The Insider:
Hi Don. Thanks so much for talking with The Insider from the road!
Don Was:
Thanks for inviting me, Andi! it’s been over 50 years since you ran my photo in Lilly’s Little Libels and about 33 since you interviewed David Weiss and me in Dallas for Time. I think we’re overdue.
The Insider:
I agree! As those of us who have been following your work know, you have had an astonishing career as a musician, record producer, and record executive. How in the world do you have time to be out on the road now?
Don Was:
My so-called “work” is also the thing I would do for fun, so there’s no difference between spare time and work time. Musicians play music–they don’t work music. Lifting heavy boxes is work and I’ve got a lot of respect for folks who are disciplined enough to do that regularly.
The Insider:
Which city are you in today?
Don Was:
Woke up in Knoxville, Tenn. Got a show tomorrow night.
The Insider:
Who are you playing with?
Don Was:
Right now, I’m on tour with Ryan Adams and the Cardinals. I’ve made records with him for the last 10 years. I think he’s the finest songwriter of his generation–incredibly creative musician with a big vision. I also tour with Bob Weir of the Grateful Dead for about three months every year and, each November, a bunch of us, including Jamey Johnson, Warren Haynes, Taj Mahal and Cyril Neville, go from town to town performing The Band’s Last Waltz Concert.
The Insider:
Should we imagine you folks on a classic rock tour bus?
Don Was:
You should! It’s a great way to travel–no airports, plenty of creature comforts. I dig pulling into a town at 5 a.m., dragging myself up to a room, pulling the blinds, sleeping till afternoon and then playing a show that brings joy and comfort into the lives of the audience members.
The Insider:
There are so many people you’ve met that I’d like to ask you about—Bob Dylan, The Rolling Stones and on and on. But let’s go back to basics today. Let’s talk about The Beatles. Were they a big influence on you as a musician as you were coming up?
Don Was:
It’s not hyperbolic to say that I wouldn’t be here today if it weren’t for The Beatles. There are an extraordinary number of musicians I know who were born in 1952 and we all have the same back story: We were 12 years old when we saw The Beatles on Ed Sullivan’s show. They looked like they were having so much fun, the music was awesome and every girl in the audience was screaming. I wanted to do THAT! At 12, we were just dumb enough to think that it was actually possible. If we’d have been 16, we’d have thought it looked cool but was not a practical career choice. At 8, it wouldn’t have registered. From that moment on, there was never a Plan B.
The Insider:
Did you see them in person when you were growing up in Detroit?
Don Was:
That was a very contentious issue in my family. They played at Olympia Stadium in September, 1964–September 6th, to be exact. My buddies and I took a DSR bus from Northland to Olympia at 5 a.m. on a freezing February morning to get in line to buy advance tickets. In retrospect, Social Services should have taken me away from parents who’d allow a 12-year-old to do that. But the system let me down.
When September rolled around, it turned out that the 6th was also Rosh Hashana and my mother felt that a Beatles concert was not an appropriate place to observe the holiday. I could’ve lived with that. However, I wouldn’t stop nagging her about it, so she proposed a compromise: she’d take me to see The New Christy Minstrels at the Michigan State Fair on the 6th, as that seemed like a holier show for the occasion.
Subsequently, I’ve had a hard time accepting any religion that would choose the New Christy Minstrels over the Fab Four! I’m sure you can understand that. So I missed the Beatles. I think you and I saw John Lennon together at Chrysler Arena for the Free John Sinclair concert in 1971 and I saw Wings once.
The Insider:
Yes, that show knocked me out! It was amazing to see John Lennon and Yoko there. She had a horrifying voice, though! Screeching!
Don Was:
I love you despite your disdain for performance art. It was an incredible show: Stevie Wonder, Bob Seger with Teegarden and Van Winkle, Allen Ginsberg, Bobby Seale, Archie Shepp, The Up. I think Jerry Rubin was playing bongos with the Lennons! As your readers may recall, John Sinclair had been sentenced to 10 years in the penitentiary for possession of two joints. The concert was staged to draw attention to his plight.
The most incredible thing was that IT WORKED! In the wake of the global attention that the concert received, Gov. Milliken pardoned Sinclair and freed him first thing on the Monday after the show. That’s another lesson The Beatles taught us: music could be used as a galvanizing force to change the world.
The Insider:
Yes, that show was really a portent of rock ‘n’ roll’s later focus on politics. What I also remember strongly about those years is how we were influenced aesthetically too. Boys let their hair grow and imitated the way the Beatles dressed. Did you go through that stage, too?
Don Was:
I’m still in that stage!
The Insider:
[Laughs] I know that you went on to meet some of The Beatles in person. Who was the first one you met?
Don Was:
The first Beatle I met was George Harrison. It was a pivotal moment in my life as a record maker. David Weiss and I were producing a Bob Dylan album called Under the Red Sky in 1989. One day, Bob brought George to the studio to overdub a guitar on the title track.
Before we started, George said to me; “Don’t let him do what he did to me last time. He only gave me one take and I hadn’t even learned the song yet!.” That was all that Bob needed to hear! He sat down in the engineer’s chair, put the tape machine into record and told George to play. George hadn’t even tuned up his guitar yet! He’d never heard the song. Didn’t know what key it was in. Bob was like an 11-year-old kid tormenting his 8-year-old brother, although it was done with great jocularity.
After the take, Bob said “Thanks, man–that’s perfect!” George looked mortified and turned to me and asked, “What do YOU think, Don?” Then Bob, in the kind of sarcastic voice that only he can muster said, “Yeah–what do you think, Don?” Time froze for me in that moment. The voices in the room dissolved into an echo chamber. How could I tell George Harrison that his solo wasn’t good enough?
Suddenly, I heard a voice in my head that said, “He’s not paying you to be a fan!” Boom–everything clicked. I said “That was really cool but let’s try another one and see if we beat it”. George was relieved and Bob thought it was very funny. But I learned a lesson that has served me well over the last 35 years. Diplomatic honesty is the best policy.
The Insider:
When you talk about diplomacy in your producing, that must be an ever-present issue. How do you tell people at the top of the music charts what to do? You must get some pushback!
Don Was:
I got some really good advice from legendary music mogul Jimmy Iovine about 40 years ago. He said, “Never produce an artist that you mind losing an argument to.” In other words, if you don’t respect an artist enough to lose an argument to them, you shouldn’t be working on their record. People push back all the time. I can’t make anyone sing something they don’t want to sing, but I can offer an opinion. That’s what they hire me to do. They can choose whether to accept that opinion or not.
The Insider:
Makes sense. Was that ever an issue when you produced Ringo Starr’s album Time Takes Time in 1996?
Don Was:
After the band broke up, all of The Beatles shied away from trying to inject that sound too literally into their solo work. I understand that urge but felt compelled to make the case that Ringo was an essential part of making that music and had the right to sound like himself without feeling self-conscious. People crave more of The Beatles’ music–who is better to do it than one of the original creators? I won that argument in 1996, but I don’t think I’d win it today.
The Insider:
What was Ringo like to work with?
Don Was:
He’s a lovely, sweet guy who knows that The Beatles were very important to people and does his best to put you at ease. No ego trips at all. Also, the notion that he is not a very good drummer is incredibly misguided and uninformed. I’ve played with him a lot over the years and his rhythmic feel and innovative approach to the role of drums in rock ‘n’ roll were essential and integral to that band. No Ringo, no Beatles. There is absolutely no doubt about that.
The Insider:
You’ve met Paul McCartney, too, right?
Don Was:
Yes, a number of times. Been to his house, played music with him. He’s incredibly warm and open. Totally aware of the importance of his music to our culture and very generous about treating the songs and the audience respectfully. The effect that music still has upon people our age is magically enigmatic.
View the entire show (above)
When we were doing dress rehearsals for the CBS special, The Night That Changed America, Paul came up onstage to soundcheck with his band. There were maybe 30 people in the theater, all of them working, mostly gaffers taping down wires, camera operators blocking their shots and the producers of the show.
When Paul broke into the opening notes of “Hey Jude” and hit the first piano chord, every single person there stopped what they were doing and started crying: everyone, burly stage hands, jaded producers, me too. I’m getting choked up just telling you about this. “Hey Jude” meant something different to everybody in that room, but we all had attached a piece of our unique inner emotional lives to that song and hearing it played exactly as we remembered it with Paul singing just a few feet away triggered an emotional tsunami.
Great art leaves room for millions of people–each with their own signature set of neuroses–to hang their inner life on it and, in the process, make some sense out of their feelings. We’re all co-writers in a way. Paul McCartney understands this and accepts the responsibilities that accompany his lofty perch in our world. As such, he’s a great and altruistic man.
The Insider:
Beautiful! It must have been so meaningful to win an Emmy for that production.
Don Was:
It was very surreal. I knew that I’d won the award because the songs were so good, not necessarily because I’d been the best musical director of the entire year. It meant a lot to get voicemail messages of congratulations from Paul and Ringo. The show was important. It was an opportunity to thank them in person for all they’d given me.
I took the gig very seriously, especially as the bass player. I was able to get the Beatles multi-track tapes and isolate Paul’s bass. I sat in my bedroom learning the nuances of his parts like I did when I was 12. Then I did my own mixes of The Beatles tracks minus the bass and practiced playing along with them for many, many hours. He was sitting right in front of me at the show and it was essential to get it right.
The most thrilling thing about the Emmys though, was having the award presented by Carrie Brownstein and Fred Armisen of Portlandia. I was star struck!
The Insider:
As an Upper West Sider, it’s my responsibility to ask my last question about John Lennon. I walk past the spot where he was shot in 1980 very often. What was his impact on you as a musician? Would you have liked to have met him?
Don Was:
John was a major force in my life. The way he fused music and social awareness set a tone that many of us have tried to emulate over the years. He also represented the raw and honest ethos of rock ‘n’ roll. Never slick, never pandering to fashion, constantly questioning conventional wisdom and trying to go places that nobody has gone before. I would’ve loved to have met him and played music with him but that wasn’t essential to learning from his example. One idiot with a gun stopped John Lennon the man but couldn’t kill what he stood for. Having gotten to know many of my heroes, the takeaway is that the music and the message transcends any individual.
The Insider:
Thanks so much, Don! It was a pleasure to spend time with you today. We look forward to your bestselling tell-all book!
Don Was:
Ha! We’ll see about that. But thank you. I enjoyed this!
Music has always loomed large in the life of Don Was. Born in Detroit in 1952, he has
enjoyed a multi-faceted career as a musician, record producer, music director, film composer, documentary filmmaker and radio host. Since 2011, he has also served as
President of America’s venerated jazz label, Blue Note Records.
For his work as a record producer, he has won six Grammy Awards – including Album
of the Year in 1989 for Bonnie Raitt’s Nick of Time and Producer of the Year in 1994. In
1995 he produced and directed a documentary about the life of Brian Wilson, I Just
Wasn’t Made For These Times, that won the San Francisco Film Festival’s Golden Gate
Award. As a film composer, he won the 1994 British Academy Award (BAFTA) for Best
Original Score in recognition of his work on the film Backbeat. He won the 2014
Emmy Award for Outstanding Music Direction for his work on the CBS TV special The
Beatles: The Night That Changed America.
Records that he has produced have sold close to 100 million albums.
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