She Get it From Her Mama

0:01 On this very special first episode of Big Time Fresh, I talked to my mom about her days as a lead singer for a classic rock cover band in the early eighties. Here for the first time that she and a bunch of nineteen year olds piled into a band and booked gigs across the country. Enjoy the show. What's up everyone, it's Bellamars and I am here with my new podcast, big time fresh. What I'm going to be doing on this podcast is, you know, kind of unboxing the lesser known sides of what is seen in the public eye. So I'll be breaking down bands, pop culture, current events. But what is most exciting is that I'm going to be having conversations with everyday people and their experiences in life and what has had the biggest impacts on shaping who they are today. So if you like the content or if you want to hear more, if you have suggestions, if if you have a story about your life that you think would be awesome to talk about on this podcast, go ahead and follow me at big time fresh on instagram and facebook, as I start this blog and podcast from scratch.

1:19 Hearing a story that you've never heard before about somebody's life may give you a fresh perspective on your own. So that's what this podcast is about. I really appreciate you listening because, like I said, it's my first episode, so I'm nervous. So anyway, let's get into it. I know I said earlier that this is a podcast that's going to be about everyday people. However, my first guest is not an everyday person. In fact, this guest will probably be the most special of all my guests forever and ever. Can you guess? That's right, it's my mom. So why don't we start right from the how where did you meet my first we met in a Japanese class at the University of Kansas. We're both half Japanese, but he's he's much more, uh, fluent in the language than I was and for some reason I took intensive Japanese and intensive Spanish and the same semester they dropped out of that class. But why Spanish? At the time? I don't know. I always had oh, come to find out later in Twi it all made sense when I did a DNA test. But Um, I always had an affinity. I wanted to learn Spanish, and so m I stayed with that for two years of intensive Spanish. But I met I met your

2:53 father in the Japanese class and one day, I remember this pretty early, I had already been in a in a band, I'd already I went to Japan and, uh, my mother got me a session at a recording studio, at cannon records, and I was yeah, I had no experience whatsoever. She knew a producer at N H K, which is like NBC or CBS, you know, and in the United States equivalent too. But Um, so the guy said, and I think it was eighteen, and the guy said or seventeen, and I said, Oh, you have a great, really great voice, but you can tell that, you know, I was an experience and I was experienced. So he said go go back and get some experience and then come back and see us. Because my intention was to too. When I finished high school. I wanted to study linguistics and and Um, go to Japan, and this woman, that one of the producers, said that she would get me a job. And and then, and then I called, I called Darren and Marty because they were looking for a female vocalist, because back then we're talking seven, nine to eighty, you know, Um, there are lots of gigs for live music, live music back then, and also it was like just go and and, you know, pop, pop music. So they auditioned me, they liked me

4:27 and I got the GIG. So fast forward to one day I was walking into one of the dorms at at Ku and I was singing, just being obnoxious and singing a Linda Ronstad song very loud, very loudly, and the guy that the desk happened to be a friend of your father's and also a guitar player, and said, Whoa, you have a really great voice. We need a singer. Would you like to sing in a band? And I said, oh, sure, why not? I mean, you know, I'll try out or whatever. And I can't I can't remember all the details, but they needed a guitar player for the band too. Um, this other band and the one that you were in for, yeah, the the one that your father and I were finally, you know, we're into together. Um. And so he came an auditioned and they liked him.

5:32 We couldn't find a good drummer, so Darren, who was guitar player, ended up playing the drums and then your father came in to play the guitar for the band. Only one bass, one guitar, Bass Guitar. Uh Yeah, Bass Guitar, drums and singer. Yes, some events may have may not be accurate in order because it's been a long time. So that was that was. And you weren't. You were a student there living on campus when we we got going and got rehearsing and everything started sounding good and, you know, we changed the whole concept of you. When your father came in, it kind of changed the whole concept of the band because they were more like top forty and and your father started bringing in Jimmy Hendrix and led Zeppelin and you know. So we kind of got into a more, you know, heavy mode, but still had a really good mix. Was that more popular? It depends on it depended on where where you played.

6:41 So so and with us. Yes, because, Um, when I was with the first band, it was top forty and I toured around with them, you know, from state to state. But we were playing like hotel moved to hotel circuits and club circuits, you know, where we would stay at the Hilton in and for three weeks and we would play. Yeah, and so almost like a residency. Yeah, for short, short term. So we would play three weeks at a time at different hotels, you know, and then when your father came in to the band, we changed our whole format and then what we ended up doing was playing, you know, kind of weekend gigs, sometimes a couple of weeks at a time. Just depends, but we're playing, you know bars, more bars and different venues and opening up for some other bands and things like that. What are their bands? This is so cool and well, most of the stuff, I mean there were some some bands that I know we opened up for Flash CANDILLAC and kind O kids. I don't leave. Yeah, that was that was fun. What kind of venue was that? That was? That was a pretty decent it was like an APP outdoor amphitheater type thing. and Um,

8:18 I think it was in Blue Springs, Missouri, and Um, we played the Opera House in Lawrence, Kansas, and I can't remember some of the names of the bands that we, you know, we had opened for at the time and then we sometimes we just headlined, you know, but Um, like an amphitheater, no, at the at the Uppera House, and then, you know, we played. Yeah, we played for weddings and graduations and Bar mitzvahs and Bot mispah's and you know and stuff, wedding singer.

9:03 It's hard for me to wrap my head around because they don't even have bands anymore, let alone residencies at hotels and, you know, Um opening for especially you're a cover band too. Yeah, it was a cover band and basically that's that's just what it was. You know, it was really not as as glamorous as you know people who but it's kind of it's kind of, uh. It's interesting now because, like you said, that there's nothing. People just don't do that anymore. You just don't, you know, unless you're at a certain level. People just don't get in a band and go travel around from from state to state, you know, filling gigs.

9:48 And one of the things it was interesting, like when we were playing in the band, when we first started playing, we got the band together and Darren was playing drums instead of guitar, Pedro was playing the Um they get, you know, the lead guitar. We changed our whole our whole repertoire. What the booking agent did was there were there were bands. He had a certain certain number of bands that would you know that he worked with and they would go contract from city to city, you know, bar to bar, and then bands, as they do, break up and so, you know, fight and break up, especially when you're on the road so long. So they would fight, they would break up, and so, in order for him not to be in breach contract, we would fulfill the contract of the band of that week. So Our Name, the name of our band changed, like you know, from from Gig to big sometimes.

10:56 So one one, one time we could be Mad Max, one time we could be snowblind, next week we could be somebody else, you know, just so that our booking agent wouldn't be in breach of contract. So that was that was funny. So you could have different names. Did you have to promote on the street, like hand out flyers, or to show up like it like back in the early days? That was mostly our booking agent and our sound man and the book. You need to take a cut. Oh yeah, what what kind of cut? I think it's, you know, I think it was maybe man. You know. So the music industry has gone downhill tremendously for the musician, because gigs were abundant. You could make a living, you know, you could make a living doing that and Um, not a great you couldn't put a kid through college, but you could certainly, you know, survive. The Way I see the pop music is there's no drummer based lead guitar singer. It's all electronics. They, you know, take advantage of all everybody. And so they're saying the music industry is dying, and hearing this, I look at it in different ways because because it was certainly those kinds of gigs are gone. Um, it's too hard. And I can say it from the other perspective as a venue,

12:30 as a venue owner, like we had that we owned the restaurant. We we tried, Um and we tried to do live music, Um, you know, booking live bands, and it was just, you know, the bands would come in and they'd make these atrocious demands for many yeah, they said, Oh, we want, you know dollars to play here for one night, and we would just look at him and go good luck. And you know in in the bay area there are so, so many bands and bands would go to restaurants but they wouldn't even pay. I mean from what I know, yeah, they wouldn't pay. Well, and and we we're guilty of it. I mean it's it's a shame. I was very conflicted because I was in charge of, you know, booking these bands and I had to say you could play here, but you know, the best we could do is compy of mail some drinks and and help you pass the tip jar around to see if anybody will pay you. Because but you know, it was just very difficult in every aspect of owning, keeping the restaurant and running and managing the bar. If we would have paid them, and you know even three, three to five dollars, we would not make any money that night. Where did you tour like? What? Well, we were out of we're based out of Kansas. So then we went from, you know, all the way up to Minnesota to the border, Canadian border,

14:01 UM, international falls in Minnesota. There's a big club there, and then we went all the way down, uh, down south to Texas. What are we talking? Crowd size life most like I said, most of his bar, that the bar up in international falls was pretty big. So, you know, in my mind, in my memory, there could have been a hundred people in the crowd. Um, what do they know? They're coming to see rock music, rock music, and we we um build ourselves as as Um classic rock with, you know a Jimmy Hendrix, Janis Joblin led Zeblin rush. Is it because you had a your female lead singer?

14:58 Now it's hard to say. I don't think there are as many female rock singers. Do you think that made it easier to to book some movie? Because I think so. Yeah, I think so. And you know, I did a lot of I did both male and female lead vocals. So for the Zeppelin and the rush, you know, to the Janis Joplin and Linda Pat Benatar. You know. Does you do free shows? Does you have to do free shows? We we would volunteer. Maybe we would do a like a donation once in a while before for fun. Yeah, for for charity. We've done that. We played a big outdoor Gig at Potter's Lake in Lawrence and that was a pretty big, crowded that's something at the University of Kansas. So you get were those so from the booking agent and they're just like, I don't get paid, but Um, yeah, I believe so. And then our sound man, who was very much a businessman, he kind of helped manage and book a lot. So he might have signed us up for that. I had I had no idea because I used to. I would just show up. I would show up and help.

16:26 Okay, I would help. Wait. So you had a sound guy also, with a sound man and a light man, and these guys were father uh, knew them from this engineering fraternity and in Nerd Yeah, Nerd uh, and they were both pretty nerdy. And, Um, there's a story that we that would go go with that. But some other times, but some other times we got our whole lighting system. But Um, anyway, that would be you, like you made it to the to the top, get paid for all your game. Yeah, having a game, getting paid more, travel across state lines, Um, and you had all the equipment to call around, and now people, you know, droppers, just show up and they still don't get paid. Yeah, yeah, we had.

17:22 We had quite a bit of equipment and we had, uh, six people total, because we took the sound man and the light man was us all the time. So then we had, you know, in right today, Sanders, and have a big deal because again, we're a comm band, you know, but but it was kind of a, you know, a big deal back then. We were, you know, very uh, we were able to sustain our livings and, you know, have a good time and do things that we enjoy doing, and I mean the fact that we get paid fifteen hundreds dollars, you know, for for a weekend or something like that. In the eighties. Yeah, depending on and and sometimes we would do we would do we would do a we actually got high school prom gigs. Yeah, and they paid. They paid well. So so it was yeah, it was quite it was quite the it's quite the at the time, you know, thinking about being eighteen and nineteen years old and just being on the road and doing that. You know, it's no no cell phone. Didn't have to call mom very often else. See it when I see uh. Yeah, yeah, it was it was definitely a different time. But you know, when I think about today, to so many

18:55 of the opportunities that you know, it's kind of a trade off because some of the opportunities that I see people going on Youtube and, you know, making yeh, making their videos, and I see it's just incredible talented people. You know that they would never ever have a chance to even be heard anywhere, but not for this kind of platform. It's certainly not in our tent. So in in their case, some of them will probably be wanting to make it big, but maybe for for the rest of them it's just a creative outlet. Outlet, yeah, UM, and for us it was just a bunch of fun. Oh my gosh, that's so creepy. And it's not like we were we were drug addicts or you know. You know, after a while it does become a job, that it it kind of attracts those types of it kind of goes hand in hand with those kinds of problems, right, and I remember being I think, I think we were coming towards the end of the life of our banded. It was never intended to be a full time thing, Um, especially with your or a long term thing, especially with your father. He's always had the PhD in mind and when he took off a year, I don't know, it was a year or semester, uh, from college, his mother, Fach, Your

20:27 Your Grandmother, they oh my God, they just like, what are you doing, throwing your life away? But he was always he was always bound for for that. You know, this was never gonna be and I remember going to bar so. Sometimes, when you're in a town, I think we're in Iowa, like Des Moines or something, and there's like three three venues in the same block right and Um, so each band, like on a break, would go and check out another band and then so we get to know each other and if we're playing a couple sometimes we play two weekends in a row or something like that. We get to know each other and we would go and do things like play, you know, get together for a softball game or something like that. And I just remember, I remember there were a couple of there was there was one band and these guys were probably in their forties and I remember watching them play and just kind of seeing their aging bodies and because that was twenty and frey was a old yeah, yeah, was the sixty back in the eighties. So I said, Oh my God, I do not want to be like these people when I'm that age. So I was out, you know, I was like I had to find something else, but I always kept which I did, you know,

22:00 and then and then I but I always kept music and being involved with musicians and that in my life all the time. Did you feel like it was you were it came to you, like all of the opportunities and to be involved with music came to you randomly, or were you actively USIC? No, I was always actively seeking out you know, I moved around a lot, as you know, and and every place I went, every place I moved to, I sought out musicians and, you know, fortunately, Um, I was able to work with a lot of musicians but unfortunately not able to to, you know, go for it all the way, because in order to do that you kind of have to sacrifice a lot and almost everything, you know, because you can't do it half asked. You know, you're either in it or you're out, and so you either do it a hobby. But if you want to make it big, then you know.

23:03 So if anyone wanted to make it big, big, those days are over. Yeah, UH, unless you, you know, just dazzle somebody like they get a lot of followers. And Yeah, and now they do these things called three sixty deals. So the artist is basically given u six of his earnings are going to other people. Manager gets off, or like off everything, whether or not, Um, they booked it or you booked it. Then there's a business manager, then there's tour manager. Then it's like is that worth it, you know, and I wonder if if people think about Oh, I want to be famous the way we used to think about, oh I want to be famous, you know, because we are looking at Van Halen and yeah, you know, you're Smith and you know that been a hard heart, you know, during those times. And and UH, they were. They were pumping out hint hits. When we were on the road, we were just copying those, covering those hits and, Um, and a lot of bands behind demand. So, especially back then, you can't hear it really on the radio at went on demand live or even it was different. It's definitely different now. I mean I think the

24:33 perception and field cover bands then was more greatly appreciated because, you know, you would, you would go and always fun. People would go just, Oh, there's a band playing. Oh, let's go see him, let's go check them out, because it was fun to go see a band. And then if they're playing the songs that you really like and they do it well, then it's like bonus, you know. So it was like, Oh, so we had a pretty decent following, you know really and yeah, in Um, in the great the state of Kansas. How could you tell about? Well, be because people would say hey, you know, hey, you're from Mad Max. Yeah, you know, and people would follow you on instagram. Yeah, right, there was something, but yeah, but it was it was different, you know, it was very different.

25:23 And now if you're at a cover band, they're like people are thinking, just kind of washed out, washed out. And that was the thing when we were we were hiring people to play at a restaurant in our meade up and every band that was a cover band or like people my age and so the men would translate into these these these gray haired, you know, kind of pop belly guys that that you know played well or sometimes not, but certainly half deaf. So you can tell them to turn down, you know, when you're playing in the restaurant, you tell them please turn down your go down for about two seconds and go right back up because they say they can't hear because been in there for so long. Um. So then, when didn't you do the I know you did. was there a track that you're saying over that was I did. I did. I ventured out of a couple of things. I Um, I collaborated with this I don't know what you'd call him now. It's kind of kind of GRUNGE IN UM heavy alternative kind of kind of genre. and Um, I met these guys.

26:51 I don't remember how, but again, seeking probably through an ad of was seeking out music. newspaper. Yeah, newspaper or newspaper and or there might have been craigslisted that time. I'm not sure. But the nineties. No, this was this was late nineties. I'm getting candy. So, so, Um. I collaborated them with them. They had a drummer and a bass player and so they had a bassline and the drums and I, Um, I put a melody to their stuff, to about seven or eight songs, and put a melody in some lyrics. We found a guitar player and then I sang those songs. So that was that. I did some work with a he was from Zimbabwe, but he had a reggae band, Dr Mooch, and then I met some really talented, Um, extremely talented uh musicians and highly trained musicians from one was a keyboard player from Spain, two guitarists from Argentina, a drummer from Cuba and there was a bass player, uh, just from you know, America. This is wh nice down in Miami. And so I started experimenting with with Jazz. Do you think,

28:23 saying how how the industry is now, that it was a good decision not to go well in yes, yeah, it's too. I mean your chances of your chances of things, and for that it was just like way too labor intensive. Did you have to promote on the street, like hand out flyers, or to show up like it like back in the early days? That was mostly our booking agent and our sound man. He ended up owning his own sound company in Missouri. The Bass Player, Um stayed in Lawrence, Kansas, and he became a real estate agent. What do you call air conditioning? And then are drummer, the guy that played drummer, who played the drums, who used to play guitar, ended up playing with Tim mcgrawl. He had a career with Tim McGraw for about twenty years and I think so. So he made um by uh, I don't know, by the definition. I suppose he made it. Yeah, unless money was part of his definition of making it. Now I don't think so. You know, I remember we used to have conversations about making it big, you know, just out of boredom, because nobody was nobody was serious or ever imagined to me serious, and talking about Oh, wouldn't it be fun to

29:53 be on the David Letterman show or and he actually did it and he played in auditoriums and all kinds of things like that. He had he hit the big time with, you know, Tim McGraw. Back then, did you? Did you feel like you wanted to never make it big? I always wanted to be behind the scenes running the show. I feel like it was what's super cool and like unique to other people. was like yeah, got this, I know how to play this. Oh yeah, my mom does this. You're right. Other people and do perceive it as as something, something cool, because I have said, I told a few people and because I mentioned earlier. It's Oh, wow, you're it was such a cool but you know background. Yeah, so, man, that's awesome, but also really sucks for music as a whole. I feel like popularity and being and being on instagram and the purpose for going to concerts and and everything now is because you like them as an artist and they're popular in the FAMAS and then you want to go take videos there for what to post them, you know, just like so, I was there and I saw this. Yeah,

31:25 look at eyes alive. It's just so it's disappointing. I think there's there's a much bigger gap of how you feel. UH, your reputation, ast to other people, because before nobody's talking here because you show up and you don't even know the person. You've never seen that. And the great thing is, like you can leave your you can leave and nobody knows anything about your your private life. Nobody knows anything about any of you. Go they want to contact you, they have to go to a damn pay phone and call you up with a quarter after looking you up in a phone book.

32:06 So all of that. It's you know, it's just a different time. And and the end was imminent with that. Oh, what was that? What was that Um Platform back in the baster? Yes, the end was imminent when that came about. It's like alright, done, it's done. The end is here, the end is near. The streaming companies don't get like sixty some crazy amount. So you know they'll be streaming, the artists will be streaming their songs and like after six months we were like, oh, I made two dollars and science off of royalty around the streams people, you know, people still. I don't understand it, but people still are paying to record albums. Would like do it almost I just you know, I don't. It's it's it's so weird. I'm I'm just kind of out of touch with that, with the whole with the way things are are are done now. I'm not I'm not close minded to it. I wanted, you know, I'm I'm more curious, even though, you know, I'm older and I've been through all that, but I'm more curious. I want to know how things work and but it's just, you know, when you get wrapped up in in the just the motions of life. Now, now music is for enjoyment and what I love is that I can access any

33:39 kind of music from anywhere and any minute of any moment of the day, you know, and that's something we definitely take it for granted. I mean when I just, you know, say Alexa, play this or play that, and you know I'm always looking for new music and new artists just to hear what other people are doing and just to know that I can do that all the time. I think it's just, you know, I think it's great. You know, back then it was just really, you know, just going at it with a shovel and a pick and a shovel, you know, but in comparison, but it was fun and everybody minded their business.

34:22 So that was the best thing. There are people who are really passionate about playing that, playing the music, and they want to perform. They're also passionate about performing and there's no place Tobat. So yeah, but I consider myself fortunate because in our Ameter when we have festivals, you know, I got involved with the community and Events and festivals and things and we created a stage. It's hard trying to figure out how to make everything work, because the whole thing about music is not even about making it, it's about promoting and brain me, which is unfortunate too. You are the product and you have to market yourself and that's that's if you don't know how to do that, you're shot to look and you have to be good, because if you're not, everybody you have a bad night. It's going on, it's going viral. So people are not not that forgiving, you know, they're not that forgifts, and people still want to hear like music. You know, people don't even think to hire a band anymore. You know, nobody would hire a band to play for things. Your phone up there put it on trouble exactly. Yeah, well, thank you for being my first episode and I think it's uh when years comes out and we'll do the same thing.

35:52 Do you have anything to plug? Here's essentials? Okay, well, we have about more to talk about, but we'll favorite cool. Thank you. Thanks for listening. If you like what you heard, check out cross the streams media dot com to hear more episodes of this podcast and the other shows on the cross the streams network. Don't forget to subscribe, rate and review on apple podcasts or wherever you download your favorite shows. visit cross the streams media dot com for more information. See you next time.