Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Singer-songwriter who co-founded The Hollies and Crosby, Stills & Nash, writing hits like Our House and Marrakesh Express.
On the island
Eight records
Jerry Lee Lewis was a madman. I've seen and experienced in real life his passion and his incredible energy in in terms of making music.
He was one of us. I remember so distinctly when Alan and I heard that he had died. We were both absolutely crying on the street.
It stunned me and Alan. We knew that me and him could sing together. But the blend that Don and Phil had was profoundly deep and it was DNA. They came from the same mother. That song changed my life.
The Beach Boys had done a record called Pet Sounds, and it was brilliant. So, why don't we hear a great song from the Beach Boys? This is also one of the best records in the world. God only knows.
It always puts me in an incredible mood, as most great music does. I've always loved the feeling inside of me when I listen to this.
Peter Gabriel is a fantastic musician. A brilliant, brilliant record maker. He did a song called Don't Give Up with Kate Bush, and I've loved it since the moment I heard it. And if anybody out there has something that they would love to do. Don't let anybody put you off. Don't let anybody dissuade you from doing what you love.
A Day in the LifeFavourite
I want to end up with one of the greatest songs that was ever written. It's incredibly profound. Let's finish off this show. With A Day in the Life by The Beatles.
In conversation
Presenter asks
2:08How much has your songwriting changed in that time?
It changed when I started to hang out with David and Stephen. In the Hollies I kind of learned how to write a melody that you probably couldn't forget if you'd heard it a couple of times. But the words left a lot to be desired. When I came to America and I saw what David was writing and what Stephen was writing and what Joni was writing and what Neil was writing. I decided that if I put better words to my melodies I'd have better songs, and that's when my songwriting changed.
Presenter asks
6:04When you think back to those early days, what is it that you remember?
I remember rationing. where you had to have a a coupon to be able to even buy basic, you know, bread and milk and stuff. I remember collecting pieces of coal at the rubbish dump, filling my my sister's pram with coal for the fire. I have very warm feelings about Salford. I didn't know that it was a slum. Nobody had any money, you know, and maybe we had a a ball to kick around, you know, but uh yeah, I I didn't know I lived in a slum.
Presenter asks
11:02What exactly happened when your father bought you that camera?
My father did give me this little small Agva camera, uh it had it tiny, and it had a little bellows and stuff. But then the police came to the door. And that was shocking. And they told my father that uh the camera that he had bought from his friend at work, that he gave to me, had been stolen, and who was it that sold him the camera? And my father w would not tell them, and uh they put him in jail for a year and uh he died at forty seven.
The keepsakes
The book
The Island at the Center of the World
Russell Shorto
I just finished a book called The Island at the Center of the World, and it's a history of Manhattan from 1600 to the present day. And it's a brilliant, brilliant book about exactly what happened, and why all the politics was all moved to Washington, D.C., and why New York was only a center made for making money. So it's an incredibly beautiful book by a man called Russell Shortow called The Island at the Center of the World.
Presenter asks
22:25How did you break it to Alan that you were leaving the Hollies?
I didn't. I didn't have the courage. I was coward. I had Ron Richards tell him. I knew it was going to be difficult. As a musician I had fallen in love with the sound that the three of us had created. And at that moment I knew that I'd had to go back to England and leave my band and leave my equipment and my money and go to America and follow that sound. And that that's what I did. It was very awkward for me and Alan. He was my best friend then. I'd known him since, as you know, since I was six years old. We had done all this singing and started the Hollies in December of'62 and Made all those records and and it was a it was very awkward for me, but I wanted that sound.
Presenter asks
31:52When are you happiest? What's the best use of your time?
I love that feeling within me that I've created a song and I love the feeling inside me when I think I've created a great photograph.
“When we studied the song And I added my harmony. After forty five seconds, we had to stop. And laugh. We were all in bands that were pretty decent harmony bands, but this was completely different. It had a magic to it immediately. And so the the sound whatever sound that is of Crosby Stils and Nash was born in forty five seconds.”
“My father would would take um me and my younger sister Elaine, but he would take us to Bellevue Zoo in Manchester, and he would take pictures. And he'd put a a blank piece of paper into a colourless liquid, and he'd say, wait. And there. Fading into existence was a photograph of me and my sister that my father had taken that morning, and it changed my life. It was a piece of magic that I remember to this day.”
“Feeling a lot of shame, feeling that he had let his family down, feeling that his life was never going to be the same. And in fact, it wasn't. But it did affect me as a person. I've always appreciated the underdog. I've always rooted for the team that's not supposed to win, but does. I hate injustice. My passion against injustice comes from what happened to my father.”
“I didn't. I didn't have the courage. I was coward. I had Ron Richards tell him. I knew it was going to be difficult. As a musician I had fallen in love with the sound that the three of us had created. And at that moment I knew that I'd had to go back to England and leave my band and leave my equipment and my money and go to America and follow that sound. And that that's what I did. It was very awkward for me and Alan. He was my best friend then. I'd known him since, as you know, since I was six years old. We had done all this singing and started the Hollies in December of'62 and Made all those records and and it was a it was very awkward for me, but I wanted that sound.”
“Who knows when I'll pass. But you know what? When they're putting the coffin lid down, I'll still be riding.”