Speaker 1: Quest Love Supreme is a production of I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: The Ladies and Gentlemen. What's Up? This is Quest Love
Speaker 1: suit Way. I believe is this our first Quest Love
Speaker 1: Spreme back together since it like last April, since the
Speaker 1: Oscar I feel like I've not spoken to you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think this is the first one we did, like
Speaker 1: one episode or something like that. But yeah, I was
Speaker 1: about to say like this, it's been a long time.
Speaker 1: We've been doing a bunch of one on ones. But
Speaker 1: I'll start off our episode with people by saying that
Speaker 1: because the ungodly amount of hours that I've spent at
Speaker 1: the Windwood train station or taking the one of five
Speaker 1: and the one of three bus to my insurance job
Speaker 1: to pay for a demo, I feel just a little
Speaker 1: bit more connected to our guest today than any than
Speaker 1: any other guests that's been philadelph Via adjacent. I'll put
Speaker 1: it that way. Now, I got excited. I get excited
Speaker 1: when any Philly adjacent guest comes on to yea Quest
Speaker 1: of Supreme. Uh. And no matter how much New York
Speaker 1: tries to claim you, I know for a fact that
Speaker 1: you did hard time at Montgomery County. Yeah, you know
Speaker 1: once once in Philadelphia and always Philadelphia. Any who Philly
Speaker 1: and I lived in Pittsburgh and I lived in Erie ends.
Speaker 1: Let's use yends. My mother is from Pittsburgh, so yeah,
Speaker 1: I am definitely have shared a fair share family members
Speaker 1: that you know have have educated edge macaated me on
Speaker 1: just life in Pittsburgh in general. Um, I'll say that
Speaker 1: our guest today. Um, of course it's a legendary singer,
Speaker 1: legendary songwriter, producer, Let's not forget a kick gass guitarist.
Speaker 1: Group member of two legendary units. Um. First, of course
Speaker 1: coming to us as a member of the Runaways, a
Speaker 1: band who pretty much defied all logic and stucted their
Speaker 1: guns and pretty much had inspired a generation of musicians
Speaker 1: and creators around the world. Um. And of course the
Speaker 1: second band needs no introduction. Of course, I'm speaking of
Speaker 1: her namesake, John Jett and the Black Hearts, Uh Class
Speaker 1: of two thousand fifteen Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Speaker 1: What could I say without her? You know, I don't
Speaker 1: even want to limit it. Just just there's no riot
Speaker 1: ral movement. There's just there's there's a whole uh portion
Speaker 1: of of of part rock and punk and a lot
Speaker 1: of post late eighties early nineties bands that formed in
Speaker 1: l A that I really want to existed without our
Speaker 1: guest today. So, without further ado, welcome Joan Jett to
Speaker 1: Quess Love Supreme. So were you talking to us? Uh
Speaker 1: right now? Were you un home in New York and
Speaker 1: on Long Island at the beach? You're still Long Island? Yeah,
Speaker 1: well yeah, I live at the beach. Yeah, I'm looking
Speaker 1: right on the water though, Like all right, you know,
Speaker 1: I just I discovered I discovered UM in the pandemic,
Speaker 1: and I keep telling everyone, especially New Yorkers, this, and
Speaker 1: they don't believe me. New York doesn't realize they have
Speaker 1: their own Mahland Drive and they have their own Venice Beach.
Speaker 1: Now you know I have not. There was a point
Speaker 1: where I think the main train was gonna shut down
Speaker 1: that leads to Williamsburg UM causing you know, I was
Speaker 1: gonna shut down for like two years or whatever while
Speaker 1: they did reconstruction, causing a whole borough to literally relocate elsewhere,
Speaker 1: Like restaurants started shutting down and and all of them
Speaker 1: basically relocated to Long Beach. So when a friend of
Speaker 1: mine made me visit out there, I didn't know what
Speaker 1: to expect like is personally expecting uh you know kind
Speaker 1: of yeah Hawkins like post Bencent Hersey's you know whatever. No,
Speaker 1: I went out there and it's like, yo, it is
Speaker 1: the ship. It was. It was pretty beat up, like
Speaker 1: when I moved here in nineteen seventy nine. So you're
Speaker 1: like a loyalist. You've been there for everything. So what
Speaker 1: do you do right after the Runaways broke pretty much
Speaker 1: right after the Runaways broke up, which is seventy nine,
Speaker 1: then I'm not my partner Kenny Laguna And what do
Speaker 1: you make of it now? Because like literally it's like
Speaker 1: if I didn't have to be in Manhattan at like
Speaker 1: the drop of the dome, like I would actually move
Speaker 1: out to Long Beach. Like it's it's they totally I
Speaker 1: don't want to say just re gentrified, but they literally,
Speaker 1: you know, they're making it. I don't know what you
Speaker 1: wanna call it, Yeah nicer. Yeah, I wasn't. I wasn't
Speaker 1: ready for that. So when I moved to it was
Speaker 1: they just opened all the mental institutions or something. So
Speaker 1: when I got here, they were crazy people walking all
Speaker 1: over the place and you could I could have bought
Speaker 1: my apartment for like twenty grand or something. But you
Speaker 1: know those days are long. Prices is definitely going up.
Speaker 1: So yeah, and now people want places like this so
Speaker 1: even more so. Yeah, and anyone's like trying to sell
Speaker 1: their house right now, and Long Beach can easily taking
Speaker 1: high six figures that almost a million. Definitely, that's that's
Speaker 1: where it is now. People are like headed out there.
Speaker 1: So I started off each episode with the question, Uh,
Speaker 1: what do you remember what your first musical memory wasn't
Speaker 1: I can't be positive, but it would be remember not
Speaker 1: the technical alright, alright, singing Mary had a little lammate
Speaker 1: what I mean? But I think of my my father
Speaker 1: playing classical music, or my parents listening to Johnny Mathis
Speaker 1: to something like that Rank Sinatra. Okay, how how long
Speaker 1: did you live in Uh? Well, technically you're born in Winwood, right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was born in Lackina Hospital, so wherever that is.
Speaker 1: I moved very early. I moved at like six months
Speaker 1: old and moved to Pittsburgh, So I can't really say
Speaker 1: I grew up in Philly. I was just born there.
Speaker 1: So when you have memories of your childhood, what's the
Speaker 1: city you think of? Maryland? I moved to Maryland from Erie,
Speaker 1: Pennsylvania when I was eight. When I was eight, so
Speaker 1: I moved. I lived in Maryland, Rockhael, Maryland from eight
Speaker 1: to thirteen, so really formative years, you know, when you
Speaker 1: come into your own I guess, you know, going from
Speaker 1: being a kid to puberty and you know, all those
Speaker 1: big changes that happened from might stay to eight to
Speaker 1: your teen years. What effect does that have on someone
Speaker 1: that you know, where you don't have actual roots, like
Speaker 1: you kind of move every of the year, every two
Speaker 1: or three years, Like what effect does that have on you?
Speaker 1: As far as like, That's a good question. I wonder
Speaker 1: how much of it I'm doing psychology on myself. I
Speaker 1: was thinking about this the other day. How much of
Speaker 1: it is my was my lifestyle from a very early age,
Speaker 1: from being on the road, you know, just constantly moving
Speaker 1: and also but growing up that way too, never really
Speaker 1: being in long place, very long longest with Maryland when
Speaker 1: I lived there for five years. So maybe you don't
Speaker 1: really feel secure I've been making friendships or any kind
Speaker 1: of relationships, so you know, I don't know. Maybe I
Speaker 1: tend to keep people in arms length, you know, it's
Speaker 1: something I'm unfriendly, It's just I'm up good with intimacy.
Speaker 1: I suppose that's real. Do you have civilians or like,
Speaker 1: what's that? It's it's well, I'm not good at faking it.
Speaker 1: He man have. I have a brother and I have
Speaker 1: a sister. They both still live in California. My brothers
Speaker 1: in San Diego, my sisters in North Hollywood. Are you
Speaker 1: the baby in the middle or the oldest? No, I'm oldest, okay,
Speaker 1: the oldest. I'm out of here, oh instantly. You know,
Speaker 1: when I was sixteen pretty much, you know, and I
Speaker 1: and I left and formed the band and not really
Speaker 1: at home much more after that. I think I see
Speaker 1: I think I see the repercussions of that now later,
Speaker 1: But I don't know if that's my lifestyle or it's
Speaker 1: from not really having that connective family thing as the
Speaker 1: result of movie. Was that because you were an army
Speaker 1: brat or just my father was you know, my father
Speaker 1: was an insurance man, so traveling insurance, traveling insurance man
Speaker 1: in the olden days. That is that a real thing?
Speaker 1: Was that at a hospital I went out to I
Speaker 1: went out to to win Woods to sell insurance. So
Speaker 1: I don't know, maybe I was like working for your father. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: But I guess, you know, they didn't have areas and
Speaker 1: they'd go and I don't know if it was a
Speaker 1: door to door. I really don't know. I didn't I
Speaker 1: didn't discuss it with him that much. But that's that's
Speaker 1: what my mother told me. Anyway, traveling traveling salesman. Okay,
Speaker 1: so we moved around. Yeah, do you remember the first
Speaker 1: album that you purchased with your own money? I should
Speaker 1: know this. We're a single, were a single. They were
Speaker 1: probably in Osmond Brothers. You have good thank you. You know,
Speaker 1: often times maybe I shouldn't be that honest, for I
Speaker 1: was gonna says most people get stuck with this because
Speaker 1: I think for a lot of us, the answer is
Speaker 1: always going to be an uncool answer, you know. I
Speaker 1: think for the shut up Steve, because you know, I'm
Speaker 1: thinking to my my owners, Yeah well no, you know
Speaker 1: I would naturally tell people like, oh yeah, Jackson five
Speaker 1: or whatever. But the real answer was Neil sadaka, how
Speaker 1: how how's that going to look in print? You know
Speaker 1: what I mean? Not great? Could have been the Chaps
Speaker 1: at five too, I mean you know what I just um,
Speaker 1: I just got done watching the movie that you won.
Speaker 1: Thank Forwards four I've been. Uh, it is so great,
Speaker 1: and it reminds me of growing up because I feel
Speaker 1: like the music I grew up listening to was a
Speaker 1: lot more diversified and a lot a lot blacker than
Speaker 1: people would would even No, I suppose it just seemed
Speaker 1: to be a lot, a lot of all those songs,
Speaker 1: all those bands that were in that very familiar with
Speaker 1: it all. But it feels like stuff I watched as
Speaker 1: a kid. You know, I don't know, I loved it.
Speaker 1: Thank you. Yeah, you know, I think for a lot
Speaker 1: of people, you know, especially with this movie, the kind
Speaker 1: of the underlying or the the the undertone of it
Speaker 1: all is basically like this was. You know, it's easily
Speaker 1: lost in history. It's set in basement for fifty years,
Speaker 1: so you know, for it to to to get out
Speaker 1: one was the miracle. But you know, to also just
Speaker 1: let the world now about, you know, contributions to culture.
Speaker 1: But thank you, thank you for completely. I appreciate that absolutely.
Speaker 1: But even more than just the music, I see, you
Speaker 1: know what they were saying about the change, you know
Speaker 1: that they were wrote upon this this change that was
Speaker 1: happening in society and just the way people looked at
Speaker 1: themselves and stuff, and it was, you know, really quite
Speaker 1: poignant my thought and really on you know, I appreciate that.
Speaker 1: Did you come from a musical family like a cousin
Speaker 1: or any of those things? Are I really think everybody?
Speaker 1: I think if you gave them no to to answer
Speaker 1: your question, no, nobody, not that they actualized. But I
Speaker 1: believe because my family all tended to be creative but
Speaker 1: never actualized. You know, they were too fearful or didn't
Speaker 1: think it was their place or you know, like I
Speaker 1: know my dad loved art and he loved the jaw
Speaker 1: or paint and you should have done that, you know,
Speaker 1: and you know my mom all those things. My brother
Speaker 1: I know that he would have liked to play an
Speaker 1: instrument but didn't pursue it. And I'm sure my sister,
Speaker 1: you know, she's an artist too, she makes things with
Speaker 1: her hands. So yeah, they all have that thing. But
Speaker 1: I didn't really get the chance that I kind of
Speaker 1: just grabbed and took. All right, So what was the
Speaker 1: entry of or at least a moment that you felt like, Okay,
Speaker 1: this is what I want to do, like the curiosity factor?
Speaker 1: What what what was that moment for you? Hearing um
Speaker 1: songs like the Bang of Gong by t Rex, just
Speaker 1: hearing certain songs on the radio, all right now by
Speaker 1: the Free because there was something that was a little
Speaker 1: out of tune with one of the guitars on the
Speaker 1: rhythm guitar, and something about that made me want to go,
Speaker 1: I want to make those sounds. It was something that
Speaker 1: connected with my bones, you know, with my my crotch,
Speaker 1: and even as a little kid, I knew it. I
Speaker 1: didn't know what the word was, but I knew that
Speaker 1: resonated deep inside me, you know, and I wanted to
Speaker 1: make those sounds. So I think, though I'm I'm just
Speaker 1: lucky that the way my life moved, because it could
Speaker 1: have been anything. I could have moved on to another
Speaker 1: thing that I love. I mean, I loved horses as
Speaker 1: they rode horses for a while. I mean the guitar.
Speaker 1: My family. I got this guitar. I tried to learn
Speaker 1: how to play it, but I didn't really have anyone
Speaker 1: to play with, so I kind of just learned the
Speaker 1: basic chords and put it down. Then my family catalog guitar.
Speaker 1: Yes it is, yes it is. Everyone starts off with
Speaker 1: okay no. And then my family moved to Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: so now I'm like, Okay, now I'm going to a
Speaker 1: place where there's got to be other girls who want
Speaker 1: to do what I'm doing. It's got to be in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles. It's gotta be other girls that want to
Speaker 1: play mark and roll. And you know, I was right,
Speaker 1: And I'm sure if i'd really looked around Maryland or
Speaker 1: you know, any of the big cities are going to
Speaker 1: d C, I would have found it too. But I
Speaker 1: just wasn't thinking that way because all my magazines that
Speaker 1: I was reading geared me towards Hollywood. Okay, Um, for
Speaker 1: you though, you know how usual or unusual, especially in
Speaker 1: your formative years, like was guitar encouraged or you know
Speaker 1: oftentimes or was this someone like you might want to
Speaker 1: do piano or the clarinet or like something that I
Speaker 1: did in school, you know, but I wasn't very good
Speaker 1: at it, and I wasn't I wasn't that interested. And
Speaker 1: now I wish i'd Now, I wish I had paid attention,
Speaker 1: you know, and that I had learned to play just
Speaker 1: so I could read music, but you know, just to
Speaker 1: be able to play other instruments. It was made to
Speaker 1: feel quite inadequate. I just worked with the trombone shorty
Speaker 1: and made me feel like, you see that guy on
Speaker 1: a little little kid with a big trombone, you know,
Speaker 1: but you know, now he's an older guy, but he's
Speaker 1: just you know, he's one of those prodigy people. So
Speaker 1: did you just learn to play just mainly by ear
Speaker 1: or you still read using now just you know was
Speaker 1: my records and stuff? Were you encouraged because I think
Speaker 1: that yes, especially especially with anyone um with a woman
Speaker 1: grabbing an instrument in the sixties and the seventies, um,
Speaker 1: hell even eighties, almost like I'm certain that there has
Speaker 1: to be some sort of figure there that says women
Speaker 1: can't do that, and women, you know, everybody said that.
Speaker 1: Nobody encouraged me. Nobody only my parents who told me
Speaker 1: when I was a little kid that I could be
Speaker 1: anything I wanted to be. So now they couldn't turn
Speaker 1: around and say, well, you could be anything except a
Speaker 1: guitar player. So you know, they just thought I'd grow
Speaker 1: out of it, that I'd phase out of it and
Speaker 1: going into something else, which I think I might have
Speaker 1: happened had I not moved to California and been able
Speaker 1: to find other other girls than maybe able to have
Speaker 1: gone on to something else, but that didn't happen, and
Speaker 1: I went to l A and nobody thought it was
Speaker 1: a good idea. My guitar teacher said girls don't play
Speaker 1: rock and roll, which I knew right away. What he if,
Speaker 1: they want you to play acoustic instead, Yeah, like follow
Speaker 1: Joni Mitchell or yeah, yeah, pretty much pretty much. But
Speaker 1: I knew exactly what that meant. Girls don't play rock
Speaker 1: and roll. So what are you saying to me? You're
Speaker 1: saying girl, You're not saying girls can't master with the guitar,
Speaker 1: because I'm in school, I'm playing clarinet. There's girls next
Speaker 1: to me playing violin and cello, playing Beethoven and box
Speaker 1: So you're not saying that you can't master the instrument.
Speaker 1: What you're saying is rock and roll is sexual by
Speaker 1: its nature, So of women or playing rock and roll
Speaker 1: and singing rock and roll, they're singing about sexuality and
Speaker 1: and they're owning it. And we're not comfortable with that.
Speaker 1: And I knew that as a as a kid, even then,
Speaker 1: I knew that that just you weren't allowed to it.
Speaker 1: But I had something to do with sex, and it's
Speaker 1: just like no, you know, because this is so not
Speaker 1: about sex for me. I want to be able to
Speaker 1: do this because I want to do it. You know,
Speaker 1: Mick Jagger rides out on a big inflatable penis. I
Speaker 1: want to do what the Rolling Stones do? You know
Speaker 1: what had nothing to do with with that. It was
Speaker 1: about fairness. I know it doesn't make sense, but it
Speaker 1: was about quality and the right thing, what's right. I mean,
Speaker 1: I'm not hurting people, you know, playing rock the woll
Speaker 1: for brace sake, give me a break. So that that's
Speaker 1: kind of fire that would fuel me on through through
Speaker 1: all this stuff. See, I've never I've never had the
Speaker 1: pleasure of having a conversation with anyone who you know,
Speaker 1: it's pretty much either first out the gate or at
Speaker 1: least in the pioneering, pioneering stages of starting a movement,
Speaker 1: to to even ask them what their mind state is,
Speaker 1: you know, because oftentimes you know, our our our greats
Speaker 1: leave and you know before we get to ask them
Speaker 1: about their process. And so you know, I always wanted
Speaker 1: to know if because even when I was in high school,
Speaker 1: like someone I think I was honest with one teacher
Speaker 1: like what I was gonna do, Like I'm start a
Speaker 1: band with that, and you know, I went to high
Speaker 1: school with boys, two men, and they yeah, they were
Speaker 1: like on fire, and you know, I'm sort of like, well,
Speaker 1: you know, are you guys gonna be boys to men popular?
Speaker 1: Are you're just gonna be one of these local accident?
Speaker 1: You know, I wasn't thinking that deep about my process
Speaker 1: or anything. I think he tried to talk me out
Speaker 1: of like pursuing my career. So yeah, see, I don't
Speaker 1: understand that about people. This is what I want to
Speaker 1: know about people and dreams. You know, you're sitting there
Speaker 1: shooting the ship with your friends and you say what
Speaker 1: you said you want to play, and someone tries to
Speaker 1: talk to you out of it. Right, Why is everyone
Speaker 1: dear to try to talk to you out of it
Speaker 1: as opposed to saying, yeah, man, that sounds interesting, go
Speaker 1: for it, and at least if you don't make it,
Speaker 1: you gave it a shot. You give your dream a shot.
Speaker 1: What is that about people? I think some people get
Speaker 1: offense or they get intimidated when they see that your
Speaker 1: dreams don't include them, and so they just have to
Speaker 1: ship down, you know what I mean. That's like if
Speaker 1: I run a Hamburger stand. The last thing I want
Speaker 1: you to do is become a vegan, you know what
Speaker 1: I mean. Don't don't do that, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1: But I also think that um, often times we're just
Speaker 1: I think in America, we we often trained ourselves to
Speaker 1: do this safe thing. Like I think hopefully my generation
Speaker 1: is the last generation. What you're here like, fall back
Speaker 1: on something safe, like I definitely heard that from every
Speaker 1: uncle Covid. The show US ain't shit safe because do
Speaker 1: what you want to do exactly. So what Okay, so
Speaker 1: you're a musician in Los Angeles and you're young at
Speaker 1: the time. Had this been you know, twenties two thousand
Speaker 1: seven or whatever, you would have the aid of the
Speaker 1: internet to help you. But what is the process of
Speaker 1: finding what you're specifically looking for, which I assume are
Speaker 1: women that play instruments and are passionate about it just
Speaker 1: as you are, Like, so, what's the process of searching
Speaker 1: for them? And at any point where you just like,
Speaker 1: at least at least in the runaway stages, were you like, okay,
Speaker 1: anyone male female can join or for you is it
Speaker 1: like I had to find all women? Know and for
Speaker 1: the runaways, it was definitely an all all women thing
Speaker 1: because you know, we hadn't hadn't really been done, or
Speaker 1: you know, if it hadn't been done, had been done
Speaker 1: years earlier with full grown women, but not teenage girls.
Speaker 1: And so I just had this thing and I wanted
Speaker 1: to do it, and I didn't see a good reason
Speaker 1: to change that that plan, you know, and give up
Speaker 1: so easy, you know, saying, oh, this might be hard,
Speaker 1: but you know, it's hard to think back and realize
Speaker 1: how different it was then than it is now and
Speaker 1: how easily you can reach out to people on the
Speaker 1: phone on the internet. I mean, you're talking we had
Speaker 1: rotary phones, you know, we're talking about phone books. We're
Speaker 1: talking about you didn't get hold of people. You know,
Speaker 1: if you got a hold of somebody, you met them
Speaker 1: at a certain time, on a certain corner, but a
Speaker 1: certain place. You know, there was none of this. So
Speaker 1: fante right here. Fonte is probably to his family base,
Speaker 1: probably most known for being one of the first musicians
Speaker 1: to really take a take advantage of the I'll say
Speaker 1: the positive aspect of internet colonization. Um. One of the
Speaker 1: one of the bands that he started was a group
Speaker 1: called Foreign Exchange, in which where is uh uh Nick? Now?
Speaker 1: He's in Wilm right but at the time he was
Speaker 1: in the Netherlands, and uh, we just recorded that and
Speaker 1: we met on okay player on the Merror site, and
Speaker 1: we just started trading files online back and forth with
Speaker 1: and we complete an album. We didn't meet each other
Speaker 1: until it was and that was until the didn't even
Speaker 1: meet yet before they made a classic album, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. And so yeah, so you know what
Speaker 1: what is the process of how do you find these
Speaker 1: these feather if you will? Yes? In that time, I
Speaker 1: believe what we did is we put an ad in
Speaker 1: what was it d L a weekly okay maybe, and
Speaker 1: we went out to a lot of the clubs that
Speaker 1: I would hang out at and I would just survey
Speaker 1: the crowd and look for girls. This around This would
Speaker 1: have been seventy five, okay. So you're like like from
Speaker 1: like after August, after August five, So all right, this
Speaker 1: is what I have to know. You're in You're in California.
Speaker 1: Were you a driver? Did you have a car? Oh?
Speaker 1: I didn't drive, No bluses. I took a lot of bosses.
Speaker 1: And also my mother was, you know, sort of complicit
Speaker 1: in all this, so she uh would drive me to rehearsal.
Speaker 1: She would take me to the club sometimes and pick
Speaker 1: me up late at night. Yeah, yeah, she So clubs
Speaker 1: weren't sweating like I mean, of course, now we live
Speaker 1: in a place where you gotta show you know, damn
Speaker 1: near twelve forms of idea to get in anywhere? Or
Speaker 1: is your license claud bye webs? Who was it was
Speaker 1: for teenagers. There was no booze, so to worry about that.
Speaker 1: So there was no booze there. And I don't think
Speaker 1: she was really thinking about drugs or anything like that.
Speaker 1: Who were your were your any any of your contemporaries
Speaker 1: also sort of in that movement that later became names
Speaker 1: themselves like no not really once like Sherry and lead
Speaker 1: to your band members sort of like coming to play?
Speaker 1: How did you know that? Okay, this is this is it?
Speaker 1: They're they're the ones. Well, we didn't have that many choices,
Speaker 1: number one, you know what I mean, So it was
Speaker 1: more like do we want to try? Well, first it
Speaker 1: was it was the drummer and myself, Sandy West and
Speaker 1: I we mentioned yeah, and so we were solid as hell.
Speaker 1: Sandy and I I took four busses at her house
Speaker 1: in Huntington's Beach, four and we yeah, four busses and
Speaker 1: I set up in her wreck room and we played
Speaker 1: you know, some just basic Chuck Perry rock and roll
Speaker 1: progression and said, you know, it was really good. Sandy
Speaker 1: played with a lot of guy, you know, high school
Speaker 1: band kind of things, and so she was used to
Speaker 1: playing with bands, but usually guys. So we really locked
Speaker 1: in and we called Kim Fowley who was our producer,
Speaker 1: who became our producer, and said, hey, check it out,
Speaker 1: put the phone down, played for him. He said, it
Speaker 1: sounds great. Let's go find other girls. So it was
Speaker 1: really you know, from there we started looking when start
Speaker 1: looking at clubs and I think put an ad in
Speaker 1: a paper and stuff like that. Who came up with
Speaker 1: the name of runaways? I did, Okay, so already at
Speaker 1: your marketing plan. Yeah yeah, I've been thinking about this
Speaker 1: for a little while now, couple months at least. Did
Speaker 1: you guys have a daily regiment or were just like
Speaker 1: when every time was free, then we'll rehearse or whatever.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I really tell the truth, I can't remember.
Speaker 1: How can you be a kid and also start this
Speaker 1: very adult thing? All parents involved, like encouraging of this order.
Speaker 1: Our parents were involved, but a couple of the girls
Speaker 1: were a year younger than me, so they were like
Speaker 1: in eleventh grade, so they still had school to deal with,
Speaker 1: and um, yeah, not all the parents were thrilled about it.
Speaker 1: But in the end, I don't know. I guess they
Speaker 1: didn't want to fight their daughters or something. But um,
Speaker 1: for school, I got good, pretty good grades, and I
Speaker 1: took my g E D. I was already in twelfth grade,
Speaker 1: but I I wanted to get out a little bit early,
Speaker 1: so would go on the road. So okay, I always
Speaker 1: wanted to know. Um, I guess to me the initial
Speaker 1: incarnation of the Runaways, like, why weren't you the lead
Speaker 1: singer or why didn't you want to be the before? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I was way too shy at the time, And you know,
Speaker 1: I was way too shy. I had no confidence. Um
Speaker 1: you know, I just I had no confidence, and it's
Speaker 1: just really shy. It was amazing that I could do
Speaker 1: what I wanted, what I was doing, you know, just
Speaker 1: getting on on stage with the guitar. But did you
Speaker 1: have your voice then? You just kept it as a
Speaker 1: secret or I sang back, I sang background vocals. Yeah
Speaker 1: I could sink. Yeah I could sing. I did wind
Speaker 1: up singing half of the leads on the first Runaways
Speaker 1: album because Shari didn't want to sing the rock and
Speaker 1: roll or the rock and roll harder songs. She felt
Speaker 1: that she didn't have the voice for it or didn't
Speaker 1: feel comfortable singing some of them to the one she
Speaker 1: didn't feel comfortable singing. I signed the leads and I
Speaker 1: same backup on everything else. So I did have a voice,
Speaker 1: but I just wasn't comfortable being the focal point. Got
Speaker 1: so at this point, at this point in developing the band,
Speaker 1: who who are you looking up to? Because again, you
Speaker 1: guys have ushered in. You guys ushered in an era
Speaker 1: and you know pretty much your your band's existence just
Speaker 1: basically starts a domino effect on again people that come
Speaker 1: tended to fifteen years later. But you know, in seventy six,
Speaker 1: when you guys are doing this band like Who's Who's
Speaker 1: cool to you? Like? Are the Stones in Zeppelin? Sort
Speaker 1: of like ad that's old whatever music? Like who Who's
Speaker 1: grabbing your attention? Like? Yeah, I mean, I know I
Speaker 1: was disappointed with the Stones when they started doing um
Speaker 1: like you weren't an exile main steep stream frisen. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I know I wanted them to some rock and roll.
Speaker 1: You know, I didn't like them with some girls. Yeah,
Speaker 1: well it was it was fine, but you know, I
Speaker 1: don't know. I guess I wanted them to be playing
Speaker 1: something that I could really rock out to. You know, whatever,
Speaker 1: No one stays rebellious forever. I know. I know that
Speaker 1: there's a good seven year I get it now, before
Speaker 1: you start doing your classical record or whatever. No, I
Speaker 1: get it now, believe me. But I think a lot.
Speaker 1: I think I really started looking to the punk rock
Speaker 1: stuff right away because the Ramons came out, I believe
Speaker 1: in the nineteen seventy five, late seventy five very first
Speaker 1: Ramons album and all the punk stuff, rock stuff I
Speaker 1: was reading a lot about, and I really gravitated very
Speaker 1: quickly to a lot of those bands because I felt,
Speaker 1: you know, kinship with a lot of them. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's always like groups or or artists or albums that
Speaker 1: are always on someone's cannon, like their top five records
Speaker 1: of all the time. You always see the names or whatever,
Speaker 1: and I've never sometimes you don't do the investigation of it,
Speaker 1: and you know, of course, I've always seen the Ramon's
Speaker 1: name everywhere. And finally I listened down from from top
Speaker 1: to bottom like two years ago and realized, like, how
Speaker 1: how genius and hard it is to really convey emotion
Speaker 1: and and lyricism in less than two minutes. Hey, hold,
Speaker 1: let's go yo. That should have jammed, though, that should
Speaker 1: jam exactly. So for you, were you seeing that there
Speaker 1: was a science here, like, you know, the type of
Speaker 1: rock that you were you were fed as a child
Speaker 1: is way different than the ideas that you're about to
Speaker 1: dispe onto the world. Like for you, it was like, look,
Speaker 1: we gotta don't borsk in to the course two minutes right, Well, no,
Speaker 1: you gotta see. The thing was, it didn't really transfer
Speaker 1: that much into our music. It might it might have
Speaker 1: translated a little bit to my songwriting, but you know,
Speaker 1: as a group, as a band, most of the girls
Speaker 1: weren't really into punk rock the way I was. You know,
Speaker 1: they were much more they looked heavier bands, you know,
Speaker 1: more like you know, yeah, you know that heavier stuff.
Speaker 1: Rainbow you know, could be black more, that's kind of stuff.
Speaker 1: So you know, we didn't really see eye to eye
Speaker 1: on our hang out music. So we didn't you know,
Speaker 1: we had to come from a place when we met
Speaker 1: in the middle. So you know, I just stole considered
Speaker 1: what we did to be basic rock and roll. What
Speaker 1: was the division of labor as far as the songwriting
Speaker 1: is concerned and what you're going to cover or who's
Speaker 1: gonna write what? Like who's who's the primary songwriter or
Speaker 1: the group? Was that you? I think I think it
Speaker 1: was May For the most part, it was me. I
Speaker 1: wrote either songs with Kim Valley as a lyricist, or
Speaker 1: I wrote songs by myself. I think I wrote a
Speaker 1: couple with some of the other girls, but not too many.
Speaker 1: And M Yeah, so I guess I was the primary
Speaker 1: one back then, Like it was sort of hard for
Speaker 1: you guys to break out in the States, but yet
Speaker 1: you know you're the magic's working instantaneously when you go overseas.
Speaker 1: Like how much of a mind funk? Was that too?
Speaker 1: Kind of that's very similar to hip hop, Like, you know,
Speaker 1: my band had to move to Europe for five years
Speaker 1: just so that you know, in quote unquote Paula Hendricks
Speaker 1: and then come back to the United States like that
Speaker 1: sort of thing. Like but in your mind, was it
Speaker 1: a dream deferred or like wait, what's going on here?
Speaker 1: Or I thought, well, you know a lot of different
Speaker 1: a lot of different feelings. Yeah, one part of me
Speaker 1: had wished that we had the same sort of response
Speaker 1: in the States, but it was so different around the world.
Speaker 1: In Japan, it was like all girls and like the Beatles,
Speaker 1: like mania, people fainting, girls fainting, and I think it,
Speaker 1: I think it kind of scared a couple of the
Speaker 1: other girls. You know, I was exhilarated, but you know,
Speaker 1: there were people were rocking the car and we'd never
Speaker 1: really had that kind of experience at all. I mean,
Speaker 1: anybody in the right mind would probably should probably be scared,
Speaker 1: but I didn't get too scared. And then, uh, in
Speaker 1: Scandinavia another place, all girls, all wearing real pacifiers and
Speaker 1: sucking on these passive Yeah, tell me about it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I didn't get it, and I never found out what
Speaker 1: it was. I guess it was just some kind of
Speaker 1: fat or fashion that they were doing, but particular photo
Speaker 1: shooters tell no, no, no, no, they were giving us
Speaker 1: the ideas, you know. Um. But then then in England,
Speaker 1: you know, England gets you know, they I think they
Speaker 1: got the runaways of a lot more than Americans did,
Speaker 1: but they still, you know, the English love to take
Speaker 1: the piss out of you. So we took a lot
Speaker 1: of ship, but there were a lot of people I
Speaker 1: think there that liked us too. We did well in
Speaker 1: Germany and I think Europe did pretty well, but we
Speaker 1: didn't tour there a lot, so I don't no face
Speaker 1: to face and record stales I can never go by
Speaker 1: really because you know, so in retrospect, what would you
Speaker 1: categorized the genre? You know, are you guys at the
Speaker 1: forefront of the l A punk movement where you just
Speaker 1: hard rock? Were you kind of the torch bearer for
Speaker 1: what will eventually become like the glam metal scene that
Speaker 1: would happen fifteen years later with those groups in l A.
Speaker 1: I mean, I always just call it rock and roll,
Speaker 1: and I think what we did, I think what we
Speaker 1: did it was punk rock to its core, you know,
Speaker 1: just doing dictating what you're gonna do and doing it
Speaker 1: and not listening to what anybody says, and I mean
Speaker 1: I thought, and doing that in the context of how
Speaker 1: society treated you at the time, I think it was
Speaker 1: the ultimate punk rock stuff. You know, even for the
Speaker 1: girls it didn't want to play in punk rock. They
Speaker 1: were being punk rock just by what they were doing.
Speaker 1: They didn't have to play it. So you guys pretty
Speaker 1: dissolved almost as quick as you came aboard. Um, do
Speaker 1: you remember how eventful or uneventful the last night of
Speaker 1: the group was before you realize that it's not happening anymore.
Speaker 1: I don't remember if it was. I didn't know. It
Speaker 1: wasn't a happy time, and we knew it was a
Speaker 1: New Year's seventy eight into seventy nine was our last gig,
Speaker 1: and we knew it was our last gig because we
Speaker 1: decided to disband after that because I didn't want you know,
Speaker 1: I felt like I said, that musical separation was there
Speaker 1: between girls want to play heavier music and me, and
Speaker 1: so I thought, man, I don't want to get fired
Speaker 1: from the band. I started with something weird, so let
Speaker 1: me just quit and we'll just you guys can do
Speaker 1: your thing. And well, I can assume that leader was
Speaker 1: one of them wanted to do to have your stuff right.
Speaker 1: It was not animosity, it was not you know, it
Speaker 1: was not an anger or anything. Weren't going fuck you,
Speaker 1: fuck you. You know. It was just like since we
Speaker 1: had been friendly, we didn't want it to be weird
Speaker 1: and it's just like, just let me, I'll just go.
Speaker 1: You guys do your thing. You know it's weird before
Speaker 1: I gotta admit that, and watching the documentary, I didn't
Speaker 1: realize that quote that Leader Ford was the Leader Ford
Speaker 1: in the Runaways, because I guess my my dealings with
Speaker 1: Leader any anytime, there was always a person that wanted
Speaker 1: to give I'm not even making any nugent comparisons, but
Speaker 1: if there was anyone that ever wanted to give like
Speaker 1: hip hop the middle finger with a quote, it was
Speaker 1: always leading forward. I knew her more for her to
Speaker 1: stay of hip hop than for like what she actually did. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: for real, Like I guess I should say I'm not surprised,
Speaker 1: but yeah, like I know her for quotes of like
Speaker 1: why she ate a hip hop? So I always knew that.
Speaker 1: Whenever I hear the name leader Ford, I'm like, uh,
Speaker 1: what happened now? But then you know, but then when
Speaker 1: I started the thing, I was like, oh, she was
Speaker 1: a runaway. I get it now. So I don't want
Speaker 1: no guilt by association though, because hey man, we all
Speaker 1: you made light of day. I used to watch that
Speaker 1: movie every day after school when I was in like
Speaker 1: third grade. So as a twenty one year old, are
Speaker 1: you feeling like Okay, well I did that. What do
Speaker 1: I do now for you? It's just like onto the
Speaker 1: next Like, did you know I was feeling like it
Speaker 1: was time to die? It is what I was feeling like.
Speaker 1: I was feeling like the whole city of l A
Speaker 1: was laughing, going we told you it wouldn't work. We
Speaker 1: told you girls can't play rock and roll, you know,
Speaker 1: And I just was I was not taking care of myself.
Speaker 1: I was drinking too much. It is my My dreams
Speaker 1: were crushed, you know. And and I had no friends,
Speaker 1: you know. It was like everybody was gone, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean. They disappear in that level and you're
Speaker 1: just alone with your thoughts and your beer or whatever.
Speaker 1: It was always drinking. So how how long did the
Speaker 1: sort of the feeling of funk last before you started
Speaker 1: your I assume that, you know, starting the Black Hearts
Speaker 1: was your eventual Yeah? Well, actually I met my partner,
Speaker 1: Kenny lou Donau, my song running partner and my produce.
Speaker 1: He became my producer and manager because nobody else wanted
Speaker 1: to deal with me. We met to write uh songs
Speaker 1: for a movie that I had contracted to do before
Speaker 1: The Runaways broke up. I had to write six songs
Speaker 1: for a film. And so my manager at the time,
Speaker 1: a guy named Toby Memos, knew Kenny and knew that
Speaker 1: he had worked with a lot of bubble Gumps bands
Speaker 1: in the sixties and knew that he could write songs
Speaker 1: quickly and should be easy to work with. So he
Speaker 1: called him and said, would you come out and meet
Speaker 1: Joan to do this project with her? And so Kenny
Speaker 1: did and we met and hit it off and really
Speaker 1: became good friends the first day. I don't know what
Speaker 1: it was that he saw in me, but he uh,
Speaker 1: but I was the real deal, I guess. And we
Speaker 1: wrote some songs and then I said would you produce
Speaker 1: these songs that we wrote together? And he did. And
Speaker 1: then you know, as we continue, I didn't have anybody
Speaker 1: to manage me. And so he had took that on too,
Speaker 1: thinking it would be easy that he could get me
Speaker 1: deals and this and that. But no, he started getting
Speaker 1: knows you know, he knows a lot of people in
Speaker 1: the business, and people just told him no. And then
Speaker 1: I think it got to him where, oh my god,
Speaker 1: this is real and and then he got piste because
Speaker 1: then he saw the sort of you know, just prejudice
Speaker 1: and misogyny, you know, straight out bullshit. So I think
Speaker 1: you know that fire lit that fire in him to
Speaker 1: help fight for me. So it took about two years.
Speaker 1: First of all, whose idea was it to recover or
Speaker 1: to redo? Uh? I love rock and roll? I don't
Speaker 1: think many people know that that's a cover song. Yes, yes, um.
Speaker 1: I saw that song when I was in England with
Speaker 1: the Runaways and I saw this band on top of
Speaker 1: the pops, the Arrows, and they were playing the B
Speaker 1: side to their hit, and the B side to their
Speaker 1: hit was I Love rock and Roll. I don't know
Speaker 1: what the their hit was. The side was A love
Speaker 1: rock and Roll and I'm like, now that sounds like
Speaker 1: a hit to me. And I went out to the
Speaker 1: record shop and bought the forty five, thinking, you know,
Speaker 1: the Runaways, maybe we could do this and it'll be
Speaker 1: a hit. But then I was reminded that by the
Speaker 1: other girls that we had done, we had covered lou
Speaker 1: Reid's rock and Roll on the first album when our
Speaker 1: first Runaways lum and you know, I guess I didn't
Speaker 1: want rock and roll and every title on every album
Speaker 1: kind of so sort of blew it off for a while,
Speaker 1: and I just held onto the song and then after
Speaker 1: the Runaways thought here we go life, life lesson, you
Speaker 1: gotta go with your gut. Yep, that's the second time
Speaker 1: you learned that lesson. Um, So, how different does life
Speaker 1: turn for you once that song makes you pretty much
Speaker 1: a household name? Well just I think the the fame
Speaker 1: level rose and we had more people at our gigs
Speaker 1: and stuff and made a little bit more money. Finally
Speaker 1: it could make a little bit more money. Uh So
Speaker 1: those things change a little bit. But um, you know,
Speaker 1: for the most part. But is that also scarier feeling?
Speaker 1: Because I think oftentimes when someone gets a success, the
Speaker 1: first thing their head is, oh God, how how am
Speaker 1: I going to sustain this? How am I going to
Speaker 1: make it last? What's the next single? That? Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: there was part of that, but I wasn't like so
Speaker 1: far up there that it was. You know, when you're
Speaker 1: number one and you're I don't know, I guess you
Speaker 1: know on one level you can't stay there forever, and
Speaker 1: I guess you you know, you know you have to
Speaker 1: have your next one. I guess initially we knew what
Speaker 1: that next one was gonna be, which was Crimson and
Speaker 1: clover right and what was it about that song that
Speaker 1: made you want to choose that? Damn? It? My only
Speaker 1: question as the day. Okay, it's a great you want
Speaker 1: to say it? What made you want to cover Christian Seas?
Speaker 1: Answer the question? Light on good and when I when
Speaker 1: I you know, when I met Kenney and I knew
Speaker 1: that he played those songs, and I'm like, so you
Speaker 1: played the Money Money He's like yeah, and I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: So I don't want to cover Crimson Clover. I just thought,
Speaker 1: you know, it would be weird because I didn't want
Speaker 1: to change the lyrics and that was just the way
Speaker 1: I was. I wanted to, you know, push the envelope
Speaker 1: a little bit because I just wanted to the original recording.
Speaker 1: So so I guess psychedelic and uh so what was
Speaker 1: my reason for doing I mean because Tommy's Tommy's like
Speaker 1: when he's I guess. Chenny told me when he asked
Speaker 1: what is it about? You know, it was about LSD,
Speaker 1: you know, Christian Glover, So it wasn't about really her
Speaker 1: M specifically. So people ask people what I'm singing about,
Speaker 1: It's like, well, I mean, I guess I'm singing it
Speaker 1: more literally, but not specifically. At anybody. You know, it's
Speaker 1: just being put out into the world. Is that is
Speaker 1: those sentiments, but it's not directed specifically at a person.
Speaker 1: So at that particular point, coming into the early part
Speaker 1: of the eighties and whatnot, or do you have a
Speaker 1: peer group? Are there is there a trusted circle that
Speaker 1: you can how around with, like normally you know, birds
Speaker 1: of a feather flock together as far as like people
Speaker 1: liking each other's music whatnot? Like was there a tight
Speaker 1: knit community in the sort of the l a rock
Speaker 1: community by this point for you at least? Or were
Speaker 1: you still like I was gone isolated, I was out
Speaker 1: of there. But in seventy nine came back to New York. Okay,
Speaker 1: went to New York. So even in New York, like
Speaker 1: for that is there was I mean, no, I didn't
Speaker 1: hang it. I didn't really you know. I was also
Speaker 1: going to say, like everyone was sort of going new
Speaker 1: wave in New York and you're going straight rock and roll,
Speaker 1: Like were you a fish out of water? And like
Speaker 1: where you sort of upholding a tradition that you felt
Speaker 1: with soon sort of take a back seat. You know,
Speaker 1: I don't know that I thought I had that much
Speaker 1: that I planned it out and thought about, you know,
Speaker 1: what's the future of rock and roll? Or um a
Speaker 1: lot scynthier. You know that there was a lot of
Speaker 1: synth music going on. Well, I mean, were you going
Speaker 1: to the Lower East Side in in in the early
Speaker 1: eighties to see groups like Bad Brains or any like?
Speaker 1: Were you at all interested in the movement that was
Speaker 1: happening in the Lower East Side? Right? I was, Yes,
Speaker 1: I was interested, but I was working too much to
Speaker 1: be I was on the road the whole time. I
Speaker 1: don't even know if I was around most of the time.
Speaker 1: I mean literally on the road all the time, pretty
Speaker 1: much the two pretty much. I mean, at least through
Speaker 1: November and then you know, depending on what the tour was,
Speaker 1: We're always working and then be off d January and
Speaker 1: then start working again in February. It was pretty pretty brutal.
Speaker 1: And I didn't realize that until the pandemic hit and
Speaker 1: then and then nothing was happening, and then I realized
Speaker 1: how much of my life I had been on the
Speaker 1: road constantly, and all these other things we talked about about,
Speaker 1: you know, feeling separate, you know, and being isolated, and
Speaker 1: but I did, you know, I definitely have friends that
Speaker 1: I uh new once, you know, once I was settled
Speaker 1: in New York and I had a routine, and um
Speaker 1: I still have that that sort of core. Few I
Speaker 1: can count on my one hand level of friends. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's that's real life, like real people. We have two
Speaker 1: to three people. Wait, I always wanted to know this.
Speaker 1: Um okay, So from my from my point of view
Speaker 1: as a record collector, UM, all right, I'll explain to
Speaker 1: you Fante. Well you probably know already, but like for me,
Speaker 1: Boardwalk Records is almost akin to like Malaco Records. So
Speaker 1: what is that what you mean that said? I always
Speaker 1: wanted to know what was it about Boardwalk Records that
Speaker 1: made you choose that as your label because I knew
Speaker 1: that sort of as kind of as as a secondier
Speaker 1: label for acts that were pop it in the seventies
Speaker 1: for soul music. I know that Ohio players wound up
Speaker 1: on board Walk Records for like their eighties catalog. I
Speaker 1: remember the Five Stair Steps morphed into uh the Invisible
Speaker 1: Man's Band, uh for the eighties or whatnot. Kenny would
Speaker 1: know so much about this because he, you know, I
Speaker 1: think he knew Neil Bogart before we got Um, you know,
Speaker 1: so Kenny knew him, uh pre pre Boardwalk. I didn't
Speaker 1: know that Neil boat Guard started Boardwalk Records. So it's
Speaker 1: constant blanco. Yeah and yeah, and he just liked me
Speaker 1: and wanted he really liked me a lot and wanted
Speaker 1: me to to be able to put out my record.
Speaker 1: So he said, you know, we'll put it out and
Speaker 1: he and he did and he died like the week
Speaker 1: before when number one and never got to see if
Speaker 1: the number one, which really bums me out because he
Speaker 1: was such he died one. Yeah, I did not know that,
Speaker 1: but um, yeah, he was a real believer and you know,
Speaker 1: one of those guys that and it always looked great.
Speaker 1: It was all sharply dressed and just you know, believed
Speaker 1: in me and believed in Kenny. I think. Yeah, everyone
Speaker 1: that describes Neil burg Art describes it as like the
Speaker 1: last true like one of the last creatives. And that
Speaker 1: was a suit at least, I mean, I know the
Speaker 1: suits a suit but whatever. Yeah, but I don't know
Speaker 1: for me though, I would say that like you were
Speaker 1: so ahead of your time, was it weird too? Sort
Speaker 1: of have not a comeback of source, but just to
Speaker 1: see no, no, no, no, I'm just saying that a
Speaker 1: lot of these bands that started popping in the mid
Speaker 1: nineties late nineties started name checking like Jones, Black Hearts
Speaker 1: like or even with your work with the Runaways like
Speaker 1: for you, did you not ever think that the day
Speaker 1: will come from which you would see kind of the
Speaker 1: after effects of your people that like grew up on
Speaker 1: your music, or especially like when the Riot girl uh
Speaker 1: with with Kathleen and yeah, well that was yeah, because
Speaker 1: they totally did tip their hat to me and I
Speaker 1: knew it so because you know, they told me so,
Speaker 1: and it was It was great. It was great to
Speaker 1: see that. I mean, I always knew that there, whether
Speaker 1: or not people admitted it, that we'd have some influence,
Speaker 1: you know, um, in in life and to music, and
Speaker 1: and that it's really nice to see it confirmed and
Speaker 1: see people say it, you know, and not just girl
Speaker 1: bands but some guys too, and that's really nice. So yeah,
Speaker 1: I was gonna say plenty of times where like Kirk
Speaker 1: has has name dropped you or you know or I
Speaker 1: know that girl. It was definitely a big fan. I
Speaker 1: was that night and at the Rock and Roll Hall
Speaker 1: of Fame when man, what an I Yeah, so, how
Speaker 1: did how did you know, was that was that surprising
Speaker 1: to you when you got the news or you know,
Speaker 1: I know oftentimes every every person I know that gets
Speaker 1: in ducked into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
Speaker 1: has the same sort of like nealistic if it happens,
Speaker 1: it happens whatever, you know, that sort of thing. But
Speaker 1: for you, was it when you got the news of
Speaker 1: of you getting in, Like what was the feeling behind it? No?
Speaker 1: I thought I was very happy, you know, of course
Speaker 1: I thought, but I see, I'm used. I'm kind of
Speaker 1: used to not being up for awards my whole life.
Speaker 1: It's not really been what my career has been about,
Speaker 1: like nominated for a lot of different things, you know,
Speaker 1: it's not what's happened. So just the fact that I nominated,
Speaker 1: I thought, was it was really nice. But I thought,
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know, and I don't know if
Speaker 1: I'm gonna win this, but and I'll still I still
Speaker 1: believe this to my core that because Chris said it
Speaker 1: on stage that night that they had they felt they
Speaker 1: had no choice but to put me in. Then they
Speaker 1: forced their hand. So whether whether I would have really
Speaker 1: gotten in or whether it was that I don't know
Speaker 1: I'll say this as much because you know I'm I'm
Speaker 1: part of that. I've been part of that. Well you know,
Speaker 1: I call the recreation of the twelve angry Men scene,
Speaker 1: but there's like thirty five of us arguing back and forth. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, your name has definitely been at least for
Speaker 1: my first year there, which I think was like two
Speaker 1: thousand and eleven, has constantly been like campion and argue
Speaker 1: and and well, you know, we were joking about it's
Speaker 1: only a matter of time for you do your classical
Speaker 1: record for your your soft album, but you know the
Speaker 1: latest album you're released is your acoustic work. And you know,
Speaker 1: how how did that feel for you? Like for you,
Speaker 1: is it a thing where you need a new challenge?
Speaker 1: And no, it was really it was a way to
Speaker 1: just we wanted to give the fans something different. We
Speaker 1: I'd never looked because I had had such a weird
Speaker 1: relationship with guys telling me and my guitar teachers saying
Speaker 1: girls can't play rock and roll. I always kept acoustic
Speaker 1: guitarists really at arm's length. I never owned one. I
Speaker 1: never wanted to own one until about you know, maybe
Speaker 1: ten years ago, maybe a little bit. But um, you
Speaker 1: mean ten years ago, and you like finally like gave it.
Speaker 1: Was like, all right, let me try acoustic guitar. Let
Speaker 1: me just have it, because I can't always hear my
Speaker 1: electric guitar, you know, if you're trying to write a
Speaker 1: riff and you really need to hear something, you know.
Speaker 1: So I just had it. But not a good one,
Speaker 1: you know, a little shitty one. Then a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago, we did a documentary called Bad Reputation. It
Speaker 1: came out. It was all about my career, in my
Speaker 1: life and itself. And um, when we did the premiere,
Speaker 1: they wanted us in l A. They wanted to see
Speaker 1: if we could perform a couple of the songs in
Speaker 1: the theater. And I knew we couldn't set up electric,
Speaker 1: and it was suggested that maybe we tried some acoustics stuff.
Speaker 1: So we we did it, but with the whole band.
Speaker 1: So it was myself, my guitar player, acoustic bass, and
Speaker 1: our drummer and we and we, you know, played Bad
Speaker 1: Reputation and a couple of the songs and it felt
Speaker 1: really good. Actually, it felt a lot better than I
Speaker 1: thought it was gonna feel. And and like you could
Speaker 1: transfer the energy it's gonna be different than electric, but
Speaker 1: it was still worked. So then last year and two
Speaker 1: is the fort anniversary of both Bad Reputation Album and
Speaker 1: I Love Up an Roll album because one came out.
Speaker 1: They both came out in one something like that. So
Speaker 1: we wanted to do some extra things for the fans
Speaker 1: and maybe record some acoustic stuff. So we thought, oh,
Speaker 1: we did that stuff for the premiere, let's go in
Speaker 1: the studio record a few songs. Once we got in
Speaker 1: there and started playing songs, we really just did everything
Speaker 1: we could do live. We just want to started recording.
Speaker 1: We just kept going and we didn't really plan on
Speaker 1: having an album's worth or two of material, but just
Speaker 1: wound up there and I thought, what the hell put
Speaker 1: it out? Yes, how do you? How do you feel
Speaker 1: about it? Like you're I feel good about it. I
Speaker 1: feel it's fun. It's different. We play some on stage,
Speaker 1: like we'll do our electric show and then and then
Speaker 1: du instead of an encore, do like three or four
Speaker 1: acoustic songs that have been going over. Just started like
Speaker 1: a month ago and a half ago, doing it, doing
Speaker 1: it and see how it would go over live, because
Speaker 1: you know, I don't know listen in front of people,
Speaker 1: so they seem to like it. So we'll see what happens,
Speaker 1: and we'll see what happens with the stadium tour. You know,
Speaker 1: we're gonna see if we can work something into that
Speaker 1: and if if it doesn't, what are those guys like now,
Speaker 1: like Mottley Crue and Boys, I don't know we played
Speaker 1: We played with def Leppard before, Okay, uh, but I've
Speaker 1: never played with Motley Crue, so I don't know. I
Speaker 1: have no idea what to expect, but it should be interesting.
Speaker 1: I learned this with Blue Oyster call the Death Lepperd's
Speaker 1: album covers were more scarier than Death Lepperd was. The
Speaker 1: thing is like if Mutt Lane, you know, like Mutt
Speaker 1: is too he's too power. Yeah, he's too polish really
Speaker 1: like I'm telling you exactly, like if you listen to
Speaker 1: Love Bites whatever, like just sucking harmonies like it's it's
Speaker 1: it's just more enhanced California harmonies to me, you know
Speaker 1: what I mean? And so I don't know it's weird.
Speaker 1: I'd never truly so I mean, of course, you know,
Speaker 1: they create one anthem that will probably play in every
Speaker 1: gentleman's club. Um. Now to the end of time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I just mean, you know, sugar has as a kick
Speaker 1: ass drift to it. But I never considered definitely. I
Speaker 1: mean I don't. I don't consider defe ever metal the
Speaker 1: same way they don't consider the Police hard rock, you
Speaker 1: know what I mean their terminology now, you know, don't
Speaker 1: you find? Well? Yeah, sometimes you were just yeah exactly
Speaker 1: right now? Like where with with this story career? And
Speaker 1: is there is there anything that you have yet to
Speaker 1: achieve or yet to you accomplished that you wish to Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm you know, I wouldn't know who who to say specifically,
Speaker 1: but I'm always interested in doing new and different things.
Speaker 1: I just actually did something that I mentioned that with
Speaker 1: Trombone Shorty. Yeah, so you know, it's it's it's new
Speaker 1: for me. Um. I'm not always great with that because
Speaker 1: I'm good with knowing, you know, being comfortable and doing
Speaker 1: what I know and that kind of stuff. So I
Speaker 1: have to try to get better with, you know, just
Speaker 1: jumping into the unknown and not being so um getting
Speaker 1: out of uh yeah comfort zone. Yeah yeah, but being
Speaker 1: okay with that and and being you know, you're gonna live,
Speaker 1: You're gonna be okay, don't worry. I don't know, I
Speaker 1: think I'm ready to my R and B album now
Speaker 1: there it is. But Joe, thank you very much. Um
Speaker 1: yeah for for for joining us and and doing this
Speaker 1: with us, and you know we appreciate your work. I've
Speaker 1: been a longtime fan of yours. Thank you all. It's
Speaker 1: been it's been a real pleasure. Definitely, thank you to
Speaker 1: you guys. Take care of Absolute Tones, Jet on course Supreme.
Speaker 1: We will see you guys on the next go round,
Speaker 1: all right, Thank you, m M M much love. Supreme
Speaker 1: is a production of my heart Radio. For more podcasts
Speaker 1: for my heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple podcast, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.