#60 Mark Farner’s American Band

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All right, Matt, thank you so much for that amazing introduction. You get the show going each and every week and this week is no exception. We're off to a rock and rolling start for Episode 60. That's right. You're here for Episode 60 of live from Detroit, the Jeff Dwoskin show. As always, I am your host, Jeff Dwoskin. Great to have you back for another amazing week. Hopefully you caught last week's episode with Joe albs part of our 46th anniversary of jaws celebration Joe dove deep into an oral history of jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind both movies that he made hand in hand with Steven Spielberg himself. If you need more jobs, check out Episode 26 of live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show my interview with Carl Gottlieb comedic legend co writer of the jerk with Steve Martin and also screenwriter of the movie Jaws done. That's right. So where do we go from there? I'll tell you we go all the way to Flint, Michigan. Flint, Michigan. That's right ladies and gentlemen, we head all the way to Flint, Michigan. Why welcome legendary rocker and guitarist Mark farner, former lead singer of grand funk railroad. That's right, grand funk railroad. Ladies and gentlemen, the power trio that captivated us with I'm your captain, we're an American band, some kind of wonderful locomotion and many other amazing hits. Mark's gonna talk all about the grand funk days and talk about his current solo career that he takes to every corner of the world. One corner he happened to stop at live from Detroit, the Jeff Dwoskin show. That's right, you're gonna love it. And that's coming up in just a few minutes. And you know what else just takes a few minutes my producers looking at me not that. Not that it the what I'm talking about that only takes a few minutes. I mean, that does too. But what I'm specifically talking about to all of you is to go to Jeff it's funny comm sign up for my mailing list. There's also links to all my social media properties. Sign up for the mailing list, follow me on twitter at Jeff Dwoskin show on Facebook at Jeff is funny on YouTube, search out the Jeff Dwoskin show. Also if you're in the mood help me celebrate 60 amazing episodes you can buy me a copy of buy me a coffee calm slash Jeff Dwoskin show house shout out anyone who buys me a coffee while I'm sipping that brew. That's right, thank you very much in advance. Also, one of the benefits of following me on YouTube is that you'll get notified when we go live every Wednesday for crossing the streams every Wednesday 9:30pm eastern time called the greatest show in the history of shows that is on Wednesday that talks about TV shows and movies that you should be streaming by TV show and streaming magazine. So you know they said it's gotta be true. Alright, so your homework mailing lists, social media YouTube sounds great. Don't forget also to subscribe and follow and like the podcast on your favorite podcast app pod jazer, cashbox, Apple, Google. But then what's really important is that you tell all your friends about it as well. You got them to use the same shampoo as us and now it's time for you to get them to listen to the same podcast you listen to say you stop over rinsing and listen to live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show y'all won't regret it one second up your life. Thank you.

And now it's time for the social media tip! All right, this is the part of this show where I share a little bit of my social media knowledge with you drop a little something that I picked up on the street I heard about I want to share with you some insights something changes week to week this week, I think is a really important one all of you probably have at one point set up a good handful of social media platforms each one of them has an About section and has links to websites and other social media platforms from that platform. Yeah, clubhouse links to Instagram etc. Go do an audit of all your about sections and BIOS and links from every one of your platforms and make sure that they you still have that Instagram site that you set up when you set up your Facebook 10 years ago, I've on some old data stuff. I did a clean up and I'm like, Hey, I think I'm going to share this with the crew. This is a good one. Alright, so go do that. Clean it up. Two simple bit of homework but your bank report later and that's the social media tip!

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All right, well, that seems like an amazing segue into my interview with Mark farner Rock and Roll legend. Ladies and gentlemen, here you go. All right, ladies and gentlemen, we're excited to introduce you to my next guest, legendary guitarist and vocalist, one of the founding members of grand funk railroad. Ladies and gentlemen, our captain Mark farner. Welcome to the show.

Mark Farner 7:02

Hey brother, Jeff, man, good to be here with you dude.

Jeff Dwoskin 7:06

Good to have you here from Flint, Michigan. Yeah, man plains most famous export

Mark Farner 7:12

export commodity. We love Flint because that's where we learned our music. That's where we cut our chops. We listened to 3k l w you know Rosalie playing that stuff early on in our lives and and listening to john our royal crown, hairdressing show way down south and Dixie talking skip on am after 11 o'clock at night, sit up and watch that all formed our Michigan music and our guitar plan and the rest is history of what came out of this state.

Jeff Dwoskin 7:50

What is it with Michigan something in the air or something? I mean, there's so many amazing musicians that have come out of Michigan.

Mark Farner 7:57

Well, I think that a lot of the factory workers that moved up here from the south, such as my mother moved here from Leesville, Arkansas to Michigan when she was 16 years old, but her whole family came to get jobs in the auto factories. That's when people were driving, you know, to cars had boats in the driveway. I mean, nice houses and things were going good for the auto workers. And then when they pulled out, they started leaving people jobless. It sure changed the scene, but the families are still here, Jeff

Jeff Dwoskin 8:30

Sure. Once you establish the roots, this is your home when you guys were coming up in the seven days, who were you hanging out with in Michigan see her nightrider that was Cooper pigs, you guys are going to a bar together.

Mark Farner 8:41

That's great, because it really wasn't like that. I mean, we didn't get to see much anybody except on stage when we were doing a battle of the bands or something early on the formative years. And then when grand funk formed, I mean Gosh, we were headlining, and we didn't get to see too many people you know, except when we would do a Pop Festival and there's be multiple multiple headliners. And then and you get to, you know, rub shoulders and do the shake and howdy with a lot of famous folk,

Jeff Dwoskin 9:10

what's the origin story like, you know, how did you perform grandfather who had done and now what bands were you in? And how did you actually let me ask you a question for us. I have a question first before the music were you on a path to be something else like was there a different job that you were headed towards

Mark Farner 9:27

the for the music, I was playing football in school, I went to football from playing sousaphone once from playing a tuba. In the marching band. We would march up and down that field and this was back when they had horns made of brass and they were happy and we would march up and down that field and none of those girls were looking at us. They were looking all over at them tight ends and guys in the uniform. So I caught on and I joined the football when I sustained Some injuries. Well, my mother, she knew that I love to hear my name called out on the loudspeaker. And so she got me six guitar lessons and rented a guitar for me to practice with and to learn on it was a flat top and acoustic Kay guitar that would have better been used for a bow and arrow set the extremes were so far away from the neck but I learned to play a few days on it and the guitar player only gave me three lessons the teacher because he had a hunting accident shot himself in the foot with a 12 gauge so I call my mother and told her to have me go up and and watch the guys that were in a rock band in the high school and so I went with my sister who's 17 months older than me and she knew these people and when they hang out they chords and I watched them play and and then I would try to do you know, emulate that. And that's kind of how I picked up and learned guitar. I had three actual lessons and the rest of them were from friends.

Jeff Dwoskin 11:02

What would happen if the guy didn't shoot himself in the foot? He might have finished those lessons he might have who knows what would happen okay. strange twist to the story. guy doesn't shoot himself in the foot grand funk railroad never happened. Marks marks heads down south and start singing country as a whole What if we get explored?

Mark Farner 11:26

Oh, my Yeah, the band's prior. I mean, you know, they were just, we do and cover tunes doing Battle of the Bands doing Beatle tunes or doing the Yardbirds. We dubbed The Yardbirds when Jeff Beck was in there, that was our that was one of our favorites.

Jeff Dwoskin 11:44

Did you always know you could sing? I mean, it was just as you were in choir, did you like how did you know you had this amazing voice?

Mark Farner 11:51

Well, I knew I could sing. I was in the choir in school. And I knew I could sing tenor, because I sang in tune and I wasn't having any trouble. But when I switched, and I put the guitar in the mix, then I started having some trouble because I would try to play the guitar and it's playing one rhythm and the lead vocal things a different rhythm, sings kind of off to it. So I was having a hard time with that my uncle woody told me, he says, sir, and I'm gonna show you how to fix that today. And I said, Really, because I told him I was having a hard time with he says, Yeah, man, sit down across the table there. And I'm gonna put this newspaper out here. It's a flint journal. He says, I want you to read it upside down and backwards, you know, you just push it across the table from you just like it showed me how to set it up, he says, and just read the headings, the bold print, and he says, just turn page after page and read that and read it a couple of times. So I'm going faster each page, I'm going faster being able to read these words, I could tell him what they were upside down backwards, and I was getting quite good at it. I was at it for probably almost an hour. And then I went into I said, I, you know, I I've done that a couple times. And I read the whole thing. And he says, Okay, good. I'm gonna sit down there. I'm gonna grab my guitar. So he goes and grabs his j 45. Gibson. He says, No, what was that song? And I said, Well, one of them's named Dean. And so I started playing, and started singing nadejda. And I never skipped a beat. And I haven't sense but I keep reading things upside down and backwards. I read things in the rearview mirror that's written on a truck behind me keeping that right and left hemisphere of the brain. Working together, is the key to getting yourself into where you can sing and play at the same time, even if they're at different rhythms with each other.

Jeff Dwoskin 13:51

That's fascinating. Never never even thought about that. I guess. I've never been in the position to have to do it. But it's amazing. It's It's pretty cool. I we tie out to do that. Yeah, it works. Oh, thank you, Mark. That's a pearl of wisdom. Number one. There we go. There you go. There we go. What was the first band you were in Mojo and the nightwalkers not familiar with the earlier work of Mojo and it was all covered tunes. After Mojo, where we bridge the gap between that and forming grand funk,

Mark Farner 14:23

it same band members just swap names and maybe one player and then we'd say the new group, but we were the Genesee and stay at one time because we lived in Genesee County, we were robbing in the hoods. Once we were the derelicts once.

Jeff Dwoskin 14:39

It's an honor just to come up with a name for a band. Yeah,

Mark Farner 14:42

it is. It is. Then I joined Dick Wagner's Bossman. Just before Terry knight and the pack, I was playing with Dick Wagner for about a year. And of course dick Wagner's fame too, because he was the guitar player for Alice Cooper. And of course, and The Ursa majors and he was the head of the Bossman in Michigan and he took me under his wing. I was playing support guitar, singing, support harmony with him. It was good. It was a real good rendition, you know, some rock musicians in Michigan of the Bossman. But then one night, we were setting up after a gig. And I asked him, I said, Wagner, how do you come up with all these tunes, dude, I said, you just are tapped into something. And he says, you can write tunes mark. And I said, I can. He says, Yeah, man, they are inside of you. He says, I know they're in there. He says, because that's where they come from and me, they're inside and they just come out. He says, You got songs in there. I said, No kidding. We're setting up in his apartment. But we're playing our electric guitars with no amplifiers. We're just playing. We're at a low volume because his wife and kids were sleeping in the other rooms. And so he went to go to bed and I stayed up and I wrote Heartbreaker. That was the first song I ever wrote. And I wrote it that night at Dick Wagner's place in Saginaw.

Jeff Dwoskin 16:07

Well, thank you Dick Wagner. Yeah. Because many amazing songs. Yeah. So it's funny how like, just somebody can just touch somebody with words and inspire them and make such a huge difference in their lives.

Mark Farner 16:23

Yeah, man turned on the switch.

Jeff Dwoskin 16:25

Think about that. The guy didn't shoot himself in the foot thick. Didn't tell you. You could do it with Mark foreigner be?

Mark Farner 16:32

Yeah. Where would I be probably be hiring him to McDonald's.

Jeff Dwoskin 16:40

Thank goodness, you went through a different route. You go from Boss Man. Now you're working with Terry knight in the pack?

Mark Farner 16:45

Yep. playing bass play bass with those guys had never played bass before. But their bass player got drafted. And they said, Hey, man, can you play bass, I said, I played a tuba. In the school band. I could probably play bass. I got a feel for it. And I did. I played bass, probably for a year or so. And then we fired Terry Knight and it went on his pack. And then from the pack, we evolved into grand funk. After we lost a keyboard player and guitar player to threats from the wives of divorcing them. We were tardy on a gig one time we were about two weeks late coming in. And this is before cell phones, and we were stranded on Cape Cod. And there was no way of getting any communications out, then that's when we determined no more women influencing the band. Whoever we get cannot be married. They cannot even have a girlfriend.

Jeff Dwoskin 17:45

No lady palace. This would be the first time you fired Terry Knight. Why did you fire him this time?

Mark Farner 17:52

Well, because we figured we could sing better than he could. And the only thing he had going for him was a gift of gab, he could talk to an audience and you know, Bs, he really didn't have the chops that we would have respected and sang behind because both Brewer and I could definitely think better than Terry, as far as carrying a tune.

Jeff Dwoskin 18:15

Did you want to bring him back in later? I mean, there's a whole thread of of everything that happened by Terry Knight, but was there a hesitation to bring him back as a manager?

Mark Farner 18:24

There was for me there wasn't from Don so much because he had kept in touch with Terry to me says we're foreigner at least we'd be getting out of Flint, Michigan, because I said to him, man, Terry's a crook. He's gonna be screwing us somehow he's gonna get over on us. And he said to me, that's when he said, Well, at least we get out of Flint, Michigan, so he was willing to take that screw. And just to get out of Flint, Michigan, I wasn't so ready for the screwing. But I wanted to get out. I wanted to see the world, man. I mean, you know, what young musician in a band does?

Jeff Dwoskin 18:57

Yeah, I think it's like a struggle with any kind of even business or anything. It's like, at some point, you have to make a choice. If you want to get bigger, do you make a deal with the devil to move yourself into a, you know, wider frame of reference where you can bring more in make more money and get more exposure? Exactly. Especially when you're young and very trusting. Okay, so we were with Don, I didn't know join.

Mark Farner 19:21

Well, we went to delta promotions in Bay City, Michigan to give these guys a piece of our mind because they sent us out to the Boston area telling us that these gigs we were scheduled to do were free gigs we had to play for free. And if we did a good enough job, then could go back and make some real money there in the Boston area. That was what they told us at Delta promotions who was booking the band and booked us out there in that Cape Cod area. Anyway, we went up to give them a piece of our mind and find out what happened to our money because through the grapevine we We found out we were actually getting paid $350 a night and we wanted some of that money. So we went up and delta promotions was not only a booking agency and band management and what have you. They were. They had a rehearsal facility. They had a recording studio in there. We were setting in the waiting room waiting to get into talk with Kiko, the owner and a band was rehearsing. I looked over at Brewer, I said, Whoever that bass player is, that's the bass player right there. And he says, Yeah, man, we got to find out who that is. They took a break. And Mel shachar comes walking out and I went, Oh my god, it's Melvin and Mel Shakur and I went to school together. We rode dirt bikes together, we smoke dope together, we did everything together. We were buddies. And I told him, I says, Melvin man, we are going to form a three piece band. Would you think about joining us? Are you would you be interested? He says, Yeah, man. I am ready to leave this band, which was question mark in the mysterious at the time. He said he was ready to leave the band. There was something about getting in a wreck with a van and stuff. I don't know what happened. But he was ready to leave. And so we started grandfather, the next week in Flint, Michigan at the Flint federation of musicians on April street there.

Jeff Dwoskin 21:21

That's amazing. So so you formed the power trio. I know grand funk railroad is a play on words from the planetarium. Which of you guys said, Oh, that's it? Let's Let's twist that. Let's make that our name. How did you come about that?

Mark Farner 21:36

That was the name of a song that Terry Knight wrote. And he, of course, did the little twist on the name. And one day he says, you know, you guys ought to just call your band, the name of my song, grand funk railroad. We went? Yeah, that sounds pretty cool.

Jeff Dwoskin 21:52

There you go. That's easy enough. Yeah, just wrote an article. It wasn't too long ago, there was some famous graffiti where over the grand truck, Western railroad, they wrote grand funk, or they change it to funk and then they put your mark down and now above that, and I remained for decades upon decades, I guess somebody just graffitied it, like a year ago or something I would have made the news.

Mark Farner 22:13

Yeah, pretty. That's a good statement right there. That's, that's pretty adamant over the years because they have painted it back Grand Trunk and Western on that trestle, but the fans refuse to have it. And it only lasts for one day, because that night, it's getting changed,

Jeff Dwoskin 22:31

because they love you. They love you. God bless them. Your big opening then is grand funk railroad. It was at the Atlanta Pop Festival, which is a hell of a way to kick off.

Mark Farner 22:41

Yes. When you're playing in front of that many people then they're not all from Atlanta, Georgia. I mean, that Pop Festival was the had people from every state in the Union had Canadians there. People from Cuba there, there was people from all over the place at that Pop Festival to stand up on the stage and look out there was just no end to the crowd. It was a sea of people at like 180,000 people plus at that concert, and you got first you guys kicked it off. Yeah, that was part of the deal. The attorneys Butera night, hooked us up with were his attorneys in New York City who were doing the legal work for this festival. So they cut them a deal on their rate. What have you just so they are bam, grand funk railroad could go on first and open the festival. And we did. We went on opening day. We went on first and the people didn't want us to leave the stage. They just kept calling us back calling us back. second night. We went on about 7pm which was you know, a better slot cooler in the day, not by much in Atlanta, Georgia, but a little bit cooler. And then the third night, we went on under the lights at 11 o'clock at night and kicked ass.

Jeff Dwoskin 24:00

That's so amazing. That's sort of like the equivalent of social media today. So back then there was no social media. But there you Oh, well, let's just get in front of 180,000 people word spreads. You're an amazing live band. Today, you need to have a good Facebook Live following and YouTube. Yeah, cracked up back then. So that's for everyone listening. This is I had to do it. And in the olden days.

Mark Farner 24:22

No social media and no social distancing. At all.

Jeff Dwoskin 24:28

No standing standing ovation. GarageBand from Flint, Michigan, boom. And then just word of mouth, right. It just spread like wildfire after that for years. That's how it happened. I would love to hear the story from you how Led Zeppelin was nervous when you were opening for them and didn't want to follow you.

Mark Farner 24:44

Well, we had played at night before in Cleveland. And we had a great reaction from the crowd because Cleveland, Ohio was one of our stomping ground places to develop our music and to develop our skills as musicians, so it was like old home week in Cleveland when we hit the stage. We had lots of fans there that loved us. Led Zeppelin didn't like that following a band that revved the audience up that much. And the following night there at Olympia in Detroit. This is our people. We're playing to hometown folks now, and they were excited and we were excited. The manager Peter grant for Led Zeppelin threatened Terry picked him up by the collar of his shirt was dangling him off the ground. You know, here's this great big man, I like the six foot five or something and Terry Knight down, you know, five foot eight maybe got him up there threatening. And so he cuts the power on the band, and we're playing along and we are just about ready to go into inside looking out and the audience knows it. And the power is cut. The only thing that I hear is the drums I turn around I look at brewery stops playing. I'm thinking What the hell is going on here and Terry comes walking out he grabs a microphone because no other microphones were active. I was on each one trying to get him to work. He brings one out. He's on this microphone says due to contractual obligation grand funk railroad has to leave the stage now. And the audience was going boo boo boo Thrawn whiskey bottles, beer bottles, wine bottles all come up. They were booing. They didn't want us to leave the stage. So an hour and a half later, Led Zeppelin takes the stage to not even half of the hall, which gave Mel Shakur and I opportunity to go out and watch zeplin from out front and not be noticed. So we did.

Jeff Dwoskin 26:52

That is an amazing way to get front row seats. So that's fine. You could say all right, everyone, we're heading down to Cobo Hall. We're gonna go pick up the grand funk concert over Cobo. Man, it's crazy when you think like Led Zeppelin just couldn't be Led Zeppelin and just go out and realize that they would have enjoyed Led Zeppelin as Led Zeppelin and could still enjoy grand funk as grand funk. Yeah, it seems a little short sighted on their part. You wouldn't think they would have such frail egos. It's like rising tide you get them going. I mean, like, when I do comedy, it's like if the person does good before him and you step out into a hot audience, you're just gonna have an amazing time. I don't see why they anyway, they blew it. They blew it. That's right. Oh, good for you guys. Especially since it was the hometown. You know, when you're Yeah. would they? Would they? Right? Alright, so Around this time, you guys are putting out your third album. And this is this incredible. One is that you guys sold out Shea Stadium in 72 hours. Yeah, you guys are like the hottest things and the Beatles were the only other people ever to play that. Yeah. To a sold out crowd. It was all that guy. But they took like, a week or so they took way longer. Oh, seven weeks. They took seven weeks. You guys are bigger than the Beatles. How does that feel? You're sitting around you down a mountain. You're like, holy crap. We just crushed the Beatles.

Mark Farner 28:12

Yeah, that was during a time to when there was no ticket master. There was no online sales. We didn't have cell phones. There were hundreds of people who camped out at Shea Stadium on the lawn. We saw the pictures in the newspapers. It showed the grand funk fans, pitch tents. They had sleeping bags, blankets. There was just hundreds of people camped out so they could be the first ones to get tickets when the ticket office opened at Shea Stadium in the morning. And that's where each one of those were sold right from that ticket office at Shea

Jeff Dwoskin 28:51

Yeah, I remember having to go to Ticketmaster at harmony house or something to get tickets for anything. So yeah. It's such a process to get tickets. Now. You just get them and they say could you would you like us to send it to your phone? It's like, ah, they have to wake up at four in the morning go like there's no there's no thrill to it. Where's your ego at this point? I mean, in a good way. I mean, you had been like, holy cow is this is just like, a couple years after you started. I mean, you guys are like the hottest things. Yeah. How do you take that all in? Because you're young? Right? You're like the early 20s. It's like

Mark Farner 29:26

you have 20 when the band started 21 years old. 22. Yeah, it's young. But we had seen so many people in our audiences. And we had adopted so many folks as ours, and we had community. Radio back then was much different than what radio is today because it was owned by the people. It was owned by patriotic Americans. That was a 777 rule in place. You could own 7am seven FM and seven television stations. Which limited that access to the people's, you know, minds to advertise to us out here and that was kept in the hands of moms and dads and grandpas and grandmas. It was kept in family's hands, people who had moral conscience over what our children saw and heard prior to 1996 when it was deregulated. Wow. So

Jeff Dwoskin 30:22

Alright, so so you're like, on top of the world, and you realize, where's the money? Yeah, we should have more money. We should have some money. Driving buying 15 cars, and we're just making it Yeah. Why is he out there buying Lear jets? When when you hear Terry Nye tell the story. He's like, they could have waited three months, and I would have been out of my contract anyway, is that is that accurate? That's how the media tells it.

Mark Farner 30:48

That was just his hype. He was always hyping something. I couldn't be around him for three months knowing what I had just discovered that the contract that he signed with Capitol Records, it was a production deal. So they actually signed Good night productions. And Don, and Mel and myself were signed as artists to good night productions, the 6% that Terry gave to the band to split. He told us this was more than the Beatles got. We believed him. You know, Jeff, that's the problem was young guys. We believe people when when they tell us things, so we think Oh, that's cool. That's great. Well, I found out in a meeting where we had been called into New York City. And we were at the lawyers offices up here in the big buildings corner office in New York City. And they tell us, we owe $400,000 to the Internal Revenue Service, that they would gladly loan that money to us if we'd sign another three year contract with Terry night. And we went, boy, there's something in the milk and cream here, boys. And I told him we we can't make a decision like that. Just standing here a snap decision. They said, Okay, we'll leave the room. So when they left the room, I looked at the other two guys. I said, Hey, we're screwed, man. This is crazy. How convenient to be in this debt. Now this debt scenario and needing to borrow $400,000. And these guys are going to loan it to us what I mean, how does this work like this, we must not have very good management, and they want us to read up. So I'm setting at this guy's desk. I'm sitting in the attorney's chair, my feet are up on his desk. And when I sat up, my foot dragged down over that big desk drawer on a wooden desk that goes across the truck. Anyways, it came over and I sat up, then there is the contract between good night productions and Capitol Records for 16%. Jeff Wow, Terry Knight was keeping 10 giving the band six to split, and then taking a management commission of that 6% that the band split and my publishing 100% he was getting over like a fat cat man, man, it sucks.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:15

That sucks. Cuz in the court ruled in his favor. And then like, yeah, it's ahead to be heartbreaking. I mean, you guys, you came back from it wrong, but it's like, Man, it's just gotta be a gut punch. Like, like, none of that is. Yeah, it's horrible to hear. Because you guys it was there was such magic being made. And then there's always like that evil. lurking. Yeah, always. Yeah, always got to be careful that evil. Oh, boy. You did kind of start over right. You became a quartet? Yeah. moved away from your power trio. Greg Ross joined the band.

Mark Farner 33:47

Yeah, we hired Greg crossback, who was one of the keyboard players, one of the guys who was married that had to leave the band when we got stranded in Cape Cod. So we got him back.

Jeff Dwoskin 33:59

Alright, so reunion. There you go. And then you guys started cranking out some hits. And this is this is where after this that, you know, you're feeling down. But then this is in the wake of all this came American band.

Mark Farner 34:09

Oh, yeah. And Lynn Goldsmith, he said, Why don't you guys write a song about what you are? You're an American band. And so Breuer comes with the lyrics. And then I told him, I said, hey, it's this thing. This song needs a cowbell. He says, I don't have a cowbell. I said, Well, it needs one. He says, Okay, I'll stop and pick one on the way to rehearsal. I'll pick one up and I said, No, I'll pick up six of them. And we'll pick out the one that fits the tune the best, the one that sounds the best with the track. So he did and we pick one out and then I heard that drum lick. It's on the beginning. That's my drum. Like I taught it to him. And I said, it's got to go like this, with that bass drum double kicking like that. And he goes mad that I can't do that. I said, yes, you can do it. You know who the hell you are. You're damn good, dude, you could do this. He ends up being able to do it, of course. And that's I wrote it all. Those chord changes. He came in with the two note chords Don did kind of gave us an outline of what he heard. But then I, I could hear a lot of other things. And I said, Well, what am I doing this that? That, that, that that that that, but what about that, you know, and then my influence of the harmony and everything that I contributed to that song right after we got done recording it at criteria in Miami, Don Brewer came to me and he says mark, I've never had 100% right credit on any song. Do you mind if I take it on this one? I said no. Go ahead down. You know why? Cuz I'm a nice guy. And he came on like, Oh, this poor guy. And I thought, Oh, yeah, I'll give him that. I mean, why not? But that's been used against me. Even though it has, it's not going to change me into being something other than a nice guy. It's just provoked me to be nicer. even longer, long as I live. I'm just gonna remain nice. In the face of all this bull crap.

Jeff Dwoskin 36:00

The advice My dad always gave me is nothing pisses off someone more than just being nice to them. Always take the high road. Yeah, just always do the right thing. I do have a question though. Based on the on the writing credits, because when people when they're working together like you guys, because it's a power trio, right? You all bring like the story you just told about American band, but I'm sure like you all, like maybe you know, you're all coming together. It's like it's that power trio. It's that magic of the three of you have all those songs. Why don't bands, artists just put everyone's name down? Is there something that goes a little deeper than that? I don't know. That's why I'm asking. I've always wondered that.

Mark Farner 36:34

Well, whoever comes up with the song is the the creator of it, whoever comes up with the lyrics and melody, and it's not the band creating it, especially when the guy the writer is telling the musicians what notes to play. When I write, I hear the bass, I hear what it should be doing under me. That's part of me being the Creator. But like, now he could he said he could never come up with lyrics because he said he just has a hard enough time playing the chords. And I said, Well, I I just let the chords lead me into some lyrics. I guess I'm blessed enough to be able to put some rhyming together also, which isn't a bad idea when you're singing so.

Jeff Dwoskin 37:24

Okay, I think I get it. It's good. That's good. So with American band, you, you probably could have gotten a writing credit if you had pushed on.

Mark Farner 37:31

Yeah, if I just said, No, I don't want to, I don't want to give up my portion. You know, I could have but later just to fill in the 45, American band came out on yellow vine, and there was 100,000 of these yellow vinyl singles printed and 100,000 of the yellow vinyl, lp 33 and a third RPM LPs, the single had one of my songs on the back on the flip side, creeping. And so Don, went to the manager are Andy capillary. And Andy came to me, and he says, I hate to even say this to you, Mark. But Don wants 50% of your royalties for creeping because it's on the backside of for an American band, and it's his song that's selling it. I said, Are you shitting me? If you have experience, and he said, Yeah, he's serious. So it's just I don't know. It's just kind of Picayune kind of a letdown that somebody would first of all, you're nice enough to say, Yeah, go ahead and take it. And then they say, yeah, since it's mine, give me half your money. Like, wow, greed.

Jeff Dwoskin 38:49

Wow. Yeah. It's a strange animal. Yeah, that's a lot to take in, in terms of grandfathered in. I guess we could tie it in with that. So it's, they say when I say they, the website, you go to GrandFunkRailroad.com that you quit. Right. But I know that's not your story. Right. Right. There was a some kind of legal shenanigans, as you can fill me in, but it is much as something where you, you signed into a corporation and and Dan and Mel kind of screwed you? Yeah. What were they thinking? Like, why don't we? Why would they do that? What brings people to like, you know, turn on the brothers like that. It's like it's Yeah, it's so hard to fathom is.

Mark Farner 39:28

Yeah, I've asked that question. eleventy dozen times. Because I don't know what it is. That's for sure. I do know that money makes people funny. It's shared to us. And some crazy shit has gone down here in the land. We all were born in. And this is just part of it. I don't, you know, I don't I can't hold anything against those guys, except for the fact that, hey, they're not telling the truth when they go out. But these bands that have You know, maybe one original member and they call it the name of the band sounds crazy. That's false advertising, but they get away with it. I don't think the fans are given a fair shake on that. I think there should be some kind of system to give a star rating. say there was five original members in the band in its inception when they released records in the early 70s. And now they're advertised and tonight to play down at this amphitheater. And they got the star rating would be there's five original members, you got a five in the left side of the star on the right side of the star, there's a two. So that gives you a heads up. Well, there's two members left out of those five men, you do your little detective work you find out which ones it is and make up your mind if you want to go see when people just flagrantly use that name of the band. And they don't tell the audience that the guy who wrote and sang over 90% of the music is no longer with the band. That is just a little underhanded, I would say because people expect to see Mick Jagger when the Rolling Stones show up.

Jeff Dwoskin 41:17

Yeah, can you imagine you're to see the Rolling Stones in snap but Mick Jagger Well, you're you're the voice You know, you're they when you think of the Grand funk railroad, you're the voice and it's like I gotta say is as I was getting ready for this, I caught an ad because they're doing a big reunion tour. And I'm like, Oh, my God, man, like has a said in the ad. Same lineup since 2002. Don't quote me on the year, but it was something like that. So I Oh my God. And so I got excited. Like, Oh, man. Yeah. So yeah, not being an idiot. I went look, and I'm like, Oh, wait, it does not say Mark. Though, maybe, right. Because, you know, I didn't know the exact years. You know, when you think like, the big reunion was in like, '98 right. I mean, that was a while ago, but you know, so

Mark Farner 42:02

it started '96 that reunion tour. It ended in '98

Jeff Dwoskin 42:06

It's too It's too bad because it's when I when I heard that story of the 96 reunion tour. You guys just clicked and then went out. You may catch the magic again. He just said thank you guys. Could you think they'd want Why would they want Mark farner you know, I mean it just seems like a no brainer. Yeah, marketing wise he could he could probably all make like when the Eagles toured later, I made more money. Yeah, to me. Yeah. later than they ever did when they were originally the Eagles. It's like yeah, it just seems so short sighted there, Robin. But we can hear Mark finer. Mark farner is American band. That's right, guys, this new awesome DVD from Chile with the

Mark Farner 42:45

From Chile with love. Yeah, there's 16 recorded live tracks. And then there's bonus video tracks, one of which is available right now at Mark finer comm for a free download. You can download rock and roll's soul. So you get a sample of what's found the DVD. Also never and always it's another bonus video on the DVD. And then there's five bonus songs that have never been released like this before. So for 1499 such a deal. And my wife Lisa and I give $3 from each DVD sales to veterans support foundation and veterans support foundation is made up of veterans and they help veterans there's they don't have a salary that the nobody's on the payroll. They're all volunteers. But this these are a bunch of great people working together to help our veterans who return from war. And they get them through transitional housing, they scrape them up off the streets, get them jobs, get them job training, great people, they advocate for our veterans in front of the US Department of Veterans Affairs to make sure that they get what they have coming to them by law. And I love these guys because there's no red tape. There's no government in between trying to do something. This is all veterans, for veterans. And I thank everybody in advance who would bless us by buying one of the DVDs. Thank you for helping us support our brothers and sisters who risked their safety to ensure hours

Jeff Dwoskin 44:27

God bless you, Mark That's awesome. That's awesome. That's that's a good amount $3 per sale. They're worth absolutely worth it. Absolutely. So what inspired from Chile with love,

Mark Farner 44:38

the book tour was booked playing down in Peru and Brazil and Chile. And one of the promoters in Santiago Carlos pastine. calls my manager Adi and he says, you know he's got a friend who owns a bismal films that would like to shoot the concert, do eight cameras shoot and he said The magic words he said he'd make you a good deal. So I made the good deals. And this guy, the other Carlos Carlos turtles, he is a fan. And he loves. He loves the music. He loves my music. He came up with the video concept for never. And always, which is the second bonus video that's found the DVD. And he didn't even I mean, you know, he just said, I love this song. And let me put together a video for you. I said, Well, yeah, I didn't know that you had even heard the song yet. But if you've got ideas, let me see what you're thinking. And he comes up with this video as a very touching video. Very appropriate. And for our times that we are going through and have been going through here. It's a touching video, and the song sells it. So I'm I'm proud of that.

Jeff Dwoskin 45:52

It's great. I watched it. Both the videos that are released for it. How long has the DVD been available?

Mark Farner 45:59

As of April 6 that was released. It's been well received. And all those pre orders were signed, I signed over 2000 of those DVD sleeves. Dude, I could tell you exactly about writers crane.

Jeff Dwoskin 46:18

Yeah, yeah. But is it just available as a DVD or whatever be like, just streamed as an album or

Mark Farner 46:26

so far, it's just the DVD but people have been inquiring into whether or not it will eventually be blu ray or, you know, another format. So I'm bringing this up to Ingram, which is our company that distributes the blank more records. Never know.

Jeff Dwoskin 46:43

where's the best place to get it? MarkFarner.com? Yeah, that's that's the best place to get it. Excellent. So what's what's next for Mark Farner? touring, you're going to be in Michigan again,

Mark Farner 46:54

I don't know when we're gonna be back in Michigan. In a week, they're trickling in one here, one there, but we played Oh, half a dozen times since the first year.

Jeff Dwoskin 47:04

It's good. It must be great to get back out and just

Mark Farner 47:07

it is man. It's like the boys in the band. They're, they're like chomping at the bit. You know, we get our satisfaction upon that stage. And it's like, that's our drug. Yeah, there's

Jeff Dwoskin 47:17

nothing like being in front of a live audience. It's exactly Yes, sir. What are your favorite re songs that you've written?

Mark Farner 47:24

I'm your captain. Second. I'd have to put in the song politician. Author The good thing and good playing album that Frank Zappa produced and foot stomping music.

Jeff Dwoskin 47:37

Excellent trio of songs. Mark, this has been so much fun. I can't thank you enough for hanging out with me. It's so cool,

Mark Farner 47:45

brother. Hey, my pleasure, Jeff. I like being here with you. And if the future holds another interview or time for us to get together, I'll be looking forward to it.

Jeff Dwoskin 47:56

Thank you so much that this is so much fun.

Mark Farner 47:59

Thank you, Jeff. I appreciate it. If I don't see in the future I'll see in the pasture. All right, brother.

Jeff Dwoskin 48:05

All right. How amazing was that? Ladies and gentlemen. Keep your hands going for legendary rocker Mark Farner it was so great to talk to mark definitely check out his DVD From Chile with Love head over to Markfarner.com you can purchase it right from there and don't forget $3 from every DVD goes towards veterans support foundation. That's amazing that he gives back like he does. Let's go support Mark for all the amazing music He's given us throughout the years.

Well, can you believe it? Here we are. almost at the end of yet another episode. How is it that episode 60 is almost complete. I know we've had so much fun together but as the end nears you know that means That's right. It's time for another hashtag when the family of hashtags from hashtag round up on Twitter, follow hashtag roundup on twitter @hashtagroundup or download the hashtag roundup app free at the Apple Store, Google Play Store and tweet along with us all day every day and one day one of your tweets may show up on an episode of live from Detroit the Jeff Dwoskin show this week's hashtag #UnlikelyRoadieComplaints. That's right, we got into the Rock and Roll mood we're gonna retain what it's like to be a famous rock star with roadies and what their unlikely complaints might be. This of course comes to us from the unlikely game a weekly game on hashtag round up that just happens to be hosted by yours truly.

Alright ladies and gentlemen, let's dive into #UnlikelyRoadieComplaints. Everyone around here seems to know how to tune a guitar but no one seems to know how to tuna fish. Hey, the jam sessions don't actually include any jam. Why these are some #UnlikelyRoadieComplaints. When is the bank and it's Start playing some new songs. It seems these play the same ones over and over again. I know it can get repetitive there's been a high case of blisters on our little fingers and blisters on our thumb. Why isn't anyone yelling? Freebird? Is anyone else noticed the minibar just doesn't seem mini enough? Is it me or the amps that go to 11? So much heavier than the ones that go to 10? Why can't we just make the ones that go to 10? lighter, so many #UnlikelyRoadieComplaints? Here's the legit one. I don't think those were brown m&ms. Has anyone else noticed that every drummer seems to have an untimely death? These are some legit unlikely roadie complaints. Do you have a complaint you want to share with us? Just go onto Twitter, and tweet hashtag on like the roadie complaints and tag us at Jeff Dwoskin show and you just might get a retweet or like maybe a comment. I don't know. I can't legally promise what I'll do before seeing it. But go ahead and do that. Have some fun. We'd love to hear what #UnlikelyRoadieComplaints you might have.

Well, here we are. Can you believe it? We're at the end of another episode, Episode 60 has come and gone. Thank you so much for coming along on the journey with us. I want to thank once again, our guest, Mark Farner, the amazing Mark Farner. And I also want to thank the amazing all of you for coming back week after week. I can't thank you enough. It means the world to me, and I'll see you next week.

Announcer 51:26

Thanks so much for listening to this episode of the Jeff Dwoskin show with your host Jeff Dwoskin. Now go repeat everything you've heard and sound like a genius. catch us online at the JeffDwoskinshow.com or follow us on Twitter @JeffDwoskinShow and we'll see you next time.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai