← The Drop the Needle Podcast
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Your message amplified.
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Ready to share your message with the world? Start your podcast journey with Podbean.
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Podbean.
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Podbean.
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Podbean. Podbean. The AI powered all in one podcast platform. Thousands of businesses and enterprises trust Podbean to launch their podcasts. Launch your podcast on PodBean today.
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My school uses Podbean.
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My church too. I love it. I really do.
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Welcome to the Drop the Needle podcast, your backstage pass to the corporate jungle. I'm your host, Jim Alstatt. And here, industry titans step up to the mic sharing their epic journeys. We're hitting the high notes and the low notes of their careers, creating a symphony of success. This isn't just another interview show. It's where truth bombs are dropped and secrets are revealed. So grab your conductor's baton because who knows, this just might help you compose the next huge hit of your career. Are you ready? Let's go. Welcome back to the Drop the Needle podcast. I'm your host, Jim Alstadt and I am so happy all decided to join us today. We're continuing with part two of our extraordinary conversation with John St. Augustine, author, radio legend, and someone who has truly grabbed life by the horns. Last time, John shared his early life in Chicago, his experiences playing football and the transformative impact of surviving two near death experiences.
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How was it possible you could dream something, not know what it means at all, and then months later stand in the same thing you've dreamt?
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And here you are.
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And here I am. Every circuit blew up. Whatever vestiges of what I thought I was or who I thought I was or what I was taught to believe growing up, gone, shit canned, done.
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Oh yeah.
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Not possible. Yet here I am. And in that moment, a very clear voice, not male or female. Don't remember John. Go on the radio.
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In part two of the John St. Augustine interview, we'll hear about John's incredible journey on foot to Chicago, his profound connection with John Denver and the musical soundtrack that accompanies his remarkable life. Let's jump back in with John St. Augustine.
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Well, I appreciate that. Any chance I get an opportunity to speak about John is a good thing for me. And it's an emotional thing. It wasn't more than an hour and a half ago I was working on something and I did my own podcast this morning, which we'll get to later. I use one of his songs and the hair always goes up on my arm and it takes me back to a different time and, you know, part of my growing up. His music in the 70s was all over the world. He's one of the largest, you know, reconcile selling artists at that time. His longevity was unquestioned incredible. Musician, singer, songwriter, the whole deal. And I knew all that and I was, I was part of all that. But then the dominoes started going in a different direction. And in 1989 he was coming to Chicago to do an event called Higher Ground, which was not a concert, but it was his public presentation did all over the world about how do we become more aware and better stewards of the planet when it comes to long term sustainability. And I was at that time just starting to get in the media. Even I was teaching part time, but I was starting to get in the media at that point and I was on the advanced team to help with media and promotion. And so I reached out to a guy named Bill Curtis, who years on A and E and the Cold Case Files, American justice. Well at that time he was a anchor on CBS News here with a guy named Walter Jacobson, right. So I remember calling Bill's desk line and leaving a voicemail saying, hey, this is what's happening at the Chicago theater tomorrow night, blah blah, blah, it'd be great if you could be there to cover it. And I didn't know Bill Curtis at all. I had met John slightly a few years earlier. I was on a vacation in Wheat Ridge, Colorado, where my auntie lived and he was doing a benefit concert and it was just like, wow, I get to see the guy live who. I've listened to the radio for years, but I knew him in a way that was like, there's more to this guy than I get and there's more to him than what's going on with this music stuff. So he comes to Chicago, they have the event right before the end. I'm walking down to get to my seat and here comes Bill Curtis in the same row, sits right next to me. We've been friends ever since and have worked on many projects over the years, Bill and I. The Earth Matter series. So proud to work on, on that with him and a radio program. So anyway, all that happens and we do the afterglow, we're upstairs and you know, everybody's talking with John and this, that, and there's just something going on. You just know when that there's. This is not an end to something, this is the beginning of something. So I mentioned earlier I was working overnights at the, at the motel or the hotel, I should say as a security guy. And one night I'm getting ready to go to work at 11 o' clock it's like quarter two. Jay Leno's on, doing the Tonight show, and he starts talking about John being guest. And this is probably in 1990, 1991, somewhere in there. And he comes out, sings a song. And when he finishes singing, the voice says, you have to go see John in Boston at the Wang center next month. Jay Leno said, here's where he's at. And immediately I thought, I gotta go there. Why would I go there? It makes no sense. So I buy a ticket on Continental Airlines, which doesn't exist anymore. 200 bucks round trip. I fly to Boston, I get a motel. I don't even have a ticket to the concert. Nothing. But I knew who Chris o' Connor was. John's road manager. I call him, I find him, he sets it up. He says, why do you got to talk to John? I said, I have no idea, no clue.
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Come on in.
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Yeah, come on in. Sure. So I go to the. He says, you can talk to him ahead of the concert. Great. So I get there with beautiful out of the Boston Commons. Big snowstorm is like courier knives and wonderful time out there. And I get there, and I walk in, and then my name was, you know what, the security guy. I'm sitting there waiting and waiting and waiting. Wait. 30 minutes go by, 40 minutes. No John, nobody else. All of a sudden, the door was open up. Here's John and his band and his manager, and they're decidedly late. And he kind of looks at me like, I know you. Why are you here? And he kept going. And Chris comes over and says, listen, you know, we lost our window. The concert's got to happen. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. Do you have tickets? I said, no. He goes, well, I'll give you tickets to the concert. Do you have dinner? I'm like, no. He goes, well, I'm getting cheeseburgers for the band, and you can have cheeseburgers with us from McDonald's. I go, okay. So I go downstairs, and he says, you can sit here. And I'm sitting in this room, and there's a dozen of John's guitars in a circle, and the only place to sit is in the middle of them. And they're all being electronically tuned. And I'm watching these electronic tuners with their going up and down, you know, the lights and stuff. And I thought, oh, my God, what is going on here? And I can hear them on the stage above me getting ready for this Christmas concert. It was a Christmas concert for the Catholic Charities of Boston. And I thought, I Gotta go up and talk to him. So what do I do? I get out of there. I walk upstairs on stage during the rehearsal, and I walk out and I'm just standing. They all stop playing and look at me and Chris like, you can't come up here. I'm like, I gotta. Where are you gonna be tomorrow night? He said, pittsburgh. I said, I'll meet you there. He goes, Listen, you have five minutes or 10 minutes after the show. He's got a big thing he's gotta do later, but, okay, just go sit down. Are you okay? So I go and sit down. Great concert. He's in fine voice. It was wonderful. I go backstage. There's always people to see him. I'm the last one there where there's a bare bulb. And he walks up to me, Shakespeare. And he goes, what are you doing here? And I said, I thought you'd know. And he looked at me like I was an idiot, which is basically my middle name at this point. And he said, did you bring me something? And all of a sudden, Jim, I had this thought that I had these letters in my jacket. And the letters were from kids that had written me after I gave a talk at their school. These were just fifth graders, maybe. A friend of mine from grammar at high school was a teacher. She put me in her class. I was just talking about environmental stuff. Hey, real general. And they wrote these nice letters. They were in my jacket. I'm like, oh, I got these letters. So I took them out, showed it to him, and he starts reading them, and he gets this grin on his face like he got out of class early or something. He's this broad grin. And he looks at me and he goes, do you have any idea what you're doing? No, I don't. He puts his right hand on my shoulder. He looks me directly in the eye and he says, your voice matters. Do you know this? I did not. He said, you voice matters. And the coming years will prove me correct. Okay? He said, now take these letters and put them in my bag. I want to take it back with me to Aspen. Okay? Gives me a hug, I put the letters in, I go home. I think, mission accomplished. About, I don't know, three, four weeks later, I get a phone call from his office saying, Mr. Denver brought these letters back. We take them to the Windstar board meeting. Winstar was a nonprofit he ran, and we're going to start implementing educational programs based on the letters you sent. Oh, there's a huge win. It was worth. It was all great, right? That was Just the tip of the iceberg. So maybe six months later, the timeline's getting fuzzy. All these years later, I'm teaching at school and I get a flyer in the mail from the Windstar foundation saying that the upcoming symposium that year, which was an international symposium, big name, big deal, in Aspen, at the aspen music tent, 5,000, 10,000 people. John sings Big deal. That upcoming event was called Choices for the Future, the Human Family. And by the time I got home from school teaching that day and sat in my yard, the lyrics or words to the Human family had written themselves out automatically.
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Oh, my goodness.
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And I just wrote them out and I what's this? This is new. I've never done this before, so I didn't share it with very many people, but I knew somehow I was supposed to be there. And cutting a very long story short, there's only one or two people that are still around from that time that could verify this. I absolutely knew it was going to happen, and I was going to speak there, but I had never been on the radio. There was no such thing as TED talks, hadn't written a book. I spoke at a couple classes that were fourth and fifth graders. That was it. And so two weeks before the symposium that year, I get a phone call, John's office again. Mr. Denver would like to speak to you. Okay. He gets on the phone. He goes, hey, pal, what are you doing? I'm like, well, right now I'm cleaning the cat box. You know, what are you doing? He says, I need your help. I say, what's that? He said, Dr. Mae Jemison, first female black astronaut in history, was supposed to speak at the event, and she canceled. Would you please take her place?
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Oh, my goodness.
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I'll tell you right now. It went through me. And I thought, my life will never be the same again. So we fly out to Aspen. I gave a talk called the Ripple Effect. And I remember the night before, sitting in a hot tub, just soaking, like, what am I doing here? And what am I. This is what's going on here? And so next morning, I get to the Aspen Music Tent, and I had taken a matchbox, like matches out of the hotel, and I wrote three words, three questions. Where have you been? Why are you here? Where are you going? That was my entire talk for 40 minutes. The woman in front of me was the senior scientist from the World Wildlife Fund. She had assistance and reams of paper and all this, you know, all this slides, the whole deal. So she basically finished. And then Rollin Smith, who was a great newsman, in his day. And it was the mc, you know, does this whole thing. And out, out I walk. I look at the pictures now. I don't know why I wore the shirt that I wore. I thought it was really cool. But I got out there, and when I finished, I delivered that poem that I had written almost a year earlier to a standing ovation audience. And when I finished, I walked outside, and there was all these people standing. I'm like, who are you waiting for? We want to talk to you. I'm like, for what? And it was this. Everything tipped, and it's never stopped since. So not only did he tell me that my voice mattered, he made good on it. He saw something in me I did not see in myself at the time. I've made it my business to pay that forward. I work with so many people, remind them, connect with them, and say, listen, this is not it. There's more here for you, and that's inside of you. It will show in time, but you have to let the dominoes fall. As we're speaking, I'm looking up on the wall of my studio and there's this huge frame poster that John gave me and signed from speaking back in 1994. I think it was at the symposium. And so whatever I've done is because of him. I owe him. That's the way it works.
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That is so cool. That really is.
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And years later, the second book comes out. Every Moment Matter come out in 2010. And his first wife, Annie, and I have been friends for a long time. I had her come to Chicago. She went to the Oprah show. It was a big deal for her and the Oprah gals. And she reciprocated by hosting a book signing event for me in Aspen and sold out at her home. And to spend four or five days, almost a week with her in the mountains and just go through all this stuff again. At one point, we're walking through the sanctuary that now exists for John out there that she helped build. And we stood in the middle and just cried. It was really something. Really something, man. Miss him dearly, I'm sure.
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And who would have known that such a profound thing would have happened from. From that.
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Yeah. And think about this. You know, again, as I always say, the headlines always obliterate our lifelines. We get so focused on what's going out there, we can't do much about. We live in very tenuous times, but we're always in tenuous times. Shit's always hitting the fan. It's better be behind the fan. Than in front of it. And so this is in all of my books. I don't think it's in the first book, but the second and third book. These stories are in there. And how these amazing things have taken place in my life because the dominoes fall, and I say yay or nay, and then it goes off on this adventure. But there's any. Any impact I've had in the world, Anybody that I've helped with my books or the TED talks or the thousands and thousands incalculable hours I've been on the radio and podcasting, and everything I do comes from the fact that he said, do you know your voice matters? I ask everybody the same thing, and I support that. When they figure out that they do. Very important, yourself included.
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Well, thank you. I appreciate that. And that is. Man, it is listening to that. It's. It's prophetic. Right? I mean, that. That's really what it boils down to. To me, when I heard that, and when I hear this again, I'm. It just shakes me.
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Well, I can't tell you how honored I feel when people ask me about this, because I get to validate that. And whether it's a renowned international superstar like him or somebody like the guy I had breakfast with that gave me a job at 16, you have to go back to those roots and see where are those pivot points, because otherwise we forget. When you forget your toast. And I think the thing I always say about John is his music was great, but it was just. It was just a hook about the work. I always thought the work he did in the world was, quite frankly, more important than the music, but they worked off each other. So he would do a concert, and if you felt inclined to go do something, then the music had great purpose. So while I say it all the time, the work continues. The things that he stood for and the things that he put voice to, they echo much of how I feel about things. And so maybe when I do this, like I did the Earth Matters with Bill Curtis series, we did 300 episodes of that, you know, then somebody listens to that, and they take it somewhere. So it is the ripple effect in everything we do.
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It's amazing. And that was an absolutely beautiful segue into our. Our next section of the show, which is the musical section.
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Very cool what you do.
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Well, thank you. As anyone can tell you that's ever listened to the podcast before, this is the section when I ask the guest some musical questions. Then this is pillar three of our show. And as I mentioned regularly Music is the tie that binds. And I believe everyone has a soundtrack that accompanies their life if they just take a moment to think about it. So you ready?
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Yeah.
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Okay. What was the first song you fell in love with on the radio or one that you heard that and can remember? I can't wait to hear that song again.
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Somewhere beyond the sea Somewhere waiting for me. Bobby Darin singing Beyond the Sea is like the baseline for everything in music for me. So I'm in my studio doing the show with you right now. And six feet away, there is a 1958 Grundig stereo that my folks bought for each other when they got married. It was like 125 bucks, huge money back in the day. And it made a lot of ups and downs in ins and outs. It really doesn't work much anymore, but it doesn't matter. It's sitting here, and I can walk into my studio every day and imagine the thousands of hours I spend perched on a shag rug in the 60s and the 70s with my dad dropping vinyl. And Bobby Darin Live at the Copacabana began the whole thing. He's the king of cool for me.
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Oh, my gosh. Yeah. Beyond the sea La Mer.
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That's right. What a great. That's exactly right.
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Yep. I love that. Did your family have a song that everyone belt out on road trips or vacations when you were growing up?
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Not so much for me growing up because we had AM radio, so who cares? But what. Later, when my kids were little, we'd go back and forth from the UP to Chicago and back. We'd always, you know, then he had, by that point, CDs and stuff. And so I would always put on Billy Joel's We Didn't Start the Fire because you have to memorize all those lyrics.
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Yes.
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There's a lot to remember. And I think even now, when Billy Joel does his concerts, he needs help from the studio and teleprompters.
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It's a lot, I can tell you that. I saw the. The first show that he did, which was in Chicago back in the day in Rosemont Horizon. He was back nights, and I saw it. And the first night he forgot. And this is when Liberty DeVito was his drummer, and he looked at Liberty for the. The words of the song. And so, yeah, yeah, he did forget him 100%.
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A
Yeah. It's a great music video. It's a great song. And I know the song came out of his. His thought because he was in the studio and Julian Lennon, John's son, came in with A friend, and they were getting ready to, you know, do some. Do some things. And this friend said to Billy Joel, well, you know, you grew up in the 50s. There was no problems in the 50s. The sex. And that's where the song started. He started, you know, the whole thing. Red China, Johnny Ray, Walter Winchell, Joe DiMaggio. All that stuff came out of that conversation with this kid. And so we would drive back and forth and put on Billy Joel and we'd try to get all the, you know, the words right. So it was a lot of fun.
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Charles de Gaulle, baseball. Yeah.
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Oh, I know. I don't even remember. I listened to him. Like, wow. It's just a lot.
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Yeah, absolutely. On another side note, I had an opportunity when I was auditioning for graduate school. I went to Manhattan School of Music, and he was doing a master class there.
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A
You're kidding.
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When I was there. No, no, no, no, no. I didn't get to go inside the master class. I just saw it from the. The doors and looking through the window, and I'd seen Billy Joel. I. I should say I have seen Billy Joel probably six or eight times.
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Very cool. Very cool.
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I'm a big, big fan of his.
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Yeah.
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So what was your favorite song that you and your friends would belt out in your senior year of high school?
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This is so easy. Oh, what a night. Late December, back in 63. So Frankie Vallian, the Four Seasons. They were called just the Four Seasons back then. When this came out, I think it was like in 75 or 6. 76 it would have been. And this is one of those things, you know, you connect it right to a part of your life that never, ever goes away when you hear it. Music, of course, is a time machine. Takes you right back there. And there's this one piece of road on the northwest side called the S curve. And it's. It doesn't matter exactly where it's at, but it really makes you slow down to snake your way through there. And if you don't know it, you see there's parts of cars laying all over the place that didn't know the S curve was there. So we would navigate this constantly on a Friday night. And for whatever reason, it seemed like every time we hit the S curve, Frankie Valli and the boys were doing their thing. So to this day, Jim, when that song comes on XM satellite radio, let me just go on the record saying I was wrong. I never thought anybody pay for radio, but now we do. Even when I was at Harpa work with OPRAH I'm like, who's going to pay for this stuff? But here we are. I will text my friend Marilyn, send her a picture, and, you know, and she sends it back, and she'll say, s. Curve. Huh? So that's the kind of thing that was. Yeah, it's just great. Great song. And to this day, when it comes on, I sing it like I wrote it.
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I love that. I absolutely love it. And that's why we go through these questions, because it teleports you in time.
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Yeah.
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Back to that moment. So it's just so awesome.
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Yep.
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Did. Well, let me ask you. Did your musical tastes change after high school when you were in college?
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Yeah, it did. I mean, some of, you know, some of these guys have been around for a while. So if I was in high school, there's Steve Miller, and he was still on in college, and some of these guys carried over Billy Joel, stuff like that. But in the. What did change was in the 80s, when I went into the service, and all of a sudden I was stationed with a bunch of guys from the south, and I learned about Don Williams and Charlie Daniels and Hank Jr. And Juice Newton and Michael Martin Murphy and all these guys. And. And that was my connection to that time. We used to cash our checks when we were in the service and go to this urban cowboy bar, and it was just ridiculous. It was a huge craze back in the day, that whole urban cowboy thing. And so, you know, Cotton Eye Joe and all the rest of its stuff, guys be banging their heads against the wall. It was just. There was one guy we had, he would get so drunk, he'd bang his head on the wall against. On purpose just to skip the record, to start it over again. So, you know, it was a good time. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So we loved him.
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Do we have the same friends?
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Probably. I would be surprised, but I have such a great affection for country music that I didn't have growing up in Chicago because we were more rock, you know?
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Right, Absolutely.
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So Charlie Daniels and I love Don Williams. I just heard him on the radio this morning. The Gentle Giant. You know, nobody that drop down baritone just lays it right out, brother. So. Oh, yeah, that's kind of how it went for me in the 80s.
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That's cool. I. We had Sunday lunch at my grandmother's house. She lived in a little town around Joliet called Sherwood. And every Sunday we go there for Sunday. Sunday dinner, Sunday lunch. And it was the same type of scenario where the TV go off. Because the only thing that you'd have is a bunch of nothing before family classics or something.
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A
Oh, family classics, yeah.
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Which was awesome, by the way. But we'd be listening to music like Earl Flats. Oh, yeah, Tubs. And so I was, I was introduced to country music at a young, young age because my dad's side of the family was from the south, they're from Kentucky. And so, yeah, I've always had a little bit of that. And then to your point, went away from that because it is more rock in Chicago, in blues, of course.
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A
But yeah, yeah. And going back to Michael Martin Murphy real quick. So another guy that John Denver helped, Michael Martin Murphy was a struggling songwriter till John recorded a song called Boy for the country and put it on a live album. And Murph said he could pay his bills and didn't starve to death. And so every year since John's passed, I've done something, either a tribute on, on radio or XM or wherever I've been. And now, of course, they do it on podcasting. And so last year it was 25 years, I believe, since John had perished in that plane crash. So it's been two years ago, I guess, and I asked Murph to come on. We've been friends on and off. Radio puts you in people's orbits and you become friends and it's all good. So Murph comes on and he's telling a story about how John wrote that song, you know, did the song much different than he did. And I was able. I'll have to send it to you for afterwards, but I was able to take Boy from the country the way Michael Martin Murphy wrote it and performed it and then edit in John doing it his version flawlessly. It took me 30 minutes to get like a two second cut in there. And I listened to it and I sent it to Murphy. He's like, I'm in tears here. I've never seen them combined like this kind of a mashup. So another guy who's had a great stellar career and I really enjoy his music, Michael Martin Murphy.
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B
Well, this just shows you that even that community, how everybody pays it forward, there are very few people that make it without the assistance of someone.
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A
Every business is like that, Jim.
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B
Yeah.
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You know, the more you're doing what you're doing, the more I go, I know who should help this guy or be part of it. When you're doing the work that needs to be done to make the world, I think, a better place, and the greater good gets kind of an uplift. People will come out of the work woodwork to support that. And unfortunately, the other direction does, too. But I think that we have to be aware of those things. And, you know, I. The longer I'm around and the older I gotten and the longer that John's been gone and some of my other people who have a great influence on me, the more I feel that that's all I'm supposed to do at this point. The rest of it's just details. It's just the way it is. It's the way it works.
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B
That's cool. So what are three songs that really get the juices flowing for you?
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A
So listen, the first live concert I went to was Bachman Turner Overdrive at the Old Chicago Theater.
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B
Holy cow.
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A
That's awesome. Yeah. And they just Taking Care of Business had just come out. This would have been 1973. And I mean, they just crushed it. And so it was a great. I'll make it a short story. So myself and a couple guys, we decide we're going to go to, you know, go to the show. We're in high school at this point, and one of the guys's dad was a funeral director, so he drives us down there in the hearse and we get out in front of the stadium. This hearse, it's like a Blues Brothers thing. You open up, there's hearses there, and we get out and we have just the best time. And. And so later in after I got on the radio, when I first started, I needed some open music. And to this day, as much as I on every podcast I do, for the most part, it's that first opening 20 seconds of taking Care of Business. There's something about that pounding and there's something about that message about taking care of business. Every way. Taking care of business. You know, that's your job. Find out what your business is. Get your shit in one sock and take care of it. So that's the first one I didn't see. I've never seen these guys together in concert live. I've seen them separate, but 25 or 6 to 4, the song Chicago did back in the 70s, I did see, right.
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B
Gonna say yeah With Earth, Wind and Fire.
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A
Yeah, man, I sure have.
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B
Amazing.
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Killer. Every one of those guys proves you should stick with your music lessons.
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B
Oh, my God.
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A
Right? They're unbelievable, every one of them. So there's this Greek theater, I believe it is from somewhere in the 80s they did the mashup of these two groups. So when you done listening to this podcast, go find that on YouTube. It's 25 or 6 to 4, which Chicago and Earth, Wind and Fire. It's mind blowing what they did.
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B
I'll see if I can get it on the playlist.
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A
Oh, there you go.
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B
Yeah, I'll try to do that.
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A
And then one. That's kind of a. More of a different direction, I would think, for some people that have been listening. This for me is. I think Joe Bonamas is the best guitar player I've never heard of.
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B
Fantastic. Yep.
- [26:37]
A
And he has a video called Distant Lonesome Train. And it's the same boom, boom, boom, boom, pounding thing. So if I take. If I'm feeling like I drag an ass walking in here in the morning, I'll drop the virtual needle on Take Care of Business, go right to Chicago, Earth, wind and fire, 25 or 6 to 4. And I'll finish it up with Distant Lone, Lonesome Train with Joe Bonamassa. By the time that's done, my teeth are in, my ears are back, and I'm ready to go.
- [27:01]
B
Ready to go. Yeah. I'll tell you what, he was considered a prodigy.
- [27:05]
A
Oh.
- [27:06]
B
Because he started so young.
- [27:07]
A
Yeah. He played with, like B.B. king and these guys when he's 12.
- [27:10]
B
Yes. To see some of those videos is just amazing. And I know, like, BB was like, okay, this kid's legit already. That's fantastic. I love that. Absolutely great choices, man. This is awesome. Okay, so what's the name of the song? That's your guilty pleasure song right now.
- [27:32]
A
It's a little dated, a little old, and I don't think that that really matters in music to some degree. The message remains the same. But there's this song by Pink, who I think is the minister's beer mug. She's the hot sauce on my friggin ribs. What About Us? And she is this powerful, powerful dynamo of a performer. And a lot of her stuff is loud and proud and in your face, but she drops it down into this what about Us? Song about talking about. Well, what about us? What about all. You all have this. What about the rest of us that don't have. And I can't imagine anybody else singing that song. So when I feel like shit's hitting the fan and I'm in front of it, that song, what About Us? Always puts me back where I belong, behind the shit.
- [28:13]
B
She is an amazing artist. I was just talking to somebody about her the other day that when we were talking about it, I said, she. You talk about somebody who is okay with her own vulnerability.
- [28:26]
A
Yeah.
- [28:26]
B
Because most of her. Her big songs that become so popular are from her personal, correct life. And she's like, okay, I'm going to open up my. My heart. I'm going to let you see my scars. Because I'm sure somebody else is feeling this way too. You're not alone.
- [28:42]
A
Well, that's that old thing where, you know, where. Where words fail, music speaks. And she is one of those performers, you know, I don't know that I ever buy a ticket to it, but I really enjoy what she does. Her presence in the world is formidable. I know that she's come from hardscrabble background. I don't know how you don't get behind stuff like that. So, you know, they have those, you know, the names of the kind of the divas that you would think of. And I don't know if you put her in that. That position, but certainly she is a force of nature who is. I always look forward to what she's coming up with next.
- [29:10]
B
Absolutely. I think she'd be the black sheep of that group, but no question.
- [29:13]
A
And she would love that.
- [29:14]
B
Yeah, she'd be totally fine with that. Okay, so what is the song that you believe could change the way people think or feel about the world around them if they just listen to the lyrics?
- [29:26]
A
Well, the first time I. This might be a little redundant here towards you get to the end. But the first time I heard Rocky Mountain High, I was probably, you know, in high school and I was living within a stone's throw of the Kennedy Expressway. It's loud and it's Chicago and there's streetlights and there's no mountains. And I didn't know what this guy was talking about. And after probably the third or fourth spin on the vinyl, I thought, you mean, there's a place that's not like where I live now? I mean, I'd never been to Colorado. I mean, I knew about it, but I never thought about it. And there was. He was. It was an autobiographical song about his own life, and there was something about what he was sharing. I thought, I want to go there. I mean, I think it's what happens. I think when artists get very popular, the songs just become rote. You don't really think about the lyrics that much. But many, many, many years later, even before I was on stage in Aspen, I found myself in a place called the Rudi Reservoir out in Aspen. Beautiful place. And I finally understood when he said, you can talk to God and listen to the casual reply.
- [30:28]
B
That's so cool.
- [30:29]
A
And I was sitting in the middle of this magnificence And I thought I could have a conversation which. That which was part of this creation, not a church. I don't have to pay any money to get in. Don't have to worry about parking. I don't have to give tithes and offerings. I don't have to say, I could just sit here. And that really brought that whole thing home to me. The song is about four minutes long, but that one gap in the middle where he says, you can talk to God and listen to the casual reply. We have lost that so much. We're so busy. Everything's overblown, over the top. To be able to sit in the wonder of nature and get answers is, to me, the best thing ever. And oddly enough, you know, my mom passed in 1997. I spoke at Windstar 94. But not long after, this all started with me and his music. I came home one day from school and she had turned my bedroom into a mountain cabin, God bless her. I walked in, you know, they had these wall murals back in the 70s with these different. You got Hawaii and all this stuff.
- [31:24]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [31:25]
A
So she put this mountain scene up on one wall. She had stained my bed, and the dresser looked like a. She put a light in there. Look like I was in a cabin. She. God bless her. I mean, it was. I'm like, wow. And so years later, after I spoke at Windstar and I came back and, you know, she was still alive at that point. You know, she took full credit for me, you know, going there because she changed my bedroom. So I think of that often.
- [31:47]
B
That's wonderful. That is such a great thing. So we had touched on it a little bit before about the songs that you hear that ring so true that they can really just truly stop you in your tracks.
- [32:01]
A
Yeah.
- [32:02]
B
Like the song. The lyrics were either written specifically for you or by you. What song is that again?
- [32:11]
A
I gotta defer to my friend. This song came out in 1974. It's called Sweet Surrender. And the first time I heard it, I didn't understand it. I was at my friend Michelle's house on a warm summer evening in Chicago on the brownstone. And she was playing this Back Home Again album. She said, I think you might like this guy. And this song comes on and it's. You know. And I kind of. Okay, that's neat. That's neat. But as years went on, it started to become less and less of a song and more and more of a mantra or, like, almost like a prayer. Because the lyrics that read like that, and I can't Tell you how many times in my life I felt I had come to a dead end. I was less than. I didn't get it. I was an idiot because everybody else told me and all the rest of that stuff. But there's this certain lyric in there that says, there's a spirit that guides me, a light that shines for me. My life is worth the living, and I don't need to see the end. And when you hear him do this, he does the song, repeats it twice. All the lyrics of the song are repeated twice. And I thought he did that for a reason, because if he didn't get it the first time, you're sure as shit can get it the second time. And there's a version that he did in 1994, three years before he died in Australia. I think it's the best one he ever did. When he puts a 12 string on and that voice tunes up, all I hear is, there's a spirit that guides me. John, it's okay. There's a light that shines for you, brother. And that your life is worth the living. You don't need to see the end. Just be here now. And that has become my go to above all else. It probably isn't surprising. We're very close. I get that. But there's something more to that. I think he was a great channel for this stuff. I think that he, like so many prophets, came in on time and left on time. And what he's left behind lives on behind him and after him. And so when I hear that song today, I also hear it when I was 14, back in Chicago, back in the day. I heard it every time since. Every single time, Jim, it sounds different. The meaning changes. The reminders come as I need them. So that's the song above all of them that. That I go to if needed.
- [34:17]
B
That's. That's just incredible. You're. Wow. That's a good one.
- [34:27]
A
Well, it is. And it starts out lost and alone on some forgotten highway Traveled by many, remembered by few Looking for something that I can believe in Looking for something that I'd like to do with my life. That's everybody.
- [34:41]
B
Amen to that.
- [34:42]
A
That's everybody.
- [34:43]
B
That is. Wow. Thank you so much for sharing.
- [34:46]
A
Well, you're welcome so much. I'm so honored to do this with you. Thank you for giving me the time to share. Yeah. To share my journey and to share my friends and the things that matter. And, you know, I mentioned earlier, I did a. I'm not a disc jockey, but I did a year's worth of radio and Washington in New York a couple years ago, called the Dao of Music because much like what you're talking about, music is a magical potion. It heals people. It's the universal language. And so my late, great friend Dr. John Ortiz taught a class and wrote a book that you should get, if you don't have to get it, called the Dial of Music. And I have, I don't know how many tapes of John and I doing these shows together where he talked about this music. And so when the opportunity came for me to do this, I wanted to talk about the music important. But how? Where did it come from and who wrote it and why? What was the impetus and all the pieces that go behind that? Because the average person listening to this show knows the words to over a thousand songs they never intended to learn because they repeated them so often. And we sing this stuff like we wrote it, but we didn't. Why is that? Because it's the universal language. So I salute your work and what you're doing with this, this podcast. I'm so thrilled and happy that you asked me to be part of it.
- [35:55]
B
Thank you, sir. I'm going to close this out with our outro here and, well, it's just about time to cue the music for today's episode, but don't forget to, like, comment and subscribe to the Drop the Needle Podcast to stay up to date on our latest episodes. I'd also like to take a moment to thank everyone again for tuning in today, and I hope you enjoyed this episode of the Drop the Needle podcast. And I'd also like to thank our special guest, Mr. John St. Augustine, for being on our show today. John, can you do me a favor? Can you let the audience know how they can get your books, get your podcast, and book you as a speaker?
- [36:31]
A
Sure. So I've written three books. The first, the first ones are out of print, but as you mentioned, every moment matters is in audio. So you get that on Amazon. I'm working on getting Living an Uncommon Life into audio. Will happen. It'll happen this summer. And then Phenomenon is available directly from the publisher, which is, if I could remember it, that would be a good idea, wouldn't it? Lulu Publishing. Correct. Thank you. So Lulu has the book there. And you mentioned earlier about the Randy Hunley book that I wrote with him, that's also at lulu. So the best thing about LULU is most of the money goes to the authors and not the other place that's named after a river, Amazon. But all the other books you can find there as well. Even the ones that are out of print, you can find them there. So enjoy that. My podcasts are Life 2.0 podcast. I've been doing it five years. It is at Podbean. Not hard to find. It's also on Spotify. And if you want to find out more about me or reach me, it's triple W.aurora media productions.com and you can see what I've been up to. Some of the other books I've worked on with people and basically everything I do is parked there.
- [37:35]
B
Fantastic. And I invite everyone to head on over to our show Notes where there's a link link to the playlist from today's episode and there's also going to be the links for you to get all of John's offerings. I'll make sure that that's on there. All right, my drop the needle posse. Like Billy Joel says, from the highs to the lows to the end of the show, this is the end of our show. Until next time, this is Jim Allstatt wishing you infinite health and happiness and the perfect playlist for your life. Thank you again for being the best part of us. Catch you next time, Sam.