Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Yeah, hither Detroit Wheels.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Hey, Mark Farner for Doug Podell.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Please Mark Farner? What the heck? How you doing, buddy?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm doing, but I ain't mill doing.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
So. Yeah, we've we've been trying to connect here for
a couple of weeks now, and it's good to talk
to you.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Man.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
You've got this new album that's been out for a while.
I'm a little late to the party on it, and
I want to talk to you about that. But what
happened up north? I understand that we got kind of
cut off because.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Of an ice storm that happened up there.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
We saw the pictures, but apparently it was way worse
than anybody thought.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Right, yeah, way worse. Brother. We are just thanking God
because the house didn't get hit. The back walkway, which
is womanized lumber into two by eight. I mean, it
was Paul Bright. It looks like a bunch of tooth
laying there, but at missed our house. It missed our
(01:04):
most of the barns. We got one barn that's got
eight broken rafters in it and a great big white
pine limb laying on it. But dude, that when that
white pine limb was covered with ice, it was three
times heavier, and when it came down, it's a wonder
that it didn't come all the way through. I just
(01:24):
thank god. That's all I can tell you. We had
our plantation of pine trees, Norway pines here on the eighty.
We got twenty two acres of Norway pines. We had.
Now we got stumps of trees that are sixty seventy
feet tall, no tops and tops are all down and
(01:47):
it's it's no longer line poles which with its had
been groomed for forty years. We've been raising these trees
bad to be line poles. And the next cutting was
going to be the money that oh so you know,
now it's salvage. The guys come. I had four different
companies and I got some people that that are you know,
(02:12):
they're going to clean it up, that they're they just
give nothing for the for the lumber that they'll get
out of the logs, but they got a whole lot
of work to do.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (02:22):
Wow, I wasn't expecting that story, sir. That is that
is crazy amazing. But I'm glad that nobody got hurt,
right at least.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
And that's it. Brother, Yeah, thanks for that.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Well, We're thankful for you, Mark Farner. You are certainly
one of the best Michigan's owned. And uh, you've got
another new album out and like I said, I'm a
little late to the party because you've already released your
third single and video on it. But uh it's called
Closer to My Home and uh, yeah your home this
(02:58):
time my.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Home is again. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
So and the unique thing that I saw when I
when I read about it, I went, wait, what I
got to talk to him about this?
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Mark Slaughter came and worked with you on this album.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Tell me tell me about this collaboration between you guys
and how you met.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
Well, we were at Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp in
New York's. David fish Off, who runs the camp, who
owns the camp, came to me and he said, listen, man,
Howard Stern wants you to come over and do I'm
your captain on his program this afternoon. I said, well,
does he want me to do it? Like with an
(03:41):
acoustic guitar. I've done this, you know, in prisons and
drug rehabs and juvenile detention things with an acoustic guitar,
And so I could have I could have done that,
but he said, no, man, take the Fantasy band. So
I had Kip Winger on bass. I had Sandy Gennaro
from Owned Jet and the Blackhearts on drums. I had
(04:03):
Teddy zig Zag on keyboards from Guns N' Roses. I
had Bruce Kulick on the acoustic guitar, Mark Slaughter on second,
me on first. And we did it. And I'm telling you, man,
I never played this song with these guys before, and
it sounded like we had been rehearsing it for a year.
(04:24):
It was so tight, man, it was like the bark
on a birch tree. It was tight. And Howard Stern
loved it. But you know, when we started, and you're
familiar with having the cans on. You got the headphones
on there and then and so you can hear everything.
But I had the cans on the start. Everybody had
(04:45):
their cans on because the TV show and we're not,
you know, really positioned in a place where you can
hear everything. But I just I had to get rid
of them because I couldn't get in touch with the musicians. Uh.
It was funny to because I don't even use it
in ears on stage anyway, I take the cans off
and I'm listening and Kip Winger and Mark Slaughter are
(05:09):
doing background vocals like, oh my god, these guys can sing.
And I said, after we got done, I said, you know,
I went to Slaughter. I said, you were two feet
away from me singing that background vocal part and you
were killing it. Man, you were hitting the notes exactly,
imp tune perfect, pitch you and Winger And he said, dude,
(05:33):
I'm going to send you this music I've been working on.
He sent me some files via the email and I
opened it up and I said, wow, man, you know,
the production on it was great. Instead of you know,
typing back or texting him, I did the old fashioned
thing and picked up the phone. Yeah, I said, dude,
(05:54):
whoever is producing you, that person has it together. That
I could point to where the guitar was coming from,
point to where the keyboards point to the When you
can hear the spread like that, and you know what
I'm talking about, Doug, oh ya, you hear that spread
like that, You could hear every instrument. That is some
fine production. He says, Well, I did the production. Mark.
(06:18):
I said, you're a kid of me. I didn't know
you could produce. He says, now listen, I want to
produce you, he said, I want to offer you my
services as a producer. He said, because I love you.
I love your music. I love it that you're part Cherokee,
he says, I'm part Native American. I think we could
(06:39):
do a great job together.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
I've met Mark a couple of times over the years,
and he's always been gracious, always been a great guy.
But we love him so much more now that he's
put his arm around you know, the Motorcity's finest and
helped you through this project.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Because yeah, I got a.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Chance to listen to some of the songs and they're like,
I got to admit there, they do have a little
bit of that eighties feel to them, that anthem feel,
that soulfulness. I mean, you really brought out your voice too.
My god, Mark, I mean you sound like it's the
seventies with your voice.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
You really do Thank you, brother, thank you. You really
do appreciate.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
I mean, so many guys have had to dial down
or dial out or you know, you barely hear them.
And I mean the last time I saw you, when
you were here at the District one forty two, it
was a fantastic show.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
But this record really.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Brings you out, and the songs are really are really great.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
They're really phenomenal. So congratulations, thank you man.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
That means the world to me. Brother, it really does.
Oh yeah, friend for a long time.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
And anybody that's a fan of the American man right
here Mark Farner is going to love this music.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
And you can just tell tell that a lot of
work went into it.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
Tell me, tell me about who's on it and where
you recorded it.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Well, I'll tell you the most of it is myself
and Mark Slaughter instrumentally and vocally. Mark did some background
vocals and then I did background vocals with myself. But
the drummers, we had three different drummers on that from
a couple of guys that one from la one from Vegas,
(08:29):
and we had another guy from upstate New York. And
but Mark did a lot of the drum programming where
if we didn't like the sound of the guy's kit,
he's got this down to where he can put any
sound in on that if he's hitting a snare and
(08:51):
the snare is just a little out with the track.
Because Mark's very into having everything like really in tune,
and so he would put a snare using the guy's beat,
the drummer's beat to trigger it. He could put the
snare in there that was in tune with the track man,
(09:11):
and well, you got a guy that knows the stuff
that much, and he is such a great guy. Slaughter
is a genuine real person man, and there ain't a
whole lot of them in this music industry.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Well, yeah, you would know that better than anybody. Yeah,
is it at all possible?
Speaker 3 (09:30):
I know Slaughter is still a band, But is it
all possible that you might take somebody like Kip Winger
and Mark Slaughter and go out on tour.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Well, I wouldn't put it out of you know, happening,
but I haven't thought of it. I have. You know,
Kip Winger is the ass kicker and Slaughter ask kicker.
But you know they got their own bands. Kick was
down I think he's still down in South America. He
(10:02):
was telling me about his gigs down there, and they
love him down there. Whether South Americans really appreciate American
rock and well especially Michigan rockers, man, Well, I.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Mean talk about a kick ass band.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
That would certainly be one for sure, and I think
it'd bring you a lot of new recognition.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
And you know people are you know, it's it's desperate
times right now for concert goers. You know, we're not
seeing the kind of classic rock bands that we have
in the past. And to bring you know, some of
that new music to the forefront along with some of
those grand funk.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Hits, I mean, that's a big show. That would be
a big show.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Yeah. Yeah. We just finished a they call it the
Rock and Romance Cruise, be three weeks ago now that
we went out of Fort Lauderdale over to I was
of mel Mexico, and we did a couple of shows
on the main deck. I mean, the wind was blowing
like forty five miles an dollar took my hat right
(11:09):
off my head and blew it out into the audience.
That's crazy. But they were loving it. Man, I'm playing
my new music. I'm playing the single anymore and anymore. Man.
They loved that song. They love it. And you know, brother,
I've got the secret of playing in the original American standard.
(11:32):
The tuning standard for the USA until nineteen fifty three
was four three two count backwards from four four to
three two, which is a frequency range that is in
tune with all things natural, especially water, and we are
(11:55):
seventy percent water in each one of us our bodies.
So I'm in the old standard. I'm old school. And
in nineteen fifty three Rockefeller changed it to a four forty,
and that's what it's been since. But a four forty. Man,
I see the difference, and I had a visual on it.
(12:17):
I can hear it. You know, Doug, you tune an
acoustic guitar to four three two A four three two,
and that guitar gets bigger. It's not louder, it's bigger though,
because the harmonics when you're coming, when you're you know,
taking your tuning peg and you're turning it and you're
coming into the zone, there's this there's like a whistle
(12:43):
that comes along the top of that string that's not
there in four forty, but it's there in the original
tuning standard for the United States four three two. So
I'm back in fourth three two. This entire album is
in four three two. It's my secret weapons that I
tell people about about it.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
Man, all right, well that's a what's that like a
class in physics or something we just went through there.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
But yeah, man, it's all about the frequencies.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
I love that well, you know you touched on uh,
you know, hearkening back to the original sound and your
new album is closer to my home. And you talked
about my Captain with Howard and I could see why
he loves you know, he loves having hit songs on
his show, So why not have one of the biggest
(13:35):
and the best.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
And you know when you wrote that song, Mark, can
you take us back to you know, better times with
the guys from Grand Funk and what was happening at
that time with that song, because it has stood the
test of time, maybe maybe more so than any of
the big you know, forty five hits, and it's an
(14:01):
epic track, just an epic track. Tell me about what
was going on at that time when you guys put
thank you.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Brother, I appreciate it. Yeah. The the thing about that
track in particular is, you know, I'm a Christian. I'm
a custom Christian. I'm a real Christian. I'm not a
superstitious Christian. I go by love and uh. And that's
what it's all about this music that people would hear
in this new album. It's all about the love that's
(14:29):
in there. And so when I go to sleep at night,
I say my prayers, man, I said, my every night
and every day I pray during the day. It doesn't
have to be you know, something going on. I just man.
When I feel the urge, I go to God. And
God is love man, and so I love cuddling up
to love because that's the only thing we take with
(14:49):
us when we leave these bone suits. Brother. And I
was saying my prayers my now, I lead me down
to sleep prayers one night and I asked God, I said,
I put a PS. That's the PS. God, please give
me a song that would reach and touch the hearts
of those you want to get to Boom. I didn't
(15:10):
know that when I got up at three or four
in the morning whenever it was uh and I wrote
the words that that was the words to the song
that I prayed for. I just because I'm writing words
all the time. When I wake up, and I got
my stenelpad right there by the bed, I write it
down because I've lost so many brother, so many songs,
(15:31):
and so many inspirations, thinking, oh, I'll remember that in
the morning. I'll just go back to sleep here and
I'll remember that in the morning. That's laziness. I should
have got my ass out of that bed and wrote
a thing down. But I wrote it that night, and
when I got up in the morning, I got my coffee,
(15:52):
go I'm looking at the horses out in the pasture.
I grabbed my acoustic guitar and I started playing fout
Fu fat do do to you? You know that little
lick on the intro, and then I hit some chords.
I hit a inversion of a C chord that I'd
never made before, and I'm looking at my hand, going, damn,
where did that thing come from? Where did that come from?
(16:13):
You know? And then all of a sudden I had
my thought was like, oh, go get those words. That
could be a song. Go get those words. So I
go running up to the bedroom and I grabbed those
words off the night stand, brought them down, put them
on a table next to my coffee man. I hit
the button on my little Sony cassette recorder and started playing,
(16:35):
and the song came together. I took it to practice
and we worked on it. And when we were at
Channel five in Cleveland, Ohio, it was the Upbeat Show,
and it was you remember the Upbeat Show.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
I do, actually I do, but many won't from Detroit.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah, hey, let's go with you beat you. My friend, my.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Friend's dad was the host of that. Oh man Don yeah,
Don Don Spiro, I think his name was or something
like that.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
But which and Hermann Spiro actually owned the program, and
uh and David Spiro manages well managed Yeah, man, I
mean you know.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Michael Stanley, the late the late Michael Stanley.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Yeah, god the rest of his soul.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
But uh, when I was there, I'm playing and and
David is saying, well, what is that song you're you've
been jamini because I'm I always warm up before we
go on, and I said, that's a new song. It's
called Closer to My Home or Closer to Home. And
he says, well, play a little bit more of that.
(17:54):
And as I'm playing it, Uh, Tommy Baker walks over.
He's the band leader for the Upbeat show band, the
trumpet player bad Ass, and he says, farner Man, when
you get to that, when you're recording that, you get
to that last chorus, he said, keep going and going
and going and going. He says, when you think you
(18:15):
can't go another line, give me ten more. I want
ten more bars of that song. So we did, and
that's how it turned out to be ten minutes long.
And you know, he got a chance to take the
Cleveland Symphony Orchestra on a journey of some rock and
(18:40):
roll history right there that they became part of. And
I always give Tommy Baker kudos for writing all that
great orchestration that's in the outro of that song, Man,
and people love it. The message in the song is
whatever the end visual heard, because it was never a
(19:02):
video of the song, right man, it's whatever, and it
just so happened to be the song. I've talked to
so many Vietnam veterans about this. They said, finally we
got on the ship, and that song was playing, Man,
from the time we left the Vietnam as soon as
(19:23):
it would end, which started again, you know, somebody started again,
and we played it all the way home. And these
guys told me, Man, Putell, they said, we got off
that boat and went right down to the shore and
got down on our hands and knees and kissed Mother
Earth right there, just like you did in the song, Man,
(19:44):
And you talk about something that completes a man's life.
That was to know that the day that I heard
that for the first time. It just made it brought
tears to my eyes. Man, that I was used as
an instrument to give love and to give hope and
for that chance, the opportunity to come home. Man, that's
(20:08):
what those guys were, That's what was in their mind
when they were listening to it. But songs without videos, man,
we our imagination takes over in the in the videos
running regardless of you know, if you really have a
screen in front of you, not your brain has got
the great creative impulse that God put there. Man.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Yeah, well that song would be more like a movie
than a video. Yeah, but yeah, Mark, it is. It
is truly the stairway to have it for the Motor City.
That that is our epic long track that all of
us from Detroit gravitate to every time you play, you know,
here in your hometown. So that story just gave me
(20:54):
goosebumps up and down my arm and back.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Brother, that is a great, great story.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Awesome, I love. Awesome. That's well, that's you know, that's
what love does. It kind of reinforces us and said, yeah, man,
get you some of that, get a hold of that.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
Hey, Mark, I know you back in I think it
was the eighties. You played with the Ringo All Star Band.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Ninety five?
Speaker 1 (21:20):
Oh is that when it was? Okay?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
Well, it gets a little hazy for me, but uh ah,
have you seen that Ringo just did that whole country
thing there at the in Nashville and he put out
a country album. I was wondering if if you ever
got a chance to, you know, circle back with him
at all over the years.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
No, I haven't. I enjoyed my time, you know, with him,
and I've learned a lot from Rango, and I take
it with me wherever I go. He's professional and he
he gave me something because he is a hard guy
(22:00):
to disguise. For him to go out in the public
and you know, and try to kind of blend in,
it ain't gonna happen.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
Yeah, yeah, not like You're Jagger or something where people
for some reason, people just don't recognize Mick when he's
out there with his hat and jacket on, you know.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
But yeah, yeah, man, you put a hat and sunglasses
on Ringo, he looks like Ringo with a hat and
sunglasses out the poor guy. But I remember at one
time he had a YouTube thing he put out and
telling people don't send anything to sign. I'm not sending
my autograph to another soul. And he was really kind
(22:40):
of pissed off, and I could see why. But when
we got to Japan, the first leg of our tour,
we had eighteen days in Japan. We left Vancouver, Canada
after rehearsing, and we had a like a press conference
in Tokyo and that we were up on the podium.
(23:02):
It was a real long table and Ringo was setting
in the middle and the band went down both sides,
kind of like the Last Supper picture, you know. And
this gal came up to me. She said, mister Farner,
I would like to know what is it like playing
with Beetle. And I go, honey, let me tell you something.
(23:22):
Ringo puts his pants on one leg at a time,
just like I do. And he gets up, Doug, and
he comes over. He puts his arms right, he's hugging me.
Thank you brother, Thank you brother, because I recognized him
for being one of us and not a beatle.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
He just a guy, and that's what he wanted to
be with the All Star band, right, he just wanted
to be in a band.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, yeah, amen, brother, that's it.
Speaker 1 (23:49):
You get it well, that that is awesome. So any plans, uh,
you know.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Now, you know, I'm a little connected with some of
the people that you know, and I know and I've
heard some rumors going around that later this year that
both of us might be involved in an upcoming event
that we've done before. That's about as much as I'm
able to speak. Have has that rumor come your way
(24:17):
yet or what?
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Yes, it has drifted across, you know, in the email
and in a text, I got another little thing saying,
I hope you're available for this upcoming thing that we're
going to be doing. I can't tell you a whole
lot about it right now, but would love to have
(24:40):
you your talent, you know, for this Michigan show.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
And I you know, my heart's always been to help
people that are down and out. And if you're helping children, man,
you know, like Jesus said, man suffer not the children,
the little children to come on to me and and
God loves the little children. And it's not like, you know,
(25:05):
people go, well, if God loves the little children so much,
why it's all these people coming up missing? Well that
God ain't doing that. That's the people. People are out
of their dang minds. You know, they're crazy. They're flipped out, man,
they're lunatics, and it's got to be us that ain't
so loony that straightens this crap out.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
Well, I'm committed and I'm certainly hoping that you're going
to be committed to this thing. It's going to be
later in the year, in October, so so we'll we'll
put it on pause and then if anything comes of it,
we'll speak again later.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
In the year.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
Yes, we will, brother, all right, Well, Mark Farner, it
is always great taking time out with you, and I
always seem to go over my time limit whenever we
get together, so I love that.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
I do too, Brother Dub podill Man. You you my brother.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Well, you know it's my fiftieth year in broadcasting this year.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
Wow, So I I am trying to enjoy it just
a little bit more than before and absorb some of
the stuff that I'm doing. And I love talking to
my heroes from the Motor City and you are one
of them, my friend.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Thank you, brother, I appreciate it. You've always had that
rock and spirit. You've always been high energy and I've
never been on the phone when you when I didn't
detect it man, So you just rock them alive down there, brother,
because you know it's worth.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
It, all right.
Speaker 3 (26:37):
Well, the new single is out. It's called Anymore. The
album is Closer to My Home. We highly recommend you
pick it up and check it out. And once again,
thanks Mark Farner for the time. We appreciate it, brother,
Thanks for rocking with wheels.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Right on, brother, rock them alive down there. And if
I don't see in the future, I'll see in the pasture.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
All right, and good luck with your tree.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
He's thanks brother,
Yeah, hither Detroit Wheels.
Speaker 2 (00:01):
Hey, Mark Farner for Doug Podell.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Please Mark Farner? What the heck? How you doing, buddy?
Speaker 2 (00:08):
I'm doing, but I ain't mill doing.
Speaker 3 (00:13):
So. Yeah, we've we've been trying to connect here for
a couple of weeks now, and it's good to talk
to you.
Speaker 2 (00:20):
Man.
Speaker 3 (00:21):
You've got this new album that's been out for a while.
I'm a little late to the party on it, and
I want to talk to you about that. But what
happened up north? I understand that we got kind of
cut off because.
Speaker 1 (00:34):
Of an ice storm that happened up there.
Speaker 3 (00:35):
We saw the pictures, but apparently it was way worse
than anybody thought.
Speaker 2 (00:41):
Right, yeah, way worse. Brother. We are just thanking God
because the house didn't get hit. The back walkway, which
is womanized lumber into two by eight. I mean, it
was Paul Bright. It looks like a bunch of tooth
laying there, but at missed our house. It missed our
(01:04):
most of the barns. We got one barn that's got
eight broken rafters in it and a great big white
pine limb laying on it. But dude, that when that
white pine limb was covered with ice, it was three
times heavier, and when it came down, it's a wonder
that it didn't come all the way through. I just
(01:24):
thank god. That's all I can tell you. We had
our plantation of pine trees, Norway pines here on the eighty.
We got twenty two acres of Norway pines. We had.
Now we got stumps of trees that are sixty seventy
feet tall, no tops and tops are all down and
(01:47):
it's it's no longer line poles which with its had
been groomed for forty years. We've been raising these trees
bad to be line poles. And the next cutting was
going to be the money that oh so you know,
now it's salvage. The guys come. I had four different
companies and I got some people that that are you know,
(02:12):
they're going to clean it up, that they're they just
give nothing for the for the lumber that they'll get
out of the logs, but they got a whole lot
of work to do.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (02:22):
Wow, I wasn't expecting that story, sir. That is that
is crazy amazing. But I'm glad that nobody got hurt,
right at least.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
And that's it. Brother, Yeah, thanks for that.
Speaker 3 (02:38):
Well, We're thankful for you, Mark Farner. You are certainly
one of the best Michigan's owned. And uh, you've got
another new album out and like I said, I'm a
little late to the party because you've already released your
third single and video on it. But uh it's called
Closer to My Home and uh, yeah your home this
(02:58):
time my.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Home is again. Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 3 (03:01):
So and the unique thing that I saw when I
when I read about it, I went, wait, what I
got to talk to him about this?
Speaker 1 (03:10):
Mark Slaughter came and worked with you on this album.
Speaker 3 (03:15):
Tell me tell me about this collaboration between you guys
and how you met.
Speaker 2 (03:21):
Well, we were at Rock and Roll Fantasy Camp in
New York's. David fish Off, who runs the camp, who
owns the camp, came to me and he said, listen, man,
Howard Stern wants you to come over and do I'm
your captain on his program this afternoon. I said, well,
does he want me to do it? Like with an
(03:41):
acoustic guitar. I've done this, you know, in prisons and
drug rehabs and juvenile detention things with an acoustic guitar,
And so I could have I could have done that,
but he said, no, man, take the Fantasy band. So
I had Kip Winger on bass. I had Sandy Gennaro
from Owned Jet and the Blackhearts on drums. I had
(04:03):
Teddy zig Zag on keyboards from Guns N' Roses. I
had Bruce Kulick on the acoustic guitar, Mark Slaughter on second,
me on first. And we did it. And I'm telling you, man,
I never played this song with these guys before, and
it sounded like we had been rehearsing it for a year.
(04:24):
It was so tight, man, it was like the bark
on a birch tree. It was tight. And Howard Stern
loved it. But you know, when we started, and you're
familiar with having the cans on. You got the headphones
on there and then and so you can hear everything.
But I had the cans on the start. Everybody had
(04:45):
their cans on because the TV show and we're not,
you know, really positioned in a place where you can
hear everything. But I just I had to get rid
of them because I couldn't get in touch with the musicians. Uh.
It was funny to because I don't even use it
in ears on stage anyway, I take the cans off
and I'm listening and Kip Winger and Mark Slaughter are
(05:09):
doing background vocals like, oh my god, these guys can sing.
And I said, after we got done, I said, you know,
I went to Slaughter. I said, you were two feet
away from me singing that background vocal part and you
were killing it. Man, you were hitting the notes exactly,
imp tune perfect, pitch you and Winger And he said, dude,
(05:33):
I'm going to send you this music I've been working on.
He sent me some files via the email and I
opened it up and I said, wow, man, you know,
the production on it was great. Instead of you know,
typing back or texting him, I did the old fashioned
thing and picked up the phone. Yeah, I said, dude,
(05:54):
whoever is producing you, that person has it together. That
I could point to where the guitar was coming from,
point to where the keyboards point to the When you
can hear the spread like that, and you know what
I'm talking about, Doug, oh ya, you hear that spread
like that, You could hear every instrument. That is some
fine production. He says, Well, I did the production. Mark.
(06:18):
I said, you're a kid of me. I didn't know
you could produce. He says, now listen, I want to
produce you, he said, I want to offer you my
services as a producer. He said, because I love you.
I love your music. I love it that you're part Cherokee,
he says, I'm part Native American. I think we could
(06:39):
do a great job together.
Speaker 3 (06:41):
I've met Mark a couple of times over the years,
and he's always been gracious, always been a great guy.
But we love him so much more now that he's
put his arm around you know, the Motorcity's finest and
helped you through this project.
Speaker 1 (06:55):
Because yeah, I got a.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
Chance to listen to some of the songs and they're like,
I got to admit there, they do have a little
bit of that eighties feel to them, that anthem feel,
that soulfulness. I mean, you really brought out your voice too.
My god, Mark, I mean you sound like it's the
seventies with your voice.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
You really do Thank you, brother, thank you. You really
do appreciate.
Speaker 3 (07:21):
I mean, so many guys have had to dial down
or dial out or you know, you barely hear them.
And I mean the last time I saw you, when
you were here at the District one forty two, it
was a fantastic show.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
But this record really.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
Brings you out, and the songs are really are really great.
Speaker 1 (07:42):
They're really phenomenal. So congratulations, thank you man.
Speaker 2 (07:47):
That means the world to me. Brother, it really does.
Oh yeah, friend for a long time.
Speaker 3 (07:53):
And anybody that's a fan of the American man right
here Mark Farner is going to love this music.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
And you can just tell tell that a lot of
work went into it.
Speaker 3 (08:03):
Tell me, tell me about who's on it and where
you recorded it.
Speaker 2 (08:07):
Well, I'll tell you the most of it is myself
and Mark Slaughter instrumentally and vocally. Mark did some background
vocals and then I did background vocals with myself. But
the drummers, we had three different drummers on that from
a couple of guys that one from la one from Vegas,
(08:29):
and we had another guy from upstate New York. And
but Mark did a lot of the drum programming where
if we didn't like the sound of the guy's kit,
he's got this down to where he can put any
sound in on that if he's hitting a snare and
(08:51):
the snare is just a little out with the track.
Because Mark's very into having everything like really in tune,
and so he would put a snare using the guy's beat,
the drummer's beat to trigger it. He could put the
snare in there that was in tune with the track man,
(09:11):
and well, you got a guy that knows the stuff
that much, and he is such a great guy. Slaughter
is a genuine real person man, and there ain't a
whole lot of them in this music industry.
Speaker 1 (09:24):
Well, yeah, you would know that better than anybody. Yeah,
is it at all possible?
Speaker 3 (09:30):
I know Slaughter is still a band, But is it
all possible that you might take somebody like Kip Winger
and Mark Slaughter and go out on tour.
Speaker 2 (09:39):
Well, I wouldn't put it out of you know, happening,
but I haven't thought of it. I have. You know,
Kip Winger is the ass kicker and Slaughter ask kicker.
But you know they got their own bands. Kick was
down I think he's still down in South America. He
(10:02):
was telling me about his gigs down there, and they
love him down there. Whether South Americans really appreciate American
rock and well especially Michigan rockers, man, Well, I.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Mean talk about a kick ass band.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
That would certainly be one for sure, and I think
it'd bring you a lot of new recognition.
Speaker 1 (10:23):
There's no doubt about it.
Speaker 3 (10:25):
And you know people are you know, it's it's desperate
times right now for concert goers. You know, we're not
seeing the kind of classic rock bands that we have
in the past. And to bring you know, some of
that new music to the forefront along with some of
those grand funk.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
Hits, I mean, that's a big show. That would be
a big show.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
Yeah. Yeah. We just finished a they call it the
Rock and Romance Cruise, be three weeks ago now that
we went out of Fort Lauderdale over to I was
of mel Mexico, and we did a couple of shows
on the main deck. I mean, the wind was blowing
like forty five miles an dollar took my hat right
(11:09):
off my head and blew it out into the audience.
That's crazy. But they were loving it. Man, I'm playing
my new music. I'm playing the single anymore and anymore. Man.
They loved that song. They love it. And you know, brother,
I've got the secret of playing in the original American standard.
(11:32):
The tuning standard for the USA until nineteen fifty three
was four three two count backwards from four four to
three two, which is a frequency range that is in
tune with all things natural, especially water, and we are
(11:55):
seventy percent water in each one of us our bodies.
So I'm in the old standard. I'm old school. And
in nineteen fifty three Rockefeller changed it to a four forty,
and that's what it's been since. But a four forty. Man,
I see the difference, and I had a visual on it.
(12:17):
I can hear it. You know, Doug, you tune an
acoustic guitar to four three two A four three two,
and that guitar gets bigger. It's not louder, it's bigger though,
because the harmonics when you're coming, when you're you know,
taking your tuning peg and you're turning it and you're
coming into the zone, there's this there's like a whistle
(12:43):
that comes along the top of that string that's not
there in four forty, but it's there in the original
tuning standard for the United States four three two. So
I'm back in fourth three two. This entire album is
in four three two. It's my secret weapons that I
tell people about about it.
Speaker 3 (13:05):
Man, all right, well that's a what's that like a
class in physics or something we just went through there.
Speaker 2 (13:10):
But yeah, man, it's all about the frequencies.
Speaker 3 (13:14):
I love that well, you know you touched on uh,
you know, hearkening back to the original sound and your
new album is closer to my home. And you talked
about my Captain with Howard and I could see why
he loves you know, he loves having hit songs on
his show, So why not have one of the biggest
(13:35):
and the best.
Speaker 2 (13:36):
Uh.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
And you know when you wrote that song, Mark, can
you take us back to you know, better times with
the guys from Grand Funk and what was happening at
that time with that song, because it has stood the
test of time, maybe maybe more so than any of
the big you know, forty five hits, and it's an
(14:01):
epic track, just an epic track. Tell me about what
was going on at that time when you guys put
thank you.
Speaker 2 (14:07):
Brother, I appreciate it. Yeah. The the thing about that
track in particular is, you know, I'm a Christian. I'm
a custom Christian. I'm a real Christian. I'm not a
superstitious Christian. I go by love and uh. And that's
what it's all about this music that people would hear
in this new album. It's all about the love that's
(14:29):
in there. And so when I go to sleep at night,
I say my prayers, man, I said, my every night
and every day I pray during the day. It doesn't
have to be you know, something going on. I just man.
When I feel the urge, I go to God. And
God is love man, and so I love cuddling up
to love because that's the only thing we take with
(14:49):
us when we leave these bone suits. Brother. And I
was saying my prayers my now, I lead me down
to sleep prayers one night and I asked God, I said,
I put a PS. That's the PS. God, please give
me a song that would reach and touch the hearts
of those you want to get to Boom. I didn't
(15:10):
know that when I got up at three or four
in the morning whenever it was uh and I wrote
the words that that was the words to the song
that I prayed for. I just because I'm writing words
all the time. When I wake up, and I got
my stenelpad right there by the bed, I write it
down because I've lost so many brother, so many songs,
(15:31):
and so many inspirations, thinking, oh, I'll remember that in
the morning. I'll just go back to sleep here and
I'll remember that in the morning. That's laziness. I should
have got my ass out of that bed and wrote
a thing down. But I wrote it that night, and
when I got up in the morning, I got my coffee,
(15:52):
go I'm looking at the horses out in the pasture.
I grabbed my acoustic guitar and I started playing fout
Fu fat do do to you? You know that little
lick on the intro, and then I hit some chords.
I hit a inversion of a C chord that I'd
never made before, and I'm looking at my hand, going, damn,
where did that thing come from? Where did that come from?
(16:13):
You know? And then all of a sudden I had
my thought was like, oh, go get those words. That
could be a song. Go get those words. So I
go running up to the bedroom and I grabbed those
words off the night stand, brought them down, put them
on a table next to my coffee man. I hit
the button on my little Sony cassette recorder and started playing,
(16:35):
and the song came together. I took it to practice
and we worked on it. And when we were at
Channel five in Cleveland, Ohio, it was the Upbeat Show,
and it was you remember the Upbeat Show.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
I do, actually I do, but many won't from Detroit.
Speaker 2 (16:58):
Yeah, hey, let's go with you beat you. My friend, my.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
Friend's dad was the host of that. Oh man Don yeah,
Don Don Spiro, I think his name was or something
like that.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
But which and Hermann Spiro actually owned the program, and
uh and David Spiro manages well managed Yeah, man, I
mean you know.
Speaker 1 (17:27):
Michael Stanley, the late the late Michael Stanley.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
Yeah, god the rest of his soul.
Speaker 1 (17:33):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
But uh, when I was there, I'm playing and and
David is saying, well, what is that song you're you've
been jamini because I'm I always warm up before we
go on, and I said, that's a new song. It's
called Closer to My Home or Closer to Home. And
he says, well, play a little bit more of that.
(17:54):
And as I'm playing it, Uh, Tommy Baker walks over.
He's the band leader for the Upbeat show band, the
trumpet player bad Ass, and he says, farner Man, when
you get to that, when you're recording that, you get
to that last chorus, he said, keep going and going
and going and going. He says, when you think you
(18:15):
can't go another line, give me ten more. I want
ten more bars of that song. So we did, and
that's how it turned out to be ten minutes long.
And you know, he got a chance to take the
Cleveland Symphony Orchestra on a journey of some rock and
(18:40):
roll history right there that they became part of. And
I always give Tommy Baker kudos for writing all that
great orchestration that's in the outro of that song, Man,
and people love it. The message in the song is
whatever the end visual heard, because it was never a
(19:02):
video of the song, right man, it's whatever, and it
just so happened to be the song. I've talked to
so many Vietnam veterans about this. They said, finally we
got on the ship, and that song was playing, Man,
from the time we left the Vietnam as soon as
(19:23):
it would end, which started again, you know, somebody started again,
and we played it all the way home. And these
guys told me, Man, Putell, they said, we got off
that boat and went right down to the shore and
got down on our hands and knees and kissed Mother
Earth right there, just like you did in the song, Man,
(19:44):
And you talk about something that completes a man's life.
That was to know that the day that I heard
that for the first time. It just made it brought
tears to my eyes. Man, that I was used as
an instrument to give love and to give hope and
for that chance, the opportunity to come home. Man, that's
(20:08):
what those guys were, That's what was in their mind
when they were listening to it. But songs without videos, man,
we our imagination takes over in the in the videos
running regardless of you know, if you really have a
screen in front of you, not your brain has got
the great creative impulse that God put there. Man.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
Yeah, well that song would be more like a movie
than a video. Yeah, but yeah, Mark, it is. It
is truly the stairway to have it for the Motor City.
That that is our epic long track that all of
us from Detroit gravitate to every time you play, you know,
here in your hometown. So that story just gave me
(20:54):
goosebumps up and down my arm and back.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Brother, that is a great, great story.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Awesome, I love. Awesome. That's well, that's you know, that's
what love does. It kind of reinforces us and said, yeah, man,
get you some of that, get a hold of that.
Speaker 1 (21:10):
Hey, Mark, I know you back in I think it
was the eighties. You played with the Ringo All Star Band.
Speaker 2 (21:19):
Ninety five?
Speaker 1 (21:20):
Oh is that when it was? Okay?
Speaker 3 (21:22):
Well, it gets a little hazy for me, but uh ah,
have you seen that Ringo just did that whole country
thing there at the in Nashville and he put out
a country album. I was wondering if if you ever
got a chance to, you know, circle back with him
at all over the years.
Speaker 2 (21:40):
No, I haven't. I enjoyed my time, you know, with him,
and I've learned a lot from Rango, and I take
it with me wherever I go. He's professional and he
he gave me something because he is a hard guy
(22:00):
to disguise. For him to go out in the public
and you know, and try to kind of blend in,
it ain't gonna happen.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
Yeah, yeah, not like You're Jagger or something where people
for some reason, people just don't recognize Mick when he's
out there with his hat and jacket on, you know.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
But yeah, yeah, man, you put a hat and sunglasses
on Ringo, he looks like Ringo with a hat and
sunglasses out the poor guy. But I remember at one
time he had a YouTube thing he put out and
telling people don't send anything to sign. I'm not sending
my autograph to another soul. And he was really kind
(22:40):
of pissed off, and I could see why. But when
we got to Japan, the first leg of our tour,
we had eighteen days in Japan. We left Vancouver, Canada
after rehearsing, and we had a like a press conference
in Tokyo and that we were up on the podium.
(23:02):
It was a real long table and Ringo was setting
in the middle and the band went down both sides,
kind of like the Last Supper picture, you know. And
this gal came up to me. She said, mister Farner,
I would like to know what is it like playing
with Beetle. And I go, honey, let me tell you something.
(23:22):
Ringo puts his pants on one leg at a time,
just like I do. And he gets up, Doug, and
he comes over. He puts his arms right, he's hugging me.
Thank you brother, Thank you brother, because I recognized him
for being one of us and not a beatle.
Speaker 3 (23:40):
He just a guy, and that's what he wanted to
be with the All Star band, right, he just wanted
to be in a band.
Speaker 2 (23:46):
Yeah, yeah, amen, brother, that's it.
Speaker 1 (23:49):
You get it well, that that is awesome. So any plans, uh,
you know.
Speaker 3 (23:54):
Now, you know, I'm a little connected with some of
the people that you know, and I know and I've
heard some rumors going around that later this year that
both of us might be involved in an upcoming event
that we've done before. That's about as much as I'm
able to speak. Have has that rumor come your way
(24:17):
yet or what?
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Yes, it has drifted across, you know, in the email
and in a text, I got another little thing saying,
I hope you're available for this upcoming thing that we're
going to be doing. I can't tell you a whole
lot about it right now, but would love to have
(24:40):
you your talent, you know, for this Michigan show.
Speaker 1 (24:44):
Yep.
Speaker 2 (24:44):
And I you know, my heart's always been to help
people that are down and out. And if you're helping children, man,
you know, like Jesus said, man suffer not the children,
the little children to come on to me and and
God loves the little children. And it's not like, you know,
(25:05):
people go, well, if God loves the little children so much,
why it's all these people coming up missing? Well that
God ain't doing that. That's the people. People are out
of their dang minds. You know, they're crazy. They're flipped out, man,
they're lunatics, and it's got to be us that ain't
so loony that straightens this crap out.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
Well, I'm committed and I'm certainly hoping that you're going
to be committed to this thing. It's going to be
later in the year, in October, so so we'll we'll
put it on pause and then if anything comes of it,
we'll speak again later.
Speaker 2 (25:40):
In the year.
Speaker 3 (25:41):
Yes, we will, brother, all right, Well, Mark Farner, it
is always great taking time out with you, and I
always seem to go over my time limit whenever we
get together, so I love that.
Speaker 2 (25:52):
I do too, Brother Dub podill Man. You you my brother.
Speaker 1 (25:57):
Well, you know it's my fiftieth year in broadcasting this year.
Speaker 3 (26:01):
Wow, So I I am trying to enjoy it just
a little bit more than before and absorb some of
the stuff that I'm doing. And I love talking to
my heroes from the Motor City and you are one
of them, my friend.
Speaker 2 (26:18):
Thank you, brother, I appreciate it. You've always had that
rock and spirit. You've always been high energy and I've
never been on the phone when you when I didn't
detect it man, So you just rock them alive down there, brother,
because you know it's worth.
Speaker 1 (26:36):
It, all right.
Speaker 3 (26:37):
Well, the new single is out. It's called Anymore. The
album is Closer to My Home. We highly recommend you
pick it up and check it out. And once again,
thanks Mark Farner for the time. We appreciate it, brother,
Thanks for rocking with wheels.
Speaker 2 (26:51):
Right on, brother, rock them alive down there. And if
I don't see in the future, I'll see in the pasture.
Speaker 1 (26:57):
All right, and good luck with your tree.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
He's thanks brother,
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