By: Rick Landers
The legendary singer-songwriter, Jesse Colin Young and I had a couple of conversations about his life in music, as well as his life and experiences throughout the years, including first hearing his signature song, “Get Together.”
Our conversation shift to many transformational times in his life, including, helping found “NO NUKES,” the devastating forest fire that literally flattened his home in California, he and his wife, Connie’s move to Hawaii where they cultivated coffee and friendships when helping build an educational facility and more. In our multi-part interview we also talked about when they began to rebuild their lives from those ashes, while Jesse continued to develop as a singer-songwriter and a mentor to his children, and as they too gained their own footing as musicians, and more.
Jesse Colin Young
Here’s Part 2 of a multi-part interview that Jesse agreed to do with Guitar International magazine and we couldn’t be more honored.
******
Rick: So, what about your kids? You’re both your kids play playing music or singing? Tristan and Jazzie.
Jesse Colin Young: Yeah. And my older kids, too.
Rick: Oh, I don’t know them. Okay.
Jesse Colin Young: Yes, the bands and bass player and I actually plays a lot of. Although he said to go back to. To upright because he’s they. He and my grandson Ethan who lives in my studio. They were in a gypsy jazz band called Yikes. Maybe they changed their name, but I don’t know. But, then they quit playing. And two nights ago, they played a San Francisco big jazz venue, and then there’s a small club attached to it.
And my daughter, Julie, has always been a songwriter and singer. And she writing a song a week. I said, “God, I wish it was me. Could I have?” It is serious dry spot, as far as songwriting.
Rick: Yeah. It’ll come back.
Jesse Colin Young: Yeah, I’ve been working on the solo show. Because about a year ago, I decided, after having a big band, that whole thing. I thought I wanted to play solo and then, when the COVID started, we started doing all of these. One song at a time. Connie would record me, and I’d figure out a solo version of one of my songs, most of which were written with bands. And then she’d get her phone and we’d put them up. During the first six months of the first year of COVID. And I think at the end of that, my manager said, ‘Why don’t you make a solo album?”
Rick: Okay.
Jesse Colin Young – Courtesy JCY.
Jesse Colin Young: And, then Jazzie has a beautiful first album called, Grown Up and Grown Apart. And then I don’t know what this one’s called. Maybe this one’s called, “The 27 Club”.
There’s some really funny lyrics in this song about the 27 club.
Rick: When you were starting out, we all had this process we really got engaged with, you know, putting the stylus on to learn songs. And we had art on those albums, which haS basically gone away with the downloads. Do you miss that type of media that you can sell as opposed to just the downloads? A lot of times, the record industry probably only looked at the Top 40. Folks now, there’s thousands or millions of people playing music, that I think is a good thing. But the money’s not there anymore, like back when you were selling a lot of albums.
Jesse Colin Young: I mean, you used to be able to make a little money if you got your record sold. You know, if you could sell 50,000 records or something, you could actually make some. A few thousand dollars, which would probably cost you to make the record or more. I know that kids are doing it. I think it was Tom Rush who said, “I just got my BMI statement. I’m let’s see, I’m making .03 cents a stream.”
Rick: Is like .003, maybe even less.
Jesse Colin Young: Yeah. I mean.
Rick: You might as well give it away for free, try to make money performing, because I think that’s where people can try to make money. But most artists don’t make a lot of money, many just play open mics and there’s no money in that. Maybe there’s some money in YouTube videos.
Jesse Colin Young: So this will be introducing Jazzy to the scene. We’ll see.
This might be the last. The beginning of the last time of touring on the road. And, you know, I think we’ll probably bring it back and I’m hoping people will really enjoy it and then we can bring it back to New England.The places are a little closer to home, here.
Rick: W’ll come to D.C., come to Virginia. Yeah, I believe you’ve played The Birchmere (Northern Virginia)
Jesse Colin Young: Oh, yeah.
Rick: The Birchmere is a great place. There’s a new place opening up called Earp’s Ordinary in Fairfax, Virginia, that’s suppose to hold 300 people. ot two gigs there coming up, but the guy’s building a 300 person venue there that he hopes to open in the fall.
Jesse Colin Young: Yeah, my wonderful friend from Hawaii. The ukulele player. Was playing the Birchmere.
Rick: Oh. Jake Shimabukuro. Yeah, I know, Jake. Great guy. I met him in Hawaii when he was 16. So. And what about Jake?
Jesse Colin Young: Oh, we did. Jake was playing there, and I was doing some promo for an album that I released in 2019 and. And we have the same publicist, Ryan. And I said, Ryan. Let’s find out who Jake wants to do. Get together as an encore.
I mean, I got my guitar. I’ve been doing live radio and stuff. I was ready to go. So, we did get together and I did a soundcheck. Yeah, he released an album that’s got a lot of duets on it and one of them is he and I, and “Get Together”.
Rick: What gear are you using in the studio as opposed to maybe going out on the road?
Jesse Colin Young: In the studio to record solo stuff. I don’t use any gear anymore. I don’t have the ears to mix. I mixed all my old records for so long, but yeah, my ears don’t work that well any more.
Rick: What about guitars? You changed your guitars depending on or you use your Taylors for both.
Jesse Colin Young: I used to use Taylors for both. I can’t use a guitar with a piezo pickup, because I slam my hand on the top of the guitar too much.
It comes across like a bass drum to a piezo. So I have this old setup they put on guitars that they used to. You know, this is the cover that had no pickup in it. But then they put this Expression System where they put this little magnetic pickup in here and cover them. And a couple of body sensors in here. So it’s good the body sensors are down away from the bridge.
Rick: Can I see the back? (Jesse turns the guitar) Gorgeous!
Jesse Colin Young: To. Yeah, they had to refinish this once. This was kind of blowing up, and they just said, “Send that to us. We’ll fix it.” They’re a great company. Great support.
I mean, I’ve broken guitars on the road or had them broken. This neck, it’s just a perfect size for my hands.
Rick: So what, what other projects do you have going on besides, you know, if you got your tour coming up and you have enough songs to do another album or or more than one album, I.
Jesse Colin Young: I think I have enough songs to do another to finished. It was going to be a double solo album, but that turned out they didn’t want to do that. So. I’ve been trying to record just two or three more songs, and I will have enough to release another solo album, when I recorded those 25 songs, or whatever they were. Yeah, yeah. It was a special time. I’ve gone back and listened to a lot, and it was just a magical time for me as a guitar player, I grew fin the midst of it. It sounds like I played…I would play the tracks first and then do the vocal. I played two or three tracks until I had enough for a track and then I would do the vocal. I can play better when I don’t sing.
Rick: Yeah.
Jesse Colin Young: That was just the way I approached it. I use for recording a fabulous mic, that’s here somewhere. It’s a wonderful kind of mic. It’s a mic that they’re remaking these days that I recorded “Get Together” on.
Rick: Is it a Neumann?
Jesse Colin Young: It used to say RCA. It has a brass casing. It’s heavy. I’ve left it out of the studio. I was glad I was going out there so much to try to get those last few songs to finish the second album. That’s the only thing in the works and working with Jazzie, that this is something new. We haven’t really played together. And as she was growing up, she kept her music very much to herself. She’s been writing since she was 12. She’s a beautiful singer and a wonderful songwriter. And I’m working on one of her songs. I have to learn some of her songs now. Not the easiest thing for me to do. You grow up playing your own music.
Rick: Do you take your songs? And when you develop a song with a vocal, do you then also make a copy using the stems, then take off the vocal and put an instrument on it to also have an instrumental version? So, you get two songs for a bit more than the cost of one?
Jesse Colin Young: I don’t think it’s gotten to that Leo Kottke point.
Rick: As much as musicians are ambitious about their music, many of us perform in ways to support causes. What have you done to support causes?
Jesse Colin Young: I’m one of the founders of No Nukes. We built the Waldorf (school) and all kinds of things.
Organic farming. Yeah. All of those things are part of sustainable lifestyle that we have. The planet’s coming apart here. We’re going to pay you know, our children are going to pay this wicked price.
These storms that now turn into tornadoes. And we have brought this on ourselves. And we’ve got to stop right now and remake things in a sustainable way. And we’re going to, you know, I guess if the ice sheet goes down off of the South Pole.
Rick: Right, right. And the and the ice underneath the ice underneath is.
Jesse Colin Young – Courtesy JCY.
Jesse Colin Young: There will be a 200. How’s that possible? A 200 foot race and seas like what are we going to do. So we got to have all these things. Yeah. Have been kind of woven into life and woven into the music, the concrete farm, learning to be an organic farmer and. And, uh oh. Steve Miron I did. I did a get together a couple years ago and gave it to Whyhunger. And this happened to be at the beginning. We didn’t know the pandemic was starting. But yeah, we did get together and we gave it to Whyhunger so that every time somebody played it, it turned into food. Yeah. I mean, my life and career is full of that, full of benefits from Vietnam vets from years ago, right after the war and all that adjusting.
Rick: You’re saying darkness. Darkness for them, right or right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, that’s good. I think that’s wonderful that you not only give your music, but you give back and and in different ways. And I think smart ways. So and I and I appreciate this interview and I look forward to see that seeing it posted and. All right. No sense of the Ryan so that he gets information you about John Martin Indyk Drake and the others.
Jesse Colin Young: Yeah I’d love to add this it’s time for me to re listen to or listen to some new people that I have never heard. And thank you for the heads up there. Yeah. Ryan will get it to you. Just a minute. And then they had. I’m with that. Yeah.
Rick: Well, my dobro, I play music and I write songs, and my dobro players are Quaker. And so, yeah, he said, ask him this question. So I said, okay. So yeah, there it is. So.
Jesse Colin Young: But Quakers. I haven’t even been to a Quaker meeting. It sounds wonderful. I mean, everyone comes in and just sits there and maybe someone speaks and maybe someone doesn’t. There’s way too much.
Rick: Yeah. Yeah. I don’t think too.
Jesse Colin Young: Much speaking going on in general, in our society.
Rick: The only thing I know is Quaker canons. If you remember the term Quaker canons were fake canons were made, I think during the Civil War to make it look as if the military I think the Yankees had had more artillery than they actually had. So Quaker came on a long time ago. Well, let’s I suppose you’ve had you know, let’s find out how much time do you have first? Are you?
Jesse Colin Young: Well, I don’t know. Ten or 20 years left, I hope.
Rick: Okay, we’ll see. All right. Well, let’s see how how it goes here. Usually it it can go on because we get into kind of into like a conversational mode with a lot of folks, especially folks who are like our age from 71. I know you just hit 80. And so there’s a lot of background to that. We can we can hit into can you believe it? You’re 80. I can’t believe I’m 71. I still feel like I’m like 20. So at least mentally. Yeah.
Jesse Colin Young: Yeah, I know. I know the feeling. Well, it’s very strange.
Rick: It is. Well, so I suppose you’ve been asked a lot of different things and so I. I really don’t want to retread over stuff you talked about before, but there will be a little bit of that, obviously. So why don’t we talk about coffee grounds or squash courts? I know that you like you moved to Hawaii and you I guess you had bought a coffee plantation or something, is that right?
Jesse Colin Young: No, we had bought a little farm.
Rick: Oh, okay.
Rick: So when you moved and you and and Connie took the two small cars. I see that you’ve got a bevy of guitars behind you. So you’ve been in are you a collector and a accumulator or you just take what you like and and just.
Jesse Colin Young: No, I’m a Taylor lover. These are mostly Taylors and a couple Gibsons and and fenders that I used to play and and a couple of basses. Because I did start as a bass player in The Youngbloods or actually became one because we couldn’t find a bass player who was any good. And to join the band and. Yeah. This is. This is basically it. I know.
Rick: Yeah, I think I see you. Parker, fly in there.
Jesse Colin Young: Yes. Parker Yeah. Those are.
Rick: I see a Gibson up there. Tom, I think.
Jesse Colin Young:Yes, that’s what it is. But it’s. It’s a new one built from the old wood. I don’t know what they call that kind of guitar.
Rick: How do you pick your guitars? How do you make your decisions? I know the Taylors are great guitars.
Jesse Colin Young: I fell in love with the necks. I guess because I had dabbled in electric guitar. In 1990 I found out that Taylor’s factory was down.
Rick: South, in San Diego.
Jesse Colin Young: A little bit. So, I went down there and bought my first dreadnought. Gorgeous. Or actually, my father bought it for me.
Rick: Oh, that’s nice.
Jesse Colin Young: Yes. A beautiful rosewood dreadnought. Fell in love. And that’s sitting right over there. And then Connie bought me an old one.
Rick: Oh, yeah. Those are great.
Jesse Colin Young: But with a with a spruce top. I couldn’t believe it. A couple of years ago they stopped making dreadnoughts.
Rick: Why?
Jesse Colin Young: The fellas told me because they can’t compete with Martin, so they just gave them up. I couldn’t believe it. So, I’m running around trying to find guitars because the dreadnought is my favorite. I think it’s because I was a bass player.
Rick: Let’s let’s talk about The Youngbloods. Their music really got ingrained into the fabric of American music. So I mean you can listen to “Get Together” and “Sunlight” and they still sound good. And I think that your your voice is such a signature voice, t carries a song even 30, 40 years later. So, even kids are probably going, who is this? You’ve been able to sustain that. It’s quite a legacy to be able to do that. So how how do you look back on that? Do you ever get tired of singing those songs?
Jesse Colin Young: No. I hardly ever get tired of singing “Get Together”. You know, it’s all about love.
Rick: Yeah, well, that’s true.
Jesse Colin Young: And. I didn’t write “Get Together”. I fell in love with it, Dino Valenti wrote it. I met Dino years later at a motorcycle shop. We were both motorcycle riders and in San Rafael, where when I was living out in Point Reyes with The Youngbloods.
But “Get Together” was there and everybody knew it from the Kingston Trio, I never heard it. And I walked into the Cafe Ah Go Go one afternoon, actually thinking I was going to rehearse. Because we were playing there and I got free rehearsal time. But it was an open mic and usually I would have passed on that and just said and gone to home practice ,because I was a new bass player in a new band and I had a lot of practicing to do.
I went down the stairs and there’s two floors down to the Go, Go. It’s now gone. We were looking for it last year, so it was two floors, below the street and that second story.
I cwent down, pushed the curtain, the side that was an open mic. And a fellow named Buzzy Leonhart was on stage with the bass player and a drummer. And they were playing “Get Together”. As they’re singing it, I ran backstage and said, “Can I have the lyrics? Write them for me?” He said,”. You Never heard that song?” I said, “No, man. But I’ve heard it now.” And you will hear it from me too. So he wrote them out for me, and you know? That song is just pure magic.
Rick: Yeah.
Jesse Colin Young: You know, people asked us why when The Youngbloods version took off, I don’t know, it’s got the love in it I. When I heard that song, I knew my life had changed. I mean, almost, you know, the when Clouds opened in the movies about the Bible and when something big is happening. And I saw the clouds in the ceiling of the jungle opened up and my life changed. “Get Together” was like that. It was like a giant arrow that said, “Dude forget about anger and that shit. This way! This is the way.” And I’ve kind of been following it ever since.
