Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast - Roger Cook & Henry Gross

Episode Date: June 28, 2021

British-born singer-songwriter Roger Cook ("Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress") and Brooklyn-born songwriter-recording artist Henry Gross ("Shannon") share tales from their seven decades in the music business and talk about playing mob-owned joints, forming doo-wop groups, opening for the Beatles (and Benny Hill!), being inspired by Jimi Hendrix and hearing their songs on the radio for the first time. Also, Casey Kasem blows his cool, George Martin teams with Peter Sellers, Henry becomes the youngest artist to perform at Woodstock and Roger writes a soft drink jingle that becomes a worldwide sensation. PLUS: Sha Na Na! "I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman"! The comedy of Jackie Vernon! Gary Lewis and the Playboys! Steve Coogan sends up Blue Mink! And Henry and Roger remember the late, great John Prine! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by FX's The Bear on Disney+. In Season 3, Carmi and his crew are aiming for the ultimate restaurant accolade, a Michelin star. With Golden Globe and Emmy wins, the show starring Jeremy Allen White, Io Debrey, and Maddie Matheson is ready to heat up screens once again. All new episodes of FX's The Bear are streaming June 27, only on Disney+. Hi, this is Gilbert Gottfried, and this is Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host Frank Santopadre. And tonight, we are pleased to have two terrific guests. guests. One of them is Roger Cook, who is a musician, singer, producer, former pantomime artist, and one of pop and country music's most prolific and successful songwriters.

Writing or co-writing memorable hit songs, including You've Got Your Troubles, Here Comes That Rainy Day Feeling, Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress, My Baby Loves Lovin', and the Coca-Cola jingle turned into an international sensation, I'd like to teach the world to sing. His songs have been covered by the likes of Johnny Cash, Dusty Springfield, Bing Crosby, Bette Midler, Neil Diamond, Petula Clark, The Drifters, Gene Pitney, and his late great friend John Prime. In the mid-1970s, he relocated to Nashville and enjoyed a second career as a writer of country hits including Don Williams' I Believe in You and Crystal Gale's Talking in Your Sleep and George Strait's One Night at a Time, among others. Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Country Music Hall of Fame

and the first Englishman to be inducted into the Nashville Songwriters Hall of Fame. And our other guest, Henry Gross is a Jew.

That's all that matters to me. I mean, I guess you wrote or sang, whatever. Yeah, that's right. But you're a Jew. That's right. Does anybody need more coffee? Henry Gross is a musician, singer, songwriter, record producer, occasional actor, and one of the funniest men in rock and roll. A founding member of the doo-wop group Sha Na Na, he played the New York World's Fair and the Catskills while still a teen.

Fair and the Catskills while still a teen. And he was also the youngest person to perform at Woodstock. He's opened for acts like Billy Joel, Aerosmith, Fleetwood Mac, the Beach Boys, and collaborated with everyone from Dion to Jim Croce to Chaka Khan and written songs for Judy Collins, Mary Travers, Southside Johnny, Ronnie Miltzap, and Cyndi Lauper. In 1976, he released the single Shannon, a song we've discussed on this podcast a number of times, which quickly went gold in the U.S. and became a worldwide hit, reaching number six on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 and number five on the Cashbox Top 100. And in 2006, he toured with a terrific one-man theatrical production entitled One Hit Wanderer, a journey through the highlights and funniest moments of his life in and out of the showbiz business.

The showbiz business. Frank and I. I don't care. We get the general idea. We get the idea. A journey through the highlights and funniest moments of his life in and out of the entertainment business. Frank and I are excited to welcome to the show

the pride of Bristol and Brooklyn, Roger Cook and Henry Gross. Wow. Wow. These introductions double as obituaries, too. Welcome, boys. Well, here we are. We made it through the intro.

Yeah, like liftoff at NASA. Now, before anything else, way before United Colors of Bennington, there was I'd like to teach the world to sing or we'd like to teach the world to sing. And, okay, Roger, how much fucking money did you make off that? Well, it supported three divorces. I made a shitload of money, but it's all gone. load of money but it's all gone i spent it roger we i didn't know gilbert was going to start there but it's an interesting place to start a song that began life as a jingle and something that you had problems with for years you you learned you hated it for a while well yes in a way i wrote a jingle it was a 28 second jingle with my friend roger greenaway you know and a 58 second jingle as well and that was that we got paid and it was done

for i didn't expect it to become a record and go in the charts you know uh it was a little lightweight for that but i've changed my mind i've kind of liked i've learned to like the song because so many people know it old people know it very well and young kids learn they sing it in school so what's the hate anymore and like i said i spent the money that is one of those songs that everybody grew up on. Grew up on, did you say? Sorry. Grew up on. Well, we should explain that Roger, he was called in with his partner.

He wrote it as a jingle. And then for years it followed him around. You said you had disdain for being introduced as Roger Cook, the man who taught the world to sing. Yeah, for God's sake, Sal. Yeah. Yeah, and like I said, I really didn't like the song that much at all for a long, long time. But I like it now, and they even sing it in church in some place in Tennessee. They sing the words of Amazing Grace to that tune, and it works perfectly. That's incredible how how

pleasantly surprised were you to see it turn up in the final episode of mad men now that was something that was something i i was very pleased also i knew there was a little check you know coming so never supposed to amuse me amaze me but, I've learned to love that song. I just have. And I always end my act with it. I do sing here now and again. I haven't sung much in 18 months, of course. But when I go out and sing, I usually do a medley of old hits from the 60s and 70s. And we teach the world to sing.

And it always brings the crowd up and they clap and they sing along and it's it's kind of i've learned to like it learn to love it yeah yeah henry you we were before we turned the mics on you were saying that you and we discussed this on the phone you're from brooklyn you're one of us you're a lifelong gilbert fan i am and and i'm yeah go ahead you know i i grew up in brooklyn it was a it was you know. I grew up in Brooklyn. You know, if you grew up there, it was a rather interesting grow-up. My neighborhood was a tough neighborhood.

And, you know, I learned very quickly that I didn't fit in with... My ethnic group was disliked. You know? I mean, it was interesting because when I moved to Nashville, I mean, Roger and I both moved to Nashville. You know, I moved in 1986. And, you know, part of the reason was the city was changing. You know, it was getting really crazy. I was in front of the Orange Julius on 6th Avenue and a bunch of guys came up to me and said, yo, get off the phone.

You know, there was a pay phone on the corner. And I not only got off the phone, I left the city. You know, I said, everything, you can have everything here. You can have the pogroms, you can have whatever you're doing. But it was interesting. So I went to Nashville, and it was great. People told me it would be crazy down there, that, you know, that I would have a harder time down there. And, you know, they said that, you know, what are you going to Nashville for? You know, they said, you know, Jew is a verb in Tennessee. But it wasn't. But it wasn't. It wasn't. It wasn't. You know, it's, come on, Roger. I mean, I was nervous. You know, I thought someone burned a cross on my lawn. And I moved there and there was no problem at all. I

found out that cross burning had been, you know, banned, you know, because of the secondhand smoke. But OK, you know, it was OK. I mean, it wasn't terrible, but, you know, it was anyway, Nashville was wonderful in 1986. It was like Mayberry. Brooklyn was, you know, I think I always remember what Larry David said, you know, he was always advised, you know, he was always counseled to exercise in Brooklyn because everybody's told you, hey, take a hike. You know, it was always like that. What part of Brooklyn are you from, Henry? I was from Flatbush. My father, we had my father had a little drugstore on Rutland Road and Nostrand Avenue.

You could actually walk to Abbotsfield from there. You know that neighborhood, Gil. Yes, and it's so funny because to this day, I can't get used to people talking about baseball and mentioning Ebbets Field. To me, it was always like this crappy, the crappy projects for Ebbets Field. That's right. You're younger, man. Well, you know, my dad only. Oh, you didn't. Or Abbottsville. That's right.

You're younger, man. Well, you know, my dad only took me to one game there in 1957. And it was fantastic. Because Gil Hodges lived, actually, where I grew up, Gil Hodges lived around the corner and two blocks back. And he used to pass by the stoop where I sat practicing guitar on his way to the church on the corner. And he would always sit down and ask me to play him whatever I was working on. So, you know, he practiced a lot because he didn't want to have nothing for Gil Hodges.

And so the game that I went to with my dad, as it turned out, Gil Hodges actually hit a home run on the bottom of the ninth to win the game, which was pretty good. Which turns up as an important component in your one-man show. Yeah. Well, it kind of sent a piece of it. It's beautiful. Years ago, when I was struggling for anything, I used to work at this club. Not work, because I got no money.

But there was a club in Brooklyn calledoklyn called gil hodges grand slam lounge was that in the bowling alley to gil hodges lanes was that in there part of that don't know i remember i remember it was it was a shitty club it was brooklyn i mean you know i grew up playing you know i don't want i grew up playing all these clubs you know in't want to, I grew up playing all these clubs, you know, in Brooklyn, they were all mob joints. And we had amazing experience in these places. I mean, I remember a place, do you remember, Gil, if you worked in Brooklyn, was there a place called the Albemarle Towers on top of the Albemarle Theater? They used to have all different kinds of entertainment on many floors of this tower. They had ballroom dancing, they got a bingo, and then they had a rock and

roll club. It was called Crazy Larry's Discotheque. I love it. Crazy Larry had arms the size of your legs, and he had a little Johnny Jellybean hat on top. And we played there a lot, and they used to give us 10, you know, we'd get 10 bucks a man for playing four or five hours. And I remember at the end of one gig, one of the guys who was a friend of ours decided they'd do us a favor and lift the microphone from Crazy Larry. So we're unpacking, and we're out there. We're waiting a half an hour, and the keyboard player with our FISA organ hasn't come out yet. So we went back in, and we said, what's going on? And they said, you stole the microphone.

And I said, I didn't take, what are you talking about? I didn't take your microphone. He says, that's all right. He says, he says, you know, you stole the microphone. We want it back. So I said, so what are you going to do? You're not going to let us take the organ out? Because we're sitting in the middle of the room.

Everything is gone. He says, you're not going to let us take the organ out? He says, no, you could take the organ. We'll keep this guy here that plays it till you bring back the fucking mic. It's a true story and I have to tell you, the guy who took it found

the mic. I love it. Henry, what's next? Go ahead, Gil. How did the two of you meet? Oh, he came to town and I don't know where we met, Henry. Well, I'll tell you what. Your pal Murphy probably introduced us.

That's it. We had our best buddy, our mutual best buddy, Ralph Murphy, who is a brilliant songwriter, producer, was Roger's partner in a company called Pickalick Music. And I went to see Roger and Ralph, rather. I went to see Ralph, and I fell in love with Ralph. I went over, you have to understand, Roger, as you get into talking to Roger, you'll see that he's really an amazing character.

Picolic was unusual, because I came from New York, and when you went to see publishers in New York, you know, it was very, everybody had the suits with the pin under the tie. You know, the whole thing was like you were talking to the guy who owned the Mets. It was, you know, everybody, everything was very staunch. When you went to Nashville,

all the people running the companies had guitars sitting around and they were songwriters too. And they were producers and they were artists. Like Roger was in how many groups? You had a band that had more hits than the Beatles on the BBC when they were out, were artists like roger was in how many groups were you you had a band that was had more cuts hits than the beatles on the bbc when they were out right blue mink we we we had a fair run yes we did and then he did a thing with roger greenway david and jonathan i

mean roger was an artist and great one and so ralph murphy produced april wine in canada he did a lot of stuff so i showed up 10 o'clock to write a song with Ralph. He says, come over, write a song. So I get there 10 o'clock in the morning. And I wake up a mutual friend of ours, John Earl, who was in a sleeping bag on the floor in Ralph's office. And I wake him up and he said he was living there. I said, I'm sorry. I was here to write a song.

He says, no, no. And he got up and he left. And then Ralph came in and I wasn't there 10 minutes. And he had a little refrigerator behind the desk. And we started having Heinekens at 10 in the morning. And we wrote a good song in about an hour. And then we went out to drink something else. And I thought, I love this place.

And so I wound up signing with Roger and Ralph. And I met Roger through Ralph Murphy. It's kind of funny, Henry. You told me on the phone you moved to Nashville and fell in with a bunch of Brits. Yeah, it's true. Because, you know, we had—see, the country—I went to Nashville because New York, really, the reason I left New York is you couldn't get records recorded. The only thing that was being recorded was R&B. And, you know, I'm a rock and roller. I wasn't going to get anything cut. So I went to Nashville. I thought

country's closer to rock and roll, which it is. And so I went down there and it was, you know, really, it was great. You can't imagine Nashville in 1986. It was just, it was like a little paradise. And it was like, you know, when Dylan came to New York, he went to Greenwich Village and you could get a room for $50 on Bleecker Street. You know, you get a little hole in the wall to hang your hat. When I left for Nashville, it was either get a one bedroom on 35th Street and breathe the tunnel soot or go down to Tennessee and get a house with a yard and a pool. It was great. It was the same price. So that was part of it. But really it was like the village was when Dylan came because there was, there were

millions of songwriters, everybody that you talk to. If you said, what do you do in New York? You say, what do you do? And the guy would say, you'd say, I'm a songwriter. He'd go, yeah, but what do you do? You know, they didn't get it. But in Nashville, they would say, oh, you need a loan for a bus? Come to our bank, whatever. You know, I couldn't believe it. It was paradise. Then I met Roger.

And then you met me. Roger, what was your initial impression of Henry, Roger? Loud mouth. I wonder where you got that. I thought, is there no beginning to this man's genius? Actually, he did. He wore me out the first time I got together. We were in a restaurant somewhere, and I had a caller that wanted to make a phone call.

And he kept saying, give me that caller. I need that caller. I said, Henry, I need to make a phone call. Give me that caller. I thought, I don't like this man. That's not true. I do love him. Yeah, that's called poetic license. him yeah that's called poetic license yeah we told uh before we were doing a sound check and our engineer john murray was telling uh henry to put his phone on something soft and what did you say roger i said put your dick out there so obviously they have that kind of relationship yes yeah and frank told me he was talking to you roger and uh and you said

is gilbert gonna ask me about my dick did i say that you did oh lord well most people do i mean yeah it's roger and miltonle, yin and yang. Roger, this is a segue. Did you write a little something about that subject that you can play on the uke that you're holding? I wrote a song about an old friend, but actually he's my age. And I did write a song about a friend like that. I did write a song about a friend like that and about, you know, watching someone kind of slip away into the twilight,

lose their get up and go. And I can play a little if you like. Would you mind? No. Sliding. No. What was it now? Let me think.

Oh, yeah. Yeah. I miss my stiffy That used to rise in a jiffy These days it's iffy If he rises at all I miss my boner That one-eyed loner That old sperm donor

He don't donate much anymore He used to stand up And watch me shave in the morning Now he hangs his head and stares at the bathroom floor He used to pop in and say hello without a warning Now he hesitates at the door I miss my porker That old moonlight stalker the door. I miss my porker. That old moonlight stalker.

He once was a corker. Now he's frail and quite small. Anyway, there you go. Oh, brilliant. My old friend. Roger, I think that's my new favorite song. All right, then.

Roger, can you cut it as a single? I wish I could. Beautiful. That sets a nice tone for the show. Beautiful. That sets a nice tone for the show. We will return to Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal podcast after this. Henry, I want you to tell Gilbert about the club in Brooklyn.

What you later learned about the clubs, some of the clubs in Brooklyn, like the 19th hole when you were reading Joe Bonanno's book. Yeah, well, I played this club a bunch of times. reading Joe Bonanno's book. Yeah, well, I played this club a bunch of times. And it was, you know, a typical club that you would, it was actually, it was a typical kind of club that you'd play at that time, you know, it was a mob club. And they had, you know, a huge picture of Frank Sinatra behind the cash register. And underneath it was a much, much smaller one of the Pope. And then we would play there, you know, we would play there on like weekends. And so, you know, they really liked us, you know, when we played on the weekends. And sometimes they loved us so much, they'd ask us to play on a weekday night, a school night. So we'd play from like 7 to 11. And the joint was empty. There was just a couple of tables in the,

you know, a couple of booths in the back with some guys wearing band lawn shirts sitting around talking. And every time we took a break, they'd come up and tell me, you's a great singer. They said, we're going to get you lots of work. We've got joints all over town. And I'd say, it's great, you know. And so, you know, they encouraged me. And so, you know, I went into show business. You know, that's something I could do.

But at the end of the night, you know, we were making 10 bucks for the whole night. And, you know, well, making $10 for the whole night. Well, I kind of cut to the story. We'd stop at 11 o'clock, and there was this guy called Rocco, you know, one of the guys that when he stands in the doorway, no light gets in. And he'd say, he'd say, just keep on playing. So we, you know, I'd say, come on, Rocco, I'm screaming four hours. I can't sing anymore. He'd go, just keep on playing. And I'd say, come on, Rocco, I'm screaming four hours. I can't sing anymore. He'd go, just keep on playing.

And I'd say, come on, Rocco, we've got to be in school in the morning. And he'd say, and I said, when they start talking like dolphins, you keep on playing. So we played until 3, 4 in the morning. And at the end of the night, they'd give us each $50. Now, my father was working for my grandfather in the drugstore he'd make 30 the register sometimes said 35 at the end of the day and so i'm getting 50 i come home my father says what are you robbing gas stations i don't want this money in my house i said no pop they gave it to me in a club well anyway you know years you and years later, I'm reading a book, Honor Day Father, by Joe Bonanno. And in the book, he talks about a club he owned in Brooklyn, the same name club.

And he says that he would hire, in quotes, the crummiest, loudest rock band he could find so the FBI couldn't bug him. Now, you see, you see, if they told me the truth, today would be Dr. Gross, but no. So, you know, now it's all of this. But that's a true story. Go ahead, Roger. I got nothing to say. Oh, okay.

You leaned in very excitedly. Henry, tell Gil about playing some of those places in the Catskills and some of the comics you saw. Oh, well, this all started out for me when I saw—I went up to the Catskills to play the Esther Manor. I don't know if you ever heard of that. It was right next to Monticello Raceway. One of the guys in my first band when I was 13 years, just turned 14, one of his fathers was a gym teacher. So they hired him at the hotel to do the athletic thing for the people and the kids in the summer. So he got us the job as the band. So we're in the, you know, we're playing in

this hotel. And it was amazing. You know, I'm always, I was always telling jokes, you know, because my father loved to laugh and he had a wicked sense of humor. My father really had a dark sense of humor. Like his father died when my parents were on their honeymoon, and so we'd go visit the cemetery, and we would pass these, you know, the same place we'd park, we'd walk across the cemetery, we'd see these beautiful limestone mausoleum buildings. And my father never failed to point to those buildings and say to me,

those guys really know how to live. But, you know, we went up to the Catskills. And so, you know, I played and I was telling jokes. And this guy says to me, says, you kid with the big mouth. He says, you want to see how it's really done? He says, come see Billy Eckstein's show tonight. So I go to some other hotel. They take us there.

Billy Eckstein, well, the comic didn't show up. So he says to me, you with the big mouth, you think you're so funny? Go out there and do five minutes, you know, 10 minutes, whatever it was. I said, no problem. So I went out. I'm telling every joke I can think of.

And I wouldn't say I bombed. They didn't know I was on. They were too busy eating. You see, the food was included. There were people eating five steaks. You know, I mean, I can't describe these places if you didn't grow up in them. You know how they keep an ambulance on the 50-yard line at a football game? They had them outside the dining rooms because these people would eat so

much. They would they never exercised in their lives and they did every exercise because it was included. And then they ate so much they would literally some of them would drop dead. And then when they were done eating, they ordered this special dessert. I told you about Frank that they only had in the Catskill Mountains. Did you ever have a fileted Danish? I told you about, Frank, that they only had in the Catskill Mountains. Gil, did you ever have a Fileta Danish? Do you know what a Fileta Danish is? No.

It's a special dessert because after they ate five steaks and 45 lemon meringue pies, they would say to the waiter, give me a Fileta Danish. And a Fileta Danish is a Danish Fileta. Oh! Now, only people that were in those joints could possibly know that. But anyway, so I went out and opened this thing for 10 minutes and I bombed so bad. Finally, a little woman looked up to me and said, it's all right. You're a nice boy.

You don't have to be funny for us. I was 14 years old. I was impotent for a month. You know, it was unbelievable. And who were some of the people you watched up there? Everybody was up there. I mean, you know, Myron Cohen. Oh, love Myron Cohen. Myron Cohen walked, I was, you know, Bobby

Columbia produced. Roger. Yeah. We'll call you in a minute. So... So... So... You know... Hi. I had a nap. Bobby Columbia was a drummer from Blood, Sweat & Tears.

He was on TV. He's, you know, he manages a lot of people. He's a very talented man and he produced Michael Jackson records. Anyway, Bobby had a studio in New City and we were having dinner in a restaurant with the engineer that was working on the album we were doing, the late Ed Michel, who engineered the Eagles records.

Anyway, so we're sitting there and I say to Bobby, that's Myron Cohen at the table back there. And Bobby takes a look. He says, yeah, it's Myron Cohen. So anyway, we're eating and I get up, I go to the bathroom. When I come back, I'm sitting, we're finishing our meal and Myron Cohen. So anyway, we're eating, and I get up. I go to the bathroom. When I come back, I'm sitting. We're finishing our meal, and Myron Cohen walks by with his party.

And he walks by the table, and he goes, Henry Gross, my favorite singer. That's unbelievable. Bobby put him up. You know, he killed me. But it made my life. You know, it was great. Gilbert, Jackie Vernon is one of Henry's favorites. Give him a little bit of your Jackie Vernon.

It was only because you do the best Jackie Vernon in the world. But Jackie told one joke in a Tonight Show that almost killed my father. And the joke was, he said, and you could do it better than me, but he said, I gave her the best years of my life and $10. I mean, it hit my father hard. I mean, they hit my father hard. I remember Jackie Vernon used to, he would go on stage with a clicker. Oh, pictures. And he'd go, here are some slides from my vacation.

Here we are being led around the quicksand. Here we are from the waist up. Here's just a bunch of ropes and hats and things. Henry's enjoying this. Roger, speaking of comedians, one of your groups, was it the Kestrels that played behind Benny Hill? Benny Hill, yeah.

It was very funny to play behind Benny Hill. It was hard to sing without dissolving in the laughter. And that's the truth of it. Benny Hill was a funny man to work with. But yeah, we sang behind a lot of people, you know. You also told me, go ahead. Yeah, anyway, so I've got to tell you something about Henry. When Henry, Henry thought he was going to be a comedian

when he was young you know and they asked him at school what are you going to be when you grow up and he said I'm going to be a comedian and everybody laughed they're not laughing now laughter laughter laughter

Henry also told me something funny he said do you see that watch he said my grandfather sold me that watch on his deathbed love it that's a lovely line it's probably an old one but it's an old one listen and ask roger it's it's odd to you know you're from england and the way you speak and everything how do you explain your great success in country western music I have no idea I really have no idea I went to I moved to Nashville in 75 I actually came up for a week from LA just to have a look at the place and I stayed 47 years you know la just to have a look at the place and i stayed 47 years you know i fell in love with the people there and i had my ear to the ground i could hear the language that was going on and what i had to learn how to do was leave out what wasn't going to be country leave out all my little english bits

all the bits i grew up with writing you know and uh i found out by by writing in a more plain language if you like i was more acceptable to the country crowd and i mean my first hit there was a thing called talking in your sleep with crystal gale sure and it was a pop song but the thing about it the lyric was kind of country so i was able to get away with it. Anyway, there you go. That started my career in Nashville, which was a wonderful thing. Tell them the lyric you had before you came to Nashville when you were in England and they asked you what you were going to do in Nashville.

Oh, you mean my original idea? Yes, you'll love this. When I go to a grave on a Sunday, even the flowers cry. I mean, that had to get you, didn't it? Never did finish that fucking song, though. Oh, my God. Roger, tell us about your short period doing pantomime before music came calling as a career. Just before I joined Roger Greenaway and the Kestrels.

Right. I'd been out of work for a couple of years. The group Enfolded I was with, the doo-wop group. And I just thought, well, I'll start taking some kind of acting jobs where I can sing as well and I did a couple of pantomimes which are things that go on for about three months at a time in England usually over the Christmas period and it's a fun show this was a show called Robin Hood that I did and I did it in both Coventry and Cardiff. And it was lucky for me that Roger Greenway found me in 1963 and said, hey, one of the boys has dropped out of the Kessels.

Do you want to join us? And I joined the group, and we went on tour. We were opening for people like Herman's Hermits. And while we were on tour, we wrote our very first song together. It was You Got Your Troubles, I Got Mine. You wrote them on ukuleles. That's a long way from where we started with pantomime. But yes, we wrote it on ukuleles.

A hell of a journey. What did you tell me on the phone? That the Kestrels taught the Beatles how to bow properly? Which they actually did. The Beatles were very impressed because the Kestrels used to open for the Beatles. Wow. impressed because um the kestrels used to open for the beatles wow and um the kestrel uh the beatles were very impressed with the way that the kestrels went up and down so well and so uniformly and roger greenaway my little buddy taught them how to do it it was like a one two three count

down one two three count up just don't do it when you're drunk that was it that's great here's the question i like to ask whenever there's a songwriter on uh can you uh maybe even perform it what you think is the worst piece of shit either one of you ever wrote where you go oh my god i'm so embarrassed by that oh go ahead roger you got more to choose from i can't sing it is this a family show no certainly not i can't sing the worst piece of shit because i divorced it from my mind years ago there was so much shit you wouldn't believe. If you write 5,000 songs, which I have,

3,000 of them are going to be shit. Wow. The man has written 5,000 songs. Henry, what about you? I wrote a song. I don't know how to play it, but I remember I brought it over to John McClain, who I record with, who's sitting right here. I had played it for my wife.

And she said, if you pay money to record that, it's going to be bad. And so I went in and the song was called, you ready? Bela's Out of Jail. B-E-L-A apostrophe S, Out of Jail. I thought it was funny. I see you're getting this. I'm getting the same. Like Bela Lugosi.

Exactly. Bela's out of jail Nobody, it was the worst thing And I spent quite a bit of time perfecting that garbage And we recorded it for several days And then everyone got really mad And this is a link with you guys, is the way you were introduced to rock and roll and how it changed your life.

Roger, you said, you know, hearing Little Richard, hearing American music, Little Richard and Elvis, and specifically Bill Haley and the Comets, turns your whole head around. Well, yeah, up until then, you've got to imagine, the early 50s actually were awful. There were people in England covering Perry Como and covering Guy Mitchell and Morris Day and that,

and it was just so bloody bad. The music in the 40s was great. The early 50s was awful. It sucked. And then I hear, Wop-bop-a-loo-laop-a-lop-bamboo. 1956, and I thought, something just changed. Something's changed forever.

Then I heard Elvis, of course, the Sun Records. And Bill Haley. I got to tell you, Bill Haley was a big star in 1956. Rock around the clock. Just turn the world around. And you thought finally This is our generation's music Music that doesn't belong to our parents

I thought it belonged to me at least My dad heard Little Richard He said that's not music I said no, that is great isn't it He said no, no He was a Chopin fanatic He loved Chopin So he wasn't going to like Little Richard

One thing we've talked about on this show a few times is that there were, you know, when the English invasion started, it's like the American acts were forgotten about. America turned its back on them. But the people in the English invasion like they all the groups like the beatles and the stones were like thrilled to meet their heroes here oh yeah absolutely and they were trying to sound like them they were trying to write songs like them but being english you had this hybrid song hybrid kind of performance come out. And that was what was so fresh, I guess, at the time. We were thrilled to meet people like Dwayne Eddy, you know, the Everdee Brothers.

Well, we had Neil Sedaka here, and he's one of the people, like a lot of the Brill Building writers, that Gilbert's talking about. But Neil was very heartened years later to find out that that mccartney liked his music oh well they were listening to carol king and neil sadaka and and uh and people like that oh yeah they were great they were great the brill builder had all these wonderful writers elton john uh teamed up with uh neil sadaka said, I want to make you a big star again. Did he really? That made Neil very happy. Roger, very early in your career, and you knew Elton because you and Tony Burrows and other people are singing background on those early Elton albums on Tumbleweed Connection and Madman Across the Water.

I heard you in an interview say that Elton wanted to record some of your songs before his publisher told him to do his own. Yeah, there was one song in particular he really wanted to record. And, of course, we were hot at the time, Roger and I, and he hadn't had a record out yet. And he wanted to cut this song. I was quite happy to have him cut it. But Dick James, his publisher, said,

no, you've got to record your own songs. And Dick was right. The rest is history. Yeah, the rest is history. God damn it. Henry, what about that pivotal moment for you where your mother bought you the transistor radio? Well, yeah, I had changed everything. It did, because we could in Brooklyn, you could get radio stations from other cities at night on clear nights. And I remember I used to get this station from Haywood, California, and it was a gospel show with a guy called Brother Al. You can find him on the Internet. It was Brother Al from Haywood, California.

And he was amazing. He would play all Mahalia Jackson and James Cleveland, all the great Thomas Dorsey songs, the great gospel songs. But his act was he would say, send me $5 and I'll pray for you. Jackson and James Cleveland, all the great Thomas Dorsey songs, the great gospel songs. But his act was he would say, send me five dollars and I'll pray for you. And he would cure people from rare diseases and get them out of wheelchairs on the radio. If you sent him five dollars, it was unbelievable. I mean, it was fantastic. But, you know, but but I was hearing these songs, you know, they'd be singing, you know, down by the riverside and they would do all that stair stepping like little Richard did when he would sing, you know, I got a girl that I love so and I'm ready, ready, ready, Teddy, I'm singing along with these gospel groups, and my mom, who sang briefly with the Metropolitan Opera Chorus and was a trained musician,

walked by my room and heard me singing this, and that was that. She said, uh-oh, he can sing, and that was so... It made her happy, and it got my father off my back to be a doctor. And, of course, at that time, it was, you know, a very great thing to be in rock bands. You know, when you were 14 years old in a band with guys 18 years old who had nice cars and, you know.

You both come from musical families, which I find interesting. And Roger, when Bing Crosby, your father loved Bing Crosby, when he covered one of your songs, were you? Yeah, he did two of my songs in the end. Two? My father said to me, well, you can't get any bigger than that, son. Never mind that this was the 80s and Bing's career was more or less over. But yeah, I was thrilled to have a Bing Crosby record. Of course.

Of course. And he sang them pretty damn good, and he whistled good, too. Henry, your dad never thought what you guys were playing. He didn't think that was music. He thought you were playing. He didn't think that was music. He thought you were crazy when you helped form Sean and I. Well, there's a great bit. Everyone can relate to this that's in show business. My father, I was pre-med in Brooklyn College, and I was doing pretty good.

And then Sean and I happened. I was playing, and the whole story isn't necessary, but the thing blew up huge with the Woodstock movie. And, you know, so when I said I'm going to be in this group with some guys I knew from high school that were now at Columbia and, you know, these other guys. So I was at Brooklyn College and the band literally blew up. We were nationwide. And my father said, you're throwing your life away. And, you know, then the band really blew up big, big after the movie. And at Woodstock, I had known Jimi Hendrix

before, you know, we played gigs with him and things like that. And I'd met him through a mutual friend at Midwood High School. It's a whole story. But anyway, I watched Jimmy play the Star Spangled Banner from a few feet away. And I thought, this guy is making music only he can make. You know, I need to make music only I can make. I know I'm leaving the band. So I told my father I'm leaving the band. He goes, don't be a schmuck. You know, like whatever I did, you know, I was a schmuck for joining the band and I was a schmuck for leaving the band. There was no winning with this guy. You know, and it's a true. Roger, I said you're still a schmuck.

Thanks for the elevation, my dear buddy. and henry you know they of of the classic uh tapes where the mic was left on oh you're going there huh we're going yeah all right we're going there shannon was the song in that classic uh casey case and uh yeah he it's one of the reasons we've discussed Shannon on this show. There have been several. I write hundreds and hundreds of songs. I make 30, 40 records. And people are going to remember me because this crazy guy said, how do you put a song about a dead dog right before a dedication?

I mean, it was unbelievable. I mean, you know, it's unbelievable. it's a funny and it's a funny song. You know, a lot of people obviously love the song and they get it. They're dog people, cat people, pet people, horses. They love animals and they get what I was thinking, what I was feeling when I wrote the song. You know, I wrote it for a dear friend of mine who's gone, Carl Wilson from the Beach Boys. And he had lost the dog. He had a dog named Shannon. And so did I. Anyway, so I wrote this song and people loved it. But a lot of people hate it. A lot of people have, I don't know what they meant. They referred to it as a right wing ballad. I'm not sure what a right wing ballad is.

I don't know what that means. I mean, if you love dogs, you're, you know, you're anyway. So it was, it was, it's strange because a lot of people liked it, a lot of people didn't. People, I get really, literally, I get letters every week from people that love the song. Anytime a pet dies, I'm notified on Facebook. You know, people write to me. They do. You know, and it's great. It's great.

And I'm proud of it. You're a big animal person. Yeah, I do benefits and things. But I i'm proud of it animal person yeah i do benefits and things but i'm very proud of of the fact that if i could have any song it would be that and and people write that love it but then it's it's 45 years later and people sometimes i'll see like there'll be 2 000 positive comments on on youtube and then one guy will go it's the most the most horrible things that you could say about anything, they say it about my song. I mean, there was Hitler and you're just saving this vitriol for my song about a dog that

died. I mean, it's really remarkable what people, the anger they hold. I know I'm going to get this guy one day. I'm going to get him. And they get me now. I'm 70 years old and they dump the vitriol on me for a song that was well-intentioned. You know, well, it's a song that we love here. Well, thank you. And Henry, Henry, can we sing a little of Shannon together? Yes, we can. And, you know, this is the thing, because I know that one day and I don't know, maybe it'll be tonight. But, you know, when you write an idiotic melody like this, when you're 25 years old, and you know, it starts,

another day as it ends, and then it goes up to, Shannon! And I always think, one day I'm going to be out there, and I'm going to go, and that's it. Nothing. There'll be nothing. How do you still hit those notes, Hen? And that's it. Nothing. There'll be nothing. There'll be nothing.

How do you still hit those notes, Hen? Very, very tight Munsingware. Gilbert, do you know the words? I have it in front of me. All right. Let Henry start, and then you can come in for the second stanza. Are we going to do the verse? Start at the verse?

What are we doing? Why don't you start, and then he'll fill in, and then you can each do a stanza. Are we going to do the verse? Start at the verse? What are we doing? Why don't you start and then he'll fill in and then you can each do a stanza. Well, that's easy for you to say. You'll sing up to here, I'm sure he'll tell her. Okay, and then you'll do the Casey Kasem part. Okay, so it's

Another day he sat in Mama Okay, so it's... Another day has had end Mama says she's tired again No one can even begin to tell her Shannon is gone, I heard her cheese drifting out to sea. See, he jumped in. She always loved to swim away. Maybe she'll find an island with a shady tree.

Just like the one in our backyard. Wait a minute. I'm looking at my Facebook. Now they all love it. People are apologizing for the vitriol. They're writing to me. Finally, I like that song. I don't know how it happened. It's an incredible moment in my life. They love it now. Thank you, Gilbert. You made my millennium. I can't take it. Gilbert doing a Henry Gross impersonation.

I can tell you. Sounded funny. Simply awful. Don't worry, Roger. You'll get your turn. It's the only song that you don't need a guitar to sing the chorus. You need a truss. But just

to prove the point. Shannon, he's gone out home. She's drifting out to sea. See, it can be done. Tell me a couple of things, Henry. Let me get this out of the way. How does Shannon, your Irish setter, get a credit on the album as performer?

Well, because that will unplug me into something on that old album. Unplug me into something. Excuse me, not on release. At the end of a song called Evergreen, I brought the dog. I wanted it to sound country, so I brought the dog to the studio, and I got her to bark. That's great. And the thing was, she barked and it distorted. So being neurotic, I said, I'd like to do another take.

And you never saw producers and engineers leave a studio quicker. So if you hear the record, it sounds like, you know, it sounds like a guy with, you know, who's planning a hawker. But it was actually my Irish setter. And people might not know that you submitted that. You sent it to Carl Wilson originally. You didn't have designs on recording it yourself. No, I wrote it for him because he got so emotional when I told him, you know, that I had, you know, he had this, I went for lunch to Carl Wilson's house. And I had known him a bit, but not great.

And so he invited me to his house. He was living in Coldwater Canyon in a beautiful place. And he had a great spread for lunch. But I never found out what it tasted like because his two giant husky dogs jumped up, knocked the table down, ate everything. And I said, he was so nice, he couldn't stop apologizing. And I said, Carl, don't worry about it. I have a crazy Irish setter named Shannon. I've seen this many times.

And as soon as I said it, he got real quiet and kind of a little morose. And he said he had a dog named Shannon that was actually a Samoyed that he loved very much that was hit by a car and it killed a month before. You see, this is why Casey Kasem didn't want to do a dedication after talking to me. But anyway, I shouldn't have been a singer. I should have been an undertaker. But anyhow, so I went back to New York. I'm sitting on the couch with my Shannon, on the bed with my Shannon.

And I lived in a building that had a lot of people whose music sounded like this. It came through the walls. You couldn't think. You know, everybody was playing this kind of rap music stuff that was coming out then. And so somebody told me, if you get a record of the environments, they made these records, like you put it on and it's the ultimate seashore or the, it's the Okefenokee swamp. So I put on this record of the, of the ultimate seashore, it was called an environments record. And right away, the room gets cooler, your mind changes and I'm playing a little guitar. I'm going, you know, and I, the song wrote itself. I mean, you know this as Roger. Do you think that you work hard writing songs and then you get free ones?

You just sit down and they come to you and you write them down and they're almost done when you do it, right? Yeah, I know the ones they just float in. Yeah, it's like I don't... They float into your conscious and half an hour later you think, I just wrote a song. Yeah. I love that. That's the answer to your question, Gilbert. Yeah.

You love to ask that question. I always ask songwriters, where does music and words come from? Roger? Well, it's obviously ancient. They were obviously trying to sing tunes, you know, like 30,000 years ago, whenever. And then somebody came up with an instrument, you know. Maybe it was a ukulele or some kind of ukulele.

Oh, for God's sakes, tell him the truth, Roger. Songs come from other people's previous hits. I mean... I'm trying to sound intelligent here. Songs come from other people's previous hits. I mean, W.C. Field said a thing worth having is worth cheating for. What about You've Got Your Troubles, Roger? You being Big Roger and Little Roger, you guys sat down and you both composed that on ukuleles? Yeah. And how long is the process for something like that?

Did it come, it was the first one you wrote together? Yeah, we were waiting. This is the very first song we ever wrote together. I can't tell you what it's like to write one song, your very first song with someone, and go out looking for a new car and a new house. I mean, that's what happens when you have your first hit record. And it was wonderful. Roger just had this little melody, and he played it to me.

He said, you want to write a song? I said, yeah, sure. And I got my new car. It took us an hour and a half. And it changed our lives. One song would change your life. I wrote 75 songs with this guy, and the only thing it changed was my debits. Henry, fuck off.

I see that worried look upon your face. Do, do, do, do. You got your troubles. I got mine. do you got your troubles i got mine she's found somebody else to take your place you got your troubles i've got mine i too have lost my love today All of my dreams have flown away Now just like you I sit and I wonder why

You got your troubles Shoot, I'm losing the chords here that's enough unbelievable wow terrific thank you what a first song to have written with somebody i mean out of the blue yeah the song was very emboldened and it covered two octaves. It was a tough song to sing. Of course, we bought the counterpoint in at the end, the guy who came in soon, but it was seem to you my friend that I ain't got no pity. And it was different in his day and and a wonderful arrangement by a friend of mine called let's read it did a great horn arrangement for it and uh well i'm just grateful for the money and and then a famous a legendary music producer heard

that and came and came into your life who was that that was george martin he heard it and he got in touch with our publisher because he heard the demo thank you for this and uh our publisher came to us one day and said george martin wants to meet you wants you to go to his office at emi so roger and i went over and we sat down with george and had a little chat for a while he said i love that song of yours and so i like the way you guys sing he said i'd like to produce that record with you now this is george martin 1965 the hottest producer in the world you know so we walked out of there floating on there the only trouble is george was producing an album time called um rubber soul and because of it we had to wait two months for him to get loose to record the song with us you got your troubles and in that short space of time the fortunes got hold of the song

and uh did their recording which was a wonderful record and uh they had we had kind of bittersweet feelings about it we were watching our song go up around the world but thinking to ourselves we could have been the artist as well you know and it would have been a a double double win if you like george martin was pretty much like the fifth beetle well absolutely and so what what was your opinion what was it like speaking to him and working with him? He was such a classy gent. He had a very posh accent, very classy, and he was involved very much with classical music.

He produced classical music. He'd also produced a lot of comedy music with some people called the goons. Oh, yes. Peter Sellew and whoever else.ry harry seek him yeah harry anyway and he beat so when the beatles came to him he had an arsenal of sounds that he could produce he could also play the piano very well he actually learned to play on a kind of clarinet a co-anglais He actually learned to play on a kind of clarinet, a cor anglais. But he had so much musical experience and so much comedic experience.

And he was used to making funny sounds on tape when you only have one track or two tracks. Oh, interesting. And this is what George brought to the Beatles. And, of course, they loved it. I mean. Oh, they were fans of the goats, too. They were fans of the comedy. They liked to slip off into these wacky sounds. And George

was right there with him, and he could produce those sounds. So George was the natural. He was the fifth beetle. No question. And you guys, you and Roger, assume these identities, David and Jonathan. And you recorded Michelle.

You released Michelle. Well, we missed out on You Got Your Troubles. And George said, he said, I'm sorry about that. And he was apologetic. He said, but there's a song the boys have got on Rubber Soul. He said, I think it could be a hit. He said, why don't you work up a version? And if it sounds right, we'll go in the studio with it.

So we did. Roger and I work up a verse, and then if it sounds right, we'll go in the studio with it. So we did. Roger and I worked up a verse with Michelle, and we ended up with a top ten record in the States, and, well, it was wonderful. Can we hear some of Michelle? I can't play it. I can sing it, but I can't play it. That's okay. That's okay.

but I can't play it. That's okay. I knew there was a reason for you to be here tonight. I thought you were not just here for the laughs. You know what, Raj? Raj, you've got to tell them the story of I was Kaiser Bill's Batman. Oh, I've got to ask about Whistling Jack Smith. Oh, I got to ask you about Whistling Jack Smith. Oh, yeah.

That is one of the weirdest songs to ever chart anywhere, Roger. Well, you know, I came up with that little tune in 1966, and I was doing a radio show somewhere, a BBC radio show, made of ale, and I played it to our who was our um a plugger at the time a professional manager a guy called tony hiller i said what do you think of this tony and i whistled it to him he went that's great i said well if you like it i'll put it i'll put some words through he said no he said there hasn't been a whistle hit in years he said that sounds like a whistling hit so it's tony hiller's idea to just take it in the studio and a whistling hit in years. He said, that sounds like a whistling hit. So it was Tony Hill's idea to just take it in the studio

and demo a whistling hit. And I called it Too Much Birdseed. Right. Which is what we used to label on people who whistled too much. And, well, I got it cut, you know. A guy called Noah Walker cut it with Whistling Jack Smith, who was actually the orchestra leader who could whistle. But then they decided it was a big hit and it was going up the

charts. They decided to get this guy in call him Whistling Jack Smith and put him on the road and make some money, make some money out of this guy. But they put him on the road and he practiced a lot of whistling. well what he didn't do was have a whistle half an hour in one lump after about 15 minutes his chops went he couldn't whistle after two days and he never worked again his career was over and he had a hit record around the world i know i i will direct our listeners to YouTube to find I Was Kaiser Bill's Batman. It's absolutely fascinating.

Henry, tell one of the touching stories from your show, your one-man show, which is the experience of hearing one of your songs coming out of the radio for the first time. It was, well, it's always amazing.

I mean, Roger, let me ask Roger, do you remember the first time you heard a song he was on there? Well, it was You Got Your Troubles. Actually, it was You Got Your Troubles. Actually, it was You Got Your Troubles.

And I was on the railway station at 2 o'clock in the morning waiting on the train. And I heard somebody, not on the radio, I heard a porter walking up and down the other side of the platform whistling the song. And I thought, I'm famous. It was a thrill to hear this guy whistling, you got your troubles. You know, I knew, this is before the story about that, but I knew Shannon would be a hit because

when I was mixing it, I was playing it over and over and I lived in this apartment in Queens, in this apartment house in Queens, and it was a lot of people that lived in the building that, you know, deified the right to party. Like if you had your band, I literally rehearsed bands with Marshall amps and drums in my one bedroom, and they never complained. You could do it in the middle of the week at night,

and no one said anything. But if they were having a party on a Tuesday night till nine in the morning, and if you said something, you would have gotten cut. So I'm playing this song over and over and I get a knock on my door and it's the guy from upstairs and he speaks a little bit English, mostly Spanish. And he says to me, that song you're playing. And I go, oh, here it is. I said, I'll turn it down. He goes, no, no. And he says, what is it? I have to have it. And I went, oh boy, you know, if this guy's liking it through the wind, through the walls, you know, without anything. But the first song that I ever heard, I had an album on ABC Dunhill. And is that the Henry Gross album?

The first one, the first one before the there were two named Henry Gross. I thought this is such a commercial title. I'll use it twice. You know, I put it had this album on ABC and I wouldn't say it was released. You know, it escaped and it didn't go. You know, it went went lead, not gold. And, you know, and pretty soon they dumped me from the label, you know, and I never heard it. And I was like, I didn't know what I was going to do with myself. I thought, will I ever get another record deal? And it's like six o'clock in the morning

and I'm in the apartment and this is the truth. And in the townhouse, the guy was renting who stole the microphone. Same guy. The same guy. A guy named Mark Hochstadt.

He stole the mic and had to give it back to save our organ player. And I'm in his apartment and we're kind of pretty drunk. And at six in the morning, Dennis Elsis, if you remember him from WNEWFM, he's still on XM and FUV, and he's an amazing person. And Dennis played a song of mine called Morning Star on the radio. And, you know, when you hear it, we had the radio on it and I heard it and I didn't recognize it right away because you're, when you hear it, we had the radio on it and I heard it and I didn't recognize

it right away because you're not expecting to hear your song. And I can imagine. And, you know, about on that label, I was, you know, you know, I was not expecting to hear it ever. So but I heard it and about halfway through, I'm going, wait a minute, that's my record. So I called him up because he was alone at NEW and he answered the phone. And we've been friends ever since. But it knocked me out. It totally – you can't imagine. It's New York City. Can we get back to the Catskills again?

Oh, boy. So you saw – well, you saw Henny Youngman out there. Saw Henny Youngman. He used to have a safety pin with a dime under it. Did you ever see that? And people would say, what's that saw Henny Youngman out there. Saw Henny Youngman. He used to have a safety pin with a dime under it. Did you ever see that? And people say, what's that, Henny? He said, it's my diamond pin. Yes.

He once gave me one of those. Oh. And he had a bottle of pride and a bottle of joy, liquids. And he said, this is a picture of my pride and joy. Oh, yeah. he would do that kind of shtick it was but you know i loved it a lot of you know i did too you gotta love it i mean it's incredible so you saw myron cohen you saw hanny did you see what like jackie gale and corbett monica and jackie mason i saw him i you. I saw Mason many times.

Yeah. He's a brilliant comic. Yeah. Yeah, that he is. He's a brilliant comic. No one can take it away. He's one of the great comics in the world. I mean, he's the man that said, there's no bigger schmuck in this world than a Jew with a boat. You know, he said, he said, you know know you give a gentile a boat he sails around

the world he said i haven't seen one jewish boat leave the harbor he says to to a to a gentile it's a mode of transportation to a jew it's a dormitory mine sleeps six mine sleeps that you know you know the guy's a genius we will return to gilbert godf's amazing, colossal podcast. But first, a word from our sponsor. Here's a question from a fan, George White. As a member of Blue Mink, did Roger see Steve Coogan as Alan Partridge singing Melting Pot? No, but I heard they did it. I heard they did it.

Taking the piss out of it, as your people have said. Oh, of course they would. Of course they would. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. A lot of it. Taking the piss out of it, as your people like to say. Oh, of course they would. Of course they would. Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Well, a lot of people are taking the piss out of that song. Henry, tell Gilbert your joke that you told me about how small your town was. Oh. Henry writes the occasional joke, Gil.

I write the occasional joke. And, you know, I wanted to get this to Dangerfield. I never did. I said, you know, so you're playing Babylon, Long Island. I said, Babylon's a small town. How small was it? Thank you. Babylon is so small,

the local postal worker had to shoot himself. What do you think, Gil? Excellent. That's small. See, I actually wrote a joke for you Gil I did I wrote a joke I wasn't going to do it but I don't care anymore Because this is going where it's going

So I wrote this joke I thought you know you remember Woody Allen In Bananas when he goes to see the Revolutionary And he brings him a little cake With the red and white string Which I thought you know you always bring gift. So I thought I'm going to go on one of my favorite comedians ever, which is really, I mean that,

and so I'm going to be on his podcast. I thought, see if I bring him a joke. So I wrote this joke, and there's a better punchline than the punchline now, because I said, what do Muslims and Jews, it's timely, have in common? What? They both love the prophet.

What do you think, Gil? So I'm telling... That's low. It is low, but it gets better. So I'm talking to this guy, you mentioned Peter Noon. So I'm talking to his guitar player who lives on Long Island, Vance Brescia, and I think I'm going to be funny. I try out the jokes.

I ask him, I said, Vance, what do Muslims and Jews have in common? And without batting an eye, he says, genital mutilation. Dunking, dunking on my joke. I mean, that's it. So there you have it. Gil, it's yours if you want it. How long were they? That prophet joke is like the kind of joke you would tweet.

Yes, that's excellent. It's your joke. You wrote it. It's yours. I don't care. It's my gift. Here's a question from Roger from a listener, Morty Weinberg. He said, Billy West, frequent guest of this show,

he wrote that he never understood the lyrics of the Hollies' Long Cool Woman in a Black Dress. There's something about the singer was German? His English wasn't that good? I don't know this. Wait till I tell Alan that.

Actually, it was a slapback that the engineer put on there. The lyric was a wild lyric anyway we were drunk we went out and had a very lush very lush lunch drank a bottle of wine a couple of brownies each went back we smoked a little doobie i have to tell you we did that's what we did in those days and then we sat down to write a song and of course this crazy song came out about prohibition and uh i do sing that song quite often in a set and people say oh we heard the lyrics for the first time you know so uh there yes that's the explanation and roger i'm not going to let you run from me any longer. We have to sing Rainy Day Feeling again.

Uh-oh. Okay. All right, Roger, why don't you start us off, and then Gilbert will come in on the off sections. Is Gilbert going to do to this song what he did to Shannon? What do you think? Maybe worse. I could lose a copyright here

which part do you want to sing gilbert you better start off roger you'll sing up until uh before the clouds appeared okay here comes that rainy day feeling again and soon my tears will be falling like rain it always used to be a monday Leftover memories of Sundays always spent with you. Before the clouds appeared and took away my sunshine. Go ahead, Gil. Here comes that rainy day feeling again.

And I'll be dreaming of your baby in vain Wait a minute Your baby's always on my mind, girl I hope And soon you're gonna find Your way back to me Cause if you say You'll stay

The rainy days will go away Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah Now wait a minute Because he does Roger's minute, because he does Roger's song perfectly and he does mine the way you heard it. That's a low bar

for perfect, Henry. That's how I remember it. I was in there. Roger, give him, give him the, sing Long Cool Woman with the words. Because when I heard it the first time, I thought they were great. I didn't know what they were either.

And you did it at the Bluebird, and I thought, that's a great lyric. And I never heard it. I thought it was very clever. Lord. Okay, well, wait a minute. Saturday night I was downtown Working for the FBI Sitting in the nest of bad men whiskey bottle piling high

well a bootlegging boozer on the west side full of people who were doing wrong just about to call up da D.A. man. I heard somebody singing this song. A pair of 45s made me open my eyes and my temperature started to rise. She was a long, cool woman in a black dress Five-nine, beautiful, tall Just one look and was a bad mess That long, cool woman had it all Do you want to hear the rest of it?

Yes, Max. Oh, well, I saw her heading up to the table. Just a tall, walking, big, black cat. Charlie said to me, I hope you're able, boy. I'm telling you, she knows where it's at. Well, and suddenly we heard the sirens. Everybody started to run. Jumping over walls and tables, I heard somebody shooting a gun. left hand and she was holding on to my right i told her don't be scared you're gonna be spared i have to be forgiven if i want to spend my living with a long cool woman in a black dress

five nine beautiful tall just one look i was a bad mess The lordy, lordy, lord Cool woman, cool woman, cool woman Had it all Had it all There you go. That's awesome. Henry, you're right. I think that's the first time I understood the lyrics.

They're great. The lyrics are great. Henry, talk about something from the one-man show, which is how a person's life changes when they suddenly have a monster hit, and yours changed dramatically. Suddenly you're on billboards. Suddenly nobody will let you pay for a meal. Yeah, well, I said in the show that I had this big hit record,

and my life changed, but the money from the record never really appeared. But what I lacked in money, I made up for in food. I mean, people everywhere, you know, everywhere I went, people dove for the check. You know, it was unbelievable. And so I thought if I had written my autobiography in 1976, I would have called it Mein Kamps. Gilbert, this is a man after your own heart. Henry, play us something from the show.

Not the last song we talked about, but because we'll save that one. Okay. Okay. Well, I don't know. From the show. Okay. We'll have a little fun't know. From the show, okay. We'll have a little fun. This is a little autobiographical thing.

Everybody's telling me I'm guilty of a felony. I took somebody's melody and put it in my song. I admit I'm lazy and my memory might be hazy. I'd never be so crazy cause there's still no right from wrong. Been high enough to see over the mountain. Been high enough to fly above the rain. Been down so low, stole pennies from the fountain. Been high enough to toss them back again

every day my honey says my jokes are not so funny i better earn some money if I want to get her love. Though I know what I'm missing, I'm a man on a mission, got a strong inner vision, and I thank the stars above. Been high enough to see over the mountain, been high enough to fly above the rain, been down so low, stole pennies from the fountain, been high enough to toss them back again I believe it's time to fade Whatever's meant to be What I am and what I ain't Is good enough for me Been high enough to see over the mountain

been High enough to fly above the rain Been down so low, storm pennies from the fountain Been high enough to toss them back again Been high enough to feel I really made it Been high enough to throw it all away Had a winning hand that I overplayed it, been high enough to know it's just a game. Been high enough to know it's just a game. Hey. Hey, Henry. Thank you, thank you.

Thank you. You still don't have it. All right. All right. How do you guys write when you write together? What's the process? He beats me up. You know, we what do we do, Roger? We usually get together with an empty canvas, and he'll start picking. He's a great picker, Henry. And out of that picking, we'll start a melodic line or something,

and then a hook line, you know, word-wise. And there's no set formula, is there, Henry? No, but Roger is, this is not, you know, like, you know, one of these, we love each other kind of things we do. But Roger is unusual in that so many writers in Nashville that I came across, now, they're great, great writers, but a lot of guys are great at lyrics, or they're great at music. Roger is one of those people that doesn't really need another writer. I think he more likes company at lunch. He writes incredible lyrics, and he comes up with great melodies.

I mean, we're sitting there, you know, and he comes in whistling, you know. I will do whatever to put you back together Somebody's gone and you've fallen apart If you want, you got me Nothing's gonna stop me Fixing your broken heart You know, like this kind of stuff, it's like... Nice.

Yeah, it's fabulous stuff. I mean, I think this was your melody, Roger. Do you have to wear your beauty all over town can't you keep a little i'm not jealous but it gets to me to know what's going through their minds Well, I get 75% of the publishing on that. So you guys sit around and Henry picks until you find a melody that you think is workable? No, he comes in.

Not always. Sometimes I'm just strumming around the ukulele. It's just, it's a little bit of magic. Songwriting is magic. It really is. If you just suddenly come together on something, you go, ooh, that's kind of nice. Play that again, you know, and you end up with a great song. Well, I got a call from Alan Pepper.

Was it a couple of years ago, Raj? And he called me up. He used to own the Bottom Line with Stanley Snodowski. They owned the Bottom Line, which was down in the village. It was one of the great music nightclubs in the country, actually in the world. And so he called me up and he's living with his wife in the actor's home in New Jersey. up and he's living with his wife in the actor's home in New Jersey. And they wanted a theme song for the actor's home. So I called Raj, you know, because I thought, you know, it would be would be perfect together to do this. And we wrote a song. And if you call the actor's home today, it's on when you put you on hold, it's on, and people actually call, Alan tells me, and they tell the, when they're going to put the call through, they say, no, wait a minute, put

me on hold, I want to hear the rest of the song. So it's a wonderful song, and it'll be on the actor's home all the time, you know, it's got a little thing, what does it go, Tired bones, come on home. Say goodbye to being alone. Walk right in and join the family. Niggles, bet you got a story about your days of love and glory that you'd like to tell a friend. If you've been missing someone who will listen, well, you've made it to the rainbow's end. Anyway, it's like that. It's a really sweet song. I love it. And, you know,

it's that, and Joe Brown, who's our friend from England, who's one of the great ukulele players on the planet. Sorry, Raj, but Joe is genius level. And he does. He did the he closed the concert for George doing the yes, the greatest version that will ever be done of I'll see you in my dreams. Heartrending. Yeah. And that's Joe. And, you know, I had was lucky to tour with him for a year and a half in England. It was fantastic. And all hail Joe Brown. All hail Joe Brown. All hail Joe Brown. He's great. He's a great. Raj, what did you mean when you said the wrong lyric can ruin a melody and vice versa? I heard you say that in an interview. If you're a singer and you write, you tend to choose words and vowel sounds, et cetera, that really work uh really work with the song the melody

and people will sit down sometimes to write a song not realize that the lyric isn't that great to sing it just doesn't roll off the it doesn't make the singer sound good i see i always try and i know henry and i have both got this in mind when you write a song you want to make the singer sound good i see i always try and i know henry and i have both got this in mind when you write a song you want to make the singer sound good you open his throat up on the high notes with the right bowel sounds perfect and uh it's just um you try to make the singer sound good and that's i think that's a secret the songwriting It's passing by a lot of songwriters now. It doesn't seem to be as important. Well, Roger's a master of that.

Really is. He comes up, you know, I have been, you know, we sit around this round table in the back of my house in Nashville and I'll say something sometimes and he'll go, oh, mate, you've gotten it all over me. Yeah. Did you get some of that on me? Yeah. He says, you know, I mean, he's disgusted, you've gotten it all over me. Did you get some of that on me? Yeah, he's disgusted.

It's not enough to just ignore it. He wipes the throw-up off his shirt. It's a brutal thing, songwriting. It's kind of like UFC fighting in a way. I want to direct people, Henry, to your album, The One I'm Hearing Things, which is just a terrific record. Oh, thank you. I mean, I go back.

You know, I told Henry on the phone that I bought Plug Me Into Something on vinyl at Corvettes on Long Island. There's a reference, huh, Gilbert? Oh, yes. E.J. Corvettes. Wow. In 1976 or 70 when did Plug Me Into Something come out?

75 but discovering your recent music I'm Hearing Things which has a song that you and Roger wrote on it, terrific record and a lot of those songs show up in your one man show here's a listener

Mark Edwards Edelstein says, Henry did, in fact, have a second hit in what we program directors used to call a mid-chart classic called Springtime Mama. Oh, yeah. That was a big record for me. Things that are ruggling around.

Did you hear some of that? It was, well... I'll do it the original key, darn it. All right. Springtime mama, dream hot lady. Let me know that I've been lazy. Flash your smile that gets me crazy Like the full-air shining moon

Like that. I love it. I also like the moment, the clip package that opens One Hit Wanderer, we see Wolfman Jack giving you your gold record. Yeah, the Wolfman. He's not my brother, Henry. He was a great guy, but he used to imbibe. And I did a bunch of shows that he emceed.

And he would come up on stage and sit on a chair while I was in the middle of a show. He'd pull up a chair and he'd get another chair and he'd play with drumsticks on the other chair in front of him um he wasn't a groover let's put it that way i mean to him laying in the cut i think was referring to a peter luger's steak but nothing to do with the groove it was not happening we've talked a lot about comedians.

And Gilbert, here's something you didn't know about Roger. He wrote a song that was recorded by Jerry Lewis' son, by Gary Lewis and the Playboys. That's right, yeah. Green Grass. It was called Green Grass, and I wrote it in my sleep one night, 1964. You wrote it in your sleep? Man makes money in his sleep. It came to me.

It came to me in my sleep. And I woke up, and the song stayed on my mind because I still had a pretty virginal, is that the right word? Virginal mind, anyway, when it came down to songs. I only had like 100 under the belt. So that song came to me, and the next day I got up and I sat down and I wrote the whole song out, and it came to me in my sleep. That's so funny because you hear that from so many songwriters,

that they'll get a song in their dreams. McCartney with yesterday right mccartney he said he dreamed yesterday eggs yeah so scrambled eggs yeah yeah by the way uh go ahead can you play that gary lewis in the playboy song oh boy green grass around my window Oh, boy. And we'll glide, my little love and I, now that summertime is high. Do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do-do Mad Dogs and Englishmen. Who am I thinking of? No. Leon Russell? Leon Russell, thank you. There you go. I'm good for something.

He was the arranger of that record. When you think of that, it's a very lightweight record for Leon Russell to be involved with. I guess he was arranging in New York in those days. That's a great second big hit. Gary Lewis had some great songwriters

working with him. Al Cooper wrote This Diamond Ring. Roger. This Diamond Ring, yeah. Al Cooper, yeah. We were lucky to be following that record, so we had a pretty big hit, you know, a top ten hit with Gary Lewis.

I never sing that song because it's too complicated. You sang it perfectly. Thank you very much. You did. It's a great melody. Kevin Palmer says, we're on the same bill with The Grateful Dead a few times. Yeah, we played.

I left the group early, like I said, you know, after Woodstock, maybe three months, four months later, whatever it was. But I did play with them at the Fillmore East. And I think that I went home at around 8 in the morning. They did two shows. You remember the Rorschach test they called the Joshua Lights? It looked like they threw ink on the screen.

It was one of the first, you know, backdrops. It was a screen behind the stage. And there were these big ink blots that would look, you know, it was called the Joshua Lights. And it was, I think it was designed for the people that were particularly ready for the Grateful Dead. And it was, they were great. I mean, they were lovely guys. I rode to the, well, that's a whole other story about getting to the Woodstock stage. But in short, I was drunk with Jimi Hendrix, Beyond Belief, in the morning. And then I rode to the stage in a car with Jerry Garcia. So the rest of the afternoon was a— It's all in the one-man show.

Yeah. And the rest of the afternoon is, as I said, a washing machine of images. I don't know what happened. It sounds like spirits have have, uh, fair to say occasionally played a role in songwriting. Well, you know, my mom, my mom was a musician and my dad was a pharmacist. This is a match made in heaven to produce a rock and roll. Right. Right. Right. Right, right, right, right. How have you guys, have you guys continued to try to collaborate under lockdown? I mean, what's that process been? Haven't done it under lockdown with Roger because he refuses to write with me over the television like this,

whatever we're doing here. Over Zoom. So you're waiting to get together until? I want to smell his sweat when I write. He just likes the way I mix drinks. That's all there is to it. He makes the great Jack and Coke. I think I thought of the name of that songwriter from the English,

the singer rather, Roger, from the English congregation that we were trying to think of on the phone. Was it Brian Keith? Yes, it was actually yeah yeah i mean he brought some magic to that record i love that song screaming high voice you know i told you frank knows everything i've never heard a guy like this he knows every fact i mean it's unbelievable i mean you ask him how to make helium out of a cardboard box, and he knows how to do it. It's incredible. I love that song, Softly Whispering, I Love You.

Oh, man. I like your version of it. You're in David and Jonathan's version of it, and I like the English congregation's version of it. Great song. Tell us about it. Not Paul Williams. Paul, what was his name now? He did a great version of it.

Oh, I know who you mean. Paul Young. Paul Young did a lovely version of it much later. He got in the charts with it, but I like that song. Terrific song. I will urge our listeners to find it. Tell us about two guys that we lost recently. Henry, a little bit about Tommy West, one of the people in your one-man show that you say took a chance on you at an important time.

Well, you know, I was banging around New York trying to get somewhere, and I signed with Cashman and West, and they were the hottest guys going. They had Jim Croce that was exploding. I mean, he had You Don't Mess Around with Jim and Leroy Brown. I Got a Name. I Got a Name was You Don't Mess Around With Jim and Leroy Brown and, you know. I Got a Name. I Got a Name was actually after, I think he. Oh, okay. Or at the same time as The Crash.

But, you know, A Time in a Bottle was an album cut on the second album. Nobody knew that song till afterwards. They realized how wonderful it was. And his son, AJ, I'm kind of like his big brother for the last 30 years or something, but wonderful guy. Well, Tommy West met Jim Croce, I think it was at Villanova in Philadelphia, and they went to school together, and they were in groups together, and I think what they had,

I can't remember the name of the group they were in, some doo-wop group they had, and then they ended up, Cashman and West ended up producing Jim Croce. And nobody wanted the record. But Terry Cashman and Gene Pistilli from Cashman, Pistilli and West, they Terry and Gene Pistilli had written Sunday Will Never Be the Same, which was a big hit for Spanky and our gang. our gang. And so they, they, as I think as a favor, Steve Barry, the great producer of a million hits on ABC Dunhill, took the Jim Croce record and they put out the first single and it blew up everywhere. You know, because nobody knows what they're listening to in this business, you know. I remember American City Suite. Wasn't that the one? Unbelievable record. Cashman and West? And before that, they, they called themselves with Pistilli, before it was Cashman, Pistilli and West, they called

themselves the Buchanan Brothers. And they had a big hit called Medicine Man, which is really a great record. And so I made records with Cashman and West, about four albums. And Tommy was a very musical guy. And here's something funny, Roger. You wrote I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing, and Tommy West sang on it in the group on the jingle. So somehow that song, I was meant to have something to do with that song. Gilbert, do you want to do a version of that? I'd Like to Teach the World to Sing would be great. Gilbert, is that in your repertoire?

Can we hear some of I'd Like to Teach the World? Oh, you're torturing the guy. Go on, Rog. Sure. I'd like to buy the world a home And furnish it with love Grow apple trees and honeybees And snow white turtle doves For trees and honeybees and snow-white turtledoves

I'd like to see the world for once All standing hand in hand And hear them echo through the hills For peace throughout the land I'd like to teach the world to sing For peace throughout the land. I'd like to teach the world to sing in perfect harmony. I'd like to hold it in my arms and keep it company. It's a real thing. Coke is in the back of your mind. Coca-Cola.

Sorry, I had to get that in there somewhere. Roger, Roger, Roger, and I believe in you that Don Williams had a hit. You had to change a line and they'll love that. What was the line? Remember the line you had to change? I just, sometimes I don't give a damn. Dom wouldn't sing damn. There was a question texting me. Sometimes I wonder who I am

is what he put in there. No, but there was another line. Yeah, there was another line. Yeah, it was about it had perhaps a chemical reference. Oh, yeah, yeah. It's just a great one. The rising costs are getting high. Right.

They put in the rising... He was singing that. He sang the rising costs are getting by. You see? And I don't normally let people change my lyrics, but it was Don Williams, and it was going to go to number one, so I let it go.

It did go to number one. It's cheap. Cheap, I want to tell us. I don't know why, but because I like the song Time in a Bottle. Henry, can you perform any of Time in a Bottle? I don't know that song. But if you invite AJ, his son, on here, he will do it and you will think it's his dad.

There you go, Gil. Perfect. AJ is a dear, dear, and a great, he's one of the best keyboard players anywhere, any country. He's really, and he's really fought not to be, when I met him, he had these songs like everything tastes like chicken, about cannibals eating a guy in the jungle. And I said, I heard him and I thought, oh my God,

it's Jim Croce again. This guy's going to be huge. But AJ stuck to his guns and made his own career and did his own style of music and never tried to do that, which is very respectable. And now that he's fairly well known, he goes out and he does some of his dad's tunes. And one of them, you know, if you want to really hear it and get a tear from it, you need to hear A.J. sing. Thanks for the booking idea. No, A.J. is wonderful. Working at the Car Wash Blues, one of my favorite. Thoroughly depressing, something mind-messing.

Low-down mind-messing. Yeah, I played the guitar on that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Impressing something mind-messing. Low-down mind-messing. Yeah, I played the guitar on that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Roger, since Henry remembered Tommy West,

tell us just one thing about your late, dearly departed friend, John Prine. Mine, too. Oh, and yours, too. Yeah. Excuse me. We were neighbors, all of us. What can you say about John? He was just a wonderful creature, as well as being a great songwriter and a very special vocalist. He was just such a kind person, such a nice person. And God, we miss him to something terrible. We went up about just a little over a week ago, we went up to Arkansas,

where we fished twice a year on for the last 40 odd years on a river called the White River. And we went up there and we took his ashes up there. Me and a couple of great guys, we threw some ashes on the river anyway and drank a handsome Johnny, which was John's favorite drink. Smirnoff and Diet Ginger Ale. Sorry. I'll tell you. You can only drink one of those.

Then you drink them all night. Anyway, my friend John, what can I say? He was just a wonderful person. What an artist. Yeah, my friend John, what can I say? He was just a wonderful person. What an artist. Yeah, and it was great to go to a John Prine show and hear 2,000 people singing along with all the words. I'm sure.

That's the kind of fans he had, you know. Yeah, we miss John. Forgive me, Henry. I didn't know you were close to John as well. I bought my house because Roger had a house, and it was a Super Bowl day, and I was over there with Roger and John, and John had something that he had brought back from Chicago,

and we were all completely gone. So I walked around the corner and bought a house. It's the truth. That's it. I walked around. When I came back, I said, corner and bought a house. It's the truth. That's it. I walked around. I came back. I said, I just bought a house. We were neighbors.

Yeah. A great artist and a great legacy. Unbelievable. And what a guy. I had Thanksgiving and Christmas at his house for years. And he was an amazing guy because as successful as he was, he still, I think, thought of himself as a mailman who wrote songs. You know, he was so humble, right, Raj?

I mean, you would never know. You would never know you were the big shot. He was very generous and he was funny. He had a, he was obviously clever and, but really soulful. I mean, the man. Very soulful, yeah. He wrote, go ahead. He was a blue-collar poet.

Yeah. He wrote for the average man in the street, you know, who had a regular job and trying to get along with his wife and raising kids in school. He wrote those kind of songs, John. Yeah, I quote him all the time. One of these lines, and I love a million John Primes lines, and there's a lot of them that people go over and over,

but there was one, walking down the street like Lucky LaRue, got my hand in my pocket thinking about you. I ain't hurting nobody. I ain't hurting no one. That's beautiful. It's incredible. Henry, there was a,

go ahead, Roger, I'm sorry. I was going to tell you a very quick story about John. This is his kind of humor. We got together one night at 6 o'clock, which was a bad time for us to write. We wrote at 1 o'clock in the morning. But somebody decided we should get together. And we sat down, we looked at each other for an hour, trying to come up with an idea and couldn't.

And John said, are you hungry? I said, yeah. He said, let's go and get a steak. So we went to Ruth Chris Steakhouse. And we ordered our food and a nice bottle of wine, and we were drinking some wine, and he was eating a bite of steak, and he looked at me and he said, I love songwriting. It was just a beautiful line at the time. I've never forgotten it.

That's great. Henry, did you want to share your poem with Gilbert? Oh, it was. Well, when Roger see, I was in England with my wife and and Roger, while we were there, Roger was being inducted into what is called the Songwriters of Distinction, which is, you know, one of the most, it's like a songwriter hall of fame here. And so, you know, Joe Brown, who was his friend,

for how many years were you friends with Joe Brown? A hundred and, they had, when they both turned 75, they had their 150th birthday party, which is fun. You know, they had these shirts. And anyway, so Joe never missed a gig in his life. And he was going to make a speech about Roger. And I had one, I had no idea what I was going to. I thought I was going to a dinner party that you needed to wear a tuxedo to get into the restaurant. I had no idea what we were doing. And so they, we got dropped off and

we walk into some posh place in what part of London it was a very posh part of London. Savoy. Savoy. And I walk in and as we walk in, they blow the trumpets and go, Mr. And Mr. Henry, Mr. And Mrs. Henry Gross. And the guy says, do us proud, sir. And because Joe got, because Joe got sick, he got the flu. And he says to me, I skipped this. I, Joe got sick for the first time in. And he says to me, I skipped this. Joe got sick for the first time in his life. An hour before we were supposed to leave, he couldn't get out of bed.

And he says to me, Henry, you'll say a few words about Roger, won't you? And I said, sure, why not? You know, I mean, my pal, and I'll say something about it. So I got in this room and I get in there. I mean, Andrew Lloyd Webber is there and Justin Hayward.

Half of rock and roll England is there. And they're honoring my friend. And I hadn't prepared anything. But I remember that Joe Brown and Roger, both of them, and in fact, every English guy I ever met, does these little limericks. So I had learned one, I think, in public school. And I thought, well, the English will like this. So I said, it was the night before the king's castration. It was his last ball. All the counts, recounts and discounts were gathered around the table talking camel shit. For in those

days, bullshit had not yet been invented. Uproads to Galahad said, where is the queen? Why, she's playing with the prick of the Prince of Peoria. What, said the king? She should be dangling the dick of Duke of Denmark. Fuck everyone, said the king, and millions of babies were born. For in those days, the king's word was the law. And I said this to him, and that was where our friendship ended. this to and i and that was where our friendship ended he says this to like a hundred huge hit songwriters with all their wives and everything i didn't know what else to say oh my lord gilbert you'd have done it gilbert would have done it gilbert would have done it you got one one thing

with you guys that keeps coming through is is uh is gratitude roger i heard you in an interview and somebody said you know who is roger cook and you said one lucky son of a bitch what is true isn't it and i'm tall and i'm fairly good looking yes i mean what do you want I'm very happy with life. I'm a very lucky man. Lucky man. We're all lucky people here, including Jim Della Croce, who's watching. And Jim Della Croce is here. He's not speaking, but we owe this whole episode to him.

Yes. As well as the Michelle Phillips show and the John Sebastian show. I owe tons to him. And Henry, why don't you, speaking of luck and gratitude, you have the perfect song to take us out. Well, I even think Roger doesn't hate this one of mine.

Ha ha ha! The waitress asks me if I'm famous. I say no, but I'm hungry. She says the eggs are cold, the toast is burnt, the bacon's mostly fat. And I say, lucky me, I like it like that. Nowhere to stay, I ring a doorbell The landlord looks me up and down and says The walls are thin, the rooms are cramped There's no place to hang your hat And I say, lucky me, I like it like that

Cause every day I play it straight. Never tempt the hand of fate. In a world of give and take, I take what's given. I find a gypsy fortune teller. In a run-down shack across the tracks. In a run-down shack across the tracks She says, money isn't in the cards Hard work will break your back And I say, lucky me, I like it like that

Cause every day I played straight Never tempt the hand of fate In a world of give and take Every day I played straight, never tempt the hand of fate. In a world of give and take, I take what's given. Standing at the gates of heaven, St. Peter smiles at me and says The food is great, the hotel's grand Your bags have been unpacked And I say, lucky me, I like it like that Lucky me, I like it like that

Fantastic. That's a great song, Henry. What a great song. Thanks, Rush. Thank you, everybody. I can't believe you're Jewish. I just can't believe it. Why?

I can't believe you're not Jewish and wrote great songs. What are the odds? I mean, you're the only guy that ever wrote a hit. I can't believe you're not Jewish and wrote great songs. What are the odds? I mean, you're the only guy that ever wrote a hit. I can't believe it. I mean, it's unbelievable. We have to thank you guys. Gilbert, did you have a good time? Gil, did you have fun with these guys?

Oh, my God, yes. Roger, Henry. We had fun with you guys? Oh, my God, yes. Roger, Henry. We had fun with you, Gilbert. You guys are just terrific, terrific artists. And Jim DeLaCroce, nothing happens without Jim. So thanks again, pal. Any things you guys want to plug or promote or mention? Henry, your website?

Yeah, henrygross.com. And for those of you that don't want to buy, I mean, CDs, you can't buy anything anymore anyway. Where would you play it? But if you are nuts enough to buy one, I've got a house full, trust me. And if you want to hear it, it's on YouTube. Just look up the songs on my website.

And it's on Spotify. It's on Apple. My stuff, all my records, they're all available everywhere. And I have songs you love, like The Night You Picked Up the Check. And Let's Open a Bottle and Wine. And some very nice heartfelt ones, too.

You know, I have all, I have, where else are you going to hear Geezers of Nazareth? Unless you come to my album. So, you know, you're not going to find it. Let's face it. You can't get it anymore. Corvettes is closed.

Corvettes is gone. What about you, Rog? Anything you want to promote or mention before we get out of here? No. Just have a good life, everyone. Have a wonderful fucking life. Thank you guys both for a lifetime of music well thank you buddy thank you very much for the opportunity to be on this show that's great it was great gil i love you and i frank you're

unbelievable and roger well you know it's yeah well then one save it for later i hope you guys are together soon so you can smell him. And Henry, you were saying you were a fan of mine. I was very flattered. No, I am. But I realize, I told Frank, I think I know, you know, I don't know a lot about but I mean, your line about

I gotta say, what you did to the guy, George Takei is Oh, Takei. Takei. Oh, Lord, I saw that. And I got to say, Gil, the line about imagine being the black sheep of the Hitler family. I mean, this is this is this is classic. This is too good. I mean, I wish we could stay on and you could do a half an hour because that's really would be the treat.

You know, it's unbelievable. Another day. Another day. And Frank tortured me because he said you were doing Caroline's and that, you know, that if I and I'm not in New York. And he said, if I was there, we would have gone down to see you. And, oh, man, that'll happen. It'll happen. Oh, thank you. You guys are entertaining as hell. Go on, Ron. Thank you. This has been Gilbert Gottfried's Amazing Colossal Podcast with my co-host Frank Santopadre.

And we've been talking to two guys. If it has anything to do with songs or songwriting, they've done it. And they continue doing it. Roger Cook and Henry Gross. That's them. And let's thank Johnny Lucas and John McClain. Yeah, Johnny. And John Murray for also making this happen.

It takes a village. We love you guys. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. That's a love you. Who's gonna rock you tonight? The cowboy at the bar is waiting for his chance He's got a pistol in his pocket, he thinks he can dance Mama, who's gonna rock?

Who's gonna rock you tonight? Mama, who's gonna roll? Who's gonna hold in your arms? Mama, who's gonna roll, who's gonna roll in your arms? The joker in the corner in the jacket and tie Doing all he can to try to catch your eye Mama, who's gonna rock, who's gonna rock you tonight? We'll see you next time. We're all around the chest Waiting our turn No matter, leave them here

Until we learn Mama, who's gonna rock Who's gonna rock you tonight Mama, who's gonna rock Who's gonna rock you tonight You know what I'm thinking and that ain't no crime All I wanna do is help you

make up your mind Mama, who's gonna rock gonna rock you tonight Oh, mama. Yeah, with his wife wishing he was alone Everybody here wants to take him home Where are we landing? Just a wait and not turn No matter, leave him here until we learn Bye. We'll see you next time. Who's gonna rock? Who's gonna rock you tonight?