Well, that's perfect. Great way to go out. Thank you, sir. Okay. Thanks for us. Nice talking to you. Thanks for listening to this episode of And The Writer Is. If you want to hear music from this songwriter I just interviewed, be sure to check

out our Spotify playlist or visit our website at and thewriteris.com. If you like what we're doing, please subscribe to us. You can also like us on Facebook and Twitter. And The Writer Is is is produced by Joe London, edited by Miles Bergsma, and published by Big Deal Music. A special thanks. to David Silverstein from Mega House Music and Michael White. Until next time, this is Ross Golan.