Quest Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. Ladies and Gentlemen, What is Up? This is Quest Love Supreme Classic.
I gotta say this is probably.
One of my favorite favorite episodes of this entire podcast, and I have a lot, But what can you say about the genius of Michael McDonald.
We were not ready?
Actually I think actually Fante steals.
The steals the show in this episode with his total rendition of the Al Dunbar. What's happening Doobie Brothers episode? No more spoiler alerts. Let's just get into it. From October twenty fifth, twenty seventeen. This is the classic Michael McDonald episode Quest Love.
So all right?
That was mine Michael McDonald imitation than Supremo.
Suprema role called premo something suprema role called Suprema Supremo.
Role, the grand I can listen one table Suprema roll this Quest Love Yeah, a k A best love.
Yeah, I'm so chill love.
Yeah, because.
Supreme Supremo role call agreement Suprema role.
Called My name is Fante?
Yeah.
You don't have to run fall because this show is getting bootleg by Alba, Suprema, Supremo.
Role Michael McDonald, We're here to meet him. Yeah, mine name is Sugar John Sweet Free.
Supremo, rorem Supremo, roll Clear, Black Knight, Yeah Clear, White Moon.
Yeah, Boss Bill was on the streets. Oh wait, that was Warren Ge.
Sorry, Supremo Roll Supreme.
Supremo rolls like and I'm quite smitten. Yeah, Michael McDonald, Yeah, I keep forgetting.
This this mcdee. Yeah, it's it's me.
Yeah.
Does anybody have the time, Yeah, that's all I gotta say.
Supremo, roll, So.
Supremo, Roll Supremo, Supremo roa.
Sorryte, I knew you're going, Oh, what's happening?
Reference?
What that was?
I wasn ball dune ball, Okay, I'm gonna.
Episode.
I have to admit that I spent three hours in bed trying to think of the perfect.
Reference, like for.
Real, from like three in the morning, maybe, Like I dozed off at six. I had nothing, man, man, and I was like, I know, Fante is gonna have ye.
I was gonna I was gonna put a tape recorder in my down to fall out.
Had elaborate scheme.
Where I was gonna you know, I didn't even remember that one.
Ruled our lives.
Oh man, Ladies and gentlemen, our guest today is probably the most beloved figure in the recording industry. I'll probably go as far as to say that he's probably in everyone's top three greatest blue eyed soul singers of all time. I personally believe that he possesses possibly the most influential,
most imitated vibrato tenor. And you know, from his years as an honorary Steely Danian and a member of the Doobie Brothers, not to mention his solo work, Michael McDonald is a pop culture god amongst mortal men, you know, and his brand stretches way beyond just singing and songwriting.
I mean, he's he's damn near a lifestyle.
Ladies and gentlemen, police, welcome to questlov Supreme, the god himself Michael McDonald.
Yeah, oh my god, So thanks for having.
Me, guys, Thank you? Uh are you? Are you thrown off by the fan worship thrown at you today?
Like? Because I feel like anytime, especially when I see you, I don't know if it's like you feel like it's a genuine appreciation for your work or is it like, is this the variety ironic embracing of you know, my work? Like are you genuine or is it just coming from an ironic comedy level? Like how do you how do you feel when people, especially millennials are coming to you and.
Well, you know, it's it's all flattering, really. I mean, you know, I always told my son, when you know, when your music is no more, no longer relevant, your pathetic comic value might be. So you know, you to go with it, you know, just you got to take what you can get when you can get it. But uh, I I'm enjoying myself these days. You know. It's we've been out there long enough doing this that no one's more amazed than me that we're still doing it at
our age, you know. And but it's still fun, you know, And I still love playing live, and I love playing with you guys, you know, looking forward to it.
We enjoyed it too, because I didn't know. I know that.
One of the times that you visited the show. I know that you know, you came with Donald Figan. You know, he was sort of like, are they clowning us? Or are they actually respecting us? And you know I was we were so thrown off because it's like, yo, he doesn't know that we like, this is what we worship, you know what I mean?
And it's not because I know about you know, yacht rock culture and all.
Those comedy bits on online, and it could seem like it's from a joky angle. But I always wondered, like, what was your personal perspective and as far as like do you think it's just novelty or or any of those things?
So you know, I I I always enjoyed it and and I had fun that that night, but I did I don't think the other guys enjoyed it as.
Much as I said, So, well, thank you. So you started out in Saint Louis, right you.
I grew up in Ferguson.
Yeah, wow, raising yes, can you talk about that? Because literally my mother is born and raised in Saint Louis And I called her this morning because I was like, Mommy, did you know Michael McDonald's and Saint Louis And she was like no. I said, well, this is interesting because y'all around the same age growing up in Saint Louis very polarized. Ferguson maybe not be the Ferguson that we know today.
No, that's right, you know, I mean, uh, that's you know, the in where the conversation is at this point today is is exactly where it needs to be, you know. I mean, uh, I think in the sixties, we all really believed that we were going to be the generation that didn't leave the burden on our next generation of racism in America, you know, and unfortunately that hasn't proven
to be true. You know, as much as we'd all like to think, I think we made great strides because I remember Ferguson in the late fifties, right, talk.
About it because people it's probably totally different.
Oh yeah, you know, I mean, you know it was apartheid is really what it was, you know, I mean nothing less. You know, when you if you were black in America in a small town like Ferguson, and if you know, it was you were not allowed to live in the mainstream. You were ostracized from mainstream society, plain and simple. You couldn't walk into the dairy queen without causing a stir, you know what I mean. It was. And I remember as a kid, you know, that wasn't
lost on me. I remember, you know, like laying awake at night. My two great fears were they were going to drop the bomb, and I remember thinking, you know, I could have been born black. It's like fifty to fifty, you know, and I just didn't understand why the things were the way they were, you know. But you know, even you know the fact that the reason I mentioned is like that it wouldn't even be lost on a four year old kid or a five year old kid.
You know, at the earliest ages, we look at our society around us in surprising ways and we go, what does this all mean? Why? Why is this this way? Why is it that way? And why don't adults do something about it? Why don't adults make this right? You know?
And so we start right there understanding that adults don't make things right, you know, that adults don't do the right thing, you know, And and so that we spend the rest of our lives just kind of, you know, compromising with that, you know, and you know, understanding it's not a perfect world. But you know, it's funny because you know, for all the press that Ferguson gotten, it's a great town. It's it's a better town than it was when I was a kid. I mean, in so
many ways. I mean, I go back there a bit, quite a bit. You know, I don't live there anymore, but when I lived there, it was post war, and you know, the downturn in the American economy was something people don't remember. But after the war, it was like a lot of small towns like that kind of went
into depression. You know, a lot of the mom and pop stores closed up, and Ferguson, you know, had had suffered that, like a lot of places until the suburbs took over, you know, and shopping malls and stuff like that, and that pretty much killed, you know, communities like Ferguson. So I grew up in that period where you know, you walk down main Street Ferguson, it wasn't much going on. You know. Today it's it's a it's you know a
lot more of an economic upturn, you know. And so you know, I think what we got to really do as a society is learned to have the conversation. You know, it's like that what's going on right now with the NFL, and you know, we got to we you know, unfortunately, we have a guy at the Helm who wants to stir it up and be divisive. You know, that's a shame, because this is the perfect opportunity for the conversation we all need to be having. You know, those guys are
embracing peaceful protests. It may not be the venue you'd like to see it in if you're a football fan or whatever, you know, whatever your problem with it is. And the whole idea that it's all about the flag and the flag is all about the military is not true. The flag is about freedom, and that's what the conversation is about. And these guys aren't risking they're not destroying my property, they're not hurting anyone. The only thing they're
putting at risk is their own livelihood. And so I applaud their courage, you know, and I think it's a conversation that we got to have, you know, And it's going to be painful, because growth is painful, you know, but it you know, that's that's the great America that I think most of us are talking about. You know, America is getting great, you know, and it can continue
to get great. But this isn't the time to fall asleep at the wheel or to turn back the hands of time to something that was not great.
But it's fascinating, says you grew up in such a divisive situation that you had that you like, how did you get introduced to soul in that way? Is it just that natural to you, because, like you said, ferguson black people, black people kind of separate.
In that way, like, well, you know, it was it was the it was society in the fifties, you know. I mean, you know, so many of my friends are younger than me, and they don't really remember, you know, they don't really know and black or white or you know, African American or Caucasian or whatever they you know, it might be very few of them remember America the way it was, you know, and it wasn't great for a lot of people.
You know, So it wasn't a footloose narrative where rock and roll came in and saved the town and that sort of thing.
Oh, you know, it's funny. The British invasion probably did more to bring awareness to mainstream radio listeners white radio listens an awareness of real American music than American radio did at the time. A lot of the artists, for instance, the Womack Brothers, they had a top ten hit on what would have been considered black radio at the time, which most white people didn't listen to, didn't know about, you know, And it was a song called It's All
Over Now. When the Rolling Stones did it, it was a huge hit, you know, and Bobby Womack made the comment, we were heartbroken until the checks started coming in. But still that speaks like you know, even motown, as popular as it was in mainstream radio, the British acts, the Beatles probably had some of the biggest hits of Smokey Robinson songs, you know, because they reached the whole other audience and that that was segregated in the United States at that time, you know.
So you know, so even the jazz scene wasn't thriving at all.
Or it was it was, but that that was I think a very you know, that was a kind of a I don't want to say, elite sector of intellectual music listeners society. It wasn't mainstream, you know, jazz was not mainstream. It kind of was in the fifties. It was probably rock and roll kind of took over where jazz left off in the fifties because jazz was that kind of bold and a lot of people growing up in the fifties were drawn to that, you know, to the artistic boldness of jazz and you know and everything
that was. But then in rock and roll kind of took over the mainstream, you know. But you know, as a kid, I remember the first time I heard records like Edwin Starr's Stopper on Site. That was a record
that sticks out in my mind. It was my sister and her friends were playing it and they were blasting it over a car speaker, and I up to that point was pretty much aware of what I knew at my age group, which was all these English bands coming out, you know, right, And but when I heard that record, it was it was like, all of a sudden, there was this sophistication to the rhythm track that this you know, the guitar was kind of tucked in and syncopated and
you know, more interesting in a lot of ways. It wasn't as a judge so it spoke to broad strokes, Yeah, it was. It had a certain kind of sophistication that I really appeeled to me. And it was from that point on that I really started listening to artists that I had prior to that not really been that aware of.
You know, do you remember the first record that you ever purchased.
Yeah, it was the Everly Brothers Wake Up Little Susie. Me and a friend of mine pulled our money and went and bought the forty five.
And how much were forty five's back when you were growing up, same.
As they are now? A buck? We're the one industry where the price has not gone up.
It was on the sorry quest what was on the B side of that?
On the B side, I don't remember. It was that record in the Chipmunks Christmas Song. That was my two big first records.
Sorry, no, no, Well I like B sides. Sorry, I know I was waiting for you jazz question.
No, I mean that's I never thought of it that way, that that rock and roll took over where jazz left off in that sense.
Yeah, I think in a cultural sense, jazz was that daring music taboo, a little bit genre that that, you know, if you were really cool, you listen to jazz, you know.
So was there a hip factor in Saint Louis A yeah, counterculture if you will.
Yeah, I definitely took place around Gaslight Square in Saint Louis, downtown, Saint Louis area South, you know, kind of somewhere between South. I'm not really sure where Gaslight Square was, to be honest with you, but I remember that's where my parents went to hear music, you know, and it was like there were jazz clubs and uh, and then the tornado hit it. One of the big tornadoes came through and leveled the place and it never kind of recovered from that.
You know. It would be like where the village and you know.
Uh, concert, Like were you attending concerts at all? Or like, what was the first show you remember seeing?
Let me think about that. I remember going to see, uh, this thing called the ALSAC Show. It was the big am radio station in Saint Louis, cakes Okay, and they brought this show to town. It was like a charity event and Wilson Pickett was on was one of the headliners. So up there was the Memphis Rhythm Section, Memphis horns,
you know, the whole the whole gang. And it was like just this powerful experience to hear those guys and Keel Auditorium, you know, and that was one of the There was another great show I saw there was the Beg's. Once I was driving around and I saw their name on the Marquee and a friend of mine and I went in.
The Australian version.
Yeah, the Beg's, Yeah, the Beatles, and this was long before their big resurgence, you know, this was like you know, sixties, you know. And we went in there and it was like the first two rows had people and nothing else. It was like there no one knew that they and these guys came out and did this show as if the place was filled to the brim. You know, they just didn't undaunted. They just put on this great show.
And I remember thinking, man, that's that's pretty cool. You know, I should somehow I remembered that, you know, and.
Wait, you casually walked by saw the Beg's on the Marquie was like listen. Was yeah, how much were shows back then that you could just not much?
It's probably about five bucks apiece. We went in and saw these guys play, you know, it's crazy. Yeah.
And at that point, had you start singing yet to yourself? And the shot? Did you start singing yet?
Yeah? I was in I was in a band. In fact, me and this this friend of mine were in a band together and we we were just driving around Saint Louis, you know, doing very much nothing as usual, you know. And I saw them on the Marquee and hadn't heard a thing about it. So we just you know, walked up and tickets were place was not even close to being sold out, but they did a great show.
How did you start playing? Were you self taught or did you take lessons?
I'm just just self taught, you know. I my I started off playing tenor banjo for my dad, who was saying, uh, he was a singer and sang in a lot of bars, not so much professionally, but he sang, you know, uh, and people kind of knew him as a singer, you know, so when he walked in a saloon, everybody wanted him to sing. And so I followed him around a lot as a kid, and uh, I would play tenor banjo for him, and uh he would do you know, uh old like ragtime songs and Irish songs and you know,
Danny Boy was his big number. And so I got the chance. The significance of that was I got to hear a lot of great piano players, got the guys that he would go to visit who played piano in these bars, and ah, and it was amazing how talented they were looking back, especially, I realized that these these these were great musicians, you know, but here they were in the corner bar and Saint Louis playing Bill Bailey, Won't You Please Come Home? For all these drunks, and they hated every minute of it.
You know, anyone else in your family?
Uh?
Singers?
Yeah? My sisters both sing, you know, and they both got nice.
Words singing background on the keep forgetting.
That Maureen, that's Mareen. She still sings with me. My sister Kathy still sings with me. And you know, once in a while, we'll do these shows around town, just like charity events and stuff, and the family will come out and sing for me.
What's your dad say when he realized you had the voice? Because he knew the band jo.
He said, get your high school equivalent? S. He wasn't a big fan of the music video. I mean, it wasn't that he wasn't, But I don't think he saw it as a viable living, you know, and.
I don't think any parent until it becomes yeah, right, that's right.
No one was prouder that I was able to make a living at it, you.
Know, But in hindsight, did you always have the voice that we know is Michael McDonald.
Uh.
There's so much technique in it, like who's teaching your who you emulating? And you know where'd you learn control and your verbrato and your tone?
You know. A lot of my singing voice came from singing in bars, you know, because I had to preserve I.
Say, smoke or beer.
And then tobacco had something to do. I thought it was a good thing for a while until it was a great thing for us. But no, I early on I realized that if I wanted to sing like James Brown and uh uh some of the you know, the showers, you know, the great blue singers, I wouldn't have a voice very long if I did, you know, you know, like Mitch Ryder and all those singers that were famous
for their screams, you know. But so I I developed a style that where I could kind of sound like I was putting more into it than I really had to. So I could sing five sets a night, you know, and.
Five sets a night.
Yeah, we did. We did. Like I did a lot of that in LA We'd play like three four five sets a night and sometimes go after hours, you know, and some go across town and play after hours clubs. You know.
So what brought you to LA as far as.
A record deal? Originally I came out to do a record for RCA Records, your own, not with Yeah, it was my own. I'm only hesitant to mention it for fear that someone might actually find it and listen to it.
Oh God.
He got discovered in St.
Louis.
Yeah. I was actually in Champagne, Illinois, playing in a bar, and a producer, a guy who I'm not to this day, who was from, believe it or not, Champagne, Illinois. He grew up on a farm there, went to l A and with the New Christy Minstrels. Remember the New Christy Minstrels. It was like a folk singing group, you know, and he if you watch that movie Mighty Wind, that's pretty much so. Anyway, he was in one of those groups, and he met his wife. But anyway, he wound up
producing records for RCA Records. He produced the first Jefferson air playing album. Harry Nilson jose Fliciano you know, had quite a run, you know, producing some great records, and he heard me in a bar, signed me up and I came out to California. And the good part of that story is he he kept me alive by using me on sessions that I had no business being on. You know, I was playing with these guys who were really a list guys, and they had to put up with me because this guy wanted me to get paid.
You know, he sings, I was playing piano.
I had even less business being on these session on which on which sessions? Oh uh, you know, things like everything from David Cassidy to Jack Jones to uh John Harton John Hartford. Uh, you know, just things that he was producing at the time, some Jose Feliciano tracks maybe, uh, but it gave me experience I would have never gotten otherwise, you know. And uh, really where I learned, you know, how to play with other musicians on a whole other level, you know, are much more professional capacity.
And you're still just self taught at this point. You just kind of figured it out.
Yeah, you know, I was came from bar bands in Saint Louis. It was like the first one of the bridge gets the solo. You know, it was like we were just rushing ahead, you know.
Wow, well, uh, you know, as we are very curious on quest Love Supreme. We would like to play a bit of God News by young Mike McDonald.
Oh my god, this is gonna be painful.
Change and you should go away. Oh baby, Paul I have Junior said, well do you know that fifteen?
I'm sad?
You know you ste know about God.
No, it's like Tom Jones Watch your Family. I think it's like, how old are you on that recording?
Uh?
Eighteen and you sounded like forty?
J Thomas. I feel it. I feel it. That was nothing embarrassing about that manh.
Yeah, it was great, Thank you? So uh woll within the in l a Uh are you interacting at all? Or how are you running into what will eventually be your peers at the mid seventies to mid eighties, like the Bacados, the Pages, the I.
Got, Yeah, you know that was I probably met those guys more on the club level doing casuals. One of the first gigs I ever remember meeting Jeff Pacarl I'm not even sure I met him. That night we were playing at a club in the Valley cent Fernando Valley and his band came in and played, and they were all underage. They were all like junior high school age and I'm trying to remember the name of the band.
They were named after their street they lived on, and it was all Grant High School kids freshman year, and Jeff was this phenomenal drummer and they were kind of a fusion band, you know. So it was interesting because every ending Jeff kind of did a symbol solo for it.
It ended each song with this you know kind of you know, and but he was obviously really great and the next time I heard about him doing sessions after that, and uh, the next time I met him, we played a casual for a TV show that was a rap party for Universal Studios. And make a long story short, my girlfriend was the contractor on this show. She was a bass player at the time, Brandy.
And I love to say, Carol, kay, wait a minute, yeah, no, no, no no, But she.
She left to go do a gig in Vegas and she said, make sure you do this gig and we could get the band together, and will you do this gig for me? I said sure. She goes, You're not going to leave it to the last minute and you know, and and have it be a complete, uh you know, disaster disaster. I said, no, I promise, I won't. Of
course I did, and you did. So at the last minute, I call the sax player friend of mine and he goes, I know these cats, they do sessions, she goes, but they love to play and they'll probably do it for free. I said, even better, you know, but I just I need somebody. So we all showed up. None of us knew each other, We didn't rehearse. We just played every top forty song we could think of, and then for the next three sets we played the same ones over again,
but they were all pretty drunk by then. Nobody cared, you know, and we uh it was Jeff Pacarl, David Page, Mike Piccarl on bass Monsters. Yeah, and uh. The next time I talked to Jeff was like a year later. He called me through the same girl, Brandy, and he said, I'm looking for Mike. We're auditioning for Steely Dan, and I thought maybe he could play some keyboard and and sing, you know, do some of the backgrounds, because they're looking
to kind of keep the band small, you know. And so as soon as I heard, I threw my piano in my Pinto and I drove down to Modern Music and auditioned. And you know, miraculously got the job, you know, and wound up toured the world those guys before.
They broke up. You know, were you playing a Wolitzer or a little black worltzer? Yeah? Okay for those that don't know, And I've always just heard the legend of Steely Dan just being a studio group, Like what was the initial meat and potatoes of the band? You came in during what Katie lied or right?
They hadn't started Katie yet. They partzel Logic was the record they were touring on. They just had just finished Partzel Logic.
So was there ever besides Fagan and Becker, were there core members that were Yeah?
Yeah, Well the band at that time existed as Steely Dan, Donald Walter, Jimmy Hotter on drums, and Jeff McCarroll on drums. Uh and Walter played bass, Danny Diaz played guitar, and Jeff Baxter played guitar, and uh myself playing some keyboards and singing backgrounds of Royce Jones played percussion and sang backgrounds. Royce was another LA guy that played clubs and you know,
uh uh great singer and a great percussionist. But uh so we were that was pretty much the core group, the whole group right there.
And how is it moving into their their band because as a self taught player, I mean the stuff they're playing is pretty adventure Yeah. Yeah, like how did you figure all that stuff out?
Well? Donald showed me, you know, what he wanted me to play pretty much, you know, and and uh, which was basically backing him up on piano and uh uh with with electric piano and uh and it was It
was great. It was a real education for me, especially in songwriting, because all of a sudden I saw how he voiced these chords that uh and there was a simplicity to it that was ingenious, you know that I I kind of learned that a lot of times, uh, the the harmonic vastness of their songs really came from the fact that the chords were very simple kind of triads, you know, with not in unusual forms, you know, like
one two inverted. Yeah. Yeah, and a lot of times that's how the chords moved, you know, in that kind of symmetric pattern. But it really it just opened my whole head up to composition, you know, pop songwriting, you know for sure.
Yeah, but how.
Can you explain the phenomenon of Steely Damn because it's for me, maybe because I grew up ten years later. You know, I see probably the figure that I see that came close to experimenting as far as he could.
And staying pop was printed.
Yeah, So what were the what were Fagan and Becker's work habits as far as like was their intention to make digestible pop music multi layered with this intricate jazz approach?
I mean, and I know.
At least watching the documentary for like as how how animal retentive they were, Like how as tasks?
Yeah? Like how what were their work habits like in the studio.
It was you know, nothing stood in the way between them and the end game, you know, what they really were trying to go for. And what I find most interesting about Stue Dan. I remember we toured with them not that long ago, maybe but four or five years ago, and of course I would stick around every night and listen to their set and they every night I would
it would hit me. You know, these guys were the darlings of Top forty radio for like ten to fifteen years, and their music is so weird, you know, it's so strange and it's so eclectic. How do they manage that? You know? But you know, I know in there as far as their work habits, like you mentioned, they were very insulated down on Walter, they seemed to be to me. They would kind of go off somewhere unknown to anyone
else and write these songs. And I know that just from my own experience of being around them in rehearsal and stuff, that some of the influences they had were surprising to me. Like Duke Ellington, it was a huge influence on those guys, you know, on the makeup of their band, and you know, the chord progressions they wrote, the way they you know, the harmonic sense that they
had with their songs. Was they really that sophistication that Steely Dan has kind of Probably the most direct influence I can think of would be Duke Ellington and our just like that, you know that we're that they somehow kind of twisted into this pop uh format genre, you know.
All right, So I'm just going to jump to it. Peg how this background, how.
I feel like PEG is probably on the records, one of the most intricate crafted background.
You listening to Mike McDonald, He's like, no, no, no, no, that's.
Not right, that's this is me, this is my my bad like has a dedication to you, Like, yeah, how.
I think that sounds better than the last time we sang it.
Well, that's what I was going to ask one. How do you how do you how do you guys recreate this stuff on stage?
Well, there's a group of us, you know, singers and.
Are they anal retentive one stage as well?
Donald kind of gives us the parts, you know, and like when I sang it in the studio, my biggest problem was I couldn't sing the harmonies listening to the last harmony I did because it was too close.
And so you do it separate.
Yeah, you know, if if I, if I were a little more schooled as a singer, I might have been able to pull that off. But so I would just have them turn off the last part I sang and then give me the new part. I'd sing it, and then the first time I heard it altogether was after I finished it, you know. But uh, but on live on stage, we would sing the parts, uh, and we would you know, you'd get your part in your head and then you only have to be you know, responsible
for that one part and with Donald. I always wanted to make sure I sang it in tune and on time, so I sang most of those parts while staring at him across the stage.
See are there five other people also matching the notes?
The girls? And uh yeah, it was me and the girls pretty much, you know, and and Donald.
You know, was the Tory unit. Not it wasn't the same as the studio unit.
Correct, No, No, it was the stulely Dan as it has been in recent past, with Catherine Russell and Carolyn Linehart singing, two great great singers. You know.
Wow, Yeah, kudos to that is. I still don't think you get enough credit for or respect for that. I mean, it just sounds so effortless that you take it for granted.
Well, those guys, that was all there was always there, you know. I came in late on these recordings.
The typically the tracks were done, and how physically, how long did it take for you to do.
You know? Typically, I don't think I ever did more than two tracks in a given session. Usually, you know, more, probably more often one you know that they were concentrating on for that day, you know, So.
You're saying you just literally breezed through peg and under half hour.
I wouldn't say I breezed through anything with those guys, you know, it was you know, and there were some tracks I actually didn't I wasn't able to do, you know, Like I remember Doctor Wu. They had sent me that track in advance and said, you know, we would like to hear your voice on this, and I loved the song and I wanted more than anything in the world to be able to do that track because I just particularly love that tune, you know, and I couldn't. I
couldn't do it. You had to sing it all in one breath, and I smoked way too much at.
That point in my life to pull that off.
So I was really disappointed. And of course they never let me live it down. But you know, it was all in good fun. But you know, there were times when I really was not the guy.
So how did they Yeah, I know they're they're infamous for replacing, Like, Okay, you're not going to nail it, get someone else.
How how do they break that news to you hurting your feelings?
Usually, No, it was you have to take those guys. They always had a great sense of humor, those guys, and you know, they would be the first two that got fired. You know, they they would fire themselves before they fired everyone else, right, So, I mean a lot of the tracking, Donald would have Michael Marty and play piano or uh and or Victor Feldman and Walter would have different bass players.
You know, uh so one stand by in the break room like Chuck Brainey.
You know, they just would they would just go ahead and hire other guys to do the parts that they you know, would do live later, you know, just just to get the track to feel the way they wanted it to feel.
You know, were you guys aware at the time that you were laying the blueprint for And there's always debate on you know, I I see, I mean I'm seeing yacht rock now. Probably you hate the term yacht rock the same way that I kind of scuffle with the word Neil's soul. But I mean, in hindsight, it's a very quick way to describe this on her music feel. Yeah, I don't know if it's like a California sound or whatever.
And it's so weird because I know that critics, at least back then, like the guys that I interact with now, who are music critics that are like kind of in their sixties now in seventies, I can tell, like they seem so not apologetic. But you know, if we talk about Second Half of Chicago or Toto's music or whatever, like any you know, they're always like and I'm like, no, like I love that shit, Like like I don't listen to NWA one of the time, I listened to everything else.
But critic were you guys sort of aware of.
Critics sort of well, I mean they didn't dismiss Steely Dan as much, but I'm just saying, like critics hold scoffed notion of what La Soft Rock was, you.
Know, yes, and no, I mean, I uh, I think we got a lot of you know, bad press a lot of the time, you know, for initially, and then you know, if the record got popular, then it was you know, we always loved it. Yeah, you know, but but I think that's just that's just kind of comes and that's kind of part of the deal. You know. I don't know that we're any different than anyone else.
You know. It's funny. I was watching the Eagles documentary, and you know, I thought every album they had was like this gigantic success, you know, but according to the documentary, there were periods and records they did where the record company was thinking of dropping them or you know, or you know, they went through their own trial and era of h and they wanted to be more of a rock band, and it was like, oh, come on, this
country band wants to be a rock band now. And they had to face all that same kind of run, that same kind of gauntlet with critics and record people, and so I think every band goes through that. You know, it's it's just what's going on in the inside compared to what people think is going on from the outside.
Well, speaking of him, since you brought it up, were you aware of any kind of light ribbing rivalry between the two camps, the Eagles and Steely Dan, I know the lyric wise they were throwing.
No, I didn't. I didn't really think that was true. I think that was a manufactured kind of a press thing because I don't know that it really ever was anything between. I think it was just a lyric in the song, if you know what I mean, and kind of like when Chuck Berry saying I couldn't unfaster or safety belt. It was just a kind of a tip of the hat to the times we lived in right, and you know which, by the way, I thought, I remember when I was a kid, we backed him up,
and I thought, how clever is this this guy? Because safety Bills had just come out that year. He is putting in the song already, you know. But I think the same thing with the Eagles. You know, the reference in that song was just, uh, you know, it's kind of life in today's world. You know what reference are we are we turned down the Eagles of Neighbors are listening,
you know. I don't think it really really meant to be a slam at the Eagles, and I think they just kind of play roy humor, the Royal Scaeah.
There's light lyrical references, which if it were hip hop, you know, shot could have been.
So obviously. Uh, Jeff Scott pulls you can I assume that.
He pulls you into the Doobies and the Doobies as you guys were working together on the Steely.
Dan was he in he during your period?
Or yes he was and we toured together and uh then the Donald Walter disbanded the band, you know, in that period of time, and I felt kind of like Timothy Schmidt said, you know, uh, I just got the best gig of my life and these assholes break up? Why?
Yeahauch was after it was.
It was excuse me, Katie k right after Katie Light, right before cad Light.
Actually, yeah, why did they break up?
I don't know. I wouldn't speculate myself, because it wasn't really a part of their world that I was privy to, if you know what I mean. I was just kind of for higher guy.
Well, you mean the period between Asia you joined the Dubies in seventy seven.
Well, yes, uh no, seventy five. That's when I taken to the streets.
I think we did, okay, seventy five. Yeah, so there was like three four years between Gaucho Wascha was eighty yeah, scam and it was along. So you're saying that period wasn't just a writer as Black Hiatus. It was like we break up and then.
Well let's see, I mean they were they were starting Katie Lied by the time we got done touring, you know, And so it wasn't too long after that, maybe six months later, that I went in the studio with them for Katie Lied and sang those backgrounds on bad Sneakers and some other things, and then Royal Scam was the next record, and then Gaucho I believe Asian then Gaucho.
So you know, they were they stayed fairly busy, you know, through that period, but they just no longer were seely Dan as we all knew them originally, you know, as a band, but more as Walter and Donald.
You know, okay, did you? I mean, why was I'm trying to figure out why. My question is, I'm sorry, why wasn't it?
I think the biggest you know, And again it's probably not my place to even say this, but they one of the things I I thought at the time was they no longer wanted to tour, and the only real livelihood the other guys had, since they weren't the writers, was the touring they did, right, So they wanted to stay on the road, and I don't think Donald Walter wanted to be on the road anymore. They didn't really care for it, and and so, uh, it just it created a whole world that they didn't really care to
be a part of. They wanted to be in the studio and they wanted to be writing songs, you know, and so they they that was kind of a necessity for them to be able to pursue that more freely, to not have the band to consider, you know, yeah, because there.
Ain't going on but the written. So how how easy was the transition to the Doobies?
Surprisingly easy? Uh? Not nothing I counted on. I mean I got the call from Jeff and uh, I flew down to New Orleans, and really it was only obsensibly. I was just going to fill in for Tommy while he was took up medical leave pretty much from in the middle.
Of this tour.
And then as things progressed and that tour came to a close, there was the back then. It was like the Dubies was one of those bands that they took very seriously an album a year, you know, and the label was really after them to get another record, and the way things worked out, it was kind of just okay. They we were all kind of caught unprepared. I really didn't see myself as part of that part of the band. But I had made a demo with Tyrne in his house.
He had put together his home studio, and he said, you want to try a recording something. I said, sure. You know, I was just over his house for dinner and so we threw the song down of just something I had been in my head and you know, and I uh, we recorded it and I put the vocal down and we thought it sounded pretty good and uh uh he played it for Ted Templeman, and Ted said, you guys should cut this. This is kind of weird
and different, you know, for the band. And it was a song called the Losing End, which is like the last song on Earth. I thought the Doobie Brothers would ever do, you know, and that would wound up being like the first track we cut for the Taken to the Streets record. And then so I hurried up and finished a couple of songs that have just been living in my head, you know. One was Taken It to the Streets and Keeps You Running and uh. And so
that the album kind of started to take shape. Pat had some songs, and and Tommy was not really ready to come back to the to the group in that touring schedule, and and uh and work.
Uh.
He was still pretty much on hiatus at the time, and and and his departure was such a gaping hole. And as you can imagine, you know, in the band, it was he was such a driving force in the band. The whole time and and to this and remained. That's even during the time I was with him, a big part of our show was the songs he had written for the band, you know.
So, I mean you were kind of thrown into a position similar to Dennis Edwards the New Temptation or even James J. T.
Taylor for cooling the game in the game.
But as far as the songs that h that he sang lead on, like when you were first doing your touring with them, like were you were you having to do uh.
Listen to the music? Yeah, like oh yeah yeah.
In fact, when I the first gig I did with him, I I flew to New Orleans. I got picked up by these two guys that I didn't know whether they were to take me to rehearsal or kill me. You know. Uh uh. We rehearsed in in this place called the Warehouse in New Orleans. And at the time, at that time in my life, you know, uh, there was a lot of things going on with me. I was playing
clubs for a lot of years. I probably was ah easy to say, down on my luck so to speak, you know, financially, and I was, you know, living in a garage in Burbank. Uh and uh. I thought, well, you know, when I got to meet all these guys, ah, I thought, well, this is the gig I've been waiting for. Everybody drinks as much as I do, and you know, and they kind of uh it was a pretty rowdy bunch of guys, you know, and uh, but they they seemed to have fun and it was a good band.
But the thing that struck me the first time we played was I was just playing these songs in a bar too, you know, too nice before I came down here in Burbank or Pasadena, you know, because they were like the big It was like Mustang Sally listening to the music, long train running. You had to know those songs if you're going to play in any of the dance bars in La Area. So here I am on stage with these guys playing these songs. I thought that
was kind of ironic, you know. But and for that whole period of time, during the time I was with Steely Dan and the Dobies, I lived in two realities. You know. I'd come home and go back to work at the Trojan Club in Pasadena, oh wow, and then be ready to hit the road with Steely Dan. And or the Doobie Brothers. You know.
So wait, you were in two full fledged bands. Well, no, I am doing your regular club.
Yeah. No, the Doobies and Steely Dan. That was separate things. But during that period when I was with Steely Dan and when I was you know, one minute, I was touring Europe with Steely Dan, next minute I was back in Pasadena playing at the Trojan Club. And then I got an audition to go to New Orleans to play
with these guys, and I stayed with them. But during my time off, I went back to playing clubs again, just you know, just to stay in, you know, in the circle of guys that I played around LA with.
You know, how much were you making around it?
Yeah? I say, could you make a Bible living?
Like? Were you like, oh, okay, not really no. I mean back then, for a lot of reasons. One was we we weren't that serious about our top forty chops and our gigs. You know, we didn't really We weren't one of those bands that really made a living at it. We were guys that did it for the weekend to make a couple of hundred bucks a piece, you know, and have some spending money. And we you typically didn't rehearse.
We just kind of got together and you know a lot of the songs you can play the drunk, yeah, And so you know, it was that kind of existence in LA, and then I looked to play with and sing on whatever. I did a lot of background singing, So that was a probably more of a of a living for me at the time.
You know, you know what White Luther.
The same story because even you know Luther's tenure with chicn Can do It were you did you cut your teeth on it, like the jingle circuit at all?
Like, uh, not so much the jingles. I did a lot of sessions though with Luther Vanders, James Ingram, Philip Ingram, you know, we we were the switch. Yeah yeah, and uh we did a lot of background singing for a lot of people, you know during that period of time.
You know, well, I know back then, uh, singing for publishing houses was a good living.
So I think that was more Nashville and New York because LA was really typically more the and it wasn't even a real viable demo scene. Typically people did their demos for free, you know, and and it wasn't like Nashville where you can make a living just playing on demos for publishing companies, you know, because there's a lot of publishing companies there. But La, the publishing companies weren't. They weren't in the fray like they were in New York and in you know, La, I mean in Nashville.
That wasn't that. It wasn't that sector of the music business out there, you know, so you couldn't.
My assumption is that, you know, by seventy five seventy six, when you're like deep into Dooby them.
This wasn't like, Okay, I got a good job.
I can well, it was after a while I quit doing the other things, you know, I mean and went off to just be a Doobie brother, you know.
But okay, but I just meant as a do you still feel like this could in any moment? And I got it?
Yeah.
I mean I think we all do in a way.
I mean, even now, do you feel like, well, let's put it this way.
I'm surprised I'm still doing this for a living as much as anyone else.
And I know that, you know, because I mean your first is always like I'm still here exactly.
Yeah, I'll wake up and go, oh my god, you know, but I mean, you know, and on the road, there'll be any number of times I'm sitting there going you know, you're sixty five years old. You know, what the hell are you doing out here? You know? And I can only gauge the sanity of it by am I still having fun? You know? I mean, because to me, it's still fun to play live more than almost anything else. I think I enjoy playing live more than I enjoyed recording. Wow.
So okay, now, I know you said this didn't mean anything to you, and you forgot about this end quote.
Here we go.
But what's happening?
Oh god, yeah, what's happened?
How many people?
You can't You can't make me believe that no black person and therefore, well we do that, But no black person in their forties fifties doesn't mention that to you every daytime.
And I didn't mean to downplay the important That's a very vivid memory in my you know, for us, it was did.
You guys feel like it was an important move like exposure?
I don't think we had the sense to realize how important it was, you know, I mean, we just did it as a lark, you know, and uh uh you know, we thought it would be fun, and our publishers kind of brought the idea to us and we thought, oh, yeah, you know, let's do that.
You know, we were just and it was a two part episode. Yeah, yeah, that was my first to be continued.
Why don't you It was just the part that I didn't why why don't you break it down for the people that haven't seen that?
Okay? Yeah, so okay.
There was a comedy show based on the movie COOLi High called What's Happening in the seventies? Uh that featured uh Ernest, Ernest, Thomas, j Heywo Nelson and Berry who was a prominent member of the Lockers Okay, Mabel Mabel. So it was a very popular popular I would dare say it was probably the Martin of the seventies.
Well Martin started and What's Happening Now? But that's fun, that's right.
He did ship Martin.
Yes, I forgot that anyway, So yeah, there was there was an episode you Gotta Explain Al Dunbar played by the late great Theodore Wilson.
I thought his name was Sweet Lou or something like that, Like, didn't he have a sweet title. He was he was sweet. Oh he was good, same guy.
He was one of those blacks like you saw in every black thing.
Like he was he was sweet daddy, sweet daddy, sweetaddy.
Thank you sw yes.
Okay.
So basically there's this so where the Doobie Brothers are coming to perform at Roger's uh high school, and you know, Rogie writes for the paper, so he's covering the show and so this uh, this this guy from the Underworld, the skive guy, approaches re Run and Rob's play by the name of Al Dunbar and he's like, hey, yeah, how would you like tickets for this concert? And he's like, uh, what's the catch?
Ain't no catch?
I what?
You just record this show?
Fun man and so and so he asked him to record this show on like this huge fucking tape recording.
It's like, whoever thought that this was gonna work?
But anyway, so he basically asked Rerun to be like the first Napster and shit and bootleg the Dewie brother Show. So he go up to the joint and so they agreed to do it. You know, he put the he put the stiff farm on him and he had his goon with him. His goon was was Bruno. I think his name was Bruno, and he at the end of the and then the episode ends, he's like, oh man, they because they try not to do it, and so rerun it's like, nah, I want to do it.
We can get in trouble.
All right, all right, all right, well you're just gonna have to tell mister Bruno hit it. He's not gonna get paid. Mister Bruno, will you please pull up a chair and talk to us, certainly? And mister Bruno goes and pulls up a store and the joint is and it's like to be continued. So then the joint opens up and so like they actually talked with the Doobies in episode two. They're talking before the show and so like they're like, so, what do you think is the biggest problem?
I actually have. Biggest problem is probably botleg So they talking to stuff.
So anyway, the show goes on. It's great, Michael does he does take it to the street.
Wait time out At actual Doobie Brothers concerts, did you guys do that fire thing? Every every everybody has their the night I almost set my house on fire moment, Yeah, I.
Might have gotten a Q tip. Why started playing with matches? Yes, you were right.
If I watched TV, it was influential. It's very good for you guys, and not let me watch that much television. Yeah, when I saw the Gong thing, I went in my basement on the drummer and tried.
To and it was not good. Was that to actually do that?
And so press, I can't tell you. Uh well, I don't remember really what we did on the show.
Uh he he lit the guy on fire.
It was on fire, and it was cutting into like d and rerun. They were all like looking and stuff.
And so then I think y'all doing take playing up like a high school and content though like the.
High school the Doodie Brothers doing a rock show. Right, everybody's excited.
Yeah, everyone loved it due and so because because the album was Living on the fault Line. That was the album at the time, and he they were talking about it. So anyway, so the crowd is going crazy and and uh, Michael McDonald's killing taking to the streets, singing, just going in.
You don't know.
It was so strong, he was.
Saying through his beard was amazing. So so goddamn was singing that ship and God damn, we wanna get up and start jumping up and down, and the taper out.
And everybody did the smooth lemonal. That's the first time I saw the Smooth, not by Michael Jackson. And it's like, oh.
So then at the end of the joint, they're sitting at the I guess everybody left. They went back home to come to and so then they're sitting there like the Dowdie Brothers. It's like, yo, man, it's fucked up.
I thought she was at home.
He was like, no, but you are our friends. But this guy told us he would hurt us. It wouldn't be a guy by the name of Al Dumbball, would it. Yeah, it was Ol Dumbar. So then they go back to Rob's place and they catch Ol Dunbar and they play the tape and it's just rerun eating chips.
I can to hear you listening to this episode right now, being mad here to worship the storytelling stocks. Thank you vant A.
Wait, that's not real life at that time, in that time of year, it was never a Doobie.
Brother show with a full with a full black crowd, like.
We're black people embracing you. Got because after that episode, after that, yeah, yeah, then I was like, oh.
Doobie Brothers, you know, yeah, I mean it was it was funny I found in my solo career, my you know,
my first couple of records. That's how we got on the radio was back then it was more independently owned radio stations, and it was really R and B radio that picked up our singles like keep Forgetting In Sweet Freedom first, and we kind of crossed over to like Top forty or what are they what was it called in contemporary hit radio, you know, but we really got our start on the R and B radio in which back then you could walk into a small station that was owned by a guy who was the program director
and who would sit and play your whole record with you, and you know, you sit and play your whole album, you know, to an audience and talk about it. And you know, that's unheard of today because of all the syndicated kind of radio things that people just can't do that anymore, at least not much my heart having it.
Yeah, okay, so let's jump to nineteen seventy eight. Can you please explain to us what was you on when you wrote What a fool belief. It's one of the most notable, memorable, confusing word structures I've ever heard. I still don't know what the song means.
It's cool Keith, he sees the wise man has the power, I know the hook.
I'm just talking about the narrative.
Sure, well, you know, I think the idea was a guy living in his own head believing that he left this great love affair that he needs to retrieve and that it must have been the same for her, and in fact it meant absolutely nothing to her.
And so you couldn't just write youre on my mind all the time, right right right about it all the time.
I don't think you'd be talking about the song now if you have.
But yeah, you know, the funny thing about that song was I had that riff in the verse riff for easily a year or two, and I take sometimes a year to write a song, you know, But every time I play it for Ted Temple, he's you know, what, do you guys got any new stuff? You know? So I played that little piano riff and I had just a couple of lyrics in the verse, and he go, God, You've got to finish that. He goes I'm telling you that's a hit. I just feel it, and I go, well, yeah,
I'm going to finish it, you know. Of course never did. And I was get together with Kenny Logins for the first time, and he came down to my house and my sister was cleaning the house because she wanted to meet Kenny Logins mostly, but and I was at the piano kind of thinking of things I might play for him. So I was playing stuff for her, you know, going what do you think of this? You know, I was thinking of playing this for Kenny, And she goes, yeah,
that's great. You know. She's you know, picking up like, you know, my dirty clothes on the floor and all that, you know, and not really paying much attention to me, and the doorbell rings, and sure enough it was Kenny. And the first thing he says to me goes, what were you just playing? I was playing her that riff and I said, oh, it's just something I was thinking about playing for you. He goes, that's what I want to work on first. Wow, that was the first song we wrote together.
So what was the kind of division of labor for that record in terms of he did you did music?
He did lyrics, no, we both we both wrote I think both you know. From that point on we came up with the bridge or b section and then the chorus together, you know, and the rest of the words, you know, because I literally only had the little verse feeling. You know, they're just kind of the temple of the song and the chords and the verse.
You know again, are you it's so intelligent, like were you? I know, no one starts thinking like, Okay, this is our bulls eye moment, this is going to happen. Like at any point did you guys think like, maybe we should dumb this down just slightly because I mean the bridge, the post bridge, Yeah, I mean it's very steely dand.
Well I was going to say at that time that was really the music was, you know, I mean everybody was trying to uh harmonize in a new and a different way and bring something, you know. It was it was after that that it got to be where well we got to pull this back and make it more primitive and you know, rock and roll and you know all that, you know, eighties. It was like, you know, all these core changes. Yeah, that's you know, not not
hip or cool. But at the time that we did it, it was steely Dan, James Taylor, artists like that who had very you know, James Taylor, as much as he was kind of uh kind of came from that singer
songwriter tradition almost folk. His influences as a is from a jazz perspective or very evident, you know, and uh a lot of his songs and uh so he you know, he brought a lot of And that was the era too where albums artists tried to do a lot of different styles of music on one record, Like if you listen to like the old oh, you know records, you know that. Well, I think Ray Charles started that where you kind of step outside your own genre and do
music isn't necessarily relate you know people. Yeah, and uh where James Taylor was great at that. He would do an R and B song, He would do a song with Marimbas, you know, and he would do the next song would be a very kind of guitar vocal folkish
kind of thing and beautiful lyrics. And so he never shied away from any style of music that he thought he could be sincere and a lot of artists were like that during that time, and that seemed to be what had come out of the sixties was artists exploring other genres of music other than maybe the genre they started out in, And so we were just kind of doing what was kind of being done at the time. You know, we didn't really think of ourselves as anything too different.
You know, so when you're sitting in the audience at the Shrine Auditorium and nineteen seventy nine was like that was highly notable for it so many so much heavy heading going on as far as the nominations were concerned. At the Grammys, Uh, you're going up. I think you don't be bringing me flowers? Uh the Gambler, I will survive, and uh after the Love is going what was your What was the feeling in your like when they called your name for a Record of the Year and Song
of the Year. You guys went off five major wards except.
For album I believe.
Yeah, it was. It was amazing, Like did you expect it? Or no? I don't think you could expect you know, you was underdogs, Yeah you just yeah, you feel I felt like, what are the chances of you know, the first record of this nature that I had anything to do with actually winning a Grammy? But uh, uh we were. We were fairly taken back by the whole idea that we were going to win not just a Grammy, but
a couple you know. Uh, it was amazing. And I remember, I mean not to be corny, but my grandmother was in the audience that night. She had come to the ground. Yeah. I was so grateful she was still with us and that she was able to be here for this, you know, but you know, it was just kind of amazing. It was kind of surreal, really, you know it was. It
wasn't until I drove home that night. I remember they had sent a car for me, and I just kind of had the guy drive up and down the Pacific Coast Highway a couple of times so I could kind of come down from the whole experience before I had to go home and go into my house all alone and me by myself with this.
You know, that's funny.
Pacific goes Eyeway, Okay, that is one of the greatest I'm glad to know I'm not the only human being that doesn't ride Pacific go Sideway just to ride it to relax.
Oh yeah, yeah, okay, sure good.
There's other people.
So when one steps that comes out, why did it implude and was there pressure to like lots?
Yeah, I felt my personal pressure really that you know, well, God, now this record, you know that whole thing of it, this next record is really important. You know, I've learned that that was never true. But at the time, you know, you buy into it and you think it's like the most important thing in the world, and it's just really not all that important. But h and whatever it is, you'll survive it. But you don't know that at the time.
And I remember feeling a lot of pressure, and I think the band felt a lot of pressure to kind of come up with something else again and something new and maybe something even different from the records we had done up to that moment, you know. And you know, I think at that point in time it was maybe it kind of marked the beginning of the end of
my tenure with the Dubies. Although I still play with the guys and I still look forward to playing with them every chance I get, I you know, great friends with them to this and I really think, as Adobie brother, all of us who have ever had any affiliation with the band, uh, it's kind of like once a Doobie brother, you're always Adobie brother somewhere in your heart and mind, you know.
So was the breakup amicable or yeah?
It was? It was It was amicable. And we were like any other band. You know, we had our moments. You know, we threw furniture at each other.
And that's where I want you to tell, Like, as the new guy, how can you you're the new guy, but you're now the definitive voice of the group.
Almost and bringing in hit more. Yeah, more definitive than what came before.
So it's like, how much power were you still the rookie that had to carry all the back the team's jockstraps or was it like.
Might Donald we love you?
And then like, you know, well what about me? I've been here since nineteen seventy one, Like what was that dynamic?
Like? No, it was never you know, because I think internally within the band, you know, uh, I think all of us still looked at you know, at that point in time, Pat was kind of the senior member, you know, and and kind of the guy everyone looked to to kind of keep the band together, you know. Uh. In fact, it was when he left the band that we showed up for a rehearsal and I don't think we all kind of looked across the stage each other, like what
are we doing here? Because without Pat it's really just not the Doobie Brothers anymore. It was after the live album, we did the Farewell tour, Yeah, and uh, it just didn't seem like there was any reason for us to go out and try to be the Doobie Brothers anymore, you know. And uh, I think it was unanimous, you know, really, you know, uh.
So even when you did what it takes a minute, your your first solo record, was uh, if that's what it takes, if that's what.
It takes him sorry, before we have got before we go to Is it true that Michael Jackson is singing backgrounds a minute by a minute?
No, he said it, and I didn't know if that was real enough.
No, you know, it actually was a joke that the whole tape, I've heard the whole conversation. People kind of edited it down to him just telling I think it was Elizabeth Taylor. I think he was talking to her, but he was just pulling her chain. And then later on he tells her that he was kidding, you.
Know, Oh, okay, but actually, you know what speaking of which you guys have the same publicists as the Jackson's.
That's right, David guest.
So there's a photo of I don't know what party it was.
I don't know if it was a Doobie's Grammy party or something, but it's some sort of like after party thing and the caption says that you guys did a long train running, shake your body down to the ground, like massive, massive, because I see I believe once it's Michael and Randy on in stage with you guys like Tito.
Yeah, it was the Jackson's and it was at the Friars Club in LA. It was a benefit show and uh, I forget what the charity was. It was a Jackson family charity and we was there, think yeah, and we we just kind of came as guests and uh and we did we did uh long train running?
And the right has this? Ever?
Does anyone have a bootleg of this or recording?
You know what?
I think?
I think there is somewhere out there in the world where I wouldn't tell you love this.
Yeah, I mean, how do you were you guys big into archiving any great I'm asking you.
Were you into collecting yourselves?
Like? No, but you know, people over the years would send us stuff like that, and I had once I had a big photo album of all those different photos of the.
No one has a Super eight in the studio as you're doing, like open your eyes and none of that stuff.
No, damn no, we just we we hadn't you know, we didn't have that consciousness yet, you know. But I think the Doobies actually have a lot of Super eight movies from early Doobies years, you know, on the plane and touring and stuff like that. You know.
So with your solo career, how scary was that too?
Probably the most scary thing I've ever done. You know. It was for some reason, and I'm not sure why. I just because there was a part of my life when I thought I'm gonna go out to California, I'm going to be a recording artist, and I had that idea in my head. But somehow coming full circle as a member of bands, uh uh, and then all of a sudden, being kind of well, I felt like I was walking the plank, you know, this is to be a solo artist. But uh And it took me a
few shows to kind of find my comfort zone. That first tour was pretty scary. And I had a great band and you know, Edgar Winner, Robin Ford playing guitar. You know, it was an amazing Willie Weeks played bass with me and I couldn't have done better for as far as the band's concern. Brian Mann played keyboards. But I just had no concept of how to act up there.
But it wasn't so you used to being the side.
Then yeah, you know, I could sing a couple of songs and then someone else does the word, but light would shift over there.
So it was sweet freedom like your first music video because in your face. When I watched that video sometimes I was like, oh, he really might not be comfortable in that situation.
You know, did I jump? Sorry? I just was asking. I didn't.
Okay, that was the first.
The first one was I keep forgetting that we did a music video and it was it was yeah, awkward, you know, it was.
Look any further.
That was that was not my forte. It was further. Yeah, yeah on you.
You came on Soul Training to promote it, and probably the best thing about it was the heavyweight you had with you. I mean, you have Louis Johnson and that's Lewis Lewis.
Johnson plased record too, yeah, and and Jeff Pericarl.
And break filling games like you had the cats with you. But yeah, I mean we're worshiping like you have the guys with you.
But back then it was just like who do we get let's get a well, you know, I was lucky to be able to beat those guys for sure, and it was my two sisters singing backgrounds. Yeah, but uh yeah, I would. I would say that on a good day you could get those guys to come and play on TV with you. But you know that it just so happened that everybody was available. And so.
That's only in particular. It was I was reading it started off as a liber and Stoller it was.
Wait, you're kind of jumping the gun because we were about to play around. Of So, Mike McDonald, I need you to tell me what are your thoughts of hearing the song?
What is it?
What are your thoughts.
Chuck Jackson.
Forgetting that you don't know, you forgetting that you don't want me no more, you forgetting men tell me about you want me?
Ron So I found this forty five in Japan like ten years ago, but it came out in nineteen seventy four.
What how.
Well, it's an interesting story.
And who was that? That's okay, that was long John Baldry, okay, Chuck Jackson.
Chuck Jackson did the original. Yeah, there was a Liverstoller song, and believe it or not, unbeknownst to me at the time was my It was one of those things where we were kind of playing. My writing partner said, you know, there's this because he hit somehow, you know, mentioned the song or something, and I was kind of just playing the piano if any He goes, what's that. I go, well, that's what you were just saying. And he goes, no, no, no,
he goes, that's totally different. And so we wrote this song. You know, I was immediately reminded by other people that you know, that's closer than you think, you know. So, uh, you know, we got in contact with Mike Steller and Jerry Leber and we realized that we had infringed on their copyright, you know, and they were gracious enough to give us some credit for the this version of the song.
Kind of weird that you technically wrote a song with the guys that like you. That's a real building.
Last Oh, I was not, you know, I mean, I don't mean to say this, like, because you know, I knew better I shouldn't. The minute I heard this guy say, oh no, that's not I realized, you know, I better listen to that song before I make any you know, But I didn't, you know, And I just you know, we we recorded it, our version of it anyway, and uh and right away one of the guys that Warner Brothers are one of the producers, one said, you know, he gave me his tape because listen to this, you know.
And I said, oh, well, you know.
Yeah, for you at least.
Yeah, well, I realized that we needed to you know, get their permission, and you know, and and they, like I said, they were nice enough to give us their permission to release it and put it out. But you know, and and credit where credits due. You know that that that song ours would not have existed but for their original song. You know.
So let's jump wait, who's credited who's credited officially for the writing of that song? Sorry, who's officially credited for the writing that.
It's Mike Stoller, Jerry Lieber, myself and Ed Sandford for for our version of it. Yeah, the original version was a liber Stoller song.
So twelve years later the song comes back to haunt you.
Uh yeah and the most.
The most gangster rap narrative of all time.
But using this as a backdrop with with Warren G's g funk Uh, what were your initial feelings or you know where the text not where the text nice? But you know, did you have were you hesitant to clear it?
No?
You know, but back then, what I what I remember was typically somebody would give you, you know, ten grand and it was theirs, you know, I mean, it wasn't like the deals that are made today where we're publishing, you know, like now it's it's it was a one off. Yeah, yeah, it was just like you know, well, you know, we want to sample this cost.
But that wasn't a one off. That wasn't a one off though, right, not that song.
One off? Yeah, but I was going to.
Was the version of my kids like you know, but yeah.
But then the expressed I'm sure there was renewed interest in hearing it live all of a sudden.
Yeah, you know, it's funny you.
Yeah, it was.
It had a certain impact on on the you know, the art record. So many people think that's the version of the song that you know as you know my uh, I'm not even sure my own kids didn't think that, you know, because they hadn't really heard my version. They were weren't even born yet, you know.
So have you have you ever performed it with warn g Once someone comes, that has to happen, Michael, especially for going to make it.
Damn he did you hear that?
Michael?
You heard that?
You know?
Nate? I thought just saw those guys on some TV or a documentary of some kind of like, wow, man.
It was Is that the first time a hip hop artist asked you for the rights?
I believe it was. And we've had quite a few things sampled since then. Minute by minute was sampled.
Thanks, that was all right. It's not straightforward. Wait, oh god, the intron it throws me off every time. Yeah, I'm sorry, I know, but like every time I hear it, I'm still like, wait a minute, wait, the one that hits you I did so Yeah, there's no regrets of it at all.
Oh no, you know, like all things it, uh, what's kind of like the rolling stones with used to lover. It's all over now, you know, you know, you know, at first they were going, oh, you know, we got we just have our first top ten record, and these guys scoop us, you know, and and then he said, but then when the checks started rolling in, I wouldn't didn't feel so bad about it. We're mad anymore?
How did you get into working with Carli Simon?
But like you Belong to Me?
Carl I played on some we played the Dobies, actually played some tracks on on her the album before that. We we uh. She used us to play on oh gosh m hm, the song that she had recorded and I can't remember what it was now, but we played. We were the rhythm section. And it was upon meeting her during those sessions, Ted said, you know, you guys should write together. And so the first chance I got, I had a little thing on cassette, you know, which was you belong to Me in the chord progression, and
I sent her the cassette. She wrote the lyric and sent the lyric back written out on paper, whish I wish I still had, you know, and uh and uh I had given her enough melody, just kind of mumbling, you know on the tape that she kind of wrote to that and that Cadence and uh. Uh. We never spoke the entire time we wrote the song together. It wasn't until like five years later she had a number one hit with it, or you know, at top five record with it.
And I wasn't version first though.
On the first it was never a single for us, but it was kind of a popular album cut. But uh so, about five years later she had a hit with it, and uh, I thought, well, you know, Jesus, I should call her and say congratulations or something, you know, And I saw I called her on the phone. We kind of laughed about the fact that we hadn't spoken about this for the last so many years.
And you cut your backgrounds on it away from her.
I didn't sing on that record. Yeah, No, just the Doobies record, the one I sang and did the background song, and so I forget she she did that record in New York.
That's you singing backgrounds on uh right, like the Wind as Christopher Cross. How did that come about? I love that record.
Actually, it was like we were like a day like today, we'd be sitting in the studio and Doobies, you know, in studio at Migo and h Christopher Cross was his first album was being cut in the studio next door, and the producer was Michaelmartin, and he came and said, Hey, would you if you get a minute after after you guys are done, would you come over and sing a background part for me? And I said sure, you know, and just kind of went over and.
How did you feel about the s c TV sketch which.
We we recreated that sketch on the tonight show where we literally had him run into the studio making it to the keyboard just.
In time to say, just.
Like the s c TV sketch TV Yeah, Second City, yeah kind of the snl of was it?
Yeah?
Yeah, it was like And the bit was based on the fact that, uh, every time his part comes up such a way that he would literally like do playing chains in the automobile like order plane on the chains running that just means sound.
Just to literally get to the microphone in time for and then run away and then you know, do it every time.
But we when we had Christopher Cross on the show, we didn't announce the audience that Michael McDonald was there. We just had an empty keyboard. As soon as Christopher was playing, wasn't he huh? Wasn't Keith playing it? At first, Oh, you're right, you're right. Keep McFee shout out to keep mc fee. Yeah, And so right when the bridge came in, Michael McDonald just ran in, bumped Keith Off and.
I'm stuffy, y'all have Michael McDonald Christopher Cross.
Like I got eat. You know. The funny thing about that that SCTV bit for me was, uh, I had just left a friend of mine's room and one of the other band members and we were on the road and we had just smoked this joint and I was really you know, stoned, you know, more than usual kind of thing. And I remember sitting there thinking I got to go lay down, you know, and I was just kind of felt like whatever this stuff was, it was you know, ungodly and got anywhere right now but not
for years, but this was back in the day. But anyway, I left and I kind of got my key in my door and I'm thinking, man, I'm not really with it. And as I walked in, I always used to leave my TV on, and that skit was in progress on the TV, and I'm like, walked in, I'm going, oh, I know that guy. And it took me a second. I thought, I think I'm really having a psychotic breakdown.
Wait, how nerdy are we to not even mention weed it all to a Doobie brother into a Doobie brother in this ninety minute interview.
I didn't want to, and I think Steve was scared because it was just obvious.
I was going because you talk about it, well, I read the number one growing industry in the United States.
Yeah, I was reading.
About your new record, which I really like. I was taking it on the way over here, and I was, I mean, I listened to it one time and I was like, Okay, I mean it sounds like michaem Dons. And I read an interview talking about how a lot of songs are kind of about your sobriety. Yeah, and that just made me hear it in a different way. How long have you been sober?
It's been thirty one years. Wow. It was a good idea for me of older people I know, and that's sober from from all.
Yeah everything, yeah, drinking or smoking or nothing. Wow, a sober Doobie brother.
I needed to do that. But yeah, it's you know, the best thing I ever decision ever made, you know, I mean, obviously it's I don't think I would be here. To be quite honest, that became increasingly more obvious to me as time went on and I realized that I didn't have that much further to go down that road, you know, And so there were low points, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, a good swath of low point you know. But you know, I'm one of the lucky ones, you know. That's that's
the moral of that story. Yeah, and there's not you know, the odds, you know, sobriety apparently aren't that good. But it's it's you know, there is a solution out there for people who need it, and and God willing, you know, you find that, you know, because for me, the alternative would have been the bad alternative.
You know, what was your solution? How were you able to stay sover so long?
Just one day at a time, you know, I just really surrendering to the truth of it, you know. I think the big, the great obsession for for most people who are addicted is that I got this, I can handle it. I can I can fix this, you know, I can, you know, And it's unfortunately for most of us who suffer from addiction, there's not enough willpower in the universe that we could muster to fix it once
we're there, you know. And so there are there are solutions that come in the form of community of people who are who you know, are suffering from the same disease and that and that's you know. I can't really, you know, speak beyond that, because I'm not an authority on it, you know, but I can say that that That's what I would suggest anyone is to find find people in sobriety that can share their experienced strength and hope with you.
You know, have you found that being sober? Has it helped you preserve your voice?
Because you sound oh absolutely, yeah, No, I that's that's you know, that would have probably died first, but I would have been shortly thereafter, you know. Uh no, it's you know, most everything worthwhile in my life today is a direct result of sobriety. For me, probably none of it is anything I would have put on that list if you had given it to me, saying, well, if you were able to, you know, stop using, what would
what would you be hoping for? You know? I most of what is most important to me today are things I would have never even thought of, you know, just the simple things, the simple uh aspects of my life. That just wouldn't have existed, you know, I would have never got to that, you know.
Part Okay, we're going to wind up the show. But there's still like version, there's there's well you worked with the great Rot Temperaton. Oh yes, what was that like? He's one of the one of my music.
Yeah, one of the best R and B writers that I know. You know, heat Wave was one of the best groups you know that I can think of with a book of songs that I You know, sometimes when you play with the band and then you realize just how many songs they actually had. That's happened to me many times. You know, we played with AWB, we played with the heat Wave a couple of gigs, and it's like song after song and you go, oh my god,
I forgot. And Steely Dan also, you know when I or the Doobies, I almost forget how many how deep their their songbook is, you know.
Uh.
And heat Wave was like that. That was one of those groups where there were so many songs. They were a British group, you know, with these classic R and B songs you know that I thought were just American records. I had no idea they were records made in London.
You know, British can do Americans better than you know.
And Rod was a great writer, a great producer.
You know speak speaking of you not being in the room at the same time. I heard you also say that when you did.
On my own, had to be in the same room that you guys were. No, you didn't even meet.
I hadn't even met yet, I sang to her voice. No, I hadn't hadn't met her yet, you know, I met her show. We performed that song for the first time the day after we met on the Tonight Show.
And what about times?
Every change times Retha was not there when I sang to her voice. It was Bert and Carol the.
Original I did.
I did perform it with her though at the Grammys.
I love that song. Are any motherfucker is going to talk about be there to ask him what it was? All right?
Yeah? I got to actually do the video with her.
Yeah, yeah, and talk about the of the videos, the Patty and the he.
Wasn't in the room with her there the video I did.
I did the shoot the video with the Retha in Detroit, but not with pat Patty. She was doing a play in New York.
Shirt the box with God put the video together. The song is called on my Own all right, So yeah, y'all will be there the Battle of the the battle that.
Wait, I'm actually more I'm more impressive you name drop James's brother Philip than anything, because he's one of my favorite singers switch switch Yeah, but with the process had the big Yeah, he's the feather.
Yeah he was in there. But like, did Rod also do that as well?
Or yeah, Rod Robert was one of the writers on that Yo there.
That made that song made a big impression on my Christian household.
That was.
Yeah, it made a very big impression, especially you know the division of secular and you know, the local radio station in Philly, w z z D used to play that a lot.
Yes, they would. Was it your intention to make a gospel song or pretty much?
I mean yeah in.
We Uh.
It's funny because that was probably the third song we wrote that Quincy kept, you know, going and I go back to the rejection. You guys need to go back write something better, you know, And so we we kept trying, you know, and James and I spent a lot of time in my studio just kind of righting at there.
Did you fully flesh out the other two songs that didn't make it?
We made demos on on them.
Did they wind up being anything?
No?
No, I still say. Was it Party Animal?
No?
No, it was.
It was one song I can't remember. It was like better Man and h actually was kind of we liked it. We thought it was We thought this is gonna use She's gonna love this, and it was like, eh, but damn. But Yamo was the song that he eventually caught his ear, you know, and we were just you know, uh, like I said, he spent countless hours just sitting there. We had a good time, you know, right, and because he and I it was always a good hang, you know with James.
You know, for those of us not familiar with what the hell of yamo be there means? No, no, I'm asking, but it.
Was your question.
Yeah, well it's kind of in reference to God will be there. You know. It's like, uh that that's the answer, you know, uh uh and yeahweh yeah yeah, but why go yeah yeahweh.
I feel like it was one of those Michael McDonald words because it's easy to you. Okay, do you get tired of people imitating you? In front of your face.
I think that was the funny you know, have you ever met Anita Baker like.
Hes she yeah, sure sure and Patty Austin to expressed there for you but yeah no, you know it's uh, I feel like I'd Sullivan, you know, really big shoe.
But do they do it in inconvenient moments like when you're like trying to sleep in the on the airplane.
And things like that, or some some guy will stagger out of a bar and grab me on.
The street start singing, bro we did that was the baby face and I was highly you had to go down.
No, seriously, I have a no for real, I have a band.
I have a band called the Foreign Exchange, and we're seriously considered doing the night where we perform our songs in your voice and call ourselves the for McDonald's and like all of us come out with beards, like even the girls like.
Scary.
But was there a moment when you realize because I know we always talk about like blue eyed soul and whatnot, but was there a moment when you realize, like I'm in an elite type club of I can go here, there, do the air and everywhere when it comes to, you know, soul music and pop music and whatever else you chose to do, but at least you like, you know, it's it's very few singers that have like the black community in their pocket, like we want to steal you.
Away, We'll take you in the trade.
Barbecue, you know.
It's you know, for me, to me, it's it's that that America, that truly American UH music, you know, And I don't know that there really is any other besides jazz, you know, any other really truly American music. You know. It's funny how so much of our culture is UH for the problems that this country seems to suffer from
in terms of racial tensions. And it always reminds me the conversations my wife and I have when she says, you know, we haven't talked in months, and you know, I'm worried about us, you know, and I say something brilliant like, well, you know, you know, I have to go cut the grass right now, cut the grass. You know, I think I feel like cutting grass, you know. And it's like that's how we talk to each other in
this society, you know, rather than because we don't. It's uncomfortable, and we don't want to talk about it, you know, when really that would solve everything, you know, uh, if we really truly just talked about it.
You know, Uh, there are a few that can lead a conversation like you can, because like I said, you are loved by everybody.
Well, you know, I thank you. That's very sweet of you to say. I you know you have to talk to my wife on that one. Well, but you know it's for me. I I've often thought that, you know, how much of our culture, from in food and fashion, certainly music and any real form of art in this country is largely African American influenced. You know, that is uh, one of the biggest influences on American culture there is,
you know, more than anything. You know, if you think of French food, you categorize it automatically as French food or Italian food. You know, when you think of which is largely African American influenced food, it's American, it's barbecue, it's it's uh.
You know, they just forget the root right exactly, you know, I.
Mean, it's we accept it as totally as American. You know, hopefully in our lifetime we will see a country where we understand who we are and we go forward.
Version then we got to stop the episode.
No, just how was that because they were like making fun of you in the movie. But it was I mean it was funny, but that kind of you were that brought back?
No, No, it was it was good.
My friend actually worked on that film as he was the music guy on that film, and he would send me, uh like dai or whatever scripts you know, and rewrites and he goes this, Okay, some of the stuff they didn't put in it. It was hilarious but brutal, but hilarious, you know. And uh and so in the end it was really like the the nicer version of all of it. But it was I thought it was hilarious, you know. And of course, you know again my kids always enjoyed that.
You know, they enjoyed rubbing my nose and anything like that, you know, the family guy whatever.
You know, Okay, this this is my last guy, I know. Okay, what were your thoughts on Michael Bolton because I thought he was kind of trying to I thought he was kind of trying.
To sting a swag a little bit.
No, I love Michael bolt whatever. It's only one mic yeahs from us we recognized.
So what were your thought because Botwan does want to do this show? I think he should.
I don't know, but I think he's great.
I mean brothers. Okay.
The first time I did a gig with Michael Bolton was a local thing in Santa Barbara and Kenny Kenny's charity that we would all do. And uh, Kenny Logan said to me, because this cat is serious, you know, he is he is. He sings like we wish we could sing.
Wow and from the school of Ray. But who who are you?
No?
I mean, he's he's he's trying to channel Ray. Who is there anyone that you're trying to channel? The closest I can think of is maybe Sarah Bone Like who? Uh, you know, because you do have an original voice that I can't trace the genesis.
Right, you know. For me, really it's just I try to do the best with what I got, you know what I mean, That's that's really what it comes down to. I I Ah, I've always I've never really had the confidence as a singer per se as far as chops and you know technique. You know you say that.
Let's get.
No, no, no, I mean seriously, I I uh and as I get older, especially, I think, you know, you got to kind of follow your voice with the years, you know, kind of you know, what, what's the what's my strength at this point, you know, and and you kind of kind of go with that. I but all those singers that you mentioned are all part of my psyche, you know, growing up. And and you know, I think when the Motown record was presented to me, my first thought was, why are they asking.
Me to do this?
You know, they came to you to do the cover, yeah, the other way, But I remember the next thought was
you better say yes, You'll be sorry. And and secondly, I thought, you know, I have sung these songs in bars for so many years, doing my best to emulate Marvin Gay or David Ruffin or whoever, trying to kind of, you know, grab the spirit of their vocal, you know, because that was the whole thing about being a bar band, if you could sound like the record, you know, so growing up doing that, I thought I should be able to kind of bring something to this project that just
reliving my own experiences of first learning those songs and learning to sing them when I was you know, much younger, you know.
Oh before we before Grizzly Bear, Grizzly Bear. Why you for the others, Well, you've done Yeah, you've done a lot with I love that record.
I want to hear those guys play here in Manhattan. And it was amazing, you know. They were a really interesting band, you know, had an incredible following, you know. Uh uh and uh it wasn't I had already done the record with them, and I really wasn't.
That aware of their overall sobriety.
But the shame them live. I was really impressed.
What made you do the record? Man?
That you weren't that familiar with them? Like, what makes Michael McDonald say yes, you know.
The song had They had approached me through management, and when they played the song for me, I just thought it just appealed to me that they had a you know, a musicality about it that I wanted to be a part of, you know, and I wanted to kind of lend myself to if possible. And the fact that it was singing backgrounds where I might have shied away from it as a piano player or something, you know, figuring out I wouldn't know what to play or whatever. But
as a vocalist, they had probably. They had pretty much spelled out what they wanted me to do, and so I was as kind of curious as they were about how I would sound on it, you know.
And so were you thrown up with Thundercat's call? No, that was one hearing that nobody's all coming.
Yeah, No, that was Kenny. I have to give Kenny credit on that because both he and my kids are huge fans of Steve's, you know, and they love Thundercat. And when he did that interview and he mentioned Kenny and I, Kenny's son called him and said, you know, dad, you know Thundercat mentioned you in an interview is an influence. And Kenny got right on that.
And you know, contacted as long as an artist has an animal name and sounds cool.
Yeah right, you don't know nothing, you know. The next thing, man, my daughter.
Is my great source of what's going on today. She plays me, you know, we take car trips, and she went to Coachella with me when I played with Thundercat there, and it was a whole weekend of listening to music with her, which I love. I really enjoyed.
You know, you made her life.
I'm sure she kept me up late to that we were there till the wee hours. And you know in bands.
I'm sorry, but you and Kenny's kids in bands.
Uh well, his son was a singer. My son's in a in a band, and that my daughter doesn't do it. She's but she's got a beautiful voice, but she doesn't want to sing professionally, you know, but but she loves music. She's a big music fan.
And he told me that because I thought that we were just going to have to explain who we were, Like, okay, so we're a band from.
Philly and you're like, yeah, I know you guys.
Oh yeah, I know.
We were throwing off.
But through her, I've I've actually become more increasingly aware of what's going on around me.
But that's awesome.
Uh I.
Man, I get it, I got I got the part. This is be there part, What's who is mo.
Austin Brothers. That's the perfect ending of the show. Michael McDonald, We thank you.
For coming question for sure, thanks for having me.
This is dream come true.
Thank you man for real.
Shout out to my sister Dawn for put me on to Michael McDonald. She would kill me if I didn't mention that fact to the world.
That's how I'll.
Discovered you anyway on behalf of Boss Bill, Paid, Bill Fontigoelo Sugar Steve and It's like you and the Great Michael McDonald's This is Questlove signing off Mexico.
Thank You West.
Love Supreme is a production of iHeartRadio. This classic episode was produced by the team at Pandora. For more podcasts from iHeart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.