Lyrics

Hi, it's Jalinda, Brittany, Lupe, Sarah, and Ashley
We're the damn selves, lucky you, you're listening too
Just us four (just us four) on a journey from the dark
And now here's Jonathan

Hello everybody, this is Jonathan Richman with a new episode of I'm Just a Spark on Journey from the Dark.
With this episode's special guest, my old friend, one of my oldest friends, the wonderful from Southern California, Andy Paley. Yeah, see?
And me and Andy knew each other. He grew up in upstate New York, and I grew up in Massachusetts,
And we met in Cambridge, in Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts, when we were both about
17 years old and starting to make music. So anyway, Andy has traveled over like, um,
Andy plays lots of instruments. Sometimes I've needed a drummer. Andy's a real good drummer. And
So he would fill in on drums for me if I was touring Europe sometimes I would need a drummer
Then sometimes I would need a guitar player and he could fill in on that all kinds of
Things and in fact my old band the Modern Lovers our first show Andy got it for us because
He let us open for his band Catfish Black that was playing which ended up eventually
Became the Sidewinders that's right

That was 1971 or something like that.
Yep, summer or fall of 1970.
Okay,'70s.
Yeah, and there was at Smith College, was that at Smith College?
I think so.
Right there in Kenmore Square, right by the old Sears building.
Yeah.
Yeah, right by the beginning of the Fenway.
And so, me and Andy work on projects. Andy has produced some of my records. Sometimes I'll play guitar on some of the projects. He's got... What else have you got? What about that singer who sings in French?
Oh yeah, I love making records with my friend Victoria. She goes by one name, Victoria.
Yeah.

Music from the 60s, which I really, really loved. And I was trying to find someone to write with,
Who, because I speak a little bit of French, but I wanted someone who could really get the
Slang right and everything like that. And so it sounded a little more casual, you know what I
Mean? Yes. Not a real French person. So I had a friend. There's no substitute. Yes. And I have
Jet Propulsion Laboratory, which everybody calls JPL in Pasadena. And there's a bunch of French
People and Italian people who work there. And my friend, Polly said, Hey, you should meet Victoria,
Because she's a fellow rocket scientist there. These are real rocket science. Yeah, this really
Is rocket science. It really is. And so I went up and I met Victoria and we wrote some songs
Together. And it was really fun. And we just kind of and then turns out she can sing too. So
We ended up putting out some records.

So you want to play a Victoria record?
Let's do that now.
Okay.
How about, um, Petit Roi Blanc, Little Black Dress?
Good.
Well, we're going to hear that right now.

Je t'habille, tu me parfumes
Ta peau douce contre moi
Ce soir nous ne faisons qu'une
Penses-tu qu'on lui plaira?
Dernier regard dans le miroir
Je suis ta petite robe noire
Je le sens me frôler, ses doigts allongent mes coutures
Dévoilant notre secret, tu es sous ma doublure
Ce reste le départ d'une belle histoire
Grâce à ta petite ramblant
Je ne peux m'empêcher de me demander
S'ils auraient eu la même ardeur
Avec telle ombre belle fleur
Wow! Wow! Wow! Wow! Wow! Wow!
Froissé sur son sol froid, un peu gêné surtout fier
De rentrer toi et moi habillés comme hier
On se sépare, retour au placard
N'oublie pas ta petite robe, ta petite robe, ta petite robe
N'enlève pas de mes histoires
C'est moi, c'est moi, ce n'est pas retour au placard
N'oublie pas ta petite robe noire
Et oui, c'est moi, ce n'est pas retour au placard
N'oublie pas ta petite robe noire

I want to tell the listeners, Andy has done also music with SpongeBob, and also when SpongeBob does personal appearances, Andy will play guitar in and I believe be musical director for his band, yes?
That's Tom Kenny is the voice of SpongeBob, and so it's called Tom Kenny and the High Seas, and we go out and do gigs, and we're just kind of a party dance band, and the damsels!
Background with the High Seas. So what we did is we, we
Combinated, we combinated our talents, Jonathan, and it's
Beneficial to the entire crowd. Well, you can't ask for more than that.

So let me see,
What else should we talk about this week? I don't know.
I really, I think the old days were fun. I've met Jonathan
In Harvard Square.

And he was on the street playing a guitar with no amplifier, it was electric guitar, unamplified, on Mass Ave, right outside Briggs and Briggs Music Store on Mass Ave.
Was I trying to make money or was I just harassing the public?
I think, I think, I think you kind of both.
Yeah. Yeah, I don't remember this, but I don't doubt it. It sounds like me.
No, it was you. And you had a white vinyl jacket on.
That was me.

It said don't freak out. No, it said freak out. Freak out because I liked the Mothers of Invention first album
Okay with the guitar playing of Frank Zappa on that especially on that uh first song on there and so
Yes, so that's and you were singing the song had
Two lyrics that I remember which were
Howard Johnson and Coca Cola.

Yes
Yes, and it had two lyrics and it probably only had two chords because I only knew about two back then
Well, it was great. I was transfixed. A lot of people were walking by, but not me. I really
Stopped. And Jonathan and I started talking about stuff. And that's a long—I think—
Of everyone I know, I've probably known you longer than anybody I know, I'm pretty sure.
Yep, yep, you're one of the people.

It's hard to keep up with the communication.

Yes, so me and Andy audience had our teenage years in Harvard Square putting bands together and attending late night parties and hanging out and, yes.
Oh, that's right, people like Donald Lyons and Danny Fields and Ed Hood.

Yes.
Patrick Fleming, and there's a whole bunch of people that were around, Paul Morrissey, a whole bunch of people. And then we went, both of us were going down to New York to uh,
Being part of the whole scene playing rock and roll down there. Yeah

It was just back and forth and some of it is hard to like the intimacy of those like Harvard Square was so
Intimate at that time. There were all these little teeny sandwich shops and little small newsstands. It was it was a very
And it was tumultuous. It was really it was really this wild beautiful rolling and tumbling thing
Yeah, and we just we bump into each other to just hanging around Cambridge and um, and then we knew, you know
Some of the same people and some of the people were in and out of bands with us

Ernie Brooks was a friend of mine friend of Jonathan's who is in bands with me in bands with Jonathan and yes
There was a whole bunch of people that you know, we're sort of just I'm the scene just walking around talking to each other
I'm trying to remember where else we went.
Then we traveled eventually all over the world.
Know, playing with Jonathan and the Modern Lovers and just Jonathan without the Modern Lovers.

I remember various incarnations of that thing and also, you know, I remember once we were in Paris
And we saw, you and I went to see James Brown playing at a concert outside.
Oh yeah, it was almost outside, it was a giant stadium, it was a place called Bercy, this giant, about 18,000 people in there.

Yep, I remember that, we went with our pal Jean-Thuy Thuy.
Yes, exactly, Jean-Thuy Thuy and he went around and picked up each instrument and played a little bit of an and then he played a little bass and then uh, but that was really fun to see James Brown and I mean, I don't know, another time.

We took a trip to Stowe, Vermont to go skiing with my brother, Jonathan, which is another Jonathan. Yes.
And when one Jonathan just won't do, we have two. That's right. And we listened to Topper, Zuki, Archie, Archie, the red nose reindeer.
Archie, Archie him a red nose reindeer. Yogi Yogi big bear boogie Archie the red nose reindeer.
Yeah! Like that! And so that's, so we had a tape of that, that changed the whole ski trip huh?
It sure did. That was the soundtrack for our ski trip. Yeah, not for others. Other skiers there had a whole different type of musical inclination.
You're probably right. Yeah, more in the seals and crops vein or something like that. Something like that, but not they didn't have Archie the Red Nosed Reindeer by Topper Zuki like we did.
And also we had Scare'Em by Toot which was really cool. Yeah. Yeah.
Scare him, scare him, scare him, scare him
Don't let him come here, alright, alright, alright, alright
Don't let him come here, stuff like that

Me and Andy were into a lot of the sounds
We get along good together musically, me and him
Yeah, rock steady and that's another thing
We had this common ground
We used to talk about music together

You know, like we were kind of
Isolated from a lot of other people at the time we knew each other in the 70s where
There was a lot of kind of hippie music that we were not particularly crazy about I think yeah
But you were still more open-minded than I was at least you could hear stuff in Crosby Stills and Nash
It took me a long time before I even could appreciate their harmonies because I was so much into that one particular bag
I was into so but

In the but it is funny because you're coming from
You know, kind of the same place. We're almost the same exact age and also listened to radio and stuff like when we were little.
So we heard stuff like Del Shannon and the Four Seasons and Smokey Robinson and the Miracle. And the Ronettes. Martha and the Vandellas and the Ronettes.
Yes. What we were listening to, you know, so, so then, yeah, that was kind of I say that was had to be our roots pretty much even though we didn't know each other when we were Really little.
And it was with loads of people exactly our age but some people were more affected
By some like the particular stuff we mentioned that resonated with us while it didn't resonate
With other people you know who heard it too just some of it some of the things that got to us you
Know it was a particular certain tone colors and certain drum sounds you know that um Hal Blaine
You know, yeah, or Earl Palmer. Yes. Incredible musicians, but we I had no idea.

I don't think you had any idea what we were listening. No, no idea at all. But it but it still blew our minds. And then, you know, I think that but there was very few people that were really into this stuff.
Like we were our age let's put it that way maybe that's what it is
Well we like we didn't outgrow it i think that's the difference yeah that's
The problem we didn't mature yeah other ways were super mature i would say
We're not um very much so our sense of humor is very
Much better than it ever was yes we don't
Child no more childish jokes for us now
Because we don't do dumb stuff no dumb stuff like we used to like when we
Invented comedy remember when we invented comedy
No, but that was immature. We don't do that anymore.
No, so now when there's a banana peel, we don't utilize it to invent comedy because
We're way too old and mature for such a thing now.
Exactly right. That would be silly.
We just would. I'm proud of you for being so mature.
And I'm proud of you and I'm so glad

To mention your name, Jonathan Richman Esquire. Yes, me and you also have a similar color sense.
Like I'm thinking of the Ronettes and when I think of like the Ronettes, I think of for example,
Colors like black and pale lavender together. Like, well, I'll bet you like black and pale
Lavender together. I do. I do. And I also when I think of them, I mean, it's kind of obvious,
But I go right to the
Sparkly kind of lavender blue dresses on the album cover that are, I think they're more blue,
But there's probably lavender shades in it, but it's just a sparkly kind of dress they had. But
Yeah, I mean, I always thought, I still think, I really do think you're a really great painter.
And I remember seeing paintings you did of Howard Johnson's stuff that was great. And that was one
Of the

First things I saw that you painted and you drew pictures of highway things and like stuff outside
Of MADEC, Massachusetts. I remember you showed me drawings and paintings back then and I just
I'm a big fan of your painting. I really am. Oh, thanks. Andy is referring to like the different
Industrial park areas around Massachusetts where I grew up and the different like some of the brand
Names. There was this chain called Howard Johnson's which had an aqua.
Of sort of an aqua turquoise blue and white and orange logo and that's why I was starting
To talk about to Andy about tone colors because a lot of times I'll hear music
With colors associated to it when I'm hearing it. And I was thinking about Andy's just general
Choice in, for example, both Andy and me are capable of buying like dress shirts that are like
Have red and white peppermint stripes on them or something like that which which which is it's a
Classic but not everyone likes that stuff.
It's just certain things like his his shirt collection and mine would be like it like and we're about the same size
So if one of us, you know, like in a pinch had to raid the other one's closet
It wouldn't be a terrible disaster. You wouldn't go on dude, you know, okay, this is reasonable. He's good, you know, so hey

You just reminded me of
The loving spoonful and
And I remember how much of an impression they made on us and you actually saw them live, which is you're so lucky the most maybe the most exciting rock and roll show I ever saw in my life was the first time I saw them when they were ragged and rough and they had just started to become a hit band. Yeah. And so you just
Without a night to give it to show that they would want to show them and it was
The with his whole series in boston at the time of
Matinees
For teenagers it was a promotion by some company that had
They would have a local band for example the rockin ramrods were on the bill
And then they had another local band i think even before them
And then the headliner one to one week they had like the young rascals
I was there it was the love and spoonful
Wow. And, um, it was, yes. So, not to go through the whole thing but how

So, were the Rockin' Ramrods the first thing on the stage?
I think the first thing on the stage was even a local, first there was a promotional movie,
It was part of a big promotional and there was a kid who sang a song for the movie and
Then there was like I think a local band before the Rockin' Ramrods, then the Rockin' Ramrods
Were the name local act and then came, they got all their equipment.
Did they have a hit with?

Bright Lit Blue Skies already? Yes, that was just... You already knew who they were? I knew who they were, Bright Lit Blue Skies, yeah, which I loved as a record.
And then they got all their equipment off the stage and on came The Lovin' Spoonful who did a total of five songs, lasting a total of about 20 minutes.
But you didn't need any more. It was so exciting. Wow. That's so great. Yeah.
And uh...

It was already it was already getting party ginsburg was the hostess jockey
While on the ginsburg who died her just passed
From the spirit from the physical plane about several months ago
Party will work in for years
Great
What loved loved but in in also
No matter how rough the crowd was in this happened to be a pretty rough crowd
Like he got respect that everybody because he was really just had this

Certain feeling about
So were there like hoods and greasers there?
Yes, yes, complete with not the Marlon Brando kind of black leather jacket but the Dorchester type of long black leather coat that was in vogue then. Wow!
And they the promoters of the show made the mistake of giving people free 45 rpm records on entrance
They were people barely escaped with their necks intact.
It was a dumb idea
No, they were no, but they were throwing them at the screen for the movie the promotional movie that they showed before that and that
The people who try it's a long story, but it was

I feel sorry for that guy, I think.
Yes. So anyway, but it ended well. The Lovin' Spoonful showed up.
Oh, that's great. You're very lucky.

So, Andy, you've got some stuff to present to us this month, this time. What do you got?
Yeah, well, I know you met my friend The Damsels a long time ago. Well, not that long ago. Yep.
And they're a vocal group that I know down here in Los Angeles. Yep. And
So maybe we could play a record by the Damsels if you want to.
Yes, I do. Say the title of the one you want us to play first.
Ok, how about Every Trick in the Book?

Very good. I'll tell the audience, I've heard them sing.
Me and Tommy were playing at a club called The Mint in Hollywood several years ago, and Andy brought this vocal group with him,
and they came and they just sang on the sidewalk, and I had my guitar, we were between sets and everything, so I backed them up on the guitar, and they could really sing.
So Andy, here it is, let's hear it.
Okay, every trick in the book, the damsel. Yeah.

There's this one boy, I see him every day
But he pretends that he don't know, I like him in that way
I want him so bad, I put on quite a show
Yeah, I'll use everything I got just to let him know
I've tried every trick in the book but I keep getting nowhere
That boy won't give me a look, he's way too cool
I told him he'd be tricked in the book, he acts just like I'm not there
What's a poor girl supposed to do?
Sitting in homeroom, trying to catch his eye
Passed him a note, sealed with a kiss that didn't seem to fly
After his street, I saw him in the hall
I accidentally dropped my books, he didn't care at all
I try to be tricking the book but I keep getting nowhere
That boy won't give me a look, he's way too cool
I try to be tricking the book, he acts just like I'm not there
What's a poor girl supposed to do?
What's a poor girl supposed to do now?
I've tried every trick in the book, but I keep getting nowhere
That boy won't give me a look, he's way too cool
I've tried every trick in the book, he acts just like I'm not there
What's a poor girl supposed to do?
I've tried every trick in the book, but keep getting nowhere
That boy won't give me a look, he's way too cool
I've tried every trick in the book, he acts just like I'm not there
What's a poor girl supposed to do?
I've tried every trick in the book but I keep getting nowhere
That boy won't give me a look, he is way too cool