"takin a walk' with Mark Farner: Grand Funk's Captain Closer to Home"

Published Oct 8, 2024, 7:00 AM

Join @thebuzzknight for this classic rock podcast interview with Mark Farner. He was the original singer and guitarist of the rock band Grand Funk Railroad which he co-founded in 1969. His best- known composition is the 1970 epic "I'm Your Captain (Closer to Home) and he is celebrating 55 years since the release with a new version of the classic. #bestmusicpodcast #bestmusichistorypodcast 

For suggestion or comments write buzz@buzzknightmedia.com

Connect with Buzz on Twitter @TheBuzzKnight and Instagram @takinawalkpodcast.

Like this show? Please share with your friends at kindly leave us a review. Review

#bestmusicpodcast #bestmusichistorypodcast 

Taking a Walk.

I think videos messed music up because when we're listening to the music or we're reading the book, that video is going we have our own video. You know, we're thinking in word pictures, and without that exercise of imagination, you can get stifled.

Welcome to the Taking a Walk podcast hosted by Buzznight. Buzz speaks with legendary figures in the music business, and today there's no exception. Mark Farner is the man behind Grand Funk Railroad and he's releasing Closer to Home with an updated version of the classic I'm Your Captain. Here's Buzz Now with Mark Farner on Taking a Walk.

It's an honor, Mark Farner to have you on Taking a Walk, sir, Nice to meet you.

Nice to meet you. Let's take a walk, brother.

Oh right now. Yeah, So we got a lot to talk about.

We're going to talk about the new version of the iconic song I'm Your Captain, your project also Closer to Home coming out. We'll talk to collectibles and the tour a bit. But I do want to ask if you could take us back to the creation, first time around of that song that to this day is part of the soundtrack of our life. Closer to home. I'm your captain. Do you what do you remember about the creation of it?

Well, I'll be glad to go back there with your brother Buzz, because it was a spiritual inspiration.

You know. I say my prayers. I pray during the day.

It doesn't have to be you know, first thing, when you get up, for last thing, when you you know, before you go to sleep. It's a state of mind. It is a belief system, you know, we pray believing. So it said my prayer down and then Parshallville, Michigan, and I was at the farm. It was a beautiful day I had. I'd been out, you know, on a tractor doing some stuff. It was a wonderful day. I felt good and I was thanking God for everything for my life and blessing everybody. And after I blessed all the cousins and you know, relatives and sisters and brothers, I put a little ps on my prayer and I said, God, would you please give me a song that would reach and touch the hearts of those you want to get to. And when I went to bed, I calmed out. I mean I was I was out until about three three thirty in the morning.

And I woke up.

I was half awake, I was not fully consciously awake, but I was awake enough to grab my stenelpad that I leave alongside my bed because I've lost so many inspirations, thinking oh, I'll just remember that in the morning, and I never have remembered one of them the following morning. So I have a pad and I they're not necessarily songs, there's just writings that I have, things that come to me and I need to get them out of my head. So I grabbed my sentyl pad and I start writing bus and you know, songwriters will we'll go back to the first verst or we'll go to the top of the verse. We'll start reading down through it to get the next line. We want to get a nice flow. We want it, we want it to be, you know, conductive, a thought process to be conductive. And I knew I better not do that. For some reason, I just had to stay focused on.

The next line.

They were coming so fast, and I knew if I went back to the top that I was going to lose where I was at, that I was going to lose that plugged in connection I had that was somewhere between heaven and earth.

It was divine. It was a divine appointment.

And I believe we are all capable of having this kind of experience if we believe, if we trust in the Creator, and I definitely do that. That prayer brought the song I'm Your Captain. When I was done writing this the last word on the stenopad, I was spent. I put that thing back on the nightstand and I rolled back under the sheet. I was gone, man, I was out. And I got up in the morning and I made coffee and I'm sitting there in the kitchen and I grabbed my George Washburn guitar and start playing. I said, oh, that's a nice little eddie right there, and started. You know, I hit a chord that it had a nice ring to it. It had these harmonics that I had never heard in this inversion. And I looked at my hand and I was trying to figure out, Wow, that's that's a great chord right there. And as I'm looking at my hand, it was just like the thought came to me, get those words, get those words.

So I go and I get the words.

I put them on the kitchen table, and I had a cassette recorder because that was you know, that was state of the art cassette recorder. Man, I pushed the button, I hit the red button, and I started playing and the song came out. As I'm singing the words, the chord shage changes came and it was just as natural as something somebody had taught me. That song, it just all flowed right out. And when I took it to reheard, so we worked it out and uh, it's it's a big.

Hit, you know.

I mean, Dona mel knew then they said, finer, man, this, this song's a hit. This song is really hit. So God bless them. Uh they were the first ones to tell me that. And uh, you know, the world has has had it. The Vietnam veterans have had it in their hearts. Many of the Vietnam veterans told me that that's they played that song over and over and over on their way back, on their way back, and guys just crying telling me this, And you know, you have this happen and it gets on you and you're just so grateful and so thankful to have been used in such a way that it influenced people that it that it had its spiritual effect on their life. There's no video. Back then, there weren't videos.

You know.

I think videos messed music up buzz because I was talking to a jacket WNW, New York City, and he told me they did a thing where they had one hundred people give their definition, their personal definition of the song by Simon and Garfunkel called Bridge over Troubled Water. He said, Fiarrener, we got a hundred diversely different interpretations, and not any two were even close. And that is so inspiring to me, because we when we're listening to the music or we're reading the book that video is going, we have our own video. You know, we're thinking in word pictures. The words come and the pictures come and they appear to us in our imagination. And without that exercise of imagination, you can get stifled. You know, you can get yourself in a ditch, in the bottom of a ditch someplace, and you fighting to get out and can't think of why you're even there. You're struggling in life and don't even know why. I think our imaginations need some exercise.

Brother, Yeah, well put okay.

So I have to ask you, that's an amazing story, and thank you for sharing the story.

There. I have chills from it. In so many ways.

Did that same scenario where you felt the divine inspiration that you describe occur with some of the other great catalog hits from Grand Funk Railroad.

Nothing not like that.

That was different.

That was it.

That was the That was the one. And I so I have I mean, don't mean to interrupt you. I have said, Lord, hey, have you got anything else?

Send bringing down?

Send it here.

So in the remaking of the song and thinking about the world today and thinking about your description as well of how many soldiers coming back from Vietnam, you know, we're really touched and that song got them through that that journey. When you were redoing the song, did you get different feelings or were they the sort of the same feelings as when you first created it.

No, I definitely got different feelings. Buzz it was.

It was remin of the of the process of you know, we got to lay this out. The first thing we did was Mark Slaughter, who produced the album, called his buddy Josh Egan, who was a drummer, and Josh is a great drummer, and Josh made a tempo map of the original version because back when we cut this song. There was no such thing as a click track, and now everything you hear is recorded to a click track. In case they got to put something in, they have to have a code for that something to associate to and follow so that it can be in time with the track. The drummer was the click track back in those days, and it was human and feel. But I don't think any of those songs were lacking for human feel myself, and I think click tracks are. You know, they're a stumbling block. Seriously, if you got a lock to something that's artificial, then there is a chance that whatever you're doing is going to have a little of a bat artificial you know, inspiration sticking out of it.

And I want I want this song.

You know, back when we cut it, it was looking at Brewer, and of course when he.

Would get excited, he'd rush a little.

Bit, and then the song had settled back down the temple map. If you could see it, dude, it was like it's like this Brewer was all over the place. But Josh followed that temple map and he laid down Ludwig drums, the same type of drums that Brewer used on the first recording, and laid it in the temple map right where it's supposed to be, and the guy is man, he was spot on, just locked right into it. I played bass on this version and a lot of the bass lines. Mel asked me, what are you hearing there? And I went, well, I'm hearing like about out the bump bump out and yeah, okay, and that dog on bom bom bomb bom bomb bom. You know that's my line that came from me in the first place. Mel Shocker is great. He is a great bass player. He's got feel dripping off of him. But and and I didn't play it like Mel played it. I played it, you know, like I played it on a different type of bass. Mel had a peep bass with a humbucker, and I played it on a Lakeland bass that was plecked. And so it was easier for this guitar player to play that bass on this track. But we were playing in a different signature. The time signature was the same. The key signature was not a four forty. The original version was cut in a four forty because a four forty is the American tuning standard since nineteen fifty three, that's when it was established. Here in the United States, but it went from four to three two, counting backwards from four four.

To three two to four forty.

And I don't know why, because four forty is an agitation. That frequency is an agitation to natural things such as water, a body of water. You play four forty, you play a two on a scale uh in four forty tuning at one hundred and twenty five decipels, and you'll put chop on that water. It'll it'll be like an ocean that is experiencing a storm, frothing and everything. You play that same note in the tuning standard of a four three two, and it is a piece of glass because it's not adjective.

It's blending in with the natural that is here. And you and I are made of how much water? Brother? And we're a lot a lot of water?

So the four have Oh I love this. Have you ever had a conversation with Skunk Baxter like this?

No?

Oh you should. He was on this podcast. Oh yeah, and he gave his.

Own version of the description of you know, the depth of music and the sonic you know, composition of it, and and you guys could talk about frequency and really go crazy.

I love Skunk.

I played done some gigs with him and he's he is a wonderful character.

Will be right back with more of the Taking a Walk Podcast. Welcome back to the Taking a Walk Podcast.

Who are some of the other folks that have you know, other musicians over your career that have you know, had an impact on you, had an influence on you.

Freddie King? When Freddy King was opening for Grand Funk, it was a blessing. Deacon Jones was his keyboard player, and those guys every night, those guys were playing poker.

After the gig, Freddy had pay him. Then he he went back when.

And we sat in on some of the poker games and it was so funny this one time. Man, it was like Freddy had lost two or three hands in a row and this is like unheard of, you know, and everybody's like going, all right, all right. Freddy reaches in his pocket and he slams a thirty eight special Saturday Night Special down on the table.

He says, Okay, that's enough of that crap. We all about died laughing.

Dude.

Oh my god, what a character I miss Oh I miss him.

Oh what a great story conspiration in my life. A great musician. He played with a wound g string. That boy had some strength in his hands. I saw him snap the headstock off a less Paul Junior one night on stage. Just bam gone. You just put that wow pressure on it.

Yeah, I love it. Mark. Why do bands ultimately break up?

Well?

I think it's, uh, you know, the estimation that the ego gets in there and I want to I want to be the one other I wanted to do it.

You know, it can't be all you, It's got to be you know, that goes.

On a lot. I think that goes on so much that it break spans up. And I've heard about this. I mean I've talked to other players, and most of the time they tell me it's the ego gets in the way. Somebody, a band member don't feel like they're they're getting enough recognition, so they, you know, they throw a hissy fit.

Isn't that true of everything in life? Ego gets in the way of everything? Really? Isn't that the bottom line problem?

Yeah, bus man, that's you know, the pride of you know, the ego can be a good thing, it really, I mean, we need to have some ego, but it needs to be under your controller. It needs to submit to you. You can't submit to ego because things will go crazy.

Mark, there's a lot of bands out there that are touring.

That aren't the bands. Yeah, they aren't. They are. Do you have a thought on that.

Yeah, there are many bands that don't. They don't even have the original members, and they're calling it the name of the band. You know what the band the original trademark of that band, and it's the same thing. I believe it's wrong with the entire world, and that is corporations because in a corporate structure, once you're in that corporate structure, you are manipulated by the majority rule. And if there's three people and two or against you, I don't care what your status was prior to that, it's going to be whatever they want. If there's four people, I mean, you know, that's what it is. Corporation and whoever's controlling the trademark. I was talking to he was on in Cleveland doing a It was a Gunner Nelson and he says, Barnard, do you know that there's one hundred and twenty six versions of this band that goes out of its old time rock and roll and there's one guy that controls the trademark and he licenses the use of the trademark to each one of these one hundred and twenty six bands, and people don't know. They're just going to hear the music. I said, bingo, that's it. And whoever has the use of the trademark, it doesn't matter. You know, it can be legal because it's a corporate thing, and that's a legal thing to do.

But how honest is that? How honest is it?

If honesty has no bearing on your life and you don't really give a rip, then you can go ahead and do stuff like that.

But I think people.

Need to know and be honest about things, and that is very unlikely in the current situation. I mean, you think about in nineteen ninety six and the deregulation of the FCC put the ownership of all these radio stations and television stations in the hands.

Of just a few people.

It used to be owned by moms and dads, grandpa's and grandma's. There was you could own seven AM, seven FM seven television station. It was a seven seven seven rule, the FCC seven seven seven rule. And when they abolished that rule, you know, it was set in place to prevent a monopoly. But when they abolished it, guess what happened and now we're suffering under that monopoly.

Very well stated, sir, really well stated. So let's talk about Okay, you're going to be hitting the road with the band right to promote the new project.

And you've got.

The single out obviously of Your Captain, and then the full album coming out in November. There's also a bonus track I want to talk about there as well that you have on there. Talk about the Friends Forever track and who's involved with it.

Yeah, Jim Peterrick from the IDEs of March and I got together at his studio and we recorded the vocal and we recorded.

It was just like a you know, you do a scratch track. It was to be.

I eventually ended up playing bass on it because I could hear some different things to make it, just to make it move, you know, a little differently. And I'm a motown R and.

B kind of guy.

I was raised on that and it's in me, so I hear things that way, and I could hear it that way as I was singing and doing it down in the studio.

I heard it that way.

And when Mark Slaughter and I were recording my album Closer to My Home. I said, you know, we got this song that Peter and I wrote, and we could we could get those tracks and I could play the bass on it because I'm here here.

I told him. I said, I've just so bent on this bass that's in my head.

I said. He said, well, let's get it. Let's see how it sounds. And so when he put it up and I played the bass on it, then it made sense to me. It gave me the feeling that I could sing to I had already done the track with jim and round Chicago there where he lives, and but I altered it when we got to Mark Slaughter studio. I sang some different parts and uh just made it, you know, more me because at the time I was just like, okay, I'm reading these words off a piece of paper and and I put my I said, what about this? You know, family reunited at the heart and it was like Jimbo was going, yeah, dude, and you know some other contributions that I felt were important to say, but to say humbly and keep the song, you know, thank you to people. This is a this is like thank you everybody for you know, making our lives and thank you for being the ones who kept us going and inspired us and encouraged us to continue with the talents that God gave us.

What a great message. That's so wonderful. Well, I do want to close with this mark. It kind of feeds right into I think a really important take. I want you to leave us with you have amazing characteristics of resilience.

What can you tell us about.

Resilience where you sort of you know, learned it and strengthened where it comes from, and what others can take away from that?

Well, I think, buzz, I think that you know, when my dad died, I was nine years old and.

It was life changing experience.

Prior to my father dying, I had uncle Garland died and that changed our family. I mean because we all got together on Sunday. Every Sunday, the whole family got together and did music. You know, there was fiddles and banjos and guitars, and my dad blew saxophone and all the women sang and it was like listening to angels sing. Brother family harmony is a beautiful thing. But when I lost my dad, I watched this the whole family kind of break up.

We stopped having the jam sessions.

We went into this morning and my mother, God rest her soul.

She was hurting. She was hurting for a long time.

And I.

Walked out of the dining room one day.

It was shortly after my dad had passed, and there were a lot of people over trying to comfort my mother. And I walked out of the dining room and I went into the living room of the eleven room farmhouse that we lived in that my great grandfather built. And my dad, before he passed, he had just purchased a television set. We didn't have one till. We used to listen to a radio, this great, big wooden radio, and we'd pop popcorn and all the cousins and you know, everybody sit around and listen to Flash Gordon and listen to, you know, all of these things on the radio.

The creaking door, and but we had the TV. It was black and white. And I walked in there and it was on.

It had been on, and my mother kind of had it on as just as a background noise, just to you know, keep her mind from wandering too deep. I think that was part of the ploy. Anyways, I walk in and Billy Graham's on the television and he says, are you hurting? And I looked over. I'm nine years old. I'm looking at this guy and I'm thinking, can.

He see me? Do you need a touch from God? And I'm one.

I look around. I'm the only one in the living room. He's talking to me. I said, I said, yes, I need a touch from God. He said, come over and put your hand on the television set. And I put my hand on that television set. Bus I tell you when I prayed with him, and I prayed to have Jesus come into my heart, come into my life life, and to comfort me and give me that comfort that I needed.

I got it. Nine years old. I got it. I believed as a child in what I was doing.

I believed, and that belief, the understanding of that belief has given me a resilience that has stayed with me, and it has gathered momentum like a snowball rolling down a steep hill, gathering momentum, getting bigger, keeping that intact.

There's so much that wants to eat away at it.

There's so many other things that you could get your mind confused by. But I thank God for that faith that I have. It's because faith is the abstance of things hoped for and the evidence of things unseen. We have to when we pray, we pray believing. So that belief and that prayer that I prayed with Billy Graham gave me something that I have kept in my heart to this day. I'll be seventy six on the twenty ninth of this month, brother, and my faith is increasing the more I take dominion over this temple and the more I tell the evil one take a hike.

I belong to love.

Man, what a great time talking to you. You're an iconic figure in music history and you're still at it, and you're still spreading the good word of music.

And the good word from your heart. Mark Farner.

Congrats on the new releases and good luck on the tour, and thanks for being untaken a while.

Brother.

It has been my pleasure.

Buzz.

It's great to hear your heart as well. I wish you the best and God bless you. And if I don't see in the future, I'll see in the pasture.

Thanks for listening to this episode of the Taking a Walk podcast. Share this and other episodes with your friends and follow us so you never miss an episode. Taking a Walk is available on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, and wherever you get your podcasts.