So how do you spell it?
Well, I went back and forth but I ended up spelling it
Dillon, like the marshal.
How old is he now?
24, my little tiny boy-man who’s 6’ 3”
Does he have any aspirations to do music?
You know what? He played a lot when he was
teenager, he had a band. He played at a party for this
surf club in La Jolla when he was really young. His
band also played at the VFW. I went and saw him and
I almost started balling because I didn’t know he could
sing that well. Later he just dropped it and I ask him,
“Are you ever going to sing again, ever? Don’t waste
your gift!”. He says, “Probably someday” but he’s not
doing it now. It’s in there, but yeah.
Tell us about your recordings. You have three
cds?
Yeah, on my first cd I was offered a deal by Asylum
Records in New York and I ended up backing out at
the last minute to go with my manager at the time.
He was an interesting character. He used to manage
Grace Jones, Scott Baio, all these huge people from the
80’s and early 90’s, these actors that sang, like Donna
Summer. He managed Janis Joplin in the early part of
her career, her first, I think, 6 years. He used to say, “You
remind me of Janis when her voice was still pure.” She
used to have more of a range until later on and then
it was all about screaming. Well, that happens, hard
alcohol is not good for the vocal cords.
Well it wasn’t just alcohol . . .
Right! So Steve managed me back then and formed
Sagestone Records, but it only lasted about 3 1/2 years
until they went under. It was me, Leon Russell, and
some guy from San Diego on stage. I was supposed
to tour with [Leon Russell] in the summer but by that
time I had made [Steve] sign back all publishing to me.
What happened was we released the record on the
East Coast, and I played to a huge audience in Chicago
and was doing really well. Then in Denmark my single
went #1 and I wanted to go there right away, but they
refused to back it. I felt like I was fighting for my life.
They spent $150,000 making this piece of shit record
that I hated and they wouldn’t spend ten grand to
promote it so they were in breach of contract. I told
them, “Start backing this up or give me back my stuff ”
so they released everything back to me except a small
percentage. I ended up reworking that record, which
lead to another deal with Big Deal /Hyena Records for
my cd, Still Wild, produced by Val Garay. He’s produced
everybody from Jackson Brown, Lynda Ronstadt, James
Taylor -- that record did really well for me. I worked
with them for like 3 years, 3 singles, toured a ton,
amazing people. The head of that label is Henry Marx.
He’s been in the business since like the early 50’s, since
he was a kid. I mean, he knows the industry inside out,
he owns Music Force publishing everything from Tupac
to Alisha Keys to Bobby Caldwell.
That’s kind of off beat for him. Bobby is not really
a R&B singer.
No, he’s adult contemporary pop, but that’s what
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