Nile Rogers - Nuclear scientist?

Vibe talked to Nile Rogers about his career and when it went off on a tangent Todd got mentioned too.

Where would you be now had you never been in music?
I’d have gone into science. In our days, we called it thermonuclear hydro-dynamics. That was my thing, in our clique at school we were trying to figure out how take nuclear energy, make it safe, and power the planet.

Nile Rodgers would’ve been a nuclear scientist?
You would not believe how many famous musicians were into this. My friend Reggie Lucas was in the same school, he was on Madonna’s album. He and Todd Rundgren developed the very first screensaver. My other partner, Tom Murray, he went on to invent all sorts of digital applications, way before laptops. I love science. As part of my charity, we brought in Gza from the Wu Tang to give a talk on magnetism and gravity.

What went wrong Nile?!
Back then, we all knew from a very young age the government weren’t going to use our research for good stuff!

No Talking, Just Head

Interesting  interview with Johnette Napolitano in the Dallas Observer. I always liked Concrete Blonde, esp their second album FREE. 

Anyway, here she talks about her time in the Talking Heads (sort of) and TR gets mentioned in relation to The Cars.

You were in the Heads with members of the Talking Heads, but that band was sued by David Byrne.

I can relate to how David felt about that project. Being in that band was like being in the middle of a war. It was just brutal. I got death threats. I had to have armed security. Fans of David Byrne were just not digging it. It was a drag. That band was mismanaged from the ground up. It was a brilliant record that nobody will probably hear.

What record is that?

We were working on two records at that time. We had finished one record and then did another called No Talking, Just Head. It had a lot of different singers on it. What they should have done was release the other album first because we could have established an identity without David Byrne. That one that wasn't released is genius. It was a brilliant record. It was a marketing mistake. I blame the management for that, but as far as being in the band and playing, how many people can say they've sung with the Talking Heads?

The fan reaction was odd considering Todd Rundgren replaced Ric Ocasek in the Cars and I don't believe he got death threats.

Well, you are talking about a whole generation who has never even seen the Cars. It just doesn't matter because Todd has his own legion of fans. How many people went to see the Cars and how many went to see Todd?

Even more Bourgeois?

We have had the new album from Brent, so how about one from Adrian – his son?: Pop/Art

Blog Critics has the interview

In listening to Pop/Art, I would think that you were influenced by The Beatles (especially Paul McCartney), Brian Wilson, Todd Rundgren, Elton John, Tom Petty, Neil Young, Bob Dylan, and Bruce Springsteen. Are there others that you would like to mention or acknowledge?
All of the above are definitely big influences. Probably the biggest one not mentioned is Elvis Costello, whom I'd call the greatest solo singer/songwriter. Simon and Garfunkel, Velvet Underground, U2, Ben Folds, David Bowie, Michael Jackson, The Rascals, Tom Waits, Roy Orbison, Eisley, Hanson, Rufus Wainwright, Jeff Lynne, Big Star, Elliott Smith, George Gershwin, Chuck Berry, and others have influenced and inspired me. I would consider my best friend Ricky Berger as big a musical influence on me as anyone.

Speaking of Mr. Rundgren, you have a song 'Everybody Knows It Was Me,' that sounds as though it might have been included on Todd's Something/Anything? album from 1972. It's a good commercial song. What can you tell us about it?
Maybe commercial for 1972! But thanks. Yes, Something/Anything? was definitely another big influence on this record as Todd recorded it mainly at home and played most of the instruments himself as I did. 'Everybody Knows It Was Me' is probably the most reflective of that album. I don't know what it was about. I refer to these kinds of songs as 'template songs' where you just come up with a template or concept like, 'It could have been this, it could have been that, but everybody knows it was me…' and then you just fill in the blanks.

Get Some Oats

Mike Greenblatt, at Goldmine [Pg. 36 Vol. 40 No. 7 ] talks to John Oats about Hall of Fame and career and of course Todd gets a mention

GM: Then you go and turn around and work some hard rock with Todd Rundgren on your very next album, "War Babies" [1974].

JO: Here again, that's another trademark of our careers: We weren't afraid to experiment. If you take it in the context of the times, "Abandoned Luncheonette" wasn't really that successful. The hit on that album, "She's Gone," only went into the Top 20 or 30, I think. That album didn't really reinforce to either us or the record company that, "Hey, you guys should make 'Abandoned Luncheonette 2.'" There was no thinking on those terms. So, because of that fact, we had no reason to think that was our style or what we should be doing for the rest of our lives. So we said, "OK, we made a good record. A lot of people liked it. Let's do something different." I think if you take "Abandoned Luncheonette" and you take "War Babies" and you put them together, you'll see that it opened up a door for us to be able to do all sorts of things going forward. The music we made in the '80s was some combination of our experimental rock credibility, plus our R&B and folkie credibility that we could draw upon.

Bourgeois back with some added Todd

Brent Bourgeois is back ... and so are ex member or Bourgeois Tagg and Mr Rundgren for Brent's new album 'Don't Look Back'. Brent has a page about Todd and the album. Todd and Kasim feature on the VERY Todd-like 'Poor me'

The New Jersey Stage also talks about the new album. 

Podcast Five: 2014

It's Summer ... well, as good as, ... so how about some music to listen to whilst in the sun. We review -

Pixies - Indie Cindy

Lily Allen - Sheezus

Anastacia - Resurrection

Damon Albarn - Everyday Robots

Kelis - Food

Paul Heaton - What Have we Become

We're having a break during June, but should be back with you sometime in July.

Check out this episode!