Welcome to A Breath of Fresh Air with Sandy Kaye. Hello and welcome to the show. It’s so good to have you here.
You know how I always ask you for suggestions for guests that you might like to hear interviewed? Well this week, thanks to an email I received from Scott in Detroit, Michigan, I’m thrilled to bring you my chat with the legendary Mitch Ryder. For those of you who’ve somehow managed to escape knowing that name, Mitch is one of the true originals of American rock and soul. He burst out of Detroit in the mid-60s and lit up the charts with his band Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels, delivering timeless hits like Devil with a Blue Dress On, Jenny Take a Ride and Sock It to Me Baby, records that were packed with raw energy, sweat and pure rhythm and blues.
But Mitch Ryder has never been just about the hits. He’s a fearless singer, songwriter and survivor who always chose artistic truth over easy success, building a long respected career on his own terms. Decades on, Mitch’s voice still carries power, soul and honesty and today he joins me to talk about the life, the music, the highs, the hard times and everything in between.
Mitch Ryder tells us about his latest book and his most recent album and insists that he has so much yet to offer, despite being over 80 and in the business for over six decades. Oh yeah, you know you reminded me, yes. How did you first get going? I know you started playing, you got interested in music as a kid, didn’t you? Well, yeah, yeah.
An Italian heritage in those type of families, the kids, when people would come for company or dinners, the kids would be trotted out, performed for everybody. So my sister and I, Nina, we were two of eight children and they would have us sing When the Moon Hits Your Eye Like a Big Pizza Pie, that’s a moray, stuff like that. When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s a moray.
When the world seems to shine like you’ve had too much wine, that’s a moray. Bells will ring, ting-a-ling-a-ling, ting-a-ling-a-ling and you’ll sing with a bella. Hearts will play tippy-tippy-tay, tippy-tippy-tay like a guitar and bella.
So that was my first introduction to singing, but I got really serious about it when I turned 14. I began traveling to places where I shouldn’t have been going at that age, but I was looking for adventure and I was looking for something different from what I was growing up in, the environment I was growing up in. And the urban scene felt attractive to me, and so I pursued that.
I got into clubs, multiracial clubs, and became kind of known there. And I recorded my first recording at the age of 16 for a gospel label in Detroit. That was like the beginning.
Just like they say heaven is, songs of joy as we melody, love, peace and happiness, that’s the way it’s going to be. You will never be lonely, we will never part. When I first laid eyes on you, I took you into my heart.
When I had that very first recording in my hand, I thought I had done it all and seen it all, but that wasn’t going to be the case. So the band that you were playing with that you recorded that first record with was a local black quartet dubbed The Pips. And I believe that you actually suffered quite a bit of racial harassment at the time, is that correct? In some of our performances around town, we never got beat up for what we did, but there was a lot of people trying to discourage us from keeping that going.
I guess, yeah, me. If somebody, including yourself, could explain to me what the seeds of racism are, I would be willing to listen, but I would not be willing to accept it. To have my own recording at the age of 16, even though it was fueled in the black community, it was a beginning and it made me understand a little bit about what the music business was going to be like.
Not enough at that point to protect myself when I went to New York and became a star. That’s crazy. I was going to New York at a time when it was very common to rip off the artist and then find the next one so you could rip him off.
But I did. You know, I made it to the top and languished there for about three years. And then the rest of the decades have been a challenge to make this my living.
This is all I’ve ever done. And it’s the only thing I really know how to do. And it could be argued that I don’t know how to do it successfully because there’s no real long history in America.
But that’s about politics and money and different subjects. It’s not about my talent. In those early days, when you had that first hit and you were in the midst of Michigan, there was obviously a lot of racial tension going on.
So you left that group to form your own band called Billy Lee and the Rivieras. Yeah. Yeah.
What had happened was the club I was working at every week, they would have a different house band come in. They would audition every week a new house band. And then they’d tell them they didn’t audition.
They didn’t pass the audition. And the next week they’d get another one in for an audition. So they never really paid a band.
So one of the bands that came through were these three boys, all from Detroit proper. They were talented. And they had a good idea about rock and roll.
They called themselves the Rivieras. And I liked what they were doing. And I recognized their talent.
But I was more from the rhythm and blues category, I guess. But when you combine those two, my sensibilities with theirs and their passion for the kind of music they did and the song selection that I wanted to do, it created a sort of a new sound that nobody in this area was really trying. And for some reason, it caught on.
And we found ourselves doing live shows. And the live shows were different. Mostly the other bands that you’d see them, they’d stand there and they’d be playing their guitars and just standing and looking very British.
Our show consisted of taking our clothes off and switching instruments during the show and running around and dancing and diving into the audience into a mosh pit that really didn’t exist at that point. So you just hit the concrete, basically, which was that hurt after a while. But we found ourselves.
Yeah, we were so popular that we were headlining over Motown acts that had hit records. So there was potential there. And one of the disc jockeys noticed that potential.
He had us create some tapes and he sent it to Bob Crew in New York. And Bob Crew in New York at that time was riding high on the Four Seasons. He liked the group, but he was from the very beginning determined to make me into a singular star.
We didn’t know that at the time because we moved there together as a group. But as time went by, I’ll give you a very good example. The very first record I put out with Crew was singular.
It was me alone without my group. And I had to march back to the hotel that we were all stuck in and tell my band that I was going to do this recording without them. I’m amazed we were able to put hit records together under those circumstances.
But we did. We stayed together as a group. We hung tight.
What now, my love? Now that you left me, how can I live through another day? Watching my dreams turning to ashes and my hope into bits of clay? Once I could see, once I could feel, now I am numb, I’ve become unreal. I walk the night of my heart. There was really only two sessions that I recall where most of the material that Crew got for the hit records and everything else that was done with the Detroit Wheels came from those two sessions.
And he was trying to figure out how to make a hit with the group. And one day we had a surprise visit in the studios from two of the Rolling Stones. I think it was Keith and Brian.
They were in his ear because Bob Crew had secured the rights to their publishing in America. And so it was important for them to know him. But also they wanted to see what he was working on.
So they came to see us and they told him, put out Jenny Take a Ride. And we think that’s a cool record. And they did.
And it was. It was our very first gold record, our very first top 10. Oh, see, see, see, rider.
I said, see what you have done now. Oh, see, see, see, rider. I said, see what you have done now.
I am madly in love with you. Now, now, now, now you’re mad now. Bob was the one who named you the Detroit Wheels, wasn’t he? How did he find that name? Don’t know where he found Detroit Wheels because it fit well with rider, I guess, if you spelled it R-I-D-E-R, but we didn’t.
You know, his original name for me was Michael Rothschild. He wanted to make you Jewish. Well, he wanted not only to make me Jewish, but he wanted to make me like a financial kingpin in the world.
The Rothschild family, the banking part of the financial part of their family ruled Europe for forever. So I rejected that outright. And then so we got tired of tossing names out.
And he brought in a Manhattan phone directory, opened it and dropped his finger and it fell on Mitch Ryder. And after we had become successful, I literally went into the phone book and called those seven people, the M. Ryders or the Mitch Ryder. There was only one Mitch Ryder, but there were a lot of M. Ryders.
And I called them and I apologized for any inconvenience I had brought into their world with unwanted telephone calls and such, you know. And were they all OK with it? Oh, they loved it. And, you know, that’s the way I was raised.
I would become more weird, I guess, as the deeper I got into the industry. I needed a poison tester at that point because the music industry is messed up. When I think of the tens of thousands of other guys that are some of them way more talented than me that tried and never made it and gave up so much.
My advice to anybody wanting to be in a band, do not try to start a family. You’re going to lose on that one. Is that what happened to you? Yeah, that was where I got their reference from.
Jump up, get it, hey! Never wiggle through that, through that, through that, never wiggle through that song. Ooh, yeah, don’t leave me by, by, for, for fun. Look at Molly now, here she comes.
Wearing a wig hat and shades to match. Got her high heeled shoes and her alligator hat. Wearing a pearls and a diamond ring.
Got brains that’s on a fling and never a clang. Devil with a blue dress, blue dress, oh! She’s a devil with a blue dress, oh! Oh, hey, per se. Devil with a blue dress, blue dress, oh! Devil with a blue dress.
Chanel number five. So Mitch, you become known as Mitch Ryder and the Detroit Wheels. You’re in New York City and you start to have hits under the auspices of Bob Crew.
What did that feel like for you? I think for me, it hit home with the very first record, Jenny Take a Ride. I was laying in bed with my wife at the time and we had an alarm set and when the alarm would go off, music would start playing. And sure enough, when the alarm went off at that very moment, Jenny Take a Ride was playing.
And I’m laying there, tapping my feet in bed going, damn, that’s good. And then suddenly I go, that’s mine. It was a great feeling.
That was the first hit. It wasn’t very long until the second one rolled around. No, he was in need of money.
He has stated in public that he put several million dollars up his nose. I like to feel that that’s pretty close to the amount that we got robbed of. Here I am at this stage of my life still wanting to do something new, to put more product out, to write a better song, to regain some footing in America where I’ve sort of been relegated to some weird little enclave of octogenarians, they call them, I guess.
I’m not going to settle for that. And I was able to establish an alternate career in Europe. I built up a very loyal fan base there.
This is a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. It’s a beautiful day. Back in the day though, when you put out Devil With The Blue Dress on, that was your highest charting single.
That turned you into an instant star in the US, didn’t it? In the minds of many of the musicians it did. We had so many compliments and people just wanting to copy, trying to get that sound that we had, and they couldn’t do it. That would be the song that was the most played song.
I think the one that went to number four was Sock It To Me Baby. But Devil With The Blue Dress on stayed on the air forever. The song Devil was written by a guy named Shorty Long, who was a label artist on soul records for Motown.
And so we had two promotion men visiting the radio stations every week. And that extra push really, really turned Devil With The Blue Dress on into a classic. Over the decades, many people have come to me and told me what an influence that was, how much it helped them understand where they wanted to go and what they wanted to do with their music.
It feels good to have those compliments coming from your peers. We’re talking about people like Bob Seger and John Mellencamp, Bruce Springsteen, they all got started in the business and were influenced in their sound by that song, weren’t they? That’s what they say. Mitch, you had a very special sound.
No, you have a very special sound still. How would you describe that sound and what made it so different? I don’t know. I’m working with what God gave me.
And I remember I was headlining, I think it was the Fox, the Brooklyn Fox. I picked out two British groups. I picked out The Who and I picked out Cream.
And I allowed them to be on my show. That was their gift from me. So Petey from The Who, when I first went to Britain, he sponsored me and he introduced me to the press.
The one question that the British press was obsessed with was how do you sound black? And I was stunned, just stunned that they could make that separation in sound. I said something about the culture there. It wasn’t what I grew up in.
It wasn’t what I tolerated. In 1967, I did a tour with Wilson Pickett using his band and my band. And the idea, because the race riots in America were, Detroit was particularly hard hit.
And that brought it home for me. So we created a tour that was meant for me to be exposed to and vice versa for Wilson. But obviously, it didn’t do anything to change anybody’s mind.
But we had fun. We did see some beginning seeds of reaching out. These days, that black sound that somebody would attribute to somebody like you would be called blue-eyed soul.
I’ve been called that, yeah. They all tried to emulate it. I mean, that’s how the Rolling Stones, how so many of them made their mark, right? Yeah, and I don’t know how they went about doing it, but I don’t think Mick succeeded.
I always was jealous of him because I wanted Keith Richards to play rhythm guitar for me. You know, what were my chances of ripping away from the Rolling Stones? I mean, gosh. Mitch, you were also the last person to perform with Otis Redding.
You did Knock on Wood with him in 1967, I believe. That was just a day before he was killed in the accident. Yeah, that was sad.
I don’t want to lose you It’s a good thing I did What I got If I do now I would surely I got to lose a lot now Cause your love is better Than any love I know I’m not lying to you I’m not in your way Your love is frightening Knock, knock, knock on wood I had recorded at Stax an album called Detroit Memphis Experiment, and so I knew firsthand Booker T and the MGs and the Memphis Horns, and they were the people that backed Otis when he made his recordings. And Otis was a tall man compared to me, and when you watch that film, that show of us singing together, one thing you don’t notice, and maybe it’s because the credits are rolling, but near the end, he put his big man, he put his big old arm and big hand on my shoulder, and he started rocking with me. And as we were rocking together back and forth, I noticed my right leg was coming completely up off the floor.
It was really cute, I guess. I was like a little puppet, but he was cool, he was very nice, and a gentleman as well. You were still huge in the US in the late 70s as that decade changed.
You did put out a song called Ring My Bell that was quite controversial. Yeah, that was part of my rebellion against Crew. He dissuaded us at a time when all the Brits were coming over and their management was imploring them to write your own music so we can build a publishing catalogue.
Bob Crew wanted all of his writers and his songs to, he didn’t want any new material from us. Even though I had written my first record and the subsequent record after that, I was starting to hone my writing skills, but he didn’t want to bother with that. He wanted all that publishing money completely under his control without having to share it with too many people.
And so Ring Your Bell was my sort of rogue attempt. I went into a studio in Detroit because I had money and I created my next single for Paramount Records and I took it to him. And he asked me at one point, well, what do you want from me? I gave it to him.
I said, this is what I want from you. If you heard the record, you know it’s a rhythm & blues song. It was played only, only on black radio in Detroit.
Yeah, I’m proud of it. There’s a, you know, it’s a slow, it’s not funky, but it’s a really cool sort of R&B song. Ring your bell Shake it hard and well Got me running when you Ring your bell Hold it high If you wink at eye I’ll be coming just to Hold it high I need you darling I need your sweet lips But you have to let me know Hey, I’m so lonely Girl, you would only Ring your bell and make it swell Those were the days when you had different radio stations, completely different playlists for different genres of music.
Yeah, and that’s why, as I said earlier, it was possible for a single little radio station in Detroit to break a record that would become national. And not just in Detroit, but other cities. You were seeing breakout records coming out of Chicago and Boston and San Francisco.
Everybody knew the game and they knew what was in it. But that changed. Mitch, as the decade changed and we head into the 70s then, you came to the attention of Lou Reed.
Tell me about that. Well, we liked the same dope. We did at the time.
So why did you decide to do a cover version of his What Now My Love? Probably one of the most regrettable situations. But I did what I was told because I was under contract. In 71, you had a hit with your version of the Lou Reed pen song Rock and Roll.
Lou was telling you how much he liked that one, wasn’t he? Yeah, he was. He came to the club to see us perform it. And we were backstage and he told me, he said, I like your version better than mine.
Yeah, Lou, he was something else. He got in with Velvet Underground and then they inducted him on his own merit. He also tried to poach one of you guys from your band.
He did poach successfully. His wallet was bigger than mine. For you, it was never about the money.
For you, it was the passion of singing and making the music. You were even dubbed by some of the critics as the American Rolling Stones. Your sound was completely new and different and taking the nation by storm.
True. And then what happened? What happened? You withdrew from music. And in 73, you took your bat and your ball and you went home.
Well, there’s a very honest account of what happened in my book, Devils in Blue Dresses, my wild ride in Rock and Roll by Mitch Ryder. And I go so far as to name names and put the blame where it belonged. So at the time then you withdrew from music, it was probably a decade before you reemerged.
And you came back with a new album with John Mellencamp producing. That album was called Never Kick a Sleeping Dog. There was a decade-long absence in America, but there were quite a few albums produced in Europe at that time, specifically in Germany.
It was a very good album. Yeah, yeah, yeah. With that cover version of the Prince song When You Were Mine.
When you were mine I gave you all of my money Time and again You got me wrong It’s just like a dream You got all my friends I’m over you You were so strange You didn’t have the decency to change When you were mine I used to let you wear all of my clothes And you were so fine Baby, that’s the reason that I loved you So I know That you’re going with another guy Don’t care Cause I know you think that’s not right I loved you more than I did when you were mine That version of When You Were Mine is meaningful for a lot of reasons. It pissed off Cyndi Lauper to no end because that was going to be her next single and we beat her by a couple weeks. And, you know, it was so respected by Prince that he invited me to a concert where, when he performed it, he did our arrangement and then invited me back to the dressing room for a say hello.
So he was clearly impressed with it. Got me back in the charts and you could tell I was on an ascending trajectory because every week when you go out to perform the higher it went on the charts the more beautiful and fetching the girls became. Yeah, you know, at my age I didn’t care but there they were looking, looking and sniffing.
Is that how it goes? Yeah, that’s how it works. You should have seen some of the beauty queens like when Led Zeppelin was happening. Oh my God, you would kill for these.
You know, if you had a wife that was that well put together but then, you know, the problem becomes when you start getting beyond the surface and try to understand the person and get to know and understand that you’re wanting to marry a person then you need to start looking at the parts that are not cosmetic. On display, yes. Right, right.
You said a lot of your success has been achieved in Germany in particular. What is it about Germany that they love their music so much there? You know, I’ve tried to ponder that question for a long time and the only answer I’ve been able to give is they have a different view of the worth of an artist than we do. I think once they’re committed to an artist they try to relate to them on a human level and in so doing you have to understand what’s happening in that artist’s career.
If you’re going to follow a career follow the career. In America, once the hits stop coming you disappear.
This is a breath of fresh air with Sandy Kaye. It’s a beautiful day. This is Mitch Ryder and you have been and will be listening to for a long time Sandy Kaye, a breath of fresh air.
And I took a mint before I’m saying this so you’ll know it’s all true. It is a breath of fresh air. Do this.
Do this for your own good and it will help you grow with strong bones and healthy teeth. Thank you so much. That’s fun.
Weird stuff. Amazing. As you said, you did keep putting out songs and you kept putting out music through the 80s.
You satirized the Iran-Contra debacle in 87. Yeah, that outfit fit me perfectly. You did a whole lot in that time.
You issued the full-length Red Blood White Meat the following year. You did in 1990 the beautiful Tulane Sunset, 92 La Gache, 94 Rite of Passage. And then you put out your first new studio album in nearly 20 years, which was The Promise in 2012.
Mama’s at the table, rising with the sun. Everybody’s hungry. A new day has begun.
Heart racing, and made for the sake of love. By the time we get to 2017, you’re inducted into the Rhythm and Blues Hall of Fame with incredible names like James Brown, Patti LaBelle, Gladys Knight and the Pips. They certainly haven’t forgotten you in America.
In isolated territories, yeah. There’s no stopping you, is there? Not that I’m aware of. If you know something, please tell me.
I’m so happy there’s no stopping you, and I absolutely love the latest album that you’ve just come out with. It’s called With Love. Isn’t that a kicker? I love it.
Can you share a little bit about that album? I’d be happy to. It’s the answer to a prayer. It equals probably one of the best albums I’ve ever made.
In terms of the creativity, in terms of the lyrics, in terms of the musicians, it’s a Class A project. But nobody in America wants it because of the stigma and the age. There was a popular movie here called No Country for Old Men, and I think they’re absolutely right.
Once you get to the point where you’re not contributing anymore and you’re just sucking off the system, so to speak, whether you want to or not, some people don’t have a choice. Disability happens and they can’t stop it. They have to suffer their way to their deathbed.
Other people just die of old age. I think if we can get to the mindset where if you’re still producing and still giving back to the country, you shouldn’t be stigmatized and you shouldn’t be categorized and you shouldn’t be banned. There should be a marketplace for you to take your new creations, but there is not.
And so that’s the position I find myself in, planning another tour for Europe next year and planning another recording for Europe next year. And it goes on and on until the day I fall down from some dilemma or another. Everyone likes you, you really shouldn’t care.
I see your face is smiling and you’re laughing, darling. You’ve got yourself high, breathing in the air. No, no, no, no, not everybody likes this.
They either drink, take pills, or just don’t care. We are not weirdo, we’re just zombie monsters. We live our own lives, that, my dear, is fair.
I’m feeling well and I’m feeling very creative and I’m constantly looking for something new to do. And I’m writing, I’ve got a musical that I’ve written. It’s almost complete, it lacks one or two songs, a stage musical play.
I’ve got a book completed that was written in 1974. And it’s turning yellow, the pages are turning yellow because I’ve done nothing with it. I’ve got recordings that were never released from the 60s and from the 80s.
A lot of stuff hanging around, unfinished songs. Gosh, my songbook is about that thick. And at one point, the songs are in different states of existence.
Some are nearly finished and some I’ve just begun, but I just do that. Maybe it’s a nervous habit, I don’t know. It doesn’t make me nervous to do it, it makes me feel good to do it.
And it makes me concentrate and keeps my mind sharp when I’m trying to convey a message to an audience that I don’t know how large it is. And I worry, I don’t know if worry might be too strong, but I’m concerned that some generations just don’t even care about that anymore. And they’re having a hard time with the English language.
And they’re only learning one way to communicate. It’s getting dangerous. On this album, we love Mitch Ryder.
Is there a favourite track that we could go out on? I’m partial to the artist because my wife is a poet and she wrote the poem. And I read the poem one day and I asked her if I could enhance it, embellish it and turn it into music and create music for it. And she said I could and I would split the writer’s credits with her.
And so that’s one of my favourites. But Lily May is a good one. Oh, What a Night is fun.
Most of them are just plain cool songs. So you can go out on any one you want, really. Artists, I don’t know, that’s a very slow moving song.
If that’s the way you want to close the show, that’s the way. It’s your show. Close it the way you want to.
I’m like one of those old fashioned DJs in the radio station that can actually choose what I play. Yeah, yeah. There you go.
You’re a privileged person. Well, I still believe that everything old becomes new again. That’s true.
That’s very true. Yeah, it’s just all circular. And hopefully America will stand up at the concerts again for you, Mitch Ryder.
I can hear your disappointment with not reaching the heights that you had wanted to in your home country. But you’ve done phenomenally and your music is sensational. And you are just a fabulous person to chat to.
I’m very, very grateful to you for your time. Well, thank you very much. The first time I was told I could go to Australia was in 1970.
My uncle George suggested I was looking. I wasn’t happy. And I was looking for somewhere to go to escape, to recover from what I had been through, which is all spelled out in my book.
And he said, why don’t you go to Australia? And I said, well, what’s there? And he said, freedom. I said, freedom? What kind of freedom? We live in a free country. He said, no, it’s different, but it’s freedom.
And so that was the first time I was given the invite to go to. And it was from a relative. So that tells you something.
When your relatives want to send you all the way around the world, it says something about your relationship with them, right? No, I think he was looking after your best interest. I hope so, yeah. I’m sure.
If I can’t get you across here to come and play for audiences in Australia, I might try and travel to Europe next year to come see you, because I’d like nothing better than to see Mitch Ryder in concert. I think you’re super awesome. Yeah, you would.
And, you know, I’ll be there. You sure will. Mitch, thank you so much for spending the time with us, sharing your stories.
Just tell us the name of the book one more time. My Wild Ride in Rock and Roll. I believe it’s called.
It’s on Amazon. It’s by Mitch Ryder. It’s called My Wild Ride as a Rock and Roll Legend.
And it won first place awards, three of them, actually. Devilry Blue Dresses. Does it piss you off that with all of the music you’ve put out, you’re still best known for Devil with the Blue Dress on? No, it doesn’t piss me off.
I think it’s an injustice, that’s all. I mean, how can you complain when, you know, the name you’re using to propel your career was connected to that era? But as I told you from the very beginning, my name could be Bruce Danforth. And I would still be doing a podcast somewhere with somebody because I just know how much music meant to me.
And I wouldn’t have been stopped. I would have found a way to have hits. Yes, that’s right.
Yes, that’s right. I was signed to William Morris for films. I had a screen test that was Sam Peckinpah got up himself out of bed to come and do my screen test for Warners.
It was for the movie The Wild Bunch. And I read for In Cold Blood, the Truman Capote thing. And I was only beat out by Robert Blake.
You know, I finally got a movie and Bob Crude didn’t want to give up any of the music to the soundtrack. And so they took away the film from me. You’re very modest and very humble and very talented.
Mitch Ryder, it’s been an absolute pleasure. I want to thank you for making the call. Do what you can, tell the kids.
When I say kids, I mean, you know, those that are looking for an easy retirement. That hopefully I can get there and perform for them before it’s too late. I have no clue as to when God’s going to take me.
Good luck editing. All the best. Yeah.
Thank you very much. Thank you. You’ve been listening to A Breath of Fresh Air with Sandy Kang.
Every day that you’re gone away, it’s a beautiful day.