Unknown: My house, my old house there at nippers corner was kind
of like a wayward home for musicians that were deciding to
potentially move to Nashville. It was literally like, Can I
crash here for a week and check out Nashville? And everybody
ended up moving. They're like, Oh, my God, this is great. I can
get around. There's a lot of opportunities. It's affordable,
yeah,
that's changed. All that's Wow, yeah, yeah,
but I know what you mean, yeah, Franklin, Tennessee. If you go
to a, say, you go to a restaurant downtown Franklin,
the cork and the cow or something, yeah, you know, or
the Red Pony, you're paying as much as West Hollywood or
Manhattan.
Yeah, it's crazy. No, I know that's
where we went the other night. We went to the southern oh yeah,
oh yeah, so, but they have an amazing steak called, they're
really the bell. But here's the thing, is that about that steak?
Yeah? I think we, you know, I say we paid 60 some odd dollars,
yeah, but it came with all the accouterments.
It
came with. It wasn't a la carte, though, and it was a, it was a
good filet mignon. So it was an upper, a top cut, and it came
with sides. Came with, it came with veggies and mashes. There
you
go. There's always,
there's always hope.
This is the rich Redmond show.
Jim, what is up with you? Man, it's so good to see you. You
know, we're, we're catching up in a public forum, doing a
little housekeeping. So I got to play some reggae music the other
night. There's, you know, our friend, Troy lachetta, founding
member of the band Tesla, 35 years you know, has this new
project called risen the believer, super positive, high
energy, reggae inspired music. And I got to rattle some
tambourines and cowbells and play some blocks and dance
around at the city winery. It was awesome. Well, you were
doing hosting there, right? Well, yeah, I was MC I don't
know why. People just hand me a microphone. They said, Hey kid,
you look like you can handle this. And I got the cigar like,
hey, our next art It was fun because I got to introduce,
like, you know, these great recording artists. And we raised
a bunch of money for Sean Fuller, you know, he is the
longtime drummer for Florida, Georgia line. And now Tyler
Hubbard and his very young daughter. She's five years old.
Cora is suffering with, like, a rare form of, you know,
childhood leukemia, and so we raised a bunch of money for her.
And it was a very touching experience. I mean, there's
Nashville has an amazing community. I mean, you know,
I've spent time in the other music markets, and, no, there's,
it just doesn't compare. We have such an amazing, close, tight
knit, knit community here in Nashville. You know,
I it. It never, never fails to amaze me. Yeah, even back when
the big concert happened for the 2010 floods, the floods, yeah,
yeah, at a big charity concert at the Bridgestone, yeah, man,
all the, all the biggies got together. You did too, I think,
right,
we did something. We're always present at some of these things.
It feels good to help in any way we can. Yes, Can you feel my
excitement? I mean, we got a great guest today. We do so
great and it's so long overdue, because I've been in Nashville
28 years, and this gentleman and I will just like, we'll just
like, pass each other and like, like, ships in the night. And it
turns out, you know, we're like, seems like he's all Italian. I'm
half Italian, you know. And if you're half Italian is a really
strong gene, it's like, you're, you're all Italian, you know,
but be but this guy cooks. He's a he's a super talent, and he's
been calling Nashville home since 1992 hailing from the
Washington, DC area as a drummer. He's a songwriter, he's
a singer, he's a producer, he's a storyteller. He's got an
amazing new solo record coming out June 6, called exposed. And
he's played with the likes of Rodney Crowell, Roseanne, cash
Amy, Lou Harris, Carleen Carter, Shania Twain, the list goes on.
I was member of the group the cicadas. He's been playing with
Felix Cavalieri of the rascals for the last 20 plus years. Our
friend, Vince Santoro, What's up, brother, what's going on?
You covered a lot, dude, thanks for making the trip to Spring
Hill. I love it here, man, it's beautiful. It is quaint. Yeah,
yeah. You're in the Brentwood ish area, just north of Yeah,
yeah. Nice. And I watched the video because this was so great
about having this job. I get to do a deep dive and steal from
all my guests. I go to the YouTube channels. I go to
podcasts. I I binge your body of work and you have just been
doing I know I watched the video and it said you built your house
with your bare hands.
Are you? Are you a carpenter?
No, he somebody gave him a weird word, build. I was the general.
Oh, so
you had planned. I did a little sweeping. You disappointed? Did
you fix that?
Do you have a background in that? No, the lucky. God bless
you. It
was a very interesting thing. I bought the lot next in Creve
Hall. I bought an empty lot, and I thought I was just going to
leave it there, but then I played basketball at the Y with
a bunch of guys, and one of the guys is a big builder in the
area, and I just said, Hey, man, I'm thinking thinking of doing
this, and can you help me out? And he gave me a big list of
contractors, and said, You can do this. Yeah, so I went ahead
and did it, and I've done it three times, and now I'm done.
That was more affordable to do
that, oh, yeah, than buying a stock house that's pre built,
I would think so, yeah, because
you're getting everything, you're more in control the cost
at that point. And if you have a GC as we're building our new
property, yeah, that's about a 20% Yeah, charge that goes to
the GC to handle the project. So do the math. I mean, we're
spending, you know, we're spending six figures on this new
place. But, I mean, you take 20% off six figures, it's, yeah,
it's substantial. It's real money. Real money better in our
pocket than somebody else's. Well,
good for you. And I don't feel so bad about myself, because I
was like, wow, he's, he's a chef, and he's handy,
and he sings Andy, and he sings and right drums,
storyteller and and we got a lot of mutual friends, and we would
run each into each other at the Union. Are you still doing the
secretary treasure
job? No, okay, step down. Who did you pass that to? Will
Barrow? Oh, Will is right, yeah, yeah. And I believe he is about
to step down. So, yeah, the people, you know, they got, it's
got to work with your daily life, because you got to be
there for, you know, eight, nine hours a day, yeah, 10 to 10 to
five, right? 10 to 410, to four, nine to four, sounds like bank
hours. Exactly.
We weren't banking, but, yeah, now,
what is the role of the secretary treasurer. I mean,
what's a date? What was a day like for you?
Well, you know, this state is a right to work state, and because
of that,
okay, so Secretary Treasurer of what? Oh, sorry, Nashville
musicians
Association, which is a union, musicians union, and it really
has a history in this town, that's,
that's an elected position. I take it is okay, so you have to,
I mean, is it one of those things, like an HOA, because
they have those, those, the President, the Vice President,
the Secretary Treasurer, and, oh gosh, well, they have staff,
yeah, and some volunteers and stuff like that, yeah. But is it
kind of one of those voluntold positions, or is it like a
highly coveted position?
Well, it kind of depends. I mean, you know, it pays decent,
but, you know, I was probably making less than that, so it
looked great to me, but that wasn't really the issue. The
issue was I was not working as much through my, you know,
through my own decision to not work as much and and I figured,
well, what can I do? So I really talked to Dave Pomeroy, who's a
Redskins fan, along with me, and we both moved down here from the
DC area, but he said that he might be needing, you know,
something at the time, and it just kind of came about that
there was an opening. And he appointed me, and then I was
reelected. Oh, wow, so, but the deal as being a secretary
treasurer in this town, yeah, it's a little different than in
New York, because in New York you can tell people that they
have to join the union, yes, and in this state, you can't do
that. And so you really got to have some value for your
prospective client. You got to sell it. You kind of got to sell
it. And we do have a rehearsal hall. So, I mean, there are,
there's a lot of pluses that are offered to a member, yeah, in
Nashville, and is that's that became the secretary.
Treasurer's job is to keep that stuff rolling. I think
I've been a member for about at least 30 years here, though,
what was first Dallas with Ray hair, yeah, who's our national
president now, I believe right? And then I moved here in 1997
you came here in 92 right before the big gone country booming.
Yeah, great timing. Yes.
Dave is so unique in the fact that if you've got to be
someplace and on stage and plan, I'll be there way in advance, as
you saw, yeah, early today, and I'm setting up and I'm I'm
relaxing before he has a show. Five minutes before, downbeat,
bam, pulls in, sets up, boom, let's go. I've never, never
experienced a cat with that ability. He's amazing.
So he's kind of a staple here in town, in the Union especially,
yeah, oh, wow, yeah. And what
was his big job that he had, Don Williams? He played with Don
Williams for a very long time,
yeah, yeah. And he was a big call on for sessions. Oh, big
time. Yeah, yeah. Very accomplished now, but now he's
big time in the union. And, you know, I think he's on the on the
Federation's board, yeah. So he's doing a
lot, and if I'm missing a check I go running,
he's the guy to talk to, man, you know?
Well, that is fantastic. And so, originally from the DC area, and
what, how did you pick up the drums? You have a musical
family.
I wouldn't say that we have a musical family. What happened
was my brother, who is eight years my senior, he had a band
called the dimensions, and they were, you know, it was kind of
like a surf band. They didn't even have a singer that a sax
player. They did, like, walk, don't run and stuff like that.
And then he went off to college and left his kit in the basement
and put a big sheet over and I said, I'm like, a mess. That
sheet off. That. And so I started listening to records and
putting on earphones and playing along. And it kind of became
something I wanted to
do, yeah, did it come supernaturally? Rick, you just
knew how to play, boom, boom, cock, a Bucha, boom, Pa right
away. Or, I don't know
about that, because everything, anything, anything good, is
going to have a beginning point and so, but mainly it was my
enthusiasm. I mean, you know, this is at the time we're
talking, I'm gonna think it was like 1968 and so stuff was
starting to happen. You had the Beatles, you had the kinks, you
had the stones, you had then Hendrix came out. Oh my God. And
when I first heard the Hendrix, and even Led Zeppelin after
that, it just, it was so in me, I just kind of had to keep
rocking with it.
Now, do you fancy yourself a rock drummer before anything
else? Probably, yeah. You know me too. I tell everybody I'm an
over educated, yeah. So if you want to hear that song go, I
could do it. It's not going to be as good as the guy that comes
from the country. Related to that, if you're listening to
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So the early influences, all the bands, yeah, you know, I'm
sorry, and so did you? Were you in front of the television for
the Beatles 1964 Yeah,
wow. And I had two older sisters, one in particular that
was just, she was over the moon. And so the girl's bedroom was
just, you know, everything people's posters, everything,
everything little dolls and everything. And, you know, so I
saw that happening, and I said, Man, this is really and then I
started to listen, yeah. And it really became, it just got
a hold, yeah, man, how about that? Ringo, 80 years young,
yes,
and plays wonderfully full of
life. He's got his marbles. He's just like full of life. He
really
is. Felix played in one of the iterations of his bands,
the All Star band, yeah. How about that? Greg Bissonette, 22
years playing with the Ringo the master, yeah, legend. Have you
gotten to interact with Ringo? Or I haven't one of your you
know how they say, be careful when you meet your heroes. I
know. Have you met any of your heroes where they were kind of
like, what? What one?
Yeah, but I'm not gonna make so
I'm trying to think, what do the names rhyme with
his initials are? You
know? What's really funny is that we might have a lot, I
mean, a lot of the same heroes. So obviously, you know, Bonham
on a moon, Ringo, Charlie, and then, of course, I love the
apostle brothers, yeah, you know, I love Carmen. I Sandy
Gennaro was, was kind of a hero of mine. He's right here in
town, you know. So Sandy crashed in my place. You convinced him
to move here. Yeah, is that right? My My house, my old house
there at nippers corner was kind of like a wayward home for
musicians that were deciding to potentially move to Nashville.
It was literally like, Can I crash here for a week and check
out Nashville, and everybody ended up moving. They're like,
Oh, my God, this is great. I can get around. There's a lot of
opportunities. It's affordable, yeah,
that's changed. All that's Wow, yeah, yeah, but I know what you
mean, yeah, Franklin,
Tennessee, if you go to a, say, you go to a restaurant in
downtown Franklin, the cork and the cow or something, yeah, you
know, or the Red Pony, you're paying as much as West Hollywood
or Manhattan, and it's crazy. No, I know that's where
we went the other night. We went to the southern oh
yeah, oh yeah, so, but they have an amazing steak called, they're
really the bell. But
here's the thing, is that about that steak? Yeah, I think we,
you know, dare I say we paid 60 some
odd dollars, yeah? But again. With all the accouterments it
came with.
It wasn't a la carte, though, and it was a, it was a good
filet mignon. So it was an upper, a top cut, sir. And it
came with sods came with. It came with veggies and mashis.
There
you go. There's always a, you know, there's always hope for
$60 we made a really expensive poop. This is how, you know, we
are successful men. We can clog our arteries with red meat. Try
to thin it out with a little bit of red wine. It doesn't really
clog your arteries. No, it doesn't, you know, because the
more I eat paleo, like, you know, hunter gatherer, just the
more energy I have. You do. It's tough, you know? It's tough
because our cultural tradition, I think my people are from
Napoli, which is more seafood, right? Yes. But no matter what
you do, there's, there is, there's the pasta, right? But
the American version of pasta is, is like a drug and like,
it's like eating a loaf of bread and you got to take a nap. But,
you know, we, we have, I have friends in Europe that are like,
Man, I eat pizza and pasta all the time. I'm fine. It does. It
doesn't do the same. Like Mike Tarana. He's this killer metal
drummer that lives in Sardinia. Wow. We had him on, I don't
know, about a year ago, and he's like, Man, I eat pizza and pasta
every day. And he's like, he's checked
well, does he walk like, 40 miles a day? Because that's
probably what they're doing. They walk. But
the thing is, you hear from everybody, I had a set A friend
of mine go. She went overseas, I believe, to Italy, and she's
like, Yeah, the food, the food doesn't give you gut bomb. You
need a nap, you know, because their food is pure, doesn't have
all the crap in it, yeah, it's our food supply here is awful.
Well, I
have cousins in bati Paglia, which is nabolita, yeah? And the
first night there, they put a bowl of tomatoes, and I couldn't
they actually looked very pale, and not that appetite, but they
were unbelievable succulent. So I'm saying, I'm agreeing with
you that something is going on in the soil, or whatever it is
in the water.
They're making the color more appear appealing, for sure, but
maybe it's not supposed to be that violent, what I'm thinking,
right? Yeah, yeah. But you go to LA and you go some of the fruit
stores, the colors of the fruit are off the charts, yeah? The
best
strawberries, the best kind of, any kind of berry in the world,
is in Southern California. Yeah,
I've seen the strawberries. They're as big as your fist,
yeah, but are those?
But that's the thing. They're not supposed to be that big. I
don't know if that's a good thing or chicken
breast the size of your four
on a good they grow in two weeks.
It's weird. There are so those strawberries come from the
fields there in Oxnard, California. I know exactly are
you? DW, that's where they grow. The drums. DW, drum, drum
workshop. Oh, because I've seen videos of you playing, do you
but back, back, every back line. So are you endorsing a certain
drum
company or, uh, Pearl, but I, you know, it's been, well, 25
years from when I was playing with Rodney. Yeah, that's even
more Wow. So
let's talk about that. Okay, you have. Can we talk about Pearl
real quick? Oh, yeah, sure.
Pearl over the because I started out, sorry, not to hijack it. I
started out with on, like, an export set back in the 90s, late
80s, yes, yeah. And that was, like, considered to be the entry
level, yeah, these exports are, they're nice now, yeah, I hear
you. I mean, not that they weren't nice ever, but I mean
they were nice entry level kit. There's, like, premium, like,
all the premium stuff that you came up knowing, the maples, the
birches, those were the premium price drum kits. You know, I
think pearl back then was a mahogany, the export.
Oh, yeah, I didn't have the export, yeah, but
man, I mean, I was at Guitar Center today, and I looked at a
PDP kit, yeah, that had a carbon fiber wrap to it. Wow, it was,
you know, it was a wrap. It was a sharp looking kit. But, I
mean, a PDP is, it's a premium kit, pretty much. I mean,
dude, I have some PD. I have a set of PDPs with the wood hoops
that I leave in LA. And it is perfect for, like, singer, song
or writers. Americana, super warm, super affordable. Every
drum company now is making entry level kits, like production
kits, which from 600 to $1,200 that are off the charts, that
have this. You know,
that's doable. You've convinced me to look into the Yamahas
stage customs. You said stage custom, but I'm looking into the
touring custom. Wow. Like, you know, the mid range,
yeah. Like, not now, when? Not the C class, but the E Class,
yeah,
yeah, yeah. Mercedes, Okay, nice. And that's good. Thank
you, see.
But see a drummer that a draw, you know, a good drummer can
play just about it even CB seven was 700 with hydraulic heads
from 1980 covered in duct tape. You know what I mean. It's
because the tone is in your hands. You know what I
mean, and damping and all that.
Yeah, a lot of it is a tuning in the heads, I guess. Yeah,
because that's an art tuning. Tuning,
yeah, but some guys get all wrapped up in the science of it,
and really it's more of a dark art. It's like, turn the key
until the drum sounds good. Try to match. Love. To lug and then
you will have a relationship between the top and the bottom
head. Most guys will go two ways to go, both heads the same
pitch, right? Or the bottom head a little tighter, which gives
you a little bit more of a rock and roll pitch bend, which I
like, I'm a fan of that
the dough, yeah, dude, yeah. Maybe that's that's been my
problem. Yeah, I've been tuning it down. No,
you got to have the bottom head a little tighter than the top. I
did not know that. Yeah, wow. Okay, I got this, you got this
feel betterment, yeah, yeah. And we had, you know, if, if you
fancy that, you don't have the greatest ear, you know, like
you're the worst timpanist in the eighth grade. You can use
the drum dial to set the pitch of the heads perfectly, so you
have a perfect starting point. And then you could tweak to
taste, which, by
the way, if you need a drum dial, we have three for sale on
marketplace. It's
not gonna really do us any good if there's someone in Croatia.
But
well, hey, you know we could ship. They could pay for
shipping. Are you having fun winning? Yes, I'm just so glad.
I'm just so glad we're connecting like this. But I
would say that you cornered the market like you definitely have
this angle where you're playing with these amazing I mean, we're
talking like the creme de la creme, singer songwriters,
storytellers, the Rodney crows, the Roseanne cashes, the Emmy
Lou Harris's, the Carlene cars, Mary Chapin Carpenter, I mean,
that is right up my I mean, that is awesome. So is, is that like
a type of music that you just love, or is that something that
happened from relationships, mostly
relationships, but, but I've the ones that I felt lucky to land,
yeah, because it did speak to me. Yeah. Hey, I stay with it as
long as I can. Yeah, and that's why I'm staying with Felix,
because I grew up on that stuff and tell us about that gig,
yeah, yeah, that's a great gig. It began, I'm going to say it
was probably, what, 98 or something like that. And at that
time I had, well, I'd been in Nashville for a little bit, but
I had heard that Felix was living in Nashville, yeah, and
in his band was Michael Rhodes on bass and George Marinelli on
guitar, yeah. And I think that was kind of the band and a
bunch of slackers, man, a bunch, yeah. So, so I decided
to join the slackers. Well, I went down and rehearsed with
them, and then Marinelli and Michael Rhodes ended up not
staying with the band that long, but we got Mike Sievers on
guitar, fabulous guitar player. And we've kind of bounced around
with bass players. So, you know we're looking to right now we
have a guy whom you may know. His name is, um, is, uh, Graham.
Maybe now he was in Joe Jackson's band. Oh, wow. Okay,
really. Great player, so we've changed some seats, but it's
always the same music. And I just, I just love the music.
What do you guys play? Like 3040, shows a year started
out to be 40, yeah. It went through some changes. They did a
big reunion where Dino came back, you know, to Nelly. Yeah.
Fabulous player. He was the one that did the yeah and and throw
the stick like, way up in the air, yeah, and somehow it came
right back. And then, you know, so we've gone, like, I say, some
changes, but it's just been, it's kind of fluctuate between,
let's say, 30, around 30 days a year. Yeah, we're doing a bunch
of stuff with Frankie Valli at the ice at the end of the
summer. And, oh, what? And I think Steve Miller, oh yeah,
bunch of opening day, yeah, that'll be
great. I saw Steve at the little new venue we have there on the
left. We pass it when you come. It's his first link. What's
that? First Bank amp, First Bank amphitheater. It's right there
on the left before you hit June lake. It's
one of those places that you have. You've seen it over here.
No, over 65 it
seats like 7000 people or so. Yeah, Steve Miller was there.
What two summers ago is fun. Yeah, our good
friend Todd Zuckerman is going to be there. And I think in
July,
with the sticks, with the sticks, with the sticks in his
hand. But the funny thing is,
is that that place, it's a real you'd think that would be a
nightmare to get in and out of because there's one road, but
they do a really good job of traffic management. This is
nice, and it's a nice place to see a show. It really is. It
really
is. It's like a Greek theater type. Never even
heard of it. Little bit of red rocks going on there. Cool.
Yeah. Well,
we're getting so many new ventricles. We just got the
pinnacle. There's a new, new venue called the pinnacle, and
then we've got that. I don't, I don't know where it is. I just
know that, you know, Eric Pritchard was playing with Megan
Moroney, and I wanted to go see, see him play, but he said was a
Nashville show, so he couldn't get me to, you know, that is
hometown show. Forget it. You know, you deserve that ticket.
Oh, that's sweet this week, Eric. But so do you open or
close with good, love and close? Yeah, that.
That's the closer. But you know, people got to be free. Leads up
to that and grooving. He's got a lot of hits. He does, he likes,
you know, he's a real fan. Of R and B. He grew up with all that
Curtis Mayfield stuff. And, you know, we do some departures,
yeah? And he wants to do that. He wants to do, you know, some
of the old hits and just little pieces of them. So it fills out
the night
fly dates kind of a thing, mostly, yeah, jump on the plane.
There's a back line drum set, yeah, and everything,
yeah, you know, amps, everything. Do you ship your
symbols so you have your own person. I do not you just play
local symbols.
That's what I'm doing, that you adapt,
improvise and overcome.
I'm afraid that that is the case, yeah? Because it's like,
you know, again,
I have a gig coming up, and, hey, do you want to use the
house kit? And I'm like, Well, what is it? It was a maypex,
yeah, Saturn, yeah, and, but you
don't know of all the widgets and the belts that are going to
be there. No,
I never know. You never know, bringing
my stuff prepared? Yeah, obviously, this show is going to
be airing after the fact, but, you know, we're recording it
beforehand, but I'm going to bring all my stuff, man.
I tell you, I envy being that way, but I've just never the kit
that's there. That's the one that I want to play. You know? I
just don't want to. That's a cool thing. Well, it's like a
surprise, and it's an adventure, and it does it kind of lifts you
up a little a notch. Now, of course, it'd be great if it was
my kid, but I'm happy doing it, yeah. But
what happens if you show up and there's like, some like, like,
crack to ride and 16 inch crashes. It happens, man,
you make the best, adapt, improvise, overcome. I once
arrived
at an outdoor gig where there was nothing but rod symbols,
nothing but rides, but
can the audience and the band tell or is it just you? Well,
I they heard me screaming, yeah. No, no, it was so ride cymbals
breaking your wrists. I asked the
guy. I said, Look, man, these are ride cymbals. Now you
understand that I've got to have some crash, so please take care
of that, sir. And you know, he disappeared, and then I never
saw him again. So he was like, okay,
ride cymbals is what it is, my God?
Well, you hear those horror stories about Broadway, and it's
funny because I think it's on the Nashville drummers Facebook
page is at least opposed to two a week of like, whoever is is
took the symbol clutch from, you know, you know, nudie.
Please return it. And God,
there is a cat named John root. John root, yeah, who? I don't
know. Who pays him. I think it might be the some of the
families that own some of the bigger drum companies, right?
It's either he's going down on behalf of the drum companies
that are stocking the pond down there, or he's paid by the
families, the conglomerate, the restaurant groups that own some
of those clubs, to maintain the drum sets. He's a great guy.
Yes, he is, and he and he's
a great drummer, really, and he's does a great job doing
that. I mean, putting kids,
he puts himself out there and hung a shingle. Hey, I'll come
by on a weekly basis, almost like mowing lawns. Well, the
weird thing is, a freaking lefty. He's cleaning drums. He's
changing heads. He's making sure there's felts, yeah. He's oiling
the bass, drum pedals, yeah. And he's Brooks and drum Dunn's drum
tuck, yeah. Really for Trey gray. You know Trey, right?
Never met Trey gray. So, so besides yourself, he was one of
these early young buck rock drummers to come and shake shit
up in Nashville. What's his name? Trey gray. He was with
Faith Hill for the longest time in the 90s, and then he's been
with Tim McGrath, and then he is now with Brooks and Dunn for
some time, and did a stint with Reba as well. Sometimes Reba and
Brooks and double share a band, right? And anyways, I'm gonna
get to see him at the end of the month, because we are doing
Fenway on the 30th. Oh, nice. Yeah, done. And, and Jason LD,
it's gonna be a good, good bill in Boston.
But Boston Boston, dare I say, corkscar pack
the cat. Mark Wahlberg Dunkey, get
out of here. That's wicked monster. Wicked pista,
so why Nashville did did Manhattan or Hollywood ever call
your name? Yeah,
but you know, those were years ago, and I just really was
hanging out in DC after making stints like with Kathy McDonald
in LA, yeah. And we opened up for Earth, Wind and Fire during
the all the Paramount Theater circuit and yeah. And then I was
sitting there and my buddy, and you'll know him, Stuart Smith,
yeah, he was a DC guy, and he must have been talking to
Rodney, and Rodney needed a drummer in addition to a guitar
player, and he just called and said, Hey, would you be
interested? And I said, Sure. So we both came down and became
part of the band. Yeah, that's what got us here.
Now I heard somewhere, little birdie told me that when you
came to Nashville, you were juggling four gigs at the same
time. Well, that's what I was, yeah, yeah, amazing,
yeah, wow. And then, you know, Roy Bucha, and passed away
during that time, so now
I wasn't familiar with him, so because of you, I went and I did
a deep dive on Roy Bucha and cool, kind of, like bluesy, hell
yeah. And kind of a guitar, God, yeah. He and Danny Gatton are
both DC guys, and you would think that they would get along
with each other. They had some weird feud going on, but I think
it was mainly just for publicity. Yeah, you know what
I'm saying? Like, oh, he left a cigarette on my amp man, and it
burned on the coat the tolax. And so I've never, I've never
liked him since, but I think that's all baloney, you know.
But they're, they were big deal. And he's, you know, Roy just
really didn't take care of himself, and he passed away. But
during that time, I was playing with Edgar Winter and Rodney and
Roseanne. So yeah, but then when I came down here, it really made
sense to make a thing out of it, yeah, man,
Edgar Winter, so you got to play Frankenstein. Oh yeah. And he
was on the Tim Bali is doing the thing. He does anything. Did we
just do that? So it was so funny, you know? And I
did a look to camera while
you were doing he broke, he broke the fourth wall, just like
the office. Thank you, Michael, so, so you have, may have had
some, some scares, some like injury scares, over the years,
but just 25 days ago, I was doing the dishes, and I was
washing a coffee mug like this. The coffee mug lacerated my
money backbeat finger right here. My wanna, why did
it do that just broke off and then
blood spraying all over the wall and everything. So 25 days ago,
my life was, I was like, Oh my God, my career is over. Healed
up so beautifully. But I was supposed to go to Texas and play
with this amazing student percussion ensemble, and one of
the pieces was gonna be Frankenstein. Nice. Yeah. So
anyways, I sent Jim Riley from the rascal flats to do it. He
jumped right in with the kids. He did. I'm sure it was
great. But did they have a timbali player to do
the thing? I'm sure he went. That's amazing.
But no, Edgar is one of those guys that can play every
instrument on the
stage, man. And he's a virtuoso sax player. He's a drummer. I
mean, he's a drummer, is this actually, is a great singer. I
don't know where he stopped, yeah. And he's still hitting it.
Apparently, that's
amazing that you have that, you know, and that's something Nancy
put in your back pocket rock and roll history, right there. Yeah,
yeah.
His first record
is the jazzier one, yeah. And we did a couple things off that
too. So it was really cool. Really
cool. That's amazing. Yeah, fantastic. And then I ripped out
that cicadas record. That had to be really fun. Now, when is it?
How often did the cicadas come? Is it every 13 years?
I think it's two different things. They're, they're Yeah. I
mean, that's one, yeah. And then there's the 20 something year,
yeah.
And they come out and just hump their brains out and die. Make
a lot of noise, so noisy they make the ground really crunchy.
Yeah, man. I mean, those songs were, wow, yeah, really, really
good songs. Yeah. Now what I It wasn't Rodney trying to make a
effort on that record to, like, be outside of the normal country
machinery, just a little bit. Yeah. So were you guys playing,
like, rock rooms and, yeah,
that kind of stuff. And we did, you know, a bunch of to the New
York TV shows and stuff. And I think we were really because of
the people involved. It was based on, if these songs hit
radio, we would do it in a bigger way. But it kind of
didn't ever happen like that, even though we did. I mean, I
thought some of that stuff was perfect for radio. Yeah, the one
that they chose to spread around was a sort of down tempo, but it
was just, you know, Michael Rhodes on bass, Stewart on
guitar, and if things had taken off, I think we would have done
something, but you know that people kind of had a lot on
their plate. Yeah,
and I'm blown away by your ability as a singing drummer.
First of all, you got a great voice, but it's almost like it's
like your fifth limb, and it comes with extreme coordination,
like we're having Mr. Stanley Lynch on on Friday. Oh, he can
do that thing. So I'm sure you guys have crossed paths over
years.
Yeah? Well, I think he co wrote one of the songs on the cicadas,
ready? I believe so fantastic,
yeah, but to do that is a is a great skill set, and I'm sure
it's been an asset for you, because, like, we want a strong
vocal band. Well, you, you know, you're covering it, yeah, that's
great.
Well, it helps and, you know, it also helps me, because I'm more
into the song. I'm deeper into the presentation of the song.
It's
amazing. How many Jim Don't you think a lot of drummers, they
don't take the time to understand the the actual
storytelling and what is being told here, because that's gonna,
like, inform what's the tuning on the snare drum? Is it
brushes, or is it sticks? Do I want to use symbols with rivets,
or how about mallets? I mean, is. And all that stuff is going
to be informed by the the involvement,
and what your involvement, if you're singing it, or even if
you're just singing backups, yeah, you're following it a lot.
Yeah, it's
a lot of stuff that you know, how many? What's the percentage
of the entire, let's say, USA drumming community that
understands that notion, that concept of needing different
symbols, like what you're talking about, brushes versus
brushes versus sticks is one thing. But hey, I need a highly
tuned snare. I want another douche snare, you know, a little
bit lower tuned, that kind of thing. How many drummers
understand that in the general collective, you know, especially
the percentage of drummers that can sing not just backup, but
sing lead, yeah. You know, you look at Phil Collins, you play
in the air tonight. That's not, you know, once the drums kick
in, it's seemingly easy, but there's a lot of like, the fills
and the way he constructed that song is very tasteful, but
there's complication to it. Yeah, and he's singing over
Yeah. But wait a minute,
I think in concert,
Chester would cover the
No, you there's actually a live video of Phil.
Had to have been a time, yeah, yeah. It hadn't been a time. You
could see YouTube where he basically does a slow walk
leading up to goo goo goo Gong, you know the big Phil, yeah, but
he times it to where he sits out of the drums right in time.
That's and then, and then he plays the rest of the song. And
he's singing with the, you know, the Madonna mic and gun. And
he's doing that. Did you guys any singing over,
dude? It's, no, it's, it's a thing. It, it
scrambles through my brain, yeah, to think about it, yeah.
You know, on Henley. You know, we did one year. You know, the
bands really are thoughtful these days about choosing their
walk on music, you know. So the house is dark and you got to
walk on music, and you got to time. It just right. So
everybody gets to their instruments, and then, boom,
they'll hit the lake. So we would, we had that one years
ago. And then, then you're on, then we're on, cool. It
was also you would use in the air, and five
years ago, oh, really, yeah, pre pandemic, that's cool. Was it a
pre produced thing that they take the track and kind of,
like, you know, like, what I would do, or I would take the
track and do, doing good on, good on good on go, and then
put, like, a reverb on that last hit.
I think our, I think our sound guy, like, was just using, you
know, the mp three of the song, and then he would just pull it
down, yeah, yank it down. Manual, analog dude, yeah, yeah,
I'll just produce it. But what a musician. What a that. Phil
Collins, wow, to play fusion the way he did. And then, you know,
just drum sound, yeah. I mean, you know, Brand X, with
Brand X, he was playing straight up British fusion. And then,
then, then everything got more pop sensibility. And there's
like, I'll sing, you know, Peter Gabriel's, let's try foot. Good
boy. They auditioned a lot of guys, and they didn't like
anyone to to do what sing or play drum to sing, yeah. And
they're like, and so Phil's like, I'll try it. And then as
soon as soon as he started singing either, like, home,
that's pretty amazing.
Look at together. Great, great. Yeah, Dino, my goodness, he
sounds better than the freaking guy singing, yeah, I mean, you
hear him sing, mother, father,
Dean Castronovo, Oh, gotcha. You know, I'm both. I'm thinking
about Dino DINELLI. No, you know
Dean castrono, not a singer, a personality like a look him up
on on YouTube, singing mother, father,
well, he can definitely, oh my. He can front, he confront, any
band. So, so now, singing a song you're so now closely, somewhat
closely related to this storytelling one man show thing.
So, so that is such a great concept. So Jim, let me catch up
to speed. So Vince has a thing where he does like a one man
show, where he will, he'll play drum accompaniment and basically
do like I watched the video, long form poetry, spoken word.
Yeah, you're rapping, and you pack the house. Every video I
see, there's a very enthusiastic audience. It's
very, it was very intense prepping for those, yeah,
because you got to, not only know, I mean, it's an essay,
basically, you know, each piece is an essay, or that I've
written, and I got to memorize it, because I'm not going to sit
there with charts, no prompter, and I can't do that. Gotta feel
but then you can't just memorize it. You You've kind of got to be
able to talk it. You got to activate, because I'm also
doing, you know this, and I can't overpower it with the
drums. It was, it was really, where did that idea come from?
I'll be honest with you. Do you know who mitten Sparks is no.
Mitten Sparks is a woman that me and my wife know and we're
friends with, and she does spoken word, and she uses John
Jackson on guitar, and it was similar to what I did, but I saw
her do that, and I just figured this. This is. Cool, and I've
been writing, and I gotta try it. I gotta see if I can do this
thing where I'm not relying on other accompaniment, that I'll
be my own accompaniment. I'll be able to stop when I want to
stop. I'll be able to accent when I want to accent. Yeah, and
it became a thing, and I started putting it together. But it's a
pain in the butt to do, man, it's just so hard to do it and
do it like it's natural. How many pieces of that do you have?
Well, on on my
DVD, on my live DVD, I guess there's 10 pieces, wow, but I
got 20 some. That's,
that's like, an America's Got Talent kind of thing. Well,
yeah, but you know, you can hear it on that show. Yeah,
I could do it. I could do it on the show. But I tell you, just
prepping for it is such a effort. It's, it's
definitely, it's Creek, as I saw it. You sent me the video
yesterday. I was like, wow, that's out there, huh? Yeah,
yeah. I was like, you know, here I am shaking off the rust of not
playing for the past 20 years, and I'm like, and this guy's
freaking telling stories and rapping
way behind. It was unique. It was a unique effort. But, man,
it's just so hard to do.
Yeah, but I appreciate because you pull it off very smoothly.
Yes,
thanks. Yeah. I, I would. I want to see the DVD. I don't have a
DVD player
that will that will not work. I'll send you some stuff. Yeah?
Send you something
like, You need to go in and make clips out of that and put it on
tick tock Instagram. I actually like, you need help with that.
Let me know, because that's, that's something that's virality
potential, yeah? I mean,
okay, yeah, you'll be the guy that's like, Hey, have you seen
the guy that does the thing? Yeah? Like, yeah, Chip
Ritter, the juggling drummer. You're right. Basically, I mean,
yeah, it's like, I like, Chip, yeah. Chips. A cool guy. He's
nice. He loves, he loved commenting on my when Spencer
used to play with me, yeah, he would comment in the Facebook
comments,
yeah, I've been around him a lot. He's a nice guy. He will.
He got to do stupid, Human Tricks on Letterman was great,
but I'm serious, you know, I saw it. That's the first thing.
Like, one of my giftings and super superpowers is knowing
talent when I see it, not you know, of course, you're
talented. You got a resume that's that's like Everest. But
you know, for something like this, you see a lot of guys on
on Instagram that are circus drumming. They, you know, all
the speed and, you know, doing all these, you know, mind
blowing. Let's reinvent Tom Sawyer, because it needs to be
like, No, you don't do that. You that's, that's sacred. You
don't, you don't touch that song, Italian guy, whatever your
name, with the beard and Mustang, and
I can't remember the guy's name, he's incredible. Yeah,
he won hand Yeah,
glass of wine on a snare drum, and he doesn't spill
it, right? It's like when you saw a mattress come and he's
also
smoking 420 at the same time, right?
Yeah, that's the pario, or something like that. Estepario.
Esteparia, yeah, so guy, that's the guy. But the thing is, is
that as you become as I get older, you realize it's like,
yeah, that's cool and all, but where's the, where's the nuance,
where's the tastefulness? Yeah, you know what I mean. Look
up this guy on YouTube playing with Felix Cavallari, and
there's a, there was a, there's a, somebody got you playing
right behind the horn section, four feet from you. And you can
hear the some of the sections. You the guys just want to move
it forward. And Vince is just like, just smile, like, Dude,
this is just pocket for but, and then, you know, there's one
section of the song where you're kind of like, slamming this.
Slamming the stick, like in the head. Was like, it's like, a
choice. And then there's another section where you're like, off
to the side, getting different sound. Another side, you like,
lighten your touch. It's like, directly in the head. It's like,
it's great, man. It's amazing.
What boredom will drive you to,
no, no, just trying to have some dynamics. You know
what I mean? I think boredom kind of feel about that boredom,
but, you know, it's like, okay, now I'm comfortable here, yeah?
How do I become more uncomfortable? That's
probably a good, good
way of putting it, yeah, where did you know so Nick Pellegrino,
Steve Marcantonio, I could start, start all the, the Manja
guys, the Manja guys. So Irish, so you've ever been to manga,
the eight course Italian restaurant over there, off of,
like, eighth Ave. It's still an Eighth Avenue, we probably
Craighead, so it's okay. What an experience. And what you do is
it's, it's, it's a traditional Italian meal in the sense that
it's multi course, and it takes about three hours. Yeah, because
you're dancing, you're gonna be dancing so you can digest and
then you're ready for another course. And then here comes a
glass of wine and Bucha. It's a great European experience. It's
amazing. So, so you know, with the American Mark Antonio, he
will not let me into the cool kids club, because I'm only half
right. So he got to be FBI. He keeps me like this. He's like,
No, you're only half the time. Any. Days I got invited to my
own ginzo night. That's good, good. So I got a ginzo night
with you still do it. It's with Jim capolino, Mark capellino,
and Neal capellino. So all the capelinhos are there. And it's
like, once a month, and it's, it's a five, six hour night
where we start with the aperitifs, really, and then
slowly but surely, here's, here's a little white, here's a
little red, here comes out the next thing. Then we're doing the
salads. Then we sit down to the main course, and then somebody
come. We got the coffee, we got dessert, booming, cigars,
whiskey, go deep. Man. It was awesome. That's fantastic. Can
we maybe we need to invite you and me? Maybe we have in the
house here, bring those guys tell Hey, why don't we do this
down here now? Oh yeah, a Spring Hill experience,
yeah. Well, I bet. I mean, Nick, Nick will cater, you know?
Oh, yeah, yeah. And, you know, that whole Manja thing began
before the restaurant where we were just doing pot luck
at each other's house. So that was your ginzo night. So I'm
just happy I got invited this ginzo night. Do you know Steven?
Steven farella, he's a songwriter. So he's, he's the
one. He's, he's like, Hey, Redmond, you know, come on, do
your own thing. That's cool. You only have it's fine. We won't,
we won't tell, we won't tell anybody to
be okay. Because I'm I have an Irish last name, but I'm 42%
Jewish, as I've come to find out.
There's, there's no Italian in you. I think
there's a pretty significant I believe I'm a lot Italian. Yes,
I checked. Well, I'm a very minimal Irish. I'm afraid
to do the 23 and meet. They got hacked. Yeah. Oh, what is that?
Everybody's DNA information. You know, your genetic testing, your
family roots in life. So the website got a got attack. For
what reason somebody wants this, all this information on these
oops, yeah, that's weird, and I don't like it. I don't like it
either, because, you know, first of all, Siri is listening,
right? Siri, I never have Siri on, and people have bought me
Alexis. I've got two Alexis, and I've never taken her out of the
box.
Well, I mean, there was actually that time we were sitting there
and I said, you know, Courtney, my wife, I said, it's funny that
you think that these machines that are in here are actually
listening to us and plotting our destruction. And we laughed,
yeah. And Courtney left, and my daughter laughed, Alexa laughed.
Siri laughed. She laughed like this, exactly, man, she totally
did, totally laugh. And then we realized we're done.
So tell us about this new record, because you have put out
solo records before, but this is the one where the first one
where you have written all of the songs that you were
performing, yeah, and it's fantastic, and it was produced
by George and yourself, right? George, Mary
George gets production credit, yes, yeah, for
those that don't know, George is the guitar player with Bonnie
Raitt, Bonnie
Raitt and the range before that, yeah, you know Bruce orange
piece?
Yeah, he was a founding member. Was he not of so your brother
probably knows all about that. I'm sure he does. Yeah. Jim's
brother is a keyboard player who plays in many tribute bands in
the Detroit
Yeah. Oh, okay, so we had dinner with him the other night. He
was, it's always lovely to see my brother. Yeah, and he he
talked about, what do you ask you about John bolo? Oh, Johnny,
yeah, do you know this drummer? We have met, we have not met in
the flesh, but of course, we know John
Molo is a DC guy, yeah. And so I knew him when I was playing in
local bands in DC. He was in the nowhere men. I think it was the
nowhere men. And, you know? And he always was like, he was okay,
yeah. And then he got really good, and he gave me a call, I'm
gonna say 10 years after that, so, like, probably around the
before, just before I moved to Nashville, and he called up and
he said, Hey Vince man, you know, I'm looking for a drummer
to for this, this project I'm doing, because now he's a bigger
shot. Is he like, he's in LA and he's putting together bands and
producing bands. And he said, she said, yeah, man, we're
looking, we're looking for a drummer. And I'm starting to
think, man, he's asked me, we're looking for somebody like a,
like a young Vince Santorum. And I went, No way. Oh yeah, oh
yeah. And then this Hornsby thing. These guys are practical
jokers to the map. Oh really, oh yeah. I would get these weird
calls. And it's, it's, it's Bruce Hornsby on the phone
saying, Yeah, Vince, hey, listen, I wanted to talk to you,
and they're jacking me up. Marinelli is sitting there
crying right next to him, laughing. These guys, they just
put you through hell, and they don't realize what they're
like dangling a carrot in front of you. Yeah? Oh yeah.
You know, whatever it takes for them to get their yayas. Wow.
Wonderful, brutal, wonderful friends.
Yeah? I mean, some guys really take that to the you know, we're
not a super practical joke band
that's like grounds for you know, dude, I'm gonna freaking
You better not. You ever sleep with the one eye open for crying
out loud.
I know it got that way
young Vincent
or I went, what? What do you mean calling me like that? Yeah,
because in 1990 90. You know, around 1990 I was, I
was younger.
You still are young, totally,
my God, man, that's right, so exposed. Tell us about the tell
us about the record. Well,
it came. It really kind of came as a surprise, because there's
one cut on that too familiar sight that I had actually
recorded probably 10 years ago, and Marinelli played guitar on
it, and I I revisited the mix, and I started adding some stuff,
and I sent it to Jordan. He said, Man, this sounds great.
And he says, Why don't we do a record? I said, really? I said,
Well, okay. Well, let me, I'll send you a couple. And so from
there, we just started, and we made a nice list of songs and
called it a record. Yeah. What's your favorite track?
I would say my favorite one is everything, trying
to remember which one, because there's because there's some
stones, II type, yeah, there's that.
That's I'll be dancing too. Yeah. No, this one is a kind of
a political statement, ah, and, but it's just a really cool
track, and I like the lyrics. I just like the way it sits. I'm
actually working on a little bit of a video for it, but, yeah,
and this is the kind of thing that I'm learning is like, you
know, if you you're gonna do this, you know, you kind of want
to get involved. And I don't have a videographer, so I gotta,
kind of got to do the thing myself. Yeah, we,
we, you know, we had John McTighe gone, yes. And he's
great. You guys share up the same publicist. Karen, yes. And
I was like, who's your publicist? Because she because,
I said, How's your how's the press on the record? He goes,
Man, I got in the Wall Street Journal. I said, Well, who's
your publicist, by the way. And he goes, Well, she kind of does
drummers, like she pitched me, you She pitched me. Andy, P is
like, Oh, my God, this is great. If I ever do a solo record, I'm
hiring Karen. So, so, um, you know. And John put together
some, you know, some affordable videos. But everyone is so
visually oriented, this is a smart thing to do, because then
it exists forever on YouTube, and then you could drive sales.
Or, yeah, you know. And
you know, as far as sales go, I know that there's not a lot of
people buying records. That's not the issue. The issue is, is
I'm doing this because it's so damn fun. Yeah? I mean, it's
gratifying when I get get an idea. And over the years, you
know, I've written for a long time, but I look back on the
history of it, and it's like there was a lot of times where I
didn't finish a song before I cut it. Yeah, you know, and I
didn't, maybe I didn't let the lyrics dictate enough. Well,
what comes first? How do you write guitar, piano? Is it a
melody? Is it
guitar or piano? But? But I don't get there until I got
something lyrically that, yeah, that is saying what I want to
say, yeah. And usually, you know, in the past, you know,
maybe I come up with a nice, clever little line or something.
And not, not to throw shade at a clever line, because a clever
line is great. That could be the impetus for the whole song. That
could Yeah, and it has in the past. But I've really gotten
into this lately. And basically, when I was working with Rodney,
you know, he's he told he said something to me that he keeps
two notebooks. This is before cell phones. This is before the
internet, any of this stuff. So two little leather bound books,
yeah. And one, he would just spew thoughts and just keep
writing, writing, writing. And then the other one he would take
from what he's written and form, you know, craft. And that's what
I've kind of been doing, and it really has been working better
for me. I feel better about so
now you got two little black books, and your wife is like,
what is this?
So it's great. Well, yes, that is great. I mean, what that is
on my to do list, you know? And it just, it just goes to show
that, you know, you're, it's never too late to put out a, you
know, a creative project, you know, because I want to, I kind
of want to do a record where it's mostly probably going to be
no vocals. It'll be more like instrumental, fusion light,
cool. It'll be kids instruments, right? Fusion light, it's all,
all professional musicians playing on entry level
children's instruments really well, yeah,
we got to replace the batteries on them. Yeah.
So there's a drummer from the DC area named Tim beary, yeah, and
he's now, I think he's in Ohio now, but he does a similar
thing. He played with mahogany mahogany rush when they were
out. And really good drummer and people are doing that now. I
think it's really cool. Yeah.
You know, the thing about writers and stuff like that, I
don't know if this is an offensive thing, maybe to me, it
is, they always have their radar up. You know what? I mean?
You're always listening. They're always listening and observing.
And if you drop the occasional nugget of wisdom. There's like,
Ooh, that's a good one. I'm going to run with it. Yeah. And
you get none of the money. Yeah, they write a hit out of
it, right, right? Just like observational comedians, they're
always scribbling. They're listening,
yeah? And it's like, you know, it's one of these days when I
get around songwriters and guys like you that listen for
stories. I'm just going to set you up with random stuff.
I will give you credit. Nice word for a third, I promise you,
you know, I
mean, the purpose of a lock is to turn a door into a wall. Ah,
is there a connection? I'm
struggling. I'm screwed down right now. I mean, at age 30,
you've spent a month having birthdays, write that down.
Write that down.
Write that down. That's a good idea. Get a run. Hey,
you know what I just saw on Netflix.
Conan O'Brien just got honored with the Mark Twain award for
comedy. And it's, apparently it's one of the last events that
they're going to have at the Kennedy Center Honors, because I
think it's getting shut down or something. Don't even get
me started building a high rise China.
But anyways, the event is unbelievable, and it was
captured for all time, and I watched it today, and it
warrants another viewing. It was, so what's it called? It's,
well, I guess it's just a it's the special of, you know, Conan
O'Brien receives the mark twain cool award. And all the who's
who of comedians, from Nikki Glaser to Adam Sandler to John
Mulaney are all roasting him in a very polite way. That's not a
roast. Then it's, well, you know, there it's more of like a
comedic tribute. Yeah, it's
well done. So it's not really labeled as a roast. It's not
a roast. No, it's the Mark Twain. I mean, it's very
prestigious. It's very prestigious. Yes, it better be
hybrid. Everyone is wearing the Conan's Great. Yeah. He really
is very creative. He really deserves it.
You know what? I You're gonna laugh at me. So I go to Vegas
this past couple weeks for a trade show. Yeah? And we have
time to kill and we wanted to go to the West Rim of the Grand
Canyon. That didn't happen, because it's like the Native
American mafia controls everything out there, and you
got to pay to hike to the edge of the freaking Canyon. But I
digress, oh boy. So we went back, like, let's go take the
damn tour. I've been to the Hoover Dam million times, and,
you know, we go there, and the damn tour was shut down. Like
one of the again, a day like today, where I'm having this
freaking Murphy's Law. It was one of those freaking days where
nothing was working out, but we, we still had a good time. It
gets you thinking, I'm like, out here on Buckner. They've been
constructing this road and renovating it, renovating it,
you know, whatever, modeling it, yeah, for the past probably six,
seven years. Wow. All right, they got potholes on 65 they put
the June Lake exit in, you know, about a year ago, and opened it
up and whatever. And that took them years. The Hoover Dam was
built in four flipping years. In 1931
we were more efficient, dude. Well, OSHA
didn't exist. I mean, 97 people died. So that's about two people
a month. Imagine coming into work and realizing you could
potentially die building a well, not only that, like, oh, you
hear about Charlie, oh, really, yeah, you know, he fell, you
know? And it's like, oh, well, that two weeks ago, yeah,
Johnny, you know, he fell in the freaking he was buried in
cement,
um, breaking bread on the giant girder, right?
We are a soft freaking generation. This is so soft,
dude, but it's got me thinking I'm like somebody at some point.
I don't know why I'm going off on this go in there, buddy, but
you know, you talked about that you like you. It was, it merited
another watch. Yeah, I'm getting to the point. So I'm sitting
there on the big bridge that they built to bypass the dam
that was started back when I lived there. Yeah, okay. Five
years prior to them actually putting a shovel to the ground,
they were designing this thing, yeah? And then it took them
another, I think, seven years to finish. The bridge. Took over 10
years to build, yeah, the dam. Okay, I'll reiterate, the dam
took four flipping years to build a marvel of engineering
and create the largest lake in the United States. Yeah. Okay.
So I'm like, I'm a big fan of videos that show like animations
and graphics and flyovers. Wouldn't, shouldn't, you know,
there's got to be something on YouTube. So I go home, we get
back to the Airbnb, I pull up on my phone, I'm like, you know,
there's got to be something out there. Lo and behold, some dude
who actually does this on YouTube how things work. He does
like how jet engines work. He does all the animations and
cutaways and stuff like that. He did a video six days prior. He
uploaded it. It's got over a million views on it already.
Nice how the Hoover Dam was built and how it works. Oh, wow.
It is freaking fascinating. Nice. Because, oh, I
mean, real of that project. But I mean, bridges are a marvel.
When you, when you cross the Golden Gate Bridge did, yeah,
and you say to yourself, a man, this man maintains this dude,
yeah, I get that. Yeah. This is, let's block the Colorado here
and create a lake that's 700 feet deep. How do they Wow in
1931 Yeah, okay, there it was, one guy's vision. One guy right
sat on top of the freaking Black Canyon looking down. Okay, we're
gonna put a we're gonna blink river. You know, you know guy.
Nice. Okay, right about here, yes. Well, let's look at the
plans. Right about I need you to build a 50 foot diameter. Need
two of them. Want two on each side, because we're to divert
this entire flipping river 50 foot diameter tunnel. I need you
to go a quarter mile up north, and all these guys. You go, you
imagine the guys go. You want us to do what? Yeah,
yeah, there's catering, right, right.
There's catering, right. Can I get some
more sun tan oil or, you know, sun lotion? I mean, Wow, dude,
it's like, it blew my mind. Hey, do you think about a project
like that? It's monstrous. Yeah, big deal. You know, I don't know
that's so, basically, that video is something I've been urging my
wife. I'm like, you should really check this out. Yeah? And
she's like, No, maybe
I'll check it out too. Yeah, I don't know if I'll watch the
whole thing. It sucks you
in. This guy does a great job. Yeah, yeah. What
do you have any interests? Because Jim, Jim loves these How
To videos. So you're a great chef. You're, I mean, you're,
I've seen videos of you cooking. I cook. So do you all the
cooking in your family? I do
most of the cooking. Yeah, yeah. So scratch you had a great as
much as I can pasta, Azul
is, is in my family. And then, I don't know if you My mom calls
it depression food, because my she learned all she got all her
recipes from my grandmother, who survived the depression him. You
know, I did a paper and I did a paper in high school. I
interviewed my grandparents, and my grandmother would be like,
Oh, we used to capture the pigeons and we'd fry them up in
olive oil. And I'd be like, and I'd be like, Wow, because I mean
they, I mean that it was depression,
that was, that was a freaking, just a that was the same
generation, yeah, they built the Hoover Dam. That's the same
generation. They're hard. Just like, really, you need freaking
safe spaces and mental health issues. Oh,
don't get me started on my Belmont story. But the you know,
and so another one of the Depression dishes is lentils
with pepperoni. I forget what she calls it, but it's like a
nice lentil dish, pasta, Fauci, except with lentils. With
lentils. Yeah. Do you have a special season? Is there
something that your your wife is like, hey, we haven't had such
and such in a while. There's probably
a handful, yeah? But, you know, I'm a gardener too, so I just
put it on, well, yeah, because I want to use on the earth, I want
to do God intended, yeah. So I get the tomatoes and the peppers
and eggplant, gosh, parmesan, you know, yeah,
when are we coming over? Yeah, exactly. I would, I would like
that. That sounds so tantalizing. Yeah, it really
does.
Yeah. Well, I mean, you know, and then we got a sub freezer,
so the one the tomatoes are coming in, I mean, it's, it's
inundated, yeah, and I got pictures, but you don't want to
see them, so it's, you got a freezer in the garage, basement,
yeah, it's done in the basement, so that when we make either
sauce, I put it in there, you know, we have a dinner sauce, or
is it gravy? Well, it, for me, it's sauce, but I got a bunch of
goons in the manger group.
We've never called it gravy. My family, it's always sauce. So I
think in
Jersey there is a contingent they call it gravy,
yeah, like the scene from Goodfellas when they're in
prison, and the slicing the garlic with a razor blade. You
know what? I mean, that stuff actually start
a walk. My mouth is water. Garlic keeps you I mean, garlic
is a super, super it is a real deal. Yeah. I mean, you know,
well,
look at the way my wife makes bread.
Oh yeah, his wife makes some serious sourdough. Before the
Panda, before the popularity of the pandemic, made sourdough a
thing. Wow, she was always doing it.
Oh, she could make Italian bread like nobody's business. Yeah,
that's really something, you know? I mean, because a good
Italian loaf, it's hard to find here, I'll be honest with you,
there's a Costco Italian loaf that's pretty darn nice. The
freaking pizza at Costco is pretty it's not bad, right? Not
bad. I'm with you. Okay, so you've been here since the early
90s. You came from Washington, so you gotta you're in definite
proximity of good pizza up there, especially around that
time, yeah, coming down here, you must have been like, Oh no,
going on. Well,
yeah. But, I mean, even in DC, I knew that, you know, well,
there's never a big restaurant I go right restaurants, because I
think my parents were kind of reluctant to do that, or my mom
in particular. But if we had, you know, a couple places where
we could get a good loaf, cheap loaf, in DC, we would do that.
And so I'm always looking for that. There's a, there is a
couple of, there are a couple of items that I do go to get
locally. Yeah. One is a extremely aged provolone. It's
called stravacchia. And then you can get that at Coco's market on
51st Okay, um, other things, you know, a lot less so online. I
gotta say that a couple things I get online.
Have you? Has the food improved here over the years? It
has, but it also with that, it's been about a bunch of restaurant
tours from California and the like that come here, and they're
recreating the California thing here in Nashville. So it is
upscale. You're paying a lot more,
yeah, for a lot less. Food, yeah,
yeah, but it's good. No, don't get me wrong. It's
good. Some Italian restaurants are popping up. What's the one
of the moment that everyone's going to I forget what people
are, four seasons number you should have Amerigo.
Olive Garden, yeah? Olive Garden.
Endless breadsticks. And then are you pairing your meals with
with whites and red, you know? Sure.
Okay, well, my wife doesn't really indulge that much, but
I'm doing it on my end, yeah,
I Yeah. I take care of it on my end. Yeah. I drink for two.
When you drink a good wine, it's,
it's incredible, and with the right meal, yeah, we shared a
nice bottle the other night. It was nice. What did you have? We
had Cabernet. Was cab. Yeah, it was a cab, cab with our steaks.
What was your cab? Do you remember the brand and the freak
show?
Something like, oh, it was like, it was somebody's name, like,
Josie or Oh, not Jose. It was like, it was, gosh, I didn't pay
attention. You
know what? The ginzos educated me really quickly, because,
because the first time I went, everyone's encouraged, of
course, to bring two bottles, and they'll say, we're going
with white tonight because we're having fish, or we'll have we're
going with red tonight, because, you know? So I bring a lot of
times I will buy bottles of wine pre ginzo education, based on
the title and the label, like, if it's this cute label. So this
goes down in infamy with the group. There was a label called
tattoo girl, and it was just kind of like this hot girl,
yeah, man, you know, like on the side of a bomber B, 52 bomber
with all the tattoos. I'm like, that looks like a great wine.
And it was like 1199 like, perfect price. So I show up with
a like, and then maybe, like, a freak show type thing, and
they're like, red nose, and they did, the bottles just sat there
the whole night. And then I realized, when my friend pulls
me over, he goes, Man, you got to go with the bees, the
barolas, the bares. Goes, you got to go with A, B, right? So
then I got to go, then I got to go to Total Wine, or I got to go
to red. Or what's the one on Murphy road there, West End and
Murphy road, it's
like a high end. I know which one you mean. I don't know the
name of
I forget, because this is happening to me.
I did take my gingko Balboa. I forgot to take my gingko Balboa
today. But anyways, I got, I learned really quick. You know,
you got to buy, like, a nice $30 bottle of wine, you know what I
mean. So there's
a good songwriter, Joe scotella, yeah, and he works in the wine
industry too, and he's, he's pretty good at finding good wine
that ain't expensive. Yeah, it's nice. So you don't have to get
that 30 but it takes a lot of trial and error. Yeah, you know,
something that is so kind of sweet or, or doesn't have enough
acid in it, it just, it becomes what they call insipid, yeah,
and, and, you know, you'll find out, because you don't want a
second glass of it, yeah, that's, well, they don't even
open these bottles.
They're still there. They're sitting. What's your go to pizza
place? You're, I make my own piece. You make your own. I
don't, but if you had, if I had to,
who's the one that we have gone to recently? Well, the Costco
pizza is not bad. It's not, not horrible. Um, I can't, I'm not
going to say because, I mean, I have delved into jet when I was
right, right? But I don't really call that a good pizza.
It's quick. It's, yeah, Detroit style, yeah, Detroit style. I
mean, we give a lot of money to sell those here in Spring Hill,
yeah, Spring Hill
starting to get some competition. We've got, you
know, if you ever heard of Joey's house, yes,
and I have liked it, and it is, but it's kind of gone. They're
not there anymore. That's the reason they're they're out in
Murfreesboro. They've got a an event space, and I can never
remember macabella or
Bella something at Riverside, forgive me, oh,
Bella Napoli, something like the monopoly. It's, it's it. I know
where it isn't. It's not
a restaurant. It's an event space where they actually do
catering. Oh, Joey's house of pizza catering, Joey and the
maca family will do it, but they're from stat. They're from
Brooklyn, I want to say, yeah. And I had them on my other pot,
my own podcast, and we had a great conversation, because you
went there for the food and the fights, the entertainment,
because they were only open for lunch and dinner, and I think at
some point they stopped colorful experience. Yeah. I mean, the
mother would be out there, and the sister was, like, Maca is
her name is running around like a ping pong ball, and just, you
know, getting people's orders, grabbing pies, doing this, you
know, handing order. She's just on on, vibrating on a different
level. Yeah, right. I mean, while the mother is taking other
people's orders, she's a sweetheart crescenza. And you
know, Joey's the only one who could make the pizza. So you'd
be like, coming and be like, go and get this thing over here.
What'd you get there? Hey, honey, how are you What do you
love? That's good, Jim. Yeah, nice kid. Saturday, wisely.
Early, just thank you. It was, it was like that. Now, Sal's,
yeah, Nellies is the daughter, not Sal's has nothing to do with
this. Nellies is the daughter of Joey. Okay,
yeah. And everyone keeps mentioning Vikings pizza. Here
Vikings, good, yeah.
He makes his own. Well, I make my own. But I mean, if I had to
go out, I'd go out and I'd be happy with what I get about it.
So I would
usually ask you the Fast Five, which would usually include your
favorite color, your favorite food, your favorite drink. But
we're not going to do it because I know your favorite food and
your favorite drink is so Jim has probably got to have some
interesting questions. What are we calling
them down? We're calling it the deep five.
All right, I'm gonna get down deep. Forget
some music for it. Here we go.
What are you currently worried about?
Getting out of here,
getting out, getting some good Italian food.
That's not a problem. Yeah, never has been. No
worries. No worries at all.
Oh, no worries. What are you currently worried about? It was
really nice working at the Union, and when I stepped down,
I've kind of let go of all my worries. There you go. Kind of,
yeah, what
a great season of life. No, I'm
actually, what I just said is, it's for real, yeah, and I'm not
worrying much. You know, I worry about my wife's health. I worry
about my health. Health is a big deal. If you don't have health,
you'd be so other than that, I'm having a good time. What's
more, the unusual places that you've been
unusual places
all the years of touring, well, all user
touring Australia, China, you know, looking back on our China
trip with Felix, you know, I, I don't know if it would even be
the same, especially with this haircut, because they were
really intrigued because of the Boxer Rebellion. Yeah, you know,
they'd see me in the elevator, and they'd be pointing at me and
giggling and stuff like that. And I didn't know why, but then
I figured it out, yeah, Felix and I both figured it out that
it was because they the people that had these style hairdos. It
had to do with the Boxer Rebellion, and then that was
ended, right? So they hadn't seen this for a while, yeah?
So, yeah, guys, Vince, if you're not watching, this has a It's
interesting. It's like a man bun.
It's not a man bun, but it's,
it's just, it's, it's a diminishing circle of hair, that
is, right?
It points, it's backwards. It's a cool style. It's
so unique, right? Yeah, we'll do one
more. What inanimate object would be the most annoying if it
played loud, upbeat music while being used.
Well, probably the elevator. Oh,
that's the one I was pretty deep with the Muzak, you know? Oh
yeah, that's a little Girl from Ipanema arranged for flute and
vibes.
That was deep
questions. Not bad. Well, hell, I'll ask you this one, just
because it's going to get under Jim's, what's your favorite
color? And if you're serious, it's green. I hope it's not
blue, it's green. We get a lot. Hey, yeah, yeah. Well,
I would say the other one is, what's your favorite song of the
moment? Like, not of all time, not an island, desert island
song, but at the moment, what's, what's inspiring you?
Okay, I'll tell you. It's Jimmy Hendrix, really anger. She
smile.
Go. Not golden rose. It's my
shining, metallic purple armor. Queen jealousy, empty envy waits
behind him or her. Finally, green ground. Here's at the
grassy grounds. Blue are the lights with life giving waters
taken for granted. They quietly understand once happy. Turquoise
armies lay opposite ready. They wonder why the fight is. Bold as
Love,
access. Bold as Love. Bold as low.
I love your process of elimination. Had to get there.
Yeah, you know,
that's like, that's when someone asks your social security
number. I have to say the whole thing to get the last four
numbers. Well,
it's like,
I don't know how I had to do this. For some reason, like,
somebody asked me a question, and I would have to recite the
alphabet to get, like, it was weird. I remember the question
would be, but
it was like, I could back the F, Wow,
can you there's no way I could do the the back alphabet away.
Yeah, right. Do
you spell race car backwards? You can
R, A, C, E, E, C, A, R,
why was that so tough? Because it's the same way forwards.
Oh, wow.
Otto, cool, Jim, you're pretty smart for drummer,
you know, because of what's in this cup. Yeah,
you know, I think is great. Vince, is that I. Can't Believe
It's taken us 28 years to get social. But you know, we have a
mutual friend with Dave Goodwin, and he, you know, he was
romantic and producing a gal named von Penn back in 1998 and
we ended up, I think you did some recording with her. I ended
up doing some recording over at Paul ebersoldt house in Memphis,
the producer. But for the most part, I had to learn your drum
parts, and it's like a rite of passage. When you first moved to
Nashville, you spend a lot of time being given cassettes, CDs,
and of course, now MP threes and Spotify links. Learn this. Learn
it no for note kid, you know. And so I just, I was always a
fan of your drumming, and now I'm a fan of you cool, man.
Great. Thank you. Thank you for being here. And if kids want to
get in touch with you, got a Vincent toro.com right? Yeah.
So, and then, Are you active on the socials? Or I'm
going to be a little more active than I normally am, but you
know, I'm going to reach out to stuff on Facebook, through
Facebook, blue sky, Instagram, yeah, you know, I'm gonna try
and do, do some little videos, nothing elaborate. Well, you
could
probably make the rounds and do like, you know, today in
Nashville and the local, you know, morning shows to promote
your new record.
Comes out. Yeah, grab that old footage of you doing your your
rap story. I
have a couple clips, and they're, they're on my Vince
santoro.com site, right? Just kind of let people know that
that's not a dead thing, that that's still out there.
But I think if you pop, if you fed that into your Facebook and
Instagram feed, tick tock. It would give it tons of new life.
Yeah, cool. And then you'd be booked all the time. You're
like, God, I got this one man show thing again. I got to do
three times a week. Thanks a lot, guys. Yeah, well, not
only that, it could be, it could, know, you another vehicle
to sell the album. Well, that's, that's what I
was hoping, is I'm gonna put all these things out. You know,
there was another record that I did with a billy Livesey. Do you
know Billy? Okay, and it's called Little Vinny. And this
was the one that was mostly I was just playing drums on a
session. He and Tia sillers, Tia sellers, yeah, a lyricist, yeah.
They had written a bunch of songs, and after I played drums
on all these tracks, he said, Why don't we do a record where
you sing all the songs. So we did that. So that little Vinny
thing is also going to be on my site. So, you know, they all
kind of help each other, I guess, yeah, to some degree,
that's fantastic.
And then people can check out, I'm sure it's rat rascals or
Felix have larry.com look for the look for a tour dates. And
they can see you, yeah, 40 times this year, somewhere in this on
this globe of ours. And Jim, I appreciate all your time and
talent. You're welcome. That was super, super fun.
I deserve it. Yes, you do. He
does. He works hard. He really, really does great job. Vince,
thanks for stopping by. You bet. Man. Really do appreciate it.
And hey to all the listeners, we really appreciate you. Hey,
we're probably at this time, we're probably going to have
merch. When this drops, I keep promising we're gonna have
hoodies and coffee mugs and all the stuff. So be sure to
subscribe, share, rate and review. It helps people find the
show we appreciate. We'll see you next time. Thanks. Vince,
thanks, Jim,
this has been the rich Redmond show. Subscribe, rate and follow
along at rich redmond.com forward slash, podcasts you.