If you did a double-take at the officer with a Stratocaster on this issue’s cover, you’re not alone. Internationally famous guitarist Stuart Smith of Heaven & Earth and Black Star Records, who is also well known for past work with Keith Emerson and Joe Lynn Turner, is also a Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) Special Reserve Officer.
To raise funds for the LAPD’s Memorial Foundation, which “provides grants for widows and orphans of officers killed in the line of duty, and for many other catastrophic occurrences within the LAPD family” at no cost to taxpayers (www.lapmf.org), Smith has been organizing the June 13th Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation Benefit Concert at The Avalon. He took a short break to tell All Access Magazine how the concert came together and what he and Heaven & Earth have in store for 2007.
AAM: Since this issue hits the streets the day after the Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation Benefit Concert, let’s talk about all the planning and preparation that’s gone into the event.
Stuart Smith: I’ve done a lot of shows, and normally I just turn up, somebody hands me my guitar and a beer and I go on and play… But this time I’m in charge of the whole thing.
AAM: What sparked your interest in the LAPD, and in doing this benefit?
SS: Years ago we [Heaven & Earth] played a July 4th concert at the Warner Center in Woodland Hills for 30,000 people. We’d heard these events often have people creating bootleg recordings and then selling them, so decided to donate the show’s profits to the Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation, hoping that the cops would move the bootleggers on. I got to meet the people involved and found out a lot about the Foundation. They invited me to play in their annual Los Angeles Police-Celebrity Golf Tournament 3 years ago, and I had a great time and became friends with a lot of the cops on the street. I even won the tournament one year! Then one day I was coming out of a grocery story and there was a robbery. A couple came out and the woman ran away but the man started punching the store’s security guard all over the parking lot. I’ve been doing martial arts (Shotokan) for 11 years, so I jumped in to help and put the guard’s cuffs on the guy. Word got back to the LAPD and we talked about me becoming a Reserve Officer while I’m still fit enough. But they wanted me to cut my hair – and I can’t do that! It’s part of my image. So I have the rare honor of being a Special Reserve Officer.
AAM: What kind of commitment is it?
SS: I usually devote 1 day a week to the LAPD, but right now with planning the benefit it’s more like 24/7. It’s a huge undertaking – not just getting performers, but hotel rooms, security, sponsors…. Whether or not you believe that fighting a war on foreign soil improves our everyday safety, the one thing I think we can all agree on is that home defense begins at home, and the men and women in law enforcement are our first line of defense. These people aren’t superheroes, they’re regular people like you and me, except that every day when they go to work there’s a chance they won’t be coming home again – and all over something so simple as a traffic stop. As a Special Reserve Officer I was up with air support over L.A. on a Saturday night, and every 5 seconds there was a stabbing here, a stolen car there. It’s mind-boggling what they have to deal with on a daily basis. I feel they don’t get the respect they deserve, and in many ways it’s a thankless job. But at the same time it’s very rewarding, and it’s a great community. More people should take the time to get to know their local police. Volunteer your time, and get involved with them, because in this day and age I think that’s where our ultimate safety is going to be – which sounds strange coming from a bad boy rock musician!
AAM: You’ve participated in several benefit concerts over the years.
SS: I helped organize a benefit at the Key Club for Hurricane Katrina victims. We raised a lot of money for a good cause. I wanted to do something similar for the Memorial Foundation. Paul Rodgers [Free, Bad Company, Queen] very generously offered to bring his full band and totally donate his time. Among many sponsors, Fender, Gibson and Star Power Guitars have donated guitars to auction off, along with Polanti watches. Taser was the first call I made and they immediately agreed to sponsor. KLOS DJ Cynthia Fox volunteered to host the silent auction after our original host, KLOS’s Jim Ladd, realized he was already committed elsewhere. Brian of KLOS’s “Mark and Brian” plays in their golf tournament too (he also won this year but I think he cheated) and he’s been pushing the show. John Lyons of The Avalon is a great supporter of the Memorial Foundation and donated the club – which is in LAPD’s jurisdiction – for the night. I asked for LAPD volunteers to be escorts, provide security, and handle merchandise, and we were literally besieged with offers. They’ve all grown up listening to Paul Rodgers. ThundHerStruck has done benefits with us before, and their singer Dyna is involved in the LAPD and volunteers her time to crime scene investigations. And as you know All Access Magazine also signed on as a sponsor. If the benefit’s a huge success, we’ll do one next year that’s even bigger.
AAM: What will Heaven & Earth’s lineup be, and what will be in the set?
SS: The lineup is the one we’ve had for the past year or so: myself, drummer Richie Onori, bassist Joe Petro, keyboardist Stu Simone, and singer Keith St. John [Montrose]. It’ll be a mix of old and new material: as much new as possible, with some old favorites. We’ll have a special guest, Persian/Armenian superstar Andy Madadian, sing an old Deep Purple song with Keith, “Mistreated.” Andy would be arrested, just for his music, if he went back home. So his presence is appropriate to represent the freedom and the type of law enforcement we have in this country. There’s a lot of time constraints with 3 full bands and an acoustic set by guitarist Mark Castrillon.
AAM: I hear Heaven & Earth is working on a new album.
SS: We’ve laid down some tracks. We have our own recording studio [The Wine Cellar Studios], so we can lay the tracks down first, then record them live. We’re taking a lot of time crafting the songs. Keith [St. John] is quite a perfectionist and he constantly wants to rework the songs, which for me can be very frustrating because I’m not used to working that way, but ultimately we come out with some very good material. We have a great writing partnership.
AAM: So there’s no release date yet?
SS: We’re talking about headlining a European tour, and we’d use the tour to work out the material a bit before recording it. Heaven & Earth is very popular in Europe.
AAM: Why do you think it’s so common for U.S.-based bands to make it big in Europe or Japan, but have trouble getting radio play in the States?
SS: In Europe I think they tend to go for the music first, while fame has become a currency in this country. I’ve been trying to get Heaven & Earth a spot on the late night talk shows to play, and it’s frustrating. In the old days the music industry was run by people who were in it because they loved music. Now it seems run by accountants. If you throw enough money at an artist – regardless of talent – they take off. Even on classic rock radio you hear the same 200 songs over and over again, and people are tired of it. There’s a lot of bands bringing out good, new material. Toto had a new album a few years back that was really good. Who heard any songs from it on the radio?
AAM: It makes you wonder what we’ll be looking back on as “classic” 20 years from now.
SS: On MySpace there are a lot of really good artists, but when you scroll down to see their label it says “unsigned” or “none.” Yet there’s some real “fashionable” garbage signed to major labels. It’s down to money: to pay radio promoters, to advertise in the right publications, to pay record stores $3000/month to put your song on a listening station, to pay even more to have your poster up.
AAM: Is that what motivated you to start Black Star Records?
SS: We create music because we love it. Heaven & Earth was signed to a European label whose “accounting” was horrendously dishonest. So we started up our own label, Black Star Records, in 2004. We wanted to be masters of our own destiny, and put the kind of promotion that we want into our projects. In February of this year we released a DVD, “The Making of Heaven & Earth featuring Stuart Smith.” We had a lot of footage from recording the last album, and had interviewed everyone along the way. We signed Howard Leese [Paul Rodgers’ drummer, and Heaven & Earth producer] for his solo album, which will be out this year. We’re planning to sign some major artists, and piggyback younger artists onto them. We really want to help the artists.
AAM: It’s great that you have the desire and resources to make a sorely-needed impact on the music industry’s bands and fans. What are some other ideas being kicked around?
SS: Downloading has completely turned the music industry on its head. You used to buy a cassette that would eventually wear out. Now you can download or copy a digital version that will last forever. It’s tough on the artists. We’re looking for a way to set up our own downloads to keep the money going directly to the artists. And the industry is also changing from bands surviving off record sales to bands making more money from touring – live concerts.
AAM: Speaking of live concerts, AAM wishes you a sold out Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation Benefit Concert!
For more information on Stuart Smith and his current projects, check out www.heavenandearthband.com and www.blackstarrecords.com. Find out more about the Los Angeles Police Memorial Foundation at www.lapmf.org.
