Papa don’t necessarily preach that their children possibly endure a lifetime of 352 days a year on the road, album sales that no longer pay for groceries, and being a slave to the whims of the musical muse, but still: Many musicians owe their careers in one way or another to their fathers. If not, in any case — just like the rest of us — they at least owe being born, and maybe even a shoulder ride or two, to their dads.
In honor of Father’s Day, SPIN asked four musicians from a few genres to sound off about fatherhood and music. Justin Townes Earle, 32, waxed philosophical on his father, 60-year-old country star Steve; Mavis Staples, 75, reflects on the late Pops Staples, whose endearing posthumous album Don’t Lose This came out earlier this year; Merle Haggard, 78, spoke briefly about his 22-year-old son Ben (or “Benny,” as he affectionately refers to him) who plays guitar in his band; and Kevin Saunderson, 50, bantered with his sons Dantiez, also 22, and DaMarii, 25, who were on-hand at this year’s Movement Festival in Detroit.
Read the interviews below.
Justin Townes Earle
I was reading an interview that you did about Single Mothers and you said that album was about the ideas of a child turning into the realizations of a man. Did you have any such realizations making Absent Fathers?
I think, more and more of my records deal with those subjects; it’s different levels of understanding coming with age, of course. The person that wrote “Momma’s Eyes” was 20 years old, and the person that wrote “Absent Fathers” was 32, so I hope that I learned a lot. I see a lot more parallels in my father and my mother. From my mother, I get a very, very strong work ethic and need of survival. From my father, I get a very obsessive work ethic,which now I see is a little bit unhealthy. Both of my parents were very much hardworking people. It’s definitely something that has been passed onto me on the surface. I think, if you’re honest with yourself, you’re a lot like both of your parents. You may look like one but you got crazy rom both of them, no matter what.
That is very true. I know your dad wasn’t physically in your life [he left home when Justin was two years old], but were you aware of him growing up as a dad and as a musician?
He was always somehow in contact through the years, though sparse. I don’t think there is a small child alive that, when one parent is absent, especially if they’re in a situation like my father, where you hear about him all the time from total strangers — there is always a want for the one that is not there. That person seems mythical, and there is something fascinating about what they do. As a child I was very proud of what my father did. It took a bit to figure out that there was something wrong. I didn’t have many friends who had both parents in the same house, but their dad lived out in Antioch, ten minutes from where they were living. My dad was [getting married at a rapid rate, getting in a lot of trouble when I was a child, and our family drama was played out in the newspaper, and people got to remember that Nashville was a city of 400,000 people at that time. S—t got around.
Was he an influence at all on your decision to start playing music?
I was young he was part of my decision to not play music. [But as I got into my early teens, being a part of the generation that was introduced to Kurt Cobain, that started to change. There was this idea of the great songwriter that was introduced to me, and another form of it in my father. You don’t want to follow what your father does exactly, so as soon as I found another avenue, that’s where it really came down. I heard stuff like Woody Guthrie, which told me I could do this because they talked like I did. Even hip-hop had a lot to do with getting me into music.
Speaking of songwriting, it seems like a lot of songwriting material, not just for you but for a lot of musicians and artists comes most easily from having [troubled relationships with friends, lovers, and/or family members. Do you think that’s one of the key parts?
I’m really not sure. I know people that have perfectly good upbringings that were amazing songwriters. Joe Pug: he’s not a screwed-up, troubled kid. It’s not prerequisite, that’s for sure. Kids who have had tough upbringings are generally very sensitive, whether they hide it or not; there’s a certain view taken upon life that is not accessible any other way. It’s not like you’re out by the living in these way expensive townhouses next to a mall where everybody drives the same car; in a neighborhood where I grew up, grown people would have terrible fights in the street, their houses foreclosed on. It’s a lot more interesting than that bland world out by the mall.
You’ve talked in other interviews of maybe having kids yourself somewhere down the line. Would you actively encourage them to get involved in music?
I’d introduce it to them, for sure. I was around Waylon Jennings one time in my life and I was sitting down on a couch. I was about sixteen years old, playing a guitar. He walked out of the studio into the lounge and stopped right in front of me, reached out and grabbed the neck of the guitar, and just said, “Son, that thing will ruin your life.” I think in a lot of ways he was right [laughs] because I can’t do normal family things right now. It would be highly irresponsible of me — I’ve seen what happens when that comes around. I know that I need to be in a better, a different position, to not be working constantly to do something like that. Hopefully, we are smarter than our parents.
Have you ever collaborated with him?
I played guitar on a record real early on, El Corazon or one of those records. I was 15 years old and he said he was glad he could wrangle me ’cause I was already loose by that time. Then we collaborated when he made the Townes [Van Zandt] record [High, Low, and In Between] I played “Mr. Mudd and Mr. Gold” on half of the verses and we both played guitar. We butt heads like hell working together. I mean, we. Butt. Heads. Like. Hell. I play it too fast, he plays it too slow. “No, you got that word wrong.”
Merle Haggard
How did you recruit Ben to start playing with you in the first place?
He was 15 years old and he was playing better than the professionals I had with me. He graduated from high school early on, and was just a bright child, so I took him on the road with me.
Did you teach him guitar growing up or did he sort of discover it by himself?
He started messing with it when he was very young and he did it all himself. I couldn’t have done that.
What kind of records did you play while he was growing up in the house (besides your own, obviously)?
Hell, I don’t remember. We played all kinds of records [laughs].
When you brought him out on the road, did you have to adjust your behavior at all?
No, not all. When I took him, he was a pro. He knew what you’d think a guy at 50 years old would know. That’s how good he was. I didn’t teach him that. He learned it himself.
Did he play a big role on [Willie Nelson and Merle Haggard’s collaborative album] Django And Jimmie?
He played three or four times on the record. I’m not exactly sure where, but he can tell where he’s playing. The band is the A-team from Nashville. He’s not sticking out any place.
Did the other band members take kindly to him or did they feel a little bit threatened, like, here is this 15-year-old coming in and playing as well as they do?
No, they were all amazed with him. He has built up a following across the United States with professional players that are telling other kids, “I wish you played like Ben Haggard.” So, he has created his own thunder.
What have you learned from him as a fellow musician?
I’ve learned a lot of different techniques and things. He gets his lessons from the Internet, where you can go anywhere you want to and listen to anybody you want to. He’s got other friends who are guitar players, and some of it he passes onto me. [I’ve probably learned more from him than he has from me.
Do you think he’ll ever go to college or do you think he’ll just keep on this path?
I’d heard in an interview that he’d done — people wanting to know when he is going to make his first record, and do this, and do that — and he said he’d be totally happy to play guitar for me for the next hundred years. He said he didn’t really have anything else in mind.
When you go on the road together do you go on father/son bonding outings, or do you kind of keep to yourselves?
A lot of people don’t understand that this is a real job. We start out with a 2,570-mile trip on a bus, and if you had to drive 2,600 miles before you said your first word this morning, you wouldn’t have time to do much with your father, either.
I take it since you guys are leaving for tour on Father’s Day, you’re probably just going to be working on Father’s Day?
We’re leaving for this next tour in about 12 days, and we’ll leave Sunday here about noon. We’re in Northern California and we’ll drive all the way to Pennsylvania. There is only one father; I’m not slighted if they don’t give me a big dinner or nothing, so we’ll probably leave just about dinner time.
It sounds like a real family thing on the road with you.
Yeah, it’s pretty simple.
Mavis Staples
When did you first start singing with Pops?
The first my father started us singing and in 1949 and 1950, probably long before you were born. My father was singing with an all-male group, and these guys wouldn’t come to rehearsal so he got so disgusted. He went to rehearsal and there would be two, sometimes three (there were six guys in the group). Pops would be so disgusted. The last time he came home, he went into the closet and pulled out a little guitar he had bought at the pawn shop. The guitar didn’t even have all the strings on it, but Pops could make it sound good. He called us children into the living room, sat us on the floor in a circle, and told us we’re going to sing. He began teaching us to sing in voices that he and his brothers and sisters would sing in Mississippi, and when they heard our first record, they thought we were much older. We were kids!
My aunt Katie lived with us and one night, we were rehearsing, and she came through and she said, “Shucks, y’all sound pretty good. I believe I want you to sing at my church Sunday.” So we went to aunt Katie’s church that Sunday and we sang “Will The Circle Be Unbroken.” That started our singing career.
It must have been something to learn how to make music from your dad, and then put out his posthumous album [Don’t Lose This]. It seems kind of like a role reversal.
I feel like my father started this and I wouldn’t dare try to stop unless the Lord stopped me, if I lost my voice or something. My father was always a hands-on father. When we were little kids, before we started singing, Pops would take us to movies on Saturdays and take us to Sunday school. We would always wait in line to get his peanut brittle [laughs], and he would make us popcorn balls. He would take us riding in the car.
When my father had gotten sick, my sisters and I moved to his house to take to care of him. While we were there we decided to make the last record for the Staples Singers. We thought Pops should make this record. He’d say, “Mavis, book this studio.” I’d book the studio, and when we’d get ready to go, he’d go, “Mavis, you call and cancel that. I can’t make it today, I don’t feel good.” Then sometimes we would get to the studio and he’d have to lie on the couch. But we finally finished it and Pops called me one evening and said, “Mavis, bring the music up here. I want to hear it.” After a while, when I felt like it had played all the way, I went back and I said “How you like it, Pops?” He said, “Mavis, don’t lose this.” I said “I won’t lose it, Dad.”
When you were recording with Jeff and Spencer Tweedy, do you see yourself working with your father in their relationship, because they’re also a father and son playing together?
Yes! In fact, I was instrumental in them being together. Spencer’s mother didn’t want him to stay because he was going to college. We were all sitting there, and Spencer wanted to go tour with his father, and Susan said, “No, you have to go to school.” And I said, “Oh Susan, he can go back to school at any time. This is a chance for father and son to bond.” I didn’t have a big part in it, but I’m glad I spoke up right there. She said, “Well, okay, I’ll think about it.” I wouldn’t say the Staple Singers are the cause of it because Spencer’s been a musician since he was a tot. They had some tapes on him of beating drums when he was four or five years old. It’s a good omen that it did happen. We’re all family. The beat goes on!
So when you went on tour with Pops, did your mom not want you to go on tour with him?
My mother gave us to Pops because he loved being with his children. Back in the day, it was very seldom that a father just wanted be around their children. When we went on the road my father would have his room right next door to ours so he could watch over us. My mother would stay home and pray. She was our spiritual guidance. She was the best cook in the world. Different artists would come to Chicago, and they would call my mother and request what they wanted for dinner. Nancy Wilson, Aretha Franklin — brother Ray Charles, he loved her sweet potato pie. But my mom, you don’t want to hear her sing. I never heard anybody sing so off-key as my mother.
Kevin, Dantiez, and DaMarii Saunderson
When did you decide you wanted to become a DJ?
Dantiez Saunderson: Three years ago were the first serious words “I want to be a DJ.” I probably said it once or twice when I was two, like [high voice] “I wanna be a DJ,” but that was the first time it really mattered. I kind of fell into it. Obviously I was always around it and I vibed to it, but I was never actually involved. There was a competitive brotherly edge: I remember my earliest thoughts of becoming a DJ was my bro DaMarii saying actually saying he wanted to learn to DJ first, so I told my pops that less than a day — less than 20 minutes — after, “I want to make music.” So he kind of kick-started me off. I was like, “Oh no way, not before me!”
DaMarii Saunderson: For me, after so many years of catching different vibes, eventually I turned around and went to [Kevin] and said, “I want to try.” I had been traveling with him, too, seeing the different reactions of different crowds, their happiness and enjoyment; seeing different kinds of people involved of all races, ages, everything, rocking together.
So, you guys used to go on tour with Kevin?
Kevin Saunderson: They toured with me. I did this American tour where we went for seven different dates. It was [Moby’s] Area Festival One and Two, I remember. We went in a camper, the whole family was there camping. They started traveling with me around the world to different places, and that’s when they got serious into music.
Dantiez: There are pictures of me with Paul Oakenfold —
Kevin: — At like five, six. I probably kept their ears protected with headphones.
Dantiez: I don’t remember that. I was probably just a rebel, like, “I don’t want to listen through this, I want it full blast.” I don’t do earplugs.
Do you remember listening to techno in the house when growing up?
DaMarii: Non-stop. We didn’t know why. Eventually I figured it out, but at first I didn’t know what it was. Sometimes I might have thought it was loud noise… I couldn’t explain it.
Kevin: I’d be messing around sometimes in my home studio, but I pushed them more in sports at that time. DaMarii actually played pro [baseball], got drafted out of high school. That’s how much we were a baseball family. Dantiez, he was basketball. It’s got a lot of similarities with music: you still want to do your best, still want to practice, still want to make sure your stuff is sharp. Music was just my job, like going to work. They didn’t even know what was going on. I’d leave them back in the house, hanging around. I’d go off and work in the studio, be in my own world.
What was the first track you heard and thought, “This is what I want to do.”
DaMarii: It wasn’t a track, it was a DJ and a vibe, music throughout the night. There’ve been plenty of [Kevin’s] DJ sets, but one that really stood out was three or four years ago at WMC [Miami’s Winter Music Conference]. I saw Luciano and it blew my mind.
Dantiez: What’s that song that goes “Rain rain rain, rain rain rain, rain rain rain” —
Kevin: — That’s one of mine.
Dantiez: That’s not even one of the more popular ones. I remember so long ago, when I was in the car as a kid, I remember just jamming to it. I wouldn’t hear it on the radio or anything. I was like, “This is techno? This is the dope side of techno!” That was my first flash-forward into the future. I must have been ten, 12.
When you guys started making music, did you go to Kevin for advice?
DaMarii: When I went to him for advice, he told us to look it up on YouTube.
Kevin: I didn’t want them to jumping in; I didn’t want to waste my time, either [laughs]. I was like, I got a busy schedule, and there’s a lot cool you can find out on YouTube. Once you get serious about it, come talk to me. I also have lots of information: Books downstairs on learning how to record sounds, music theory. I put them to websites like Dubspot, macProVideo, so I said, “You have all the information right there. Feed off of that first and then get serious. You gotta put the work in.”
Dantiez: I moved to New York for school at Dubspot. That was cool. I learned a lot of technical stuff that I would have missed — that anyone could miss — a lot of basic stuff you should know like compression or effects. You should never stop learning.
What have you learned from your sons?
Kevin: New technology. They use and have every plugin. I’ll read something about it and get excited about it, or somebody will tell me about it, and I’ll have Dantiez and DaMarii show me. They already know the plugins, so that kind of helps. Some techniques, too, like Ableton and stuff like that. I learn that from them.