You’ve got to want it.

And you’ve got to be willing to do the work.

So I’m standing on stage at Jazz Fest watching Hall & Oates and it occurs to me the difference between them and all the acts I’d seen previously is they had hits, and the others did not. But what were the odds of Hall & Oates having a hit again?

Yes, Springsteen brought Gary U.S. Bonds back on to the chart, but then Mr. Bonds dropped right back into obscurity. Those latter day-comeback hits are creepy. And now, you can’t even have them. Because radio doesn’t want you, you’re too damn old.

So what you do you?

Cry in your beer and play your old hits.

No one’s as jaded as a baby boomer musician. Believing the good times were stolen from him by the Internet. As if oldsters always continued to top the chart.

So Hall & Oates are going through their hits.

And one thing that’s staggering is it’s not on hard drive. They’re really playing. Remember when kids took lessons in school, practiced, studied? Now everything is instant, if you’re not famous on your first track, cut moments after you picked up your instrument, you figure someone else is to blame.

But that’s not the way it used to be. Wow, you should have seen Irma Thomas fronting her funk/soul unit. But no one will form a big band anymore, they’re afraid they won’t get paid, that if you split the money up nine ways, there’ll be next to none left.

But Hall & Oates have got a big troupe. They’ve got a full sound. And that’s all a result of those damn hits. Like “Rich Girl,” “Kiss On My List,” “Private Eyes”…

They go on and on.

And Daryl Hall knows he’s got to play them every night. But he mixes up some of the other songs, and he says “Sara Smile” and “She’s Gone” are truly fresh every performance.

So I’m talking to Daryl in his dressing room…

Yes, that’s one of the perks of being me. And being me, I know this is not the best time, because he’s still amped up on the energy. You’ve got to screw yourself up to deliver, and it takes hours to come down.

You see I’m standing on stage thinking about the unlikelihood of the band having another hit and I realize Daryl Hall found a way out. Via his TV show, “Live From Daryl’s House.”

How did it come about?

Daryl and T-Bone Wolk b.s.’ing. All the good ideas arise when you’re relaxing, in the shower, doing something else.

And unlike most people, Daryl said LET’S DO IT!

And he paid for it himself.

If you think this is common, you know no musicians. Musicians need someone else to pay. Hopefully a label.

But Daryl laid down 40k a show…OF HIS OWN MONEY!

Are you willing to do this?

This is the number one e-mail I get, after LISTEN TO MY MUSIC AND WRITE ABOUT IT!, where can I find some money?

Look inside your wallet. Wanna steer your own career? Pay for it. And now, more than ever in the modern era, no one else is gonna pay.

Palladia’s paying Daryl now, but that’s years later.

Yes, today you’ve got to stick it out so long you don’t know whether you’re on the road or in the ditch to ultimately discover if what you’ve got is real.

But it doesn’t stop there…with “Live From Daryl’s House,” with its new acts and food.

Yes, new acts. That’s how Daryl Hall keeps current! Wasn’t his intention, but if you get on the road, it’s the detours, the unexpected, that will pay dividends.

Daryl didn’t have a master plan. He just started.

Which is exactly what you need to do.

So, without a single new hit, without chasing the dragon, Daryl Hall made himself relevant today.

But, there’s more!

He’s got a show coming up on the DIY channel, wherein he restores an historic house.

Huh?

Daryl’s done a bunch of these. He restored the house you see on “Live From Daryl’s House.” Actually, that’s two put together!

But he just sold it.

Now he bought an old house in Sherman, Connecticut, and his redo is what makes the DIY show.

How does Daryl know how to do it?

His family is made up of musicians and builders.

You’re all about your roots.

And he bought a club across the river in New York. Yes, Daryl Hall is going into the club business!

Huh?

That’s a terrible business!

But he’s got an experienced partner and he’s got the acts appearing on his TV show and he’s gonna go for it.

In other words, you’ve got to say yes as opposed to no.

And the successful never stop working.

Those hits didn’t come by accident. Daryl Hall dedicated enough time to get there, do you?

P.S. I spoke with John Oates too. He just cut 18 singles in Nashville, with everyone from Vince Gill to Hot Chelle Rae. There’s no need for an album. And making singles, they can all sound different. And he’s playing Bonnaroo with Jim James. That’s the new game, going on an adventure, not plotting it all out in advance, but just doing.

P.P.S. I told John he needed to tweet, he needed to know who his audience was. He was reluctant, but this is now part of the game. You’re not an actor, you don’t have to make expensive MTV-style videos, but you do have to be in contact with your audience, otherwise they won’t know you have new stuff out, they won’t be able to support it!

P.P.P.S. The food at Jazz Fest is cheap! Nothing’s ten bucks. So you can sample. I wish the rest of the venues would follow their lead. Ate a great muffaletta!

P.P.P.P.S. Could have listened to Del McCoury being interviewed all damn day. Ellis Marsalis tickled the ivories and I was enraptured. John McHugh hipped me to the Pine Leaf Boys. Music is social. Hell, I checked out stuff mainly because it was favorited on the Jazz Fest app!

P.P.P.P.P.S. Daryl went on Stern and views for “Live From Daryl’s House” jumped. Make Howard your number one stop. Assuming he’ll have you. Assuming, like Daryl Hall, you’re willing to be honest.

 The Rolling Stones – 50 & Counting Opening Night – Los Angeles Staples…

Utterly LAUGHABLE!

And this is the OFFICIAL CHANNEL!

Is someone brain dead there? It’s almost impossible to watch this video and have a desire to go, talk about revealing the clueless men behind the curtain.

This is the Stones. A band that can’t even play “The Last Time” as well as you did in middle school.

In case you’ve been buried in a hole, the Stones got rid of all those high-priced seats by blowing them out for $85. Four digits worth.

Doubt me?

Just read these tweets from Wes Brodsky (@WesBrodsky):

@Lefsetz how right you were… Look at the $85 ticket line at Staples for Rolling Stones. Slashed everything last min pic.twitter.com/x9Lh0q45OC

— Wes Brodsky (@WesBrodsky) May 4, 2013

@Lefsetz btw that line wraps around 3 times. Must be 2-3k tickets that got released at the $85 price point

— Wes Brodsky (@WesBrodsky) May 4, 2013

That pic is stunning.

Then again, that’s how it used to be, back when concert tickets cost 3, 4 and 5 dollars. Before greed turned everybody into a bottom-fisher.

In other words, these people would have gone for a reasonable price, they wanted to attend, but not for $600.

Meanwhile, they couldn’t even bake in the fees?

I mean even the Eagles, who broke the triple digit ducat figure, don’t have the chutzpah to charge extra, they include the fees in the ticket price.

But the dirty little secret is the twenty seven to forty bucks in fees are promoter profit.

In other words, the Stones are not part of the solution, but part of the PROBLEM!

And is anybody really gonna pay $600 for a ticket after this? Or are they just gonna wait for the bargain? This is how Ron Johnson lost his job running J.C. Penney, by trying to turn a second-rate brand based on discounts into his previous employer, Apple.

But even Apple doesn’t insult you with prices this high.

Yup, you can see the Stones or buy an iPad, which will give you years of functionality, well, at least until the Cupertino company supersedes the model you’ve got, unlike the Stones, who’ve been playing the same old songs for decades.

And I got this interesting e-mail from a scalper:

From: Brad Coombs
Re: Stones Tickets

Bob:

A few observations from my brother-in-law at Circle City Tickets, in Indianapolis.

Brad,

He’s right on everything about how the markets work and that eventually people just say screw it I’m not going.

With social media if people are thinking that way it only takes a short time to get a “tipping point” where virtually no one new is going and the sales just stop.  You’ll always have the die-hards that will find a way to go no matter what but after that a lot of people only go so as not to be out of the loop socially.

Thanks for forwarding.

Mike

Mike Peduto
Circle City Tickets

Yup, resellers know the game better than the Stones!

But come on, if the above video isn’t taken down by time you read this, I’d be stunned.

There’s no energy. The crowd looks like a parody of the seventies. The band is so thin they make Gwen Stefani look fat, and she looks like she stepped onto the set of “Cocoon,” and she sucks besides…well, she adds nothing. Why didn’t the band get someone their own age? It’s not like the audience cares about Stefani, maybe only the press. Where was Bonnie Raitt, Buddy Guy? Fergie worked on the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame special because that was made for everybody, for HBO, not fans.

So if anybody who was at this show says it was great, they’re lying. Because we have evidence. This horrible video.

The Stones shouldn’t have gone out at all.

They’re a laughingstock.

Video may have killed the radio star, but social media and the Internet put a stake in the heart of the Rolling Stones, who should have quit while they were ahead, kept their money and stayed home.

They’re an insult to history.

They rehearsed?

Paul McCartney is better in his SLEEP!

1

Last night in Memphis
Tonight in New Orleans

That’s right, I’m with the band. Where we all want to be.

If you don’t know Little Big Town’s “The Road To Here,” you’re unaware of the best Fleetwood Mac album the legendary band didn’t cut.

Oh, they played their megahit “Pontoon.” Even the minor smash “Tornado.” But what made my day was those tracks from the “The Road To Here,” “Bones” and “Boondocks,” and…”I’m With The Band.”

I’d be lying if I told you the crowd in front of the Acura Stage cared. They were all just camped out for Fleetwood Mac. En masse.

Reminded me of nothing so much of that night back in the sixties when I was crushed at a Chambers Brothers concert at Boston Common. Get squished once, you never forget it, you know it can happen again. Maybe Jazz Fest is too successful. If someone cried FIRE, even if there was none, at least a score of people would be trampled, that’s just how tight it was.

And I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention Little Big Town’s countrified cover of “Born This Way.” That got the somnambulant audience going.

But it was “I’m With The Band” that made my day, that made me feel privileged to be in attendance, pondering how far I’ve come and how far I still have to go.

Lord I was born with a suitcase in my hand
Living in a life that few could understand
Sometimes it gets so confusing that I don’t know where I am
But I always know who I’m with
I’m with the band

That’s the magic. When the guitars start to twang and the voices begin to soar. We’re lifted out of our seats, onto our feet, we can’t help but sing along.

And unlike Maroon 5, Little Big Town is forever. Because they had another hit, the aforementioned “Pontoon,” and unlike pop, and the new rock, country never forgets.

2

Along about eighteen twenty five
I left Tennessee very much alive
And I never would have got through the Arkansas mud
If I hadn’t been a’ridin’ that Tennessee stud

Jimmy Driftwood wrote it, the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band did the definitive version with Doc Watson, but the Little Willies performed it this afternoon.

Songs last.

And they’re not the ones that make the hit parade so much as those that infect musicians, who keep them alive.

3

If it keeps on rainin’, levee’s gonna break

Come on, it’s my second favorite Led Zeppelin song, after “Ten Years Gone” and maybe “Battle Of Evermore.” It’s the headbanging riff and the drums!

And that’s the one thing that Galactic could not replicate.

Still, today the rain finally stopped. But this is the land of levees, the original was done by Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe. And to hear that harmonica and those lyrics is to get your body swaying back and forth, like you’re running the river with Huck Finn, like nothing matters other than this moment.

I heard no more from Galactic, but this was enough.

4

The Preservation Hall Jazz Band was better than billed. It was the energy, the dancing, the fun!

Once upon a time we didn’t dance to electronics, but real instruments and people. The Preservation Hall Jazz Band will remind you of that era.

5

I’d be lying if I told you the highlight of Phoenix’s performance was the band.

It was FRANCIS FORD COPPOLA! Sitting right there, next to his daughter and grandkids.

This is the guy who did “Godfather” and “Godfather II,” possibly the best two flicks in the canon. He was relaxed, taking in his son-in-law’s band, but I couldn’t stop thinking about his brain…”Apocalypse Now,” how did he come up with all that? Musicians are not the only living legends.

And sure, I’d talk to Spielberg.

I’ve stood next to George Lucas.

But they’re the Stones.

Francis Ford Coppola is THE BEATLES!

And Phoenix radiated energy and managed to enthrall the crowd by being themselves, which is so different from the rest of the hit parade, who strive to sound just like everybody else.

It was the synths…

And the drummers.

Two. Who were so powerful I think they might have been able to replicate John Bonham’s parts.

6

Last night I went to a party at Terence Blanchard’s house.

He lives on a main rue in the Garden District, an edifice so spacious and spectacular you ponder moving to New Orleans yourself.

And when he stood up and blew with Dee Dee Bridgewater and Shelly Berg I got those goose bumps you feel when you’re in the presence of greatness.

And just like that Joni Mitchell song, they were doing it all for free. Yup, the public pays, their friends get a glimpse for nothing.

And like everybody has e-mailed me, there’s seemingly more music after the festival than during it.

Tonight I got invited to see the Black Crowes with their new guitarist, Jackie Greene.

There’s a party at a bowling alley.

There’s multifarious bands on Frenchmen Street.

More than you can partake of.

I’m gonna have to come back!

(But I’ve still got one more day to go!)

Monica said she just recorded it in Spanish.

What was the name of the track again?

“Maybe It’s You.”

Don’t know it.

But then twenty minutes later it came up again, and this time I heard it correctly, she sang IT MIGHT BE YOU!

It took just that long for the synapses to fire, to remember the Stephen Bishop number. You remember, from “Tootsie”!

That’s what Mitch said. I referenced the suit Bish wore on the Oscars, which looked like paint had been dripped upon it, and Mitch just remembered the red dress Dustin Hoffman wore in the movie. He started reminiscing about a flick from thirty years ago, which we all know so well.

Isn’t it funny how the shoot-em-ups make all the money, but it’s those that touch our hearts that truly live on.

And I know Bish.

Used to see him all the time at Harold’s house. We connected over women. We were both single, me freshly separated, Stephen never married, with great insight and a good sense of humor. You see these people on stage, you hear them on the radio, you’ve got no idea what they’re truly like. Then you meet them and you realize THEY’RE JUST LIKE YOU! Only a lot more successful.

You remember “On and On”. Which I always mixed up in my mind with Rupert Holmes’ “Pina Colada Song” (formally known as “Escape”), even though they’re very different, but they were both AM hits when everybody listened to the FM, everybody hip, but both were about…being away.

Down in Jamaica they got lots of pretty women
Steal your money then they break your heart

“On and On” is one of those tracks you think is too wimpy when it’s a hit and then years later you realize it’s truly magic, especially when you find out the guy who wrote and sang it is anything but wimpy.

But Bishop didn’t write “It Might Be You.” The music was by Dave Grusin, the lyrics by Alan and Marilyn Bergman. But it sounds just like him! Most people are stunned to find out he didn’t write it.

Then again, he delivers it.

But the production is key, it sounds like a TV theme, anything but rock and roll. The way it starts quietly, coming over the hill, it makes you think of a sitcom, like “Mary Tyler Moore.” And then there are the accents, which you sing along to, when you hear the track and know they represent “Maybe it’s you,” which is sung over and over again later in the song.

And the verses are meaningful, but sappy.

Then there’s the chorus…

Something’s telling me it might be you
It’s telling me it might be you

MIGHT! You know the feeling, when you’re talking to somebody the first time and you get that feeling, somewhere in your upper chest, THIS COULD BE THE ONE!

And when you leave the engagement you’re walking on air, basking in the euphoria of the connection. The next day is a complete write-off, all you can do is think of them. You’re in your own mind and you love it. You’d almost rather not call or text or e-mail, for fear the spell will be broken.

But it’s the end of the song that truly resonates, the aforementioned “Maybe it’s yous”

Maybe it’s you
Maybe it’s you
I’ve been waiting for all of my life

I’ve been waiting for so long, barking up trees, kissing frogs, but finally…I might have found the one.

Maybe it’s you
Maybe it’s you
I’ve been waiting for all of my life

This is the essence. This is what the song sounds like. Hope. That a better life is coming down the pike. That while you were just minding your own business your whole life became complete.

And every time you listen to the track, you love it more.

Because of the foreshadowing.

The wandering verses.

And the resolution.

Great music is not about genres. It’s about songs, production and performance.

And life isn’t about achievements, but feelings.

And when I listen to “It Might Be You” I feel like life is made to work out. That when you’re down and out it’ll surprise you. Just maybe…

Rhinofy-It Might Be You

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