{"id":5478,"date":"2010-11-15T00:00:34","date_gmt":"2010-11-15T05:00:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/?p=5478"},"modified":"2010-11-14T19:32:00","modified_gmt":"2010-11-15T00:32:00","slug":"gonzo-goes-on-the-record-with-the-knack%e2%80%99s-%e2%80%9ccriminally-underrated%e2%80%9d-lead-guitarist-berton-averre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/?p=5478","title":{"rendered":"Gonzo Goes On the Record With The Knack\u2019s \u201cCriminally Underrated\u201d Lead Guitarist, Berton Averre"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>\"\"<\/a>Exclusive Interview by Sam \u201cGonzo\u201d Gonzales<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIf bands were getting kids off, those concert halls would be filled.\u201d- Berton Averre<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

When did you get The Knack? I got The Knack in 1979 when they hit the music scene hard and fast with the phenomenal \u201cMy Sharona\u201d. The Knack was Doug Fieger on lead vocals, Berton Averre on lead guitar, Prescott Niles on bass and Bruce Gary on drums. Some consider them one hit wonders, but the honest truth is that they were an energetic live band that beamed with pride and a \u201chappy-go-lucky\u201d attitude. They managed to create and leave us with a catalogue of cleverly and well crafted songs. Rock critics misunderstood them, even mistreated them, but the fans loved them. I was one lucky fan who got to see them play their hearts out for their fans in the summer of 2005.<\/p>\n

Berton\u2019s love and appreciation for great songwriting led him to join a writers workshop for musical theater in the early 90s. It turned out to be a very rewarding move for him. To date, Berton and company have written three musical comedies, \u201cThe Party\u2019s Over\u201d, \u201cJungle Man!\u201d and \u201cRobin Hood: The Untold Story\u201d and currently working on a fourth one. In regards to writing for the musical theater stage, Berton says, \u201cIt\u2019s an art form, and when you\u2019re doing it right it\u2019s so goddamn thrilling.\u201d Most recently, I had the distinct honor of interviewing the \u201ccriminally underrated\u201d lead guitarist who played a huge part in the creation and success of The Knack. Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome Berton Averre to Ringside Report.<\/p>\n

Gonzo: You\u2019ve ventured into and have been very successful with \u201ctheatrical musical scoring\u201d. Can you tell us how you began doing that?<\/strong><\/p>\n

As somebody who loves and appreciates songwriting, it became more and more obvious to me whenever I listened to the great old classics, and I\u2019m talking about when they used to do a great Rogers and Hammerstein, that they were the giants of songwriting and that what they achieved with melody and lyrics in a musical theater song was, I just used this analogy recently, the difference between a comic strip and a novel, there\u2018s just that much more going on. And it was after \u201cSerious Fun\u201d and I was going off on my own and I wanted to find something that I wanted to apply to my creative side for the rest of my life. And friends would say to me, \u201cBertie, you love musicals, you should do musicals.\u201d I heard of this great writers workshop for musical theater in town and I joined it and as luck would have it this guy named Rob Muerer joined it the same year and Rob was Christopher Cross\u2018 writing partner and we\u2019re both from the world of rock who discovered as writers how much we loved musical theater.<\/p>\n

We just had identical tastes and we started writing together and we learned in this writers workshop the major discipline of what you have to do to create great musical theater and you don\u2019t just slap it out. If you\u2018re doing right, every note and every syllable is planned and there for a purpose and there are specific purposes in musical theater, to put it most simply, you\u2019re there to advance and support the story. And it\u2019s an art form, when you\u2019re doing it right it\u2019s so goddamn thrilling. It really is. When a Richard Rogers melody soars at just the right moment and Hammerstein writes brilliant lyrics to it, it\u2019s defies description and it\u2019s an emotional connection that, because of the music, because music is such a great natural communicator of emotion, we really don\u2019t know why, we really don\u2019t know how and it registers, and it registers specific emotion.<\/p>\n

I mean, I\u2019ll hear a Debussy piece, a piano piece from a hundred and thirty years ago and I just sense that the emotion I feel, whether its kind of like this longing, or this resignation, that that is what he was putting in his piece and this was some guy on the coast of France a hundred and thirty years ago in a completely different world that I\u2019m in and taking this abstract progression of notes on a keyboard and communicating emotion accurately. It\u2018s magic.<\/p>\n

So, anyway, Rob and I got into it and we were writing and we\u2018ve had some shows produced. I don\u2019t have any shows that anyone would know nationally yet, but the funny thing about it is that it feels so close to what I say about modern popular music is that they don\u2019t know how to do it anymore. I mean, time and time again I\u2019ll see a new show and the lyrics are abysmal and the music is not versatile and its not entertaining, its just basically the lowest common denominator and I do pretty well at it because I have a full range of musical tastes and expressions. There are probably, to speak frankly, there are probably very, very few people in musical theater who can write something like that as legitimately and authentically as I can because it actually is my life, it\u2019s not a style I\u2019m picking up and putting down, it\u2019s something that I do naturally.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s unbelievably rewarding. Rob and I wrote a show called, \u201cJungle Man\u201d, and everything we do is musical comedy by the way, and \u201cJungle Man\u201d was a kind of tongue in cheek send up of the Tarzan and Jane story. And I\u2019m telling you when six hundred people laugh at your joke, that we wrote, it\u2019s literally a more powerful feeling than I\u2019ve experienced in a rock performance. To put that in perspective, when we played The Forum, which is here in my hometown, in the same room that I would watch Magic Johnson and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar play for a sold-out crowd and I went into the solo for \u201cSharona\u201d, they threw the lights on the house and the entire crowd were standing on their feet with their arms up in the air like it was choreographed, that\u2019s probably the most powerful feeling I\u2019ve ever had in a rock show and having six hundred people laugh at a joke, in a way, blows it out of the water.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s how rewarding it is, because that\u2019s how much work goes into it. In rock you can kind of just slam it out. It\u2019s amazing. And the collaboration is crucial. It\u2019s compartmentalized, I\u2019m the composer, Rob\u2019s the lyricist, Mark is the book writer and Mark is kind of like the quarterback and so we\u2019ll get together and every song that gets written for the show comes out of a discussion, comes out of a conversation, comes out of a story-boarding of this is what has to happen in the song, does she first meet him, does he think she\u2019s hot, she doesn\u2019t initially like him, but then he ends up talking about his car and that makes her like him more, it\u2019s basically beat by beat so that at the end of song the story has continued much like the song continued through a guitar solo.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s very intricate. Again, if you\u2019re doing it right. I think, I\u2019d like to believe, that quality will rise to the top, but on the other hand, it\u2019s pretty depressing, I\u2019ll go see a show and no kidding the score is fucking awful. I mean, capital \u201cA\u201d, awful and the crowd\u2019s going nuts. They haven\u2019t heard Rogers and Hammerstein, they haven\u2019t heard Leonard Bernstein enough to recognize how far these people are falling the mark.<\/p>\n

G: What CD is in your CD player at this very moment?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, my answer is not CDs, it\u2019s files that I\u2019ve created off of an internet radio station, it\u2018s my current passion. There\u2019s an internet radio station that is London sixties music, like the music that was playing on the radio in London because sixties music is probably my number one passion. To hear great songs, in some cases songs from the sixties that we have literally never heard once as opposed to the songs you\u2019ve heard a thousand times. When I discovered this station it was just such a delight. Once a week they\u2019ll do this thing that\u2019s called \u201cThe London Sound\u201d and \u201cA Month In The Life\u201d and it features snapshots of songs that were on the radio in a particular month, like let\u2019s just say, October 62 and it\u2019s the songs that were never even hits over there, right? And in some cases you\u2019ll hear a song that was a hit over here and not over there and then you\u2019ll hear a song that was a hit over there and you go, how the hell did this not make it over to the states? And I extract songs and I burn compilation CDs and I give them to a few select friends and make their day.<\/p>\n

G: It\u2018s like coming across something new or discovering treasure.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It really is. It\u2019s a buried treasure. We always want to hear and add something new that we can love and sadly for me personally it just doesn\u2019t happen with modern pop music. It just doesn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

G: I knew coming into this interview that you\u2019re a die-hard 60\u2019s music fan. The era of music I\u2019m fond of is from the late 60s\/early 70s timeframe.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, the 70s were just a hangover from the 60s. You know, certainly when those of us who dwell on the 60s bring up something from the golden era and you go, \u201cOh, yeah, the 70s. Oh, well, gee, all that had was Zeppelin, 10cc, Elvis Costello, The Sex Pistols, oh gee, I guess the 70s had some decent music too.\u201d<\/p>\n

G: What about 60s music appeals to you?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The qualities are fun, exuberant, melody, harmony and basically the overall of it is that The Beatles changed everything forever and when you listen to the music that was being created in their era it was everybody trying to catch up with The Beatles and trying to keep pace, which was impossible, but it still ending up goosing them into doing stuff that was a lot better and a lot more interesting than any of them would have come up with on their own.<\/p>\n

And so you end up hearing people trying very, very hard to come up with an interesting melody or a chord change we hadn\u2018t heard before or bringing in other instruments for the arrangements, orchestral instruments, and then the other thing is the incredible cross-pollination because you had great Motown stuff coming out of Detroit, you had the amazing singer\/songwriters from the Folk movement, like Paul Simon and of course it all happened because of Bob Dylan and all these people were listening to each other and instead of having, \u201cThis station plays Soul, this station plays college music, this station plays Folk\u201d, you ended up having one Top 40 and the competition was incredibly fierce.<\/p>\n

If you listen to a Top 40 from a week in 1966, you will hear a great James Brown song that we still hear everyday today, followed by a great Simon And Garfunkle song, followed by a great Beach Boys song, followed by a great Beatles song, incredibly different genres, but all they had in common was they were all trying to make hits, they were all trying to make a song that everybody would love.<\/p>\n

G: The intent and the energy came through in the music. I agree, the music of that period is pretty uplifting.<\/strong><\/p>\n

It\u2019s because it\u2019s a given that music makes us feel better and it makes us feel glad to be alive and it sounds like such an obvious thing, but I guarantee you if you listen to music from say the 90s or more recently, you\u2019ll be surprised how much of the music is depressive. You can just tell from the tone of it, by the structure of it, from the delivery of it, it\u2019s depressive. It\u2018s not meant to make you feel better. And it\u2019s beyond unfortunate, it\u2019s a crime when I think of kids growing up without joyful music, it breaks my heart. Because look at how much joy you\u2019ve gotten from music. And imagine if you took all that fun, exciting, sexy stuff and replaced it with grays and \u201cI don\u2019t know if I wanna get up today.\u201d Well, fuck, I mean that\u2019s an interesting point of view for an occasional song, but when it becomes your philosophy?<\/p>\n

G: Today\u2019s music seems to be very image oriented. Songs take a secondary position because image is everything and the attitude being projected is primary.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, that\u2019s exactly right and that\u2019s really one of the major reasons why we have all that dark, depressive music is because the angry young man, alienated stance became the only acceptable stance for somebody who wanted to have credibility in the rock world. It\u2018s funny, if you want to have a laugh, go through album cover pictures of bands from a certain era and try to find one guy who\u2018s smiling. Including us, actually no, I take it back, if you look at \u201cGet The Knack\u201d, both Doug and Bruce have big stupid grins on their faces. Because that was one of the things Doug would talk about at the beginning of the band. He would say, \u201cLook, we\u2019re having a great time, let\u2019s not try to pretend we\u2019re not. Let\u2018s allow our fun to transfer to the audience\u201c, cause we were first and foremost a live pub band. And it\u2019s like when you say, when the image drives it, that\u2018s what they\u2018re thinking of, It\u2019s like, oh, God forbid somebody dismisses me as just say a guy with rose colored glasses. God forbid somebody actually dismisses you as somebody who enjoys life.<\/p>\n

Cause the rocker isn\u2019t supposed to enjoy life and sing about it. It\u2019s idiotic, it really is. There\u2019s great stuff from the 60s that\u2019s angry. The Stones\u2019 song, \u201cLook At That Stupid Girl\u201d, how downbeat is that? But they actually had a way of delivering it and you could tell they were having fun, that they were like, \u201cOh, good, let\u2019s go trash my latest girlfriend. Let\u2018s do it in a song. How cool would that be?\u201d, instead of moping. You know, moping is boring. Especially, because the other side of the coin, or rather the second prong of the two prong downer of recent modern music is that people don\u2019t learn to play very well. It\u2019s hard to be musically interesting if you\u2019re really stunted and limited. Every stage of the development of rock music up until a certain point, people getting better and better on their instruments and more importantly better and better at coming up with chord progression in songwriting and that just kind of stopped dead. When was the last time you heard some young person talking about his recent favorite band and going, \u201cMan, the guitarist is great!\u201d It\u2019s not even relevant anymore.<\/p>\n

I remember I had a conversation with a friend of mine, who\u2019s the son of one of my oldest friends and he\u2019s very intelligent and I was bitchin\u2019 about this and I was trying to think of the word I would describe and I said, \u201cglory\u201d, it actually is like a heavy, uplifting, kind of hair on the back of your neck stand up moment and I said, \u201cI just want know when\u2019s the last time you heard a new song that had a sense of glory?\u201d And he said, recently enough, \u201cWell, that\u2019s not what they\u2019re going for.\u201c And I thought about it later and I thought well, that\u2019s a very tired reason. Because when I bring up, \u201cWhen was the last time a band had great harmony?\u201d \u201cWell, that\u2019s not what they\u2019re going for.\u201c \u201cWhen was the last time you heard a great guitarist?\u201d \u201cWell, that\u2019s not what they\u2019re going for.\u201c \u201cWhen was the last time you heard real, expert songwriting craft?\u201d \u201cWell, that\u2019s not what they\u2019re going for.\u201c Well then, what the fuck are they going for? What\u2019s left? Singing? No. Writing? No. Playing? No.<\/p>\n

Well, what are you other than a fucking poseur? Well, one of the reasons basically is that were living in an immediate society and kids are growing up less disciplined than ever in many ways. And learning how to play an instrument is not easy. You can\u2019t just sit down and pick up an instrument, there are the occasional geniuses that do it, but you can\u2019t just sit down and pick up a guitar and start smashing away and having expert time and rhythm and being able to find new chords and going to them in time and rhythm. It takes practice. It actually takes sitting down and hammering out that same chord structure a hundred and fifty times until your fingers are comfortable enough where you can do it in rhythm and fast enough and most people, and that\u2019s actually one example, but most modern musicians in these bands don\u2019t want to do that.<\/p>\n

Apparently, whatever they do is good enough because thank God for them the music doesn\u2019t seem to be much of an issue anymore. And people talk about what trouble the modern music business is in, and it\u2018s in terrible, terrible trouble, and a lot of that has to do with modern technology and downloading instead of buying and the old style contract structures and where is the new money going to come from, and all that, but if bands were getting kids off like the bands got you off and the bands got me off, those concert halls would be filled and people would be making money.<\/p>\n

G: Kids these days have \u201cGuitar Hero\u201d and they get a quick fix and a false sense of playing guitar.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Exactly. There\u2019s a saying that goes, \u201cDo you want to be a symphony conductor or do you want to wear tails and wave a baton.\u201d In other words, those are the trappings, those are the image, your words, of being a conductor and there are a lot of people now days that say I want to be a musician in a band. Why? Well, because they\u2019re saying they make a lot of money. Not because the music that I grew up on is so inspiring to me that I want to do that too. And frankly, I don\u2019t blame them because there hasn\u2019t been all that much to inspire them. I have found, because I\u2019m a baby boomer, and I\u2019ve never been married, never had any kids, but all my friends are married, all my old buddies are married and they have kids. Everyone of them, their kids at some stage in their teenage years, out of curiosity or exposure or whatever start listening to their parents CDs . They don\u2019t go back. I\u2019m telling you these kids that were just as, \u201cOh, I hate hearing about how great your music was.\u201d<\/p>\n

I have this friend, an old friend, and her daughter had good grades and was going to Santa Cruz and all that. One day my friend tells me, \u201cYou know she\u2019s totally into Love. You know the group Love, but this is not like being into Zeppelin that the whole world knows, this is actually paying attention. And she goes, \u201cShe just absolutely loves them and I didn\u2018t put her in that direction she just basically discovered it.\u201d So, I feel that when exposed to great music, kids get it. They really do.<\/p>\n

To make a boxing analogy, because I know you\u2019re writing for a boxing site, imagine if you will, that every boxer that, you\u2019re seventeen and every time you turn on a boxing match, it\u2019s some hump. It\u2019s like the latest flavor of the month that has a 20 and 0 record because they found 20 guys he could beat. And imagine, your dad sits you down and goes, \u201cHey, this guy is Sugar Ray Leonard, watch how he boxes.\u201c You go, \u201cJesus, he\u2019s fantastic! Look at those moves! Look how fast he is! Look how he reacts! Look how he covers up!\u201d You know, it\u2019s like it\u2019s undeniable talent. Imagine how stark the contrast would be if you saw a great boxer after watching a bunch of mediocre boxers. It\u2019s undeniable, so basically, they think when, you know I have a girlfriend, she\u2019s not like a teenager, but she\u2019s younger than me. And so there was a lot of music from my era that she\u2019d never heard before. And I would put on some song and say, \u201cDo you know how much has gone on in this song, check it out we\u2019re only a minute and a half into it, in other words, that\u2019s how much it\u2019s packed with talent and interest and after a while she would admit to me that the album that she was listening to at the time of a modern artist, the next time she\u2019d put them on she\u2019d say, \u201cThere\u2019s kinda nothing going on.\u201d And so, no matter what era you\u2019re from, the things that make you essential, they\u2019ll be noticed and they\u2019ll be appreciated.<\/p>\n

<\/a>\"\"<\/a>G: You grew up in Southern California. How did growing up there foster or hinder your guitar playing development?<\/strong><\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t very nationalistic about it, the music that I loved was the music I loved whether they came from Pittsburgh or San Diego. The people that influenced me most on guitar were the same, I imagine, that influenced a 14 year old. The usual guys, but Jimi Hendrix was my idol. He\u2019s remembered most for the flash and the drive and rightfully so, I mean, he basically created pelvic thrust in rock music.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s an absolute translation of the animal man in a guitar part which is kind of mind-blowing if you think about it. But for me, the biggest change, and I recognized this with the first Hendrix song I ever heard, when I was 13 years old, the first one I heard was \u201cThe Wind Cries Mary\u201c and he went into the guitar solo and I was thinking, \u201cOh, my God, he\u2019s playing melody\u201c It wasn\u2019t just blues rhythm. And that, I mean, again, that\u2019s art for art\u2019s sake and it was unthinkable before him really.<\/p>\n

G: He opened the door for so many people. He was a special guitarist who was able to do what he did in the short time that he did it in. Amazing.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Yeah, I was actually thinking the other day about that. The only three idolsI have are the Beatles, Jim Hendrix and Bob Dylan and those three were the inventors of what we know as rock \u201cn\u2019 roll, but the modern you know what sixties rock was, the big explosion that we never recovered from, the Beatles were it, they were way in the top, but without what Dylan did in terms of songwriting and yes attitude and in terms of what Jim did with his playing. Everything great that happened in the sixties you can trace back to one or more of those three extremes, The Beatles, Dylan and Hendrix.<\/p>\n

G: I have come to the conclusion that you are \u201ccriminally underrated\u201d as a guitar player. When I listen to your guitar playing I get the feeling you\u2019re serving the song and that the song is the top priority at that moment.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, you just stole my thunder because that\u2019s exactly what I was going to say. The guitar parts are there to serve the song and when you go into the guitar solo it\u2019s function, at it\u2019s best, is to keep the vibe of the song going and it\u2019s just basically an instrumental approach to what the song is conveying, and so, playing melody whenever possible, playing recognizable parts as opposed to just licks. The world\u2019s most beloved guitarist all fall into that category. And really this is because without the song there\u2019s nothing. We were talking about Jimi, I use Jimi as an example, as amazing, as world-shattering as his playing was, if he didn\u2019t, by the fluke of nature also write great songs, it wouldn\u2019t have mattered. It wouldn\u2019t have made a difference.<\/p>\n

The song is the delivery and if it\u2019s not a good song, you know, a jazzman can sit and listen to a solo and get something out of it and I had my Be-bop period when I was 18, 19 years old and I can still appreciate a good jazz player but really the world responds to songs in rock \u2019n\u2019 roll. Because of Jimi Hendrix we ended up also growing up glorying in the instrumental aspects of it. If you were to ask people who their favorite guitarists are, dollars to donuts they just happen to be in bands or are individuals that also create great songs. Our purpose was always the songs.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy Sharona\u201d was an extended solo, and on Round Trip, \u201cAfrica\u201d was an extended solo, and when we played live, which I think you saw us, \u201cTequila\u201d was an extended solo. Those are the only extended solos in the Knack camp, because we weren\u2019t that kind of a band, we didn\u2019t want to be that kind of a band. Because we love rock \u2019n\u2019 roll, you know, it\u2019s like anybody else, we could appreciate that there are times that somebody does want to hear a big solo and as long it has interest and isn\u2019t just somebody wanking.<\/p>\n

G: How frustrating is it to hear a song that you\u2019re totally into and then the solo comes in and it doesn\u2019t add to the song? And when the solo is done, you think, \u201cOh, okay, we\u2019re<\/strong> back to the song.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Right, and you go, \u201cGood, we\u2019re back to the interesting stuff.\u201d It kind of reminds me of a TV show or a movie or a play in which there are several storylines, like let\u2019s say the parents have a story line, and the 16 year old kid has a story line, and invariably one of the storylines will be more interesting than the other. Well, it\u2019s like that, it\u2019s like the song intrinsically will have more interest than all the absolute best guitar solos. And so, you\u2019re going to want to get back to the part that has the full entertainment spectrum, you know, that has storyline and characters.<\/p>\n

G: The musicianship of The Knack was outstanding! Each member held their own and served the song. No one member tried to overshadow each other or the song. I saw The Knack play a few years back and you guys had so much energy. You guys were an awesome live band<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Well, we prided ourselves on that, you know, we always were, and we never at any age would have gone out if we weren\u2019t able to give the people our best show. And as far as, what you said about the individual musicians never overshadowing the song, I have to give credit where its due, Doug was the leader of the band. He was the absolute quarterback on that. And of course, that brings us to Bruce our drummer, who was spectacular. He was nuts-good, he really was. Fortunately for him, the music we really loved and we ended up being influenced by as The Knack were groups like The Who and of course The Who had the original insane drummer, Keith Moon. If you listen to what he\u2019s doing in the middle of a Who song, it\u2019s ridiculous, it\u2019s like he\u2019s playing a drum solo, and it\u2019s so great, it\u2019s so exciting, it\u2019s so fun, yet it\u2019s so unexpected. And with Bruce he had the ability to do that and Doug would very tightly rein him in so that it never became about the drums. Doug had a vision, he definitely had a vision.<\/p>\n

G: I offer my condolences at the loss of Doug earlier this year and respectfully I ask the next question. And you don\u2019t have to answer it if you don\u2019t want to, but how have you been since Doug\u2019s passing?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, I\u2019m doing fine. Doug had been sick for several years. I thought we were prepared for his death and when it happened I found out that it\u2019s still a shock. Doug died so well, he was unbelievably brave. I, for purely selfish reasons, it was kind of, in terms of The Knack, it was this awkward thing because I would never have wished for Doug\u2019s sickness, needless to say, but I was the one member of the band that didn\u2019t really feel like going out and playing anymore. I had great fun playing and its definitely something that I feel I miss now not having that at all.<\/p>\n

But certainly, you know, the grind, the flying out to play a gig and flying on to the next one got old. If it wasn\u2019t a special gig, if it were up to me, we just wouldn\u2019t have done it, three times in the summer would have been find with me. So the aspect of if someone were to say to me well you know it heartbreaking that you\u2018ll never get up on stage with The Knack again. Well, never doing it again, that is very sad when you think about.<\/p>\n

G: Doug had a great sense of humor. Each time I watch the \u201cLive From The Rock N Roll Fun House\u201d DVD, I crack up with Doug\u2019s character, Emcee Jimmy Lemonjello! Where did he come up with that character?<\/strong><\/p>\n

In the early Beatles era, you would see these movies, you would actually go to the movie house and it was a presentation of a whole lot of groups, you know, just like what we would call videos nowadays. And like there\u2019s one called Go-Go Mania, I gather Beatle Mania and there might be one of the Beatles song, or the Hollies song, or some group you never heard of doing a song. And one of those movies had this guy hosting it and he had hair like the wig that Doug found for that. And so Doug\u2019s character was based on that guy as best as we can remember.<\/p>\n

G: What was the process for creating songs for the group? What came first the music or the lyrics? Can you talk to us about that process?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The thing is the creative relationship, there\u2019s nothing else like in the natural world, people who don\u2019t have a creative partnership-relationship really can\u2019t relate to what it is, because there are so many things going on at once. If somebody says, \u201cOh, I know, my relationship with my wife\u2026\u201d Well, no, you don\u2019t know. Because it\u2019s the drive to create. One is so vulnerable when one brings say a song to the table, you probably as a writer know what I mean, you present something and someone says, \u201cUh, no.\u201d<\/p>\n

It just feels like they kicked you in the nuts. It feels like they denied the part of you that\u2019s most central to your existence and if you have a relationship with another human being where basically the two of you are kind of doing that to each other everyday you get together. There\u2019s got to be a whole lot of trust. If one is a musician, if one considers oneself a professional musician, a professional songwriter and you come to the guy you write songs with and you say what about this, blah, blah, blah, blah and he goes, \u201cNah\u201d. Doug and I, especially in the early stages, like a lot of songs on Get The Knack, we would write at the same time together in the room, like I\u2019d bring in the riff from \u201cSharona\u201d and we\u2019d go back to his apartment after bashing away at it at a rehearsal, just kinda jamming on it, and we would write it, you know, words, music, he\u2019d have music ideas, I\u2019d have word ideas.<\/p>\n

There is this kind of trust and respect that either one of us could say to other one, \u201cYeah, that\u2019s great.\u201d or \u201cNo, that\u2019s not.\u201c, and by the way, one of Doug\u2019s greatest strengths was his excitement in the process. It was so thrilling to be writing with somebody that would say, \u201cWe need the guitar to do some kind of transition at the riff.\u201d I\u2019d go, \u201cWell, what about this?\u201d \u201cYeah, that\u2019s great!\u201d Talk about passion for pop music.<\/p>\n

The two of us together, it must have been intimating, because there\u2019s nobody who cared as much about a certain kind of music as I do, as Doug did, and vice versa and we both knew it about each other. It\u2019s the only way you can ever have a successful writing partnership. The trust has to be there. In all cases, the music came first cause there\u2019s a lot of songs that Doug would write on his own, but if I\u2019m not mistaken, and I really don\u2019t think I am, he would come up with the lyrics. There\u2019d be a lot of times when I would create a song structure musically, and he would go, \u201cYeah, that\u2019s great.\u201d and he would take it and go home and call me up and say, \u201cHere\u2019s the first verse.\u201d It would be that two stage thing, that I would be at home recording on a four-track or something and just like working up song ideas and then just giving him the raw material or in some cases, pretty much finished without the lyrics and he would then go home and do them. So, it was always music first.<\/p>\n

G: I\u2019d like to ask you something about one Knack song. \u201cOne Day At A Time\u201d from \u201cSerious Fun\u201d. What happened? That should have been a huge hit for you guys. What can you tell us about that song?<\/strong><\/p>\n

If I tell you the story, you\u2019re gonna think I\u2019m making it up. When we signed with Charisma, they were a new label and we had supposed image issues. They saw we had great stuff and they wanted to sign us, so we thought well it must really be great stuff if they\u2019re afraid of our image and they\u2019re signing us nonetheless. So, from the start, they had a guy, I won\u2019t mention names, but they had a guy and he was basically their A&R guru and he said from the start, \u201c\u201cOne Day At A Time\u201d, that\u2019s a hit I can bring home, that\u2019s the one.\u201d And so, there was this strategy in place, that we break the album with a song that\u2019s more our harder rock song and so that\u2019s why \u201cRocket O\u2019 Love\u201d was out first, and then we get whatever tracks we can onto that and then we can add another song and every time we came to him he said, \u201cI\u2018m holding off on \u201cOne Day At A Time\u201d, we\u2019re breaking it at the right time, blah, blah, blah.<\/p>\n

Never broke it. And we just were mystified and bewildered. We found out later on that at some phase based on some of the other acts on their label they had figured out, or decided, that The Knack wasn\u2019t going to happen on Charisma, regardless if whether they could have gotten a hit out of us or not and so they, personally, buried \u201cOne Day At A Time\u201c.<\/p>\n

G: It\u2019s such a great song.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Well, you know, we like it. You\u2019ve always liked it and we thought it could have been a hit. It\u2019s pretty galling to think that the reason they didn\u2019t push it hard is they were afraid it would be a hit and they decided they didn\u2019t want to deal with it. And, yeah, that\u2019s what happened<\/p>\n

G: There were also those critics that wrote you guys off as Beatles-wanna-bes, when that was the furthest thing from the truth. The only comparison I can distinctly make is that The Knack and The Beatles both had strong writing ability and strong musicianship. What do you think of the Beatles comparisons?<\/strong><\/p>\n

There was something that they didn\u2019t like about us. In some cases, they weren\u2018t good journalists, they weren\u2019t professionals. Robert Dilbern was the lead reviewer and critic for the L.A. Times and he obviously didn\u2019t like our band and when \u201cGet The Knack\u201d first came out, on the front of the entertainment section, the picture of \u201cGet The Knack\u201d next to a picture of \u201cMeet The Beatles\u201d.<\/p>\n

So, before you\u2019ve read a word, you\u2019re thinking, \u201cWho the fuck do these guys think they are?\u201d Then, in the first paragraph, he says, \u201cThe Knack\u2019s music is geared to a 13 year old\u2019s taste.\u201d So, right away, if you\u2019re 18 years old, you\u2019re thinking I really don\u2019t want to like these guys. He\u2019s kind of front-loading all the reasons why someone wouldn\u2019t like our band. Then, you turn to page 6, which nobody sees, and he\u2019s reviewing the album and saying, \u201cThis a really good song and this is a great song and it could go on to be a classic.\u201d And I\u2019m thinking, \u201cThen why the hell is that not on page one?\u201d<\/p>\n

It was designed not to help us and I\u2019m thinking \u201cWell, then, why are you a reviewer? Why don\u2019t you just write an article.\u201d And really, I mean, there were other examples I can share, you know, I won\u2019t bore you with the other examples where people were bending over backwards to not do their jobs because for whatever reasons they didn\u2019t want us to be a hit, they didn\u2019t like us, I don\u2019t know, Doug rubbed some people the wrong way and he said things in early interviews and there was this really stupid politicization of music going on at the time. Liking a particular kind of band put you in that camp, and for me, it was like you were talking earlier about limiting and being very limited and kind of closed down in your approach to other kinds of music, and for me I thought well, that\u2019s just robbing a whole lot of people of different styles of enjoyment.<\/p>\n

I mean, I would tell people at the time, meaning it totally, that I really liked the Sex Pistols and I really liked Abba and then I\u2019d sit back and watch their brains explode. Because at the time it was inconceivable, you were either the kind of person who liked Abba or the kind of person who liked the Sex Pistols, well, I\u2019m the kind of person who likes people doing pop music really good. And so, there are so many different ways around the lot, to be able to deliver a song that has meaning.<\/p>\n

You\u2019ve got the depth of a Paul Simon song, you\u2019ve got the fun of an Abba song, you\u2019ve the anger and drive of a Sex Pistol song, who would be dumb enough to rob themselves of Paul Simon because they like the Sex Pistols? Nobody\u2019s that stupid. Using the sixties as an example, can you imagine somebody saying, you know, James Brown\u2019s song, \u201cPapa\u2019s Got A Brand New Bag\u201d comes on and it\u2018s followed by \u201cDon\u2019t Worry Baby\u201d by The Beach Boys, \u201cOh, I hate The Beach Boys because I like James Brown.\u201d<\/p>\n

G: Years back I\u2019d come across friends who only knew The Knack for \u201cMy Sharona\u201d. When I\u2019d share a cassette tape of other Knack songs they were impressed by the songs and their musicality.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I understand to a certain extent what happened, because \u201cMy Sharona\u201d was such a big hit and kind of a phenomenon in it\u2019s own way. It would overshadow a lot of songs, that’s understandable. You couple that with the self-fulfilling prophecy of the reviewer who just couldn\u2019t wait to blast the band and the music and it just became a reality of it\u2019s own, that was the reality of perception. When I was growing up in the late sixties, The Beach Boys were a joke. And The Beach Boys were a joke because we were all hippy kids. And The Beach Boys, \u201cOh, they were that band that did Surf Music.\u201d Well, skip forward five or six years and The Beach Boys music is considered great, capital \u201cG\u201d.<\/p>\n

G: When you played the \u201cMy Sharona\u201d solo, with the lights coming up and the crowd standing on their feet and arms in the air, you felt the powerful feeling of energy and feedback, there\u2019s kind of a build up to that I think, because you know the fans want to hear \u201cMy Sharona\u201d, they\u2019ve heard it many, many times, but when six hundred people start laughing at a joke, its as if you\u2019re hanging on a ledge and you\u2019re waiting for a response and when it happens, it registers simultaneously with audience, that has to be mind blowing.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That\u2019s very insightful. You\u2019re right, \u201cMy Sharona\u201d is a proven commodity, you know it\u2019s going to get them going and with the joke, they\u2019ve literally never seen the show before and never heard the joke before.<\/p>\n

G: One more question before we sign off Berton\u2026 Do you have an rock instrumental CD in you just dying to get out?<\/strong><\/p>\n

You know, there have been times when I thought, I\u2019d like to do that just to basically show what I can do and to create some, I hope, good music. I am so separated from the music business at this stage of my life. Let me put it this way, if I had a good friend who had a website from which he launched new music and he said, \u201cAll you have to do Bert is record 15 songs and give them to me and I\u2019ll do the rest.\u201d I would do it. But, I don\u2019t have any level of expectation. It\u2019s hard for me to do music without it being career oriented. I\u2019m a results guy, I really am, and that\u2019s one of the reasons why the musical theater thing works so well for me
\nbecause you write on assignment. You don\u2019t wake up in the morning and go, \u201cThe sky\u2019s so blue.\u201d and it inspires you to write a song. You\u2019re inspired to write a song because we need a song. And I love working an assignment, because it focuses me. So, just basically to write and create instrumental music, I\u2019d rather take anything good from that and apply it to what we\u2019re doing in musical theater.<\/p>\n

G: On behalf of RSR, I want to thank you for your time and the great interview. I hope you have continued success with composing for Musical Theater.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Thank you. I hope you got some good stuff.<\/p>\n

[youtube v\/5DSOyaxKnaA?fs=1&hl=en_US ]<\/p>\n

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Exclusive Interview by Sam \u201cGonzo\u201d Gonzales \u201cIf bands were getting kids off, those concert halls would be filled.\u201d- Berton Averre When did you get The Knack? I got The Knack in 1979 when they hit the music scene hard and fast with the phenomenal \u201cMy Sharona\u201d. The Knack was Doug Fieger on lead vocals, Berton […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[2036,2040,2038,1850,2037,522,1890,2039,1889],"class_list":["post-5478","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-boxing-news","tag-berton-averre","tag-bruce-gary","tag-doug-fieger","tag-interview","tag-lead-guitar","tag-music","tag-my-sharona","tag-prescott-niles","tag-the-knack"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5478","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5478"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5478\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5504,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5478\/revisions\/5504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5478"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5478"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ringsidereport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5478"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}