May Pang was John Lennon’s companion for the late-1973-to-early-1975 period that has become known as Lennon’s “lost weekend.” Although Pang has used that phrase for her documentary and photo exhibition, she doesn’t see this time as “lost” for Lennon. Not only did he record two albums ( Walls and Bridges and Rock ‘n’ Roll ) and produce another (Harry Nilsson’s Pussy Cats ), but Pang reunited him with his son Julian and was there when he reconnected with Paul McCartney and considered writing with ...
Jun 26, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 187
Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab has been a top audiophile label since its 1977 founding and 2001 reboot after Jim Davis, president of the high-end audio equipment company Music Direct, bought it out of bankruptcy. But the label was hit with controversy almost three years ago with the revelation that it included a digital step in the production chain of albums sourced from original master tapes. Davis issued an apology for “using vague language, allowing false narratives to propagate and for taking for...
Jun 19, 2025•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 186
John Hall has been CEO of the family-run Rickenbacker guitar company since 1984, right around when R.E.M.'s Peter Buck was inspiring a generation of jangly bands with his Rick riffs. The Beatles had led a Rickenbacker surge 20 years earlier as John Lennon and George Harrison played Ricks in A Hard Day’s Night and prompted the Byrds’ Roger McGuinn to get a 12-string Rickenbacker and basically to invent folk rock. Hall tells a hell of a story about meeting the Beatles and McGuinn, and he reflects ...
Jun 12, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 185
David Lowery is looking back while pushing forward. The brainy, witty Camper Van Beethoven/Cracker frontman just released a two-CD, three-LP solo album, Fathers, Sons and Brothers , that’s a sort of musical memoir. Here he tells stories about those stories, reflecting on the recent Camper shows to mark the debut album’s 40th anniversary and speculating on whether the band would have had its career if he hadn’t written “Take the Skinheads Bowling.” He also discusses the almost accidental ways in ...
Jun 05, 2025•1 hr 23 min•Season 1Ep. 184
Zev Feldman, a.k.a. the “Jazz Detective,” has turned his crate-digging passion into a career: He tracks down previously unreleased recordings and jumps through the necessary hoops to get them released, often in lavish packages for his label, Resonance Records. This past Record Store Day featured such Feldman finds as live albums from Bill Evans, Freddie Hubbard, Kenny Dorham and Charles Mingus plus a limited-edition double album of previously unreleased Patsy Cline performances, Imagine That: Th...
May 29, 2025•1 hr 7 min•Season 1Ep. 183
Vicki Peterson and John Cowsill, who are married to each other, have been making music for many years but recently released their first album together, Long After the Fire. Peterson has been singer-songwriter-guitarist for the Bangles and Continental Drifters. John Cowsill began drumming for the Cowsills at a young age, more recently was the Beach Boys’ drummer and now fills in as lead singer for the Smithereens. The new album features songs written by John’s two late brothers, Bill and Barry Co...
May 22, 2025•1 hr 1 min•Season 1Ep. 182
Called "the Wizard of Vinyl" by the New York Times, Chad Kassem has devoted his professional life to the cause of great-sounding records. In addition to running Acoustic Sounds, a go-to mail-order company for audiophile albums and equipment, the outspoken Kassem oversees the specialty label Analogue Productions, the Mastering Lab, Quality Record Pressings (QRP) and other related businesses, all based in Salina, Kansas. In this freewheeling conversation, Kassem discusses how Analogue Productions ...
May 15, 2025•1 hr 20 min•Season 1Ep. 181
With mid-‘60s hits such as “Jenny Take a Ride!” and “Devil with a Blue Dress On,” Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels all but created the rock ‘n’ soul rave-up, and he became the musical godfather of the so-called blue-collar rockers including Bob Seger, Bruce Springsteen and John Mellencamp. In this career-spanning conversation conducted from his Michigan home, the 80-year-old Ryder reflects on the impact that he and Detroit had on each other, the genesis of those early hits, the assist he gave ...
May 08, 2025•50 min•Season 1Ep. 180
How does a label execute ambitious rerelease campaigns for its key artists, in this case Yes and Talking Heads? We talk with Rhino A&R directors Jason Jones and Steve Woolard about the Super Deluxe Editions, Record Store Day releases and other archival packages they have been assembling for these two bands. Woolard also oversaw Yes rereleases more than 20 years ago—how have the band’s audience and their expectations changed since then? Why does the Yes Close to the Edge box mix CDs, a Blu-ra...
May 01, 2025•1 hr 11 min•Season 1Ep. 179
As this episode kicks off, Kevin Godley and his longtime songwriting and creative partner, Lol Creme, have just left 10cc, so instead of being part of hits such as “The Things We Do for Love,” the duo continues pushing their artistic boundaries as Godley & Creme. Godley describes how he and Creme collaborated on music and, eventually, videos—for themselves and, among others, Herbie Hancock (“Rockit”), the Police (“Every Breath You Take”) and George Harrison (“When We Was Fab”). He recounts w...
Apr 24, 2025•49 min•Season 1Ep. 178
“If we did something that was too drab, too normal, too obvious, we'd say, ‘Nah, let's give it a kick in the ass.’” That’s how Kevin Godley describes the approach of his former band, 10cc, and his drive for creativity and art has not abated. Godley was 10cc’s angelic-voiced drummer who would go on to make inventive music and groundbreaking videos with Godley & Creme. In Pt. 1 of this illuminating conversation, Godley explains how Lol Creme, Graham Gouldman, Eric Stewart and he—all strong son...
Apr 17, 2025•59 min•Season 1Ep. 177
Omnivore Recordings co-founder and four-time Gramny-winning producer Cheryl Pawelski has figured out how to do what she loves for a living. She went from obsessing about music in Milwaukee to having great adventures in the "floater pool" at Capitol Records in Los Angeles. With stints at Rhino and Concord as well, she oversaw ambitious reissues by, among others, the Band, Big Star, the Smithereens, the Beach Boys, Pat Benatar, Nina Simone and the Miles Davis Quintet. Her long association with Wil...
Apr 10, 2025•1 hr 8 min•Season 1Ep. 176
Rhino Records has 47—yes, 47—releases coming out on Record Store Day (April 12), but that’s not all that’s been keeping Rhino Senior A&R Director Patrick Milligan busy. The Rhino High Fidelity series, which he oversees, has taken off, with recent Doors and Black Sabbath releases selling out quickly. He also launched the less expensive, still-all-analog Rhino Reserve series with albums from Allen Toussaint and Eddie Hazel. How does the label choose the titles for each series? How did it come ...
Apr 03, 2025•1 hr•Season 1Ep. 175
Over the past year, Peter Holsapple has toured with the reunited dB’s and enjoyed the overdue U.S. vinyl releases of their classic first two albums; seen the release of a book, compilation album and tribute album dedicated to his other band, the Continental Drifters; and, most important, recorded a terrific new solo album. The Face of 68 offers an abundance of Holsapple’s smart, melodic pop-rock songwriting with some extra grit behind it. In this freewheeling conversation, he discusses looking b...
Mar 27, 2025•1 hr 20 min•Season 1Ep. 174
Joe Harley oversees some of the best jazz vinyl rereleases around as producer of Blue Note’s acclaimed Tone Poet series. Harley picks the titles, and, as he did with the much-coveted Music Matters series, he preps each release with ace mastering engineer (and recurring Caropop guest) Kevin Gray. Here Harley reflects on how he went from growing up (and playing drums) in Nebraska to preparing audiophile versions of albums he loves. What criteria does he use in choosing the Tone Poet albums? How do...
Mar 20, 2025•1 hr 15 min•Season 1Ep. 173
Producer Joe Boyd (Pink Floyd, Fairport Convention/Richard Thompson, R.E.M.) has written a massive, highly entertaining, illuminating book about world music called And the Roots of Rhythm Remain , the title a lyric from Paul Simon’s Graceland song “Under African Skies.” That album is a jumping-off point for Boyd’s explorations of music from around the globe, with stops in Jamaica, Cuba, Brazil, India, Russia and Eastern Europe as well as the southern U.S. Here Boyd tackles such questions as: How...
Mar 13, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 1Ep. 172
No one mixes fury and vulnerability, ferocious energy and pop smarts like Bob Mould. His 15th solo album, Here We Go Crazy , comes out March 7, and he remains at the peak of his powers. Here he reflects on his tremendous, sometimes turbulent career, starting with his attending Macalester College in St. Paul, Minn., meeting Grant Hart at Cheapo Records and launching the trailblazing punk trio Hüsker Dü. Why have the Twin Cities punched above their weight musically? Given his triumphs with Hüsker ...
Mar 06, 2025•1 hr 4 min•Season 1Ep. 171
Mike Mills of R.E.M. and the Baseball Project and a new supergroup with Darius Rucker is here, and we’ve got questions: How did R.E.M. come to share all songwriting credits, and why did Mills initially object? What impact did the albums’ producers have? Given the bandmates’ senses of humor, why wouldn’t R.E.M. smile in photographs? Had R.E.M. decided to call it quits before it made Collapse into Now ? What songs did Michael Stipe transform in surprising ways when he added lyrics and vocals? Did ...
Feb 27, 2025•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 170
Part 2 of our conversation with guitarist-songwriter-singer-storyteller Dave Alvin begins with him discussing musical biopics and the one that put him off the genre for good. (Hint: He was in it.) Has he seen A Complete Unknown ? How did he wind up actually recording with Bob Dylan? Will any of these recordings ever come out? Alvin also revisits his early songwriting efforts, including the first song he ever wrote and “Marie Marie,” which he wrote for the Blasters and became an international hit...
Feb 20, 2025•54 min•Season 1Ep. 169
Dave Alvin has had such an epic career that we’re going to need two episodes to fit it all in. Much of Part 1 spotlights Alvin’s values as a musician. As he tells it, the Blasters, the revved-up L.A. roots-rock band for which he was the main songwriter/guitarist, had lots of rules. The Third Mind, his current psychedelic improvisatory band, has few. Why does the latter appeal to him now? How did seeing Jimi Hendrix twice inspire him? What were his stints in the Knitters and X like? When Alvin em...
Feb 13, 2025•1 hr 4 min•Season 1Ep. 168
Do you know the tragic story of Badfinger? Behind such life-affirming songs as “No Matter What,” “Day After Day” and “Baby Blue” and the much-covered power ballad “Without You” lay a dark tale in which Badfinger’s manager defrauded the band and left them destitute. Bob Jackson played keyboards and guitar in the last Badfinger lineup that featured Pete Ham, the honey-voiced singer-songwriter behind most of those hits. This lineup recorded the album Head First in late 1974, but Warner Bros. refuse...
Feb 06, 2025•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 167
Nora O’Connor is a super collaborator, someone who loves singing harmonies and makes everyone sound good. She’s a member of the Chicago all-star group the Flat Five and a formidable singer-songwriter in her own right, as her 2022 solo album, My Heart , her first in 18 years, reminded us. Here she reflects on her life as “a music worker,” including what she’s learned from performing with such artists as the Decemberists, Iron & Wine, Mavis Staples, Andrew Bird, the New Pornographers and Neko ...
Jan 30, 2025•1 hr 10 min•Season 1Ep. 166
Macie Stewart, half of the Chicago-based duo Finom, is one of those musicians who can do almost anything. She’s a classical pianist and violinist who wrote her first piece for an orchestra at age 11 and still creates string arrangements, such as on her 2021 solo album Mouth Full of Glass . She also taught herself acoustic guitar and began writing songs on it when she was 13. When she finally picked up an electric guitar, she and fellow singer-songwriter-guitarist Sima Cunningham formed an experi...
Jan 23, 2025•1 hr 4 min•Season 1Ep. 165
Michael Jerome had been drumming in a post-industrial metal band when he auditioned for Richard Thompson in 1999, little knowing he would be this brilliant guitarist's percussive foil for the next 25 years and counting. Jerome also has played with Charlie Musselwhite, the Blind Boys of Alabama and, for several years, John Cale. He’s been Better Than Ezra’s drummer since 2009 and played and toured with Slash for his latest album—and what started as an experimental side project is now moving cente...
Jan 16, 2025•1 hr 24 min•Season 1Ep. 164
It's time for our fourth annual check-in with masterful mastering engineer Kevin Gray as he comes off yet another crazy-busy year. What new did he and Doors engineer/producer Bruce Botnick think they could bring to the instant-sellout Rhino High Fidelity box The Doors 1967-1971 ? Which Rhino High Fidelity album doesn’t make sense to him as an audiophile release? Among Rhino, Blue Note and Craft’s Original Jazz Classics, which label works far in advance, and which one keeps him rushing? Is he sti...
Jan 09, 2025•55 min•Season 1Ep. 163
Redd Kross, a band overdue for massive appreciation, is having a moment. There’s a new page-turner of a memoir, Now You’re One of Us , co-written by brother bandmates Jeff and Steven McDonald with Dan Epstein. Their narrative rocks to life in Andrew Reich’s new documentary, Born Innocent: The Redd Kross Story. The movie, in turn, inspired the 2024 double album Redd Kross , a candy-colored collection of irresistible hooks, massive riffs and sharp reflections, all wrapped in a cover that one broth...
Jan 02, 2025•1 hr 22 min•Season 1Ep. 162
Beatles author Bruce Spizer wrote the liner notes for the new vinyl box The Beatles U.S. 1964 Albums in Mono, and here he digs into the history of these reconfigured U.S. Capitol albums, from Meet the Beatles! through Beatles ’65 and The Early Beatles. Spizer is a New Orleans tax lawyer and CPA, and that expertise has helped him untangle the Beatles’ early dealings with labels such as Chicago’s Vee-Jay. Capitol executive Dave Dexter passed on the Beatles four times before being put in charge of ...
Dec 26, 2024•1 hr 11 min•Season 1Ep. 161
Steve Conte became lead guitarist in one legendary band, the New York Dolls, and co-wrote half of his latest album, The Concrete Jangle , with the main singer-songwriter of another one: Andy Partridge of XTC. Conte is a longtime New York working musician who has played with such artists as Paul Simon, Peter Wolf, Phoebe Snow and, in a great story, Chuck Berry. Now he has released two solo albums on Stevie Van Zandt’s Wicked Cool label and has two songs vying for the Coolest Song of the World 202...
Dec 19, 2024•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 160
Don Was may be an accomplished performer and producer, as covered in Pt. l, but he’s also got quite the day job: president of Blue Note Records. How did this rock-funk musician become the top executive at one of the most prestigious, influential jazz labels? What was the Blue Note album that turned him on to jazz when he was 14 years old? What early mistakes did he make at the label, and how did the Tone Poet reissue series factor into the solution? How much does Was prioritize new artists? What...
Dec 12, 2024•50 min•Season 1Ep. 159
His ‘80s band Was (Not Was) scored a top 10 hit, “Walk the Dinosaur,” but Don Was has had an even greater impact on the music world as a producer. In 1989 he produced two big comebacks: Bonnie Raitt’s Grammy-winning Nick of Time and “Love Shack” and other songs on the B-52’s Cosmic Thing . Then came work with Bob Dylan, Iggy Pop, Willie Nelson and—in a long, fruitful collaboration—the Rolling Stones. He’s got amazing stories detailing his Stones job interview and the origin of Cindy Wilson’s cry...
Dec 05, 2024•53 min•Season 1Ep. 158
