A Conversation with John Doe

John Doe: How are you doing?

Puremusic: Oh, I'm doing good. It's funny to talk to you because I just went out and rented Pure Country and then Great Balls of Fire and watched them last night and this morning.

JD: There you go.

PM: You watch a guy in a couple of movies, and then you pick up the phone and you talk to him, it's a strange segue. I'm right at that spot.

[laughter]

JD: I hear you. It's called immersion interviewing.

PM: Yeah, right.

[laughter]

PM: And then in between the movies I've been listening like hell to the new record, which I think is great.

JD: Thanks, Frank, I'm glad to hear that.

PM: So I haven't seen much online about what kind of a family and a home you grew up in, and when music took a hold of you in a primal way.

JD: Well, my mother and my dad, they were both musicians, just for their own enjoyment. My dad played classical piano. And my mother, when she was in college she sang opera. She kind of taught me how to sing, how to breathe right, and not sing from your chest, but sing from your diaphragm.

PM: Wow. So you knew that right from the top?

JD: Well, she didn't like say, "Okay, now, this is how you do it." It was more like I would see her sing.

PM: Right, you were aware of it.

JD: Yeah, kind of learning by example.

PM: Right.

JD: But they both had regular jobs. They were a librarian and a teacher. But music was their hobby, the way that people used to just have hobbies like playing the piano, but really well. And I'm of the generation where music was everything; The Ed Sullivan Show and the British Invasion and all that stuff was pretty much what everyone was wrapped up with.

PM: I mean, I can remember those Ed Sullivan shows like it was yesterday.

JD: I can't, but I'm glad you can.

[laughter]

PM: Because I had a bunch of brothers and sisters, and so I think we still talk about that.

JD: Yeah.

PM: Did you?

JD: Yeah, I have one brother, lives in Brooklyn. We lived in Kingsport, Tennessee, which is by Knoxville.

PM: Sure, I'm calling from Nashville.

JD: I do remember there being a big deal about Elvis Presley being on Ed Sullivan. I don't remember seeing it, but I remember the song, "Hound Dog" from that. And I remember it being like a big deal that Elvis Presley was on Sullivan. Yeah, I guess it's kind of cool, but I don't really recall it.

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