This is a LONG interview from ClassicRockRevisited. I don't think it has been posted yet, but sorry if it has been. There's quite a bit of good Dave stuff in here! And also an interesting comment on the state of VAN HALEN (check the highlight). Some boring stuff, but a pretty good interview.
Enjoy!
CRR: You’re a pretty busy guy right now, rehearsing with Steve for his upcoming tour.
Billy: That’s right, we’re putting the show together right now. It is coming together really cool, there’s some great stuff in it, some of the best stuff off his new record and a lot of great older stuff. It’s a blast, it’s pretty challenging though; it’s not easy [laughing].
CRR: How long do you rehearse each day?
Billy: We go from about noon until about 8 or 9, then I come home and I work for another 2 or 3 hours, go to bed, wake up and work for a couple of hours on what we have to go over for that day. So it’s been a lot of work.
CRR: You guys rehearse for 8 or 9 hours every day?
Billy: Oh yeah. Steve’s stuff is pretty complicated, but we’ve all played complicated music before, I play be ear so I have to learn everything that way, so it’s a little bit tougher for me. You wont see much written music anywhere, I’ve actually never seen any in any studio that I’ve ever been in or any band that I’ve ever been in. However some of the stuff is written out, some of the stuff Steve has done before has been written out by one of his assistants, this is so some of the other guys can sometimes refer to that in an emergency, but I myself have got to learn it all by ear.
CRR: Will you doing a lot of older material, like "Shy Boy" and things like that?
Billy: I think "Shy Boy" is on the list of possibilities, we’ve done it a few other times on the London DVD, we’ve done it on a couple of the G3 tours, so it’s out there. We still get a lot of requests for it.
CRR: Do you have a certain amount of songs that you’ll do, I mean do you have a rotating set list or can fans expect to hear the same songs every night?
Billy: Once the show is together we keep it pretty much the same but we do have other songs to swap out, one night in a certain spot we’ll do one song and on another night in the same spot we’ll do another song. With lighting and queues a lot of the time you have to keep the same format, which makes it easier for the working personnel, for all the crews guys that actually have to work [laughing]. We get to play but they have to work so we make it easier on them.
CRR: The tour starts in a couple of weeks and runs for a couple of months?
Billy: We start March 1st and we go for 2 solid months in the US, I think we have 4 or 5 days off during that whole time, so we play constantly. In a few places there’s 2 shows in the same day.
CRR: An early and a late show?
Billy: Yeah it’s challenging, it’s going to be tough but we’ve done that before, the tour that we did where the Live at The Astoria DVD came from, we had a couple of double headers in Spain where we did an early show, dried off, let the people out and the next ones in and then we did another show. It was tough but it was a good kind of tough, my hands were in amazing shape when I came off that tour I’ll tell ya, "I’ll open that coconut for you no problem" [laughing].
CRR: Is the band lineup still the same?
Billy: Same band, same lineup as the Eric Clapton Crossroads DVD, except for a different drummer.
CRR: Tony (McAlpine) is still there?
Billy: Tony is still there yes, Dave (Weiner) and the drummer Jeremy (Colson).
CRR: I guess playing with Steve is like playing with family isn’t it? You’re soul brothers.
Billy: Very much so. He’s a good buddy of mine. Steve and his wife are great friends of mine. His sons are great kids; I know his Mom and stuff also. We go back a long time of course, we both got famous together in a way with Dave (Lee Roth) and that was an amazing time and it started a relationship, though we knew each other prior to that. I actually recommended Steve for the gig with Dave, originally I think Steve Stevens was the guy Dave wanted but he was already committed to Billy Idol, so I said "Well I’ve got another Steve for you"
CRR: You were already working with Dave?
Billy: Yeah he called me first; he called me right out of Buffalo. I flew in to do a Talas tour, I had a meeting with him that day, and I had no idea what it was about. He really did a great job on the security of information of what was going on. Sure enough he wanted to start a band right away, so as soon as the tour was done, he flew me out to L.A. and we started putting the band together.
CRR: We’ll talk more about this later of course but right now I wanna talk about your new CD Cosmic Troubadour which is your 2nd solo CD. Given your past history of playing in different bands and guesting on other peoples records for such a long time, have you always had this burning desire to do your own stuff?
Billy: No not necessarily, I’m a band guy and I’m a team player and I like to play with people. I never thought of myself as solo artist because I like to work with other people. I like to bounce ideas back and forth, I like the interaction of a band, I always have and I always will. The solo venture has been really cool as an aside to that but I always prefer doing the band thing so I bring some of those band sensibilities, I try to keep them in mind as I’m putting a solo record together. Hopefully the result does not become to self indulgent because in my own humble opinion, I have a good line drawn between myself as a singer/bass player/ songwriter/ guitar player, those are distinctly different gigs and I try to look at them completely distinctively so that I don’t cloud the lines. I try to approach the guitar parts like I would if I happened to be a guitar player, which I’m not necessarily but I can play guitar. I look at the bass as part of those components, I favor it a little bit more because that’s kind of the idea behind this particular record, it has a little more bass stuff on there. I try to look at it like I’m still working with an ensemble. It seems to have worked out really well in that things balanced themselves out, but the proof is in the pudding and that’s up to other people’s opinion as to whether it did work out well [laughing]. I’m my own worst critic, I’m very critical. If I do enjoy the song and a piece of music and it sounds like an ensemble playing, where things are balanced and the guitar is working with the bass and the bass is working with the drums and the drums is leading the charge rhythmically and if the lyrics don’t make me cringe. Hopefully the lyrics tell something more that just, love and baby then it works for me. That’s why I try to please myself and meet this criteria.
CRR: There’s a nice balance between the instrumental songs and the ones which feature your singing, was that your intention to not make it completely one sided?
Billy: Yeah I wanted to kind of mix it up because that’s probably what I’ll do when I perform live. Let’s face it, I’m not known for being a singer or a song writer, I’m known for being a bass player [laughing], thankfully I’m known for being known for something. I don’t want to put upon the audience or have the opinion that they must listen to my stuff because it’s me, I understand and am thankful that they’ve given me the success I’ve had as a bass player so I’ll ask their indulgence for a couple of vocals on some songs, it seems to make sense to me.
CRR: I understand you’ve taken some vocal lessons in the past is that right?
Billy: Well I’ve seen a vocal coach here and there since I’ve been in L.A. I’ve sang my whole life since the early 70’s but sometimes a lot of accomplished vocalists will go through the same thing where you end up developing bad habits and you end up losing your voice, somebody has to fix it for you. I found this one particular vocal coach who was spectacular, he only worked with "A" list singers so somehow I managed to squeak in, I’m far from being an A list singer. He really helped me a lot, it just helped me with my intonation, hitting pitches and hitting them easier. The proof was in the London DVD, the vocals on the DVD were not fixed, nothing was re done, what I sang that night was what I sang. I was worried about that because I wanted to go in and fix some things while they were mixing it and then they called me and said "It’s done", I thought I was doomed, but it’s not bad, it doesn’t suck.
CRR: I think your vocals came off sounding very convincing on this new CD. It was kind of fresh to hear this different side of you as a musician because everyone knows how well you play the bass.
Billy: Well thanks. Quite frankly I’ve gotten a lot of positive response, I’m still shy about it. I’ve never been this supremely over confident person in any aspect of my life except fishing, I can kick ass fishing [laughing].
CRR: I think some people may disagree with that, because you look pretty confident and you don’t look very shy when you’re up there playing onstage. You’re a pretty flamboyant player.
Billy: I could get an Oscar for that act. I know what I can do, but like I said I’m really self critical and I pay attention only to the bad things because those are the things that I’m always trying to correct, the good things that I can do and the things that are executed well and that people enjoy, that stuff goes by and I don’t even remember it. I pay no attention to it at all. If I come off the stage and there’s one mistake, I’ll be dwelling on that one mistake rather than the other 99 things I did right and if the audience is still clapping for an encore, in my mind I’m thinking about that one moment.
CRR: There’s a word for that type of person Billy and that’s perfectionist.
Billy: That’s right, that’s right [laughing]. I try to be, within the realms of humanity though. This is art, I don’t beat myself up over it but it is a concern of mine because people pay their hard earned cash to come and see me play and I always want to do the best for them.
CRR: In your mind what’s the biggest difference between Compression and Cosmic Troubadour?
Billy: Compression was pretty experimental; I didn’t really know how to do a solo record. I just put these things together and we managed to form pieces of music that I believed in as compositions, I sang everything, it was my first outing with my baritone string guitar as the main guitar instrument and it was a very interesting recording experience. I programmed all the drumming except for 2 songs and I pieced it together like that. It was great fun, I’m a staunch supporter of the digital recording revolution, I love it very much and I have great setup in my house. Then when Cosmic Troubadour came around, like I said I did miss the interaction of playing with somebody so I brought in Ray Luzier to play drums and he did a spectacular job, it was really great having a drummer that is that hot, playing on my tracks and working with him as a musician as I would with a guitarist or a bass player, especially as a bass player because the drummer is the guy I watch first, he did a really spectacular job.
CRR: And there’s the David Lee Roth connection as well.
Billy: That’s right, how ironic is that? He ends up being Dave’s drummer. He’s a great guy and a great player and I hope to do some live shows with him in the very near future. Actually I did something with him at the music trade show, at the NAMM show, we played together and we had a blast, it was a riot. People really dug it.
CRR: Just how different is a baritone guitar, can you tell me the difference?
Billy: The baritone plays exactly the same only it’s tuned much lower, if you play an E chord on a regular guitar, if you took those same finger positions on a regular guitar it’s a B. Everything is much lower.
CRR: Is there a reason why you play the baritone guitar rather than a regular guitar?
Billy: My voice is lower in pitch so my normal tones for me to sing is kind of in the Sinatra lower range, sorry Frank [laughing], so that’s what inspired me to do my first solo record was when I had my first baritone twelve string, it just spoke to me. I thought it was great and I could sing along to this all day, that’s what led me to do Compression and then I just carried it a little further on Cosmic Troubadour.
CRR: Everyone knows how technically proficient you are on the bass but how would you rate yourself as a guitar player?
Billy: Not bad. One thing I kind of specialize in is oddball chord voicings, in other words I’ll do a chord but I’ll finger it much differently than I would normally. A lot of that comes from playing twelve string, whether standard tune or baritone. In baritone you get a lot of open strings and have these beautiful cascading notes with very little work from your left hand, I’ve played guitar all my life, as long as I’ve played bass, but bass was always my first love and my specialty. I wish that I could play the things on guitar that I can play on bass. I can’t do it; I’ve tried [laughing]. The guitar, I play with a pick, bass I play with my fingers, I can’t do the licks I do on bass on the guitar, and I wish I could. It works vice versa as well in that I can’t play bass with a pick.
CRR: You’ve also played guitar on other projects as well such as the CD you did with drummer Terry Bozzio.
Billy: Yeah I played a baritone on that as well.
CRR: That was a great experimental sounding record.
Billy: Very.
CRR: The record label Magna Carta is known for pairing up great musicians together and the results are usually very interesting.
Billy: It was a strange record, but I was thankful I was granted the opportunity to make such a left turn. Terry is a genius, a spectacular composer as well as an amazing drummer. It was great to work with him, a supreme talent and he of course played on the first 2 tracks on Compression as well.
CRR: How much of the guitar work did you do on the new CD, pretty much all of it?
Billy: Mostly everything. A couple of tracks my friend Simone added guitar textures and any keyboard, synth or string stuff was Simone as well. One of the last tracks is called "Hope" and he did a lot of the strings on that and all the guitars as well, they’re a little bit quirky but they have this interesting element, that’s one of my favorite’s on the record, it’s just a gorgeous piece of music. The string arrangements on that were just fantastic.
CRR: The title Cosmic Troubadour is also mentioned in the song "Back In The Day", it seems to me that lyrically this song is about a time when maybe the music scene wasn’t as tainted and was a little more pure.
Billy: My friend you are the first to get it absolutely correct [laughing]. That’s exactly what it’s about. It’s about playing in a band when we weren’t concerned about getting record deals, we were just playing, it was enjoyable and we loved it. It wasn’t about commerce or industry, economics or marketing, it was just playing. It’s sad to see that it doesn’t exist as much as it did but I do believe that the future looks bright. The music business having the huge shakeup that it’s had in recent years financially, has removed from it the type of people who are in it to get rich. That kind of ruined it, now it’s leaving a person like yourself involved in journalism, in music. You must be pretty dedicated and I could take a wild guess but I’m pretty sure I’m correct that music is probably the main thing in your life.
CRR: Pretty much yeah. I do this for the love of music. If I was paid huge amounts of money for doing this it would probably taint it a little bit for me.
Billy: Exactly. I make a decent living as a bass player, I ‘m doing ok. I’ve had a couple of hits and a few moments of success. I’m not super rich, I don’t own property in different countries but I’m doing ok and that’s fine. My intention was never to be supremely rich, if it was I would have got into real estate.
CRR: The best thing for you as an artist is to have the freedom to create and do what you want.
Billy: Exactly.
CRR: And if you get paid to do what you enjoy doing then…
Billy: What a great deal. I consider myself very lucky and it’s not just lip service to say I’m thankful because it’s true, I am very thankful, I do what I love to do and I get compensated for it? Not a lot of people can say that and I understand that. It’s pouring rain here today in L.A. and people are stuck on the freeway on their way to a job they probably hate, it’s not easy. I’m warm at home, nice and comfy with my basses and my guitars and my nice warm computer [laughing]
CRR: Also on "Back in The Day" struck me as being quite interesting as well for another reason, right in the middle of the song rather than doing a guitar solo…
Billy: There’s a bass solo.
CRR: Yeah. I thought that was a nice left turn, I mean how many songs have a bass solo in the middle of them?
Billy: "My Generation" by The Who, that’s about it. Not very many. I purposely put that in there, you know it comes to a certain part of the song, people fall into these rules. There’s a solo section, so guitar what are you going to do? Why do we have to have a guitar? It’s important to keep the groove going, the bass and drums have to be playing together and that’s my challenge when I have to do a bass solo. You have to not lose the tempo, pulse or feel of the song or if I’m going to change it I’ve got to change it to something that makes sense. You can’t just drop everything and just solo, solo, solo as a bass player, it’s like a drummer doing a fill or doing a solo within the context of the song, you can do some moves, you can move around but you cant lose the time, because if you do then the whole song is going to fall apart. I’m lucky to play with some great drummers who can do that sort of thing but as a bass player it’s a similar thing that we have to do if we’re going to play a solo within the context of the song, it’s gotta work, it’s gotta fit and it’s gotta be in time. I think that’s what this solo accomplishes in the song. It’s a difficult move on bass, it’s an arpeggio thing across the finger board, it’s not an easy thing to play but the challenge for me was to really make it work within the context of the song.
CRR: I think it worked.
Billy: Thank you, I think so too, otherwise I would have rewound it and did it again until I got it right.
CRR: You spent a large part of the 70’s and part of the 80’s leading your own band Talas, can you tell me a little about the origins of the band, you were based in Buffalo right?
Billy: Absolutely. There was a semi regional band based in Buffalo called The Tweeds, they had had a hit single in the 60’s, they were all kids in high school, it turns out one of them ended up in my high school, Kenmore East High School in Buffalo. His glory days were over from that band and he needed a bass player to play some shows he was doing under the same name but different band. We just started doing copy tunes but that didn’t quite work out so we decided that the Tweeds name was too associated to that hit single from so long ago, he and I decided to put a band together, we found a drummer and went from there. His girlfriend had a horse named Lady Talas or something like that, we probably spelled it wrong, knowing Dave the original guitar player, he was notorious for his bad spelling. So we called the band that and got a drummer and started booking gigs and we were just a copy band. Then we changed the drummer back to the original guy from The Tweeds, a guy named Paul and the 3 piece Talas started. Again all we were was a copy band for years and years until finally we wrote one original, then two or three and then a couple of other things occurred around the band and we ended up recording our first record in ’79, then we went on to do the Sink Your Teeth Into That record after that, those guys split and I got 3 other guys in the band and we did a 4 piece Talas where we did one live album and then Dave called me.
CRR: So you had a revolving lineup for a while?
Billy: Actually we had the same lineup for a long, long time. I kind of brushed over the chronological order of that stuff. The original 3 piece went from ’72 or ’73 until ’84, so we kept it together pretty much. There was one year where we stopped playing together.
CRR: You were in a well-known band called Max Webster for a very short time, how did that happen?
Billy: A very short time yes, that’s amazing [laughing]. I played a run with Talas up in Toronto, we played a little club called Larry’s Hideaway and I remember Kim (Mitchell) came in and saw us that night, I started talking with him and ended up speaking to him a few other times when the situation with Talas was on the outs, for that one year that we weren’t together. Kim called me and I went up to Toronto and started working on the Mutiny up my Sleeve record, I think that was the one. I loved the stuff and Kim is still a very good friend, I remember I wasn’t real familiar with what Max Webster did so he sent me down their records and I loved all the stuff. I did all the pre-production prior to the record but then at the last minute just before we were going to go in somebody changed their mind and they ended up getting another bass player. It didn’t work out but I did do all the pre-production on that record. Kim and I spoke a few times after that about doing things, that’s why Talas ended up doing "Battle Scar", which became one of our mainstays live.
CRR: That is an amazing song.
Billy: Yeah, I remember when they did that and Kim told me the story how they brought Rush in to do it. Apparently both bands loved the song and they both wanted to do it, if I remember it right, the deal was who ever ended up in the studio first got to put it on their record and I may be wrong, Kim would know the story better than I. They ended up just setting up both bands and doing it as a duet and it ended up on the Max Webster album. I thought it was a great song so we started to do it in Talas, same thing when I did a tour with UFO, when I came back we dropped a few UFO songs into our set just to tell people that I did know these songs and I did play them [laughing]. I did a tour with them in ’83 in Europe.
CRR: They weren’t in the best of shape then were they?
Billy: Oh my god. I came home from that tour and the movie Spinal Tap came out and I went to see it and I did not laugh once, it was not funny at all.
CRR: Because you had just lived it [laughing]
Billy: I remember thinking "Holy shit, I just came out of this", now it’s funny to me looking back on it, at the time when I saw it in the theater I thought "I just got done with this, no thanks" [laughing]. With all due respect, I mean I love those guys but that was a rough time for them.
CRR: These Talas records you did were all released independently weren’t they?
Billy: Yeah the first one we did on our own imprint, the producer made his own little label imprint and we printed up 10,000 copies and we sold them all. That was it. It was re-released recently on Metal Blade from the original recordings. When we did the Sink Your Teeth Into That record, that was picked up by Relativity Records which was also Steve Vai’s label for Flexible, so that’s where the connection between Steve and I began when he was involved with that company, they were based out in New York City. Talas was an amazing band and I learned everything or the foundation of everything I know now from that band. We played every single night, 3 or 4 sets a night. We did 21 shows in a row once and this is all locally around Buffalo in clubs. We’d set up our gear, tearing it down at night, dragging it in the next day, no roadies, no monitors. We carried our own sound, we set up with whatever lights they had in the club, we learned in the trenches. I learned about everything. I learned how to solder wires back onto equipment after lightning had struck a building once that we were set up in, to putting out a fire in the dressing room from somebody’s cigarette to prevent the club from burning down. We had been though every conceivable configuration of doing a performance, from doing high school dances and weddings, to doing an free show on the beach outside in front of 10,000 people, everything. It was great training.
CRR: Were you just doing club gigs, did you get onto any tours as an opening act?
Billy: In 1980 we opened for Van Halen, we did about 40 shows with them, but prior to and after that we did a lot of openers in Buffalo, sometimes a band couldn’t make it or couldn’t get through customs or whatever, so they’d put us on the bill. We opened up for UFO, Blue Oyster Cult, Triumph, Iron Maiden; we did Aerosmith a couple of times. We opened up for Twisted Sister one time in NYC. U2 was once our opening act and for years nobody believed it when we would tell that story but recently they played in Buffalo and Bono mentioned it onstage, somebody bootlegged the show and sent me a copy, so I took Bono’s comments and put them on my website
CRR: How did your band initially attract Van Halen’s attention?
Billy: This is an amazing story if I do say so myself. We got this manager in Buffalo who’s name was Harvey, he was the local promoter in Buffalo, he would bring in The Who and The Stones to arenas, all the big acts that would come to town were booked by Harvey. He was the biggest thing in the music business in Buffalo, the guy with the biggest connections, so by default we ended up having him become our manager because we were the biggest band in town so it just made sense. Harvey connected with a guy name Brad in NYC and Brad started to make some connections down there and expanded Harvey’s business. He said "Why don’t we showcase you for Premier Talent", they were one of the biggest booking agencies. We went down to NYC, played a show opening up for somebody, Premier Talent was there and they liked the band, but that was the last we heard of them. We thought now what do we do? Out of nowhere we get a call, Premier had sent our demo tape to Van Halen as a potential opening act and they said yes. We were more surprised than anyone, we never thought anything would come of it and all of sudden we’re doing 40 shows with Van Halen. So we went out on that tour and it was amazing, but here’s the funny part of it, Harvey who wanted to expand his business, he was an entrepreneur and a go-getter. He decided to make a movie, he hired some film guys and some script guys and he shot all of Buffalo and we had this little Buffalo premiere, it was laughable by Hollywood standards but he was trying, he was doing ok, he’d made some slasher movie, I forget the name of it. We all went to the premiere of it and we were drinking and hanging out afterwards, it was a big thing. The movie bombed but he figured a way to license it into other countries and make money off it in licensing fees. Then he found out he could take foreign films and license them here and not even worry about making the movie, he could just find movies he loved, bring them over here and make money that way. Well that’s Harvey Weinstein, founder of Miramax, Brad is Brad Gray now the head of Paramount. So my manager was Harvey Weinstein.
CRR: You were also approached by Eddie about joining Van Halen weren’t you?
Billy: Yeah I kept it quiet for along time but now that things are pretty much over with them, I like Michael Anthony, he’s a great guy and he’s so important to that band. I was kind of torn inside because I didn’t want to see the band change but I sure did want the gig you know?
CRR: This was around the same time?
Billy: Yeah he came to me after that tour, but it was either the next tour or the one after that that he specifically asked me to join the band. I remember I saw them a few days later and Dave who I didn’t really talk to all that much, I was more in communication with Eddie, came up to me and said "We’re really looking forward to having you come out to L.A.". I was still living in poverty in Buffalo so my head was spinning at the idea. Who knows what the real motivation was, I don’t think they thought Michael was a bad player at all, so I’m not sure what was behind it. I really like Michael’s playing in the band, he’s a great singer and he’s such an important part of that band for me as a fan. Like I said I was torn, it was a great honor to know that I must have been doing something right if they were asking me to join the band. They did ask me, it was a great, great honor and I’m very thankful that they did even though it didn’t work out in the end.
CRR: That’s ironic because Dave mentioned in his autobiography that Gene Simmons was apparently trying to steal Eddie away from the band very early on to get him to work with Kiss, but Dave was hip to his plan and put an end to that.
Billy: That’s funny yeah, thank god. In all fairness a couple of other bass players that I’ve spoken with in L.A., some pretty accomplished bassists, they had toyed with them also. Again I don’t think it’s any slight against Michael I just think there was a lot of pressure in the band internally and they were starting to look for solutions to the problem. It wasn’t the solution to change members, they just needed to sit down and talk with each other and maybe get a better relationship between everyone in the band rather than bringing in someone new.
CRR: Like we discussed earlier the Van Halen connection didn’t end there, just as Talas was about to sign a major record deal you got the call from Dave to join his band.
Billy: Exactly, we had just got singed by the William Morris Agency and we were booked to open a tour for Yngwie (Malmsteen), Danny Goldberg from Gold Mountain Entertainment contacted us to do a record and then the 3rd call that I got which was all in that same week was from Dave, he wanted to have a meeting with me when I came out to L.A. but he wouldn’t say what it was for. I went out there and everything was shrouded in secrecy and he told me "I’ve left Van Halen and I want to start a band with you", I thought "holy cow".
CRR: He’d obviously kept you in mind.
Billy: Apparently yeah. When I got back from doing the Talas tour and I got his call I asked him "When do you want me to come out?" and he says "Now" so I got on a plane and flew out to L.A. I still had my apartment back in Buffalo and on my ’72 Pinto I had been driving around with the spare tire for 2 years, I was completely broke [laughing]. I went from poverty to paparazzi waiting right outside my apartment building. It was pretty amazing.
CRR: Did you get involved in the L.A. club scene at all?
Billy: Not too much. I enjoyed the party scene, like the Rainbow and places like that.
CRR: Was it as crazy as everyone says it was?
Billy: It was very crazy, it was out of control. I’m a complete non-drugger, since ’71 I haven’t even had so much as an aspirin but I do like a couple of glasses, 3 or 4 glasses of beer, ok maybe 6 or 12 [laughing] and some wine or whatever, I do have my fun. The only negative thing was I’d go out and about and you’d see people doing blow on the tabletops and stuff like that, but that was their thing, they’d learn their lesson on their own. It was just an explosion, the L.A. Scene was the scene where everyone wanted to be, all the bands were coming from there and people from all over the country were going there.
CRR: I was just talking to a musician who was part of that scene at the time and he told me that it wasn’t if you were going to get signed but when you were going to get signed. You could throw shit against the wall and if it stuck, you had a record deal.
Billy: Exactly, that’s why I was glad to come out there and have Dave bring me out, I completely bypassed the whole showcase thing and schlepping to gigs, to The Roxy and The Troubadour trying to get gigs. I had done that already for over a decade with Talas and those days were over, it was time for me to cash in.
CRR: Did you click musically right away with Steve and Gregg?
Billy: Absolutely. Steve and I had a lot of common ground in our past. I was a huge Zappa fan, he was one of the first guys I really got into when I was young, I could recite whole sides of Zappa’s records and we would often do that in the bus with a couple of beers. Steve was also into the early Bowie stuff, a lot of Hendrix and he was a total Zeppelin freak so we bonded right away, we knew a lot of the same material. Gregg similarly he knew a lot as well, we used to play stump the band and we would flip through the radio to see who could guess the songs first and he just knew every song there ever was.
CRR: Musically he came from more of a jazz background though didn’t he?
Billy: A little bit yeah, but he had played in rock bands his whole life too, he got a little more known through jazz. When Steve and I were given the task of finding a drummer, we had to put ads out but we weren’t allowed to tell anyone who it was for. A couple of hundred people showed up at S.I.R. rehearsal studios, they all came in one after the other, there were some famous guys and some really heavy hitters but when Gregg sat down Steve and I looked at each other and we knew instantly that he was the guy. He was amazing, his attitude and his playing ability. I think we gave him a tape of all the songs to learn, the next day he came back and he had learned the whole thing and there was like twenty pieces of music, they were all done. He had every move exactly right. We had a riot; it was such a great time. Dave was my hero in Van Halen, I mean everyone was my hero in Van Halen, I loved Van Halen but Eddie and Dave were the guys. We were down in Dave’s basement practicing and telling stories and having a few beers, laughing and having a blast. It was the best of times. I remember one of my first rehearsals, we were up onstage doing "I’m on Fire" and I’m singing the high harmony part and Dave’s coming over and singing in my mike, and it suddenly dawns on me, "That’s David Lee Roth" [laughing]. You forget, I was out in the audience at one time watching him do this.
CRR: That must have been a real kick in the pants.
Billy: I was doing songs by my favorite band by the guy who sang them. I considered myself very lucky, very thankful to Dave and to this day he’s still my friend and I still see him out and about once and awhile. When you’re in a band and then out of the band there’s always some negativity involved but I love the guy and he’s still my hero. He changed the face of rock you know?
CRR: Apparently now he’s working in NYC as an EMT, knowing Dave were you surprised to hear that?
Billy: You know I wasn’t. He doesn’t take the path of least resistance; he’s always up for a challenge. He still plays and performs a lot but to do that is quite commendable. I know he’s not doing it for publicity and he’s not really publicizing it, that’s why I hesitate to tell you some of the stories I’ve heard and some of the amazing things he’s done.
CRR: Some things have come out in the news; I think that’s inevitable just because he is who he is.
Billy: Yeah, if my wife had her baby delivered by David Lee Roth in the back of a car somewhere I’d want to tell somebody about it [laughing]. Stuff like that has been happening to him and I think it’s really commendable and I know he doesn’t take any pay for it either, I think that’s awesome. It really says a lot about the guy I think.
CRR: I have to tell you I saw both the Van Halen 5150 tour and Dave’s Eat ‘Em and Smile tour back in ’86, both shows came through town about 2 months apart and in my opinion you guys blew Van Halen away. You guys were an incredible live event; there was so much power in your playing.
Billy: Thanks [laughing]. That was the difference of Dave having a band with 3 young guys who were as hungry and happy to be there man, we were thrilled and jazzed to be in the moment. Van Halen had already done that; they were seasoned veterans, a great band with great musicians. I loved Sammy Hagar on that first Montrose album; I think it’s one of the greatest rock records ever made. That’s all that I’ve ever heard him do that I really like.
CRR: I always enjoyed his early solo stuff.
Billy: I always thought he was a great singer but I thought his situation in Montrose was the best thing he ever had. It really is one of the greatest records ever made. I didn’t like him as much in Van Halen, when someone has to change a member of the band, as a fan it’s never the same for me. Sometimes it can be good, like I love Back in Black by AC/DC, everyone was worried what were they going to do without Bon and it turned out to be their biggest record ever.
CRR: You change the dynamic of the band once a member is replaced, especially when you change the singer, that sound goes with them.
Billy: Oh absolutely because they’re the ones singing the songs.
CRR: Whereas with you guys Dave was still there but now he was surrounded by these young hungry players as you said, I never saw Van Halen when he was there but watching you guys I had some sense of what it must have been like.
Billy: In my mind that’s what I was imagining Van Halen to be like, the way we were on Eat ‘Em and Smile. I didn’t know what was going on in the private areas of their backstage dressing rooms, though I was in that area I wasn’t around to hear any of those discussions. In my mind that’s the scenario they created, whether or not it was true or not I don’t know. When we were together, that’s the way it was, backstage was a riot. We were having fun, dinner was set out and there were girls around, it was a crazy wild time. It was very much out of control but in a nice way.
CRR: I saw the Skyscraper tour as well but it wasn’t the same, you were gone and it seemed like the onstage chemistry was missing.
Billy: I have heard that.
CRR: Skyscraper itself was more pop sounding, more keyboard oriented.
Billy: Things changed after the Eat ‘Em and Smile tour. Although I didn’t agree with the changes and I didn’t think it was the right change to make…
CRR: You mean the musical direction?
Billy: Yeah. I give everybody that was involved with it credit for taking the chance. The way they wanted to lean more towards dance and electronics, which later on down the road did become huge, but you’ve gotta know your audience and the audience was just not gonna let that fly you know? You take a chance, you roll the dice and sometimes it comes up, sometimes it doesn’t, it didn’t come up unfortunately for them.
CRR: There were rumors that you were forced to tone down you playing on Skyscraper, is that true?
Billy: I had to play within the context of what the songs were and they just weren’t the same vehicles for playing as what was on Eat ‘Em and Smile. I remember I did the demos at Steve’s studio and then when we came in they wanted the bass playing to be like what was on the demos, which is kinda my fault because everyone suffers from demo-itis whether they want to admit to it or not, you hear the demo and later on you’re gonna want the song to sound like the demo, so I should have given it my all on the demos. I just figured I’d hold the note here because later on we’ll do something fancy right? No, later on you have to do it just like you did it on the demo [laughing]. I shot myself in the foot with that. Even some of the solos that I just was fooling around with on the demo, they wanted it exactly like that as well. There were a couple of moments on Skyscraper that was ok bass playing wise but to me it just wasn’t how I had seen the band live on Eat ‘Em and Smile. I give them credit, rather than coast on a formula that they knew well, they tried something different.
CRR: After you left Dave you formed your own band Mr. Big. That debut album was more of a return to the style of Eat ‘Em and Smile.
Billy: Exactly. That was kind of the idea, I wanted to carry on with that kind of players, but it was based around songs and based pretty much around my favorite types of music, Humble Pie, Spooky Tooth, Bad Company and Free, all those bands.
CRR: The first song "Addicted to that Rush" was a great lead off track, it signaled to the world that you were back and that this band meant business.
Billy: Yeah it worked out really well. I really love that first album and I remember it stayed in my, at the time cassette player [laughing] for months and months before we went on the road. I was really pleased with that first record.
CRR: You had top 40 hits and platinum records with Mr. Big, did the band accomplish everything you thought it would.
Billy: Yeah I considered it a roaring success. We sold millions of records all over the world. When I’m out at a club and a Mr. Big song comes on, it always catches me by surprise, "Oh yeah that’s us I forgot" [laughing]. It was a great band and now that it’s over I feel comfortable saying we kicked complete ass live. Opening up for other bands, they’d be in a sweat by the second show of the tour. We did great live.
CRR: When you did your final tour in Japan unfortunately it wasn’t with the original members, Paul Gilbert had left some years earlier and you replaced him with Richie Kotzen, what was that like?
Billy: Yeah when Paul left we replaced him with Richie; I loved Richie’s playing. In a lot of ways many people thought he was a better fit for the band, he was a blusier player and a more groove oriented player, but Paul was the original guy and like I said before once you change one guy it’s never the same for me as a fan. I hated to do that but we really had no choice, we could either not play at all or get a new guitar player. So we got Richie and I love him as a player. Paul is amazing, he’s a great songwriter and he added a real element to the accumulative chemistry of the band, and you change that when you add someone new. Richie was great and it had great potential to continue on and do as well or better but unfortunately there were just too many miles on the odometer.
CRR: So due to the tensions in the band you decided to just go out and finish it.
Billy: Yeah and we didn’t end on this constant reunion kind of thing, trying to get things back to the way it used to be. It was over and we just decided to call it a day.
CRR: Would you never say never to working with them again?
Billy: I got up and jammed with Paul a few weeks ago here in Hollywood and we had a great night just talking and hanging. I don’t know that we would ever work together again; it was just nice to see him. We never discussed anything about Mr. Big or any business; we just enjoyed hanging out talking about Judas Priest songs.
CRR: A certain singer in Mr. Big was strangely critical of yours and Paul’s playing that must have been a rather difficult situation.
Billy: It was sad. Everybody in the band I thought was supremely talented and I loved everything everybody did, I loved Pat’s playing, I love Eric’s singing and love both Paul and Richie’s guitar playing. To know that the feeling is not mutual, it’s kind of sad, but I thought Eric was a great singer and a great songwriter, that’s why I hired him to be in the band, unfortunately personality wise it just didn’t work out.
CRR: Was that always a problem or just towards the end?
Billy: Right at the beginning I saw signs of it, I made a conscious decision to swallow it and keep moving. I don’t know now if that was the right decision but looking back at what we did as a band I’m glad we all tolerated it and we put up with each other for so long.
CRR: Because some great music came out of it.
Billy: I think so yeah.
CRR: You’ve won awards for you bass playing, had multi platinum success with different bands, what else is there for you to do musically, is there any musical dream that you have yet to fulfill?
Billy: Well I’m lucky to say that almost every dream that I’ve ever had has been fulfilled. I’ve sat in chair #1 on the Tonight Show, I’ve had number 1 singles and videos and all that stuff but I have to say there’s still more to play, I still love to perform in front of people. So in spite of all those big goals having been accomplished, every single night that I go out to play, just prior to going out onstage I still get the same feeling that I’ve had my whole life. There’s always something I’m looking forward to doing, I’m excited to get up and play, and it never gets old. In my house I’m surrounded by basses and I’m always playing and thinking of something and I’m always learning something new. It’s still quite an adventure for me and I’m glad of that because I know anything you do for 30 or 40 years can start to get old after awhile [laughing]. To me it’s still new, fresh and exciting. As far as musical goals is concerned I just want to continue to be able to perform live, especially all over the world. Just this past year with Steve we went all over South America to main land China, Australia and Singapore.
CRR: It’s a great way to see the world isn’t it?
Billy: It’s an amazing way. You wouldn’t believe the places I get e-mail from, Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Afghanistan and kids in Iraq.
CRR: People in those regions know your playing, that’s amazing. Maybe one day you’ll get to these places.
Billy: It’s so amazing. I’d love to. I’ve had some pretty exotic adventures. I love playing in Indonesia, it was like National Geographic, it was amazing adventure. I remember one of the first times we went to Jakarta in Indonesia with Mr. Big, this was around 1993 or ‘94, and we had to go there for a radio interview. We left the hotel and drove and drove and drove, out of the city and past the shanty towns and all you could see were Coleman lanterns because there was no electricity, cardboard buildings and scrap wood where people lived. We get way, way out to the edge of the jungle and there’s the radio station, we went in and we did the interview, we had a riot with the DJ, he was a real funny guy. When I came out of the radio station, coming out of the bush was a kid holding Guitar Player magazine with me on the cover [laughing].
CRR: That’s crazy.
Billy: I’ll never forget that as long as I live. This barefoot kid just wearing a pair of shorts waving this pen for me to sign his magazine. Incredible, right there is the payoff. That’s 30 years of work paying off right there.
CRR: Who’s a better singer you or Steve?
Billy: I think I’m the better singer, I love ya Steve [laughing]. Only because I’ve just done it for a lot longer, back in club days slugging it out, I sang all the Bowie and the Priest stuff, I even sang the Lou Reed stuff, I sang "Satellite of Love". Hilarious.
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