Speaker 1: Let me get this microphone up here. Let's see, because
he's got his guitar with him. Brooklyn Mike is here. Hello,
Brooklyn Mike. Oh, I think I hear you a little bit.
Check check. Oh there we are. Good. Good morning, Matt
and everybody. Good morning. Let's say I'm gonna turn that
down and turn that up and it's uh yeah, Mike's
got his guitar with him, so he's gonna play. So
this is exciting because, again, for those who are not familiar,
Brooklyn Mike has been well this morning on the Morning
Show because every Saturday morning, Peter plays a classic episode
of the Morning Show. This Morning Show was from twenty eighteen.
It was from the end of twenty eighteen, and you
were on it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, twenty eighteen, and at that point I had been
already listening and participating with The Morning Show for probably
at least a year or two at that point already.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I know.
Speaker 2: It was you know when Moose was still on and
Moose was off the show at that point twenty eighteen.
Jarrell was there. Yeah, so at the very least twenty seventeen. Yeah,
so we go back good eight years, eight nine years
something like that.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, so this is the first time. So you've
been on the morning show many times. Have you ever
been on a rob show, Robber's video show? In fact,
I've never had the good fortune to meet Rob yet.
Oh okay, so you haven't even met Rob yet. I'm
sure you will at some point. Yeah, but you've been
on so you've been on Retrospect Radio obviously recently for
the first time. So that was that was a lot
of fun. That was great. I look forward to coming
back in next Friday. Absolutely, And this is your first
time on this show, so so welcome. Thanks.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, being I retired from my regular job
at the beginning of this year, and so this is
affording me, you know, time to do things that have
been back burnard for a quarter century. Yeah, so including
you know, performing and playing music. You know, I moved
here January of two thousand and one from Brooklyn, New York,
and you know, got it, you know, started working and
had to pay bills and be an adult. So I
kind of back burned the music. I didn't really have
the time and the energy. I was working nights, so,
you know, working weekends, so my schedule was not conducive
really that much to playing out and yeah, I mean
certainly if you could always find the wherewithal to do it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I just didn't have it in me.
Speaker 2: I was more focused on, you know, just building a
new life here in New Hampshire with my wife.
Speaker 1: Yeah, which has worked out beautifully. No, that's wonderful. We
have a call. Oh no, nobody there. Someone was calling
the studio line. All right, I thought it was one
of your fans. But whoever it was, they hung up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well one of them. Yeah, Daryl, the Dragons Ione
should be listening this morning. If you're listening, Daryl, good morning.
Speaker 1: Oh excellent, Good morning Daryl. Yeah. I haven't spoken with
him in a long time, but you had lunch with
him recently, right at breakfast or something. Yeah. Yeah, we're
good friends. Now that's excellent. That is excellent. He's a
good man. Yeah. Absolutely, Well he's a musician himself, he is.
You guys are gonna do? Uh?
Speaker 2: We were we know, you know, we we totally had
plans because in additions playing guitar and bass, my first
instrument was trumpet and I love jazz and uh Darrell
plays saxophone and uh and clarinet. Uh, and we had plans.
We had it all mapped out. We were going to
do a duet. We had a name for the duet,
and we had repertoire ready to go. And then he
took an unfortunate fall and he's recovered quite well, but
he feels he doesn't have the proper dexterity in his
fingers in his hands anymore to play. So we had
to kind of shelf that that project.
Speaker 1: Fortunately, let's see it. Oh, I think our caller is online.
Hello caller, who's.
Speaker 3: This Ricky Mapleton?
Speaker 1: Oh my goodness, Ricky Mampleton. Hello are you so? Are
you familiar with Brooklyn Mike.
Speaker 2: I'm yes, I am.
Speaker 3: Huh, go ahead, I learned a bottom from of your show.
Speaker 1: Oh wonderful, wonderful. So see you already have a new fan.
Hopefully we'll be disappointing. Good morning, rick Yeah, morning, Ricky
Mapleton is gonna be on with us in the uh
in the not too distant future. So, and it's been
on the show many times.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think I'm coming on in February.
Speaker 1: I think so. I don't have it in front of me,
but that sounds right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm good to have you. Thanks. I
was starting to call up with heavy thanks. Give me
to you guys.
Speaker 1: Oh, thank you.
Speaker 3: Yeah, just a big, big fan of the show. Guys,
you're still rocking and.
Speaker 1: Rolling absolutely well. Thank you very much. We appreciate that
and we look forward to look forward to seeing you
in February with your new project.
Speaker 3: Ah yeah, I got a project coming up called The
bread Man Cometh.
Speaker 4: A rock opera round Bread.
Speaker 1: Yeah, very excited about that. I'm a big fan of
sandwiches myself in French doasts, so you know I like bread.
Speaker 3: Oh well, I'll bring some in and have a great
show and I'll talk to you guys. Keep going.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much by bye.
Speaker 2: It's funny that he mentioned bread, because you know, the
first thing you think of is you know bread that
we eat? Yes, And I think I only learned recently
that the band bread, uh, which I always thought, you know,
bread that we eat, but it was actually you know
bread the nickname for money. Yes, I think that's that
was the the meaning of the band.
Speaker 1: You only learned that recently about Wait about uh that
that the name bread of the band?
Speaker 3: Oh?
Speaker 2: Oh, I thought you meant no, No, I knew that
that was that was I was confused.
Speaker 1: No, no, we Yeah, Amen, let me some bread. Solid No.
Speaker 2: No, but I only learned learned recently that that that
was the meaning of the of the name of the band.
Speaker 1: Oh, I got you, I got youa yeah either way. Now,
you had said, I don't remember if this was an
on air or an off air conversation during Paul's show,
but you mentioned back in New York you would work
with Walter Egan.
Speaker 2: Correct, we didn't work Yeah, actually we did work in
New York. Walter Egan is originally from Queens from Forest Hills, Queen's,
same town. Coincidentally as Simon and Garfunkel and.
Speaker 4: I.
Speaker 2: You know, I was playing in many, many bands, and
he wound up working with one of the bands that
I was working with, not on a permanent basis a
little bit more than subbing, but we would go up
to that band. The band leader, so to speak, Ray Passenan,
is from East Millinocket, Maine. Yeah, so we would he
booked us. Ray would book us at this in Brewer, Maine,
at a kind of a motel that would have a
lounge there and we'd play there for the whole week.
It was called Stacy's. Doesn't exist anymore, it's gotten torn down.
But this was in the nineties and when we go
up for the week to Maine, Walter would would go
with us and play for the whole week. And in
fact he would he would carpool like I would drive,
and he'd carpool with me, so I'd have his guitar
and his amp in my car. And it was a
lot of He's he's a lot of fun. But he
lives in Nashville now. Yeah, so, yeah, Walter is a
fun guy, is very talented, very talented guitarist. So his
biggest hit was Magnet and pretty much a one hit wonder,
but very very good songwriter. Yeah, great guitarist, good singer,
just all around good guy.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, Yeah, that was fun. Is there anyone else
like that that you worked with back in the I
don't remember the guy's name.
Speaker 2: It was only one night again with a lot of
the bands that we you know, you were mentioning earlier
about you know, one of one of the downfalls of
being in a band is when somebody can't make it.
But we were fortunate, you know, in in New York City.
I mean there's I mean, there are a lot of
musicians everywhere, right, but we had quite quite a circle
of bands that we all knew each other on the
on the circuit, so to speak. So if like if
we if our drummer couldn't make it, we had our
pick of drummers. Same thing with guitarists and all that.
So there was one one night where our drummer couldn't
make it, and I don't know how our band leader,
her name was Patients More, she found this guy but
he was again I don't remember his name, but he
was the drummer for Paul McCartney and Wings. So we
worked with him for one night. Oh yeah, English guy,
super super nice of course, great drummer.
Speaker 1: Yeah there, I don't know.
Speaker 2: There was a guitarist from the Left Bank, you know,
walk Away Renee, that song. Just every now and then
we'd come across, you know, we'd wind up working with somebody. Yeah,
and it was just you know, main job, main thing
was to get the job done. But it was all
it was all lot of fun, right, There was never
a lot of money in it. I mean yeah, you know,
for many years and it's still my approach where whether
it's right or wrong, I'm happy with it. Where the
music that I decide to perform or do, this is
what I'm doing solos. But or again, back in New York.
All the bands I was in I played bass.
Speaker 1: Okay, So we were.
Speaker 2: Doing cover music mostly believe it or not, because it
was in the nineties, mostly country bands. Really yeah, so,
and we were super busy. I mean there was a
month I remember we did like thirty two jobs in
one month.
Speaker 1: Oh my god. Yeah, wow, like doubles.
Speaker 2: You know, you do an afternoon and you know, on
a Saturday afternoon at like a fair or something, and
then yeah, play a bar at night.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 1: So where was I going with that? Oh?
Speaker 2: My choice of music that I play. So back home again,
I was playing in these cover bands, and family members
and people I knew would say, you know, why don't
why don't you join a wedding band? You can make
so much money. I'm like, I'm not doing that music.
I don't really care at this point about the money.
I should have cared a little bit more about the money, honestly. Luckily,
you know, my wife was very patient with me, and
you know, she worked and I worked the day job too,
but I'd work part time jobs, full time jobs, depending
on how busy I was with music at any given point.
So as a result, I worked a lot of different
types of jobs, imagine in my life, and so yeah,
still to this day, like the repertoire that I do
is not primarily songs that people know. I mean, there
are a fair amount of those songs. But for example, everybody,
anybody who knows me through the station knows Gordon Lightfoot
is like my hero, and I don't really do his
I do. I think two songs of his, well, now
three because I learned sundown, but I do so I
do three songs of his that were popular songs that
were hits that people would know. But then I'll do
ten songs of his that unless you're like a Gordon
Lightfoot fan or had his albums or have his albums
and were really into his music, you wouldn't know them.
But I love the songs. And it's a little bit
selfish on my part. It's like three parts to it.
Part of it is selfish because I enjoy it. Yeah, okay,
And I think that if a performer is doing songs
that he or she enjoy really enjoys, you're going to
get the best result usually because it's from the heart.
So that's one thing and the other thing is I
think it's a little more interesting for audiences unless they
just want to hear songs that they know. And that's
why I don't really want to play like like primarily
like in a bar setting because people are drinking.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I did that for years and years and years, even
my first band with my brother, which was all classic rock,
and it was fine, you know, because people are drinking,
you know, they want to sing along and they want
to know the songs. But hopefully I could find some
venues a little more low key where it's more of
a listening experience, So I could do these songs, for example,
by Gordon Lightfoot and my other hero Dan Fogelberg, that
people might not necessarily know, but I think they'll wind
up really enjoying it, hopefully. And the third thing is
that at any given point, if I'm performing and somebody
is in the audience or more than one person, Let's
take Dan Fogelberg for example, that is a Dan Fogelberg song,
and then I'm doing these cuts like off albums that
when never on the radio, I'm hoping they'll be like
really happy about it. Hear that it's like, oh my god,
he's doing For example, I used to play this place
in Greenwich Village called the back Fence, and I played
their solo many times with many bands over the years.
And my favorite America song is Daisy Jane. And it
got some airplay, but it wasn't like, you know, it
wasn't Ventura Highway for example. You know, it wasn't like
a huge utit and there. So I was at the
back Fence one night and played Daisy Jane and there
was this guy there just at the bar, and he
loved the song and he went nuts and he said,
every I'm gonna make sure I'm here every time you
hear just because I want to hear that song.
Speaker 5: Wow.
Speaker 2: So to me, that's like it's not even about the money,
like that's the payoff, right, you know, it's like mission accomplished.
Speaker 1: Yeah, absolutely absolutely. You mentioned your brother, so you're in
a band with your brother. And then my.
Speaker 2: Brother he passed away unfortunately a couple a couple of
years ago, passed away.
Speaker 1: But he's seven years older than I am.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I you know, I know you're an only child,
but I think it's kind of normal for let's say.
Speaker 1: Especially I should just clarify, Mike come not an only child.
Just in case any of my siblings are listening. I
often feel like I will sorry, sister, right, it's okay, okay, yeah,
I have I'm just remembering. Yeah, yeah, it's okay. I
have two half sisters and a half brother. I'm sorry,
and everybody scattered. And I was already yeah, I was
already older when the first one was born. So I
often feel like I grew up like an only child. Okay,
so that's okay. Just I'm only correcting you, just in
case any of them are listening, which is unlikely, but
I don't want anyone to be mad at me. I apologize.
It's all good. I did know that, and I.
Speaker 2: Forgot totally okay, But the reference is it's still relevant
in that. So my brother, being older than I am,
I always kind of looked up to him. I just
wanted to like emulate him. And he was a musician
from early early on. First played drums. We had a
drum kit in the basement, and I'd go down and
play the drums, you know, just by ear. That was
actually the first instrument that I played. Yeah, and uh,
and then he was a great guitarist and keyboard player
and singer. My sister is a singer. My father was
a singer, and so my first band when I started
studying guitar, and my brother had already been playing for
years and he was in a band. Then that band
split up, you know the way it goes, and then
he and the lead singer and a rhythm player wanted
to form another band, and I was just learning to play,
and I joined them, and we were three acoustic guitars
at that point, and then about a year later we
had the idea. I started studying bass, and then my
friend John Sheridan, who I played with in like a
ton of bands. He's like my best friend back home
in New York while he's in New Jersey now. So
then I then my brother went he like I said,
we started out as three acoustic guitars, and then when
we supplemented the band with the drummer, my brother went
to electric guitar and I went to bass. Okay, and
then we were like a legit four piece, you know,
with acoustic rhythm.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, and it was great.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: The name of the band was County Line and uh.
I came up with the name for the band from
a song by the Pussett's Art band John Poussett's art.
Who you interview was a great interview. That was a
great feather in your cap.
Speaker 1: Oh thank you. Yeah.
Speaker 2: And if you ever get the chance to see him
he plays over at the Rex. I've seen him there
a number of times. You will not be disappointed.
Speaker 1: He's great. Yeah. The last time we had him on,
that's why it was because he was great. I've seen
him in a few times.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Huh.
Speaker 2: So anyway, that was my first band that was all uh, classic.
Speaker 1: Rock and then and then what why did that end?
Speaker 2: Work started drying up a little bit. Yeah, So that
we started that band, County Line. That was about nineteen
eighty six or seven, and we went strong for a
good three or four years. Yeah, and then in nineteen
ninety but we're going we're going one hundred and eighty
on this one. In nineteen ninety, my wife and I
bought a pizzeria. Okay, so I started working when I
was eight years old. I'm going to backtrack real quick
a little bit. I started working I was eight years
old in pizzerias.
Speaker 1: Wow, And I know it's not legal.
Speaker 2: But it was a pizzeria and it was in Brooklyn,
so it was okay, gotcha so eight years old, I
started working in pizzeri's. I did that straight through thirteen
years until I was twenty one, through all pretty much
all my school years.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 2: And then then I wasn't working in pizzer anymore. So
from twenty one that was whatever year that was nineteen
eighty two, and I was a bank teller and I
did a whole bunch that worked for a coffee company,
industrial hardware company, all kinds of stuff. But in nineteen
ninety an opportunity came up in our neighborhood actually a
block from my mom's house.
Speaker 1: There was a pizzeria for sale.
Speaker 2: And I wasn't really involved in a career or anything,
and I knew how to do the you know, run
the business. I did it much all my you know,
thirteen years, all my young life, and my wife and
I decided to buy the buy the pizzeria. So then
I couldn't play music anymore because I was there like
seven days a week.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah.
Speaker 2: And then we got rid of the pizzeria in ninety two,
and I mean I didn't even lock the door the
last day. And my friend John Sheridan, and it's like, okay,
you're ready to join the band again and then we
were off and running. And then, like I said, country
music was like really up and coming then with you know,
the coming on the scene of like the likes of
Clint Black and Garth Brooks and Brooks and Dunn and
you know, Dwight Yoakum and all these guys. Yeah, and
it just country music exploded, and believe it or not,
in New York City and Long Island and New Jersey.
You know, all the line dancing and all the you know,
all the bars and clubs were doing it.
Speaker 4: Oh.
Speaker 1: I believe it because I remember that that wave in
the nineties, that wave a lot of country was huge,
and it was very very mainstream in that in that sense.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, but it's you know, my kind of one
of my running jokes is, yeah, what you'd expect, you know,
nice Italian boy from Brooklyn playing country music, you know.
But you know, I have all the accouterment, you know,
the the Western boots and the Western shirts, and I
never want I have a couple of stetsons. I only
wore I think once when we played we actually did
do a wedding. But they were country music fans, so
we are to our country music. That's what they wanted.
Speaker 1: By the way, I'm curious about the pizzeria. So you
owned it for a couple of years and.
Speaker 2: Yeah, three years, ninety ninety ninety two, and then why
did you give it up?
Speaker 1: It failed? Oh really?
Speaker 2: Yeah, we were the small guy in town. You know,
there was a pizzer on every block. And there were
two main drags in our neighborhood, Manhattan Avenue and Nasa
Avenue that kind of intersect at one point, and all
the pizzerias and businesses are on that on those two streets.
We were on a boulevard. Parking was hard, there were
no other stores there, and you know, we were the
new guy in town. Y. We you know, we made
enough just like to pay the bills. But after three years,
I'm like, I'm not doing this. I'm marking like nine
the one hundred hours a week. I can imagine, Yeah,
I'm done. And we couldn't even say I'm like I said,
I'm an open book. I'm honest. We couldn't even sell
the business because we couldn't show a profit. Yeah, so
we just we we sold whatever, liquidated whatever equipment we
could yeahs and said, you know, just chalk it up
to experience.
Speaker 1: Right right, you know, yeah, yeah, exactly, and life went on. Yeah, yeah,
you know.
Speaker 2: But I always say, you know, if we hadn't done it,
we'd always be kicking ourselves in the butt saying, oh,
what is exactly what could have happened?
Speaker 1: So absolutely it was.
Speaker 2: It was a great learning experience, which what I took
away from there is I'll never own my own process
again ever.
Speaker 1: No, thank you. I don't blame you. By the way,
So should we talk about where the name Brooklyn Mike
comes from, because you weren't always Brooklyn Mike.
Speaker 2: No, I've always been Mic from Brooklyn. So it's got
to be over it's got to be over fifteen years ago,
because I know when we moved to New Hampshire, we
lived on the east side. We were on Harvard Street
and we lived there for about ten years, and then
we moved to the West side, which that's where we
are now. We're just like a couple of blocks from
the Bedford border. So I know this came up, This
Brooklyn Mike nomenclature came up when I was still at
the old house. So I know it's more than fifteen
years ago. So I'm going to say between maybe seventeen
eighteen years ago something like that. Well, I used to
watch this show on Manchester Public Television called Norman Friends,
which was the great late Norm Moody was the host,
and even greater than Norm was his co host, which
happened to be mister Matt Connerton. And so that's where
how we you and I first met, not in person,
but we came to know each other so to.
Speaker 1: Speak, because Norm would take.
Speaker 2: Calls on you know, while the show was going on.
He would take phone calls, which was fine, yeah, and
you know, no big surprise, I called in, which you know,
That's how I came to know Peter and I started
calling Peter's And it's kind of funny because when I
think back to it, I would do it in New
York too. I would call in like I've won some
like prizes on radio shows.
Speaker 1: Like I wasn't like a.
Speaker 2: Prize hog, but every now, if it was like something
that interested me, I'd say I won like two or
three things in New York over the years. So it
was always kind of fun to like connect with the
disc jockey. I thought it was always fun, you know,
because I wanted to hear myself on air. I couldn't
care about that. Yeah, So so anyway, I called in
Norman friends the first time that I called in, and
you know, you'd say, you know, oh who's online?
Speaker 1: Or what's your name?
Speaker 2: Actually you would answer the phone, and so I said, oh,
my name is Mike. And I don't know if it
was right right on the spot or eventually, I just
I guess I didn't feel comfortable giving my last name.
It was either that or I remember saying, well, you know,
there were so many mics, and there are other mics
probably that do call in, so just to make it
easy and differentiate, I'm from Brooklyn, so just call me
Brooklyn Mic. Yeah, and that's how it started. Yeah, you know,
I kind of gave myself, you know, you know, my
own stupid nickname.
Speaker 1: It works, it works. Yeah, you've been Brooklyn Mic ever
since Peter asked me.
Speaker 2: Peter asked me recently, says, you know, when hopefully you
start performing out places, are you, you know, going to
book yourself as Brooklyn Mike. I'm like, no, no, it's
like why not, Yeah, it's kind of it's kind of pretentious.
I think I don't think I think you should. I
don't know, I said, I'm going to think about it.
A funny little anecdote about that is that I did
one another place in Greenwich Village that used to do
plenty of them, that would do open mics, and I
only did an open mic one time in Greenwich Village. Again,
this is like mid eighties, and like, I'm gonna do it.
It's gonna be kind of fun. I even played on
the street one time with the guitar case open in
the village. It's just a fun experience. So it's something
I made. One thing I never did though. I never
played on the subway that I wouldn't do. So I
played this open mic once at this bar in Greenwich Village.
And again, my my last name is like very ethnic,
not that it's that difficult, but my joke was always,
you know, usually when people get married, the woman takes
the husband's name.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And.
Speaker 2: I always said I would have preferred to take my
wife's name because I just like it better, you know.
And so I booked myself as Mike and then I
used her last name.
Speaker 1: Oh no kidding, Yeah, interesting, Oh that's funny, that's funny. Well,
do you want to play.
Speaker 4: Something for us?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Okay, if you're just joining us. Brooklyn. Mike is
here with us live in studio. He's got his guitar,
and I'm going to bring the level up on that guitar.
And uh, you know we're already live, so no chance
to do a proper sound check.
Speaker 2: But uh, I have the level set right at midway,
both volume and tone, so I could always adjust it
if I that's great.
Speaker 1: It's plenty of plenty loud. Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, sounds
good in the headphones. Make it a little less bright here.
Speaker 4: Okay, So.
Speaker 2: Not to be redundant, but Gordon Lightfoot, I just feel
I have to start with a song of his. Okay,
So here's a song again. This is a real old one.
This goes way back. I don't know, sixty eight, sixty nine,
and certainly not a song anyone would know unless you
know you're a Gordon Lightfoot fan or have his albums
and you know, would be familiar with it. Even if
you're not a fan, if you have the album, you
might know the song. Yeah, but I'm gonna start this one.
I played this once years ago on Peter's show. He
really liked it, okay, and I think it's apropos for
today because it's entitled Saturday Clothes.
Speaker 1: Ah, it's a little.
Speaker 2: Tale about I kind of envisioned a young guy going
out to live on his own for the first time,
maybe going away to college, and having his own little
place and really kind of something I think a lot
of us could relate to, like learning how to do
things on your own for the first time, you know,
away from mom and all that good stuff, you know.
And so he's really going through that process in his
own place here, and every Saturday he has a gathering
at his home or his apartment, whatever it may be,
and his old friends come over every Saturday night, you know,
and at the end of the night, everybody leaves, and
he's already looking forward to the next Saturday.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: He's like cleaning up after the mess that they've left.
And that's kind of what this little tune is about.
And it's called, like I said, Saturday Clothes.
Speaker 4: I feel a little blue because I can't sew. There's
still a lot of things that I should know. Anyone
can guess. I don't know how to press my Saturday clothes.
Everyone who's going home. I feel a little sad to
watch them me. But I'll be cool because I don't
believe the happy times are gone. I could still put
on my Saturday clothes. Everyonebody knows I've got two. That
was a swell time. So now we'll take the bucks
away and put the glasses on the train. I'll see
you all next Saturday.
Speaker 6: Two three.
Speaker 4: I feel a little off because they're gone, and if
my own we're here, I'd still be put in a
week or two. There's lots of things to do in
my Saturday clothes, and everyone's on hold. I've got to
turn bad. Was a swell time. So now I'll take
the butts away and put the glasses on the tray.
I'll see you all next Saturday.
Speaker 1: Hmm, that is wonderful. Wonderful Brooklyn. Mike is here with
us a live in studio And uh so that was
Is Gordon Lightfoot your your favorite Did you say he
was your favorite favorite singer songwriter? Absolutely? What what is
it like? Is it is it possible to sort of
describe what it is about him that connects with you
so much?
Speaker 2: Yeah, this has been asked of me. Well, on the surface,
I love his voice, his singing style, but just his
the music in general. I mean, uh, you know, he's
the consummate storyteller. People usually refer to him as that,
and there's something about uh. It's kind of funny because
many of my favorite UH musicians singer songwriters are Canadian,
and I think it's something about, you know, you're from
a different place. Wherever you're from, you kind of have
different sensibilities, and I think it comes out in the songwriting.
Like Joni Mitchell is my favorite female vocalist, She's Canadian.
Another one of my favorite songwriter singer songwriters is Bruce Coburn,
also Canadian.
Speaker 1: Dan Hill.
Speaker 2: I don't know, it's just something I've just always loved
his music and just something different about it. Certainly, you know,
started out as straight folk, but then like a lot
of music of that was coming folk music that was
popular in the sixties and those singer songwriters and bands
that can I married through into the you know, late
sixties into the seventies.
Speaker 1: You know, there was a change. There was like an.
Speaker 2: Infusion of country and so then we get you know,
country rock. And it's also kind of funny because growing up,
when I was really young, there was an elderly woman
we had. We lived in a six family apartment house
that my parents owned and downstairs from us, we were
on the second floor. On the first floor, there was
elderly woman and she lived with our son, and we'd
go down when we were really really young, like you know, five, six,
seven years old, and we just like spent time down
there because we were just like friendly with the neighbors.
And she would have I don't remember what program it
was on TV, but she loved country music, but I
mean country western, and I hated it. Its just I
just felt like it was just so corny, because you know,
I wanted to hear the Beatles and you know all that,
and so I I was always in the back of
my I think subconsciously thought I don't like country music.
I hate country music, right, And then the evolution of
I should say the infusion of country music into rock.
So many of the bands that we grew up with
that I wound up loving. I'm thinking, oh, these are
great rock bands. I love them. But looking back on it,
there was like a lot of country influence. So Eagles, Poco,
even Crosby Still's Nash. You know, you went from folk,
you know, and then there was rock elements. But then
and even if you know, when you see videos and
pictures of these guys. They were wearing like country outfits,
Like the shirts were like all deck down and stuff.
Speaker 1: It was it was a style, you know.
Speaker 2: And so unbeknownst to me, it was like I was
absorbing that, you know, and not really putting a label
on it, you know what I mean. Not that that's necessary,
but it's just kind of funny how things turn, you know,
And then I wind up being in country bands.
Speaker 1: I'll go, figure, we have we have a call. Hello,
call her? Who's on the line. Good morning, Gene Simmons,
Gene Simmons, Oh my goodness, Jean Simmons of Kiss. Welcome, sir.
Speaker 3: I was just doing in doing my early Christmas shopping
for and I uttered it unleashed. Wow, And I heard
the Brooklyn Mike on your show. Is that correct?
Speaker 1: Brooklyn Mike is here, you know, Gene Simmons of Kiss,
another real New Yorker. Yes, yes, that's right.
Speaker 3: In fact, that's why I was calling. I know that
Brooklyn Mike is a very humble guy, and he will
never admit they actually said in with Wicked Lester for
four shows.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 1: Yeah, he left that out. He did not mention that
earlier when he was talking about his will, he will
deny it.
Speaker 2: Gene, I you know, I'm I'm I'm humbled by your
call this morning, but I don't know if you're. At first,
I was thinking, this is the first time you and
you and I have ever spoken, But now it just
you just sparked the memory that one night, way back
in the good old days, you and I spent a
fun evening at Studio fifty four. Wow, Oh the memories.
Speaker 3: That was the night that you and I were doing
lines off the smaller Carly Simmons back.
Speaker 2: Oh, hey, well she didn't mind, so I mean, you know,
get it. Well, the getting's good.
Speaker 1: I guess it was consensual, right, Ah the memories.
Speaker 3: Thanks memories.
Speaker 1: Wow, Well, this is amazing. It's wonderful to have this
kind of reunion happening. Jeene Simmons of Kiss, Well, Matt, I.
Speaker 3: Am absolutely mesmerized that I have my old friend Brooklyn
Mike in the studio.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: I hang up now and continue my Christmas shopping, all right,
And I just wanted to point out that for the
next fifteen minutes, if you go to Kiss online dot com,
fifteen percent of all coffee monks wow, by one.
Speaker 1: That's at Kiss Online dot Com only for the next
fifteen minutes. Wow.
Speaker 3: So the next fifteen minutes by one coffee munket full price,
get the next one fifteen percent.
Speaker 1: Oh that's a deal. That's that's fantastic. Wow. As amazing
as we New Yorker say, such a deal. Wow.
Speaker 3: I think we do have the four cups where false
Stanways on one and Gene seven Kisses on another. Uh huh,
Acey and of course Peter Chris from chis.
Speaker 1: Wow. Well, that's amazing. So you can get all four.
That's that's great.
Speaker 3: Collect them all, Mat.
Speaker 1: That's wonderful. Got to collect them all.
Speaker 3: I am not a professional math, but I will say
that if you buy the Jean and Paul, you will
get the Ace and Peter at fifteen percent off for
the next fifteen minutes.
Speaker 1: Wow. Oh boy, it just gets better. I hope you'll
extend that, because you know, I am doing a radio show.
I don't think I can make that purchase in the
next fifteen minutes.
Speaker 3: That's something you're gonna have to work out with your people.
Speaker 1: Matt, I understand. Geene Simmons of kiss.
Speaker 3: I am kicking up Brooklyn. Mike's time. Nice to hear
your voice again. Brooklyn.
Speaker 1: Mike, thank you, my friend.
Speaker 3: Maybe you can make a stop on that nighttime show
there on Friday night.
Speaker 1: Thank you, thank you? All right, Oh wow, he's gone
Gene Simmons of Kiss.
Speaker 2: He mentioned Peter Chris. Peter Chris is from my neighborhood
in Brooklyn, Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Oh, yes, yeah, actually the same
street that might that I lived on for a little
while that my brother lived on. Oh no kidding, and
uh on the same street also down the other end.
Barry Manilow. Oh nokiddy, that's pretty wild. Wow, that is Yeah.
Speaker 1: So did you ever interact with Peter bris No, no, no,
or what about Barry? No, no, no. It's nice to
be able to reunit reunite you with.
Speaker 2: G I'm just you know, I'm playing it back in
my in my mind that it was quite quite the affair, something.
Speaker 1: I can imagine. Well, do you want to you want
to play another song for us? I'd love to hear more.
All right, do you mind if I keep it a
little low key? I don't mind at all if I whatever,
whatever you want to play.
Speaker 2: Okay, here's a song again. Dan Fogelberg is my other
singer songwriter hero Man from Peoria, Illinois.
Speaker 1: Huh and yeah.
Speaker 2: I mean if I had to describe myself musically and
what I do, I'd just say the mellow music man, you.
Speaker 1: Know, like it or not.
Speaker 2: I mean, that's just just what I am and what
I do. Sure, but it doesn't mean I don't do
any up tempo stuff. But my heart is really with
like the sentimental, really mellow kind of stuff. So okay,
this one's entitled song from Half Mountain.
Speaker 1: All right, Brooklyn, Mike live and studio, m hm, sounds good.
Speaker 7: All right, Okay, here we go.
Speaker 4: Now the windows. In a moment, it will be raging.
Now my soul is young. In a moment, it will
be aging and higher the pines. I wrote several lines
and left them in a bottle for you to find.
Now the dream is rising. In a moment it will
be passed. This breath is my first, it will all
too soon be my last. And on me with the coast.
I made several toasts to you and me and the sea,
and no one heard.
Speaker 6: Mm hmmm.
Speaker 4: Now wised. In a moment, it will be raging.
Speaker 1: Now my soul is young.
Speaker 4: In a moment, it will be aging and higher. Both
four pines, I wrote several lines and left them in.
Speaker 6: A bottle for you to fine.
Speaker 1: Wow, beautiful, beautiful. So that's side that San Fogelberg. Fel Berg, Yeah, Fogelberg.
What I feel like I've never really listened to much
of him. I mean, what are what are his big
hits again? I forget? Well, there's the Leader of the Band? Uh,
the one he talks about his fut leader of the band.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, yeah yeah, and then is longer longer than anything?
Speaker 2: Oh, that's the big, big one is that's actually my
wife and I and mine. That's our wedding song, no kidding,
longer and then uh yeah. But I do like twenty
his songs, and wow, none of them are let me see,
none of them are really are hits?
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, no, that's cool though, actually you know why,
I mean, why be predictable? Yeah, you know, dude, it's
cool that you do some some deep cuts there. Yeah.
Speaker 2: How about a song by Bruce Colburn? Yes, yes, so
this is called Lord of the Starfields Again he was really,
I mean, this guy is a prolific songwriter, is virtuoso guitarist, Yeah,
and really a one hit wonder Wondering Where the Lions
Are nineteen seventy five. I don't know if he had, well,
Danny rocket launcher, yeah, rocket launcher.
Speaker 1: Yeah. In the eighties, that's when I first became aware
of a right now Yeah, yeah, yeah. And this one
is kind of.
Speaker 2: Lord of the Starfields, not really a religious song, but
kind of giving acknowledgment or praise to what I would
refer to. And it's not my own term source. Everything
emanates from yeah, yeah, and it's entitled Lord of the Starfields.
Speaker 1: All right, Brooklyn Mike live in studio.
Speaker 5: Load of the star Fields, Ancient of days, You's maker.
Speaker 4: Here's a song in your praise, Wings of the storm
cloud beginning, and then.
Speaker 6: You make my heart.
Speaker 1: Like a banner in the wind.
Speaker 5: Oh the Fire's song, Keep me birded.
Speaker 4: Oh my, the Fire's a.
Speaker 5: Song, Keep me birded.
Speaker 1: Lord of the star feels.
Speaker 4: Souler of life, heaven under far, both of your life,
voice of the no smile of what to you all
the warrior only comes home to you. Oh on the
fire sun keep me.
Speaker 6: Oh my.
Speaker 8: Fire's son, keeping the fires sun keeping.
Speaker 1: Well, that is cool. Yeah, I've never heard that before.
That's an oldie. Yeah. Yeah. He's known more for producing, right,
He's produced a lot of albums, hasn't.
Speaker 2: He I'm not certain about that. Yeah, but what I
will tell you is his albums are engineered. They're like
the finest sounding, like sonically, the finest albums that I
that I own, and I own like three hundred albums.
They just sound so good the way they're produced and engineered.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Yeah, Ri Scobert and that.
Speaker 2: It's funny because I saw him a number of years
ago and when vinyl was coming out again and he
had a new album and it was on vinyl, and
I bought it, and I'll never buy vinyl again. Honestly,
it just sounded horrible. Really, Yeah, I was really disappointed
with it, especially in comparison to like his old albums
from the seventies, which sounds so good.
Speaker 1: I know, I don't know what it is. I know
that some vinyl now is it's not like there's a
cheaper way to do it where it's not like, uh
where it's basically just they how do they do it?
It's not I don't I don't remember exactly, but it's
it's there's a cheaper way to do vinyl now that's uh,
it's not like the original. It's it's you're basically listening
to a CD, but it's on the record, okay, instead
of uh, you know, instead of listening to actual vinyl. Yeah,
but uh no, that's interesting.
Speaker 2: It wouldn't surprised me though, if he were a producer,
because the guy's brilliant. Yeah yeah, and I've met him
a couple of times.
Speaker 1: Super nice. Oh yeah. But he's still tours. Yeah, he's
still plays it. Yeah yeah good.
Speaker 2: I mean as far as touring, I don't know. But
he still does shows for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker 2: But even like Gordon Lightfoot, I mean he died a
couple of years ago and he was almost eighty five
years old. He's still doing like one hundred shows a year.
Oh wow, crazy?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Wow? Do you want to do? We have time
if you want to do one more? You want to
do one more? See? What should I do?
Speaker 7: What should I do?
Speaker 1: If you're just joining us? We've got Brooklyn Mike here
in studio, a long time member of the extended family
around here. But this is, uh, this is Brooklyn Mike's
first time on this show. Yeah, it's fun. I'm very
excited about it. Like I said, I've.
Speaker 2: Started saying before being that I'm not working around regular
job anymore now now it affords me time to do
you know, or be able to come here in the
morning or yeah, you know, because I was working weekends,
I was working nights and just wasn't conducive to doing
too many other things.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, what should we do here? Would it be
crazy to do another Gordon Lightfoot song? Not at all,
not at all eas your favorite after all? Again, it's
very uh, very selfish of me here. No, that's that's
quite all right. Plus you do you do songs that
a lot of us haven't heard before, so well, see
that's see, that's my thing.
Speaker 2: It's like, hopefully you know, whatever the songs are, you know,
people are enjoying them, and hopefully it makes it more
interesting rather than hearing a song that you've heard three hundred.
Speaker 1: Exact, you know, a thousand times exactly.
Speaker 2: Like I told Peter, like I do a couple of
Eagles songs, but you know, nothing against take it easy.
But I'm not doing it anymore now.
Speaker 1: I know how to do it.
Speaker 2: If somebody requests it, I could do it, yeah, but
it's not My choice is not to do take it easy?
Speaker 1: Yeah, do we really need to hear it? Again? I
don't blame you. You know what I mean, I don't blame you.
Speaker 2: So let's see. So this is actually this is kind
of a moody song. This is also an old one,
just goes back I don't know, sixty six, maybe nineteen
sixty six, sixty seven, can remember, I mean, Gordon was
you he was performing way back in the early fifties,
I think it was. So this song is about the
four seasons, which you know, was kind of apropos right now,
we're kind of changing seasons here. He starts starts with this.
It's four verses and starts with the spring, summer, autumn,
you know, ends with the winter, but then by the
end of the last verse, it's returning to spring again.
And he kind of describes it as you could if
you really listen to it, it could be related to
a relationship between two people. So there's that analogy, so
to speak. And this was actually the first day that
I started that I studied guitar. I was determined to
play a full song the first day, so I went
I had my lessons, and I went home and I learned.
I played this song the first day. So this is
the first song that I learned how to play. On
the guitar, and it's entitled pussy Willows Cattails.
Speaker 1: Okay, so all right, good luck with this one, Brooklyn
Mike live in studio.
Speaker 7: Okay, m.
Speaker 4: Pussy willows, cattails, soft winds and roses, rain pools in
the woodlands, water to my knees, shivery, quivering the warm
breath of spring. Pussy willows, cattails, soft winds and roses,
cat birds and corn fields. Day dreams together, riding on
the roadside. The dust gets in your rise, raveling, disheveling.
The summer nights can bring pussy willows, cattails, soft winds
and roses, slendered rays and colored days, dark blue horizons,
naked limbs and wheat bios, Hazy afternoons, voicing, rejoicing. The
wine cups still bring pussy willows, cattails, soft winds and horses.
Harsh nights and candlelights, wood fires of blazing, soft lips
and fingertips, breasting in muscle treasurey, remembering the promise soft spring,
we see willows, cat tails, soft winds and roses.
Speaker 1: Oh beautiful, beautiful.
Speaker 2: I'm wondering if I could uh substitute my my music
for sedation at the Doctor's Eye.
Speaker 1: You sound great. You sound great, Brooklyn Mike, thank you
so much, my friend. This has been wonderful. It's really
been my pleasure to be here. Thank you, Matt. Absolutely,
and you're gonna be on Retrospectrum Radio right next Friday. Yeah,
it's coming from us this coming Friday. I should say
very good, very good, by the way, before we run
out of time too. I just want to remind everybody
for those listening live on Saturday tonight, the pop punk
pop up at Terminus Underground of course, presented by New
Hampshire Underground. Jenny and I will be there the event
doors at seven pm, All ages fifteen dollars entry, twenty
dollars VIP lounge. Come see some great bands, Island of
Alaska on what You're On gr Im and of course
some great artwork. Jenny will have a table setup. Also,
Dennis Layton will be there with his art with Love
from Faith, Elements and Fantasy, Brenda Drew Designs, Cosmos Creations,
Andre Dumont, Prospero's Painting's Mystics and Chelsea Purington Photography. That
is tonight, doors at seven at one thirty four Hayines
Street and Nashua, New Hampshire. You can go to New
Hampshire Underground dot org for more information. So we look
forward to seeing you there and I believe this is
part of the Winter Stroll in Nashua, so great events,
so come see us. By the way, if you're wondering
what happened to Jenny, she went home because we had
a very important package delivered, so she took an Uber
home microphone, a new microphone for my podcast studio at home,
and it's an expensive item, so she went home to
make sure that the ports pirates didn't get to it.
But Brooklyn, Mike, thank you again, my friend. This has
been absolutely wonderful to have you here and we'll do
it again in the Future're coming back in January, right
to this show.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I believe we're booked for January twenty fourth, outstanding.
Speaker 1: I'll look forward to it. Thank you very much. Absolutely
anything people should know about where to find you online
if they want to book you, or now that you're
taking bookings or gearing up to do.
Speaker 6: That, you know.
Speaker 2: I've got a couple of videos on YouTube, okay, but
they're under my name, which is Michael Plotino plot I
n O okay, first time I've given it out. Oh yes,
but there's just I've just got a couple of videos
on there. I'm just starting to try to have some
kind of online presence. It's very very new to me. Yeah,
you know, I'm still used to recording on a four
track cassette, which I love doing, right, you know, So
certainly if anybody listening really wants to get in touch
with me through any of the radio shows, all you
guys know me and have my contact so that would.
Speaker 1: Be awesome, absolutely absolutely all right, Brooklyn, Mike, thank you
so much, And of course if you missed any part
of today should will be up in just a little
bit at wmnhradio dot org and at my website Mattconnorton
dot com. And that's gonna do it for us for now.
We'll talk at y'all a little bit later.
Speaker 9: Bye, everybody, you're listening to w M and
Speaker 4: H before Luis