Now, Henderson, the character in the book--is, was, one of those people who was born with everything going for them, at least it looked that way on paper. He was a multi-millionaire and, uh, that was a good start, I suppose. And, uh But he wasn't happy. He'd been married twice and was contemplating a third marriage and wasn't really sure that he liked her very much. And he was very guilty about his wealth--because it was inherited.
And so he tried to be earthy and get his hands into the soil. He tried pig ranching, he figured that was pretty earthy, and, uh, decided that he didn't like pigs either. So he said "Well, I'll go along with you" and he did. And while he was up in the plane to Africa to find out what life was all about for him, he looked out of the plane window and he said, um, you know, "Look at those clouds down there; it's very strange to look at the clouds from up above them.
I remember as a boy having dreamed up at clouds a lot and having seen the cloud from both sides now, I suppose I shouldn't really be amazed by anything. I call my song "From Both Sides, Now. Did you ever used to watch that show called Star Trek? I just had a flash of this show, that I saw while I was singing this tune.
It was the only show where Dr. Spock ever got any emotion, right? You remember that one? It was really great because They've been there for a while, they took some horses and they took some grain, they took a lot of that stuff, and they were going to experiment up there, maybe as an alternative planet, you know? When we mess this planet up too bad we'll have to go some place, right? So they were up there working kind of scientifically and all of a sudden, a message comes to Dr.
Spock and the Star Trekkers that this planet is being bombarded by some kind of rays which are, uh, not very good for any kind of animal, vegetable So, it's getting bombarded so they all go down to check it out. First thing they notice is that there are no insects around, then they notice there are no animals around. And just when they're about ready to say that there are no people around, they discover this colony of people in the euphoric state, and not only that, when the doctor checks them out, every uh They get musicians to come in and play live in a really tiny little space behind a desk.
They have great stuff. They had Randy Newman. The Korean band I saw was called SsingSsing. It was kind of like David Bowie bass and drums, and then this really wild South Korean traditional singing. And a lot of gender-crossing. It looked like I was seeing the future.
I can hear the song. I can hear what I would be doing with it. I can hear the accompaniment. I listen to Mexican radio—the local Banda station out of San Jose. I mostly listen to NPR. There are some good modern people. I like Sia. How do you cope with the frustration of not being able to do everything you want to do? I just have to stay home a lot. The main attraction in San Francisco is the opera and the symphony, and I make an effort and go out, but I can only do it a few times a year.
You broke onto the scene with such a powerhouse voice. What did it feel like, singing with that voice? Well, I was trying to figure out how to sing! And trying to be heard over the electric instruments.
I had no idea that I sang as loud as I did. In the documentary, you talk about growing up in Tucson, Arizona, and how culturally rich that was.
How do the current politics around the border resonate with you? I feel filled with impotent rage. I grew up in the Sonoran Desert, and the Sonoran Desert is on both sides of the border. The same food, the same clothes, the same traditional life of ranching and farming.
It used to be that you could go across the border and have lunch and visit friends and shop in the little shops there. There was a beautiful department store in the fifties and sixties. My parents had friends on both sides of the border.
They were friends with the ranchers, and we went to all their parties and their baptisms and their weddings and their balls. Animals are getting trapped in there. Children are getting cut on it. In the meantime, you see people serenely skateboarding and girls with their rollerskates, kids playing in the park. I spent time out in the desert when I was still healthy, working with a group of Samaritans who go to find people that are lost. You run into the Minute Men or the Border Patrol every five seconds.
The border is fully militarized. People are coming to work. You have to be pretty desperate to want to cross that desert. You were talking about this back in , when your memoir came out, before it became such a national wedge issue. Were people not paying enough attention before? I lived at the border then. I lived in Tucson for ten years. I saw what was going on. That was going on in the Bush Administration. So people have been caught in this web of suffering, dying in the desert.
My children were coming home repeating homophobic remarks they heard at school. So I moved back to San Francisco. I wanted them to have a sense of what a community was like where you could walk to school, walk to the market. More of an urban-village experience. In Tucson, I was driving in the car for forty-five minutes to get them to school and then forty-five minutes to get them back, in a hot car.
I can tell that you have a real sense of mourning over what the border used to be. And they all influence our culture profoundly. The cowboy suit that Roy Rogers would wear, with the yoke shirt and the pearl buttons and the bell-bottom frontier pants and the cowboy hat—those are all Mexican.
We imported it. We eat burritos and tacos, and our music is influenced a lot by Mexican music. It goes back and forth across the border all the time. How did growing up in that hybrid Mexican-American culture shape you as a musician? I listened to a lot of Mexican music on the radio, and my dad had a really great collection of traditional Mexican music. I loved popular folk music like Peter, Paul and Mary.
I loved the real traditional stuff, like the Carter family. I loved Bob Dylan. And I tried to copy what I could. When I heard the Byrds doing folk rock, I thought that was what I wanted to do. It was a song I found on a Greenbriar Boys record, and I thought it was a strong piece of material.
I just liked the song. But the record company recognized that the song was strong, too, so they had me come back and record it with their musicians and their arrangement. And I was pretty shocked. But it turned out to be a hit. We were on our way to a meeting at Capitol Records, in an old Dodge or something, and I was jammed in the back with our guitars.
Then the engine froze, and the car made this horrible metal-on-metal shriek. We had to push it to the nearest gas station, half a block away. Nobody was anything particular at the time. We were all aspiring musicians. The Dillards were there. When you look that pretty, Drop dead gorgeos, just to kill me Hold op now, what's the rush? Just chill for a minute and have a drink with me I promise that I don't bite, unless it's something you like! I'm kidding, I'm a real nice guy I wanna get to know you better if you don't mind I think you're beautiful, Is your pops a drug dealer, cause you're dope I just need you to know, that you had me at hello!
My bad, but you know what I'm thinkin I lose my filter when I'm drinkin I only got one thing on my mind, no point in lying I'm trying to make you mine You need a little more convincing? It's all good cause I'm persistent! Baby you got me tripping Let's spend quality time and just kick it kick it You got me in the zone, Yeah, you're a better league of your own I just need you to know, that you had me at hello!
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