A Conversation with Robert Randolph (continued)

PM: So would you talk with us personally for a minute, about your relationship with God? How would you characterize it? Not exactly your usual rock 'n' roll question, but...

RR: No, but... Well, I grew up in a church. And my parents, early on when I was a kid, always taught me how to understand who God is and what he does for everyone, and how he keeps us all in line, and he is the ultimate being, he's the one that we only have to answer to. And it's kind of how I live my life. He's ultimate, he is to be thanked for everything that happens with us, because at any point in time, he's the one who could take it away.

PM: Right.

RR: And I can say I'm not the most spiritual person, but I know that I'm spiritual minded, and I'm always trying to get in that groove, where peace and brotherhood rules.

PM: In the age of the Bling Bling epidemic, your message is definitely coming from a much different place.

RR: Oh, it has to be. I mean, I just don't understand the mentalities of some of those guys who sing about some of that stuff, but we like to do otherwise. We just keep giving people some positive messages, keep them singing and dancing. And keep them happy about life. You know?

PM: Yeah, it's a beautiful message, and it's simple, and it's back to values that made a lot more sense to me, and to you, apparently.

RR: Oh, thanks.

PM: I sure appreciate it. When you get a little time off, where you do you go to get away?

RR: I like to go home, man.

PM: You go home.

RR: Back to New Jersey, yeah.

PM: No exotic locations yet.

RR: No, just like to go home and turn on the TV, watch some good football, basketball.

PM: [laughs]

RR: Cook out on the grill.

PM: I hear that. What about your first steel mentor, Ted Beard? Is he alive and well?

RR: Oh yeah, he's alive, him and Calvin Cooke as well. Calvin has a record that'll be coming out very soon.

PM: Is he a sacred steel guy?

RR: Yeah, yeah. He's one of the early mentors, too. He's one of the early players.

PM: Calvin Cooke. I'm going to go back and get a little learning.

RR: Yeah.

PM: Do you know what label Calvin Cooke will come out on? Is there like a sacred steel label or--

RR: No, I'm not exactly sure which one.

PM: Okay. We'll search him out. [calvincooke.com]

RR: If I can find out, probably call you back and let you know.

PM: How do Calvin and Ted, these early mentors of yours and some of the originators of the sacred steel, how do they feel about their student's rising stardom?

RR: Oh, they're happy about it, because these guys played for years and years and years. They wanted to become that, but they just couldn't do it because they had a heavy, heavy commitment to the church. And it was different back then, back in those days. So they're really happy about it.

PM: Wow. It's unbelievable, all the factors, that it's a black man playing the pedal steel--

RR: [laughs]

PM: --which is an incongruous image to a lot of people. And that it's a guy who comes out of the church and he's on VH-1. I mean, it's an unthinkable kind of quintessentially American scenario.

RR: Yeah. I mean, that's what a lot of people don't understand. It becomes weird to a lot of people, that whole story.

PM: And it's almost like one minute you're playing in church. Okay, you bust out into some clubs, but now you're like--you explode onto the jam band scene with all these--basically all these young white hippies going crazy! It's beautiful.

RR: I know, isn't it?  continue

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