Fine Tuning

Billy Sherrill's Brave New Wave

Billy Sherrill has produced hits for some of the biggest names in country music. This year, he turned up recording New Wave Brit Elvis Costello, cutting some rollicking rock by Lacy J. Dalton and introducing a new all-female group called Calamity Jane. We sent Bob Allen to ask for an accounting.

Playboy: We've heard of crossover, but isn't it weird for you to produce Elvis Costello?

Sherrill: It is weird, but we just did a one-shot deal. It was one week out of his life and one week out of mine. It was an experiment that worked. We had fun, but I may never see him again. But I hope I do; he's a nice guy.

Playboy: Why did you do it?

Sherrill: He asked me. You know, he's probably more of a country fan than I am. He really loves George Jones. Me, I like to go home and listen to Johann Strauss. Anyway, we did the album. I didn't understand a lot of it because he is so radical in his phrasing; he probably knows something I don't know. But I had a ball.

Playboy: Do you think he could ever be a great country singer?

Sherrill: Anybody can have a country hit if he really nails something properly. But I don't see him as a, um, main-stream-country act.

Playboy: You've produced a wide range of women singers, but Lacy J. Dalton is still quite a departure for you. Were you looking for somebody fresh?

Sherrill: No. I was just listening to a bunch of tapes when this gutsy voice asked, "Why do I fall for those crazy blue eyes?" She made everything else I heard that day--including tapes from all our great publishers and writers in town--sound like crap.

Playboy: You personally screen all your material?

Sherrill: Every last pitiful one--and most of them are pretty bad.

Playboy: Couldn't you entrust that chore to someone else?

Sherrill: It'd be like hiring a guy to make love to my wife.

Playboy: Do you get bored working with the same artists year after year?

Sherrill: Sure. And it's always the same feeling: We look at each other and you feel like you're taking your sister to the drive-in one more time.

Playboy: Is that what happened with Tammy Wynette?

Sherrill: There's no big divorce suit pending, you know. If somebody came in with a song that destroyed me and I got that old feeling again, I'd pick up the phone and call Tammy and we'd cut it.

Playboy: But you continue to produce George Jones.

Sherrill: Recording Jones is like coaching Earl Campbell: You give him the ball and you know what he's going to do with it. I bet him $100 that He Stopped Loving Her Today would go number one. He thought it was too depressing, too slow and too long. Needless to say, he paid up.

Playboy: We've heard that in some cases, you finish all the instrumental tracks, so that all the artist has to do is walk in and do the vocals.

Sherrill: Sometimes you have to do that. It depends on the alcohol content in the artist's blood. A lot of times you cut records and the artist isn't even in town.

Playboy: You once said you produced some of the ugliest performers in the business. Do you also seek out....

Sherrill: Craze-o's? I don't know, and I've thought about that a lot myself. But they've all had their flings and are settling down now. Jones has straightened up, Paycheck, too.

Playboy: You co-wrote Tammy Wynette's hit Stand By Your Man. Does it bother you that it gets played in gay bars?

Sherrill: As long as I'm paid performance royalties, I wouldn't care if they played it in Russia.

Playboy: What accounts for your fascination with strings?

Sherrill: There's a part in He Stopped Loving Her Today when you realize that the guy in the song is dead and (concluded on page 218) Billy Sherrill(continued from page 162) that's the reason he stopped loving her. Well, without the strings, the song just lies there for about two bars. But add the chromatic string gliss, and you can see that son of a bitch walk through the pearly gates. That's why I like strings.

Playboy: How do you know if a song will be a hit?

Sherrill: If all the pickers and writers and the "in" crowd flip over it, chances are it's a stiff. If they hear it and ask "Is he crazy?" it's probably a number-one record.

Playboy: We hear you like to stay out of the public eye.

Sherrill: I love anonymity. Last week, I was standing down in the lobby just looking out the window when a guy came in with a sack of tapes that it would take a year to listen to and said, "I want to see Billy Sherrill today." I said, "Hey, I've been trying to see that bastard for a year! Yeah, man, he's a real jerk, anyway!" I really loved it--that's why I hate to see my picture in the trade magazines.

Playboy: What do you think of the Rolling Stones?

Sherrill: I never think about them.

Playboy: Aretha Franklin?

Sherrill: I love her. I've stolen a lot of her licks.

Playboy: Ray Charles?

Sherrill: He did things 20 years ago that sound as though he did them the year after next. He's a genius.

Playboy: Bob Dylan?

Sherrill: Great songwriter. I once asked him, "What the hell does Rainy Day Women No. 12 & 35 mean?" He said, "I'm not sure."

Playboy: Phil Spector?

Sherrill: He's a big hero of mine. What he did was really records, you know? You roll in, no overdubs; you've got 80 musicians, an echo, a couple of guys or three girls who can really hook it.

Playboy: After 20 years of producing, are you producing new talent to stay young?

Sherrill: I'm only 26! I just sound old because I've got a head cold. Seriously, Calamity Jane was a record-company idea. They asked me, "Why don't you put together a girls' group?" It's a total experiment. Besides, it's fun. They're all a lot prettier than Johnny Paycheck.

Playboy: One last question. Does it help a woman to have a big chest in this business?

Sherrill: It didn't help Barbara Mandrell--who, by the way, is one of my closest friends. I only said that because she says that.

Turn page for Music Poll results.

Playboy music poll results

Apparently, the Rolling Stones made as big a hit with you as they did with us this year. They nailed down top honors in both the pop/rock group and album categories. Jagger had to take a back seat to top-rated Bruce Springsteen and second-place Billy Joel in the pop/rock male-vocalist division.

Linda Ronstadt still has her grass-roots supporters. She was voted top female country vocalist even though this was the year she starred in The Pirates of Penzance, following an album heavily flavored by New Wave. Joni Mitchell, who snared high honors as top female jazz vocalist, has continued to fascinate jazz fans ever since Mingus, now more than two years old.

All in all, we think your selections set the stage for some interesting discussions long into the night. Take a look for yourself.

Making the world safe for jazz

Finally recovered after a string of health problems, Miles Davis limped across the concert stage this year and showed himself to be the toughest jazz-blues-rock-wa-wa trumpeter around. Performing with a mostly rock group, including a conga player who wrestled his drum to the floor, Miles once again unsettled the few remaining jazz purists. But that was the last note from the purists this year. Most of the notes came from a new breed of crossover contenders who have found a way to sneak their music onto the radio and sell some records.

Nineteen eighty-one saw lots of activity on the pop charts by artists who--rightly or wrongly, willingly or not--carried the label jazz: Al Jarreau, Grover Washington, Jr., Stanley Clarke and George Duke, David Sanborn, Tom Browne, Jeff Lorber, Pat Metheny, Lee Ritenour and, of course, George Benson, who started the whole movement. Most of the records have been the R&B-influenced brand of fusion that some have dubbed jazzz. For a change, pop critics are the ones debating the nomenclatures, while jazz writers appear ready to accept the success of Washington and Jarreau without argument.

The fusion artists--most of whom reject the word jazz (and why not? It's always been the kiss of death commercially)--are doing what comes naturally, as all music these days becomes increasingly eclectic. The Stones' Tattoo You features the great tenor-sax player Sonny Rollins--who goes uncredited in the liner notes. Just for the record, Mick says Rollins is an old favorite of Charlie Watts's. Rollins is just now coming out with his first self-produced album, called No Problem (Milestone). Dizzy Gillespie put in an appearance on Chaka Khan's remake of his classic Night in Tunisia. Duke Ellington's Sophisticated Ladies made it to Broadway in a razzle-dazzle, definitely showtime treatment of the music.

Bird lives on film and in print. Now, as Richard Pryor prepares for his screen role as Charlie Parker, a picture book about Bird has appeared in England; it weighs in at eight pounds and costs $111. With money like that going for books about dead musicians, you can't blame the new breed for cashing in while they're still breathing. So what if Grover Washington's funky wail isn't Charlie Parker's--just view him as a guerrilla occupation trooper making the world safe for bebop.

Playboy's D.J. Poll

The trouble with some contests is that they're judged by amateurs. Of course, there's good reason for doing things that way; after all, it involves the same principle that made America great. On the other hand, there are plenty of good reasons for letting the pros have their say. Experience counts. With that in mind, we asked 22 of the country's best-known radio personalities for their choices of the year's best music. Part of the point was to see just how closely their personal tastes would mirror the tastes of their audiences--you. Frankly, we didn't expect such little deviation from our readers' poll results. What this means, we suppose, is that there's some kind of uniformity out there. Quality, like the color yellow, is difficult to describe but everyone knows it when he steps in it. What follows, then, are the names of the d.j.s and their choices.

Howard Hesseman (Dr. Johnny Fever of WKRP in Cincinnati)

Tommy Edwards WLS, Chicago

Larry Lujack WLS, Chicago

Steve Dahl WLS-FM, Chicago

Garry Meier WLS-FM, Chicago

Sky Daniels WLUP, Chicago

John Fisher WMET, Chicago

Kid Leo WMMS, Cleveland

B. Mitchel Reed KLOS, Los Angeles

Jeff Gonzer KMET, Los Angeles

Jack Snyder KMET, Los Angeles

Mary Turner KMET, Los Angeles

Dan Ingram WABC, New York

Dave Herman WNEW-FM, New York

Richard Neer WNEW-FM, New York

Pat St. John WPLJ, New York

Frankie Crocker WBLS, New York

Joe Bonadonno WMMR, Philadelphia

Lisa Richards WMMR, Philadelphia

Picozzi WYSP, Philadelphia

Jimmy Roach WDVE, Pittsburgh

Tempie Lindsey KISS, San Antonio

D.J. Poll Results:

Best Album

1. Rolling Stones / Tattoo You

2. REO Speedwagon / Hi Infidelity

3. Steve Winwood / Arc of a Diver

Best Single

1. Rolling Stones / Start Me Up

2. Donnie Iris / Ah Leah

3. The Go-Go's / Our Lips Are Sealed

Best Group

1. Rolling Stones

2. Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band

3. The Police

Best Male Singer

1. Bruce Springsteen

2. Mick Jagger

3. Bob Seger

Best Female Singer

1. Stevie Nicks

2. Chrissie Hynde

3. Pat Benatar