The Art of Longevity Season 7, Episode 1: Rickie Lee Jones

Being a longevous, ‘real deal’ music artist requires many things, but being pure in heart is certainly one. And there are few people on this earth as pure in heart as Rickie Lee Jones. 

With the completion of Last Chance Texaco in 2019 (her brilliantly evocative and critically revered addition to the vast ‘rock memoir’ library) Rickie Lee permitted herself to look back to those early days and draw new inspiration from them. 

“Before I finished that book, I was burdened, but when it was done I began to shed my fears. I am 68 years old and you cannot scare me any more”.

The resulting first studio album release since then is Pieces Of Treasure, Rickie Lee’s versions of a selection of American songbook classics including Nature Boy, September Song, Sunny Side of the Street and no less than two iconic Sinatra numbers. The success of this album is in the way Rickie Lee finds her way to occupy these well-travelled songs.

But, this being The Art of Longevity, I want to know about the bad times as well as the good. And Rickie Lee Jones has had more than her fair share of years in the wilderness. By her 90s records (Pop Pop, Traffic From Paradise and Ghostyhead ) Rickie Lee’s career showed the classic curve for established artists, of high critical acclaim but steadily reduced commercial success. 

Even after a minor resurgence in the 2000s (beginning with the superb Evening Of My Best Day), a further decade of being largely forgotten left Rickie Lee broke and unable to find a record label to release new music. How did she get through that time?

“I thought, maybe this was payment for having so much success so fast. It’s a kids game and there are many many new young artists coming up at any time. The thing is to teach the audience that you are not just a pop artist but that you are a real musician”.

We listeners, have a lot to learn!

Transcript

Rickie Lee Jones: 2:41

Thank you. I've been at it a while.

Keith Jopling: 2:45

How are you Ricky Lee on whereabouts in the world? Are you today?

Rickie Lee Jones: 2:49

New Orleans? I'm good.

Keith Jopling: 2:52

I haven't been to New Orleans for about 20 years, I think, what are the changes you've seen since you moved there?

Rickie Lee Jones: 3:00

The price of real estate is really going up. And a lot of people from out of town, you know, artist types or rich hipster type types bringing in a lot of cash. And that, you know, that's not a terrible thing. You should be able to live where you want. But from my view, what that does is alters the character in subtle ways. So here in the south, people are very friendly, right? I mean, everybody, Hey, how you doing? Mitch? Ricky, if they don't know you, they still not at you and say hello. But the folks from out of town aren't like that. So then you have these new people who are like LA and they don't look at you. And you go as so they're beginning to change the character, the the coin sweet character. There's no infrastructure here. So like, the roads are really bad. The schools are bad. There aren't many policemen. So when the cost of real estate, I mean, you asked so when the cost of gunked up inordinately was nothing to support that, then it's gonna fall back down, you know, eventually they'll take their cash and leave. So in a way, it could be good because maybe some neighborhoods will be inadvertently saved from Airbnb ease, but Well, we'll see. Anyway.

Keith Jopling: 4:30

Yeah. It's not an untypical story, and terms of what's happening to neighborhoods all over the world. Well, Ricky Lee, congrats on pieces of treasure. That's your new record, which is going to be released pretty much as we released this episode. Your music, though, has always been right from the beginning. Posts genre, it's always been eclectic, but somehow jazz comes back around to jazz So the jazz side of life, as you described it, just tell me a bit about the genesis of the record. What made you finally get around to making a record like this? Because it seems like a natural step for you.

Rickie Lee Jones: 5:12

I think it wouldn't have happened if it wasn't Russ teittleman This idea and a way to reunite with him a little more than a year ago, he really wanted to do this jazz record. And I think that it was a point of honor with him. I think he felt that it's a thing I do so well and hadn't been acknowledged for hadn't done a really not that I haven't done great renditions of jazz. But the records were always eclectics hadn't done a really good jazz record. And I had kind of hoped to start on a new record of my compositions, but he was not going to do this one first. So that's the genesis of how that happened. It

Keith Jopling: 6:00

feels to me like it's more than a jazz record, though, because there's something really emotional about it, it's very close to the nerve. Could you only do this, after you'd written your memoirs, last chance to text the code? If Ross would have approached you, you know, five or six years ago, could you have done it,

Rickie Lee Jones: 6:19

then the first thing I was gonna say was, I didn't really see that memoir would affect that, but But when I think of it in actual time, before completing that year, you're probably right on the mark, there was a sense of relief and accomplishment, the depths of what I experienced finishing the memoir, I haven't really been able to explain, but it kind of dropped me off here. And now at this age, and this place now with so much Joie de vie, and so much excitement to get things done. And before I finished that book, I wasn't burdened by all the stories and all the past, for many reasons, you know, carrying grudges, or, you know, on behalf of family is myself. And once I told the story, yeah, I was free to do anything. And then another thing happened. Maybe this is what's happening to me and like, no, but once I made the record, as I was singing, I began to change again, I began to shed again, fears, so that when it was done, I was like, I am 68 years old, and you cannot scare me anymore. I know exactly who I am. And what I do. And there's a little bit of claiming age, as a woman, that's so empowering. And until you do that you live in fear people finding out, Hey, you're not, you know, you're flawed as far as how people view age or whatever. So I recognize that there was a certain power in claiming age. And I think I know he's been trying to do it. But once I found this voice since I sang these songs, and she's so intact, and yeah, I can feel she's her age, but there's no the way we pigeonhole people according to age, so that kind of that in that personality who's singing that music, she and forgive me for calling her a sheep, but I kind of experience it theatrically, like the actor in me creates this character. And that character knows just what she's doing. And there was a different voice for this music than I'd ever sound jazz before. It's lower. And it's funny, and it's really intimate. And I think before I was really involved in just listening and controlling the texture and timbre of the voice, but something happened, where I was just totally engaged with the vowel sound and the music and the player that I finally arrived at the here and now and this record is what happened.

Keith Jopling: 9:35

Yeah, that's nicely put, because it feels like there's all the gamut of emotions is on the record, because I know you know, it was emotionally tough to do at times. You maybe come on to some of the songs in a moment, but it's also playful, and it comes across playful. So I'm listening to it. It takes you on that kind of emotional journey, which I love.

Rickie Lee Jones: 9:57

It's a mistake to think that because here's her Falling that your stat, the depths of feeling. And it's not that it's overwhelming, it's just wonderful. So you know, this body, like, I'm weeping and, and I'm weeping on behalf of the of the lyric. But I'm also overwhelmed by the feeling of making a sound, you know, it's, it's, it did, which is quite fantastic and I've often been overwhelmed by a particular, you know, emotion of the like, like at the end of cycles, I'll make it but please just don't ask me how it's like this that this was more of a of an immersion in in feeling, you know neither neither terribly sad or you know what I mean? So at the end of all in the game, when in the Lyric, finally the writer is promising it will be this way, but it may not. And then he says he'll come back and kiss your lips. So I can't even recite it. It's so present. I just love feeling all these wonderful things and every time you sing the song, you can go right back to that house of feeling in a safe and wonderful place to to explore that. That's the fun of music for me.

Keith Jopling: 11:37

The art of longevity is presented with Bowers and Wilkins, the revered British Premium Audio brands, Bowers and Wilkins make some of the world's finest audio products from the iconic 800 series loudspeakers trusted by Abbey Road Studios for over 40 years. So the flagship px eight wireless headphones. This is music as the artist intended you to hear it. Okay, so tell me about the curation process. Because this is a particular set of songs from you, if you talk about the American Songbook and everything that's there. It's huge, it's limitless. So how did you go about whittling it down to this collection?

Rickie Lee Jones: 12:19

Well, for a couple months, once we had that lunch, we began to exchange song ideas. I had a song I knew I wanted to do just in time, he knew he wanted me to cry, here's every day, you know, he wasn't that hot for all in the game. I had all the way on on the list. But as as we when I started to think this one is isn't gonna make it it's, it's so dramatic. And the rest of them are kind of storyteller, you know, stories where this one is just I don't even know what it is. We had a list of maybe over 15 songs, which we did record and recorded some of those songs, the you know, the difficult ones are the ones that get recorded more than once. And once that's happening, you know, you're probably not going to get it. The great songs are recorded once or twice, ma'am, ma'am. And you know, you got him. So ultimately, we had 10 Perfect songs, nine perfect songs. And we're not sure what to do is it never entered my mind, which had been on my on a imaginary list four or five years ago, because I had done it three different ways trying to find it, you know, I'd done one with the band one by myself. And this was the only song that had so much Ricky stamp in it. And less jazz bands stamp, you know, because my stamps, it just were so on personal. And I I determined not to put it on because it would change the overall feeling of the record. Let's keep it this thing, this vein that we hit that's kind of upbeat and funny and grown up. So we did that. And then once we mastered and listened again to it. Oh, my God actually, is really very good. So it'll be a well, we'll release all three versions. But I do think the record is perfect is a little short. But I think it should be short. I don't you know, the the thing of more food, or music is a bad way to go when you're making art. Absolutely.

Keith Jopling: 14:37

And that's the world we're in is like just volume and this insatiable appetite, but I think those versions come in handy in that sense. You know, you should definitely get them out there. So let's talk about a couple of songs. So one of Ross's choices was here's that rainy day. I mean, I could be wrong, but it feels like it's one of the lesser known Sinatra tracks from the Capitol years. It's not from You know, the big albums, it's from one of the later albums, from no one cares. And there's a passage in there, which is really interesting. So it's eight bars of just instrumental. That's right. And you kind of take them by surprise, because after four bars, you think what's going to happen next, and nothing happens next. It's just, it just plays, but it's so beautiful. So I haven't come across a song that does that. Ever. I don't think there probably is one, but I can't think of one.

Rickie Lee Jones: 15:29

I am so glad. You're the second person that mentioned that. So we left space for an instrumental. We tried a few people, but it felt like you'd put an instrument and it just didn't feel natural. There are so many great solos, why force a solo on what is already so perfect. And it's a conversation between that quiet tune and the singer. So we made the choice to go and we love like it is and thanks for noticing that. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 16:08

you've always worked with phenomenal players. Tell me a little bit about this group of players on this record.

Rickie Lee Jones: 16:16

Again, this is the choice of the producer. This is what's wonderful about having a real producers, they know who to hire to make the thing happen. And not just great players, because there's it's a town full of great players, but who can play with the singer, and who can play with me. And I just want to mention this because it was unexpected. I'm not sure what happened in my life to put me in a defensive place when it comes to musicians, but I wasn't expecting any love at all from from anybody and and when I came in, I don't even know if I started seeing him yet. Maybe I did. But in the break, that young drummer came over and Russell Malone on the guitar, and they said one at a time, what an honor it was for them to be playing with me. And it made me feel so whole and ready to do my job, you know, and because it's been a hard journey, and I placed myself in front of people who were disrespectful and and it affected the work that I did. So he picked people that I think I don't think they were buttering me up. I think they sincerely were like, wow, Rickie Lee Jones, I haven't gotten a wow, Rickie Lee Jones in many years. And it's amazing what it did. For the truth, you know, you cannot write down with a word or pick me right now.

Keith Jopling: 18:02

You're only human like the rest of us. But I get it, you can kind of forget who you are and what you've done. Before I came into this interview, I had two shots of vodka at the bar downstairs. So I'm like, I'm interviewing Ricky Lee Jones. So you know, there is. Okay, so some of these songs seem to choose themselves. So natureboy, September song, sunny side of the street. These are songs that your father taught you and use and sang to you. Yeah, so tell me about what memories came back. When you were recording these and how they ended up in the music.

Rickie Lee Jones: 18:38

Well, sunny side of the street, you know, I think it was a song I actually used by by Blackbird in sunny side of the street to audition for the Luke King Show, when I was eight or nine, and the piano player, you know, so that that the data that the data is zero when swinging the way they would have done it. And so when I went to do it, I thought to tell the emotional history of the song for me. And the way to do that is to tell it very slowly, like you and me talking. And so if it's just me and the guitar player, then I can fill it with all that. I don't know why, but when you slow it thing way down, especially I think that's usually fast. And people hear it in a different way for the first time. They'll experience their own history with the song or their own history with whatever and I find it a fun and effective way for me to tell a true story with a song so slowing it down, which I had only thought of doing but hadn't done with that guitar player who was playing a lot even when we're doing things rubato I feel a pulse more or less, so I'm gonna, you know. So that dynamic of what's happening there is that I don't know this guy, I haven't played with him much. He's got his own set of nerves. I've got mine. He has his own thing he wants to say on his guitar. Is he listening to me? Or is he just playing his guitar, and all these things are happening, where I'm going, Ah, and then when it was done, it was perfect. I like all that drama that's happening, if everything if you know everything beforehand, and it's wonderful to play with people year after year, but if you throw yourself in with somebody who's a little different, and you both stay on your feet and dance through the thing, I have a moment in that song that's turning out to be one of my favorite moments in a meeting I recorded it's so on effected, he's playing a instrumental there and I go Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah, Allah. I was like, Who are you? Do is that lady go? Allah, Allah Allah? And I didn't know at that moment very much. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 21:19

this is where it really is a jazz record because there's a conversation going on between you and the musicians. Throughout I think I wanted to ask you about one for my baby. Because yesterday, it was International Women's Day. And there was a lot of stuff came out about women in in music, and their journey through the music industry, which if we have time for maybe we come back to, but it's another Sinatra song. And I feel like when you try and do a Sinatra song, you kind of take on Sinatra. And that's, I would imagine quite a daunting thing. But the way you did it was to discover it was originally by Ida Lupo. Ida Lupino. Yeah,

Rickie Lee Jones: 21:57

she's quite a dynamo herself. I believe I should look it up first. But I think she's one of the first women to own her own stuff to become a producer, and an a, an A power player herself in 1950s. Hollywood. So she's both I saw her playing the piano and to what would have been like a couple of young kids at the time, right? So and her character, the character of a woman talking to the bartender being kind of tough. And as the teenager watched it, she was like, wow, so I got it all I went, Oh, this girl is is like a cool, young, bright spark in the middle of all these men in this fictional movie, but but that part is real. And that's the part I'm gonna use to build a new interpretation of the song because he owns it. You know, the main thing about Sinatra is poor me. It's after hours and poor me. That day left again, let's get drunk. We pour sobbed saw trike. But she's got a little bit of humor and power and you know, biting it never know. But I'm kind of a poet. And so the humor, and that, and that not poor me. I just went I tried to lean on more when I did. Yeah,

Keith Jopling: 23:29

I think which is great to hear, because it's sort of is the masculine and the feminine version of it in a sense. Thanks for listening to the art of longevity. I hope you're enjoying the conversation so far. Please take a moment to rate the show. leave a review on Apple podcasts if that's where you're listening and do spread the word. Also, you can sign up via the songs familia web page for our newsletter, artwork, and much more. Back to the conversation. Let's go back in the career a little bit if you don't mind. So your first two albums were so definitive in your career, that's the industry's narrative, not necessarily yours. Maybe it feels like this current project was a return to that time. So you're working with Russ teittleman. You've written your memoirs, so much of it was focused on those early years. I'm kind of interested in, again, how long it took you before you could comfortably go back there and enjoy looking back at those incredible early couple of records that you made. Well, I want to

Rickie Lee Jones: 24:36

address the sense and the feeling that you're talking about that I had that there's a connection to the earlier somehow in this and I think that that's the inexplicable thing. It's it's harder to say even though everyone might be feeling it. How do you say because it's just a collection of songs and but they There's some something powerful about it, there's something confident, there's something whatever it also on a practical thing, whatever the dial, the report is that I have with teittleman. That's really palpable, when we're together, we are our best selves when we're together, and it shows up, it shows up in the music. So that that's real. But it also, and I, you know, I cross my fingers a little when I say this, but I think that a career and isn't cyclical thing in popular culture. And you know, we're just getting started in rock music. It's only, you know, 60 years old, but it seems as if an my part in this was so iconic, so quickly. And then people have to ingest if they really believe that and does that translate to a next generation, and then another another, what does it mean? So but as far as respect that goes, so however high you are, you're gonna go exactly that low. And if you give up, that's where your career will end. And if you keep fighting, then you know, you're in the and I'm talking about about practical clubs, but also help people perceive you. You're in the lower echelon of Yeah, she was okay. But when she had one hit, like Rick James, right. Just keep circling around. There's there are people though, what are you talking about? She, she's a writer? Yes, yeah. And then finally, it seems as if, and maybe it's all in your own mind. But yeah, I accept my place in the world. I love that I have a career. I know what I do. And people's perception of it depends on what Article they've read and stuff. So I've made a mistake and reacting to those things. Because of that, they only, you know, they have two minutes in their day to read what they read based on what's happening in their lives, they come to the show, all you can do is be a human being who loves your life. And if you can do that, people will come, be healed, be joyful, go back home and not hit their dog and they have a bad day. That's the job. And so I feel like maybe the the big cycle of my career has come back to a place. And I know you're not supposed to say that out loud. But Have some respect that that's the guys coming up and saying it's really an honor to be playing with you. Whereas 10 years ago, it just wouldn't happen. And I just the same woman doing the same work. But there is this spirit, that is humanity. And it's just not always, you know, sometimes you got to walk through the fire, inexplicably. Yeah, don't you find? I do.

Keith Jopling: 28:15

Ricky Lee. That's why I wanted to do this show. That's why it's called The Art of longevity. And you said it in your book, actually, careers breathe, just like we breathe. And you know, there are good times and bad times. And there are good years, and bad years. And, you know, decades the same. I'm interested in though, to explore this. Because reading your book, you knew this at the very beginning. And you went through the struggle to get your break. I mean, you went through actually years of abject poverty when you left home as a teenager, but you somehow knew that you were going to get your break. So it was there was a sort of destiny, calling aspect of your career. But you knew that at the beginning. So just a quote from your book, you said I was aware before I even made a record of the dangers of being used up too fast. There is a frenzy that happens in the music world. So you had an awareness at the very beginning. How has that helped you throughout? Because there have been some ups and downs over the last four decades.

Rickie Lee Jones: 29:17

Well, when I was a kid, just barely hopeful of ever having a real career and what watching who got on the cover of the Rolling Stone and snapping my nose at the elitism of it all. I was also carefully watching how careers were almost built and died suddenly, it seemed like back then you had a three record career. If your first record was big, you will die a terrible death. It was better to build up to the third record when everybody celebrated you and then you could have a long career. In my case, it wasn't just a big success. It was it was mentioned bigger so Oh, there was a possibility at that level that I could throw some bridges and be maybe like, I hope Sinatra maybe in in the 1950s, you know, 15 years after my big success, I'd still be working, it'd be hard and bitumen. So I had a plan from the very beginning of how to wrangle whatever happened, and that in the worst case scenario, if I had to be what they used to call a cult, right, a cult artist, well, then you'd have a fierce and small group, but you'd still be able to work in music and not in the laundry room at the hotel. So it's a matter of perspective, right?

Keith Jopling: 30:45

Yeah, totally. And you know, I work with a lot of new artists that are up and coming now rising artists trying to break trying to get that break. I mean, it's never gonna be like the break. Yes, because completely different. But in a way the, the discussion we have is that what is the goal and actually the goal when it comes down to it is to have a career and be a con artist. You end up there anyway, if you started out when you started out, so you may as well just settle for it. In a sense,

Rickie Lee Jones: 31:14

you can call TARDIS you think they're thinking manageable, but fierce group of people who will stay with him for a lifetime?

Keith Jopling: 31:23

Exactly that fan base that's there for you. Yeah, through thick and thin. I think I bought all your records from I mean, that like the evening of my best day, I think is probably where I actually rediscovered your music. But then looking back just before that, you had that sort of classic experience as an established artists from your time so you released records that were always critically revered, or really well received by critics, or through the 90s Pop Pop traffic from Paradise and ghost ahead. But they just kept on selling less. How did you get through that time?

Rickie Lee Jones: 32:01

I was hard. And and that's part of what I'm talking about. Maybe that's in my mind, but I just thought maybe this is payment for so much success so fast, that you have to suffer making the best work you can but nobody's gonna look at it. Just hang on. It's some kind of, you know, I grew up Catholic is some kind of moral, you know, debt that you owe for having so much glory so soon. But also think the emphasis is is it the word popular, popular music popular singer. So, you know, it's a kids, gay men, there are many, many, many other young people who come up who are the popular artists. The thing is to teach the audience that you're not a pop singer, that you're as an artist, a musician. And everybody wants, like you said, Call Carter's, they want to know where to put you. So they can decide if you're part of how they see themselves. I think that it was that complicated thing of Rickie Lee Jones is ism pop singer, or a rock singer, or, you know, she's big. And now that we don't hear about her, she must not be very good. And we're not even gonna guide that thing, because she's just probably not very good. Now, there are musicians or musician journalists who will check out what you're doing, just because that's what they like to do. There's a small group of fans who want to go with me on my journey, even though I'm taking a lot of turns from where I began, and they're like, I like techies a lot. But I really hate this post dia thing. But I'm gonna stay with you. So it took a fierce, kind of, and I picked up new kids with goes to hit, I lost some old fans. And that was, I wasn't really sure why. But ultimately, I think what I've done is kind of did my own genre. And go, here's the singer, songwriter genre that creates different kinds of music every time. Unlike Joni Mitchell, who makes this kind of record each time and you can count on it. You don't know what Ricky's gonna do I have the same voice. Yes. But like she goes to work with a banjo player now what she's doing so, but I think now after 40 years or 45 years, I'm hoping anyway, that there are others singers, songwriters who do the same thing, who explored different ideas. And what's consistent about their work is their heart, their compassion. Their kindness that comes through in everything they do that for I hope, when I'm gone, that will be the trail

Keith Jopling: 35:10

coming through to how you got through the other side of that, because you were put on such a pedestal at the beginning and you're on major labels for so long that those 90s records were also released on major labels which come with big expectations, and attachments. Always. By the time you got to I'm thinking of 2015 the other side of desires, which has got some songs on it that I really love infinity in particular, I really love that song. That was crowdfunded, wasn't it? I mean, I've just found that extraordinary to look at the career of Rickie Lee Jones, you crowdfunded an album, how did it feel to be in that place at that time?

Rickie Lee Jones: 35:48

That was risky, you know, broke, and I really didn't have the money to make a record. And you know, there have been some years recently where I couldn't get a label to take me on either. So. But if they did, they're offering so little money that in the end, I'd almost lose money. So I thought, if we crowdfunded, maybe I can, you know, make 20 or $30,000, at the end of the day, and we must talk about money, because who, you know, we're in the business of music. But it was risky. Because what if nobody shows up to my party? What if nobody, what if we don't reach our goal, and in fact, we did have to readjust the goal because the manager is going, we just can't look like we didn't, we didn't reach our meager goal. So it's okay. It's just a journey. And, and there, ultimately, there were people there who helped to fund the record. And the problem is that, unlike working with Russ teittleman, you're not in a spiritual position of power. I did want to learn humility, I really felt that was an important part of my lesson on Earth. But humility doesn't help an artist manifest their person, their persona. It just doesn't, you know, if you're too meek, and you can't open up your arms. And so, you know, it's just been a journey of, of a human being going. I feel like I'm too self important. I need to learn to be humble. Oh, well, that wasn't a good idea. Because I couldn't do the best record, I could, you know, it's just me learning as I am making do, because I no longer had, I think that I'm at my best when I have enough money to work, and really positive and loving attention. I can go to higher places with that. And without it, I don't. I wish I could say that I'm self perpetuating. And it doesn't matter what circumstance I'm in. But but it really, really did. I know, a lot of people look back on their work and like me go, I could have done that better. But the main thing I would have liked to have done with them is just changed the keys. Because I think I was kind of depressed. So everything that I say is very low, right. But some of it if I would have had somebody to put it up there, you can sing that that's going to be somebody's going to sing infinity a little higher, and then they can they can hear it or taking my time hurrying along, that should have been a higher thing. So I look back at that and go bad keys, but good songs.

Keith Jopling: 38:47

Well, it's really interesting to sort of hear you talk about how you've had to keep that belief because you had so much self belief at the beginning, but then you have to keep it. I think that's where the doubt comes in is when you're not fulfilling the expectations that you had early on. And so you're gonna have to ride that. That roller coaster.

Rickie Lee Jones: 39:05

It was really important to me to bring the old people in. And I'm glad you brought it up. As I spoke with the journalists yesterday, you said I saw in Cleveland and in 1979, you open the show with Chuck, he's in love. And we were just gonna go down and then you introduced us to Dinah Washington and Billie Holiday. And by the end of the show, we not only knew you but we knew them. It was like, Well, that's exactly what I wanted to do. I did lash live at my plenty Valentine. And in 1979, if you can imagine it, it's disco. Farrah Fawcett. It's so different than it is now and people were really not interested in the music of 25 years earlier, which would have been Sinatra and the rhythm and blues. Jazz kind of thing. Artists determined first I'd like singing it and wanted the world to know it was part of what I did. But I was determined that people would hear it. And I just wanted to say that to you that that was part of my as a kid that was part of my mission, not only to sing jazz, but for those people who've never heard it, to hear it.

Keith Jopling: 40:23

The art of longevity is brought to you by the songs familia. That's me, working with Project melody and audio culture. It's recorded at the cube. London's first member studio for content creators, currently based in West London cube will be opening a second site in Canary Wharf in January 2023. Our cover art is by Nick Clark, and original music for the podcast is by the neoclassical composer and artist Andrew James Johnson. Just coming back to now then with pieces of treasure, there's something in there which you recognize that you'd always to some extent your career was a vessel for the classics, I think, yeah, we talked about Sinatra, you cover Nat King Cole, on pieces of treasure. I mean, those early songs felt like they were from the American Songbook, in a way, you know, so you've kept the lineage of Gershwin and Sondheim. And, you know, your first inspiration was West Side Story. I'm interested, like, how do you think that's going to continue in music who's taking that lineage forward?

Rickie Lee Jones: 41:31

You know, I'm not very educated with young people, for music to get to me, you know, it has to have something resoundingly emotional in it. My manager manages a band called Lake Street dive. And the singer in it is, uh, you know, not that her tone is like me at all, but I can tell that she has educated herself in a wide variety of jazzy music and this and that. So when I hear her, I can have respect, because I know, she comes to the stage not imitating anybody, not trying to do tricks, just letting us hear the timbre of her voice. I think there's a Trad jazz fire that's burning here in New Orleans. Kids love to play the 30s and 20s songs. So if it is continued, it's going to continue in a grassroots way where people actually hear the songs that love them and sing them themselves.

Keith Jopling: 42:37

I think it comes back around I sense there's definitely a flight to those classic years actually the late 70s, early 80s. I didn't know Lake Street dive actually. But But thanks for introducing them to me. But on this show, I've had the declines who are amazing. But then I think about artists like Lana Del Rey, even Harry Styles, they want to make those classic records that were made in the late 70s. And I get it.

Rickie Lee Jones: 43:07

Yeah. Are they attracted to the country, folky rock kind of thing of it? Or what is it you think that calls them to it?

Keith Jopling: 43:17

It's the classicism of it. It's the album The narrative, the fact that you got absorbed with a side one and side two, and they want to feel like they, you know, make a mark in that way. You know, as you did with regularly Jones and pirates.

Rickie Lee Jones: 43:32

You did it? Yeah. That's great.

Keith Jopling: 43:35

So the other thing that's come back around recently is spoken word lyrics. Which you've been a natural that since the beginning, do you think scat singing will make a comeback? Sure.

Rickie Lee Jones: 43:44

Why wouldn't it if people haven't done it, then a new generation can go here's something we can claim as our own. So,

Keith Jopling: 43:52

yeah. Ricky Lee, I got a whole bunch of other questions. But I don't want to keep you much longer. And I'm just interested in what's next for you. What are you excited about? When you get the record out? And you maybe take it live just over the next sort of year or two? What are you looking forward to the most?

Rickie Lee Jones: 44:11

I hope again, a stand in front of really large audiences that aren't necessarily familiar with me and sing to them. So old and new, young and old, that I can place myself before people like in the very beginning and let them hear for themselves what it is feel for themselves what it is. I would really like that to happen in the next year.

Keith Jopling: 44:39

Are you coming to the UK or Europe?

Rickie Lee Jones: 44:41

We are I think we're gonna go and come to Glastonbury that they are the only festival and say, Ricki Lake come on down. I don't know if we can if we're allowed to play in London if we play there, but hopefully play in London.

Keith Jopling: 44:57

I'll be there at the front row if you take this record live. So Thanks so much for joining me and I wish you all the best regularly.

Rickie Lee Jones: 45:05

It was really unexpected pleasure didn't talk about the word. Fantastic.

Keith Jopling: 45:12

Thank you so much. Thank you. See you soon