CLEVELAND: STEVEN VAN ZANDT GETS UP IN MID-SENTENCE. HE WALKS ACROSS HIS
HOTEL SUITE TO FLIP OVER THE KINKS' COMPILATION TAPE IN HIS BOOMBOX AND
RETURNS TO HIS SEAT.
He is touring with Bruce Springsteen as lead guitarist in the E Street Band
in the largest musical spectacle of the year. He is playing Silvio Dante,
the flamboyant strip club owner and low-level mobster in the acclaimed HBO
series The Sopranos. He has launched his own record label, Renegade Nation.
And on Tuesday, he will release Born Again Savage, his first album in a
decade, backed by U2's Adam Clayton on bass and Bonham's Jason Bonham on
drums.
``I have the best two jobs in the world -- the E Street Band and The
Sopranos,'' said Van Zandt, surprisingly animated the morning after the
typical three-hour marathon concert with the E Street Band earlier this
month. ``I've always been very picky about what I do, but I really love what
I do every day.''
And when Van Zandt, 49, didn't love what he did, he did something else that
he loved. When nothing interested him, the time he calls his ``Sahara desert
years'' between 1991 and 1997, he didn't do anything.
``I spent 30 years in a bubble trying to make music,'' said Van Zandt.
``Then I spent seven or eight years looking around and observing things,
trying to figure out where I fit in. I think I have found that now. Call it
destiny.''
`Jersey Shore' sound
Van Zandt found his destiny in an unusual series of unusual families.
His rise to stardom started in 1974 when he co-founded Southside Johnny &
the Asbury Jukes with Southside Johnny Lyon and in 1975 when he joined Bruce
Springsteen and the E Street Band at the end of the recording sessions for
Born to Run.
Known by the nickname ``Miami Steve,'' he quickly became an integral part of
the band, co-producing Springsteen and the E Street Band's biggest
successes -- The River in 1980 and Born in the U.S.A. in 1982.
``Little Steven (the nickname he adopted after he left the E Street Band) is
one of the architects of the `Jersey Shore' sound,'' said Robert Santelli,
director of education at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum. ``From
Born to Run onwards, he not only had a dramatic impact on Springsteen's
music, he also shaped the Jukes and led the Disciples of Soul, one of the
great bands to come out of New Jersey that never got its due.
``He is the most important to that sound right behind Bruce,'' said
Santelli.
Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul is the band Van Zandt amicably left
the E Street Band for in 1984. However, his new influential ``family''
wasn't musical. It was political.
He co-founded Artists United Against Apartheid in 1985, a move to help
pressure the South African government to recognize blacks there as equal to
whites. He also helped create the anthem and album Sun City.
His interest in politics around the world soon burned brighter than his
interest in music, though he continued to release albums.
``Politics became so all-consuming though,'' he said. ``The victories are so
few and far between.''
Van Zandt eventually grew tired of the political world, and he wanted to get
back to music.
``I really needed to reassess what I was doing,'' said Van Zandt. ``I set
out on a journey of discovery, and I learned everything I know basically in
the '80s. I became totally obsessed with politics, but I wanted to come back
to the music world.''
In 1991, however, in the midst of the grunge-rock explosion, Van Zandt
didn't really fit in.
``I came back to music and realized, `I don't belong any more,' '' he said.
``It was obvious, it was not going to be an easy time for me to relate to
the modern world.''
He produced a few records for some friends, but that wasn't enough.
In the '80s, he had started a five-album series built on themes -- the
individual, the family, the state, economics and religion. The fifth album
was written in 1989, but he couldn't find anyone to release it. By 1994, he
really wanted to put it out, so he started his own record company and an
Internet site to distribute it.
Then he was thrown for a loop.
``David Chase just called out of nowhere,'' said Van Zandt.
Chase, known for his work on well regarded TV shows like Northern Exposure
and I'll Fly Away, was creating a new show for HBO about a family of New
Jersey mobsters. He had seen Van Zandt's induction of the Rascals to the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum and thought he could work in the show.
Van Zandt had never wanted to be an actor, but he was interested in the
idea.
``I thought, `What the (expletive), I'm not doing anything,' '' he said.
``The show was fantastic, but I thought, `Nobody is going to watch this
thing.' ''
That turned out not to be true. This year, The Sopranos was a surprise hit,
and it led the nominations for this year's Emmy Awards.
``The set is like a family -- no pun intended,'' said Van Zandt. ``This
acting thing is something I really enjoy, though now I may be spoiled from
working with anyone else ever again.''
Tuned in to radio
Van Zandt often closes his eyes when he thinks, as if the answers he's
looking for are written on the back of his eyelids.
When he thinks about his future, he closes his eyes a lot.
His record company, Renegade Nation, could take off. So could his new solo
career.
What Van Zandt really wants, however, is his own radio station.
``I really feel strongly about radio,'' said Van Zandt, firing up another
Marlboro. ``Radio is in a lot of trouble right now. And it's too important a
part of the culture to just let go. Some things are more important than
business.''
Van Zandt's first order of business these days is the release of his Born
Again Savage album.
It is Van Zandt's first straight-ahead rock solo album, though its subject
matter -- being spiritual in a consumer-driven world, is still a bit heady.
``I've always worked very hard on the lyrics, but the music always comes
first,'' he said. ``If the music was even remotely sentimental, the album
could have been maudlin. I think the music works -- as a juxtaposition of
rock and religion.''
The album's first single, Salvation, is a bluesy rocker filled with
AC/DC-styled guitar riffs that looks at the search for the meaning of life.
The revved-up anthemic punk of Guns, Drugs and Gasoline features a sneering
vocal about society's real ills. The power ballad Saint Francis combines
beautiful music with a brutal post-apocalyptic view.
``(E Street Band drummer) Max Weinberg called me raving about how good it
is,'' said Santelli, of the Rock Hall. ``By all indications, this could be
Little Steven's return as an active recording artist.''
Van Zandt sees it that way, laughing as he said, ``Maybe I've actually timed
something right for a change.''
Regardless of the record's reception, Van Zandt is proud of what he has
accomplished. And he feels that could be the album's biggest selling point.
``Passion catches on,'' he said. ``You could make music to sell advertising.
But it is so much better if you do it out of passion, out of love. That
applies to everything.''
