THE MAKING OF one mississippi - FEATURING Brendan Benson

Intro:
Dan Nordheim: You’re listening to Life of the Record. Classic albums, told by the people who made them. My name is Dan Nordheim.

Brendan Benson grew up in Harvey, Louisiana and later moved back to his birthplace of Royal Oak, Michigan. As a teenager, he played in punk bands around Detroit before leaving for Los Angeles. It was there that he met Jason Falkner and was inspired to work on solo music. Later, Jason Falkner helped him record a 6 song demo that unexpectedly led to him getting signed to Virgin Records. Brendan Benson’s debut album, One Mississippi, was released in 1996.

In this episode, for the 25th anniversary, Brendan Benson looks back on how One Mississippi came together. This is the making of One Mississippi.

Brendan Benson: Hi, this is Brendan Benson and I’m here on Life of the Record to talk about my debut album, One Mississippi, which came out, I believe in 1996, I’ll have to check my notes. But yeah, there’s lots of juicy stuff behind the recording of this album actually. I was a really young twenty year old, like you know, I was very immature, I’m an only child, I was not prepared for the kind of things that awaited me (laughs). And I’m like turning 50 this year and I barely know this stuff now, like barely figuring it out now. You know what I mean? (laughs)

So I was living with this woman out in Los Angeles and her roommate was dating Jason Falkner of Jellyfish. And I was awestruck, I thought this guy was the coolest guy ever, he was kind of a rock star in my mind, he had made it. He was in this band and they had a record and I was just very impressed. I watched him play some shows too during that time and it was unbelievable. I didn’t know acoustic guitar and voice could be so cool and exciting. I guess I was seeing also the skill involved, like, “I kind of want to know how to play guitar better or I want to know how to do that. I want to know those chords, like what is that? That’s a major seventh chord, what is that? That’s so cool!” I was young and I was so enamored.

He turned me on to so many records during that time. Odyssey and Oracle being one of them, Something/Anything?, Todd Rundgren. These were were things that were not The Beatles, they were like The Beatles, but they weren’t The Beatles, they were like as good as The Beatles. Cause I didn’t know about Harry Nilsson or Randy Newman or any of that stuff. He turned me on to songwriting really, in essence. And then it was on, it was game on for me. I started educating myself, I started just listening to tons of music. I think that’s what happened, I think he planted some seeds that, “You could do it on your own. You could do this solo.” Cause I thought I would be in a band so I was watching this guy who was in a band, doing it solo, like, “Wow that’s cool. If he can do it?” It just made it seem tangible. So I moved home, back home into my mom’s house and I just locked myself in my bedroom and I just recorded song after song after song. I was just obsessed. Like everything I do in life, I just obsess to the hilt, hyper-focused, and then came out of the bedroom in a few years with a bunch of songs.

And while I was writing these songs, I met this girl named Emma in Michigan and she was on her way out to Mills College to go to school at Mills College in the Bay Area, California. And I asked her if I could follow her out there (laughs) and she allowed me that. And I was in love with her, I was wooing her, trying to win her over and so I moved with her out to Berkeley, California and while I was out there, I decided to look up an old friend and I said, “Jason, I’d love to come down and visit. Also I have these songs which I’d love for you to hear.” And so that’s what I did, I went down there and I stayed with him for a couple nights and I played him my songs. I seem to remember there was a period, I think I went back to Berkeley with Emma and there was a period of waiting where I didn’t hear from him and I didn’t know if he liked the songs so at some point I figured, “Well, he’s not into them.” I don’t know what it was, weeks later, he called me up and said, “Dude, I really love these songs. Why don’t you come down again and let’s record these. Let’s do a better job recording these and I’ll help you with them.” He didn’t say the word “produce” but I think in retrospect, that’s what he was doing. He chose six songs to do and we recorded them on his Tascam Porta One Studio maybe, I forget, it was a four-track, little cassette four-track. But he made that thing sing man, he made it sound great. He was like the master of the four-track so he made everything sound great. He played just about everything, he played the drums, the bass and I sang the songs of course and played a little guitar (laughs). And those were the songs, in fact those so-called “demos” led me to getting signed to Virgin Records. In fact there was a little bidding war, I was kind of being courted by Columbia Records in New York and Atlantic also in Los Angeles. It was pretty crazy. So these six songs started me off on my career.

“Tea”

“Tea” was I think I wanted to come out sounding like I was going to play intelligent pop music. This is going to be meaningful and deep. This is not bubblegum or and this isn’t grunge. So I wanted to kind of make a statement with that. Ironically, it’s about drinking tea and it’s kind of light hearted, sounding kind of bubblegum. But no, I think I wanted to show my chops. “The Trilogy,” as I call it, the first three songs on the record. I kind of was into the idea of, at the time I think I was listening to a lot of Gershwin, I was really (laughs) at this point going way over the top now into the craft of songwriting. But yeah I was listening to Gershwin and Cole Porter and they would do these intros to songs, right. And I was also listening to a lot of Paul McCartney like Band on the Run was a big one at the time. I loved how he did this, like he did these medleys or these recurring themes on his album. I loved that kind of stuff so I wanted to kind of do something, I wanted to dazzle people in the beginning. I was kind of wanting to pull out all the stops (laughs). I was very excited, very overzealous and very excited.

“Bird’s Eye View”

There were these major labels interested in signing me and putting out an album and it was crazy. I was flying out to, I flew out to New York and met with Steve Berkowitz at Columbia Records, who had also signed, just recently signed Jeff Buckley. And so he was talking a lot about Jeff too, I remember at the time, and that kind of weirded me out because he was supposed to be interested in me but really talking about Jeff a lot. But it was also kind of freaking me out. Jeff Buckley was kind of a glimpse into the future I thought maybe a little bit like, “OK here’s this Jeff Buckley guy, no one’s ever heard of, and he’s written some songs.” And he’d just released that Cafe record I think and he was getting some buzz and getting some money and stuff like that. So all these ideas were going around in my head while I was meeting with these people and I was very apprehensive I guess. Worried about making the wrong decision, worried about making a decision based solely on money too. I was trying to be smart about it so I ended up going with Virgin Records because they were the smallest of the three really. That was the basis of my decision. And Andy Factor was the A&R guy there and he was a great guy, also really young like just a bit older than I am I think. He was about to sign Elliott Smith, which fell through in the end, but that really impressed me because I heard some Elliott Smith and I was like, “Oh I want to be on your team” (laughs). But that kind of later fell through but anyhow. I think I was kind of gauging, you know Jeff Buckley seemed maybe a little too much too quickly, Elliott seemed like “OK something I can hang with.” More my style. Also Beck was getting very popular then. All this to say, it made me very cautious I guess about things. And in fact, in the end, probably served me no good because in retrospect, I think I was too apprehensive about stuff. It was so overwhelming for me as a twenty year-old, I don’t know, twenty-one year-old. In fact, aside from some punk bands that I’d been in in high school, I hadn’t really performed in front of people at all. I mean, as a guitarist in these punk bands but not as a frontman. So that was kind of yet to be determined. And still is to this day maybe arguably (laughs).

Yeah there was a school of musicians or kind of a group of musicians around Los Angeles. Jason Falkner, Jon Brion, Grant-Lee Phillips of course, the Largo scene and I was fortunate enough to witness that, in fact be on a night, Jon invited me up there one night. But yeah, Elliott had played it, it was almost like a rite of passage at one point, you know, Largo, it was a passage to this school of music really. And it was kind of a clever, classically trained kind of school, which I don’t even know what to call it, like super gifted (laughs) school of musicians or something. You know, the elite, and they were craftsmen, they were craftspeople. They could the perfect song, like Elliott could do that, Jason Falkner, Jon Brion, yeah they could I mean, on command, they could just write a song, you know. It takes me like days, weeks. It was weird, I was kind of on the periphery of that I guess. I was there the whole time, but never, you know, aside from one performance at Largo, which I think I was terrible, I was so nervous, but I was pretty much invisible. Watching all these people, these great people though. It was kind of an awesome place to be in, just a fly on the wall in Los Angeles at that time. You know, hanging out with The Grays and meeting Red Kross guys and the Jellyfish guys, you know, Roger Manning. It was such a cool scene, you know, very exciting and everyone was so talented and everyone was so gifted. I remember at one point, driving by Canter’s on Fairfax and seeing Jon Brion. It was like 3 o’clock in the morning and seeing Jon Brion in his robe outside Canter’s, kind of holding court with all these people around (laughs). I think he was playing guitar in a robe. But you know, I think ultimately, not to pooh-pooh it, but ultimately I think it kind of gave me a complex. I mean I feel like I never felt good enough, I always felt inferior. I always felt kind of not quite that caliber. So it was like I said, elitist, it was sort of exclusive. I don’t know, maybe it wasn’t.

Yeah “Bird’s Eye View” (laughs). I’m not sure what it was about, it was inspired by, believe it or not, it was inspired by a conversation about gang banging in Los Angeles (laughs). I was sitting with my friends at the farmer’s market in Los Angeles, talking about South Central, and I had never been there. Oh I think I was wearing a bandana, I think that’s what sparked the conversation. I had a bandana in my pocket and a friend of mine said, “You know, you probably shouldn’t be sporting a blue bandana hanging out of your back pocket like that.” And I was like, “Really? Are you kidding?” He’s like, “No actually, you probably shouldn’t.” So I was like, “Wow OK. This gang stuff is like for real?” So I started thinking about it, but songs for me always kind of go on tangents. But “Bird’s Eye View,” that’s kind of the impetus for that song. Hard to believe. The end lyrics, “So dress your sons and daughters in neutral colors” is kind of a giveaway, but yeah it’s very tangential, that song.

“Sittin’ Pretty”

I learned how to go (sings guitar riff) “da-da-da-da-da” on the guitar so that’s like the basis for the whole song I think. I think I was just excited about my hammer-on I learned (laughs). I mean, I don’t play very well now but I certainly didn’t play very well then. Like it is kind of raggedy because I was kind of like making a point of saying, “This is how I play it.” Like “Sittin’ Pretty” took a turn from what it was because of...The story is that I went to New Orleans and made this record with Jason and completed it and then scrapped it because I didn’t play on it. Jason and I went out to New Orleans to make it, I picked New Orleans because I wanted to, you know it was a destination record (laughs). It was during the days, I mean money was just flowing right, during the days when just record companies were writing checks and I said, “OK I pick Kingsway in New Orleans.” I love New Orleans and I didn’t pick it because of Daniel Lanois, I didn’t even know who Daniel Lanois was at the time. So Jason and I went to New Orleans and we made it at the Egyptian Room and Kingsway, two studios. It was a bad scene, it wasn’t going very well. He was kind of taking over and I was feeling left out and I was pissed. We got through it, we made this album, I was not happy with it. So I went back to my A&R guy, Andy Factor, and I said, “Check this out, I mean I don’t think this is the record we want to put out is it? I mean it sounds like a Jason Falkner record (laughs) with me singing on it.” Which, by the way, this record should really be out because it’s amazing. I mean he did a great job but just I don’t think he took into consideration my...whatever, me, much at all. So it was a big controversy, you know, the record company was like, “Well what are we going to do, scrap it and make another one?” And yeah, that’s what we did.

It was unbelievable, they just said, “OK let’s do it again.” Ok so hundreds of thousands of dollars later. And I’ve got this bellyache now, I’ve got this new reflux thing and I’m just a wreck kind of, you know. And now I’ve got to make the record again. This time I’m going to make it at home, I decide. So I pick Hyde Street Studios, it just kind of has some cool history and some griminess to it I liked. And I’m going to pick a producer, but this time I’m going to pick somebody, you know, not a friend, and someone without this prior relationship, this teacher/student thing, which was hard to break, hard to get through that during the making of this record. So Ethan Johns was mentioned, I don’t know, he was thrown into the hat by my manager then, Richard Brown. And of course, I’m a fan of his dad (laughs) so immediately I’m like, “Well who’s this? Well hell yeah, already I’m down. If his dad is Glyn Johns then he’s gotta know how to make records.” But I went ahead and met him anyhow and turns out he’s an awesome guy. And I think maybe I was his first big project. Yeah he went on to make great, all these cool records, Kings of Leon...but yeah so I made it with Ethan Johns and I also chose a very very special person, secret weapon, Michael Andrews. And Michael and I just became friends really quickly and he was my advocate. He helped me get my ideas across. Because he was a cool guy and he was super talented himself, like very very talented, he was able to kind of understand what I wanted. And he was almost my liaison with Ethan at times, a lot of times, because I didn’t speak music at the time, I didn’t know how to talk about it. I would usually just be frustrated like, “Why doesn’t this sound right?” So Michael was, he was the man, just would explain it to me in whatever way. He loved my music too and he was happy to play it so I wanted him to be in on it. So he played bass and he played all kinds of crap on it, he played keys. And then I got Woody Saunders, an old friend and bandmate from Detroit. I played with him in many bands. We’ve fallen in and out over girls (laughs). He’s just a dude, a great guy and he came out. So Woody came out and stayed, actually lived with me for that time. And we’d go to Hyde Street every day and meet up with Michael and Ethan and then go to work. It was a blast.

“Sittin’ Pretty,” I wrote that song of course, in my bedroom alone, just no audience in mind, not thinking twice about it. But it was pointed out to me later while I was on tour in some college somewhere, some college town. I was on a radio station and the DJ was taking calls, live calls and a woman called and said, “I find that song offensive” (laughs). “What do those lyrics mean? It sounds abusive and misogynistic and…” And it is of course, I mean it sounds, (laughs) well not it is but it sounds that way, yes. That was a defining moment in my life. I hadn’t an argument for her, I didn’t know what to say. I said, “Well I didn’t intend for anyone to hear this song when I wrote it.” So I wasn’t really checking myself. And of course, I would never hit a woman, I would never tie up a woman or anything like that, it’s artistic license, just shit you think of. But since then, I think twice about my lyrics (laughs). I’ve always thought twice about them. Which sucks, I think.

“I’m Blessed”

Oh “I’m Blessed” yes. This is also part of the original six. I like saying that, “the original six,” makes it sound important. But yeah this one is a little more autobiographical, in fact a lot autobiographical. I think this is my attempt at a true autobiographical my life story sort of song, which I don’t think I did very well. But I think “I’m Blessed” started me off on, I think it was the first of these autobiographical songs, more so than, you know other songs, I play characters in them or whatever. But “I’m Blessed” is definitely, that’s me talking and there have been others where it’s me talking and in these “me talking” songs, it’s always about the south, it’s all these same themes, you know Louisiana, being an only child I think comes up a lot. But I think “I’m Blessed” was kind of the first of those songs.

I think like during that time, I didn’t know what I wanted probably. I mean, I know Jason has said that to me and he’s right. Like I just was kind of trying to figure it out, I mean trying to grow up really fast and then trying to figure out who I was. And trying to figure out a name for the album or what I would be called, I didn’t even know. Like I thought it was going to be a name like a band name, I wanted to call it a band name but it all happened so quickly. And you would think in all the makings of the record that I would have thought of a band name but I couldn’t think of one so in the end it was a very quick decision to call it “Brendan Benson.” Of course I wish I hadn’t (laughs). I wish I’d thought of that band name. Like you gotta be a solo guy like Peter Criss or you know, Gene Simmons (laughs). You can’t just like come out on the scene with some fucking name. You gotta know who the fuck that is right?

“Crosseyed”

I wrote “Crosseyed” when I was working at Off the Record in Royal Oak, Michigan. It was one of the best jobs ever (laughs). I worked there with all my friends, you know it was great. But one day, this girl came in to the record store and she just, I don’t know something about her just struck me. I was in to this girl, I don’t know whatever, but she had this strange kind of twitch about her. I don’t know, maybe it was neurological but she had some sort of literal twitch. But I thought it was kind of sexy or something, that kinda turned me on, I don’t know. So she left and I turned to my friend who was working there too and I thought about telling him about this chick and how I thought she was really hot but I thought twice about it. I thought, “I can’t say that cause he’ll make fun of me, she was like twitchy.” So that’s where “twitchy lady” comes from (laughs).

In the end, I felt like it was a little tortured. The songs were a little like tossed around and beat up a lot by then. Like changed and then put back together and changed, it was too much thought, yeah too much fiddling, tweaking, redoing. That’s a lesson I learned later on long after that. You know, moving back home to Detroit and meeting Jack and I think it was kind of the opposite of that. You know, just like you didn’t have to be perfect, there was no major seventh chords involved, it wasn’t about that. It was about what you’re singing, it was about the content or it was about the sound you’re making, not where your fingers are on the fretboard. I don’t know, I had my head up my ass too much. So that was good for me. I moved home for that reason. I was home visiting Detroit when I saw the White Stripes, their first show in fact, and I saw this scene going on, this whole garage rock scene and I was like, “This is where I come from, this is what I want in my life.” Know what I mean, like these guys are, yeah it’s a lot of posing and shit, it’s a lot of style over substance. But the substance is fucking cool and exciting and it’s easy to play (laughs). It’s not all these, and I don’t have to create, every song has to be A Night at the Opera. Whatever, I don’t have to write that fucking album. I can just write stupid little songs like I used to. Because that’s what One Mississippi is, a collection of stupid little songs, in my mind. Like, I had years to write all these stupid little songs and finally I got to put them on an album (laughs).

“Me Just Purely”

Jason came up with that minor thing in the beginning. The song was always (plays guitar chords and sings) “This is only temporary, these songs are my worst habits.” That and then he did that (plays guitar chord changes). And I was like, “Woah!” (laughs). I thought that was cool as hell. Together we made beautiful music.

The interesting thing about this song I think was the first line, “This is only temporary,” actually was stolen from I believe Tesla lyric. Tesla, you remember that band? Shit, I don’t know, 90s and they were like a heavy metal band or something. And I heard a song on the radio, I was just driving in my car and I heard a song on the radio and I think the lyric said something about “temporary.” And I just thought “temporary” was such a pretty word. “Me Just Purely” is really kind of based all around the phrase, “This is only temporary.” Pain is temporary, you know, yeah like it will only be temporary, or the song is temporary. Maybe that was my subconscious way of saying, “It’s OK to say what you’re about to say.” It allowed me to maybe speak my mind or something. I don’t know. This weird cathartic thing there I think. I say you know, “These songs are my worst habits,” each song is a bad habit. This song, I’m proud of, I like the lyric a lot. Even though it was inspired by a Tesla song. I don’t even know if it was Tesla actually. It was just some bad heavy metal song but it had that beautiful word “temporary” in it.

We kept a lot of his production ideas intact. Like “Me Just Purely” or something, you know that bridge in “Me Just Purely,” that’s Jason Falkner, you know. But that’s me on the, singing the vocal, that’s my melody. So to recreate that, how do you do that without Jason? There were like things that he had done that I didn’t even understand, you know, he had sung background parts that I was like, “I don’t know what the fuck that is. Like I don’t know how to do that. But the idea of some backgrounds would be great so what do we sing?” (laughs). We just were winging it. And we could figure it out too like some stuff we could figure out but it was just like, “But that’s the thing that doesn’t sound like me. So let’s not do that.” I thought I knew what I sounded like then (laughs).

“Got No Secrets”

Touring with Heatmiser was really enlightening for me. I mean, those guys were really smart, really kind of I think a little older than I was at the time and I looked up to them. You know, Elliott of course, at that point, I was a fan of Elliott’s and kind of starstruck a little bit. Even though Elliott was (laughs), at that time, no one really had heard of him. Long before the Grammys and all that or the Oscars or whatever it was. Elliott, I remember once, gave me some great advice. I was sitting with him at the bar in, I don’t know where we were, on tour somewhere, it doesn’t matter. And I said, I don’t know, I think I was trying to, I was picking his brain, I was geeking out asking him like about his songs and stuff I think. Being a general pain in the ass and just asking him, “What advice does he have?” And his advice was to “just love everything you do and not try to guess what somebody might like or not try to, don’t do it for anyone else but yourself. And make sure that you genuinely love it.” To this day, when in doubt, I think, “Alright.” Like sometimes I gotta stand back and do the Elliott test like, “Do I even like this? Do I love this?” It’s an important question to ask yourself, keep yourself in check.

“Got No Secrets,” that was a later addition to the album. Written between the Jason album and the new album. I did a lot of demos, I think I wanted to improve on the album so I scrapped a lot of songs while keeping some others and brought in new songs. So “Got No Secrets” was a new one and ehhh not my favorite. This one is not me talking (laughs) and a lot of people think, there’s the lyric about, “I took drugs and my dad beat me” and stuff. Completely not true. Just fantasy. This song is kind of silly, kind of a Police, I guess my attempt at like the Police or something. This song though, it’s like I feel like it’s one of the songs I wish I hadn’t put it on the record actually because it was a later addition and it shouldn’t have been on. I think it wasn’t very well realized. I think I was trying to get too poppy, I was trying to write songs for the radio. Thinking I needed some kind of radio kind of, I don’t know, once again, thinking way too much about it. So I kind of have disowned this song I think (laughs). I don’t play this one live ever. I can’t even sing it, I couldn’t even sing it for you. So fuck that song (laughs).

“How ‘Bout You”

“How ‘Bout You”? Is that the one with the laughing in the beginning? The beginning of side two yeah. That, everyone’s always wondering, I thought I’d give you an exclusive here, what that is, what is inspiring. Cause people have asked over the years like, “What is he saying? What does that mean?” It was a fart. We were standing around a microphone, Michael and I and Woody were standing around the mic, singing “How ‘Bout You,” singing those background vocals. And Michael farted and it was the worst smelling thing. So he’s (laughs) the only one, we bailed and he’s the only one who remained at the microphone (laughs) cracking up and saying, “That shit’s inspiring” (laughs). Still funny. Still fucking funny.

“Emma J”

“Emma J,” “Emma J,” well “Emma J” was written about my beautiful Emma J. I just wanted to write a love song for her. Well this song is cool because it was featured in Zero Effect, which was a movie with Ben Stiller and Bill Pullman. And I remember, Emma went to see it in the theater and it was mind-blowing, it was the best thing ever. When that song came on, in the theater, like when you hear your song in a movie in the theater, it’s like crazy-sounding. It’s awesome. It sounds weird, it sounds different but it sounds massive and of course in this movie like with these big names and stuff, it was very impressive and we were dazzled. It was a great feeling I think for both of us. Not only did I write her a love song but then I presented it to her in like THX sound (laughs) or whatever. And I think she was aptly impressed, I think she was very moved by it. I mean genuinely moved, I remember that night, it was great. Great night. Great night for us, I remember that one (laughs).

And of course Michael Andrews plays the solo on “Emma J,” which is some of the most brilliant notes ever played in succession. Brilliant, God. That’s where you can kind of hear his genius coming out. That’s all him, that’s his solo. So good.

“Insects Rule”

I remember writing this one, it took me all day and I was determined to write it. I was sick of writing songs about me or about girls or about, I don’t know just, I wanted to branch out and write, I wanted to write about anything I wanted to write about. I wanted to be able to do that so it was a challenge to myself I guess, it was a discipline. And when I had the first couple lines, “I once knew a woman, she was skin and bones,” it reminded me of a Robyn Hitchcock song and I knew I had to write it because that’s where I wanted to go. I just thought it was a good discipline for me. See I always thinking, over analyzing things way too much. But then, it was cool because this song I heard that the Foo Fighters played this song sometimes in Japan or something on a tour so I thought that was pretty cool.

“Maginary Girl”

I thought I was so clever by leaving off the “I” I guess. I don’t know why I thought that. It didn’t occur to me that I could say, (sings) “Imaginary girl, imaginary girl.” Honestly I didn’t think of that (laughs). “Maginary Girl” is one of those just sort of pop songs that I feel like has not withstood the test of time (laughs). And I’m not surprised. You know, it’s a little vapid, a little, I can’t even remember it really (laughs). I didn’t even listen to this album, I couldn’t even listen to it before we did this. I though about it but I was like, “Nope” (laughs). Not going there (laughs). I gotta actually, I do have to listen to this album. For instance, “Maginary Girl,” I don’t actually remember that song, maybe it’s cool. I should go listen to it (laughs). But I think that’s one of those songs like, (sings) “Maginary Girl,” I was very aggressive with my vocal I think and it’s hard for me to listen to that now. I was just a little over the top with it, you know what I mean? And I can’t stand to listen to this record by the way. This is a total cringe record for me. Like my voice, everything uhhhh, I’m trying too hard, I’m way, you know sounding kind of emo and kind of oof, bad. But genuinely it’s like a cult record. I’m so surprised that people know about it and then people site it as being like an influence and stuff and I think that’s so cool. But hell no man, that record’s so terrible (laughs). I mean truth be told.

“House In Virginia”

“House In Virginia,” another song for my lovely Emma J. This was my interpretation before ever having been to her grandmother’s house but hearing all about it. This was my interpretation of it, like she would tell me about her grandmother’s house in Virginia and it sounded just lovely, it sounded picturesque or cinematic or whatever you want to say and inspiring. So I wrote the song and then later finally did go to her grandmother’s house in Virginia and it was exactly like I described it (laughs). I’m just kidding but it kind of pretty much was.

Emma and I lasted, we lasted ten years. She moved home with me to Detroit at the end of the nineties, I think it was. And it took a couple years but we eventually split up. We remain great friends, we always will be great friends, I love her. But yeah it just wasn’t in the cards for us. She was everything to me at this time, during One Mississippi and Lapalco even. She was my support, my rock, she was my foundation, you know. So she’s in all this music, she was my Ono you know what I mean (laughs)? She was always with me when she wasn’t in school. Yeah and she lives in Switzerland now and I can’t wait to go visit her out there in fact.

You know the songs were kind of written because I was so sad and lonely, a lot of these songs. And then I met this girl, Emma, and I was in love with her and I didn’t want to leave and I want to just be with her. But I couldn’t because I had to go sing the songs (laughs). I couldn’t figure it out. Like when I first went on tour for One Mississippi, my first tour ever, I don’t remember exactly what it was, it was probably a local thing or whatever but I remember having to practice with the band, with my band and stuff and I had to learn how to play while standing up and singing at the same time. It was all different, it was crazy, I was starting from really just zero. And I had to like, I was supposed to be impressing people in these cities, going to play, like, “the new act on Virgin Records. The new whatever, his record’s hot, he’s going to be the new thing,” you know, and I was just failing (laughs). I hired my friends to play, most of them couldn’t play instruments, I taught them how to play the bass and I’d say just, “go like this and this.” I mean it was ridiculous.

I went to Japan in fact on a tour to Japan and was not invited back because I think the reason was because it wasn’t good enough (laughs). And it was amazing, the shows were amazing, which is the ironic part. I mean it was like a sea of people in the place and then outside the place and so we thought we had done great. I mean the music was terrible I think is what the problem was (laughs). Like in Japan, that was yeah the beginning and the end, the day I was going home or something, they had me in to the office for a meeting. And I have a translator, they’re speaking to me in Japanese. She’s translating that, “The show was not…” I don’t know what the words were exactly but it was pretty much saying like, “This was not good and this is not acceptable.” And maybe they said, “We’ll be in touch” (laughs). “We’ll have our lawyers be in touch” or something. I mean it was really, I’m probably making it sound worse than it was but it was really weird, yeah. Cause the show was really fun. I remember us climbing, at one point, climbing up on shit, some of us were climbing up on the rafters. The crowd was going berserk. I mean whatever, fuck it, that’s a good show, I think. Cause if you can get a Japanese crowd to go berserk, you know. Maybe they weren’t going berserk now that I think about it (laughs). My memory is like, it was just crickets probably. We were climbing up on shit, no one gives a fuck. No I mean, I had just a bad live show. Plain and simple. No way of (laughs), there’s no way of getting around that. It sucked. I’m sure on some level, I was relieved because I think I probably did it, in retrospect, I think I probably was sabotaging it the whole time. I was scared of it. All these becoming, you know, Beck was breaking and I remember people were saying, “You could be like Beck, the next Beck” and stuff and that just didn’t sit well with me. Now that I think about it, I don’t know what they were talking about but any kind of talk of success or fame and I was like doubled over. I’m sure I sabotaged it, I’m sure I did all that. Hiring my friends, you know, yeah. Maybe even not releasing the Jason record. Maybe it was too good. Cause it was really good.

Being a performer, being an entertainer, that part I hadn’t worked on, I hadn’t any experience doing that. So my big Tom Petty story, it was like terrible. Yeah I got to open for Petty cause we shared the same manager really was how it happened. So I got a night at the Fillmore because he was doing I think maybe two weeks or he was doing a residency, and having different openers. So I got to get one of the slots, I got one night. And I was, you know, this was my big opportunity I think, this was my big moment, you know. I got Ethan Johns to play with me, he played some pump organ and Dan McCarroll, who was in the Grays, who was the drummer in The Grays at the time, he played this cocktail kit. And I played my songs for this San Francisco audience and they were cool to me but you know, it was terrible (laughs). And then I asked, of course I asked my manager like, “What did Tom think?” And he said, “I think Tom didn’t have anything to say (laughs) or he didn’t see it” or something like that. But he did say that Mike Campbell saw it and Mike said that he just didn’t get it (laughs).

“Cherries”

“Cherries,” this was a blast to record. I think this was all of us in the room, including Ethan Johns on keys, Ethan was on the Hammond B3, which he plays so well. And Woody on drums of course, Michael on bass. And this was done live and we did a bunch of takes and we edited it together, spliced it all together and you can hear it, you can hear the tempo speed up, it’s hilarious or slow down. But it was so fun to do, it was great, I wanted to do, I don’t know, I wanted to do that kind of fun Beatles studio stuff. We did many takes I remember because we were all vibing on it man, it was just such a droney song, you know. We were all trying to get the right magical moments to happen I think. The song itself, the lyric or the inspiration comes from this girl that, she wore this chapstick I guess, it smelled like cherries. And for some reason, whenever she came around, I don’t know she peaked my interest. I was always interested in I think the twitchy lady or the weird people that were on the periphery or I don’t know, kind of a guilty pleasure thing, almost ashamed to say that I was attracted to this person. You know, because she was uncool maybe so I think that’s what that’s about. My secret was that she was the one who smelled like cherries.

These songs are so old, I can’t get down anymore. There’s nothing, like the recordings, I can’t listen to those cause... I don’t know, it’s weird. Maybe I’ve kind of turned my back on them in a way, mentally. Like it’s a little bit painful to go there. I mean, that might be a little too stonery to say but I feel like there might be some truth to that. They kind of come with bad, I don’t know, bad vibes, a little bit. It turned kind of ugly you know with Jason. I mean not ugly but just we fell out, we totally like, he was so angry that I chose not to use the record. And then there was this incident with the woman, the so-called friend, who, she asked me if I would mind if she gave it to her friend at a record company. And I said, “No, please do, that would be awesome.” And it turns out, it was Andy Factor. But also, some other people got a hold of it and this bidding war happened, slight, not bidding war, it was more a courting. I just met a few people. But she, this so-called friend, in the end wanted this big finder’s fee. So I was, I’m not playing dumb or I don’t want to sound like a victim but you know, I was kind of this slightly dumb kid from the midwest out in Los Angeles, dealing with some heavy shit. You know, heavy hitters, people who knew shit I didn’t know. I didn’t know what a finder’s fee was, I didn’t know what a producer was, I didn’t know any of that crap. All I knew was that she did this for me and I thanked her and I didn’t know I should pay her but you know, there was a lawyer involved and shit, and I was kind of like, “Woah man. This is gnarly.” She just guessed that I got all this money I guess, I don’t know, so weird. Yeah so I was dealing with all this shit man so I moved the fuck out of Los Angeles in with Emma, you know, I finally won her over and we moved in together and I was living this better life without these kind of vultures. But I also had to like go to work, I had to go on tour and work this record. I mean, I’m being slightly dramatic, you know at the time, of course life was great. I had all this money finally. First time in my life, only time in my life (laughs). But yeah when I think back on it, it’s like there’s some gnarly shit that went down.

I’m so glad to hear that One Mississippi is still being talked about and still being mentioned by my peers and you know, younger musicians and people citing it as being an inspiration or an influence. And the fact that it’s kind of a cult classic record, really makes me feel great. Although I can hardly listen to it nowadays, it still of course has a huge place in my heart because it’s where I come from. It’s a snapshot of that time in my life but also it was yeah like the beginning of my career and the beginning of all these things. It’s a very significant record to me for sure. Even though I can’t listen to it (laughs).

Outro:

Dan Nordheim: Visit lifeoftherecord.com for more information about Brendan Benson. You’ll also find a link to stream or purchase One Mississippi. Thanks for listening.

Credits:

“Tea”

(Benson)

“Bird's Eye View”

(Benson)

“Sittin' Pretty”

(Benson/Falkner)

“I'm Blessed”

(Benson/Falkner)

“Crosseyed”

(Benson/Falkner)

“Me Just Purely”

(Benson/Falkner)

“Got No Secrets”

(Benson)

“How 'Bout You”

(Benson)

“Emma J”

(Benson)

“Insects Rule”

(Benson/Falkner)

“Maginary Girl”

(Benson)

“House In Virginia”

(Benson/Falkner)

“Cherries”

(Benson/Falkner)

℗ Gladsad Music (ASCAP) and Gladsad Music/Arthur Unknown Music (ASCAP)

Theme Music:

“Winter Cold” by North Home

℗ Meladdy Music (ASCAP)

Intro/Outro Music:

“The Hardy Boys” by Charlie Don’t Shake

Episode produced, edited and mixed by Dan Nordheim

Mastered by Jeremy Whitwam