Pushkin

This is Broken Record, liner notes for the digital age. I'm Justin Richmond.

Hey y'all, we'll be back on our normal schedule next week, dropping new episodes on Tuesday.

But we wanted to share with you in episode we didn't get a chance to run last year, but still really enjoyed.

Its Bruce Hadlam speaking to singer-songwriter, pianist, 90s alt rocker, Ben Foltz.

Foltz is best known for the music you put out with the Ben Foltz 5 in the mid 90s, particularly for the song Brick,

which was a bit of a surprise hit in 1998.

It was also known for its on-stage antics, like smashing a priceless Steinway piano on National TV in Australia,

that got him dropped from a Steinway endorsement.

Foltz talks with Bruce about the genesis of these angsty stage antics, and also about the making of the song Brick,

and other anecdotes gleaned from the book he wrote about his life and craft, called A Dream About Lightning Books.

Enjoy this episode. It was taped pre-pandemic, so Bruce and Foltz are in the same studio, and we'll see you next week.

You mentioned in the book that you are both a hard worker and completely undisciplined.

Right. Now, you've written an enormous number of songs, your last record house, you had a piano concerto, you've written different kinds of music.

What was it like writing a book as opposed to writing songs?

Interestingly, I found discipline writing the book that I hadn't found in writing songs.

And I think it actually came down to something I had read Stephen King said about, if you want to write a book,

sit down in the morning, shut the door, and write two to three thousand words.

I should get you up to about two o'clock, go get lunch, and forget about it.

And I thought, oh, he knows how to write a book, I'll just do that.

And I went to my office, shut the door, and I wrote for three or four hours like Stephen King said.

Now, I've never written music that way, so that is discipline that I found.

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