Steve talks about how Phil Collins introduced him to Eric Clapton, which led to sessions at Sound City and Royal Albert Hall, and eventually a spot with Tom Petty's band. He also describes getting sober in April 1993 and how it changed everything.
Questions this video answers
April 30, 1993.
43 years old.
Welcome to this episode of the Million Dollar Mastermind. I'm Larry Weddell. And before we get started, if you want to know exactly how to win again and Again, go to wydellonwinning.comwebinar now to watch something I've put together for you. Now let's get going into this episode of Million Dollar Mastermind. Here you are as a young guy getting started and everything. How did that impact you? How did that transform you? Just being around that, just being around.
Them and playing with those guys elevated. My playing elevated. You know, it's kind of like if you, if you, if you're half decent tennis player and you start playing with the pros, then your game rises, gets up. You know, my, my game started to get really good playing with these guys.
And that mushroomed into everything that came after that, I guess.
Yeah, I started working with some big artists, you know, I mean, I mean when Average White Band faded, I became like a studio musician. And then, and then while I was doing the studio musician stuff and running around recording for all these different people, Duran Duran came on looking and asked if I, if I, if I wanted to work with them. They were thinking of getting back together and I ended up going to London and working with them on Notorious. And then I was on tour with Duran and we happened to be in London when Bob Geldoff got knighted. And there a big party at the Hard Rock Cafe. And I went to that and I was sitting there and mingling. I was mingling. Phil Collins came over, he said, hey Steve, how you doing? I said fine Phil, how are you? He said, he said, did you ever meet Eric Clapton? And I said, I met him once with Average White Man. He showed up at gig but just to say hello, I don't really know. He said, oh, he's come over. He said, I'm sitting over here with him. So I went over and I sat down 15 minutes and chatted with Eric Clapton and Phil Collins. And we just sat there, chatted. And then I got up and I left. And a couple of weeks later I got this phone call. Eric's gonna play a few gigs. Would you like to come and play with him? Yeah, I'd love to play with Eric Clapton, you know, and, and I went and did that, I went and did that. And then that turned into, into a gig. And then George Harrison and then, you know, came, came, came from that, directly from playing with, with Eric, you know, he liked to come and see us play at the Albert Horn. One day he walked in there and said, I I got been offered a gig, but I don't have a band. And Eric said, well, why don't you take mine? And George Thomas looked at us and said, would you guys play with me? And it's like, yeah. Then we went and did that, and then through that I did a gig and Mike Campbell was there with. Came and played guitar with George at the Royal Albert hall. And. And then the next thing I know, I got this call to come out and play with this mysterious band out in California. He didn't want to tell me who it was. And I walked into, into, into the studio. They flew me out there and put me in, in Sportsman's Lodge. And that wasn't much of a clue to who it was. I was gonna.
Yeah, yeah, that was the. That was a funny choice. Yeah.
And then I, I walk in, walk into, into, into Sound City, and there's Mike Campbell and, and, and, and Tom Petty sitting there. And I'm like, oh, it's you.
It's.
Yeah, it's you. And then, and then we sat down and cut. You don't know how it feels. And this is the funny thing was that, you know, I'd never met. I'd met Mike before with George. I'd never met Tom before. And so we sit down and we do a couple, learn this song and we play it and we go in and we listen to it. And they were behind with Rick Rubin and Jim Scott were behind the board and, And Mike and Tom was standing behind them. I was in front of the board with my back to the studio, and I'm standing there and they listen to this track. And Tom turns around to Mike and he says, wow, what a difference a drummer makes, eh? And I'm standing there going, well, what does that mean? You know? You know, that could have meant anything like, you know, and my. And Tom looked right at me and he said, don't worry, you won. I didn't even know I was in a competition for anything. I just thought I was coming out there to do a session.
And you won.
And I stayed the rest of that week and we recorded the first half. Then the big change came for me.
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Part two of the recording. So that was in October, April 30th of 1993. I had a lot of personal stuff going on, and I decided that I was going to stop drinking and I was going to stop messing around with drugs. Like. And I was 43 years old and that didn't all. None of that stuff looked really good on me. And I had too much trouble going on. There was no way out of it. And I said, you know what? I'm just going to try doing this without that. And I stopped drinking and I stopped drinking and stop messing around with that stuff. And then I came back out and I did the second half of the recording and that went well, too. And so the Heartbreakers have been with me. The first time I came out, I was drinking. The second time I came back out, I wasn't drinking.
How is that different for you? How was that different for you, the experience of it?
Well, I mean, I didn't, I didn't exactly, you know, I never, I never drank on the job. I would drink after the job. I mean, that was my celebration, right? Was. Was. Was after, after I finished work, I could go drink as much as I want, you know, and, and, but, but my personal life as far as, like, there was a lot of children flying around and a lot of child support, and I couldn't figure out why people were having kids with me anyways, you know, it's like. And, and it was, it was. My life was a mess. It actually, it seemed like I was never going to have any fun anymore and that my life was over. And. And then, then the Heartbreakers came along and, and, you know, I remember from the Wildflowers recording, Tom had this song called Crawling Back to youo. And there was a line in that song that I. That really stuck out to me was, I'm so tired of being tired. Sure. As night turns into day. Most things I worry about never happen anyway. And that whole. Most things I worry about never happen anyway really stuck out for me, you know, and through all the early, those early, those early, early years of sobriety, when Tom passed away, I had it tattooed on my arm.
Oh, you did?
Oh, I got the little outbreaker logo. And when I played, that logo points straight at my heart and wow.
Wow.
It was 25 transformative years that changed my life. Taking the drugs and the alcohol out of my life really made me change a lot of things, and I'm truly grateful for that.
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