Gino Vannelli: ”Wild Horses” (It’s Gino Time at GFP!)

The original version of "Wild Horses" is difficult to find. Outside of the music video on YouTube, it's not available on any streaming service or for sale electronically. Stranger still, Wikipedia has no entry for the song or its corresponding album. This is a shame - "Wild Horses" is an incredible song. In this episode, we give you all the information (and more) that we could find out on the song and video, from mystical experiences in Peru to a shaman named Jamie in Arizona and ties to the Getty family. Sit back and enjoy. It's Gino time!

Helpful links:

Original Video

Mixtape

Boom 97.3 Interview (Behind the Vinyl)

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Here is our Spotify playlist featuring every song we've featured.

Our theme music is by the incredibly talented Ian McGlynn.

Transcript:

Frank:
[0:00] So today on Bill and Frank's Guilt-Free Pleasures, we're going to talk about Gino Vannelli's "Wild Horses." We're going to discuss his determination in getting a record deal, his connection with a shaman named Jamie, and also his connection with the Getty dynasty.

Bill:
[0:17] But before we get to that, cut to the theme music.

Frank:
[0:22] Take it away, Ian McGlynn.

Bill:
[0:44] In this episode, we are pushing Frank Pearson to the limit. Because today's song is a mysterious song.
It's a song that seemingly has disappeared from all streaming services. It is difficult to find any information on.

Frank:
[1:07] Yeah, there's no Wikipedia page specifically for this song. There's no song facts page for it. I have not been able to go to either of my main resources to look up information for this song.

Bill:
[1:21] And I realized this as I was doing my deep dive and I thought wow they even scrubbed the album from Wikipedia
So today's episode is on Gino Vannelli's "Wild Horses."
So turn up the heat, pour yourself a glass of red wine.

Frank:
[1:39] Sit back and enjoy.

Bill:
[2:04] As we mentioned, this is a challenge.

Frank:
[2:08] Oh my goodness, like I have so many tabs open on my computer right now and each of them has just a little bit of a nugget of information for the song or for Gino Vannelli and I mean I'm going to,
be honest I'm probably not going to refer to any of them I'm just going to make it all up as I go
along but yeah researching this was a little bit of a little bit of a chore for me I'm glad I had a little bit of time off over the holidays so I could dedicate some time to it.

Bill:
[2:38] So why don't you give us a little history of Gino Vannelli anyways that you could find anyways on as far as the artist goes.

Frank:
[2:45] Gino Vannelli was born to his parents, has brothers and sisters, and is a musician.
Oh wait, it's only brothers, isn't it?

Bill:
[2:53] You sure he's got any sisters?
Yeah, okay. All right. Maybe maybe I'll have to take over,
He's coming out of Montreal Quebec and so we also featured another musician at a Montreal named Andy Kim, who also had a similar backstory in that they went to the big city in the States.
For Andy Kim, it was New York. For Gino Vanelli, I believe it was LA?

Frank:
[3:20] It was Hollywood actually. So this is one of the things that I actually found, I think it was a YouTube interview that he did.
They booked tickets to go to Hollywood and they get there and they realize they're in
Hollywood Florida, not Hollywood California.
He went with his brother Joe. And this is according to Gino Vannelli in a YouTube interview.
This is something that I find interesting too, because some musicians have varying like origin stories or Genesis stories that that changed from interview to interview. So you kind of wonder which which is true and which is a bit of an embellishment.
Anyways, according to Gino, he and Joe had tickets booked to go to Hollywood, but end up in Hollywood, Florida and then have to book a separate trip from Florida to California.
they end up in Hollywood proper.

Bill:
[4:13] And while they're in Hollywood,
he's being supported by his family. His parents are good to him. Like in terms of the story,
his mother was sending money. But what ended up happening is his mother sent money to Hollywood, Florida instead of Hollywood, California. Was that what happened?
Yeah. So I don't know if they went to, I mean, I didn't hear the story about them landing in Hollywood, Florida, but his mom had sent money
to Hollywood, Florida and they were stuck. They had no money. They'd been trying to make things work.
And he was kind of at the end of things. as far as making his dream happen.

Frank:
[4:46] Yeah, it was down to like his last $5.

Bill:
[4:48] Yeah, so he went into a church, he said, and sat in this church sometime in the early morning hours. It was open, sat in there, and just, I think he fell asleep.
He said the quietness of the place, not so much some sort of mystical thing. He was really quick to say that, even though we'll talk about his spirituality later, I'm sure, but he said the quiet sort of space helped him to know what he needed to do.
And then he went over to where Herb Alpert's studio was.
And he sat there while the guard who is slightly injured,
so he couldn't run so fast, but the guard's like, you stay there.
And Gina Vannelli said, I'm allowed to stay here. It's on public property.
And he said, don't you dare try to run over and talk to anybody.
And Gina Vannelli's like, yep, yep, yep. And then he sees Herb Alpert come out and then he darts across the parking lot to get to him.

Frank:
[5:41] And Herb Alpert, sorry, is one of the co-owners of A&M Records.

Bill:
[5:45] Exactly, and so the guard is saying, damn you, he's trying to get him, pulls out his gun apparently, because Herb Alpert's wife has been stalked.

Frank:
[5:51] Oh, jeez.

Bill:
[5:55] Or something like that, so Herb Alpert's wondering what's going on. So in this moment, Herb Alpert's thinking this could be the stalker, Gino Vannelli's taking his life in his hands, and then he just says to Herb Alpert, I have all these songs, I want to try these things.
And Herb Alpert says to the guard, like, hey Joe, relax, it's okay.
And the guard is so angry.
And he says to Gino, come back in half an hour. And so Gino Vannelli comes back in half an hour,
plays the songs for him. And then Herb Alpert said, welcome to A&M Records.

Frank:
[6:27] Yeah, and it's similar to the Andy Kim story where he had a similar instance. He was in New York, but same thing, regular exec just waited, waited, waited, and finally kind of ambushed the exec.
And I will apologize that my confusion with the Hollywood Florida versus Hollywood California
story in my typical research fashion, I was, you know, 100% into it. I was a had the YouTube video playing while I was scrolling through Tinder. So it's.

Bill:
[7:01] Wait, wait a sec. Did you make up the Hollywood Florida story?

Frank:
[7:03] No I thought that I heard that I think it might be true. I'm not sure.

Bill:
[7:07] Okay, but you know, he's gonna be so angry when he listens to this. So there's something about Montreal singers who have the sort of moxie to just go for it.

Frank:
[7:10] I know right.

[7:16] Yeah, yeah, they got a lot of guts and especially to run through a parking lot,
with the security guard chasing you like that's like going all in on your dream.

Bill:
[7:27] The guns pointed. Yeah, hopefully Joe was a bad shot. Well, hopefully he didn't kill curb Alpert. Yeah, these are tough times. Oh.

Frank:
[7:28] Yeah.

[7:33] Yeah I know I like to think that the the guard was probably distracted by Gino of Nellie's amazing hair.

Bill:
[7:39] Yeah, he's a very good-looking man and in 1970s Gino Vannelli hair is something else now Gino Vannelli is very successful in the 70s,
He had his big album. I think was this I was his third album or fifth album brother to brother Yeah, and the song was I just want to stop written by Ross Finnelli. I believe is one of his brothers I thought I was written by Gino was actually written by his brother. Gino is a songwriter. Yeah.

Frank:
[8:04] Make sense brother to brother.

Bill:
[8:06] But well, yeah, there we go. And that's a huge rock song and also I mean he just Did huge business in the 70s we head into the 80s and now it's a different time Gino cuts his hair.

Frank:
[8:10] Well, yeah, because the 70s are different from the 80s.

Bill:
[8:21] They are but there's a sound new wave has come in and Gino purposely ends up making an 80s record before this one so,
He gets into a fight with CBS records or Arista one of these record companies of what he's with and they won't let him
Release his music. So there's this,
Lengthy period where he doesn't release anything. So you have Nightwalker has come out in 81 and then it takes until
until 1984 for Black Cars to come out. And Black Cars is an 80s synth album.
And he knows what he's doing.
And then the follow up to that three years later, his big dreamers never sleep. You'll see on your Wikipedia page in front of you, Frank, there is no hyperlink.
No one has published a Wikipedia entry.
Now, of course, the question is, will we be the people who publish that Wikipedia entry?

Frank:
[9:12] I'm going to include the story of him traveling to Hollywood, Florida.

Bill:
[9:16] Yeah, and so we'll see if within half an hour someone changes it, we'll know it's false. So Big Dreamers Never Sleep, 1987, this album comes out and it's as usual produced by Gino Vannelli and his two brothers, Joe and Ross,
and it includes kind of his last major hit,
which is "Wild Horses," the song we're doing today. And then this sets in motion his future, I think.
Cause by then now he can become a touring thing. He's got all these songs and "Wild Horses" is one of those regular songs he sings.

Frank:
[9:49] Yeah, yeah.

Bill:
[9:52] Yeah.
So as I said earlier, I really pushed this episode.
So I apologize, Frank. I'm like, we're doing Gino Vannelli, we're doing Wild Horses, it's happening. And Frank didn't realize I bought the CD online
because you can't get an MP3, you can't buy a legit copy of this online.
So I went and bought the actual album. So I got the CD and it's that old CD thing
where you open the booklet and like, oh, here's a list of songs and a list of performers, no lyrics, it's thin.
And the back page is all about how great a compact disc is. Oh, seriously? Oh yeah.

Frank:
[10:24] Oh seriously?

Bill:
[10:26] So I think I have an original copy. I think it might be a German pressing even. Yeah.

Frank:
[10:30] Yeah.

Bill:
[10:31] So it's fine. It's very 1980s in its production.
There's a couple tracks that really stand out for me, but Wild Horses, Far and Away is a big one.
Now it's written by Gino Vannelli and Roy Freeland,
which I don't have a lot of information on Roy Freeland. I would have liked to have dove more into this,
but he's done a lot of work with other songwriters.
So it's hard to know, this frustrates me,
when a songwriter doesn't talk about his co-writer. So when Gino Vannelli talked about writing the song,
and talk about Roy Freeland's involvement.

Frank:
[11:08] I mean, it is a Gino Vannelli song. So, you know, it's tough to take that away from Gino. But at the same time, you know, throw the man a bone.

Bill:
[11:18] Yeah, now to be fair, I think both you and I when we talk to others about the podcast we don't even mention each other.

Frank:
[11:26] Oh, no, I call it my podcast. Who's this Bill guy? It's just a character I do.

Bill:
[11:31] Yeah, he's the other guy but anyways while I was making this.

Frank:
[11:34] One stop. Yeah. There is a Wikipedia page for that song. Thank goodness.

Bill:
[11:35] So, okay this brings us to the song There's so much to talk about with Gino Vannelli and he's so interesting in this way that I want to talk more about Gino
finale and hopefully we do an episode on I just want to stop. Yeah, that's gonna happen.
Yeah. And I have this working theory or interest in Italo Canadian rock stars. Someday I'm going to write a paper on this, publish it in our scholarly journal that we publish semi annually.

Frank:
[11:58] Yeah.

[11:58] Oh, yes.

[12:06] You mean our show notes?

Bill:
[12:07] Yeah, our show notes. But I'm not there yet. But I just want to note also Italo Canadian when this comes up in our future episodes this year. All right, did you find anything on the song? Gina Vannelli talking about it.

Frank:
[12:20] Yes, like the inspiration for it. Yeah, yeah. So, oh, it's a classic mysticism rock star move.
So Gino Vannelli is in Peru and he's hiking to Machu Picchu.
And he doesn't say it specifically, but it's 100% assumed that he's in Machu Picchu.
He takes part in one of those ayahuasca ceremonies, which is, it's like a tobacco. It's like a cannabis sort of, well, it's not cannabis, sorry.
It's a...

Bill:
[12:58] It's not peyote, is it?
No. Okay, so did you find an article? Like, I was looking high and low for, I found one interview.

Frank:
[13:04] Well, I read an interview, I read an article and I listened to the one interview and he.

Bill:
[13:11] Yeah, okay, go ahead. Keep going on the Ayahuasca thing, yeah.

Frank:
[13:14] Doesn't say specifically that he was doing ayahuasca but you look at Machu Picchu and he said he was involved in a sort of spiritual awakening and then when you research Machu
Pichu, yeah, they do these ayahuasca ceremonies, which sort of healers and shaman or whatever in Machu Picchu, it's part of the ceremony, it's supposed to open up your mind.

Bill:
[13:41] Gotcha. Okay, so I couldn't find an article on that stuff. That's good research. Good job.

Frank:
[13:46] He doesn't get an answer through this whole ceremony and through his whole experience.

Bill:
[13:51] But something has happened to him right he's had some sort of spiritual awakening.

Frank:
[13:55] Awakening. So he goes home and then he starts talking about it just like I need an answer for what
happened in Peru.
So he hears about the shaman in New Mexico.

Bill:
[14:07] In New Mexico, Jamie the shaman. So Jamie the shaman is in New Mexico and he flies to Albuquerque and then has to drive.

Frank:
[14:10] The shaman.

[14:20] Yeah, Jamie.

Bill:
[14:22] To the fun is it Santa Fe is that in New Mexico is something like that.

Frank:
[14:23] To find the shaman.

[14:27] Yeah.

Bill:
[14:28] So he's driving and a convertible. So this is just to me is like, first he's a rock star who went to Peru while there was like all this civil unrest. People are getting murdered and stuff.

Frank:
[14:38] Yeah, they're oh yeah.

Bill:
[14:39] He's like, but I had to be there. I'm like, Oh, this is so rock star has this experience on a mountain top. And then buys a flight to New Mexico from LA.
I think that's where he was at that point gets a convertible because of course you get a convertible and then drives at like a hundred
miles an hour down these roads, which is super dangerous.

Frank:
[15:00] The whole time he's kind of tapping out the beat of the song on the steering wheel. And he's saying like, I gotta get to that. I gotta get to the shaman. I gotta get to shaman Jamie.

Bill:
[15:11] He did.

Frank:
[15:13] I have to get there. It's like nothing's gonna keep me away from shaman Jamie.
So he's booting along and I don't even again, I was probably scrolling Tinder, But did even he was talking about getting lost. Did even find Jamie. OK. Yeah.

Bill:
[15:28] He got to Jamie, but he never got the answers to what he needed, but he got this song that he had in his head. By the time he got there, he had the chorus kind of mapped out and so he had wild horses in his head and he had the drum beat going.

Frank:
[15:41] Yeah.

Bill:
[15:41] And so I imagine Roy Freeland probably helped in fleshing out these songs that he'd have them and he'd be like, not a ghostwriter, but the sort of person who comes in
and helps kind of clean things up. That's my guess. Roy, you can reach out to us though.

Frank:
[15:52] Tell us your ayahuasca story.

[15:57] But yeah, so the whole time when he's tapping it out on the steering wheel and he's coming, he's like, he's saying, I need to get there.
wild horses aren't going to keep me away from getting an answer to my questions, to getting an answer for my vision.

Bill:
[16:11] Right, so this song in interesting ways,
because you can see this as a love song, but this could also be a song about his seeking the divine.
And so wild horses couldn't drive him away from this experience.
But of course we're gonna dive into these lyrics.

Frank:
[16:28] Yeah, so the lyrics kind of indicate it's more of a romantic thing, but I think it's,
This also, it also parallels nicely with his like dogged determination and his experience with Herb Alpert and getting a record contract back in the 70s.

Bill:
[16:47] Yeah, that's good analysis.

Frank:
[16:50] That is good analysis.

Bill:
[17:12] Alright, now it's time to dive into "Wild Horses" The Song.
As the sun goes down on the Arizona Plane and the wind whistles by like a runaway train,
Hey hey hey, it's a beautiful thing.
Well it's me and you and a flatbed truck, my heart kicking over like a white tail buck.
hey hey hey in the middle of spring.

[17:59] So, whitetail buck, deer, middle of spring is they want to get some dates.
They got like the Tinder thing going on for deer.

Frank:
[18:09] Yeah, the the the the bucks are on their Tinder. Right. What's deer Tinder? What do you think that? I wonder what that was? Yeah. Yeah.

Bill:
[18:13] You just always swipe right. Yeah. Always. I saw a bunch of whitetail buck actually in the woods and we followed it.

Frank:
[18:22] Oh, yeah, by by your place, eh?

Bill:
[18:22] Yeah. But then following it, I realized they're probably coyotes, which is a really bad idea to be trying to follow a group of coyotes. It was the total setup.

Frank:
[18:31] Wait, so you saw kairi's that were dressed as deer.

Bill:
[18:33] I gotta go see the optometrist.

Frank:
[18:35] This is sounding like a Looney Tunes episode. What I like about that opening lyric and we were talking about this when we were listening to the song beforehand is there's the and the wind whistles by like a runaway train, the drums, it's that clickety clack. It's that train sort of you get that real feeling that imagery of a train. So again, this is something that
that the lyrics represent what the sound is.

Bill:
[19:04] Exactly. And they make sure to have like such perfect production for this. They have some of the best session players around, I think anyways, because the drummer and the drums are the key. It's those, it's those brushes on the drums. And that's Dave Garibaldi, who's the drummer for Tower of Power. And it's incredible. And so as you listen to it, those drums drive it. But there's also this bassist named Jimmy Haslip, who's on the bass. And if you go through,
through his like website, you can see he just plays, he's just a session player.
And he just came in for this one song and holy cow, that bass moves and then you have Joe Vannelli on the xylophone.

Frank:
[19:46] Thank you!

Bill:
[19:47] So those things altogether make this song what it is. And then Gino's voice is this sort of, I don't know, I'm trying to think of, he does something with it.
It's different from I Just Wanna Stop. What are you thinking?

Frank:
[20:01] I get huge how this feels. feels.

Bill:
[20:03] So there's some Roy Orbison Elvis and other performers who I was thinking of that have that but the Elvis thing is really what I was thinking too.

Frank:
[20:15] That that hey hey hey like it's that.

Bill:
[20:18] Yeah.
And so it's that lustiness, right? Like Elvis, even though now, at least for us growing up, I never thought of him as the this sort of sex symbol thing, but he was that thing in the 50s.
And then Gino has that feel he's bringing to the table.
And then you got, okay, the next section there, you can cut me deep, you can cut me down, you can cut me loose, it's okay.
Yeah, yeah, it's okay. And then he goes to, you can kick and scream,
you can slap my face, you can set my wheels on a high-speed chase, oh you, no matter what you do. And we go into that chorus.
Is it...

Frank:
[20:56] No means no.

Bill:
[21:21] It's kind of creepy But this is the nature of these songs of that era, especially before.
So it feels like it's harkening back to a 50s, 60s feel.
And that's where you have this notion of this chase.
There is something to it when you read these things like, ah, I don't know if I'd sing I'm saying that now, but that's not our styles when we're trying to woo women.

Frank:
[21:45] That is Gino style. Gino doesn't give up. again the whole Herb Alpert thing and you know speeding to see Shaman Jamie.

Bill:
[21:54] Yeah, "Wild horses could not drag me away from you."
It is such a great line, and it works so well with all the sounds around it.
And when I was a kid, I remember, this is the first time I heard a song about wild horses.
And then of course years later I'm like, oh, there's a Rolling Stones song? Oh, I guess Gino was just singing a Rolling Stones song.
And now the Rolling Stones song goes like this, wild horses couldn't drag me away.

Frank:
[22:22] Yeah. Well, it's a common saying though, too, right?

Bill:
[22:23] Okay.
Yeah, I guess it is, yeah. And then, you know, there's, so there is a whole thing about wild horses in song.
So Gino's got the, he's got the moxie to say, I'm gonna use this that Rolling Stones have used,
I'm gonna use it in my song. only to be taught by Bono who's gonna use it a few years later.

Frank:
[22:42] The.

[22:42] Yes. The feel of the song is a very Southwestern feel.
Like I said, the clickety clack of the drums almost has a bit of a country edge to it.
rock edge to it.

Bill:
[23:20] Yeah. And there's this, uh, I have written down here, evocative, erotic imagery, right?
There's this sort of notion of like, it's me and you in a flatbed truck in a foot of mud, just my luck. Is that bad luck or good luck? Cause he's stuck in mud in a flatbed truck. That kind of insinuates that that's not a bad thing for him. Is it?

Frank:
[23:43] Yeah, I mean, if he's with her, it's a good thing because, you.

Bill:
[23:48] Is it?

[23:48] It's a flatbed truck.

Frank:
[23:49] Know. Yeah, exactly. And the horses are going to get stuck in the mud too, so they can't even
drag him away from her at that point.

Bill:
[23:54] Yeah, exactly.

[23:54] Right, they could probably help to get that truck out of the mud though.

Frank:
[23:56] Yeah, maybe. Yeah, just get a team of horses like a chuckwagon kind of a thing.

Bill:
[24:02] So we have the second verse has a nice balance to it where he says, well, as the sky falls down, right?
And then that's where it begins.
I guess the other one is the sun is going down. Now the sky falls down from the midnight blue, spitting like bullets on a hot tin roof.
Hey, hey, hey, it's a beautiful sound. And I know that sound, the sound of rain coming down on a hot summer night on a tin roof.

Frank:
[24:27] Yeah. Oh, yeah. Like bullets. Yeah. Like he says.

Bill:
[24:29] Oh yeah, like bullets. Yeah. Like he said.
Exactly, yeah. Oh well, it's me and you in a flatbed truck
and a foot of mud, just my luck, 100 miles out of town. And so again, I guess that's good luck.
Although if the rain's coming down, I don't know if you want to be in a flatbed truck.

Frank:
[24:46] Well, they might be inside the cab of the truck.

Bill:
[24:48] Okay.

Frank:
[24:51] Just just because it's a truck, does it in a flatbed truck doesn't mean you have to be outside in on it.

Bill:
[24:55] Right. If I was going to go literal, he has a tin roof on that truck and it was too hot.
Don't touch the tin roof.

[25:25] Again, these are images and we learn from Richard Fry.
Literalism isn't needed here. just get the picture and get the feel.

Frank:
[25:34] Yeah, exactly. It paints a picture.

Bill:
[25:36] And then from there, it goes to the same line. I'm all, it's different here. He says, yeah, you can call me a fool.

Frank:
[25:42] No, it's different. Yeah.

Bill:
[25:44] You can call me blind. You can call it quits. I can't hear a word that you said, what you said.
Cause if I had you once, I'm gonna have you twice.
Ah, okay. I'm gonna follow my heart instead of good advice.

Frank:
[25:58] No, I have is that good advice.

Bill:
[26:03] I think it makes more sense to say instead of good advice. my heart instead of good advice.

Frank:
[26:08] So my reading of it was, I'll follow my heart is that good advice. It's a question. And I'm going to tell Gino here, for someone who's been a fool in love and has been blinded by love, sometimes following your heart is not good advice. You do that too often you end up like me researching while you're on Tinder.

Bill:
[26:31] Stuck in a foot of mud.
Yeah. And then of course we go on to the wild horses.
there's repeats and stuff but the feels just come through and it's incredible just the sounds of the song.

Frank:
[27:10] The sounds in the imagery that it paints you can feel the song. Yeah, it's very textual.

Bill:
[27:18] Yeah definitely I was wondering this should textual is but what was the other word you said earlier remember what was it yeah definitely not a word yeah.

Frank:
[27:21] Yeah, definitely not a word.

[27:29] Shakespeare in Vengeant Words, why can't I?

Bill:
[27:34] Oh, you're not Shakespeare.

Frank:
[27:36] Could be. The instrumental is that syncopation? It's got to.

Bill:
[27:38] All right. I was wondering if this should just become a category. Take it to the bridge.
So the bridge in this song must be that part where he sings a bit and then it moves to
the brushes doing.
It's got to be something like that. And it just is perfect because it just brings you to the end and all the good stuff going on there. And the brushes, you know, clean the floor. They do. Ah, that sounds a lot.

Frank:
[27:57] Be syncopation. There's a definite divide between the,
song and then the ending and that just sort of takes you on a little journey.
It does. The bass goes for a walk and it takes you along with it.

[28:17] Yeah, yeah, I was gonna say the brush has set the pace.

Bill:
[28:21] Better than me going through man madry. Yeah, it's phenomenal.

[28:55] Do you remember the first time you heard this song?

Frank:
[28:57] It's got to be early 90s, the first time that I really paid attention to it. Because I know that I've heard it, I must have heard it back in the 80s. But it was probably the early 90s when,
I'm just starting to get into music and understand music. Starting to gain a small appreciation for,
the stuff my parents listened to, in terms of like the Rolling Stones. So I probably heard it. and thinking it's like, that's not "Wild Horses." That's by the Rolling Stones. And then,
hearing it again and listening to it. And the more I preferred this version or this the song to the Rolling Stones "Wild Horses." And I love the Rolling Stones "Wild Horses."

Bill:
[29:41] Yeah, I'm with you on that. I love this version. This is the version,
And I would have heard it probably in the late 80s on video hits on cbc.

Frank:
[29:49] Oh, okay. Yeah.

Bill:
[29:51] Because this didn't do well in america, but with cancon regulations in canada you had to.

Frank:
[29:53] Because it had to have no choice but to do good.

Bill:
[29:59] And this is an example where cancon is great because the song is great,
So for whatever reason it didn't make it over there, but we heard it over here I feel like I've heard it on the radio and they would play it on the radio I just never knew it was Gino Vannelli I wouldn't know who he was anyways then but it was a song I remember hearing cuz I played it for Ashley,
This is a big test of course,
Ashley's sitting next to me and I said, okay We're gonna do this song next and I play it and all I could think of is like yeah She has no idea about the song and she hears it. She goes. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I know this song.

Frank:
[30:32] She says that about a lot of songs, Bill.

Bill:
[30:34] But no, she was like she started humming the xylophone part She was like, whatever, I want to hum it.
Yeah, and so she had it, like, okay, she knows this song. And so it is a song where people know it, even though when I say Wild Horse's Gino Vannelli, I feel like people might not be aware until they hear it and they're like, oh, I I know this.

Frank:
[30:53] Yeah, and even to mention Gino Vannelli, you're like, I know the name, but I have no idea what he sings. But then you say like wild horses, and you start,
singing a bit of the song or I just want to stop. People know that song. So they know who Gino Vannelli is. They just don't,
know who he is.

Bill:
[31:13] The music video is iconic.

Frank:
[31:16] Well, yeah.
I want to say that there's a new move that I'm going to add to my dance floor repertoire. And we talked about like, there is a,
There's a subtle eroticism about the song.
And in the video, it's just Gino Vanell, like there's the one movie that he does where he he takes his fists and he's not pelvic thrusting, but he's just like slamming his fists on his,
upper thighs and he just like and like to the beat and just like that's a new dance floor move for me.
Like that that's a little bit of a transition move, but it's going to come out next time I'm on the dance floor.

Bill:
[31:51] You.

[31:51] It's great. And so those who haven't seen the video, of course, you'll see the show notes. They'll be there,
That's the only place you can hear the song if you're looking online.

Frank:
[32:00] Yeah, unless you buy the CD.

Bill:
[32:01] Unless you buy the cd like I did I would like to buy the vinyl me. I'll look for the vinyl next So let me set the picture for you. It's black and white,
he's wearing A white billowy shirt not quite the pirate shirt that we would have seen in seinfeld but not too far removed from it very 80s,
He's got those jeans that are they may be acid washed or stonewashed. I'm not sure Is that a stonewashed like acid wash or not at all? Wait, I think they're acid washed.

Frank:
[32:30] You're asking me fashion questions and I really have no answer to that.

Bill:
[32:33] Okay, so they're acid washed jeans I think or they're the blue acid wash style at least of that era and He's got some lighter Western boots on perhaps brown perhaps white hard to tell,
So when you see him snap his fingers and then pump his fists against his thighs, he's moving with the beat,
he's got the two-hand snap back and forth two-hand snaps sometimes hitting his thighs and,
He's got,
great hair.

Frank:
[33:04] Because I have it kind of playing here. Well, while we're talking about it. Everyone is sweaty. Yeah, it's the Arizona plate.

Bill:
[33:10] It's hot it's at least it looks hot I mean Arizona plate. It's hard to know like I keep thinking it's a carnival, but the scenes are like they're in the backyard of a hot Arizona town.

Frank:
[33:25] I think like raising Arizona like there's a there's a because the the laundry's out on the on the line and everything. Yeah.

Bill:
[33:32] Yeah, that's right because that's the background is these bedsheets that are hung up. There's a woman just sitting in her like bikini that looks like she's from the 50s maybe chewing gum and not.

Frank:
[33:42] Yeah, sunglasses. Yeah.

Bill:
[33:43] Interested. But there's also this fan beside her like those fans you see at the top of buildings that spins around. What type of fan is that? Yeah, so the condenser fan is right at her feet so it's like are they on top of a roof? But then you have a band behind him and it seems like at least one.

Frank:
[33:50] Well, that would be a condenser fan for an air conditioning unit.

Bill:
[34:02] Or two bass players at once. There's someone playing xylophone, someone playing drums, but there's,
three iterations of this band. It keeps changing to these people who look like players because they don't look like anybody you would hire to act.

Frank:
[34:15] I'm looking at there's there's the one like bigger drummer, like he's balding wearing glasses and everything like, and I'm not here to shame, but he's not a Hollywood like attractive,
man that you would like feature in a video.

Bill:
[34:31] There's only one person who is both out of place and totally in place and that is the it girl,
So she's playing harmonica or appearing to play harmonica I'm not sure we can even see a harmonica and she's just moving with the rhythm and she is striking and She is sweating. Yes, like she's probably sweating the most which of course is very 80s.

Frank:
[34:45] Yeah, dancing and clapping. Yes. Yeah.

Bill:
[34:53] Yeah, and so Juno belly's kind of sweating but she is sweating and she's kind of like moving and and he's not, like this is the interesting thing for me in the video, is they're not set up as love interests.
She's dancing around him to the music and he'll look over at her kind of, but he's not interested in her in that sort of way.

Frank:
[35:13] Main character of this video is the song.

Bill:
[35:17] And so they're moving to it and she's just kind of this character that as a viewer you're drawn to. She is totally fascinating.
Alright, so here is some deep research. Two in the morning, I wake up, can't sleep. Maybe thinking about the video, I don't know.
And like, I gotta figure out who this person is.
So I find this article online. And let me just read the title because the title says it all.
MTV It Girls. Who's the girl in the video? This is the article.

Frank:
[35:51] So you went, okay, you read the article, but then you went all the way through the comments.

Bill:
[35:52] They go through iconic ones. And then in the comment section, someone says, who's the girl in "Wild Horses?"

[36:03] The comments. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I kind of typed into the search engine and then it said it had.

Frank:
[36:04] To find this information.

Bill:
[36:09] Something written there, but I had to look through and there's nothing on it. But several people wrote in the comments, who's the girl and "Wild Horses?" So clearly there are people wanting to know. So I get this name Rosetta Millington. And looking it up, like, who is she? I click on it.
It's like, it's not Rosetta Millington. Someone named Rosetta Getty. Who's Rosetta Getty? So I'm I'm looking at this I see a picture of this person like well, that's her but there is nothing Linking her to the video. She is not,
Unfamous She is married to Balthazar Getty who is the great-grandson of Jay Paul Getty,
I believe it's Jay Paul Getty who is the richest man in the world Do you remember that movie all the money in the world? Where's about the kid who got kidnapped? That's Getty.

Frank:
[36:57] Yeah. Yeah, yeah. Okay. Did they invite? Did they invent Getty images? Like when you?

Bill:
[37:00] And so his father Balthazar's father.

[37:06] Yeah, the Getty no, it's all connected. Yeah, it's all connected. So.

Frank:
[37:09] Is it? Yeah. Okay. I was trying to be hilarious.

Bill:
[37:11] Yes, I think so. Anyways, I at least from what I know because there's this Getty Museum and stuff.

Frank:
[37:15] Oh, that's unfortunate.

Bill:
[37:16] And So Balthazar Getty's father is the guy who got kidnapped,
in that and had his ear cut off by the mafia and all that and then had a pretty tortured life and died young.

Frank:
[37:27] Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's unfortunate.

Bill:
[37:28] So Balthazar Getty was a son who never really had you know, a good father figure anyways.
This is kind of going off on the side here, but it's all gonna come together.
He marries Rosetta Millington who becomes Rosetta Getty who has her own clothing line.

Frank:
[37:42] So how does she end up in this video?

Bill:
[37:43] And she's like a fairly big deal from everything I see and they're worth a ton of money, like 300 million.
This is before they're married. So there's no mention, she's online and everything, no mention of this video.
But when you see her, that is Rosetta Getty.
And she has her own line of gowns and stuff. And you can watch these videos where they talk about their life together.
And the reason I'm bringing this up is She maybe inadvertently follows the theme of this song,
because Balthazar Getty was not an easy person to live with because he had this very public affair with Sienna Miller in 2008.

Frank:
[38:26] Oh, that's right.

Bill:
[38:28] Oh, that's right. So everyone knew this. He had kids, like they had three or four kids, I think.
And he was off for a long time with Sienna Miller and they got back together and they're still together,
because wild horses could not drive Rosetta Getty away from her husband despite, yeah, very public.

Frank:
[38:45] His infidelity. Yeah, very public. Wow, that's crazy.

Bill:
[38:48] So it's crazy. So that was my deep dive research and it's totally her. And there is no connection.
So I don't know if she's used her money to push down "Wild Horses." I don't know why, because it's fascinating.
And as far as eight girls in a video, she's not exploited, I don't think.
I mean, it's, we're guys talking about beautiful woman in a video, but she's just this fascinating figure.

Frank:
[39:13] Yeah, yeah. And she's not I mean, it's not an overt objectification of her in the video. It's not her front and center writhing in a bikini on a car or something like that.

Bill:
[39:25] No, she's not wearing the bikini the person wearing the bikini is just sitting there. Yeah, I.

Frank:
[39:28] Yeah, and she's completely uninterested. It's almost like a David Lynch film.

Bill:
[39:32] Was Heather in down yeah, that's great. It is like a David Lynch film If anything, this is what Wild at Heart should have used maybe I mean, of course, what am I saying?

Frank:
[39:34] I would be down. Do you know that?

[39:43] Yeah, well, why would a hard?

Bill:
[39:44] Chris Isaac, but this has a total lynching feel and belt is our getty said David Lynch. This is not connected but is
is he sees David Lynch as kind of a surrogate father to him. All these weird connections.

Frank:
[39:56] But.

Bill:
[39:59] Yeah. Either way, this video feels like Lynch.

Frank:
[40:03] Yeah.

[40:03] It's all six degrees of Gino Vannelli.

Bill:
[40:06] Yeah. Thank you, Gino for Twin Peaks. So that video is so watchable. I've, I've watched it over and over again, but I also can't help but see Eugene Levy playing Gino Vannelli from the SCTV.

Frank:
[40:14] So.

[40:20] In an SCTV parody of this, yes.

Bill:
[40:20] Yeah. Yeah. They did a parody of it. I just want to stop where he keeps singing and growing more and more chest hair. So that would be like when we talk about categories, if we're even heading there, we might as well.

Frank:
[40:26] Yeah.

Bill:
[40:32] Hallmark movie is like, well, it's a David Lynch movie. This belongs in a David Lynch movie.

Frank:
[40:35] Yeah.
in David Lynch movie. Yeah.

Bill:
[40:37] So I can't see it as a Hallmark thing,
but I can see it as a David Lynch movie.

Frank:
[40:41] Can we talk about Gino Vannelli in more recent pop culture history? So in 2008,
Boston Celtics would play a clip of Dick Clark's American Bandstand and it's just like music playing and a bunch of people dancing and it was like you know panning
through the crowd and everything and the end of this clip that they would play at Celtics games and it was always during a blowout win for the Celtics. The end of it was this bearded man wearing a very,
very tight t-shirt with Gino Vannelli on it. It just said Gino,
and they call it Gino time. So in 2008, Gino Vannelli is thrust into the forefront of the Boston like sort of sports pop
culture history because everyone knows the guy who's dancing in video and everyone knows the shirt that he's wearing so it's Gino time so Gino
Vannelli has this small little resurgence in 2008 and that's also the year that they won their last championship was 2008 so Gino Vannelli has a part of the Celtics 17th championship in the NBA.

Bill:
[41:53] All right, let's talk some categories. Okay. Michael Bolton. Could Michael Bolton sing this?
Okay, I was actually thinking he could if he toned it down.

Frank:
[42:08] But you're asking a bird not to fly.

Bill:
[42:10] I was gonna say at the end, but he could not by the end. He just go wild. He is the wild horse.

Frank:
[42:15] He is the wild horse.

Bill:
[42:17] Now I do have another category unfair because I didn't tell you about this. But who who else could sing this and I have one person who I feel could sing this and that's Chris Isaac.

Frank:
[42:25] Yeah. It's fine. Oh, yeah. Well, it has that that sort of, like.

Bill:
[42:28] Oh yeah. Yeah.

Frank:
[42:30] I said, that southwestern almost rockabilly feel to it. So,
yeah, who else would who else would would be able to do that? maybe John Bon Jovi and his like cowboy rock stage or Kid Rock?
Okay, like Enya?

Bill:
[42:44] Or I could see it being like a female voice who makes it feel kind of ethereal. So maybe.
Yeah. Yeah, she could.
Maybe Anya. Maybe like a Phoebe Bridges or a Tori Amos?
Could she do it?
I'm just trying to think. Someone could do something with it. Could Jule sing this?

Frank:
[43:14] Yeah, I can hear Jewel singing this. Yeah, Jewel. This is your challenge. And we know you listen to the episode. So we challenge you to sing Gino Vannelli's Wild Horses and send it over to us and maybe hang out with me.

Bill:
[43:15] Yeah, all right, Jule. The challenge is on.

[43:49] Another category here what season of the year and what time of the day does this song work best?

Frank:
[43:56] End of summer in the evening.

Bill:
[43:58] You got it, that's the answer. All right one more for you. What part of the date do you play this song on?

Frank:
[44:05] Okay, it's not a first date song. You know what, it's a third date song after you have a mild misunderstanding. If you're really into her, but without, you know, going creepy.

Bill:
[44:14] Oh, okay,
Okay, because I have getting fresh written down. Not mild misunderstand. To me it seems like that would be your kind of go-to kissing song. It's a kissing song. That's a game.

Frank:
[44:21] Okay, well that's usually third date.

[44:29] It's a kissing song. And a flatbed truck.

Bill:
[44:33] Yeah, all right. I mean there's one more major category we gotta get to of course. Mixed tape. Mixed tape. You got a mixed tape going? I have a mixed tape. Okay, I'll let you go first.

Frank:
[44:40] Okay, yeah. Mix tape.
Okay. I have a mix tape. Okay, so my mix tape, the theme I went with was songs that have animal names.

Bill:
[44:51] Animal names? animals Okay, all right, all right, gotcha, okay.

Frank:
[44:51] Animals in the title.
So, Like a Bird on a Wire, the Neville Brothers, Barracuda by Heart,
Rock Lobster, the B-52s,
A bit of an outlier here and this is just because I love the band but also the song is beautiful. Transient Whales by Toad the Wet Sprocket. Pony by Genuine.
And I am ending this just for you Bill hands by Jewel.

Bill:
[45:30] Hands is not an animal.
It's not funny anymore. This is like four, I don't know how many episodes
you've done this to me, whether I've kept it in or cut it out. Okay.

Frank:
[45:40] No, no, no, I do have an ending for you and this one honestly is just for you. by crazy town.

Bill:
[45:42] Oh yeah.

[45:47] Yes. Oh, what an ending. Oh, that's a great transition into my stuff.
So my mixtape went with texture to quote you actually actually from an earlier episode. So after you know, Wild Horses plays or I guess your part. I'm on fire Bruce.

Frank:
[46:01] Oh yes! Oh good call! Bruce Springsteen can sing me a song.

Bill:
[46:08] Springsteen. Yeah. Oh, good. Yeah, I got the feel. Yeah. Oh,
he could totally sing this. I just died in your arms tonight cutting crew. Okay. Drive the cars. Wicked Game Chris Isaac.

Frank:
[46:18] I will listen to this mixtape.

Bill:
[46:24] And then I'm gonna end with Yeah, who's gonna ride your wild horse is you too, because it has that feel and not the one that's on Octon baby, but the mix that was actually the single. It has that sort of feel as well. And it's like a scale,
back Bono. And I really like that song and the wild horses
fits within the Gino wild horse world. So it feels like the Gino finale is like wild horses won't drive me away. And Bono is like.

Frank:
[46:47] Yes, yeah.

Bill:
[46:53] Who's gonna ride your wild horses? There's there's something going on there. It is the Gino verse. Yeah, I felt really good. I spent a lot of time on this. I do have something else. Gino is so weird. When he's interviewed, he doesn't

Frank:
[46:56] It's all in the Genoverse.
Yeah. That's a great mixtape.

Bill:
[47:09] even bother talking about "Wild Horses". He only wants to really talk about his spiritual
journey. I just don't want to hear about it. I want to hear about "Wild Horses," Gino! I don't want to hear about the ego and you're Carl Jung. I just want to hear -

Frank:
[47:20] I just want you to stop and tell me all the things about you baby.
 
Bill:
[47:24] Exactly. So I am so glad we got to talk about a song that's not easy to find on Spotify, that's,
not easy to find anywhere.
Yeah, that you'd have to go on Amazon and look for dreamers never sleep if you wanted to get a CD copy of this.

Frank:
[48:00] Yeah, or write Bill, he might be able to send you his. Bill's like a CD library. He can he lends them out and they do come back sometimes. Yeah, and the song I think is critically.

Bill:
[48:09] They do. You know what? are still an awesome way of listening to music.

Frank:
[48:17] Critically underappreciated. Like we said, it did very well in Canada, but in the broader North
America really didn't chart but such a such a good song such a really really good song and a visceral song, you can feel it.
You can feel everything that he's singing.
It is so good.

Bill:
[48:39] Yeah, I can't help but gush over this and so, you know, we don't do irony anyways,
We like to joke around we don't do irony and this song is incredible. So if you're out there And you know this song but haven't been able to sort of place it anywhere. We're here for you,
and,
We want you to know that no matter what's going on in the world, wild horses won't drag us away from bringing guilt-free pleasures to you.

Frank:
[49:13] Thank you for listening.