Backstage Pass Radio

S4: E10 - Eliot Lewis (Hall & Oates / Average White Band) - Just A Bump In The Road

March 29, 2023 Backstage Pass Radio
Backstage Pass Radio
S4: E10 - Eliot Lewis (Hall & Oates / Average White Band) - Just A Bump In The Road
Show Notes Transcript

Date: March 29, 2023
Name of podcast: Backstage Pass Radio
Episode title and number:  S4: E10 - Eliot Lewis (Hall & Oates / Average White Band) - Just A Bump In The Road


Artist Bio -
A singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, Eliot Lewis has toured the world over as a member of the Daryl Hall & John Oates band, as well as a former member of The Average White Band. Eliot has also been the only musician to appear on every episode of Daryl Hall’s popular, "Live From Daryl's House” show all while keeping his own solo career going at a seemingly impossible pace. 

Over the course of his career, he has worked with the music business elite including, Billy Gibbons (ZZ Top), Joe Walsh, Sammy Hagar, Todd Rundgren, Train, Cheap Trick, Grace Potter,  Squeeze, Rob Thomas,  Jason Mraz, Darius Rucker, Gavin DeGraw, and many, many others. 

Having mastered four instruments over the course of his career; guitar, keyboard, bass, and drums, Eliot’s shows will find him moving from one instrument to another.                                                                                                                                             

Equally, at home in front of 100 or 15,000, Eliot has performed on the world's most legendary stages, including Madison Square Garden, Japan’s Budokan, Red Rocks, The Hollywood Bowl, Carnegie Hall as well as Late Night with Jimmy Fallon, Conan O’Brien, The Today Show, Jimmy Kimmel Live and many others. 

Eliot has carved out his own distinctive musical brand and sonic landscape and has written, performed and produced ten solo releases.

There are many who shaped Eliot’s music and writing. As a guitar player, definitely Jeff Beck who I've been listening to all my life, as well as Billy Gibbons who I had the great fortune of working with recently, and Peter Frampton who I actually jammed with when I was 14 yrs old. I had the amazing experience of meeting and seeing many influential artists when I was a kid mainly at Madison Square Garden in New York City. 


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Artist Media Handles:
Website - www.eliotlewis.com
Instagram  - https://www.instagram.com/eliotlewis/
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/EliotLewisOfficial


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Your Host,
Randy Hulsey 

 

Eliot Lewis 

Wed, Mar 22, 2023 7:23PM • 1:43:10

SUMMARY KEYWORDS

play, musician, music, band, artists, song, great, thought, keyboards, instruments, guitar, world, day, daryl, record, average white band, pretty, talk, songwriter, backstage pass, Eliot Lewis, Eliot Lewis Music, Hall & Oates, Daryl Hall, Live From Daryl’s House, Average White Band, Connecticut

SPEAKERS

Randy Hulsey, Eliot Lewis, Adam Gordon

 

Randy Hulsey  00:01

My guest today hails from Norwalk, Connecticut, and has traveled the world playing with some of the best musicians out there. It's Randy Halsey with backstage pass radio and I'm glad you guys are here and doing well. Today's guest is a multi instrumentalist, and a singer songwriter who has toured the globe with hollow notes and the average white man. He is a staple on the hit series live from barrels house with Hall of Fame artists Daryl Hall of hollow notes, and he's also released solo material last year. And that effort is titled anything is possible. Stick around, and we'll catch up with the mega talented Eliot Lewis when we return.

 

Adam Gordon  00:36

This is backstage pass radio, the podcast that's designed for the music junkie with a thirst for musical knowledge. Hi, this is Adam Gordon. And I want to thank you all for joining us today. Make sure you like subscribe and turn the alerts on for this and all upcoming podcasts. And now here's your host of backstage pass radio. Randy Halsey.

 

Randy Hulsey  01:06

Elliott, what's shakin, my man? How are you?

 

Eliot Lewis  01:08

I'm doing great, Randy. Great to be talking to you, man. Yeah,

 

Randy Hulsey  01:11

likewise, good to virtually see you. Where are you calling in from today?

 

Eliot Lewis  01:16

My home state of Connecticut.

 

Randy Hulsey  01:18

So you still are in Connecticut? Born and raised in Connecticut? Exactly.

 

Eliot Lewis  01:22

You know, it's funny. I've lived out of state once or twice, but only for brief periods of time. You know, I have a little bit of family left here in Connecticut. So it's still home. And with all the traveling I've done, I thought I'd probably live someplace else. If I hadn't done as much traveling as I've done. I would probably live in another state. You'd already mean you

 

Randy Hulsey  01:43

burn out a little bit.

 

Eliot Lewis  01:47

Yeah, Connecticut's really not a bad place to come home to Yeah. So yeah,

 

Randy Hulsey  01:52

it's interesting that you say that, because a lot of the artists that I've spoken to a lot of the American artist, and what and when I say, so I interview a lot of local people and regional people. And then I have you know, guys like yourself that are national and some Hall of Famers. And from that level of musician, you know, the ones that have gone out and toured the world, I found that a lot of I shouldn't say a lot, but there are quite a few American artists that have moved to Europe. And they now reside in Europe and have lived there forever. And then there's European artists that have migrated to the states to live. It's kind of funny how that works out. There's like this, this crossing over the over the pond, so to speak, right? And whoever's here goes there, and whoever's there comes here. It's kind of weird how that works out.

 

Eliot Lewis  02:37

Well, there's an old saying that sometimes people think the grass is greener. Absolutely. And

 

Randy Hulsey  02:41

then the other part of that saying is, have you ever seen the other side of grass? Right? It's not very great at all.

 

Eliot Lewis  02:48

Sometimes it is not. No, it's not at all. You know, it's great to experience different places, of course, but you know, we, we all have our homes and our bases. So

 

Randy Hulsey  02:58

absolutely. And I mentioned to you before we hit the record button that I was out in LA last week doing an interview, you know, it was just two and a half days out there. But you're always eager to get back home for some reason, you know, the comfort of your own home, you know, your own studio, your things. They're all here. So,

 

Eliot Lewis  03:13

yeah. And then by the way, that looks like a nice studio. You've got a nice couple selection of guitars here. Thank

 

Randy Hulsey  03:18

you. Yeah, I have a I have a few now I just need to learn how to play all of them. Right? Actually, I'm I'm a local artist here in Cypress, Texas with just you know, that's a little northwest of Houston to be exact. And at one time, I was playing upwards of about 130 shows a year before COVID. And then I thought that I cut that in half because this podcast, I had no idea when I started it what kind of time suck it was gonna be. But it takes a lot of time. If you're going to do it, right, like, you know, you could kind of, I guess half assed the show, if you will, or you know, and it would just be okay, but I'm an all in or all out kind of guy. Like I want to make it the best that I can make it if I'm going to do it, or just not do it at all. It's kind of the mindset.

 

Eliot Lewis  04:02

Right? Well, good for you, because that's a good way to approach it.

 

Randy Hulsey  04:05

Yep. So I believe that I have spoke to a mutual friend and an old neighbor of yours on season three, and it's Stephanie Ryan. So I it was interesting to find out that you and Stephanie knew one another.

 

Eliot Lewis  04:21

Yeah, yeah. When I moved to let's see, I was up in not far from Norwalk, which is where I'm from, and move back to Norwalk, South Norwalk in think a met her like literally the first day I moved into this new apartment, her and her boyfriend, they couldn't maybe her boyfriend that would drive going up on the elevator to my moving in, literally. And I think it was him that looked at me and said, he's looking me up and down going DEROS house and I said yeah, yeah, and honestly, it's not often I get recognized for stuff like that. It's only You know, for people who've watched the show, and, you know, sort of insiders, so, so that was a really nice way to enter that, that that time and get to know Stephanie and she's great. But you know, like I was saying she's, she's working really hard. She's really got a good head on her shoulders got a lot of talents, great songwriter. And we've done a couple things together. And it's just really nice to see her her career moving forward. That's really

 

Randy Hulsey  05:24

cool. And I said, it's always, you know, it's always a small world somehow, but it was interesting. Her story was, you know, ex firefighter and runway model turn musician. It's like, What haven't you done? Right, that those don't kind of go hand in hand. But yeah, it works. Right. So

 

Eliot Lewis  05:43

it does. Yeah. And I think I think you what you've probably discovered to us, I think music was her first love. So you know, it's something that she needed to really, really follow on. Absolutely. I agree. So sometimes we get sidetracked with things. But we you know, sometimes hopefully, we get back to what really fills our soul. Yeah,

 

Randy Hulsey  06:00

it's called Finding Your Way, right? And the older we get, we figure out, okay, that's not really what I want to do my heart somewhere else. So let's go take a run at that and see what happens, you know, exactly, exactly. Well, she was a wonderful guest. And I like I said, I still keep in touch with her. And we're trying to line some stuff up in Houston. So, you know, anything for the fellow artists? You know, that's kind of what we do. We have to stick together. So yeah, I think it's important that we support each other. Absolutely. And that's kind of the that was kind of the whole premise behind the show is, first of all, you know, I'm a music junkie. And I love the stories behind the songs. I love the songwriters, I love to understand what the songs were about and where they recorded and all these weird things that most people don't care about. But the other part of it being a professional musician, playing out shows like how do I how do I support my peers? Right? How do I maybe allow them to have five more listeners that they didn't have yesterday to their music? Right. And so those were kind of the two things that piqued my interest about the whole podcast? How can I give back to the fellow artist? Right, so here we are? Well, that's

 

Eliot Lewis  07:06

great. I mean, it's all really reciprocal. Sure. No, it really is. I think you get back what you put out. So I agree with

 

Randy Hulsey  07:13

that. I agree with that. So it's my understanding that growing up, you came from a very musical family, correct? Yeah, I did. Yeah. Me a little bit about the family upbringing. And like, you know, what mom and dad or siblings were doing from a musical perspective.

 

Eliot Lewis  07:30

My, my mother was a classical pianist. So and a teacher. So I grew up, you know, hearing her play and practice classical pieces for three hours a day. And working, you know, a classical piece can take years to perfect. So I kind of got that instilled in me from a really young age. And I'm the youngest of three brothers. So two older brothers were all five years apart. So my oldest brother's 10 years older than me. And he discovered music at a really early age, he discovered guitar and became a great guitar player. So growing up, I was exposed to this classical music, which is very, you know, as you know, it's very sophisticated music. And then my brother was, was, you know, he was of the era of the Beatles, and the early Rolling Stones, and the who all of the British stuff that was really exciting in the 60s. So as a really young kid, I sort of missed the Beatles wave was just a little bit too young for that. But I got the tail end of it in, you know, into the 70s. So it was just an amazing melting pot of great music, everything from rock and blues to classical to funk, and soul. It was all sort of there. And it was very, very healthy musical environment to grow up in. And so really, what happened was that the sort of middle brother who I'm very close to, he doesn't play an instrument. But I think what happened is my parents gave him a drum kit at some point. And like, when you're a kid, you want to try out a whole bunch of different things, right? Our attention goes from one thing to another, literally, you know, I think he played the drum kit for a couple of days and gave up on it and just went to something else. And then I got on the drum kit and was like, oh, wait a minute. This is for me. And it was literally Randy, like it was a lightbulb moment at 10 years old, that went off and was like, This is what I want to do for the rest of my life. So that's really what started me on the journey.

 

Randy Hulsey  09:32

That's pretty cool that you're in, you know, what the kind of the common theme for a lot of the shows that I do is that the artists they know at a very early age, that music was going to be their thing, like I would say, let's just say 60 interviews. There. There might have been I don't think any of them said well, I didn't start until my teens or my 20s it was always like at the age of five or at the ages six or seven, you know, it was very, very young age, we knew that and I and I knew it as well, even though I don't make a living per se at music. But I knew at a very early age that, you know, I started out as a classical pianist and then morphed into what you see behind me here. And that's kind of that was kind of my upbringing. But that started at a very, very early age, much like yours. Right. And, and I think it's because the parents kind of maybe instilled that in us a little bit. They didn't push it in my house, but it was, there was music going on. And people, you knew that my mom was a piano, like your mother was a piano player. And it was inevitable that we were going to do something with music, correct?

 

Eliot Lewis  10:44

Well, yeah, even, you know, like you said, at a really early age, I think we respond to music. I think music is so instinctual to so many people, it's whether, you know, we kind of lit really let it into our, our spirits and our souls, you know, so I think I knew that music excited me, you know, probably from five years old. But at 10, it was really when I discovered the drums was like, Oh, well, that's what I want to do. It's the drums. And then it became real, like a really, you know, of an actual thing. Yeah, that I wanted to do. You know, it's just, it's been a, it's been a hell of a journey. That's all I can say, you can get in all the other stuff.

 

Randy Hulsey  11:25

Well, you've, you've certainly made a go at it, for sure. And kudos to you. Because a lot of people can't say that the business is so saturated with people trying to make it I go out to Nashville periodically. And it's just so it's crazy, the amount of tech, I mean, first of all, the amount of talent out there is phenomenal. But everybody out there is trying to make it in that business. And it's just so I can't say that I'd really want to make a go at it.

 

Eliot Lewis  11:52

Starting now compared to then we you know, I have to keep it all in perspective, there are things available to us. And musicians that are starting out artists that are starting out that weren't certainly weren't available to us when we were growing up. And there's a lot of advantages to what's happening now. But of course, growing up, you know, I was a teen and was a young kid in the 70s grew up, you know, born in the 60s, but you know, really hit my stride in the 70s where music was, it was so special, because there were very there were far less artists back then. And you really invested in an artist, if you liked an artist, you went out and bought the records, you you know, I would walk two miles to the, to the general store to get a magazine to to find anything on this artists that I could possibly find. Obviously, there was no internet and no YouTube. And so you really invested yourself and that's a little bit different. Now that's, that's one of the biggest differences I see is that, you know, we're so used to with technology, instant gratification and the attention spans are shorter, you know, it's a different thing. So I do feel for artists that are just starting out now it's a it's a real challenge, you really have to figure out a lot of stuff.

 

Randy Hulsey  13:08

Yeah, and I think that we're probably I'm gonna guess pretty close to the same age. But I think you would probably agree with me here. There was a time when listening to musicians from the mid 70s to the late 70s bands like Firefall and 10, CC and all of these bands, right? I mean, it was like 1520 years before I even knew what these guys look like, right? Because because we didn't have, like you said the instant gratification of seeing their pictures and having their bios all plastered all over the internet. It was kind of a mystery thing. And you remember probably as well as I do back when we went to concerts back in the day, cameras and video recorders were forbidden in these places, right? You didn't there was no such thing as a cell phone, video and Van Halen play in right.

 

Eliot Lewis  13:56

So yeah, that's why there's so little footage of these iconic bands from that era is because nobody had cell phones, you know, if you were lucky enough to get a camera in sneak a camera, and it was not great quality. So exactly. You know, I mean, you know, I guess that's an advantage to where we are now in our lives, you know, is the technology can can be used in a really constructive way and capture a lot of things. But yeah, I mean, like

 

Randy Hulsey  14:21

anything, there's good and bad and everything, right? We talked about the whole zoom thing and the WebEx thing and you and I being able to talk 2000 miles away like we're sitting in front of each other, that's a pro right but then you become you become reliant on those types of things and you lose that personal touch of actually sitting down in front of another human and having a conversation and you know, the kids that are coming up now, not all of them of course, but conversations are like what's that? You know, I text my friends like I don't talk to my friends, you know, so yeah, I know. It's a totally different time. Like how can you communicate? How can you have a job in the real world if you can't even Have a conversation like you and I are having right now. It's pretty scary thought but

 

Eliot Lewis  15:03

it is very different. It's, we have to accept that is it's a digital world. Now there's no really no turning back, you know,

 

Randy Hulsey  15:11

and it's in for us. It's just adapt, migrate or die. Those are your three options, right? You better get on board or you're not, you know, you're going to kind of get left at the train station. That's what it boils down to.

 

Eliot Lewis  15:21

Right. I agree with that. And I think a lot of artists had had a problem in really embracing it, struggled with it. And it was a challenge for me. If for whatever reason, I had adopted technology very early, you know, when I went from drums, to bass to guitar to keys, I mean, I played a little bit of keys when my mom gave me a couple of lessons when I was a little kid. But I really embraced the technology from a pretty early standpoint, you know, in the 80s. So, you know, adapting this technology continually has been pretty comfortable for me, but it's not for everybody, you know, I was kind of resistant to like using a computer to make music, you know, I was using back in the 80s. It was, you know, a lot of hardware stuff, samplers and sequencers. And when people were really getting into the computer, I was like, No, I don't want to look at a screen that doesn't, that doesn't feel comfortable to me. You know, I want to, I want to use my imagination and be in my own head when I'm doing that. And but you know, it has its has its pros and disadvantages. And

 

Randy Hulsey  16:29

I had a long conversation with Knibbs Carter, the bass player for the rock band Saxon, on my show, and you know, those guys are spread out all over the world, he has a place in LA or in Orange County Area in California and guys in Europe, and it's just sending files, WAV files back and forth to one another. That's how they produce the records. And, and it makes sense, because you don't have all of the expense of travel. And you know, that could get quite expensive traveling from the UK and Europe over to here or back and forth, right? It's not like you're playing in your local garage band. Everybody can just come over to your house. You know, everybody's worlds apart now. So yeah, well, it's interesting. You said the drums were kind of the first instrument. I'm kind of curious, what was there not a drawl to the piano? Because I think you said your mom was a classical pianist. Like, were you never drawn to the piano? Like you were to the drums? The deer kind of remount probably jogging your memory a little bit here. But

 

Eliot Lewis  17:29

yeah, so what happened for me is I think at that tender age of 10. All I wanted to do is hit stuff. When you're a young kid, I just didn't have the, the patience, or whatever you want to call it to want to sit down at a piano, the discipline, you know, although, you know, was hearing this sophisticated music and it was really little did I know, then it was really having a profound effect on my ear as a musician, because you know, it's harmonically so sophisticated. So, but at 10, I just wanted to hit stuff and have fun and play music. And coincidentally, the timing of that couldn't have been better. So I picked up the drums at 10 years old, and I'm still in elementary school at this point. So my brother, the middle brother says, l you you've got to, you've got to meet this kid. His name is Kevin, and he's riding the school bus every day. And he he's got a bass and either an electric bass or an acoustic bass. He's bringing on the bus. And he's got a he's got like a tape recorder. And he's singing along to the Beatles. And I think his father's in the music business. So sure enough, like that week, I saw him on the bus and introduce myself and I'm 10 years old, and he's like, 11. And so we immediately bonded. And you know, it was within minutes that I think I was over his house was which was just a mile down the street from where I lived. And discovered. Yeah, his dad was in the music business. He had 1000s of records. He was working with the band mountain. And then West Bruce and Lange. He had a discovered in work with Santana. Just unbelievable. That

 

Randy Hulsey  19:12

was the old Leslie West.

 

Eliot Lewis  19:14

Leslie West. Exactly. So like, oh my god, you know, I just I found the drums at 10 discovered I want to do this for the rest of my life. Now I'm finding this this sort of partner in crime at this age who was on the same journey as a bass player. Okay, so of course, we ended up jamming literally every day in his house after school for three or four hours. And we did that for years and we developed a real chemistry back then, just two things were so unplanned, we would just follow each other plain, you know, and it really, really groomed how we grew as musicians. And was just an amazing an amazing upbringing because, you know, due to his father being in the music business, he ended up working with Peter Frampton. So why I would, you know, because he was working with him at a&m records, you know, Peter Frampton would come over to his house and we would jam, we would go see him at Madison Square Garden. You know, the first time I ever went to Madison Square Garden was to see Alice Cooper when I was 11. And, you know, that was my dream of dreams. And so it just everything just unfolded in this unbelievably sort of organic, but really special way that just put me right into the heart of the business at a really young age, exposed to all these really high level artists. You know, one week it was seen the who, the next week, it was meeting Elton John, and just on and on. So very inspirational in that. I think that's what really drove me to, to want to have a lifelong career in this.

 

Randy Hulsey  20:43

Yeah. And you certainly have, but I want to I wanted to ask you real quick, you know, after the drums, I think it was was it the guitar that you jumped over to the guitar after the drums.

 

Eliot Lewis  20:53

So I think I played drums up until from 10 to about 16. And then I really thought, I'm not sure this is, this is all there is I want to write songs. And I became very attracted to the songwriters in the band. So I would turn the records over look at who was writing the stuff. And it was, you know, was typically guitar player and singer and keyboard player. So I wanted to play something melodic and be able to write and contribute in that that area. So I transitioned over to guitar and there were a lot of guitar players that were influencing me, my oldest brother, he basically modeled himself after Jeff Beck, you know, who sadly passed away, obviously, recently. And so there was a lot of Jeff Beck, but there was just a lot of great great guitar players that I was attracted to. And the one actually who really put it over the edge for me, believe it or not, is Rick Nielsen from cheap trick? Oh, yeah. So I got into Cheap Trick. When I was the I was about 14, or 15, or whatever it was. And I would turn the records over and I would I would seek Well, Rick Nielsen wrote almost everything on these records. And I really thought it was like, wow, if that goofy looking guy can do it, maybe I got a shot. Of course, he's a genius. He wrote some great songs. So that's really what put me into that. Going down that road of wanting to be a songwriter, you know, and then that it just went from there. And then I had a, an offer to be a bass player in a band with some really high level musicians, a couple of musicians out of the Chicago area that put a band together with two of the X Alice Cooper band members. So they they needed a bass player. So I was like, Oh, well, I'll play bass, played an eight string bass for a few years and did some touring on the east coast here. And then by the time the early 80s, happened in the the technology really exploded in the keyboard world with synthesizers and sequencers. And I thought, well, let me experiment with this. Because doing that I could really be a complete songwriter, I could really understand. And that was really the motivation, I could really understand being a drummer, being a guitar player, bass player and keyboard player. And with that technology that was starting to surface, I was like, I could probably put all this stuff together myself. Now, a lot of my early influences, were people who did just that. They were Todd Rundgren, their Stevie Wonder. My brother was say to me when I was 10, you know, we would say, you know, these, these guys recorded all that stuff themselves. They played the drums, they played all these instruments. And that was fascinate. I didn't know how that worked. But it was fascinating to me. So when the time came that the technology exploded. I just naturally gravitated that way. I thought I could could be a complete songwriter. And then, you know, I developed my craft over a few years and eventually got a publishing deal. And that led into a million other things. Yeah. And we'll talk

 

Randy Hulsey  23:46

a little bit more about the songwriting in a minute. It's interesting that you said that about Rick Nielsen and the wonderful guys from cheap trick. I went to play a microbrewery up in Magnolia Texas this weekend, and I realized that I didn't have my my iPhone plug in the in the truck. And I'm like, geez, is there any other music in here? I really don't even listen to CDs anymore. But I happen to hit play on the CD player. And it was cheap tricks, greatest hits that had been left in there for probably a year and a half ago. Right. Who knows how long they'd been in there. But yeah, I mean, what a bunch of wonderful songs those guys wrote. Surrender, if you want my love, you know, I'll cover a magical mystery tour. I mean, just your eight signs. I love

 

Eliot Lewis  24:33

you. Well, they they hit me just right back in in I think I discovered them. Probably a girlfriend at that point in my life district turned me on to them and they just hit me just right. They were like powerpop and they had a lot of Beatles influence. So they had this edge, but they had all this melodic stuff going on in their songs that were super musical.

 

Randy Hulsey  24:53

I was going to pick on you just a second ago when you said I play an eight string bass. I was going to crack on you and say what is four strings not enough for you. But now we get on this cheap trick subject and didn't Peterson play a 12 string bass

 

Eliot Lewis  25:06

he Okay, so here there's what happened Randy's when I got that offer to be a bass player. I was at the height of my, you know, love for cheap tricks. So I thought, well, I'll I'll do I'll get out my cheap trick influence in this and I went out and bought a hammer eight string bass that basically resembled Tom Peters is 12 string bass is a huge purchase when you're about 18 years old of like, $800 or $1,000. Yeah, I was like, wow, what am I doing? You know, and then of course, you know, we'll get into it. But I mean, all these many of these childhood heroes for me I've now worked with. So it's been, it's been pretty amazing that

 

Randy Hulsey  25:43

that is awesome. And I know that those guys were on the live from barrels house. So with you guys, going back to the instruments real quick, you learned all of these different instruments. And it's interesting that you've stayed really close to them. Over the years, I found that kind of interesting, because I like you, and I'm am I multi instrumentalist, but I have been so removed from the piano. I mean, you can see it sitting behind me here, but man, I need to really knock the cobwebs off and get back on it. And I threatened to do that and introduce it into some of my shows that I'm playing. But I just, I, it's a time thing. It's like, okay, I don't have time to sit and really brush those cobwebs off. But, but for you, you're really proficient and all of the instruments still that you play, we'll talk about the looping in a little bit. But, you know, videos of you playing, you know, all different kinds of instruments, how do you keep that fire burning for the love of remaining proficient and all of those instruments?

 

Eliot Lewis  26:42

Well, honestly, I love them all, they all represent a lot of creative satisfaction. So when I hit the 80s, I went into full full force into the keyboard world. But I never saw myself being a performing keyboard player, I thought it was going to be something that I did a lot of my writing on and use, like I said, that use the technology. And I was sort of going into a path of being a songwriter, engineer, producer, you know, because I was getting publishing deals. And that really, so at this point, in the 80s, I really kind of gave up on being a live musician. You know, we all wanted that when we were kids. And it didn't happen for in my circumstances. So I thought I'm going to be a keyboard playing producer, writer. So ever since then, ever since I got really serious about being a songwriter, all of those instruments have played a role a constant role. So I've been and then of course, you know, I never thought I would end up as Daryl Daryl Hall and John Oates as keyboard player, you know, and we can get into that. But when I joined that band, that was the position that was open, that was free. So I decided, well, okay, I got to step up my chops here and go for it. But I embrace all of them. I have fun on all of them. You know, I think I probably still have the most fun on guitar and drums to me, those are those those are like home home base for me. Well, it's

 

Randy Hulsey  28:12

interesting. And we'll talk a little bit more about the live from barrels house in a minute, but I did want to point out to the listeners that the keyboard is your primary instrument in Hall and Oates. And yeah, I was gonna ask you why that and not something else. But you kind of you were reading my mind there was a telepathy thing going on here that you must you must have seen it on my face or something. But I was going to ask you why not the drums? Why not this or that? You know, why not being Shane or T bone or, you know, you know what I'm saying? Like, yes, keyboards, but you know, if you want to elaborate on that a little bit like how Darrell found you, and then how the keys, you know how that became your role there.

 

Eliot Lewis  28:51

So so out of the ADC, I was playing a fair amount of keyboards in my songwriting world. I was playing a bunch of instruments, but a lot of keyboards because of the technology. And then I ended up doing a lot of songwriting with the average white band. So the original member Alan Gauri, of the average white band, live pretty local to me and Connecticut, and my brother, my middle brother, Jeff, was in the booking agency world. So he was actually booking average white band. And he put together me and Alan in probably around 1987. And average white band had been broken up for a few years. So Alan was just, he was in the, on the same track as I was a little further ahead than me, of course. So we just got together a songwriting partners, and we really, really clicked. So we wrote together for you know, three or four days a week for about a year or two. We wrote a lot of songs together and then he decided they were going to put the band back together. They brought me out to Seattle and this is like late 80s. Now about 88 Okay, and to co produce this sort of comeback record because I had co written some songs for it, I was sort of just in the right time in the right place, I never ever expected or was looking to join this band, I was just looking to write and expand on that. And before you know it, we were doing shows, and all of a sudden, I was in the band by default. And I was, and I never dreamt that this would happen. But I became like a half of the lead singer. And in because I played keys, I was playing a little bit of keyboards, I was playing bass and half of the songs. So it was a really great opportunity for me and going out on tour and doing these huge festivals with with these amazing the Earth, Wind and Fire and James Brown and Isley Brothers in the whole world of soul and funk, you know. And so Darrell and Alan had been friends since the 70s, because the average white band in Holland notes were both signed to Atlantic Records. So they go way back, and they had a history together. So Darryl would show up at average, YPN chose, you know, when we might be over London or something, and he would come and sit in, but he would see me, eventually him and his manager approached me that, you know, hey, we would really love you in our band. They made it clear that they, they were interested in having me be a part of Hall and Oates. And so, but I still had a home in average white band, it wasn't quite ready to leave yet. But as you know, you know, you get involved in something. And before you know it like a decades past, so I was getting ready to want to try something else. So within a couple of years, two years, I was ready to leave the average white band. And I did. And then, you know, spent about a year or two, really just redefining who I was, and creating more of my own music, and then got a call from T bone. In fact, that was on January 1, I guess it was around 2003 or four. And he calls me up. And because we had done some shows together average piping and Hall and Oates. And he said, Hey, l, it's bone. He said, I'm here with Darrell in the studio. And he said, Well, you know, Darrell Scott, a solo tour coming up. And he says, we're, we're trying to think of somebody who can play some bass and maybe some keys and sing and maybe some percussion, and we're like, Oh, we got to call L. Yeah. So. So he's like, are you interested? And I was like, Yeah, I'm ready to go back out on tour, because I was in average white band for 13 years straight. So it was a big chunk of my life, and had a blast. It was great. So I said, Yeah, I'm ready. I would love to do that. And so it was a short tour. It was a Darrell solo tour. But at the end of the tour, you know, Darrell said, Hey, I would like you to be in the band for real. And I was like, okay, yeah, I'm ready. And you know, the keyboard position was open, because they had a guitar player at the time. Of course, Darrell and John both played guitar. So they didn't need another guitar player. They needed a keyboard player. I was like, okay, but it was, you know, it was a it was a challenge. I have to be honest, you know, I had played keys, but I had never played keys on that level. Yeah. And I had some big shoes to fill like Bob mayo, who was Peter Frampton, his keyboard player was an incredibly brilliant keyboard player and a lot of lot of major talent. So and you know, all the notes catalog is pretty extensive, and it's very keyboard driven. I had to make a choice. And T bone was really, at the heart of it all. He really encouraged me. He said, Well, you can do it. I know you can do it. And we totally believe in you. So it was a really interesting time. Again, I never thought it would be I get most of my exposure in my career as a keyboard player, but that's how it ended

 

Randy Hulsey  33:29

up. And we'll talk a little bit more about bone and just a minute. But, you know, as a musician, you've mastered like four instruments and the ones that you spoke of, you know, like the drum, the keyboards, the bass, basically the for musical food groups. Right? Right. Is there is there one that you would say you're more proficient at than the rest? Good

 

Eliot Lewis  33:50

question. They're pretty well balanced. So I'm not really a performing drummer anymore. But drumming certainly is probably the most instinctual thing for me still, even though I don't perform on it. I perform all the drum parts and you know, on my recordings, and I do sit in and I play when we're out on the road, I'll jump up on the kid at soundcheck. Sure. And that's still the most insane, instinctual instrument for me, but I think the guitar is probably the best suited to kind of release what I have in my head most of the time, you know, in the most connected to me, Well, I was

 

Randy Hulsey  34:31

gonna I was gonna say that it's a good thing that you are a multifaceted guy when t bone can call in, right? Because I mean, hell had you not, you know, learn the keyboards or not been proficient. That gig may have never happened for you. Right?

 

Eliot Lewis  34:43

This is exactly true. And in a lot of times, when I'm talking to people that are coming up in the music business, I always tried to give them a little bit of that insight that if you can keep yourself as well rounded as possible, it will create a lot of other opportunities for you. Do I didn't go into it with that thought? Or would that just a plan? Yeah, I wanted to be a complete sort of self contained songwriter, but then being proficient on a few instruments definitely gave me opportunities that, you know, I decided early on well, you know, you know, when I was a kid and Van Halen came out, I was like, Well, I'm never going to be that good on guitar, there's just no way. So you have to decide do you want to be like the most proficient at one instrument? Or do you want to be just good at a bunch of instruments? And it worked for me?

 

Randy Hulsey  35:31

Well, you know, there's an old saying, and they've always said, diversify your portfolio. Right? Yeah. So there's, I mean, that's, that's true for your finances. That's true for music. That's true for a lot of things. It's relevant for a lot of a lot of different things. But of course, they're all very different instruments. But if you had to give three of the four up and just keep one, which, which would it be for you?

 

Eliot Lewis  35:58

It would be guitar, that's pretty easy for me to answer. Yeah. Because it's sort of like, it encompasses almost everything that I love. It's melodic, I can I approach it very rhythmically as a drummer. Okay. And, yeah, I mean, yeah, I would say I do a lot of my writing on the guitar. So that was probably the one I would keep.

 

Randy Hulsey  36:18

And you might have touched on it maybe briefly earlier. But with with all of these different instruments, I would have to guess that you have a very, your response might be very eclectic. But if I asked you, who influenced you, as a kid, you know, let's say, the 70s. You know, you said you were born in the 60s to 72, who was kind of doing it for you as a kid. And maybe to expand on that question. Is there anybody now that does it for you, right? From an influence like you'd like you've maybe not an influence now because you know, your your style has been developed over over time. But maybe maybe there's somebody that you really liked these days that you're, you're into, right? So? Yeah, who influenced you as young kid? And then who's kind of cool to listen to for you these days?

 

Eliot Lewis  37:09

Well, okay, that's pretty easy. Because it's still pretty clear in my mind, then the number of influences that were really important to me as a kid, the first one, believe it or not, was Glen Campbell. I wanted to emulate Glen Campbell, I loved everything about what he was doing in the late 60s, then we turn a corner and we go an extreme different direction. The first artists that I really gravitated to and got invested in was David Bowie. Because I discovered him at a really early age. But again, a lot of this was due to my brother exposing me to this stuff, older brothers. Yes, older brother five years older. So you know, this stuff was way ahead of a 10 year old at the time. But Bowie really, um, you know, the first record I heard from him was a record called man who sold the world. And it was like, the lyrics were like science fiction. And there was it was like, a different world was like, wow, what is this, this is completely different than anything I've heard. And then Alice Cooper, it's, I found that I was gravitating to artists that had a real unique, identifiable, Style and Image, I was really interested in the whole thing, not just the music, but this whole way of presenting their art, okay, that I gravitated to. But of course, I was loving all the Stevie Wonder that I was hearing and, of course, a huge influence on me and somebody I've worked with now, more times than I would ever have dreamt of is Todd Rundgren. His record something anything was playing in our house, like every day. And Hello, it's me and saw the light. And of course, now I've worked with him. You know, I don't I've kept I forget how many times I've worked with him now. So he was a huge influence. And he was one of these guys. Like, like, Stevie Wonder that I discovered was playing everything himself. But then, you know, again, it went into the harder rock stuff, the cheap trick. I discovered kiss at a really early really early age. I literally was one of the few people that heard their demo tape, Randy. Wow, this is demo tape, because of my friend's father. They went to his label or his company to to shop their demo. And so I heard their demo tape and I was like, you know, when he would always have him, myself and his son, Kevin, listen to this stuff to see how the kids reaction to this stuff would be. And I thought, Oh, this sounds like heavy Rolling Stones. You know, it's kind of cool. I thought the makeup was a little crazy. But then then, within two years there sign in there on the cover of every major music magazine, you know, wow. And I became a huge fan just because it just, you know, not only because of their music really it was more because As of what you were able to do with an imagination, absolutely, that really, that excited me. Yeah. So it was really, you know, it was all over the place musically. But I mean, you know, it was it was a lot of rock stuff, some soul stuff. It was a lot of the theatrical artists of that era that I really loved and still love. I mean, of course, Led Zeppelin were in there. And then we hit the 80s. And I loved the police. I still think the police were just, you know, Andy Summers, one of my favorite guitar players, Van Halen, and on and on, you know, nowadays? Yeah, like you said, you know, we've listened to, and they've been exposed to so much music in our life. So we have an understanding of it, we hear something, we can analyze it and sort of decipher it very quickly. But there are a lot of artists out there that are great. In the rock vein, you know, I discovered this young band, I'm sure you know, with Greta Van Fleet. Michigan. Yeah. Yeah, Michigan, exactly. I when I heard them really just come on the scene, like everybody else. Obviously, there's a lot of Zeplin influence there. But I had a feeling that they were going to find their own kind of thing. And I think they have. And I just love the fact that you can see 21 year old girls singing and loving this stuff that it comes from that place that we came from loosely. You know, it's real music, it's played. It has some improvisational qualities to it. They find their way through the music organically, that I love.

 

Randy Hulsey  41:29

Yeah. And it's also cool that the three of the four members or brothers too, I'm not sure a lot of people know that. That is really cool. Yeah,

 

Eliot Lewis  41:35

I know. I know. So it's really great to see them. I've just watched them explode. And you know, on the concert in the festival scene, Joe Bonamassa. Great, great, great guitar player. I love him. We have wanted to get him online from Darrell says for a couple of years. There's another guitar player who I love by the name of Andy Timmons. Oh, yeah. Danger, danger, danger. Exactly. Incredible guitar player, there's an LA band that I think is great. They're sort of like, called Dirty honey. Kind of like a cross between Aerosmith and Guns and Roses or something. I don't know. But it's very cool. But, uh, you know, very much of the 70s era.

 

Randy Hulsey  42:13

It's interesting that you even say Andy Timmons, because I had reached out to him. My, my wife and I both are big danger, danger fans. I think I reached out to him, and I don't, I'd have to go back and look, but anyway, if you talk to him, you can say hey, man, I met this cool guy, Randy, you need to get on his show, man. No, but I love the I love the Danger, danger stuff, a great melodic band, you know, rock band, but very melodic. Great musicianship. I've always loved them.

 

Eliot Lewis  42:40

Well, it's funny because I never even knew of Danger, danger. I learned of Andy Timmons literally on his in his solo world, so I never, and then, you know, people told me always this guy's from danger, danger. So

 

Randy Hulsey  42:52

that's interesting. Well, also, you mentioned earlier, Glen Campbell. I mean, what, like one of the greatest guitar pickers of our time, right. And it was interesting. I had watched, I guess it was a documentary or something on him. But you know, his daughter was playing with him in the later stages of dementia. It's and she had said that when he got to like stage four dementia, that he couldn't remember lyrics, they had to have, you know, teleprompters, which, who doesn't need those anymore? All the things we tried to remember, but he couldn't remember the words to songs that he had written and played all of his life. But she said, there's one thing that I can say about my dad, he never missed a note on the guitar, ever. And it's weird that is that is that a subconscious thing is that a muscle meant like, it's weird, you will forget the lyrics. But she said he would, he would play the same thing over and over again, live shows that he's played forever, and he would never miss a note on that guitar.

 

Eliot Lewis  43:51

I think it says really deep, subconscious level, when you've done it for that many years, the others part a different part of your brain that's firing and muscle memory. And just you know, I think it's on a very deep, instinctual level, he was going to come on Darrell show he was in I was just over the moon, because that would have been the most 360 circle in my career, you know, but he was just getting too sick. And his his, his daughter said, you know, we just don't know how it'll go, you know, it's a long 12 hour day, we just don't know how he was probably at Stage Three at that point. So

 

Randy Hulsey  44:29

we'll speak at a playing multiple instruments. It's my understanding, and I think I'm on point here, but again, correct me if I'm wrong, but you play all the instruments on your solo efforts. Is that Is that a fair statement? Or do you also lassoed musicians and to help you with that talk to me and the listeners a little bit about the solo stuff from from just the musicianship part,

 

Eliot Lewis  44:52

we add I've probably 99.5% of all the records I've done as a solo artist I've played on Okay, and again, it just comes out of, you know, spending the time in the years at these instruments and sort of knowing what I want. Now back in the 80s, and 90s, I did a lot of collaboration because I was in the publishing world, and I co wrote with a lot of different people. And I love that process of collaborating, I think it's really special. And it can lead to amazing work if you have the right chemistry with somebody. But again, it goes back further that I wanted to be the sort of self contained artist and songwriter. So when it came time to starting starting to do my own solo records, it just made sense for me to just do them myself, I kind of knew what I wanted, and could kind of visualize the end result. And just do it quickly and seamlessly without getting slowed down with schedules. And, you know, so it really is that I mean, I love collaborating with other people, but I just was able to do this pretty quickly and efficiently.

 

Randy Hulsey  45:54

And you could probably do it in a fourth of the time, because you're not waiting on schedules and travel and things like that, right. And

 

Eliot Lewis  46:02

part of it was necessity, because I you know, I was a part of band of these bands for a while. So I did have a big touring schedule. So I had to figure out things a little differently than if you were just doing if you were just a solo artist, and you had nothing else to to concentrate and focus on. So I had to an even my live presentation really developed out of that necessity to have been on the road with a band and then having to sort of keep my solo career going alongside it. And being able to do a presentation without always relying on other musicians because, you know, I'm not, that's not my sole focus, it wasn't my sole focus. Now it is to, to develop a band to the point where you just feel like you know, you have that chemistry that really happens over many years really was really hard for me to attain, just because of my schedule. Well, is

 

Randy Hulsey  46:58

it safe to say that you produce and master everything on all of your efforts? Or do you ship that off for somebody else to do that

 

Eliot Lewis  47:05

almost everything I've actually done from from start to finish? Interesting. Yep. I've tried to, to learn a lot about all the aspects of music making from the record, obviously, the writing, you know, process to the recording process to the mastering the mixing, and I love it. It's a challenge. I never feel like I'm ever completely satisfied. But, but it's a learning process. And I love to keep learning and listening to other people's work and you know, moving forward,

 

Randy Hulsey  47:34

and just to kind of shift gears a tiny bit, we're talking about the recording of the music, but I think it's cool that you can go out and purchase a 200 to $500 device called a looper right, and basically become a one man band. And there's of course going to be listeners that are not musicians. So I wanted you to share maybe just high level about the loop station or the looper and how that works. And why somebody would want to use such a thing because you've become I've seen some of your videos you're very proficient at doing that. So share with the listeners the whole looping experience as a yes.

 

Eliot Lewis  48:11

So like what you described it pretty well. So it's you can do it many different ways. And it's been around now for a while. I think one of the first artists that I really saw doing it on a high level was KT Tunstall with her song black Corson territory, you know, you should work with her online from Daryl sales, but she was doing this looping thing probably about 20 years ago. And I was like all this really, really cool. So basically, again, you can do it in many different ways. But typically, a lot of people have these pedals, or boxes that are like a guitar player has effects pedal. And it is it's a device that allows you to record a phrase or a passage. And then we'll loop that part and then add a layer to it, add a harmony to it, and create a you know, a multi instrumental song or track, doing it yourself live in the moment. Now I was using some backing tracks for a while and playing some of those instruments along with my own recordings. But I was looking for a way to make it really live and in the moment, and I kept being drawn to this process of looping. And I thought this would really be good for me because I'm a multi instrumentalist, I was a drummer. So the coordination of doing this and it does take some coordination and most people that are doing the looping thing, you know, typically now you've seen I'm sure you've seen this you know, you'll have an acoustic guitar and you create a rhythm on the guitar itself and you'll you'll get a little rhythm going and then you maybe you'll loop apart my vision for this was a lot more ambitious. I wanted to somehow try to recreate a three piece band, you know, bass drums, maybe some keyboards three part vocal harmony. My itself. So it was it was quite an undertaking. And I actually got into the looping thing. And tried to create that that vision about three or four years ago, and got a little frustrated and put it aside because it was just like, well, it's fairly technical. And you have to be on top of so many different things where you record the track, where you take it out where you change your, you know, a lot of button pressing with your feet. And I was like, Well, I'm trying to entertain an audience to how is this going to work and it just like, so I kind of put it aside, but I knew I wanted to revisit it. Yeah, I was perusing YouTube sunlight. And I found somebody that had a different process that I was using. And I sort of went, Wow, that's sort of what I originally really originally had in mind. And it was basically just streamlining the process. So I sort of adopted some of that technical stuff to my show in my presentation. So you know, with looping, like I said, you're looping apart, you know, you say typically a drum groove. And then you will loop a four bar phrase, you'll loop a bass part, and then you'll loop a guitar part. By the time you loop the parts that you want, you're a minute and a half into a song, and hopefully you don't lose the people's interest, you know what I mean? It can take a while. So I wanted to find a way of getting into the song, the meat of the song very quickly. Yes. So I think I've achieved that. And it's, uh, you know, right now I'm using, you know, not to get too technical, but I'm using like a rolling, lot of rolling stuff, rolling loopers using a hands on I can pad to create a lot of the rhythms and I sample all the drums meticulously myself, okay, I have a drum kit that I'm going to be incorporating into my show, and literally be playing drums, keys, bass guitar, and doing these three part harmonies. And I think

 

Randy Hulsey  51:54

it's a it's, it can be an intricate part of the show, if the presentation is there, like you're building a loop or the song, you know, some people are probably, you know, you, I guess you could be not as proficient and, you know, people would be like, oh, you know, they're yawn. And then and but if you're if you kind of, I think it's kind of like the whole Benihana experience somebody's cooking in front of you, you know, you've seen it a million times, but it's still a presentation kind of thing, right? It's all

 

Eliot Lewis  52:23

about presentation. And there's so many ways for musicians to present their music. And of course, you know, most people have several musicians on stage and have a band, some people just play on their own. As some people do this looping thing, to me, it made a lot of sense, because the looping experience is the closest thing to playing with other people. Because it's in the moment, it's live. And then I'm reacting on what I've played, like, I would react to another musician I'm playing along with, so I'm reacting, whatever I just did. And you know, you have an idea of what you want to do. But in the moment on stage, you know that tiempo was going to be different and how you lay down a groove or a passage is going to be a little bit different from every night tonight. So I'm then reacting to what I've just previously done, and then expands into this whole completely unique experience. In every song every time I do a song, it's a little bit different, as some people that have seen me now a few times do this. And they're like, Wow, that was completely different than the last time we saw. And I love that because I think it should be unique, every experience should be somewhat unique.

 

Randy Hulsey  53:34

Well, a listener, you know, the listeners that are not musical might ask the question, gee, well, what's the benefit of doing that, and probably the bet, a couple of the benefits that I can think of is you don't have to pay the band, right? You play every song that you want to play, you don't have to argue with the band, you know, you don't have to wait on the band. There's all kinds of benefits to being a one man band.

 

Eliot Lewis  53:58

There is that I mean, you know, listen, I've worked with I like to think some of the best musicians in the world and nothing replaces that that's truly unique thing. But again, beat with my own experiences being a part seen being a member of haulin oats and having this touring schedule, I had to come up with a way that was sort of streamlined, that would work into my schedule and work into my touring worlds. That made sense. And again, relying on other people is professional as they may be. It takes a lot of time and a lot of rehearsal and a lot of planning. So this just made a lot of sense that allowed me to move ahead very quickly. I'd have an idea and I'd be able to execute it very quickly and just just go for it.

 

Randy Hulsey  54:43

How many solo shows would you say a year you're playing like with I don't know what the extent of the touring schedule is for Hala notes right now but how many shows a year you think in guessing that you you play solo?

 

Eliot Lewis  54:57

I would say Not that much. I mean, you know enough though, that I keep very busy on on a typical year we would be shooting live from DeRose house, I'd be out on the road, maybe 100 days with haulin oats and then I would do 30 to 40 solo shows a year. So that's another 70 days out on the road or whatever that is. So it's a good chunk of time most of the year. I'm working in busy this year seems to be where I will be doing more and more and more solo shows. I think haulin oats are not doing a whole lot right now. I'm not sure what Darrell has planned for the year so I'm kind of moving right ahead with with my own shows.

 

Randy Hulsey  55:38

Sure. That makes sense. And in your shows are not just local to the northeast, they're all over Yeah, right. Yeah, they're

 

Eliot Lewis  55:44

all over. Yeah, I'll probably I'm sure I'll get out to the West Coast again this year and always do Midwest always do the you know, the Ohio, Indiana Michigan area. I have a show of nice theater show in Decatur, Illinois. So yeah, I'm all over the place. And I love it. I really do

 

Randy Hulsey  56:03

for sure. Well speaking of your music, I wanted to share a clip of a song off the latest solo record and this is a song called what we make it what do you say we treat the listeners to a clip and then we'll come back and chat a little bit about the song Fair enough.

 

Eliot Lewis  56:17

Great sounds good? This

 

Randy Hulsey  57:08

great song there. Eliot I've really grown fond of the of the music, you know, before I hunted you down. And and you agreed to come on the show. I wasn't that familiar with the solo stuff? Of course, you know, with the Hall and Oates stuff. And the average white shore horse, right? Good, good solo material man. And and again, just to reiterate to the listeners, all of the instruments there and all the vocals and everything, are you right? It's not a band that's sitting in there playing all that right.

 

Eliot Lewis  57:38

Oh, yeah. No, it's all me playing that stuff. Yeah.

 

Randy Hulsey  57:41

So was this recorded? Like, do you do this in a home studio? Or do you you actually go outside of the home to record the parts yourself? I'm gonna assume the firt the first but I don't want to put words in your mouth.

 

Eliot Lewis  57:55

No, correct. Correct. I'm one of those guys that definitely adopted all of that stuff. early on. I saw I had, you know, I had the home studio back in the 80s. And never turned back. And just loved that concept. Even before I really knew a lot of other people had done it. You know, like Tom Scholz of Boston, you know, I mean, what he created in his home, it just seemed like a natural thing for me to do. So I was dabbling in the four track Porter Studios back then and a track and then everything you the Chi 12 tracks and everything in between.

 

Randy Hulsey  58:32

And it's so much easier, you don't have to have all this hardware anymore. Everything's just software on the computer, right? And you just plug into interface and away you go.

 

Eliot Lewis  58:41

Pretty much yeah, I've always been for whatever reason, I've always been sort of a minimalist, I tend to I like, you know, in the digital age that we're in, we have a lot of options. You know, when you're talking about like a guitar plugin for a track, you've got a million options. But I've always been a bit of a minimalist, I want to sometimes restrict my options to makes me work a little bit more quickly. I don't want to be bogged down with a million I like, you know, I like some options, but not too many. Yeah,

 

Randy Hulsey  59:14

I was gonna ask you a little earlier, you had mentioned that, of course, you're tracking the loops. But you you mentioned about harmonies, I'm assuming you're laying the harmonies on that Looper as well. Is that correct? Yes, exactly. And so before you said that I was thinking in my show, so I'm in an acoustic duo. I don't play in a band but I have a lead guitarist and we do you know, kind of everything from the eagles to John Denver and to George Strait all over the place, but I use a vocal harmonizer by tc helicon. And it's, you know, you can dial it in to be a third above a fifth above four below like you can so I didn't know if you were actually using some kind of vocal harmonizer when you play solo,

 

Eliot Lewis  1:00:03

yeah, yeah, I've done both actually the Harmonizers are great. Now. They absolutely they track really well. I have a Roland and I have a TC as well. But I'll do both. I'll actually loop some of the harmonies and sometimes use that depends on what I'm going for and what I'm what I'm doing, and what works best with the technical setup.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:00:23

Sure. And I think I think when you're in an acoustic duo, like I'm in, you don't want to ever overuse that. But it's nice to add a little you know, like if you're doing a old eagle song, you know, the eagles were nowhere harmonies, right. So to add a little harmonies and take it easy or something, you know, a song like that, but you don't I don't use it on every song. It's just very selective where it makes sense. So I think you don't

 

Eliot Lewis  1:00:46

wait, you don't want to overdo it. For sure. Right? Sometimes less is more just a little treatment makes a lot of

 

Randy Hulsey  1:00:53

Absolutely. And of all things musical, would you say that songwriting is something that you look forward to doing? Or and you've kind of already answered this. But I'm drilling down a little bit. But would you say that it's something that you look forward to do? Or is it more of a chore, that piece of the music business for you

 

Eliot Lewis  1:01:13

is something I absolutely look forward to, okay. Now, it doesn't, to be fair doesn't always come. You know, there are times where I'm like, Oh, I really should be writing some new music. But for whatever reason, that moment in your life, you may not be super inspired, or really focused or really a good time. And so you got to push through that sometimes a little bit, hopefully, and you come out with something. Absolutely, it is the process that I love. I really love writing. And I get lost in it. And it's I really look forward to the whole process of writing and recording new material. And I mean, I've done a lot, I have almost a unit, you may not see it on out in the digital distribution world. But I have put out about 10 CDs. I had a long story short, I had to take off some things from the market, because bid three records ago was released by a more major label. And we took songs from other EPs and stuff that couldn't be out in the world in double format because of licensing. So I had to take some things off the market that I'm going to read eventually rerelease so but there's a lot of music behind me at this point. Yeah,

 

Randy Hulsey  1:02:29

and I was going to make that point later on. But you do have seven to 10 records out. But if you go out to Spotify, you don't see but I think maybe one or two right? So that's for somebody that's doing homework on some somebody that makes it very confusing to me.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:02:48

Well, that's gonna change very soon. There's a there's there's about to be a couple more records to hit that stuff. Yeah.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:02:53

Awesome. Well, would you say that you? Is it safe to say that you try to write every day? Or do you write every day? Or? Or is there just some days you just don't? You're not that structured around when you're doing it?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:03:04

To be honest, it not every day, am I writing because to be a, you know, a solo artist today? As you can imagine? I'm sure you know, you have to wear a lot of hats. So I'm still involved in every aspect of my career, from the booking to the management to the the Yes, I mean, I have a little bit of help, but I'm doing almost all of it. So not every day can be dedicated, sadly, to the creative process. You know, I wish it could, but we do have to wear a lot of hats. And, you know, I embrace it all. It's all good. It's all part of the process. Absolutely.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:03:41

I in You know, I've heard a lot of artists, solo artists, they've turned the whole social media thing over to an agency to do for them. And they wound up pulling it back because they said, you know, people were complaining that, wow, that just doesn't sound like something that you would say that's not your humor. That's not how you articulate yourself. So it wasn't coming across as that person it was more fabricated by somebody else. And they didn't want that they didn't want to lose that. That touch with the fan, right? They wanted to be intimate with the fan. And I can see what they're talking about. Because you got to connect somehow if you can't see somebody you have to connect somehow and social media is about the best way to connect with them these days.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:04:25

Right? Yeah, you know, and you know, a lot of lot of artists have a good personal interaction with their fan base. And I do really try to do that in interact with a lot of people. I'm very lucky. I don't have a massive fan base, but I do the ones that that are interested in what I do I really cherish so I want to I want to have that connection with them. Yeah.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:04:46

Well, I wanted to thank you while I'm thinking about it for you know, when I reached out to you it was it seemed like minutes and you had already responded to me. And luckily it was favorable that you you were willing to be on the show. But there's so many times find that people will read your message and then they'll never respond. Right? And it's like I'd rather just write have you tell me no, like, I'm a sales guy for a living, right? And I'd rather you just tell me no and I move on down the road, right? As opposed to meet keeping on and trying to Hey, Elliot Hey, Elliot, who told me no, and I'll go kick rocks, but But you are very, thank you. I wanted to say thank you for for being gracious with your time, of course, but for being quick, quick to respond. And I appreciate that. That's very Yeah,

 

Eliot Lewis  1:05:31

I mean, it's all good. Randy, I actually love doing these and I love connecting with people, like you say, you know, hopefully, somebody else gets something out of it, that's positive. And that can be you know, put to use. So you never know, the relationships you're going to start sometimes they start this way. And you know,

 

Randy Hulsey  1:05:49

they really do and, you know, so many times so many times, like I've had so many artists on my show where I've just stumbled across them from an Instagram post or or whatever. And I have literally fallen in love with our material. And if I hadn't started this podcast, I probably maybe wouldn't know any of the people well, you know, there's there's some known people that I've had on the show I'm talking more about the local artist and more the regional artist and that kind of thing but some of it is just great music that you would never get exposed to had I not subjected myself to you're gonna go look you're gonna go listen to new stuff and be open to hearing everything right so that's that's kind of the whole premise behind the show is exposing myself and people to new stuff I wanted to feature another song off the record and this is a song called well traveled heart let's take a listen to that one real quick and then we'll come back and chat

 

Eliot Lewis  1:07:04

will serve wheelchair

 

1:07:21

wheelchair

 

Randy Hulsey  1:07:32

another solid effort there, Elliot good song. And that was well traveled heart. I know that artists hate to be to have their music boxed into a genre. But if you had to box, your music, where do you think you would fit? From a genre perspective? I hear multiple things in there. I hear some James Taylor in there. I just hear some different things. Right? And I'm curious in your own words, right? Like, if they said you got to put this in a genre? What what would it be?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:08:04

Well, I don't know what it would be called now. I mean, certainly I can't escape or hide where my influences come from, which is this a lot of the 70s the stuff that were first exposed to sow, if you want to call it classic rock. I mean, I think that's kind of where my music sits. And that can mean a lot of different things. I mean, it could mean ZZ Top, or it can mean the Eagles or it can mean cheap trick. Or it could you know, mean Todd Rundgren, it's all this stuff that was floating around in my head as a kid. So it's still the stuff that I love. So you know, I don't try to write a song. Like I have to write this kind of a song with this kind of a tempo. I just let it at this point. You know, I think when I was younger, I was really trying to guide the song to where I want it. Now I kind of let the song more write itself. And just let it be what it wants to be even if it's a slightly different genres of sounding thing that that I originally thought it would be. So you know, some of my stuff is going to slightly into the country world. I mean, I used to do smooth jazz stuff, not myself that used to produce like smooth Jeff stuff. So it's, you know, it's a bit all over the place, you

 

Randy Hulsey  1:09:15

know, and that's what makes it good sometimes is that there's no there's no boundaries, right? There's no walls around it.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:09:21

Yeah, I think for artists and I've always felt that you really got to hopefully write for yourself, make yourself happy. Don't try to please somebody else do what's really on your heart and what you want to hear. So the music I write is really what I kind of want to hear. And hopefully that resonates and sounds genuine with with people.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:09:41

Now you mentioned earlier, you know, you spent time with the average white band and I think that that was what 89 through 2002 ish something is my days. Yeah, fairly close.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:09:54

I think that's right on the money. Okay.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:09:55

How do you How would you say the music for me? rich white man differs from from Holland oats what you're playing in Holland oats, because average white man's a little a little Motown ish, right?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:10:09

Well, not even Motown. It's funk. It's really more James II. It's really James Brown. I mean, that's really the pinnacle of their their musical influence, but it's a lot of things Donny Hathaway, Marvin Gaye. But yeah, there's obviously some Motown there. Yeah, for sure. And now, Darrell, is also coming from that place to the Philly soul sound. There's so definitely some Motown influence there. And I think that's why they had such a great chemistry together, Alan and Darrell. So there's some similarities there. But of course, haulin oats have really gone into a lot of different areas, that average white band hasn't they've really gone into the pop world, of course, the rock world. So you know, they're just they're master songwriters. Well, I

 

Randy Hulsey  1:10:51

found it interesting. Interesting to point out that next to, of course, Mr. Casual, right, Charlie Deshawn. Yeah. You're the longest tenured musician that has not only been in Hall and Oates, but yeah, the same for average white band to correct.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:11:07

Ah, let me see. It's been. Yeah, like you said, 2002 is so I don't know, I was with that band for 13 years, something like that. So I think, you know, Clyde Jones, who replaced me replace that position that I held in average white band was in the band, I think, for nine years. And now they've have a few members. And I think yeah, those members are probably haven't been there as long as I was. So maybe you're right. Maybe right. Yeah. But now it and all and oh, it's it's been quite a while. It's been like 18 years. I've been in the band for sure. So quite a long time. Not like Mr. Casual. He's been like 40 years. Yeah. 35 years or something crazy.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:11:49

Well, and he's had some of the most recognizable and iconic sax parts on a lot of their songs. You know, man eater. I can't vote for that. I mean, there's, we go on and on and on. I think Charlie lives in down in Florida somewhere now, correct? Yes. Yeah, he's

 

Eliot Lewis  1:12:04

in Orlando. Okay. Yeah. All right.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:12:06

What does it mean to you to be an integral part of the fabric of, of what probably were guarded as the best selling duo in rock history.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:12:18

It's a It's extraordinary. To me, it's fascinating. I mean, you know, if he would have told told me, when I was a kid, that I would ended up, you know, when I discovered the hall notes, like, say, in the early 70s, when she's gone, came on the radio, like when I really was hearing that a lot, probably in 76, or something like that. 77 If you were just told me that eventually, he was going to join a band and be in this band for 18 years and have this journey real with Darryl and his show, and play with all these people. I just thought, well, that's the craziest thing I could ever imagine. But I mean, it's been, you know, an honor to be a member of their circle. I mean, they've had such amazing musicians in their, in their history. And what they've accomplished is pretty incredible. So in their music is just so widely accepted. You know, I mean, people from all genres just love their music. It's so accessible. Yes. You know, I've rock guys that I know, love all the notes, jazz guys. You know, they everybody in between. That's why they're so universally sort of popular. Yeah.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:13:23

And I think I think that a lot of that, you know, that Philly influenced two shows through in their music as well. So it's not just raw, but, you know, there's, there's some, you know, I don't know if you call it Doo Wop. But I mean, that's kind of where they're all came from those roots. Yeah. And he really did. Yeah. And I mean, like you said, what an amazing batch of musicians and I guess when, I guess when your uncle Daryl, you can leverage whoever you want in the band and get the top notch players in there.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:13:51

Yes. So when I think that I for somehow ended up in that position is kind of mind blowing to me, you know, I mean, that's like working with Todd Rundgren. You know, I've played with him. Like, for instance, like not a lot of people know this, but his fans obviously know, during COVID, when nobody was doing shows, Todd decided to do a stint of virtual shows, like high level, well produced virtual shows. And he reached out to me, and I just, you know, had worked with him a few times. And I just thought, wow, this is amazing. And I'm so humbled. I mean, he's got his choice of some of the best musicians and keyboard players that are far superior to me. You know, so me to be in that world with musicians like Todd and Darryl and John is pretty humbling, I have to say,

 

Randy Hulsey  1:14:41

and then when especially when you kind of came up listening to them in the beginning and then next thing you know, you're, you're right in the middle of playing with and that's got to be a pretty cool thing to experience. I would imagine.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:14:51

Yes, it's unbelievable and the experiences that it's brought into my life are just you know, there's nothing that can replace touring all over the world, yeah, um, I had to have done a lot of touring with average white band. But, you know, I mean, my dream of dreams when I was a kid, like I was saying, I saw Alice Cooper at Madison Square Garden, was to play that. And I honestly never really thought I would play the garden. I just thought that's, that's a real, it's like winning a lottery for a musician. And I've played it three times now. Wow. So it's like, you know, and that's, you know, I've played every major venue in the world you can imagine from the Buddha Khan, to red rocks to the Hollywood Bowl. Oh, to Arena in Wembley, and every play of Carnegie Hall, I mean, every place you can dream of as a musician to play I've played and largely because of them, really, because of them. Those are

 

Randy Hulsey  1:15:42

all the cathedrals of where you play, right. I mean, those are Yeah, like, what you've made it when you when you play that it's kind of like a country star, you know, play in the Ryan or play on, you know, the opera. Yeah. Well, that's the pinnacle. That's the summit right there. Right.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:15:57

Exactly. Exactly. So the experiences are really, really special. And there's something that'll that'll have it for the rest of my life, for sure. Now,

 

Randy Hulsey  1:16:04

cool stories there, for sure. It was it was kind of funny. I was watching a documentary, maybe last week on Frank Stallone, and I didn't realize that there was ties to Daryl Hall back from the Philly days with Frank Stallone, of course, the brother of Sylvester Stallone, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. Very talented musician. Frank is

 

Eliot Lewis  1:16:23

yes, absolutely. And he was, you know, he was a guest on the show. He was a guest on live from DeRose house. And the story that Darrell tells is just so funny, because, you know, they were friends, these guys were all friends. And they were playing together. And he tells the story, and I'm probably not going to get 100% Right. But basically, that Sly Stallone came to Daryl and said, I'm, you know, working on this movie, it's a self made project that I'm doing, I really believe in and I think you should think about writing a song for it. And he offered Darryl this. And I think Darryl either passed or he didn't have time. And sure enough, you know, he went on to something else. And then a year or two later, rocky comes out. And it's like the biggest movie in the world. Right. Jarrell could have been a part of that.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:17:10

Well, and I think that you know, he was very integral with what the second Saturday Night Fever something he had a quite a bit of music and that probably, maybe a lot of people don't know about, you know, the the first one was big for the Bee Gees, that you know, that they blew up? And then, you know, I think he was he was pretty tight tied in with the second Saturday Night Fever. So it's interesting. He's a great musician. And I think in the documentary, you could tell that there was always this he was always in the shadow of Sly right then. And he could never quite get around that. And those were his own words. You know, that's not me making stuff up telling you in this conversation. But yeah, interesting documentary, because he's, he's been the musician for all of his life. So

 

Eliot Lewis  1:17:57

and it's amazing how much of those guys look alike. Pretty unconnected? Yeah.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:18:01

Well, we've talked a little bit about it. But the you know, this conversation probably wouldn't be complete without talking about, you know, the live from Devil's house, what a great series. I loved the episodes, the artists that have come on the show, and I'll have to say that it was that show that kind of inspired me to do the podcast, because I kind of liked the whole idea of just the collaboration, right? Where you, you bring in a musician, you talk to him about their music, you collaborate, maybe you play some songs, live with them, maybe you just let them play, and you just have that fellowship with them. And I think that that's really cool. Now, I don't feed my guests when they come to my house. You know, I'll give them some water and stuff like that. But I think that's a whole cool thing. And it's, that's kind of where I came up with the idea of, I'd like to do something like that in podcast form, right? Not a live TV production, but very cool. It's

 

Eliot Lewis  1:18:55

been a it's been an amazing experience. I never thought it would turn into what it's turning into. I mean, I remember being on a plane with Daryl one day and him saying, you know, really want to try something, you know, like, some sort of a show and have some friends over and do it at my place and maybe put it up on YouTube. You know, it literally started like that. And the first episode was so small, and just so low key, you know, we had some of our Tech's given cameras, you know, that had never really worked a camera before. So it was so it was so casual and small. And then of course, because it's sterile, the show blew up very quickly. salutely And you know, and I was there from the first day I was really lucky. I think the only musician that's been privileged to play on every episode would be on every episode. So quite the experience another accolade for you. That's pretty crazy.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:19:48

Do you know off the top of your head, how many episodes that you you've been in?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:19:51

It's got to be somewhere around 90 Now because we're into shooting new episodes that I think will be released. You No, this year, I don't know exactly what the timeframe is. But we've already shot three new episodes. I think we have three more to do. So there's new stuff coming. It's coming back. Okay. So I think overall, it's probably somewhere around 90. Yeah.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:20:16

Where is is he in New York? Or is he in? where's the where's the house? That is it. Is it in New York? Okay.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:20:22

It's in New York. Yeah, the original house, the original, like three or four years of the first three or four years were at his actual home, and milk, milk, Brook, New York. And now most of them are shot at at his club, the life and neuroscience club and polling New York.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:20:38

Okay. Okay. Yeah, I've had some people that have been on my show that have played the club. Yeah. Yeah, that's interesting to know that. And I think, you know, on the show, you've been fortunate enough to play with some of some of the best musicians on the planet. For the listeners that may be maybe are not as familiar with live from barrels, house talk, talk, just share, drop some names, if you don't mind of some of the people that that you've played with on the show. So they kind of have an understanding of the format, talk about the format, but then share some of the names that have that have joined the band on the on the show.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:21:14

So DEROS idea, I think, really was to just try to capture a session with us the band, Daryl and a guests, and have it be very organic, and really not have it over rehearsed or too perfected. He really wanted to keep it loose. And, you know, have the people that were viewing the show feel like they were watching something sort of unfold. And it really is that way. It's it's pretty, it's pretty loose, and it's very organic. And it comes together very quickly. And you know, fortunately, the guys that I'm playing within the band are amazing musicians, we're great friends and have so much respect for them. So we you develop a good chemistry and good working relationship with them. Sure. And so we're able to move pretty quickly through the show when we do do it. But yeah, we've had, you know, we might have mentioned Todd Rundgren, one of my musical heroes. He's been on the show a few times. Joe Walsh, another musical hero mine Cheap Trick. And one of my favorite bands, you know, Goo Goo Dolls, Rob Thomas train. Booker T. My old friend our Alan from average white band. Squeeze. I mean, just you know, Billy Gibbons, one of my favorite guitar players from CZ TA. Yeah. So there's been a lot cross section with Shelby Lin, who's more of a country artists. Some rap artists, so it's been pretty eclectic, musically. Sammy Hagar Of course. Yeah. So it's been it's been incredible. You know, to work with this amount of people.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:22:48

I'm just trying to think of some standout episodes for me, I think. Was it the OJS I think yeah. Oh jays, were on that. That was a really cool episode for me. And then I really enjoyed the Jason Mraz. One any logins was great. Yeah, I've always been a big Loggins and Messina fan, you know, back from the day and then yeah, so love Kenny logins.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:23:10

I got a lot of respect for him. He's a great musician. He really is

 

Randy Hulsey  1:23:13

for sure. And you kind of mentioned it earlier, but the songs really are not they're not rehearse the do you guys go through the songs before they're before they, you know, kind of, Okay, roll, um, the run through the songs first or whatever. Okay.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:23:27

Sure. Yeah, we usually are given they figure out the songs they want to do. Sometimes it's a week, sometimes it might be just a few days before we shoot the episode. And we you know, we work we have the song lists, we work on them ourselves individually at home. Gotcha. And then we come together on the day of the shoot. And typically we'll you know, we just get our soundcheck, we get our sound dialed in, we'll run through the song, once they're all come in, we may just run through one song once or sometimes he just wants to keep it fresh and wait till the guests arrive, the guests will arrive. And you know, he gets his sound or her sound. And then we literally just go we just take I have to say most of the tapes that we end up with are usually the first or second takes, if we have to do with or take there's something wrong. Right. So usually, you know, unless there's a real train wreck with the sound or you know, there's a wrong word in the teleprompter or something like that, then will stop but almost everything is first or second takes. Yeah, so it's pretty fresh even though you know, it may not be perfect. You know, the melodies may not be all completely true to the original. The feeling and the attempt is there in the chemistry hopefully is there we're finding our way through it.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:24:47

Yeah, absolutely. Well, and there is that facade that they're totally unrehearsed like, nobody really even needs to know that but you know, I've seen some where I don't maybe was one of the Kenny Kenny logins want, you know, songs and Darryl was like, wait, I'm taking the second verse. No, you're taking that, you know, you're, you're kind of debating, okay, which verse was I taking? So it comes across as very organic like, Okay, we haven't practiced this, we're just gonna, like, just do it and what comes out of it comes out of and I think that's, that perception is really cool. And you guys are top shelf musician, so you could pull it off anyway, probably if you if you didn't play it a couple of times before, whatever. But I think the whole format is really amazing. I love the format of the show. Very cool.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:25:35

All Thank you. Thank you. It's a it's an honor and a blessing to be a part of, you know, it's, it's pretty unique. And I

 

Randy Hulsey  1:25:43

think talking, you know, talking about life and Derleth health wouldn't be complete without mentioning T bone walk, right? We mentioned bone earlier, but he was the musician's musician wasn't a le a very much

 

Eliot Lewis  1:25:57

so Randy, he, he was just such a huge figure in my life. From the first time I met him. I mean, I've known about him before he met him, of course, with all the stuff he did on Saturday Night Live. And of course, with all the notes and Carly Simon and Billy Joel, just an amazing person and incredibly intuitive musician, somebody who could pick up any instrument and just be completely at home and comfortable on and just was a huge inspiration for me. And again, he's the one who really kind of got me into the band. You know, he was the guy who thought of me like, oh, we need somebody to play a bunch of instruments. And he remembered me. And, and then once I got into this situation, he was so supportive. But yeah, he was the he was the real deal. Yeah. And, you know, when he left us, it was heartbreaking. I mean, he was really Darryl Darryl and John's right hand, man, I'm sure many, many years.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:26:51

Well, you could you could tell that he was, you know, he was a big part of what you guys were doing for sure. And I think we're I really were I really fell in love with him. There was an episode where they recorded by the pool, and it was the song. And I might get the name wrong, but you correct me please. like had I known you better than playing by the Yeah. You remember, you remember which one I'm talking about? Yeah. And he's just playing solo, you know, on the acoustic guitar, and it's like it was there was so much Phil there. I just fell in love with the song. I wasn't familiar with the song before. Fell in love with it. I've probably listened to it 1000 times since then. But yeah, that that was kind of the one that did it for me for seeing bone play for whatever reason. He was

 

Eliot Lewis  1:27:35

the he was the epitome of like I said, the instinctual musician that could go into any almost any musical situation and be comfortable and just know what to do. How am I know the right stuff to play, which is very unique. Not many people could go into a situation on an keyboards as well. I mean, we had so much fun, there'd be moments on stage where he gravitated to, for whatever reason, I think he transitioned from being the bass player to guitar Yeah, towards the end there. And sometimes, you know, he played guitar great, but he would get frustrated at like his pedals and amp. And he'd say, Well, I'm taking this guitar off, come up, come and play the guitar, and he would jump on the keyboards. So we just had a blast. Sometimes sterile and John wouldn't even know because they would you know, they weren't weren't turning around. We would just like would have this great communication and fun with you know,

 

Randy Hulsey  1:28:33

well what was that 1313 ish 14 years ago that he passed gives it been that long. Yes.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:28:39

Something like that. Yes. Crazy. Yeah. I think 2010 is crazy.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:28:46

And time crazy measure. Well, another patch another passion of yours kind of the you know, to jump off the Darrel bandwagon there and the life from barrels house, but you have another passion and that's photography. Like do you stay pretty busy with the photography thing? Or what's going on photography wise for you?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:29:05

I do. I mean, you know, it definitely ebbs and flows, you know, depending on what's going on in my career. Like, like I was saying earlier, no, we wear a lot of hats and trying to do what we do. So there's not always time to do all of that creative, fun stuff. Photography for me started as a hobby when I was about 18 1718. Earlier on, I mentioned the police and Andy Summers while I discovered Andy Summers was a great photographer and as well as the guitar player for the police. I mean really great photographers in you know, showed stuff and galleries and and had books and and I was already into photography and I just thought oh, it seems really natural to marry photography and music. So it just became a real passion of mine. I never, I never thought about being a professional photographer. But But I kept it going and when I joined home notes, actually T bone Sol Sol some of my black and white Photography. And he told Daryl about it. Darrell came to me and said, hey, well, you know, listen, would you want to shoot us because we always need new photographs, we always need new stuff. And so they kind of offered me a position as well as for shooting them. So early on in my, my time with the band, I did a lot of their press shots and a lot a lot of stuff for them. In fact, I think I did one or two record covers for them. To me, it's it's just really a great creative outlet when I'm on tour, and I'm in a new city, and I'm walking around and get out with my camera and kind of like, detach from the music element for a minute and just get into something else that also kind of feeds my soul.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:30:37

That's very cool. Well, we'll didn't I think I read something where you you documented a lot of the travels with Holland notes over the years, is that is that correct? Is there? Is there a formula, the formula that you you know, I've got to do this or that? Or is it just organic, where you just take pictures of whatever, right, the only

 

Eliot Lewis  1:30:56

thing that seemed to be pretty consistent was, what happened was that, and this goes back even further, when I was with average wipin, I had a camera on me a lot of times back then a film camera, and you know, before digital, and we played a huge festival in Scotland, which is where they were from. And there were literally like 40,000 people. And so I was like, oh, man, I've got to take a photograph of this just so I could remember and put it in my scrapbook. And then many, many years later, when I joined Errol, and John, I saw an audience shot from the perspective of the stage. And I thought to myself, Oh, I did that a few times years ago. And then I thought, Hmm, that would really be cool. Now this we're in the digital age, to recreate that. And I went to Darryl and I said, Daryl, would you be okay with me taking a shot after you guys leave the stage of the audience from our perspective, he says, That's a great idea, do it. And he I said people can tag themselves in on social media and Facebook and see it from our perspective see themselves. So that became a kind of a consistent thing. I would do these audience shots of, you know, 10,015 20,000 people every night. Okay, so that became a thing, little tradition. That's really cool. I have a lot of audience shots. Yeah, for sure. Well, those are all things that you know, 15 years from now, 20 years from now you can go look back at and it's all kind of chronicle their wallets. Color notes entered the hallowed Hall and And what 2016 I

 

Randy Hulsey  1:32:20

think 14 or 16. Okay, for Yeah, 15 Yeah, something somewhere around there. Okay. And I wanted to ask you about this, because I'm not sure I know that when a ban enters the hall, don't all of the contributing artists, they're part of the hall as well with that ban. Like, like, if there was an original guitarist, the guitarist leaves in they get they get brought into the hall of fame that past guitars is considered in there to correct so think so. Okay, so So is it safe to say that because Hall and Oates are in the Hall of Fame that you are as well in the Hall of Rock and Roll Hall of Fame? Is that a fair assumption? Or what's your take on that?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:32:59

I would say, I mean, I love the premise of what you're saying, but I'm not sure that I would consider myself a part of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame book, I think, if I were a, you know, maybe Charlie to Shante because he was there from such an early time, you know, it's that experience is really about Darryl and John, not to meet and not to demean my position but I think they they deserve being in the rock and a Hall of Fame. It wasn't based on my music or a lot of my contribution because I really didn't do any a lot of creative stuff with them. I've been just, you know, I've been they're one of their backbone musicians for a long time. So first of

 

Randy Hulsey  1:33:39

all, your humble musician, you know, that's that's cool, but I guess maybe I should have rephrase the question. So the hall doesn't tell you like hey, Elliot, you're now a member or you're not a member like there's no no loosely interpreted Right? Like you could you know, you

 

Eliot Lewis  1:33:58

didn't get that memo. Okay. Okay. No, but I was incredibly honored to be there and be with them that was like you know, unbelievable moment for sure. I mean, you know, and like to be invited for instance to the White House and play for a sitting president you know, these have been just incredible moments that I'll cherish but yeah, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was cool. And also to because of my history and my my fascination with Kiss were inducted on the same night Oh, how cool and unfortunately I didn't get to meet them I thought well, I have some stories about them and I would have loved to talk to them but you know, in the moment everybody is so the shuffled off into these rooms and interviews that nobody has time to do kind of extraneous stuff so I get it but it was really a really a pinch me moment. You know, being on stage and seeing kiss, looking back and staying and you know, Glenn Frey from the Eagles and all these amazing musicians.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:34:53

Well, you probably didn't think so. But it's nice for guys like me to know that even the best musicians have technical issues on stage at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Do you remember what I'm talking about? Man? There was like, I'll just stay here all night if I have to. It was kind of funny. Do you know what happened? I don't, I don't know the backstory. But I just know he was having monitor issues or something something wrong with scissors, or is in IRS weren't working. I don't know what the story was.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:35:24

So I'll make this short and sweet. The reason that we had to stop wasn't my fault. But it was due to my monitor. It was me. And I've never, ever had a technical issue. In the 18 years I've been with the band. But long story short, what happened was that most of us at that point, were all using regular monitors floor monitors, not in ear monitors. And Darold uses regular monitors. So they set us up for the dress rehearsal. Normally, my floor monitor is on a riser on a wedge, okay, so it's about two feet off the ground. Okay. So for whatever reason that the dress rehearsal, they couldn't find the box that my monitor went on. So when on the floor being that my monitors on the floor, they had to give me x amount of level to reach me at my keyboard position. Then from the time we did the dress rehearsal to the show, they found the riser and they put the monitor back on the riser, meaning the monitor was now two feet or so closer to the microphone. Okay, so when we went to play, and I went to sing the first do and she's gone, we get all this feedback. Oh, that's right. There was feedback wasn't there? I was feedback. And I was like, What the hell with this is my microphone. And I looked over to the side of the stage, I knew what the producer looked like. And I said, Yeah, I pointed toward my mic. I said, this is my mic going off. I don't know what to do. As you know, this didn't happen at rehearsal, we I figured it out, made the connection pretty quickly. It was just a technical oversight, you know, nothing that anybody could do too hot, then, you know, basically was too hot, they had to give me more level to reach me. And then they, they put this thing back on the riser, it was closer to the mic, and it went off.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:37:10

And I didn't even remember the feedback until you just mentioned it. So well. I didn't mean to bring that up probably a sore subject. Well, it's not even really, you're not even technically

 

Eliot Lewis  1:37:19

one of those things that just happen, you know, and it's all part of the experience, you know, but we, you know, fortunately, that doesn't go out live. So we were able to stop, and then you know, and then start again. And that happens a lot that apparently has happened a lot. Sure. So, you know, the edited showed, and have show that yeah, you gotta You gotta love live

 

Randy Hulsey  1:37:39

performance, expect the unexpected.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:37:42

Anything could happen. Absolutely. Doing my looping show on my solo show, literally anything can happen. Absolutely. You know, I think that's what makes it you know, you show people you're human, you're really doing it and flaws and all you know, it makes it interesting.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:37:55

That's how they connect, you know, you're human at the end of the day. So that's what you know, you're showing the the humaneness and the human side of, of the business. You know, we're you know, we're we're all people at the end of the day, we make mistakes, sometimes. Sometimes strings break, sometimes we get feedback and you know, it is what it is.

 

Eliot Lewis  1:38:15

It's how you it's how you handle the situation. How you persevere.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:38:19

Absolutely. Talk to me a little bit about the upcoming solo tour I know that you have some stuff lined up but what you share with the listeners what you kind of have in the in the near future what's coming up and what what people can look forward to even from even a new music perspective right tour on music what's coming up new for ya Elliott Lewis,

 

Eliot Lewis  1:38:44

oh, a lot. We're putting together a lot of shows as we speak. So yeah, I'm going to be able to this year because I think the schedule be a little lighter with with Daryl and John. So I'll be able to do a little bit more more shows on my own and reach a few more places that would otherwise be harder for me to get to, you know, that for years now, I have done a lot of solo shows alongside their tours, like on a night off, I'll book a show. But now I'm able to book a little further ahead, knowing where I'm going to be or where I'm not going to be. So, you know, unfortunately, I'm getting some some nice interest in offers. So I'm doing some bigger, you know, more meaningful shows I have some more theater shows coming up this year. But I have fun in every place I play a lot of still love to play, still love connecting with an audience. So I'll probably do more. And the more in the range of 50 or 60 shows us your if not more. And again, like you'll be able to reach a lot of different areas and states that I haven't been able to and then of course there'll be some new music. I'm working on some writing some new music, just shot a new promotional video that really shows what I'm doing with this looping show now, it's really meant to kind of showcase this kind of presentation I'm doing and that literally will be ready tomorrow. So I think I'll be Got a release that this will be cool. So yeah, a lot of stuff going on and then we're waiting for the schedule for the next sterols tapings.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:40:08

But where can the listeners find you on social media?

 

Eliot Lewis  1:40:11

Definitely can find me on all the obvious ones you know, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter YouTube are the main ones for me. I don't spend a whole lot of time on tick tock but those for pretty much the staples. That's one

 

Randy Hulsey  1:40:25

that's blown up everybody's whole tick tock thing like I I'm on it, but I don't do much with this. Oh, it's

 

Eliot Lewis  1:40:31

me. I

 

Randy Hulsey  1:40:32

don't know, I tried to figure out how I can make the show part of TiC tock like, I don't know, I don't know. Maybe I'm just not that. Yeah, eight of doing silly videos and stuff like that. But

 

Eliot Lewis  1:40:44

anyway, sometimes with those stuff, you need somebody that understands that we're

 

Randy Hulsey  1:40:48

Yes, yes. Well, it seems to be it's very effective. But it almost seems to be for a younger crowd. If that's if that's even a real thing. Like I guess social media is for whoever the hell wants to use it at the end of the day. But yes,

 

Eliot Lewis  1:41:03

I think you're right. I think tick tock is a little more geared towards a younger audience base. Sure.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:41:08

So again, yeah, I'm just trying to figure out how to say hey, I've got this guest coming up, or this guest coming up, but I'm not doing any anything crazy, you know, anything, anything that's gonna go viral? For sure. But Randy, we're

 

Eliot Lewis  1:41:20

all trying to figure it out.

 

Randy Hulsey  1:41:22

Every every day. It's work in progress, right? every deed? Well, Elliot, listen, it's been an awesome chat. I know I've kept you a longtime you've been gracious with the stories. I love them. I know the listeners will certainly love to hear what's going on in your world. So thanks for spending time with me this evening and taking that valuable time out of your day. I appreciate it. Oh, my pleasure, Randy. Real pleasure talking to you. Yeah. Likewise, in your your you're most certainly an amazing musician. And I wish you continued success. And you know, best of luck now and in the future with the solo stuff. And then the live from Devil's house and every other thing that you have coming up. So thank you so much. You're welcome. And I asked the listeners to like, share and subscribe to the podcast. Also make sure to follow Elliot on all of his social media outlets, including Elliott lewis.com. And that's e l i o t. Le Ws is you can follow the show on Facebook at backstage pass radio podcast on Instagram at backstage pass radio, Twitter at backstage pass PC and on the website at backstage pass. radio.com Thank you guys for tuning in. And we'll see you next time on backstage pass radio.

 

Adam Gordon  1:42:33

Thanks so much for joining us. We hope you enjoyed today's episode of backstage pass radio. Make sure to follow Randy on Facebook and Instagram at Randy Hulsey music and on Twitter at our Halsey music. Also make sure to like, subscribe and turn on alerts for upcoming podcasts. If you enjoyed the podcast, make sure to share the link with a friend and tell them backstage pass radio is the best show on the web for everything music. We'll see you next time right here on backstage pass radio