okay, do you keep in touch with him?

ry cooder?

yeah.

no: only at the time that he was still coming around our house and he showed up with - what's that guy's name - jack nitzsche?

oh, right.

he would show up with him and then the tour we did. it was cool like i tried to learn what i could about slide playing from him because i thought that he was thé guy. no, but i didn't keep in touch really.

who else? winged eel fingerling?

elliot [ingber]?

elliot, yes!

elliot..., i haven't seen him in a long time. just when i was starting the mallard band i ran into elliot because i was in the los angeles area. i heard various stories that he's doing well - still lives in the same little place down in hollywood. but no, i would like to see elliot: he was always a very sweet-hearted great person. but how many people out of... - i don't know how old you are... -

i'm almost forty....

well, i just turned forty-five a few days ago [8 january - t.t.].

happy birthday, belatedly.

thank you. actually what's today?: beefheart's birthday maybe?

yes, we do this radio show somewhere around his birthday. so far we have done this the third year.

right. fourteenth or fifteenth, right?

i think it's the fifteenth.

something like that. anyway, what is he? fifty-two now?

no, fifty-three.

that's right. you're right.

shock? why was it a shock?

why, just that someone who is fifty years old and had access to health care, would have died so... --

prostate cancer is something that is like, you know what i mean: people don't go in and get check-ups and go: 'oh, i have this let's catch it'.

yeah.

we have all known about it for the last four years or so.

yeah, well: i think i first heard it a year and a half ago.

it's been quite a while that i've been hearing about it: when he was doing the 'tipper gore' ['parental advisory' music censorship - t.t.] thing.... he was a cool guy. i differed with him on certain things he was involved in - you've got to respect that.

yes, he actually got projects dóne: i definitely think he deserves credit for 'trout mask replica'. i wonder if that record could have been made without somebody like zappa behind it. if it would have been issued...; it could have been recorded.

at that time - that's true. but i don't know how much different he saw that album from 'wild man fischer' - you know what i mean?

yes, yes.

so it was all frank's big cartoon. you know, if you went to his house and saw the entourage of people there - it was frank's cartoon party, sort of like this rock 'n' roll fellini....

yes: the circus. definitely: sort of fellini circus.

for me it was cool. because he had already done something in 1964 - whatever it was when 'freak out' came out that went like: 'hey, fuck: you listen to this. you know the beatles? give me a break'. you know, it was great.

that's what i have always loved: my favorite album of his has always been 'we're only in it for the money'.

the first three....

well, 'freak out' is wonderful too. and i thought that 'strictly personal' was the same sort of thing in a way: that it was a reaction to 'sergeant pepper's lonely hearts club band' [album by 'the beatles' - t.t.]. particularly 'beatle bones 'n' smokin' stones': almost vicious. you know, john lennon [a member of the beatles - t.t.] got very upset about that. i have never been able to find it, but supposedly he gave a front page interview to 'melody maker' where he denounced the song.

yeah, and beefheart's thing was that it was about the insects after the holocaust - right.

oh no! i never heard that before!

it's right. it works. it's a good --

i have always said it's a wonderful put-down of psychedelic lyrics and it's also this brilliant psychedelic lyrics song at the same time.

oh yeah, exactly. what it was, you know, like cockroaches and the beetles are going to live through this shit - and the stones smoking - you know, for the nuclear holocaust or whatever. i mean: i could understand that, but i'm sure he could be very brutal and meant it the other way too - side-stepping that one.... it was a good tune.

i love it. have you ever heard the british issue of 'strictly personal', the mono version? there is some distortion, but i think it's deliberate, like when the mirror is singing back to him on 'son of mirror man'. it sounds much better: closer to what was originally intended.

i have no idea, i would have to hear it.

like the 'i may be hungry but i sure ain't weird' ceedee that has all these versions of 'strictly personal' that were recorded for buddah records, but the sound on those takes was quite good.

hmmm. no, i haven't heard any of that - i just remember it was altered, the phasing and stuff. the psychedelia that was thrown into the album after i had heard some of the tracks - because i was supposed to be learning those tunes....

you had heard the tapes?

yeah: we had all those work tapes from the original unmixed tracks - because i was learning them. 'kandy korn' and whatever - i don't know what's on that album, to tell the truth - 'i feel like i said' and a few things like that: learn all these slide parts.

'trust us' and 'safe as milk' - which is my favorite song: such a great song.

well, yes: they were great tunes. they were very blues-based with an african feel to a lot of the rhythms. it was cool stuff. and yes: the later elpee didn't sound anything like that.

i have turned up a magazine that picked the usa 'strictly personal' as a good make-out record because it was so quiet: it was one of the top ten records to put on when you wanted to seduce someone.

very weird.

that's how screwed up the mix was.

right, like barry white - both 'walruses of love'.

now, this again may be a rumor: do you remember ever backing up sunnyland slim?

no.

may have happened before you -

think it probably was. i remember hearing the name. but before me.