Ringo Starr, musician: I never play music alone

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Hello, I'm BBC reporter Regan Morris.

And this is the interview from the BBC World Service.

The best conversations coming out of the BBC,

people shaping our world from all over the world.

If you're not a little bit afraid, then you're not paying attention.

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Do not make that boat crossing.

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Being born in America, feeling American,

but having people treat me like I'm not.

We're more popular than populism.

For this interview, I met musician Ringo Starr

at the Sunset Marquis Hotel in West Hollywood,

a rock star hangout just behind the sunset strip.

Born in Liverpool, England during the Second World War in 1940,

Ringo, real name Richard Starkey,

found fame as the drummer of the legendary British band,

The Beatles, widely regarded as one of the most influential acts

in music history.

After joining John Lennon, Paul McCartney,

and George Harrison in 1962,

the four-piece band became a global pop music sensation

through hits such as She Loves You,

Yesterday, Penny Lane, and Hey Jude.

They also released multiple studio albums

and starred in five major motion pictures.

Although the band split up in 1970,

their legacy continues to live on.

They remain one of the best-selling musical acts of all time

over half a century later,

alongside the likes of Elvis Presley and Michael Jackson.

And such was his and the band's cultural impact that Ringo,

one of two surviving members of The Beatles

received a knighthood at Buckingham Palace

for his services to music in 2018.

But despite achieving seemingly all that can be achieved

in a music career,

the 85-year-old seems to be showing no interest in retirement.

He's just released his 22nd album as a solo artist.

And Life as a solo artist has proved to be something

of a cultural shift for Ringo

when compared to his time in the group,

where songwriting duties were typically undertaken

by John Lennon and Sir Paul McCartney.

At the very beginning when I started writing,

I'd bring my songs in and I'd say,

I've got this song,

do whatever, and they'd all be just laughing hysterical.

Because all I'd done is rewritten another song.

I just changed the words.

And so it took me a while to get through that moment

into writing my songs, you know.

And in the end, I started chaining out really good.

Now you're a prolific songwriter.

I am.

And I like to write with people too.

I like to play with people.

Welcome to the interview from the BBC World Service

with Ringo Star.

Before our conversation began,

I had to check something important.

I've been calling people of the BBC asking

and I have to call you Sir Ringo by etiquette.

But...

No, Sir Richard.

Sir Richard, I'm just going to call you Ringo.

Oh, that'll do.

No, no, just call me Ringo.

Okay.

I'm working.

You're not from the BBC.

I am from the BBC.

I'm one of the Americans.

Yeah, this is the BBC.

Oh my God, that's a surprise.

I feel nervous.

Very nervous.

A British national treasure

and the American is here to do it.

Ringo, thank you so much for doing this.

It is such a genuine honor to meet you

and I love your new album.

Ah, I can go now then.

Thank you.

Thank you, yeah.

So the long, long road,

it was recorded in LA and Nashville,

but it feels a lot more Nashville.

Is that fair?

Yeah, no, that's absolutely true.

I mean, it's a country album

and there's no better place to do a country album

than countryland, Nashville.

And what happened was that

when T-bone and I came to the moment

of I asked him to produce the record

and he told me that lots of songs.

He puts, you know, we pick the songs between us.

He sent me some songs,

I'll say I'll do those three,

but not that too, whatever.

And I wanted to do this one that I'm co-writing.

And he'd say, okay.

And, you know, we sort of got on like that,

putting it together.

And then he, so he, you know,

we'd pick a song, any song you want.

And he put some meat on it in Nashville.

But, you know, it sort of, he knows a lot of players there

and he has a groove.

He loves to use, so it's like a band.

And then he'd send it to me

and I'd play drums and sing the song.

And then we'd send all that back to Nashville.

And he put it all together

and add stuff on top of that, you know?

And you collaborated with Cheryl Crow

and she was great with Metz.

Cheryl a long time ago in Monte Carlo.

They used to have a music festival there

and she was it and I gave her the awards.

But, you know, it bumped into many times

on the road she'll come and see us.

That we went to see her.

She's a really nice girl.

And, you know, and Molly's great too

and, you know,

barely strings and just all the players on it.

You know, that's T-bones end.

He knows them all.

I know all of them, but he knows them.

And it caused the recording in Nashville.

They just pop in and play.

It's great.

And you just said you would play the drums,

but you're going on tour.

Who's your drummer on tour?

No, I'm the drummer.

You're the drummer.

I was going to say that.

And next to me is the drummer.

Because for the songs I come down

and sing from the front of the stage,

we need a drummer.

And Greg Bisson has a great friend.

He's a great player.

And so he takes over.

Well, we play together

through any of the other songs,

Collins or Luke's, you know.

And then when I go down front, he's the drummer.

I imagine that's a hard job being a Ringo Starr's drummer.

No, we have a lot of them.

We play together, which is great.

So it gives the band a bit of meat.

I believe you were talking to Rick Rubin

on his podcast about how you never play alone.

You only play music with other people, isn't it?

I do.

I once, I went up, you know,

like the old movies into the back room

and played the drums.

And all the neighbors

get off.

When I was a lad.

And I think that's what did it.

And I've never,

but if you play piano based guitar, I don't care.

It's saxophone.

I'll play with you all night, you know.

I'll play with, that's how I did it.

I made all my mistakes on stage in

Eddie Clayton, the group, Rory, the Beatles.

You know, not the same mistakes.

There's things you have to find.

And that's how I've done it.

And I tell all my grandkids,

get an event, get a few of your schoolmates together.

You know, just

they're practicing and playing by themselves.

Get with people.

T-bone Burnett, the legendary producer

who you've just made this album with.

This is your second album.

Country album with him.

He describes your sound as Texas.

I know.

I know, but you know what's it mean?

I, well, I didn't realize.

He says that is this true

that you long before the Beatles,

back in Liverpool, your band was,

was it called the Texas Ravers, the Raving Texans?

I was never in the Texans.

So this is now, okay.

He told me that I said,

I don't think that's me.

But, you know, you've got to let him get on with this.

I see.

So that's not true.

You weren't in a Texas country.

I would know.

I don't remember any band called the Texans.

You know, Jerry and the pacemakers

and a lot of other bands at that time in Liverpool

was a great time for musicians.

I think a lot of it came because

the call of it stopped.

You know, if you were born after September,

I think it was

1939.

You didn't have to, there was no call up for you.

And so...

To go to the military.

I left the factory and became a musician.

Didn't have to go to war.

Yeah.

One of the songs on the album is that beautiful cover

the Carl Perkins song.

Oh, Perkins, yeah.

You've had a real affinity with him.

I did.

I did.

You know, I loved him and I loved,

you know, a lot of other players.

And Jerry Lee Lewis always wanted to sing like Jerry Lee,

but that never happened.

And

already Cochran that time, Johnny Ray,

even further back,

Frankie Lane, even further back.

And, you know, because as you grow,

and if you listen to more different music,

you know, you all go through the Jake and

Jamaican moment and reggae and, you know,

I just love music, really.

You know, I'm not like, oh, only that.

I'm not, but you, you have loved country music for quite some time.

And when you were with the Beatles,

I believe you only wrote two songs.

And one of them was a country song kind of.

Don't pass me by.

Can you?

Well, we did it in our country fashion.

Yeah.

I'm thinking it would have been more country now

if we'd done it with people.

It was a country for the Beatles.

Don't pass me by.

Don't make me cry.

Don't make me blue.

Yeah.

Can you dig us back to what it was like

introducing that song to the band

or playing it for the first time?

Well, that was, you know, way, way into the band.

At the very beginning when I started writing,

I'd bring my songs in.

And I'd say, I've got this song,

do you know, whatever, whatever.

And they'd all be just laughing as serifil

because all I'd done is rewritten another song.

I just changed the words.

And so it took me a while to get through that moment

into writing my songs, you know.

And then I started telling it out really good.

Not now you're a prolific songwriter.

I am.

And I like to write with people,

till I like to play with people.

And, you know, right now,

it's a friend of mine, Bruce Sugar,

who, you know, when if I put the drums on these tracks,

he's the engineer because he's the studio in my house.

That's where it is.

And, you know, that's how it is.

And you recently played at the at the Grand Old Opera.

I believe for the first time.

And yeah, that was the amazing night.

I had I played the rhyming with the old stars several times.

And that was, you know,

every time just before I went on, it was like,

this is the rhyman.

You know, if you're like country music,

this is the rhyman.

And then the invite me to play at the Grand Old Opera.

Which is great because they have a huge piece of the rhyman stage

at the Grand Old Opera.

So you're standing at the rhyman really.

And there, there, the stars to play.

And it was a great night because it was like five or six bands.

And we already had three numbers.

And there was a great audience.

And yeah, I'm at the Grand Old Opera.

They made me an honorary resident.

And the National Musician Union,

let me join them.

So it was just great giving and loving.

And you know, because the last time I was there with Pete Drake,

a legend in their time,

a long time ago.

Was that, is there anything like that?

I mean, that sounds like a real bucket list moment.

Is there any place you haven't been to?

No, that was an incredible.

Even the rhyman was a, what a, wow, the rhyman.

Ring with the rhyman was big enough.

And then after years,

just last year, off to last year,

then the Grand Old Opera invited me.

And that was like, oh, God.

You know.

But is there anywhere you haven't played, I guess,

or that any experience?

It wasn't an experience.

It was like, because you understood it.

If you followed music,

but the rhyman was the place.

And now it's the Grand Old Opera, which is the place.

And I'm standing on it.

You know, that's incredible.

You're listening to the interview from the BBC World Service.

Ringo Starr is charming.

He seems surprised that I'm not a Brit.

That the BBC has sent an American to interview a British national treasure,

a global icon.

I'm a little nervous about that as well.

We're conducting the interview in a bungalow

amid the gardens of the Sunset Marquis Hotel.

This is where rock royalty comes to escape,

and to party.

We're steps away from the whiskey a go-go,

and the Roxy, iconic rock and roll clubs on the sunset strip.

When the Beatles came to LA in the 1960s,

it was at the peak of Beatlemania.

And they were often mobbed by fans.

There are photos of rock stars all over this hotel,

including Ringo Starr, who I can hear laughing

as I paste the lush green gardens ahead of our interview.

Ringo, in his trademark dark sunglasses,

black jacket, and a white star on his black t-shirt,

goes out of his way to make me feel at ease.

Peace and love, he says.

The soothing catchphrase of an 85-year-old music legend

who looks, moves, and sings like a much younger man.

He laughs easily, burst into song often,

and flashes a peace sign for the cameras.

And although he still got that Liverpool accent,

his vibes are pure peace and love, California.

This is a poison-dart frog.

For decades, so David Attenborough has shaped

how we feel about the natural world.

But for a long time, there was one topic he never talked about.

We didn't believe that we could change the climate

by human beings.

I'm Immanuel Jochi.

I'm Kai Wright.

And on the next episode of Big Lives,

as David Attenborough prepares to celebrate his 100th birthday,

we explore how he took on the mission of his life.

Listen to Big Lives wherever you get your podcasts.

Okay, let's return to my conversation with Ringo Starr.

Country music now is very cool.

Even Beyoncé is making country music.

It's definitely happening.

Yeah.

What was it back in the 1950s and 1960s,

though, in Liverpool?

Like, how on earth did you get any country music?

Liverpool, as everybody who lives there knows,

because it was a port,

we started with, you know, in a lot of families,

the one of the sons was in the merchant navy,

and they were bringing the records over.

And because that's when it started to get big, you know, late 50s.

And it's still known right now as Liverpool is the capital of country music in England,

because they had English bands coming over and just, I think Liverpool went for a country.

They love country.

I know I loved it.

I can't speak for anyone else, but, you know,

that's just how it was from Liverpool.

Now, I used to love listening to country music, because

it always had an emotional side to it, you know, and so you'd feel that, you know,

it was, I make fun of it by saying it was like the wife's left, the dog's dead,

and I don't have any change for the jukebox.

I'm down, I don't have no money for the jukebox, you know.

So I don't, it's just a thing for me, but I love the blues.

You know, I tried to emigrate to Texas to be by lightning Hopkins.

It was just, he got to me.

I was with his voice and his playing.

He was the blues guy that got to me.

You tried to emigrate there to Jews?

We did?

Yeah.

You've had the story.

We went down to the American, not embassy in Liverpool, whatever it was,

and we wanted this guy and I to emigrate in the gave us forms.

They gave us a list of factories we could apply to, because we came out of a factory, you know.

And, and then we went back and they gave us, well, okay, yeah, that's good.

Now fill in these forms, more forms, I'm 18.

You know, you have your like attitudes when you're 18, and I ripped them off and never went.

It's good for the world.

Yeah, well, you don't know, so out of that came this, you know what I mean?

We laugh at that on, you know, in the band, if I had got to Texas, things would have been great.

Different, different, and now you live in Los Angeles, supposed to be.

I live in, well, I've been, you know, I've had a house in LA since the 70s.

A couple of rented houses and apartments.

And I've just, I've always loved the attitude of LA.

Besides, I love the heat and the light.

It's just been a good place for me.

It's a very peace and love kind of place.

Well, yeah, very peace and love.

And I remember when we came in the 60s, we played, you know, we could, it was like hippie time.

And it was so great. The sunset strip was great.

And it reminded me of Chelsea in England.

You know, whenever it was changed in England, all of these designers came out and closed

changed and, you know, and a lot of them were just living in apartments in King's Road and

were making it at home. And I think that's, that's shares is one of them made at home.

So it was a huge attitude, spiritual change going on in, in the world, musically, and attitude,

you know, was changing. I was going to ask you some things if they're true or not.

Is it true you coined the phrase hard days night?

Yeah. Is it true that you've never had pizza or a curry?

This is getting bigger than, yeah, I've never had a pizza or a curry. I have never had.

Because allergies, you have allergies to it.

I have, yes, things make me, yeah.

Is it true you would, oh, I'm sorry.

Is it true that you were the first beetle to try marijuana?

Yeah, I took the first puff.

And your life has been so well documented. There's a movie coming out about you very soon,

another one.

The one that's coming out about Dion?

The very beginning of playing you.

Coming about George and Paul, Paul Moose, the man is crazy.

Yeah.

Have you met Barry Keegan?

I did, yeah, I met him here actually, he came over to the house before he started.

And we just hung out and said hi and, you know, be friendly, very nice guy.

What did he want to know from you and what about you?

Well, it wasn't like one of those and how did you pick up your fork and, you know,

which hand you use to pick your nose, you know, it was none of that.

It was just hanging out, saying hi.

And I think there's enough footage out there for him to get to know me, you know what I mean?

You'll see the attitude.

You know, it's that no one I'm excited.

I did, you know, go to the set.

The set is incredible, you know, because they're doing those full movies.

And I had a bit of trouble because I was thinking documentary.

And the not documentaries, they are films.

And I had to get used to that, you know, because they know that did not happen then.

Oh, this did that.

No, this is your story.

And, you know, so we'll see.

The four movies.

Are you worried about the box office?

Who you always said you were the second favorite Beatle or something?

Are you worried about it?

When you say I get more box office?

No, I must have said that a long time ago.

I mean, well, putting, you know, the four lives in those years, in their own space.

You know, I'd like it to be one of those new theaters where they have like four or five

actual cinemas in them.

Let's put us all on, you know.

All at once?

Yeah, that would be great.

Well, you could do it in the night then.

You know, like 11 o'clock, you see John, you know,

three o'clock, you see Paul, six, you see George, Midnight, you see Ringo, whatever, you know.

That would be cool to sit there, bring sandwiches.

Thank you for listening to the interview.

If you enjoyed this conversation, you can find many more episodes of the interview wherever you

get your BBC podcasts, including chats with other music icons such as Stevie Wonder,

Patty Smith, and Pete Townsend.

Until the next time, bye for now.

This is a poison dart frog.

For decades, so David Attenborough has shaped how we feel about the natural world.

But for a long time, there was one topic he never talked about.

I didn't believe that we could change the climate by human beings.

I'm your vinyl Jochi.

I'm Kai Wright.

And on the next episode of Big Lives, as David Attenborough prepares to celebrate his 100th birthday,

we explore how he took on the mission of his life.

Listen to Big Lives wherever you get your podcasts.

I'm Ivana Davidovich, a BBC journalist.

For the past two years, I've been following a revolutionary project to locate absentee

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These are British fathers and the children as of birth, as of right, are British citizens.

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Seeking retrace for these children.

World of Secrets, searching for soldier dad.

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