Pete Fogel- Was the electric bass your first instrument?
Harvey Brooks- Actually, no. My first instrument
was the guitar. A friend of mine, Bob Rose who plays sessions in Manhattan now,
was in my French class at junior high school. He brought his guitar in one day,
but I'd never had anything to do with one before and I really liked it and he
showed me how to play a few chords. I did my first gig with him- two guitars
for 50 cents at a local church and then we formed a band, got a drummer and
a saxophone player and a manager and the manager said, `You gotta have a bass'
so I became the bass player.
PF- Why were you chosen to be the bass player?
HB- Because there were only four strings and it would be easier to do. I wanted
to be the lead guitar player. The band played dances and then we also got to
play all different kinds of weddings.
PF- How old were you then?
HB- Fifteen, sixteen.
PF- How did you get your first break?
HB- My first break came through just playing more and more gigs. Then I was
playing at a club in the city and I got a call from Al Kooper telling me that
he was at a Dylan session and he needed a bass player.
PF- So did things snowball from that session onwards?
HB- Yeah. I did that session and on that I met Mike Bloomfield and that led
to The Electric Flag eventually. But also being
in Albert Grossman's stable- he managed Gordon Lightfoot and Richie Havens and
Peter, Paul and Mary- through them I also met a guy called Arthur Gorson who
managed Eric Anderson and Phil Ochs and I got involved in the folk scene. I
moved to Greenwich Village and I played at the Cafe a Go Go almost every night
with a different artist and this all through the Dylan thing. I became a sort
of folk hero, electric bass player. Felix Pappalardi was the other guy who was
doing it, he was a great bass player, he eventually produced some of the early
Cream records. I did a Richie Havens' "Mixed Bag", his first album.
PF- What Dylan albums did you play on?
HB- "Highway 61" and "New Morning".
PF- Did you know at the time that you were playing with a legend?
HB- He was becoming a legend, and for me it was just a good step. I was doing
okay, I had just bought a new Mustang and I was making money on my gigs, but
I never imagined what the difference was when you were involved with a phenomenon
or in that case musical history. One thing, you're in a club playing your gig
and the next day you're in a limo.
PF- What do you remember most about the way he worked in the studio?
HB- Bob worked really spontaneously and fast and we didn't spend a lot of time
looking for the perfect notes, it just had to feel right. The way we'd listen
was 'Yeah, that's okay, there's a couple things there that might not be right,
but they felt good.' If the take felt good we went on. There were no microscopes
at that session. The only microscope was in Dylan's hand, and from his point
of view did the song come off. That's all he was concerned about.
PF- Tell us how The Electric Flag came about.
HB- Mike Bloomfield originally came from Chicago with Paul Butterfield; they
were discovered there by Paul Rothschild for Elektra Records. He got them to
New York and right about this time it had been a couple of years and Bloomfield
wanted to do his own thing and so he had a friend, Barry Goldberg from Chicago
and Nick Gravenites. We met at the session, so I got on the train and in a short
period of time Albert Grossman was behind the project and we went to California
and started The Electric Flag.
PF- You were white guys playing black music?
HB- It was a mixed color band. Buddy Miles was the drummer, who we got from
playing with Wilson Pickett. Over the couple of years that the band was together
we had three or four black guys, but it was predominantly guided by a white
blues mentality.
PF- Did the band sound too white or did it have some soul?
HB- No, the band had a lot of soul. It was based on James Brown and rhythm and
blues with Michael's psychedelic blues. If you listen to the Butterfield "East
West" album, what was he doin'? Nobody knows to this day. It was his version
of the blues, he could play some serious blues, but he really stretched out.
And the electric playing sort of symbolized the blending of the blues, R&B
with pop. We were the first band to bring in the horn section, The Electric
Flag and the American Music Band. The idea was it was based on American music.
We were combining the rock, rhythm and blues and the psychedelic environment
that we were in in San Francisco in 1967.
PF- So you were there with the Grateful Dead and the Jefferson Airplane and
all those bands?
HB- Yeah, we were all playing at the Fillmore. Having been in San Francisco,
I sort of lost my memory.
PF- You always considered the Monterey Pop festival as the great event. Why?
HB- It was great in the sense that it was the first outside the Newport festivals.
It was really the first pop festival and it had all the legends of pop: Otis
Redding, Janis Joplin. It was a phenomenal thing. I remember being in a hotel
room with The Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix was there and everybody was floating
around and it was quite an event.
PF- I read that you and Brian Jones and Jimi Hendrix talked a lot. What did
you guys talk about?
HB- It was funny. Brian Jones was the English version of blues, we were talking
about the blues and he was talking about how all the English musicians really
loved American blues and Jimi was saying that he found the English version of
the blues kinda funny. He said he thought it was honest, but he thought they
played pretty funny.
PF- How many live gigs did you play with Hendrix?
HB- I played a bunch of gigs on the same bill with him at the Cafe a Go Go,
just jamming at the club.
PF- What was the crowd's reaction to Jimi when he was playing?
HB- People always loved Jimi, he was always a crowd pleaser, even when he was
wearing his multi-colored mohair suits he'd do that stuff and you couldn't help
but like it.
PF- You also played live with The Doors?
HB- Yeah, I played with The Doors at the Forum and at Madison Square Garden.
PF- How did you meet Jim Morrison?
HB- Robbie Krieger, the guitar player was a big fan of The Electric Flag, and
he really liked my playing and he invited me out to his house and we jammed
around. This was probably 1968, '68 and '69, I spent a lot of time in LA doing
different albums and doing gigs and hung out with everybody.
PF- How true to life is the Oliver Stone movie?
HB- Okay, I'll lead into the whole scenario. Morrison was a very introspective,
nice kinda guy, but he had a lot of deep thoughts from how he grew up and his
family. As The Doors developed and he started doing a lot of drugs his personality
was taken over by the success of the band, the excess of the band, and the problems
they began to have.
PF- Were you brought in because they needed some new blood?
HB- They just came up with some incredible music and they were looking to go
forward. Basically what I had to do was take a lot of song fragments and put
them together and help them make songs out of them. A partner of mine called
Paul Harris did horn and string arrangements and there was a good hit out of
that, "Touch Me". I played bass on that. "Touch Me" represented
the start of another era, but they couldn't keep it going. I think they were
pretty burned.
PF- Did you ever play the upright bass?
HB- Yeah, when I was a kid. I didn't start on it. I always wanted to play it
because I felt that was a legitimate instrument. I was brought up with the bass
being a bastard instrument, you weren't a real musician unless you played the
upright. All the bass players that I admired were the upright players. I bought
a bass and I was gonna start lessons on it and my mother came in and accidentally
knocked it over the night before I was gonna start. It broke the neck so I never
started.
PF- Who were the bass players who influenced your playing through the years?
HB- Mostly Scott LaFaro who used to play with Bill Evans, a fabulous bass player.
Paul Chambers and Ron Carter and then Monk Montgomery who was Wes Montgomery's
brother and one of the first guys to play electric bass in live performances.
Really he brought it out and that was one of the great experiences, because
it made me feel valid. Although I don't consider myself a jazz player my style
is basically a jazz style, very in the feel, in the pocket.
PF- But is it true you don't read music?
HB- I do read but I know I'm not a real good reader. My reading has improved
a lot, I'm self taught and it's getting better.
PF- How about when you work with someone like Fagen when it seems like everything
is complicated with lots of changes. Is that hard?
HB- Well, a big part of it is if I get the charts ahead of time I do some homework
and then I use the charts as a guide. But also my ears are real good and my
feel is good and as long as I can do a little prework on it, it's okay. But
if you stuck it right in front of me without any rehearsals I'd have a problem.
I'd still play it and you'd love it, but it might not be perfect.
PF- I was reading that Miles Davis called you a white, fat motherfucker. It
seems that he treated everybody like that, what was he like?
HB- Miles, he challenged you, he put it in your face and if you went away he'd
rather not talk to you. He related to the fact that you could take it, and he
put the probe out to see who you were. He figured in his mind he's a guy who's
been around, done a lot of things and if you're gonna be in his world, you're
gonna have to be tough enough to stay there.
PF- What was it like recording "Bitches Brew"?
HB- That for me was a wonderful experience; it was the first actual sessions
with jazz players of that caliber. I'm a very big jazz fan, I have a great amount
of respect for the music. I felt very honored to be in that company; I still
felt like a bumpkin, but they made me feel real comfortable and I just did my
thing. Miles wanted me to go out on tour, but I didn't feel that it was my forte
and I didn't want to be embarrassed.
PF- But didn't you feel that he had been around and that he felt you were good
enough? Do you regret it now?
HB- I do on the level that all the players that did those things with Miles
really grew a lot. Although I don't think that was my element, I really don't.
PF- You trusted your own opinion more than you trusted Miles'?
HB- Yeah. One thing I did learn is that if you're gonna make mistakes, you might
as well make your own mistakes, but on the other hand it would have been a good
thing to do. I should have been more adventurous. I didn't feel like I was at
home.
PF- What music do you prefer to play?
HB- I like music that's' in a band context with horns and singers. This is what
I love about Donald's project, it's perfect music for me because I'm a real
aficionado when I play- I like to listen and it's similar to Electric Flag.
There's a horn section, everything's defined and I love pop R&B music.
PF- Do you think that Fagen picked up on that?
HB- Absolutely. I think maybe that's why I'm in it. Also, Donald and I have
had some discussions about what we like- we like a lot of the same stuff, just
growing up who we saw and what kind of music we listened to and so those jazz
roots are in the way I play. Cause I'm a very tasteful player, I look to pick
just the right note for the right feel for the thing. It's just instinctive
to me.
PF- Let's get to the main question: How the hell are you gonna learn all of
Chuck Rainey's bass parts?
HB- (laughter) I'm not. I'll see the chart, read what it is and just embellish
it because...
PF- You don't wanna play exactly what's on the record?
HB- What for? Paul Shaffer preaches, 'Learn the way it's done on the record.'
Well, it's good to learn how it is, but that doesn't mean that you have to play
it that way. That's the starting point, so I do it to the best of my abilities
to absorb the part and then play the music.
PF- How did you meet Donald?
Bonnie Brooks- A funny story is that the first night that he came down to Hades,
we didn't know who he was. He came down with Jeff Young and sat at our table.
When the Little Big Band finished, Harvey came over and Jeff introduced him
to us and that he was from Steely Dan. We then got into a discussion with Donald
over Bandaids. We went next door and I had a cut and we only buy these medicated
Bandaids. They were standing behind us and I said "Oh, I'm really excited
because we found these medicated Bandaids." And Donald says to Harvey,
"Have you tried slimy razor blades?"
HB- As soon as he said that I thought, "Oh, I like this guy."
PF- Did you get a kick out of when Donald started playing Dylan's "Down
Along The Cove"?
HB- Yeah, I thought it was an interesting arrangement, it took me a long time
for me to relate to it.
PF- I think it took The Little Big Band a long time to relate to it. So were
you familiar with Steely Dan's music throughout the seventies?
HB- Absolutely.
PF- What did you think of it as music?
HB- It was like Steely Dan was something I would listen to. Their records were
very well crafted. I feel that they may have overindulged a little bit from
time to time, like on "Aja" spending a few million dollars or whatever...
PF- They were working completely differently from the way Dylan was working.
HB- Oh, this is another world. Dylan at that time just threw it out, I don't
like either extreme. I like to put the preproduction in and make the music happen
and take the time to really do it right, but God bless you if you have the time
to do it and get it the way you really want it. I've never had that in my life.
I'd love to be a part of anything like that. That's the best musical scenario
to be able to take it and get it right. But also to be able to say yeah, it's
right now, and know that you've got what you want.
PF- What's it like working with Donald on stage?
HB- It's a pleasure. I've found him to have a very wry, good sense of humor.
PF- Can you see a difference from the Hades days to now?
HB- Oh, yeah, he'd be coming through the back door, but now he's walking through
the crowd like he doesn't care any more.
PF- But it's been great seeing how his fans appreciate him.
HB- I think he needed to know.
PF- My thinking was when he came out and started playing, if we put his best
fans in the room the vibes would be so great that he'd keep coming out and playing.
HB- I think he's a fabulous musician and I enjoy playing music with him. Because
I like his music, I enjoy playing what he writes just as a musician interplay-wise,
he listens and it's very friendly and very respectful. All I wanna do is just
play. I'm not there for any other reason than to make the show happen. I'm not
a frontline entertainer, I'm not looking for anyone's thunder, I just wanna
support a good focus. He's a classy guy.
PF- When you're on stage with Donald and The Little Big Band and you see the
crowd's reactions to all the songs that he plays like "Black Friday"
or "My Old School". Could you compare it with when you played with
The Doors or Jimi Hendrix?
HB- I think with Donald it seems to be more musically earned than it is an event.
A lot of other people that I've played with in an incredible situation with
hundreds of thousands of people, it still wasn't as musically earned, it was
more like an event.
PF- Do you think the fans who come out to watch him play are more knowledgeable
about music?
HB- I think because he's more knowledgeable and he's really a musical person
I think his fans really appreciate the music more than anything else. And the
sardonic twists, there's good lighting, when that's together I think the show
can be really incredible. I think he's learned a lot from the Beacon show and
just in what they want to do with the proper lighting and staging and developing
these things. I think it'll be a phenomenal show.
PF- How did you like playing with Leroy Clouden at the Lone Star on "Chain
Lightning"?
HB- I found Leroy to be a very tasteful drummer. If all this continues to work
out and I'm on tour, Leroy and I will be a very great fat pocket because he's
a simple player and he's delicate and he's very musical and I relate to that
a lot. I think the pocket will be monstrous. It won't be big, it won't be very
boisterous, there'll be room for everybody. One of the things about a lot of
playing is that everybody has to cram their music in and it's just like a wall
of sound. When it's very tastefully done and very specific, there's room for
everybody and the tones and the sounds and the colors of the music will be a
lot cleaner.
PF- When Steely Dan toured Walter played bass. So this'll be the first time
that Donald and Walter have toured together where they're using another bass
player. Walter's gonna play guitar and speaking of guitar the other guitar player
is Drew Zingg. Who do you think will play lead?
HB- Walter will probably be the lead guy.
PF- Tell us about Chuck Jackson.
HB- Chuck Jackson is a fabulous R&B singer from the fifties. He did a tune
called "Beg Me", he's just a big, deep, powerful voice. "Kentucky
Bluebird", "Take A Message To Michael", he used to record on
Venture Records. Everybody will love him. That's the thing that's so good about
the shows, we've got a wide selection of material. I can see Donald's whole
plan -- to make it valid you gotta have some valid people. He's got a lot of
people from different types of music and from different eras. Strong show.
PF- Catherine Russell and Mindy Jostyn on back-up vocals.
HB- Catherine's a great spirit. Killer voice, soulful, happy person, great presence.
Same for Mindy. Mindy's very versatile, she plays harp, violin and everything
else.
PF- If you had a musical philosophy what would it be?
HB- Enjoy and listen first and then play. That's while you're playing, listen
and enjoy what's going on around you and passit on to your fellow musicians,
then play.
PF- When you look back on your career do you feel that you've accomplished a
lot?
HB- I do and I'm proud of it and I feel there's a lot ahead. I'm very thankful
to have some opportunities to continue to do what I do. Things are getting good
now. I'm practicing more, generally, my career's feeling very strong. I have
a lot of support, I'm a happily married man.
PF- Have you ever written music or published music?
HB- Yeah, I've written not a lot of music, but I wrote something back on the
Super Session album called "Harvey's Tune" which had some success.
I did a lot of writing with The Rhinestones. I've recently recorded four tunes
at Donald's new studio, River Sound, which is a fabulous studio and which I'd
highly recommend to anybody.
PF- Do you want the songs you did at River Sound to be a group?
HB- I'm shopping it as a group and I'm also shopping it as tunes for somebody
else to do. The group is called Human Condition and I'd like to see that happen.
We have that up at Columbia, Arista turned it down. We'll see what happens.
We have Jeff Young, Catherine Russell, whom we met through Jimmy Vivino and
Jimmy's on there, too.
PF- What are your three favorite Steely Dan songs?
HB- I like "Home At Last," actually there's a lot of them...
BB- "Josie."
HB- Yeah, I love "Josie." I also like "Green Flower Street,"
"Do It Again," "Peg," I couldn't just name you three.
PF- Thanks, Harvey. I'll see you down at the shows.
Metal Leg contents | The Steely Dan Internet Resource
Last modified on 1/9/2003