For part one of this Q&A, click here.
MMM: Now did you find, I know when our old band got back together after a long, long hiatus, there was a lot of unspoken communication that is frequently there with groups that have played together for a while [that] was still there? Did you find that as well?
Larry: I felt that immediately, yeah, stories that go back to when we were kids, and it’s all there; it’s all at your fingertips. It all came back right away.
MMM: I know on the website you refer to yourself often as family, and it’s really kind of comparable to that, isn’t it, in many ways, isn’t it?
Jim: Yeah, I think out of respect ‘cause if you have all that, what you don’t have, the disfunctionality of what you have in family (laughter). We are a pretty smooth functioning band and, you know, able create a model city in which most towns can work as well as we; we each have our own role: I’m kind of the musical director, and Larry is the technical end, engineer, co-producer, Bob is the accountant, Mike schedules the rehearsals, everybody has a role. And we don’t get in anybody’s air space, but we help each other at the same time.
MMM: Jim, you are personally continuing to explore other areas of music as well, aren’t you?
Jim: Yeah. I mean, I will always be a part of the Ides, you know; that’s one thing I know because when I don’t play with the Ides for a while, I start getting the heebie-jeebies, you know. It’s too much in my blood, the Ides of March is. But at the same time, I produce, I write for other artists, I write for film, television, commercials. Larry and I produced different acts together. I produce on my own. I’m discovering new talent, constantly; plus I do a thing called world stage, which is like my superstar concerts, where I get together with all of the musicians that I have worked with through the years, lead singers of groups like 38 Special and many others. We do these great shows. Some are for charity, some are for profit. We have one on the schedule for October in House of Blues in Florida and the San Miguel schools. That’s been a lot of fun. I have a new jazz outfit from Lake Forest. So, never a dull moment.
MMM: Well, tell us a little about, we mentioned it a moment ago, and I know I just ordered my copy, the Still 19 album, which is just new from several months ago. Tell us about that.
Jim: We set out to make the best album we ever made, and that was our mission. It’s essentially the first totally new album since ‘73. We have had albums since 1990 that have been reformed, but a lot of them were re-treads where we would re-record the hits, re-record some of our favorite songs, like we did back in the day. This is a fresh sheet of paper except for “Vehicle.” If it weren’t on there, the people would be very angry. But we actually re-recorded “Vehicle” using the same recording techniques as back then. We wanted to sound authentic, and Larry studied master, in terms of reverbs, compression mic’ing, and I studied every nuance of my vocal.
Larry: We nailed it. I can’t even tell the difference.
Jim: That was our goal.
