LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES SEPTEMBER 2, 2019- ON THIS DATE IN 1972 THE DOOBIE BROTHERS RELEASED THE SONG THAT STARTED IT ALL FOR THE BAND, THE SINGLE ‘LISTEN TO THE MUSIC.’
WHEN WE TALKED TO TOM JOHNSON HE SAID THE MOMENT HE WROTE THE RIFF FOR THIS SONG, HE KNEW IT WOULD BE A HIT.
THIS IS WHAT HAPPENED THE NIGHT HE WROTE ‘LISTEN TO THE MUSIC’:
“I was sitting in my bedroom in San Jose. I was doing what I always do, I had been up playing guitar for hours. It was like 2 or 3 in the morning. I had the opening riff to it, and I think I figured out all of the chord changes as well. I called Teddy (producer Ted Templeman), woke him up, and played it for him over the phone, and he was less than enthusiastic. (laughing) I think it was because I woke him up. But he said, ‘Well, yeah, it might be pretty good. Needs a couple of changes.’ But we didn’t ever change anything. It stayed the way it was, the way I had it. The chord changes and everything we made are the same.”
HERE’S ‘LISTEN TO THE MUSIC’ AND A LITTLE EXTRA , FROM AN APPEARANCE ON THE ‘MIDNIGHT SPECIAL’
