Rock and Roll; Interview with Jabo Starks [Part 1 of 2]

Okay, okay, well I see I started with James I think it's six to five and then you know you later years you'll be here you will hear people say one he's you know he's saying well I want everything on the one you know and to me I looked at James on stage as not that vocalist you know that got it centered chrome to you and all that stuff he was more of a I guess in that music world they call hoofa and dancer and dancers dance to beats that's right on top of everything that's a dancer's always on top so that's what I equated the on the one to me but then again you hear the one two you know like if you say one two three four you're all that is top that that first beat is right on time right on top like I said after one two three four it comes one again and you're

right on top of it but that's the way I equated that with James though you know well now to me I made you know this is my perception of being on the one of what's not the one and two and four because when you're playing the blues which I came up playing with Bobby playing you know you played the blues and and and they said if you play a 12 bar blues you know you start up like you know and the two and the back beat is the two to me you know and you're on five and this and then you know you just got your hands on the high head but there you know but you add so much to it it's not so much as being one is not so much as being emphasized

when you're playing other than playing with James Brown with James Brown it had to be that had to stand out that one had to stand out wearing if you're playing the blues you play your turn around and your bridge is a little different you don't but when you went into anything else like with James then you had to you had to emphasize he wanted to hear he wanted to hear that because I still think out of his dancing he always listen regardless of what happened for that first beat that that right on top of it and always you on top of it you know he was doing it because if you weren't on top with it then it it turned around let you know that too you know come on man you but that's that's basically now that's my perception of it I mean this is the way I see it I can't explain why somebody else might see it well see now you want to make you start sounding like I can home you know because yeah I have to home that I have to home that part to get to it

but I do like you know on the one understandable with James Brown you have to be you had to be on the one and that's what you was here and when you said it when he kicked it off like one two three you said you always you always made it stand out we're stronger than anything else and you just hit it and basically when you hit it when you were playing the he wanted to you you hit it so he could hear it and that was that's what that was you just make that one stand out you know even if you're playing it on from your sock symbol you still make it sounds make it come it come out and the socks in the bass drum at the same time you're hitting it you know you're making it sound

that's what you're doing you know it's coming out that's to me that's one in Mark yeah uh when when when you played in James's band you must understand pardon me the changes drew the times how the things how it changed yeah when you were when you were in James's band there was always constant change you know personnel change so you you there was routines to be done James choreographer all of the routines and then but when the routines were done every time one came around there was a change somewhat and everybody it was almost like what

you call regimented like like an old regimented armistile they when you decayed us when you move everybody moved and it turned and then they were you had routines as they called that's what you were doing and every time you hear that one regardless of what tune James was playing the routines was done in that sequence like that you know you have to then again in the old band you had those changes in the old band the old band to me was really regimented I mean strictly regimented but then again that was a part of that era and then when you move to the next new batch of people that came along it changed somewhat for something else you got another gear as you call it and the the more that you change personnel the more gears you got you understand you do you have quite an understanding what I'm saying okay that's what that's what that's what I'm

talking about you the change in James Brown organization that's what I'm saying okay now we're talking about change within James Brown's organization okay when I joined James in 65 there were four drummers five drummers four or five drummers on stage yes no one drummer played in more than one or two tunes some drummers didn't play at all when he was on stage they just played when the other part of the show was going and that I couldn't understand but then again you have to understand the change there is a little something James would hear something from each person that he hired so especially in the rhythm section he would hear something from somebody else and regardless if he liked that little note or two or that lick or two he played he hired that person

for a little while and then he'll get that what he could get out of that then he'll move to the next person and gradually as you do that you change but what you're doing is you're bringing fresh minds into that group and that's what he kept doing bringing fresh ideas because each guy that came in that group regardless of James oh James will say he'll be a drummer too you know at least he you know he we flew around a little you know but then he can say well I hear this so I want you to play he has heard something somewhere and he wants to try and perfect what he heard but he has a drummer that might come close to it and he hear something similar he'll let him he'll work him for while then he'll use that and he'll move again but then after he moves the change comes not only in the drummer but in the rhythm section because you go back to James old James Brown and you hear

slow tunes you know you hear slower versions of tunes you hear more structured in one one one lane that's like a two lane road you know then after that old group left the band that was a time it was time to change then they say well golly okay everybody's leaving the old band left James so now what is he going to do so then you had the group out of Cincinnati to come that's when boots it came wow boy I was bass player I mean not did nobody else was not playing bass that was a new idea they had a new way of doing everything James did that was the turn around for him but when you get that that's a fresh idea so James changes along with the band changing and when that change came he was shouting back up again but that's what that and that's what I meant by by the change of

the personnel because everybody that came through that group bought something to that band regardless of who you were you bought something there because he didn't hire you unless he heard something that he liked that you were doing even a hard man and James not hard man you know but that's that's basically what it was James brown band when the when the change was bought about boots it came to James I'm trying to figure out how to say this to you I put it in terms where people will understand to mean boot set okay we were talking about boot set boot set college you know okay okay okay all right I think boots at college you know with he when he came to the group first

you must not just say boot you have to put his brother felt in there with him see because the guitar felt as a guitar player boots as a bass player but see they complimented each other you as you see what I'm saying and then then boot sets playing man I have just never I had never played with a bass player of that caliber when you say funk and I don't even know how you define funk to tell you in my terms I'm thinking for me now but when you say funk you be talking about how man that can start playing and all you want to do is just get there and you hear so much stuff that he's playing he takes what a lot of people do with one or two notes he's taking put 10 or 12

in there I mean I mean he's all over there I mean he's just grooving he's you sit on a pocket with him but then you have to think about Phil's back there with that rhythm with what boosts is doing compliment and then the drummer has to sit in that same pocket as they call it with that rhythm section I have to explain a little few things to you when I say pocket to my knowledge of what a pocket is when I started trying to play and when I try to play with a rhythm section that's what we are a rhythm section and until you can get where you can sit down and think and play as one as a rhythm section you're not quite that rhythm section that's I think you know looking bass is banned for instance you know that band that rhythm section that he had was so tight and so together you have to learn to play with each other I'm not trying to outplay anybody else

only thing I want to do is keep that heartbeat going as they call it as long as I can keep that heartbeat going the bass player the guitar player or that horn player can do whatever he wants to do because he knows that that solid foundation is back there behind him and that rhythm section can get in that groove and you can't move it you can you got to do you got to do things and when you are innovative when that groove starts you start hearing stuff and when you start hearing different thing it makes you play differently so for a sex machine when you did sex machine you know like that pattern it just sits and and you sink into that pattern with that rhythm and it just and it goes and that's the best way I can explain it to you you know but you you have to hear it to know exactly what I'm saying but that that that boots about another he and Phil's I can't

leave Phil's they bought another move but James Brown went into another gear when they got there and I was the only one left out of the old band and I possibly would have gone I know I would have when everybody else but I had a contract with James and I have to you know I had all of that contract I had a contract with him and so I was there but I was thankful to be there with Lucy I learned a lot from those guys playing playing with James required strict attention as I said before earlier it was like a regimented you see that's where that dancer part came in they weren't doing things I started doing things with James Brown when I joined the group when I started playing most of his stuff his his me his part of the show you see then you'll go back

to the drummers that we had it came from five drummers to three drummers to two drummers and it stayed two drummers there until I left the group but there was a reason for two drummers and as I was saying there was no two guys played the same way and James may have had a different he may have heard it different one night or hear it different and he would want somebody else to play it but to play James's show I had gotten to the point with that group that I was the drummer that had to play his show only I had to play his entire show and when I did that James Redancing that's when I come back come back to where I say well a hoofing by the dancer when James is dancing James would make little moves and you could hear if you caught the show in person that you hit those you hit them and as you keep playing the same pattern but you would hit his moves and

make it it was hey I was just using dramatic it made it spontaneous you know when you hear it people would look wow did you see that he made that well how did you catch that but you had to pay attention to him because he always challenge you to watch him and sometimes I used to catch him off and that's a little yes I have called James I have played and you play his show and there's one thing about it if you play it this way if you start playing it one way you play it that way don't change it unless he changes it you don't change it that he changes it and he I played his show and I made hits and he forgot him hit turn around smile and he's back and come back to do it again and say well okay I missed it then I'll catch it now but that's you start I started doing things like that with him okay you said if I missed I am not perfect and if I missed I don't like to say it like that it was rather rare because it was it was a job with me

it was when I go on stage I go on stage with the same idea that he has I'm going to do this show and I'm going to do it the best that I know out I'm going to remember I don't have time to worry about a watch what the audience or what the other part of the band is doing I had to watch James Brown because the watch James Brown did you do James Brown show that way and when I do that show like I would tell him all the time I didn't I didn't miss it I know it I know it because I have sit there and you play it long enough to know it now if you want to change please tell me and we'll do that but you it's just have a but James has a thing about here find people too you know oh yeah it didn't find it if you missed if you missed a note or two or a few other things no no that's cloud and I was we were talking about well that's like

with James Brown you time to me it's very important I was taught to play it I mean to play time and whole time now if you were going to do something different when you do something you do that but as long as somebody's up there working you play time you know that's like when the Ray Charles man if you ever paid an attention to Ray and that's today now it's such a habit with Ray when you see Ray go off that's time he's he's giving you all the time you need right there you know you know even though he's he's precise and a lot of stuff when you work with Bobby bland that was time but that's when I first started really knowing what good hard time meant it meant holding everything you do regardless of what a person in front of you do like when with James

when Macio some of those guys will be playing solos you know if you listen to that horn you you know you know where he's you know know where he's going but you hear him playing and he know if you keep everything right there as they say if you keep your foot right on him he can constantly move and all of the stuff that he's doing is when you make him play a good rhythm section makes an artist work you know and you watch Ray or any of the groups that's that's working even with James um we've gotten in the grooves where it's hard to turn them loose and and and I literally made that you know you can play and people say you get a high I get a high from playing drums I get a high from playing music and you play and you get the groove is so good it's hard to turn it's a scary

feeling it's hard to turn it loose and guys will tell you man you were grooving you grooving and that means you you've sitting on a pocket and you sit or standing like a metronome or car and it's just stays there and it's scary sometimes because you just how can you groove so hard and it's just it's a good feeling that's what it is really you want to do it that way when you want me to do it now okay I played the regal theater and it was the last show and there was still garbage puttos of people outside waiting to get in they couldn't get in and the last show we finished the last show they broke the doors down they demanded another show and we had to do another

show I had never seen that before but I mean it was just they just rushed the door and tore it down and they wanted another show and you did it he was just that hot you know