PM: Among the many fine musicians featured on Private Radio, two musical icons appeared, Barry Beckett [legendary Muscle Shoals keyboardist and songwriter, publisher, etc.] and Don Helms [the original steel player for Hank Williams]. What's the story there, how did they become involved with the project?

BBT: Barry was just going to be part of the band to start with. He was a friend already. He'd done music with me for a couple of movie soundtracks. I didn't know Don Helms, Marty got a hold of him because we were doing "Lost Highway" [the Hank Williams classic, written by Leon Payne]. He used the same guitar he used on the Hank records. So when that steel comes in on that song, it sounds like a Hank Williams record. It's eerie. It's funny how two people can play the same guitar, the same lick, and it sounds different.

PM: And in this case, you can't even say "it's in his hands" the same way, since he's using a bar.

BBT: Exactly, it's weird. It's like Earl Scruggs, when he plays banjo. Marty was saying one time that he could pick up any banjo in the world and play it, and it would still sound like Earl Scruggs. It's just the way he plays. I cut a song with Earl, too, on his new record.

PM: Is he fun?

BBT: Yeah. He's real quiet, the whole Scruggs family is real quiet. I cut "Ring of Fire" with him. We had a big time. I think it's his first record in 14 years. I was on it, and John Fogerty, Don Henley, Melissa Ethridge, and Sting, Elton John...

PM: Geez, Sting on an Earl Scruggs record, you gotta love that. Speaking of "Ring of Fire," did I hear you say that Johnny Cash was cutting a song of yours?

BBT: Yeah, they just phoned the other day, and said they wanted to cut "Private Radio." It makes sense.

PM: Mark Collie's [a cowriter] on that tune, right? I always thought he should have been a big star, I think he's really great.

BBT: Oh, I agree. And "Private Radio" is right up Cash's alley. It's dark, not your convertible top down driving song, you know.

PM: How were the guitar chores on the record divided between Marty and Brad Davis, I'm not familiar with the latter's work.

BBT: Well, it's different on the 60s record, but on Private Radio, Brad played a lot of acoustic guitar. On "That Mountain" the hillbilly song, Brad and Marty both solo on acoustic. Brad plays in a Bluegrass band when he's not playing with me or Marty. He's a real good flatpicker, but he's also really good at the ambient swells on the Gretsch, the special tonal work with different pedals, all that. Like the guitar atmosphere on "Starlight Lounge," that's Brad. Marty plays all the Tele and B bender stuff.

The whole record was cut in my basement, we use that Radar system. It's a way to cut digitally while retaining the warmth of analog recording. I'm not a real technical person, it's got its pros and cons, but my engineer Jim Mitchell could certainly tell you all about it.

I'm not really a guitar player, I mean, I could sit down and play you a Neil Young song or something. [laughs] I always wished I was a good guitar player. But I love guitars, and I know the different sounds each make, even more so than drums, though I'm a drummer. As a result, I've become a guitar collector to some extent. We've got a '61 Strat and a '67 Telecaster, a '66 Precision Bass, and a '58 Les Paul Jr. Best guitar in the house is '64 ES335. Man oh man, rings like a bell. That's a damn good guitar. We've got a '67 ES330, you don't see them around so much, that's another good one. We got one of those new Danalectro Baritones, a lot of guitars.

PM: Will "That Mountain" be the second single?

BBT: Well, they've already started playing "Walk of Shame" in a number of places. But they should be playing "That Mountain, " I'm gonna encourage that. It's Dwight Yoakam's favorite song on the record. He said it's the first time he'd ever been jealous of a song, that he wished he'd written it. He said I got him on that one. He liked that one and "Your Blue Shadow."

PM: That's a beautiful song.

BBT: That's one of my favorites, it's about the moodiest song on there. When we were rehearsing for the tour the other night, that song and "Private Radio" were the ones that made us look at each other and say, "Well, that's right there."

PM: It's nice that the two songs written for your life partner turned out so strong. That does a man no harm.

BBT: That's right, I'm proud of those. Those aren't the ones you want to bone, you know. [Here we were interrupted by a camera call, they were starting the last shoot.]

PM: Well, thanks for your time, I enjoyed talking with you.

BBT: My pleasure, thanks a lot.

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