In 1967 when Frank was 13 he blew his mind. He did hundreds and hundreds of hits all at once. "It took me seven years just to come down” and was in a mental institution for awhile, then in 1970 he was given a recording contract.
Frank Marino and Mahogany Rush have released a new album, and they are getting ready to go on tour. I spoke to Frank at his home in Montreal
Interview with Frank Marino
F: Hi Frank.
Fr: How are you doing?
F: Wonderful, you just released a new album called “Real Live” how is it doing?
Fr: Actually, it’s doing very well. I mean I haven’t seen a record do this well since I was 22 and it’s doing very well right across the board.
F: Are you going to tour?
Fr: Well on the 19t of October ‘04 we had the release and on the October 20th my drummer told me he took a gig. So, here we were, all of a sudden I had no drummer. It turned out that it took as long to find the new guy, Graham Leduc, that it would have if I waited for the other guy. But by that time we lost three or four weeks and if you rehearse the new guy, then you’re into the Christmas break. So there’s going to be no touring until January or February 05.
F: Is there anybody from the original band left?
Fr: Oh God no. The original band that most people know as the original Mahogany Rush
isn’t even the original band. We got known as a recording act when we were those guys, me, Jimmy and Paul. I had other drummers before Jimmy and I had other bass players before Paul and they were all called Mahogany Rush. For lack of a better term, we’ll call them the original guys. I think Jimmy left by ’80 and Paul by ’84. That’s a long time ago. The bass player I got right after Paul is still with me. That’s Peter Dowse, almost 20 years.
F: Will you be touring with your new drummer?
Fr: I sure am! I resolved to put myself in the position that I just want to make sure that I have a lot of guys who are ready to go out and do this stuff. That’s why it’s a good thing that Graham has his own band (Violent Marv). Peter also plays for the Montreal Jubilation Gospel Choir and other stuff.
F: How many albums have you put out now?
Fr: Well I put out 3 for 20th Century Fox, I put out 7 for Columbia, and then they turned that into a bunch more because they had some Greatest Hits packages. Probably around 25 records but that’s if you count all of the Greatest Hit packages. I’ve actually sat down to record from beginning to end, 15 or 16.
F: Are you still looking for that main stream success?
Fr: No, that’s the whole thing. I was never looking for, main stream success. If I was ever looking for main stream success, I would have long ago stopped recording 15 minute songs. I mean that was just not the way to get main stream success especially in the age of radio. I want to make a certain kind of music. It’s really something I love to do. If I make money at it that’s wonderful, if I don’t make money at it, I’m probably going to do it anyway! We had great success because we believed in the music, and people noticed that and they became kind of a cult, almost like the Grateful Dead. Our group and our fans are like the rock version a hard rock version of the Dead. I’m the guy from ’69. My mentality is there. It really is there!
F: Have you ever done a video?
Fr: No, sir. I’ve been on film doing concerts. People have shown my concerts. I know how to make one, technically, but I don’t believe in them!
Fred, I’ll tell you something. One day I’m probably going to do a video. I may be sixty when I do. One day I’ll do one but when I finally do one it will be totally different. It’s just taken me 20 years to figure out how to be different. I think videos are ridiculous. As a matter of fact, why have the sound on at all? Just using a video to sell, is like using sex, to sell your music or using devil worshipping like some of them did for a while, to sell their music. Upside down crosses, eating bats, stuff like that. What is that? What has that got to do with music? Music is for the ears. What has the eyes got to do with it? I mean if we were talking about selling clothing, then you might want a good looking girl wearing the good looking clothing. But we’re talking about music here.
F: And you don’t think you’re missing a whole audience?
Fr: Of course I’m missing a whole audience but it’s an audience I largely don’t want. Like I said, I’m truly an anti-establishment counter culturist back from ’69. I’m not just talking that crap. I believe it.
F: It seems you have a completely different pull on things and taken exactly the amount of success you want.
Fr: I just take it as it comes and when it gets to be the wrong kind, like I was seeing in the late ‘70s, I walk away. I walked away from Columbia. I still had another album to do for them and I walked away. I called them up and said I’m not doing the other album. “You’ll never play the big concerts again”. I said great, I don’t care. . I never was doing this to play big concerts. They don’t understand that kind of idealism. They don’t understand that a person can actually throw the money away. To me the real wealth and you’ll understand this, my three daughters that’s wealth. The last 11 years since my first daughter was born and all this having the kids around, nothing can equal the kind of satisfaction and happiness I got out of the last 11 years, nothing. And I’ve played with the biggest artists on the biggest stages. And let me tell you something, it’s not even close in terms of the happiness.
My take on all this is, if the music industry, wants me to play for them, well that’s fine but, it’s like I’m here playing, come and get me when you want me, and take the pictures you want. But I ain’t going to listen to them say oh now we’re going to do this and oh, we better follow that trend, and oh, we better make the record this way, and oh, those songs are too long, and, you can’t do that!
What’s all that! I’m not going to change what I want to do just because I’m going to make a couple of dollars.……
F: You’re a radical.
Fr: Well, I’m kind of a radical. My friend, and his wife Liz Vandel, an amazing singer, they live in England, she calls me the anti-man. There’s Frank, the anti-man, the anti-celebrity . I am an anti-celebrity. I don’t like celebrity. I think it’s dumb to act like you’re somebody you’re not, or even somebody you are (a rock star). In the‘70s when we were playing 40,000 seaters, we’d get to the airport and my band would get into the limo and I’d rent a car and go to the gig because I think it’s embarrassing and I don’t want to be getting out of a big long black limo looking like jerk. God, I’m just a guitarist.
F: O.K. Frank, tell me about the last time you got high?
Fr: I was thirteen years old and I stayed high until I was forty years old. I’m not kidding you. It took me seven years just to come down.
F: What did you do?
Fr: I did a lot of acid. Hundreds and Hundreds of hits.
F: By accident?
Fr: No, I was doing it for years. I was doing it since I was 10 years old. Smoking grass, hash and acid. That was the ‘60s. That’s what you did.
You’ve seen the Woodstock hippies and their little kids, their mascots. Well I was one of those, mascot kid. I was way too young. Now I know that. I was way too young to do that stuff, but it was 1966, ’67. I mean, who knew. That’s what was going on in the ‘60s and quite frankly alcohol made me sick. So I started by doing that other stuff and by 13 I blew my mind. And I mean I blew my mind, I was in a mental institution for awhile. I learned how to play music in a mental institution. It was a means of therapy for me. I picked up a guitar and I stuck to it like glue. When I ended up in the hospital, freaking out and going through a trip like you wouldn’t believe and having to go through it for years! People wondering will this kid be OK. Will he come back, has he gone crazy, has he lost his mind, is he coming back. That’s when I realized I needed that guitar, I needed to play it. And I needed to keep playing and keep playing it and I did it, day and night, day and night, day and night, insensibly. That’s when I became the guitarist. You know something, Fred, had there been drums in there, I probably would have played drums. If it was a piano, I probably would have played that.
F: I read you never let go of the guitar for feared of letting your mind go free?
Fr: No wander, to wander back into the trip! I’d have to explain that whole trip to you.
People think that I went through the seventies a drug crazed freak. Yeah, I might have been a drug crazed freak but I wasn’t taking any drugs.
I have gone since then, not a drink, not a drug.
And you don’t have to………
F: Do you have an opinion on Marijuana Probation?
Fr: I don’t think people should go to jail for pot. The laws need to change now. ………
F: Tell me about your website www. Mahogany Rush.com.
Fr: Our website is pretty busy. I’m very, very active on the message board, I’m very active in the chat room, personally, and I’m probably the top poster on the site. We have like over 1,000 posts. On the front page of my site, I’m doing something that nobody is doing. I have a juke box. And that juke box has every song I’ve ever done, free. You want to listen to it? Go to the juke box, dial up the album, dial up the song and listen to your hearts content. I’m not afraid of the downloader’s.
F: O.K Frank last Q. Do you have some good advice for young musicians?
Fr: I’d say the best advice I could give a young musician is be true to your craft.. If you’re going to pick a career, pick something you love because chances are you’re going to get hurt any way so you might as well love what you’re doing. Because someone is going to come along and notice what you’re doing. They’re the ones who are going to get you to make something out of it. Do you know why? They’re business people and they’re going to rip you off. That’s exactly what they’re going to do. Sign you up and rip you off! The up side of that is that once they sign you up, even though they are ripping you off, you’d at least make something out of it and if you have good attorneys, they’ll make sure you don’t get too badly ripped off. The music industry is a cut throat, low ball business. I can count on two hands ten people I know in the industry that I really think are good guys. The rest of them are scum bags! That’s the truth!
This was written for the magazine Green Thumb in 2004
Frank Marino and Mahogany Rush have released a new album, and they are getting ready to go on tour. I spoke to Frank at his home in Montreal
Interview with Frank Marino
F: Hi Frank.
Fr: How are you doing?
F: Wonderful, you just released a new album called “Real Live” how is it doing?
Fr: Actually, it’s doing very well. I mean I haven’t seen a record do this well since I was 22 and it’s doing very well right across the board.
F: Are you going to tour?
Fr: Well on the 19t of October ‘04 we had the release and on the October 20th my drummer told me he took a gig. So, here we were, all of a sudden I had no drummer. It turned out that it took as long to find the new guy, Graham Leduc, that it would have if I waited for the other guy. But by that time we lost three or four weeks and if you rehearse the new guy, then you’re into the Christmas break. So there’s going to be no touring until January or February 05.
F: Is there anybody from the original band left?
Fr: Oh God no. The original band that most people know as the original Mahogany Rush
isn’t even the original band. We got known as a recording act when we were those guys, me, Jimmy and Paul. I had other drummers before Jimmy and I had other bass players before Paul and they were all called Mahogany Rush. For lack of a better term, we’ll call them the original guys. I think Jimmy left by ’80 and Paul by ’84. That’s a long time ago. The bass player I got right after Paul is still with me. That’s Peter Dowse, almost 20 years.
F: Will you be touring with your new drummer?
Fr: I sure am! I resolved to put myself in the position that I just want to make sure that I have a lot of guys who are ready to go out and do this stuff. That’s why it’s a good thing that Graham has his own band (Violent Marv). Peter also plays for the Montreal Jubilation Gospel Choir and other stuff.
F: How many albums have you put out now?
Fr: Well I put out 3 for 20th Century Fox, I put out 7 for Columbia, and then they turned that into a bunch more because they had some Greatest Hits packages. Probably around 25 records but that’s if you count all of the Greatest Hit packages. I’ve actually sat down to record from beginning to end, 15 or 16.
F: Are you still looking for that main stream success?
Fr: No, that’s the whole thing. I was never looking for, main stream success. If I was ever looking for main stream success, I would have long ago stopped recording 15 minute songs. I mean that was just not the way to get main stream success especially in the age of radio. I want to make a certain kind of music. It’s really something I love to do. If I make money at it that’s wonderful, if I don’t make money at it, I’m probably going to do it anyway! We had great success because we believed in the music, and people noticed that and they became kind of a cult, almost like the Grateful Dead. Our group and our fans are like the rock version a hard rock version of the Dead. I’m the guy from ’69. My mentality is there. It really is there!
F: Have you ever done a video?
Fr: No, sir. I’ve been on film doing concerts. People have shown my concerts. I know how to make one, technically, but I don’t believe in them!
Fred, I’ll tell you something. One day I’m probably going to do a video. I may be sixty when I do. One day I’ll do one but when I finally do one it will be totally different. It’s just taken me 20 years to figure out how to be different. I think videos are ridiculous. As a matter of fact, why have the sound on at all? Just using a video to sell, is like using sex, to sell your music or using devil worshipping like some of them did for a while, to sell their music. Upside down crosses, eating bats, stuff like that. What is that? What has that got to do with music? Music is for the ears. What has the eyes got to do with it? I mean if we were talking about selling clothing, then you might want a good looking girl wearing the good looking clothing. But we’re talking about music here.
F: And you don’t think you’re missing a whole audience?
Fr: Of course I’m missing a whole audience but it’s an audience I largely don’t want. Like I said, I’m truly an anti-establishment counter culturist back from ’69. I’m not just talking that crap. I believe it.
F: It seems you have a completely different pull on things and taken exactly the amount of success you want.
Fr: I just take it as it comes and when it gets to be the wrong kind, like I was seeing in the late ‘70s, I walk away. I walked away from Columbia. I still had another album to do for them and I walked away. I called them up and said I’m not doing the other album. “You’ll never play the big concerts again”. I said great, I don’t care. . I never was doing this to play big concerts. They don’t understand that kind of idealism. They don’t understand that a person can actually throw the money away. To me the real wealth and you’ll understand this, my three daughters that’s wealth. The last 11 years since my first daughter was born and all this having the kids around, nothing can equal the kind of satisfaction and happiness I got out of the last 11 years, nothing. And I’ve played with the biggest artists on the biggest stages. And let me tell you something, it’s not even close in terms of the happiness.
My take on all this is, if the music industry, wants me to play for them, well that’s fine but, it’s like I’m here playing, come and get me when you want me, and take the pictures you want. But I ain’t going to listen to them say oh now we’re going to do this and oh, we better follow that trend, and oh, we better make the record this way, and oh, those songs are too long, and, you can’t do that!
What’s all that! I’m not going to change what I want to do just because I’m going to make a couple of dollars.……
F: You’re a radical.
Fr: Well, I’m kind of a radical. My friend, and his wife Liz Vandel, an amazing singer, they live in England, she calls me the anti-man. There’s Frank, the anti-man, the anti-celebrity . I am an anti-celebrity. I don’t like celebrity. I think it’s dumb to act like you’re somebody you’re not, or even somebody you are (a rock star). In the‘70s when we were playing 40,000 seaters, we’d get to the airport and my band would get into the limo and I’d rent a car and go to the gig because I think it’s embarrassing and I don’t want to be getting out of a big long black limo looking like jerk. God, I’m just a guitarist.
F: O.K. Frank, tell me about the last time you got high?
Fr: I was thirteen years old and I stayed high until I was forty years old. I’m not kidding you. It took me seven years just to come down.
F: What did you do?
Fr: I did a lot of acid. Hundreds and Hundreds of hits.
F: By accident?
Fr: No, I was doing it for years. I was doing it since I was 10 years old. Smoking grass, hash and acid. That was the ‘60s. That’s what you did.
You’ve seen the Woodstock hippies and their little kids, their mascots. Well I was one of those, mascot kid. I was way too young. Now I know that. I was way too young to do that stuff, but it was 1966, ’67. I mean, who knew. That’s what was going on in the ‘60s and quite frankly alcohol made me sick. So I started by doing that other stuff and by 13 I blew my mind. And I mean I blew my mind, I was in a mental institution for awhile. I learned how to play music in a mental institution. It was a means of therapy for me. I picked up a guitar and I stuck to it like glue. When I ended up in the hospital, freaking out and going through a trip like you wouldn’t believe and having to go through it for years! People wondering will this kid be OK. Will he come back, has he gone crazy, has he lost his mind, is he coming back. That’s when I realized I needed that guitar, I needed to play it. And I needed to keep playing and keep playing it and I did it, day and night, day and night, day and night, insensibly. That’s when I became the guitarist. You know something, Fred, had there been drums in there, I probably would have played drums. If it was a piano, I probably would have played that.
F: I read you never let go of the guitar for feared of letting your mind go free?
Fr: No wander, to wander back into the trip! I’d have to explain that whole trip to you.
People think that I went through the seventies a drug crazed freak. Yeah, I might have been a drug crazed freak but I wasn’t taking any drugs.
I have gone since then, not a drink, not a drug.
And you don’t have to………
F: Do you have an opinion on Marijuana Probation?
Fr: I don’t think people should go to jail for pot. The laws need to change now. ………
F: Tell me about your website www. Mahogany Rush.com.
Fr: Our website is pretty busy. I’m very, very active on the message board, I’m very active in the chat room, personally, and I’m probably the top poster on the site. We have like over 1,000 posts. On the front page of my site, I’m doing something that nobody is doing. I have a juke box. And that juke box has every song I’ve ever done, free. You want to listen to it? Go to the juke box, dial up the album, dial up the song and listen to your hearts content. I’m not afraid of the downloader’s.
F: O.K Frank last Q. Do you have some good advice for young musicians?
Fr: I’d say the best advice I could give a young musician is be true to your craft.. If you’re going to pick a career, pick something you love because chances are you’re going to get hurt any way so you might as well love what you’re doing. Because someone is going to come along and notice what you’re doing. They’re the ones who are going to get you to make something out of it. Do you know why? They’re business people and they’re going to rip you off. That’s exactly what they’re going to do. Sign you up and rip you off! The up side of that is that once they sign you up, even though they are ripping you off, you’d at least make something out of it and if you have good attorneys, they’ll make sure you don’t get too badly ripped off. The music industry is a cut throat, low ball business. I can count on two hands ten people I know in the industry that I really think are good guys. The rest of them are scum bags! That’s the truth!
This was written for the magazine Green Thumb in 2004