Gary James' Interview With
Kyle Vincent



He's been the lead singer of The Bay City Rollers and Bo Donaldson And The Heywoods. He's toured with Barry Manilow. And he's enjoyed success as a solo artist. The gentleman we are speaking of is Mr. Kyle Vincent.

Q - Kyle, you've been called "The Crown Prince Of Soft Pop." Can you live with that title after your name?

A - I can live with anybody calling me anything. I'm just happy they listen to the music. That was Goldmine that said that. I thought that was pretty nice, actually. I guess reviewers like that are pleasantly surprised that somebody like me keeps doing the music they love to do, rather than trying for a hit or trying to change with the times. I've not done that too much. Production wise, occasionally. For the most part I just write what I like and it's almost all based in most of those classic bands and songwriters and singers that you've interviewed so many times. That was my training.

Q - I'm just guessing here, that before you started your professional, musical career you must've had rich parents. I say that because you took bass lessons from Joe Satriani and vocal lessons from Seth Riggs. Those people couldn't be charging a few bucks. That had to be quite expensive.

A - (laughs) Well, I grew up in Berkeley and Joe Satriani worked at a little guitar shop called Guitar Restoration. Nobody really knew who he was. He had taught Steve Vai. Steve Vai was kind of the guy who launched Joe Satriani. But just prior to that, I was just 16 maybe, I took bass lessons from him. One thing I keep in my memorabilia box is a check, a canceled check, and it was ten dollars for a lesson. It was ten dollars for a half hour, forty-five minute lesson from Joe Satriani. It was torture Gary because I was just not a good bass player. I was just starting out. I was a horn player and singer, so the bass was very foreign to me. He was kind of frustrated. (laughs) At the end he heard songs that I wrote and said, "Wow! That guy's really good." He actually asked me to join his band at one point. So, it has kind of a happy ending there. Seth Riggs, when I moved to L.A. I didn't have a pot to piss in. I really didn't. I just scrimped and saved and worked my tail off to pay for each lesson, which was a hundred bucks for forty minutes. Trust me, back in the day, that's like the early '80s, like $500 now or something. It was a lot of money.

Q - You must've gotten something out of it 'cause you paid the money.

A - I did pay the money. I only went maybe a few months. My voice just wasn't locked in and I just needed a little tweaking. I always had this philosophy that train your voice, train yourself on an instrument, but don't over train. Otherwise you won't develop the soulful part, the heart, the part that really makes you unique. You'll just be a tactician, a technician. And I don't want to do that. I just made sure I had locked in the proper way of breathing and singing and the I left the lessons behind and just kind of took off on my own.

Q - For two years you worked as a personal assistant and driver for Kim Fowley. I'll try to be as nice as I can be here. How could you stand the guy?

A - He was a character. I don't know. For some reason Kim and I got along, but certainly there were moments. I saw things. I probably could write a book about what I saw and heard and know, but I will say he definitely had an ear. He had his ear to the street. He was a pretty darn good talent scout. He really could pick out acts before they hit. His downfall...

Q - His personality.

A - His personality rubbed a lot of people the wrong way, but the follow through wasn't always there. He would find the act, he found Guns N' Roses. He found Poison. He found my band, Candy back in the day. Just tons and tons of artists, and then he just kind of got a little off the rails in one way or another. So, he was kind of his own worst enemy. I got the joke. I saw him. I saw deeper into him because I saw him in every possible scenario, compromised and ill and happy and sad. So, I saw it all. He had polio as a kid. There's a real back story there. So I guess I had a little more compassion than others. A lot of people had bad things to say about him. Most my memories of Kim are filled with hilarity. I just found he was a funny guy. I gotta say he was a good ear for me. I knew how to filter his advice. Sometimes it was kooky and out of left field, but if you listened between the lines he was a pretty darn smart guy. Ironically the real big wigs in the industry, the Clive Davis', the Jerry Moss', Herb Alpert, they really liked Kim. I have letters from Clive Davis to Kim. As a matter of fact, I just saw one the other day. They were very cordial. He was definitely off. They wouldn't necessarily invite him to all of their functions, (laughs) but they let him produce Helen Reddy. There were times he was accepted and times he was an outcast. He was kind of his own worst enemy, unfortunately.

Q - This band Candy seemed like it was a fairly successful group, but you only made one album for Polygram. What was the problem there? Or was there a problem?

A - There certainly was. It's as you know for sure from the countless interviews you've done, I'm sure this story is more common than the success stories. The A&R guy got fired like weeks before the album came out. I've been told there was an actual memo going around that said, "Don't work on any of his acts." So we were just stillborn. We managed a kind of a cult following I guess. Japan, one of the after school shows, would use one of our shows. We built a big following in Japan, which I have grown on my own in the last decade or so.

Q - I was just about to ask why you're so popular in Japan.

A - Well, it started with Candy and morphed into my own career, which is wonderful because I give them one Candy song at the end of the show and they're happy. (laughs) But I've grown new fans from that for sure who don't have an idea who Candy is, which is fun. It was produced by Jimmy Ienner, who produced The Raspberries and The Rollers. So, all these bands are coming together here. We were huge Raspberry fans. I really liked The Rollers. L.A. was changing. We were at the first wave of the hair bands and we were the Pop version of the Quiet Riot, The Ratts, The Armored Saints and the Great Whites and on and on. We were the really young, cute, skinny, white capezio, red tight little pants Pop band. We played with all those bands. We just got an enormous female following in L.A. Just huge. So, they had to give us a record deal. They couldn't deny it. So we went to Miami to record the album and when we came back, L.A. had changed. It turned into like Heroin Rock. All of a sudden Guns N' Roses and all this dark stuff was happening. Like, "Wait. What happened to the flash and the pizzazz of The Troubadour?" Now it's like I'm going to shoot up and write dark songs and it didn't work. So, I wasn't going to stay forever in this band anyway because I'm wanting to be a solo singer/songwriter. So, I guess it was the time to go in that direction and I definitely did not want to go in that direction. So that's why it didn't last long. If there was success at the label and the album had been a success, the single and all that stuff, for sure we would've stuck it out of course. We would've adjusted to the change in music for sure.

Q - You've said your A&R guy had been fired, label president carted away in handcuffs and your promo men was bumped off.

A - (laughs)

Q - Who are we talking about here? Can you name names?

A - No and yes. I'll leave the first one nameless for now.

Q - Because he's still in the business?

A - Right, peripherally. But the promo man, Charlie Minor, huge, independent promotion man. We were scheduled to go out on the road and we had a real sit down, Charlie and I. If you were gonna write a movie about kind of a mobster proficient guy who gets your song on the radio, whatever it takes, at any cost... You don't worry about it. It just happens. You know how it was back in the day. And he was that guy. There were multiple stories. A girlfriend took him out. I'm not sure. It was one of those things where the industry was hush hush. Maybe that's not the real story. I don't know. All I know is I didn't go on the road with him 'cause he ceased to be.

Q - I see you did backing vocals for The Rubinoos. So, they're still around?

A - Yeah, they're still around. Still making albums. The guitar player and songwriter is a dear friend of mine. We've written tons and tons of songs together on multiple albums of mine and a couple of Rubinoos. When I lived in L.A. we were all there. I'd just run into their sessions and cut some vocals and vice-versa. I think they sang on my albums a few times.

Q - You toured with Barry Manilow. What was that tour like?

A - Barry is all about the music. He's a relatively serious person. I sat next to him in vans, planes, private jets. He would do crossword and I would be reading. That was a pretty amazing experience. I gotta say we have the same manager to this day. He (the manager) came up with the idea. Barry was going out on what was called The Shed Tour, which are the outside amphitheaters. It was an extended summer tour. Barry didn't want to come out while the sun was still shining. So, I was to stay on stage and do my thing until I got the word that I was done. Until it was dusk. And that was that. It was cool. We were really just friends. I had to separate the guy you see backstage or at catering or on the bus in the t-shirt or shorts, and after my show I would go out into the audience to then be a Manilow fan and watch Barry Manilow come on stage. I was a huge fan growing up and so I didn't want to taint the image by getting too personal and seeing too many things on a personal level. But there were a lot of nights when I'd come off stage and he would give me a little pep talk, advice. Sometimes after shows he would tell me what I was doing wrong or could improve. So, it was great.

Q - That he would take a personal interest in your career is admirable.

A - Absolutely.

Q - You were on Polygram Records. You were on MCA Records. You were on Disney's Hollywood Records. Did you have a personal manager who was negotiating these deals for you?

A - Every one was different. They all happened in a different way and fell apart in a different way. (laughs) One of my most successful ones was with Hollywood Records. The way I got that deal is I had just lost my deal with MCA. That was the Charlie Minor one and the album was never released. I actually just got off the road with Barry and I had to regroup again. This business I look at is you're always on a wheel. You're either up or down or somewhere in the middle. Each time you're thinking, well, maybe that's it. Maybe it's not meant to be. I've probably said that every couple years. (laughs) And so it was one of those times. I went and got a real job selling advertising for an L.A. newspaper. I couldn't have been more depressed because I had to go to the Roxy and The Troubadour and Whiskey in a suit and sell ads. It was, "Wait. Kyle, didn't you play here a couple of months ago? What are you doing?" It was just so unbelievably humbling. I went to South By Southwest, the Austin festival and I snuck into a party and I went up to a guy and I said, "What are you looking for?" He said, "I'm looking for three minute Pop songs." I said, "Well, you've come to the right place. What hotel are you at?" (laughs) He told me and I said, "A CD will be at your door." And I left, went to my car and got the whole package, put it there and two weeks later I had a record deal, a publishing deal, and a manager deal all at once. It just all fell into place. So, they've all happened in different ways.

Q - How did you get this gig with The Bay City Rollers? Was that a recommendation? Did you have to audition? Were you a Bay City Roller fan? Did you ever see them in concert?

A - I did actually. I don't know if I was in the 9^th grade or not. It was at my high school. We had a Jazz concert and there were two theatres adjacent to one another and my Jazz band; I played the saxophone. We were in the little theatre and in the big theatre we could hear screaming, incessant screaming. So, I snuck in from the little theatre to the big theatre and I found myself at the stage door, watching The Bay City Rollers playing at like the height of their career. It definitely did a number on me. It was like, "Oh, my God! I gotta stop this Jazz stuff 'cause I like this. (laughs) This is really fun." So, twenty-five years, thirty years later I'm walking on Hollywood Boulevard, I remember it exactly; I was walking out of a restaurant and the phone rings and it was a friend of mine who had promoted a single of mine to number one at his Omaha station. He was now managing The Rollers. He said, "We had some not great reviews. We need a singer." He said, "Would you be willing to do it?" I said, "Absolutely!" (laughs) "Are you kidding? I love The Bay City Rollers." Now technically so I don't get in trouble with their ardent fan base because sometimes they don't like it

Q - Because you're not one of the original members?

A - Right. None of those people are originals. Les wasn't one of the originals. Kim Fowley, once I called him, whining late at night, saying "I'm getting a lot of crap from Roller fans and I understand it, but it's starting to hurt me." He said, "Look, Babe Ruth was a Yankee. He wasn't an original Yankee. Now, Derek Jeter is a Yankee. Is Derek Jeter not a Yankee because he wasn't an original Yankee?" I'm saying every now and then Kim would give me a five minute piece of advice that really helped. So, I took some heat from their long time fans. Technically, we were going out as The Bay City Rollers Featuring Ian Mitchell. You know how it is. You've interviewed all these bands where there's legal issues and you have to perform under some convoluted name, but nevertheless, I like to say I was the seventeenth member of The Bay City Rollers. To answer your question, I went to Vegas and I did have to audition, but it was live, on stage, during a show. They said, "Go out there and sing 'Make Me Believe In Magic' and 'I Only Want To Be With You'" The audience reaction was strong and so Ian took me aside and said, "Mate, do you want to be the new lead singer of The Bay City Rollers?" That's exactly what he said. I said, "I'd love to."

Q - And you were with them how long? Two years?

A - Yeah, two years. It kind of fell apart. It wasn't necessarily pretty at the end, but on stage it was wonderful. We did a month engagement at the Riviera in Vegas. It was choreographed. I kind of plotted everything out, really designed where we were gonna be for each song. It was really fun. I'd never done that before. I just loved those shows. Manilow was next door at the Hilton. So it was kind of cool. We were playing the same month at the same time just down the road from each other. Anyway, on stage it was nothing but fun. It was a blast and we were always booked with bands that I just loved so much. So, if I love the songs and the personnel and getting paid? C'mon! It was a blast. It really was.

Q - And from The Rollers you went on to Bo Donaldson And The Heywoods. Which was a harder gig for you?

A - Well, The Rollers was made a little difficult like I said from some fans that de-legitimized anybody who wasn't an original member, so that soured it a little for me. Bo Donaldson was just pure fun, easy as pie, great, great musicians who were great people. Do the gig, go out to dinner and you're just happy the whole time, from the time you get off the plane to the time you get back on the plane. It was just great. I still, in theory, think I might do some shows with them. I don't know. He kind of switches out singers sometimes. So, it could happen.

Q - Weren't you a councilor on the Hampshire Council Of Governments in Western Massachusetts? Didn't that take time away from your singing career?

A - They've gone out of business and I'm no longer doing that. It was only like once a month you go in there for a meeting. I accomplished some things. I got to see how being an elected official works on a local level and how it doesn't work. More so doesn't work. It's really funny. It's just like when you watch the Congress on C-SPAN and you see how it doesn't work. It's amazing. It's really difficult to get anything done.

Q - You've said, "I'm pretty much the go to guy when there's some wayward '70s band in need of a singer. I've been a Roller and a Heywood. I'm waiting for The O'Jays to call." Hey! Maybe we can make it happen, Kyle!

A - (laughs) Oh, man! Walter Williams is one of my all time favorite singers. Everybody loves Eddie Levert, right? But the smooth, silky pipes of Walter Williams... I just love that man's voice.

Official Website: www.KyleVincent.com

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