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The Atlanta Rhythm Section will be playing the Kent Stage on October 25.  The band had several Top 20 hits in the ‘70s including “Imaginary Lover,” “Spooky” and “So Into You.”  We had a chat with original lead singer Rodney Justo to talk about his career, playing with Roy Orbison and bringing ARS back to the Kent Stage 

 

Greg Drugan:  You were the original lead singer of The Atlanta Rhythm Section, what do you remember most about those early days of the band coming together?

 

Rodney Justo:  That is such a good question.  I’m gonna try and give you an honest answer as opposed to the first thing that comes to my mind.  I remember trying to get the place (the studio) built. When I heard we were going to have a studio, I thought we were going to have a big building with the name of the studio on the outside.  When they dropped me off, I was like, this is like an office! When you go to Nashville, all the recording studios are in stand alone buildings.  That’s what I thought we were going to have.  That’s one thing I think of.  I think about doing the work in the studio, putting down carpet, putting nails in the walls, putting in sound proofing. It was a lot of fun.  Then I think about how many hours we would spend in the studio.  We would show up at three o’clock in the afternoon and we would work until we couldn’t stand up. It might be 3 o’clock the next afternoon by the time we quit. I remember there was a sofa behind the control board and I fell asleep many times on that sofa. Now, I’m thinking about so many things!  It’s very peculiar. I remember singing to scratch tracks. I did all the singing for that first album. 

 

GD:  You have a lot of fond memories. You have a lot of stuff coming back to you. 

 

RJ:  Even the bad stuff.  I tell people all the time, once it’s over, nothing is really that bad. Sometimes bad stuff is good for you because it makes trips more memorable.  If everything goes perfect, you don’t remember it. You think about trips and things that you’ve done, there’s usually something that went wrong.
 

GD: ARS has always blended Southern rock with elements of pop and jazz. How did your vocal approach help shape that unique sound of Atlanta Rhythm Section?

 

RJ:  That’s a pretty good question because there was no southern rock when we got started.  There was the Allman Brothers but the Allman’s to me were a Blues band.  I know Gregg and Duane (Allman) forever, since I was twenty years old.  It was kind of a new approach.  I grew up wanting to be an R&B singer. I don’t have the voice for it. I love those old R&B songs, Sam Cook and Bobby Blue Bland, I love that kind of stuff but my voice is too clear. I think I’m singing with soul, but it doesn’t sound like it. (laughs) It’s peculiar because I’m a Spanish guy in a Southern Rock band. (speaks with a twang)  I can’t sing a song like this, it ain’t gonna happen. My singing is a little bit different than most of the southern guys. I sang the songs pretty much the way Bobby Buie wanted me to sing them.  Bobby was our producer, manager and primary song writer. He owned the studio, well he owned a fourth of it but it may as well have been his.
 

GD:  So ARS came out with the first album and eventually you left after a fairly short time and then you rejoined the band years later. the What was it like stepping away, and what inspired you to come back?

 

RJ:  Well, we're talking about three separate issues.  I stepped away the first time, it was no problem.  My daughter had some medical issues and like every stupid musician, I had no medical insurance. You got to pay for these things.  We were in California after a disrupted, would be Deep Purple tour. Deep Purple we never saw again after the first gig. We hadn’t worked live dates in two years.  I like singing, but I want to sing for humans. The Rolling Stones had pretty much quit working the road, I’m talking 1972. Buddy comes back and says “You won’t believe the deal I signed today.”  I thought, ‘Oh man, were going on the road with The Rolling Stones!’  He said, “I signed a deal with Hannah Barbara.” I said, “The Flintstones?” He said, “Yeah, there gonna have a new TV show Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kids and we’re going to do the music for it.  I said, “where does this little Rodney fit in?” He said, “I’ll put you down as a background singer.”  I said, “I didn’t come here to put down as a background singer for some cartoon show.”  That’s why I left. I had some opportunities to go to New York and that’s what I did.

 

Ronnie (Hammond) quit in 1983 so they asked me to come back. I said ok but that didn’t work out either. I said “boys, like Dizzy Gilespie once said, ‘this band should disband.’” Clude me out! Then I got a job, like most people do and did that for 28 years. I wanted to be a dad and raise my family. Plus, I had an overwhelming love for my wife. I wanted to be with my wife, I wanted to be a dad and a husband. I did it and I worked long enough to retire. Then I came back with the band in 2011. The band sounds better than ever.  People get mad when I say that but I know what the original band sounded like, I was in it! 

 

GD:  I saw you guys a couple years ago when you played in Warren (Ohio) with Pure Prairie League I believe and you guys did sound fantastic!

 

RJ:  Thanks!  That’s important to us. I remember that Warren date! I remember it mostly because it didn’t happen. It was supposed to happen and then it got cancelled.  I had a bunch of credit because I had already bought the (airline) tickets for the guys and the credits were just sitting there. I couldn’t wait to use them again.  (They played the makeup date in 2022.)

 

GD:  You worked with Roy Orbison in the past.  How did that opportunity come about?

 

RJ:  This goes back a long time when singers didn’t travel with their own band.  The first time I met him, he had a guitar player with him and his name was Frank Carter. His daughter is Deana Carter, one of the country artists. Roy was a very loyal kinda guy. For example, we worked every year in Canada. We would work in North Dakota, work our way north to Winnipeg and then work our way to Vancouver Island. When he had no money, there was a guy named Marlon Payne and he never forgot that guy for helping him out. So every year we would go to Canada and work at a reduced rate because that guy helped him out when he needed it. 

 

Anyway, Fred Carter was the guitar player and later on, I worked with him quite a few times.  My band would back him up. I had the band to back up any artist who came to central Florida. Those bands had mostly two or three hits. Del Shannon for example, he had maybe three hits at the time and he was a good guy. I got to know just about everybody in the business because my band worked with them.  I was young and I was singing pretty good and Roy liked the way I was singing.  When he finally got his band, Bobby Goldworth was his rhythm guitar player. Bobby had a lot of hits in the ‘60s and ‘70s but I took his place in Roy’s band. I was twenty years old and that’s how I got tight with Roy.  Roy was a big influence on me.  Not so much musically, but I got to see the world because of Roy. And I’ll never forget, it was the way he treated people. Roy was a sweet, sweet guy.  In fact, I told this story at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, they had a big thing honoring Roy. I worked with the Four Seasons and after the show, Frankie Valli and I went to a diner to get something to eat. I told him that this was my last day in the band. He said ‘what do you mean?’  I said, “I’m going to work with Roy Orbison.”  He said, “Rodney, you are going to work for the nicest guy in show business.” I had known him, but I didn’t know he had that kind of reputation.  I’ll never forget when he died, Roy was on the cover of Rolling Stone.  The first paragraph said “Roy Orbison was the sweetest guy in rock and roll.” I thought to myself, that is so wonderful for a guy to have that reputation through his entire life. That’s the way you’re supposed to live.  When you go out, someone should say something good about you. You should live, when you go in the hopes that someone says something nice about you in front of your family. I hope someone says something nice about me in front of my children.  That’s my goal. 

 

GD:  That’s a great goal!  His last show, his last performance was in Cleveland in December of ‘88.  I almost went, but it was a snowy night and I live in Akron and I didn’t want to drive up to Cleveland.  I so regret not seeing Roy Orbison. 

 

RJ:  He was a sweet guy.  Always sang great, always! Never complained.  He had heart issues and I had heart issues.  I ran into him at a party in New York.  So I run into him and say ‘hey, how you doing Oobie?”  He said “Hey, Rod how are you?”  We got to talking and I asked, “Roy, didn’t you have a heart attack?”  He said, “No Rod, I had a quadruple bypass.”  Meanwhile, he’s smoking these French cigarettes!  I’m thinking to myself, what in the hell is going on with this guy smoking those cigarettes?!  I quit smoking instantly after smoking for thirty years. That was it!  Smoking quit me, I knew I was never going to smoke again.  But here he is smoking these French cigarettes that stink! 

 

GD:  So you come back and get the band back together as they say, in 2011.  The fans that come to the shows today want to hear the classics and the hits from the ‘70s.  How do you keep songs like “So Into You” and “Imaginary Lover” fresh after performing them so many times?

 

RJ:  It’s difficult to explain.  You would think that I’m singing them the same way all the time and essentially I am. The notes are the same but the feeling is different because the audience is different every night. I’m not nervous about singing.  I’ve never been nervous. I know what I’m doing but every night, I hope they like us. Singing the same songs over and over, it doesn’t bother me. I think in some way I’m trying to improve it every night. I just try and make it better than I did it last night. 

 

GD:  That’s a great attitude to have!  For performing for 50 plus years, what continues to drive you as a performer? 

 

RJ:  I tell people all the time, it’s all about the people you meet.  I love after the show when we’re selling merchandise, people come up and talk to you. It’s so nice. (They say) “you know, I used to get laid to your band. Thank you!” You think you got laid? (laughs) These songs mean things to people. It’s our responsibility to connect them to the songs over a period of time.  I take it seriously and I don’t want to let people down.
 

GD:  So you’re going to be coming to the Kent Stage at the end of the month, I believe it’s October 25, what can fans expect from the show?

 

RJ:  Well, there’s seven songs that we have to do or else there gonna ask for their money back.  Gotta do “Spooky” gotta do “So Into You” gotta do “Imaginary Lover,” gotta do “Champagne Jam.”  We’ve got a pretty big catalog of songs, not that we do them all.  We just started doing one.  It was a good record but it didn’t do anything. Vocally and lyrically the song makes a lot more sense now than it did then.  It’s called “Crazy.”  It’s got harmony guitar parts, lyrics are good, it’s appropriate for our times. It worked out so we put that in the act.  We don’t play it every night, but we’ll probably do it (in Kent) depending on how long we play. We’ve had gigs where we just play two songs. 

 

GD:  We look forward to seeing you here in Kent, I believe you’re the headlining act so you have the whole show to entertain us.

 

RJ:  Isn’t someone else on that show?

 

GD:  I don’t believe, but now you’re making me double check. 

 

RJ:  Regardless, people show up, we’re gonna do the songs and do them respectfully. We’ll have a good time.  We’re doing things to each other and people can’t tell.  We’re pulling jokes on each other and doing things every night. 

 

GD:  You gotta have fun!

 

RJ:  That’s right! We’re doing our damnedest. 

 

GD:  Rodney, thank you so much for your time and I’m going to see you at the end of the month!

 

RJ:  I look forward to it! It was nice to speak with you and I like to talk about the band and what’s going on. Thank you for inviting me. 

 

Be sure to check out the Atlanta Rhythm Section on Saturday night, October 25 at the Kent Stage.  

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You can see the entire Zoom call below!