The Old Rockers Podcast – Episode 2 … The Legend of Billy Cranston

Episode 2– The Legend of Billy Cranston

Theme music begins:

“When I was young, my Dad used to say,

‘Son, we’re all going to die one day.

Why don’t you take a little time to do some good along the way …

Take a little time …

(music fades going into chorus.)

Gregor (low voiceover, speaking intimately into a microphone): Welcome to the Old Rockers podcast …

Del (interrupting, much higher energy) … where 60 years of male friendship are held together by the connective tissue of music, as two old guys dredge up stories from their misspent youth.

Gregor: Why are you so hard on us?

Del: Because there are so many others who worked harder than we did, had more talent, and are more deserving of the fame and fortune than was handed to us.

Gregor: Who ever told you that life was fair? This is about much more than music and merit. This is about time and nature and art and love …

Del: I thought it was about two guys who once played in an obscure band called Grendel. I’m your host Del Watson.

Gregor: It’s about their journey… and I’m Gregor Brewster and (together) … together we are Grendel. Do you remember where you were on February 9, 1964?

Del: Why would I remember that?

Gregor: Maybe this will help … (sings from All My Loving) Close your eyes, and I’ll kiss you.

Del: Ah yes, a Sunday night. The Beatles on Ed Sullivan. Sundays were always a big TV night for Trudy. We’d watch, was it Get Smart? … or maybe Car 54, Where are you? One of those.

Greg: Then, afterwards, it was always Boom-bada-boom-bada-bada, Bonanza!

Del: Hoss, Adam, and Little Joe. I remember seeing you in the school hallway the next morning after The Beatles and we said, almost at the same time, “We’re starting a band.” But that was a little easier said than done.

Greggor: For starters, there were only two of us. And we played folk songs on acoustic guitars.

Del: Even more importantly … what’s the first thing you do when you start a band? You’ve got to come up with a name. Initially we were going to be The Uniks, but then someone told us what the meaning of that was. Then there was Lug Nuts.

Gregor: Yeah, we had a logo that turned out to be some kind of Nazi war symbol. Then we came up with Fourplay, even though at that point we were Twoplay. Finally, we settled on The Usurpers.

Del: Neither of us knew what it meant, but we thought it sounded cool. Now, all we needed was a drummer, a bass guitar, and someone who could sing. We played a little with a guy a year behind us … what was his name?

Gregor: Rosenthal. Artie Rosenthal.

Del: He was terrible, but he had a nice drum set and a big rec room, and parents who didn’t object to noise. After about two practices Gregor and I decided to move on from him, but then his parents hired someone to paint “The Usurpers” on his bass drum.

Gregor: It looked great, but the kid was hopeless. So, we kicked him out of the group. At least you and I thought we kicked him out. Rosenthal became a lawyer and he lived in Providence, so I’d run into him every now and again, and he swears that we never said anything to him. The next thing he knew we were in another band, and he was stuck with “The Usurpers” on his drum set. Said he never played after that.

Del: Little chickenshits! We went back to being a twosome and tried writing some songs together. Remember You’re Going to Miss Me When I’m Gone?

Gregor: It should have been called You’re Going to Forget Me Before I Go!

Del: Your dad even drew up legal papers for us to split all songwriting credit and royalties equally, just like Lennon/McCartney.

Gregor: Trudy came up with “Grendel” as a mash-up of Gregor and Wendell. All we needed now was … the rest of a band.

Del: A kid in our class, Robert Moran was a day student who lived in Cranston, said there were some guys in his neighborhood who were also trying to start a band.

Gregor: He always wanted to be called “Robert” because someone in the hallway or locker room would start singing (sings, Del joins in) Bob, bob, bob, bob moran …(repeats) Bob Moran, oh take my hand, you’ve got rockin’ and a-rollin’ stompin and a screaming, Bob Moran. (they laugh in finishing).

Del: Yet another footnote in the history of rock and roll. Anyway Bob talked to these guys. They all went to Cranston East High School, and they said they were willing to meet us. So we went. There were four of them. Joey was their drummer. He was really good and had started the band. They had Ollie on bass.

Gregor: He was horrible. Funny-looking and the rhythm of a coughing spasm. Billy on guitar. He didn’t play that well, but he was good-looking and had a great voice. And Geoff who played, get this, accordion.

Del: The first thing he played was (sings) Lady of Spain I adore you, pull down your pants I’ll explore you. I borrowed that line years later when I wrote (sings) Oh Gloria, is there more of ya, to explor-i-a.

Gregor: Well, this has been a nice trip down memory lane, but we have to remember that we have a guest today, and he’s patiently waiting for us.

Del: Coming to you live from San Miguel de Allende, Mexico … the one, the only, the Man, the legend … Billy Cranston. Hola, buenos dias, amigo.

Billy is the same vintage as Gregor and Del, but has an impressively droopy white mustache. He is wearing a Hawaiian shirt and sunglasses. He speaks in a low melodic voice.

Billy: More correctly “Buenas tardes,” since it’s afternoon. How’re you boys doin’?

Gregor: We’re in a studio in Vermont, I’m guessing it’s about sixty degrees colder here than there. It’s good to see you, man. You’re looking good.

Billy: Good to see you, too, but I can’t really say you’re looking good. Del, you look like someone dragged you behind a Jeep for the last forty years. (laughs, so do Gregor and Del)

Del: Ouch! I see time hasn’t mellowed you. How are you getting along with the senoritas down there.

Billy: There’s no shortage of widows and divorcees down here. They all have two things in common. They have lots of money and they most definitely don’t want to get involved with a musician, not seriously anyway. The good news side of that is that they don’t mind at all getting unseriously involved with a gi-tar player and they usually pick-up the check.

Gregor: I can see why you like it down there. You gigging much?

Billy: I’ve got two regular gigs at restaurants that keep me in margaritas and cerveza and we have an informal group of old rockers that meets at El Centro de la ciudad.

Gregor: What’s that?

Billy: City center. There’s a beautiful plaza there with shade and benches. Not surprisingly, a number of decent musicians have drifted into SMA, so there are plenty of people who just like to jam. You guys would fit right in.

Del: Sounds like my kind of scene. Gregor and I were just reminiscing about the first time we met. Give us your take on the earliest days.

Billy: It was in Joey’s garage. His parents let him keep his drums set up there. We didn’t know what to expect with you guys. Robert Moran set up the meeting, and he wasn’t the coolest guy around, so we were expecting a couple of dorks. In that sense, you didn’t disappoint us.

Gregor: (laughs) Hey … did you always call him “Robert?”

Billy: (smiles slowly, then sings) Bob-bob-bob-bob-bob Moran. (everyone joins in for several seconds)

Del: Bob Moran … whatever happened to him?

Billy: Murdered. In a parking garage. About ten years after high school. Somewhere in New York City, I think.

Del: Holy shit! New York was a nasty place in the 70s. Sounds like a story I don’t want to hear. Do you remember the first song we played?

Billy: (sings a guitar riff) …

Del: I know the song was I’ve Had It but I don’t remember who did it.

Billy: I’ll ask my phone.

Gregor: Cell phones work in Mexico?

Billy: Americans are so ignorant about Mexico. Their history is much richer and more complex. The United States looks like a giant strip mall by comparison. The Bell Notes.

Gregor: The immortal Bell Notes. So, if we were such dorks, why did you let us in the band?

Billy: Joey and I really wanted to be in a real band. We tried to get Geoff to ditch the accordion and get one of those electric keyboards like Mike Smith in the Dave Clark Five had, but he wouldn’t do it. Geoff was good, but in a church organist kind of way. He was really not a rocker at heart. And Ollie? There just wasn’t a word to describe him other than disaster. After a few practices Joey and I decided to throw our lots in with you two.

Del: The problem was … now we had a line-up that was a drummer and three guitarists. Tell folks how we solved that situation.

Billy: We handled it (pauses) the manly way.

Del: Forthright, with compassion and sensitivity … the manly way.

Billy: Yes, the manly way. Joey told Ollie that he didn’t have to keep hauling his guitar and amp into and out of the garage. He could just leave it there. Then, the four of us got together and started playing. Gregor was the strongest on guitar so he was lead. I was the weakest, but I didn’t want the challenge of learning a new instrument.

Del: So I was nominated to play bass, something I wasn’t thrilled with, but that’s what worked best for the band.

Billy: We practiced without Ollie a few times. In true manly fashion no one talked to him directly. Eventually and inevitably, he heard about it from someone else. I think it was Robert Moran. He came to a practice and banged on the door for us to open up. But did we? No-o-o-o … we did the manly thing and snuck back into the house, left by the back door, and peeled out in Joey’s car.

Del: Not my proudest moment, but I remember the four of us laughing hysterically at the time.

Billy: Eventually he calmed down, then Del rubbed salt in the wound by offering to buy his bass and amp for about a quarter of what he had paid for it.

Del: And he took it! Said musicians were sissies and he didn’t want to be one.

Gregor: “Cowards” or “chickenshits” would also have been appropriate word choices. And what became of Ollie?

Billy: He’s dead, too. Motorcycle crash. The story was that he drove a bike about as well as he played the bass.

Gregor: Remind me not to ask you about any other common acquaintances. Stick around. We’ve got to sell something then we can reboot our conversation. If you’re just joining us our guest today is Billy Cranston, one of the original members of Grendel and a recent electee to the Rhode Island Music Hall of Fame.

Del: Congratulations on that, Brother. Richly deserved.

Billy: Muchas gracias mes amigos.

Del: Support for this broadcast is provided for by Lester Martin Wealth Management, where we think about the future so you don’t have to. Gregor, back when we started Grendel, did you ever think that we would wind up being shills for a giant financial institution?

Gregor: I sure did. Clearly remember when I was trying to figure out how the hell the lead guitarist for the Kinks got his guitar to sound like that on You Really Got Me? I knew right then that some day you and I would be advising retirees on how to manage their financial assets. How about you?

Del: Damn straight! I think it was during those years when I was living off-the-grid on the commune in the Emerald Triangle in the 70s when I said to myself “Wendell” (I use my full name when I’m having a serious discussion with myself) … “Some day you’ll be too old to be banging nails and selling weed to make ends meet. You should set yourself up with an outfit like Lester Martin Wealth Management to make sure you are provided for in your dotage. It’s not to early to start planning for your future with a certified CFP.

Gregor: And a CFP is …?

Del: A Certified Financial Planner, you dope. And you know why you should work with a certified CFP? Because a CFP is a fiduciary. You know what a fiduciary is?

Gregor: I’m a lawyer, remember? Of course I do.

Del: Well, I didn’t have a clue so I’m going to tell you what I learned. A fiduciary is paid to act in your best interests. They’re not like brokers looking to sell you a product that earns them the highest commission. Those people are just used car salesmen wearing ties.

Gregor: … and driving BMWs. What kind of car do you want your fiduciary to drive?

Del: They can drive BMWs, but at least I know that they earned their money by doing what is best for me, not by by hoodwinking me into investing the latest shiny spoon that makes them the most money.

Gregor: The CFPs at Lester Martin are trained listening specialists. They don’t talk at you, they listen to understand what you want for your financial future, and they will develop a plan for getting there. They think about your financial future so that you can think about how Dave Davies got his guitar to sound like that on the instrumental in You Really Got Me. Let’s get back to our show.

Del: Our guest today is Billy Cranston, one of the original members of Grendel, the band that took Rhode Island by storm in the late 1960s. Billy joins us live via the miracle of modern technology from San Miguel de Allende, Mexico.

Billy: You know I’ve got a CFP fiduciary from Lester Martin.

Del: You’re joking … Really?

Billy: We’ve got a close, personal relationship? I call him “Douche” for short.

Del: Walked right into that one, didn’t I?

Billy: He asked me to make a list of my assets, so I gave him a list that said “30 jars of coins and a stack of one dollar bills about an inch high.

Del: (laughing) What do estimate as the total?

Billy: Gotta be in the triple digits!

Del: A triple-digit man! You forgot to include the guitars.

Billy: Got plenty of those, but I need to keep ‘em all.

Gregor: Sorry to interrupt the playful banter, gentleman, but we’ve got a story to tell. Billy, you’ve told about the origins of Grendel? Did we really take Rhode Island “by storm.”

Billy: Whoever said that is an extremely poor judge of weather. Luckily we were early to the band scene so we got a lot of college gigs right away. It was all cover stuff, most of it British Invasion, but also American R&B. We’d play Louie, Louie two or three times a night. If we ran short of material we’d play What’d I Say which we could stretch out to 10-15 minutes. Mostly we played fraternities, which was fortunate, because it meant the crowd was half drunk by the time we arrived and fully drunk by the end of the first set.

Del: As long as you played loud and fast, you were all right.

Gregor: We were lucky not to be electrocuted there was so much spilled beer on the floor by the time we were packing up the equipment.

Billy: As people started realizing that The Beatles were writing their own material, we thought we should do the same. Then you guys came up with No Remorse.

Gregor: Hold on. I know my name is on the record, but that one was 1000% Del.

Del: Why are you so dismissive? People thought it was pretty good.

Gregor: If, by “pretty good” you mean “derivative” and “moronic,” then I agree.

Billy: Hey, it’s rock and roll. It’s all about stealing.

Del: Billy, you might not have heard this, but after we’ve been playing No Remorse in the band for a couple of months, Gregor takes me aside … all serious and grown-up … and tells me that I’ve got to “stay within my experience” when writing original material. That’s why I came up with I Think I’m in Love next. (Billy starts laughing.)

Gregor: And I refused to play a song about masturbation. Still do.

Billy: (Still laughing) No one would have cared! The acoustics we so bad that nobody could understand the words to anything we played anyway. The Stones sang about girls having their periods and all kinds of things like that. I still think we should have played it. Song was hilarious.

Gregor: You can get away with suggestive, over-the-top material if you do it tastefully. That’s what I tried to do with Casserole Blues.

Billy: I’m gonna cream your spinach right between your legs? That’s tasteful?

Gregor: All right! All right! Point taken. How did the whole “Cranston” thing come about.

Billy: Joey and I lived in Cranston, and went to Cranston East High. In the early days of Grendel, you and Del had the habit of referring to us a “the Cranston boys” so we, mockingly, started referring to himself in the same way. Then, Joey started calling himself Joey Cranston and I became Billy Cranston.

Del: Kind of a Ramones thing.

Billy: Yeah, but years before the Ramones became a thing.

Del: Do you think they copied you?

Billy: It’s flattering to think so, but I doubt they ever heard of us. Then, after Del dropped his bombshell and Gregor went off to college, Joey and I were left holding our dicks, so to speak. We found another guitarist and a bass player, both from Cranston, so we called the group Cranston, not The Cranstons, but just Cranston.

Del: Like the band Boston?

Billy: Yeah, but years before Boston. Cranston, the band, lasted over ten years, but then the other guys all decided to get real jobs, but Joey and I kept performing as an acoustic duo. We toyed around with some new names, but everyone kept referring to us as “the guys from Cranston,” so we figured why fight it? We kept it going for another twenty years. In addition to some regular gigs at clubs and restaurants, we did birthday parties, weddings, bar mitzvahs, and Gregor even hired us to play at a bunch of political rallies when he was going to be governor.

Gregor: I hesitate to ask … is Joey still with us?

Billy: (laughs) Right after we both turned 50 Joey started saying “I’m too old for this shit” and he applied for disability with Social Security, claiming he couldn’t work any more because he was suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome. It never interfered with him playing gigs, but he kept saying “As soon as a I get my first check, I’m outta here. And as soon as he got his first check, he was.

Gregor: Where is he?

Billy: The Philippines. Married a Filipino lady and tells me he is living in paradise. Wants me to come visit.

Gregor: Why don’t you?

Billy: I need my Lester Martin fiduciary to figure out a way to make that stack of one dollar bills turn into thousand dollar bills.

Del: I had a funny thing happen a few years ago. I was cleaning chimneys here in Vermont, and I tried to remember what your real last name is. It’ll come to me, I thought, but it didn’t. I had some kind of mental block. I vaguely remember it being Irish, so I kept try every Irish name I could think of. Billy McGill, Billy O’Reilly, Billy Donahue, Billy O’Rourck … this kept on for months! Then, I’m up on another rooftop and it suddenly came to me …

Billy: Jones. I’m William Jones.

Gregor: We have to wrap this sucker up. William Jones, Billy Cranston … thank you both for joining us and great to see you, but I do have one final question. You were there from the very beginning. You stuck with your musical dreams. You’re the professional. You’ve paid your dues. Does it bother you to see Del and I, through no merit of our own, getting so much recognition for doing nothing while you, and many others like you, have been fighting the good fight?

Billy: Meaning, am I jealous of all the attention and money you are getting? Am I resentful for you having something handed to you on a silver platter, while I have some jars of coins and three ex-wives? Do I hate your fucking guts and shake my fist at an unjust god?

Gregor: Exactly.

Billy: No, man, because in Rhode Island I’m more famous than either of you, here in San Miguel, too. And I can have my pick of any widower or divorcee in town, as long as she’s over 70.

Gregor: Ladies and gentlemen … Rhode Island Music Hall of Famer, Billy Cranston.

Reference:

March 4 … (Brewster/Watson)

March 5 … Accept with the Left