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| Lazy Bones |
Matchbox strikes
Band pumped over Jagger
collaboration
By JANE STEVENSON -- Toronto Sun
TORONTO - Not every band can say its latest
single was co-written by Mick Jagger.
But pop-rock act Matchbox Twenty's new song,
Disease, is credited to Jagger and frontman
Rob Thomas.
Turns out they were originally working on the
tune for Jagger's 2001 solo album, Goddess In
The Doorway, but it didn't make the cut. And
Jagger only ended up helping out, finishing the
lyrics on the second verse.
"That name is huge, no matter what size it is,
when you see it sitting there, it jumps out at
you," explained Thomas, seated alongside
rhythm guitarist Adam Gaynor in a Toronto
hotel room last month to promote the band's
third album, More Than You Think You Are.
They have sold 20 million records since their
1996 debut, Yourself Or Someone Like You.
"I opened up Rolling Stone once and there was
an article saying we were nervous that we had
Mick Jagger pen us a song. And I was like,
'That's not fair.' Like, nothing against Mick
Jagger. He's a legend. But I did write the song
and it was my song."
For the new album, Matchbox Twenty divided
their time between Bearsville Studios in
Woodstock, N.Y. and The Hit Factory in
Manhattan.
Thomas joked that they began in upstate New
York in order to keep track of fun-seeking lead
guitarist Kyle Cook.
"We were walking through Woodstock and if
you go into the middle of the town square,
there's homeless teens, they're always hanging
out there. So Adam's walking through one day
and there's all these kids in a drum circle, and
he looks into the middle of it, and there's Kyle
with no shirt on."
Added Gaynor: "He was having the best time.
That's Kyle, pure Kyle. That's his new album,
pure Kyle."
Once Matchbox Twenty finish touring for More
Than You Think You Are -- they begin in North
America in the spring -- at least three members
will pursue solo projects: Cook with his other
band The New Left; drummer Paul Doucette;
and Thomas, who's written songs and
appeared on the albums of many other A-list
artists including Carlos Santana, Willie Nelson
and Marc Anthony.
In fact, Gaynor stressed there has been no
animosity within the band since Thomas scored
three Grammys for co-writting and singing on
Santana's huge 1999 hit, Smooth.
"He's a great singer, but he's a songwriter and
that's what he does. And it would be, like,
'Okay, so Rob, you have like seven months off
now and you can't write any more songs.' That
would be ridiculous. He happened to get into a
wonderful situation with the Smooth thing. And
that's like a blessing."
Thomas said the pinnacle of his
songwriter-for-hire experiences so far was
working on three songs for Nelson's album, The
Great Divide, which came out earlier this year.
"Every gig is based on the pure joy of wanting
to work with somebody that I've always
admired," he said. "We're all going to get older.
But only one of us is going to be Willie Nelson."
Too bad about their first meeting, then.
"I got on his bus and was just a drunk idiot,"
said Thomas. "I was just like, 'I love you! I love
you!' And so, a couple months later, I went to
another show of his, and I was much more
reserved and sober and he was really nice.
And that was the night that he said, 'Hey, we
need to do something together.' "
And, no, you don't get a contact high from
Nelson, who likes his pot.
"No! I go straight to the source when I'm with
Willie Nelson," said Thomas with a chuckle. "I
remember once we did Letterman together, and
I was just singing backup, and he was sitting on
the couch and somebody asked him, 'Man, we
saw you get off the bus there and it looked like
it was leaking oil or something there was so
much smoke just pouring off of it. What was
that?' " |
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| jb |
This is a complete lack of gratitude..but thomas' wife is one hottie... |
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