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Interview Podcast

MP3: Hey, Herbie, how you doing, man? Herbie Hancock: All right. Thanks for taking the time to do this, I appreciate it. Oh, thanks. So, let's talk about the new album. Obviously this is, you know, sort of a tribute to Joni Mitchell, and you—would you say it's basically your take on some of her classic songs, or what? Yeah, that's pretty much it, you know. Well, you know, it's funny, because it seems to be obviously, a tribute, but that wasn't actually in my mind when I thought about doing it. I mean, she's a friend of mine. You guys have known each other a long time, right? Yeah, a long time. You know. And she's a genius and I have deep respect for her and she's a wonderful poet and writer. So, I thought it was an interesting and great idea to do the music of Joni Mitchell. Right on. I wasn't thinking of it as—I wasn't thinking of, like the word tribute means something a little different than the way I really felt it you know. This is more personal, you know. More like a celebration, sort of, as an artist and as a friend? Yeah, yeah. I mean, she does good stuff. I mean, yes, it is a tribute but when I think of the word tribute, very often I think that the person that's doing it doesn't have… The connection. The kind of yeah, personal connection with whoever they're doing the tribute to, like I did with her. Or, it means the person whose music they're doing is dead. That's the other thing. And she is very much alive. No doubt. How did you guys first come together as friend or as musicians? Well, years ago she did a record called Mingus, which was about Charlie Mingus. And I actually got called by my friend Jaco Pastorius who had been working with Joni. And he called me one evening and said that he was doing this record with Joni about Charlie Mingus. I was sitting thinking "What? Joni Mitchell with Charlie Mingus? What?!" [laughs] And he said, you know, something like, "The only person that's missing is you." You know. So, I said, "What? Joni Mitchell and Charlie Mingus?" I mean, seems remote to me. I said, "Who else is on this record?" He says, "Wayne Shorter," I said, "I'll be over right away." [laughs] Right, totally. That's all it takes. Yeah, that combination of you know, especially like, Wayne—Wayne in particular, but Wayne and Jaco? Something's got to be happening. So, I got over there and so, what I didn't know was, you know, what kind of approach that Joni wanted. What would make her comfortable. And Jaco said, "Now, she wants us to stretch out." I said, "Oh, really?" [laughs] And so, I did. We just, we kind of painted, you know, we were like painters, painting the music. And Joni just flowed right into that. And I was shocked, you know, about how comfortable she felt in that kind of environment, cause I hadn't really heard that in her music before. Sure. And what year was that? What year did you guys—when you did that Mingus record? I have to Google it. You don't have to look it up right now. But, I mean, early seventies? It was either like late seventies or early eighties. Excellent. And now, when you came up with the idea for this record, when you told her about it, was she like, flattered, or surprised, or had you talked about it before? Or how did that conversation go like? Well, she was surprised. And I think that was the biggest emotion that she had. And I think in some ways flattered too. Right. I told her about it when I went to Canada, because I was asked… There was an awards ceremony or something, right? Yeah. It was a Canadian Songwriters Association. And they called me and asked me if I would come there for this award ceremony and present Joni with the Hall of Fame award. Which I did. And it was during that time that I told her that I was doing the record of her music. And she said, "Oh, really?" And she's also featured on the album as well, right? Right, she sings on one of the songs. And then in terms of the other guests, I know you've got like Leonard Cohen, you've got Tina Turner, and then you also have some younger talent—you've got like, Corinne Bailey Rae is up on there and Norah Jones? Right. How did you pick those guys? Were those people that you already had working relationships with or people that you just sort of reached out to because you thought that they would fit this project? Well, first we thought about the project. And I actually depended very much on Larry Klein, the producer, for many of the elements that went into making this record, including suggestions for the singers. I was hoping that we'd have singers that Joni liked. And it was Larry that said that Joni was a fan of Tina Turner's and that Joni liked Norah Jones. I don't know if Joni had hear of Corinne Bailey Rae before, but Larry thought that Joni would like her. Yeah, definitely. You know. In the case of Leonard Cohen, Joni was, for many years, an admirer of Leonard's work. So, that was clearly something that we felt could be you know, very interesting and appropriate, to somehow involve him. And as it turned out—I didn't know Leonard. I didn't know Corinne Bailey Rae. I have known Tina Turner for many years and I know Norah Jones. When she first had, you know, the big hit. The Grammys, yeah. I met her then. And I've seen her a few times since than and I had met her, I guess half-sister, Anushka, who's a… Sitar player right? Yeah, sitar player. And actually I met them both together after the Grammys at a party that Blue Note gave, when she had the first hit album. And so, I felt very comfortable and at least I had some tie in with them. And they all agreed to participate on the record. And has Joni heard it herself yet? Yeah, Larry told me she has. And she liked it? She really likes it. Excellent. So, I was really relieved when I heard that. I bet! Nice. I also wanted to ask—I know, from back in the day, you were like, a big proponent of technology in music and when a lot of those sort of jazz purists were complaining about synthesizers and whatnot coming into the music, that you kind of embraced that, when a lot of other people weren't really ready to. Have you—do you continue to really keep up—like, nowadays, we've got MP3s and digital home studios and this and that. Are you still a big technology guy? It's my nature. It's all in my nature. I've always been into science in one form or another since I was a little kid. And when I was like, five years old, I used to take apart clocks and watches and try to put them back together. It's a basic curiosity I have about how things work. You know, that's just the way I am. You know. Actually, at heart, I'm a frustrated techie. Right on. And when I have the opportunity to do something with technology or fix something that has to do with something electronic or electrical or you know, something involving hardware stuff here in the house, or even somebody else's house, I jump at the chance. I'm the kind of guy—I walk down the street, I cannot pass a hardware store without walking in and looking around. Or a computer store, or anything, I'm totally into that. What's your opinion on—I mean everybody's basically saying that digital formats are you know, pretty much to the young kids, the youth today, they've already replaced CDs in terms of people going to an actual record store to buy something, or just clicking online and getting it for free, or paying for it from a service or whatever. Being that you, when you started out it was just vinyl, and then the format, the delivery has changed so much over the years. Right. Are you a supporter of digital music? Or do you still… Do I still go to the store to buy records? Yeah, yeah, exactly. Nope! All right. Well, it's a lot easier to get it digital, yeah. Do I pay for it? Yes. You know, I'm the kind of person that, if I want something—first thing I'll do is go to iTunes music store. If they don't have it there, then I'll order it online from Amazon.com. If not there, I try to find it—I'll Google it and find it somewhere. You know, it's a time thing for me more than anything. Yeah, totally. I mean, realizing that one of the problems with the technology is that it encourages people to disassociate themselves with physical contact. With other people. Yeah. Knowing that, there's also the other thing, that so many things, so many more things are vying for our attention these days. It's a very complex world that we live in and somehow we need to achieve some kind of balance between not getting caught up with isolation, but at the same time being able to go with the flow. Yeah, I hear you. So, I hope I'm kind of, approaching finding that kind of balance. Yeah, I think that's a good balance. I also wanted to ask you about—I mean obviously, you know, it's hard to believe it's been like 24 years, but you know, your bit hit single "Rockit" was huge to the hip-hop community. That's still a song that, people go crazy in the clubs hearing that today. A lot of your music has been sampled over the years, and I know you've done some collaborative work and whatnot. I wanted to ask you, being that you're a guy who's experimented with all different kinds of styles over the course of your career, are you interested in hip-hop as just a fan, or on a consumer level at all? Or are you—I know a lot of the older jazz musicians aren't into it because of the sampling and stuff like that, whereas, that was one of the first songs to have a DJ scratching on it and most DJs list that as their biggest memory and influence. Is that something that you're involved with at all? Well, yeah, I was just thinking about the statement you made about all the musicians—being turned off by the idea of sampling. Yeah, well certain ones definitely. Certain ones, yeah, not all. But certain ones. Well, that's because they haven't been sampled, or they haven't been sampled and paid! Right. That makes a big difference. Yeah, but I've been sampled a lot and I've been paid a lot, you know. So, I mean, it's—for me, I'm pleased that someone could take something I did many years ago, that's been dead and buried and they resurrect it in a form that's viable for today's ears. You know, put it in kind of a—give it a rebirth in a new context. Absolutely. I'm pleased when that happens. Right on. And for the most part I get paid for it too. There's nothing wrong with that either. Yeah, no doubt. I also wanted to ask you, you've done countless, countless albums and you know, as a solo artist and also as a member of a band and playing on sessions and whatnot, you've also toured extensively, you've played all over the world, and continue to perform all the time. Do you have a preference, studio versus being on stage, or does it just sort of depend on your mood at the time, or what? They're like apples and oranges in a way. An example would be live recording as opposed to studio recording. That kind of puts them on an equal—even keel, in a sense. But they really are separate, because they're separate environments. The music gets affected. But not necessarily negative in either case. Just different. For me the studio experience feels more personal for the most part. And the live experience feels a little more collective, because the audience is part of—the audience is a member of the band, because their vibe, their energy affects your performance. Totally. I hear you man. Unless you're isolating yourself from the audience, which I prefer not to do. Right, that makes sense. I know that you… Oh, by the way, you did ask me something more specific about hip-hop? Yeah. I'm open to hip-hop but I'm not—I'm not in any way an expert on it. You're not listening to it every day and whatnot. Right, right. It's not that I follow it—actually the truth is, to be brutally honest? Yes. I have so many projects that I work on, that it's very difficult for me to find the time to listen to other things just for pleasure. Sure, sure. Because usually there are projects I'm working on and there are things that I have to either study or pay attention to because of the nature of the project. Because, I'm involved with a lot of different things. And all of them aren't musical either. Right, right. All kind of stuff. See, I'm—for example, I mean, there was a time when all I paid attention to was music, you know. And I see young people, in particular, they spend so much of their day with earphones in their ears listening to their iPod. And I don't do that. I spend much of my day, well, I'll be honest again, much of my day in front of the computer because I like that stuff! Yeah, totally. But also, I mean, I read the newspaper, I try to stay abreast of basically what's going on in the world and in politics. And with the environment and with social conditions and… The world around you basically. The world around me, right. Exactly! You know, I'm—I function more from the standpoint of being a human being than from the standpoint of being a musician these days. So, that's different than the way I used to be. This is a much broader umbrella that embraces a whole lot more than what I did as a musician. And what it does for me, is that it provides a much broader pallet from which to draw an inspiration. It's not just music that inspires me to create, it's life. No doubt, right on man. I wanted to ask, you know, also, in terms of, your career spans fifty years, you've accomplished so many things, not just the different albums and working with certain artists and putting out legendary, influential material, but just staying active and staying successful and being not afraid to switch gears and do something totally different or against the grain. What do you credit to your longevity in the music business which is notorious for just chewing people up and spitting them out? Well, I'm more concerned about my function as a human being than my function as a musician. In other words, my function as a musician really stems from my function as a human being first, you know, because I'm not just a musician. I'm only a musician when I'm either talking about it or doing it. But when I go into the voting booth, I'm not a musician, you know. You're a human being, sure. When I'm out to dinner with my daughter, I'm not a musician. When I'm out with friends, with my wife, I'm not a musician. You know, when I'm talking to my next door neighbor, I'm not a musician. See. So, I mean, but I'm always a human being no matter how I manifest myself. All those are aspects of being human. So, that realization was—it took years for me to come to that realization and it came—I came to that realization through the practice of Buddhism, which I've been practicing now for 35 years. It's called Nichiren Buddhism. So, I'm a member of what's called SGI. It means Soka Gakkai International, it's a lay Buddhist organization that was founded in Japan. So, as a result of practicing Buddhism I've had a lot of realizations about life that have been instrumental in helping my own personal growth and development, which includes a realization of the beauty and greatness of other—and respect for other human beings. Sure. You know, and so, at this point in my life I'm more concerned about my function and my purpose on a day-to-day basis and on a you know, a lifetime basis. And at my age I'm concerned about the future and I'm concerned about the youth, which are our future. And what can I do to be an element toward the advancement of life and advancement of the quality of life for myself and for others. To me, that's important. And it doesn't just manifest itself through the music because I can talk! Right, there's other things you can do besides play piano. Right, right. It has to do with you know, attitude, where I'm coming from, you know, and I found through experience that respecting others and being open to ideas, to what others have done and--has served me better than being closed. Sure, that makes sense. Yeah. And it helps me in the learning process about life. And I hope I'm always a student of life and learning how to improve my own and being a, hopefully being an encouragement to others. No problem. I got one more question for you, then I'll let you go. Now it seems like more than ever, the youth out there, people want to be on stage, you know, they want to be musicians, they want to be singers, they want to be rappers, entertainers—they want to be a star. As somebody who's been in this entertainment business for so long and been so successful at it on a number of different levels, what advice would you give to the young people starting out just trying to get their foot in the door today? That being a star has no intrinsic value. That fame has no intrinsic value. That bling has no intrinsic value. That power in and of itself has no intrinsic value. What has value is the elements that we all possess, that we can help to improve upon in our lives, which are aspects of being a human being. Like courage. Like trust. Being non-judgmental. Being open. Sharing. Being well, like honest. Having the courage to be vulnerable. And being what you believe in. And trust in your heart. And those are things that are priceless. Everything else you can buy. So, the only thing—and the beautiful thing is that we all possess all of those things. But it's—these are elements that we need to develop in order to learn the lessons that are available. But it's necessary to do what we can to develop all those things in our lives. And the word success—it's not what a lot of people think it is. Success is having the ability and activating the ability to take a challenge in life and flipping it so that it becomes a source of learning or other attribute that moves your life forward rather than back. That is called being involved with the art of living, and that's the greatest and most difficult art that there is for a human being. Well, listen man, that's great advice. And I just want to thank you again for taking the time to talk to me, Herbie, I definitely appreciate it. And are you going to be touring in support of the new record? Yes. As a matter of fact, we're going to kind of do a little mini-tour in November just to kind of test the waters and now the agents are trying to you know, shape next year for doing more major tours, to support the record. That sounds good man. Well, I'll be on the lookout if you come out to the Bay area, I'll definitely try to come out. Okay, great. All right. Nice talking to you man, and have a good one, good luck with the album. Oh, thank you Brolin. All right, take care Herbie.