Hootie & The Blowfish: ”Hold My Hand” (A Redemption Episode)

Through revisiting Hootie & The Blowfish's first major single, Frank is finally able to come to terms with his shame. He is so sorry, Hootie.

Links:

Music Video

Sesame Street Segment

David Letterman Show

How Our Cruelty Killed Hootie and the Blowfish - and Damaged Our Souls

Mixtape

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Transcript

Bill:
[0:01] Today is redemption day at Bill and Frank's Guilt-Free Pleasures. We are going to celebrate the positive force that is Hootie and the Blowfish by taking,
a deep dive into their iconic first single.

Frank:
[0:17] So why don't you hold our hand as we take you through this song and take you through the band's history.
This is Bill and Frank's Guilt-Free Pleasures.
So I have a confession to make. I know the name of the podcast is Bill and Frank's Guilt-Free Pleasures, but I am riddled with guilt.
Riddled with guilt for what I have done with a band that I once loved and then turned my back on because it was popular to make fun of them. And of course we're talking about Hootie and the Blowfish,
and we're going to be talking specifically about Hold My Hand today, but back in 94,
Hootie and the Blowfish burst onto the scene with their album Crack to Review, and were hugely popular. Crack to Review is not only one of the best debut albums of all time, but one of the
best-selling albums of all time. And then 96 they released Fairweather Johnson. So,
Cracked Review has I think 26 million copies sold and then by 96 Fairweather Johnson comes out 2.3 million copies sold. So the world turned their back on Hootie and the Blowfish and I was one of those who turned his back on them. I,
I denied liking them. They were a dirty secret to me. I loved their music still. I still loved their music.

[1:46] I was not supportive of the band and made fun of them. And for that, I need forgiveness.

Bill:
[1:54] So Hootie and the Blowfish, if you're listening, we're sorry. And we're going to go from guilty to guilt-free today.
Let's go through the history of hooting the blowfish.

Frank:
[2:10] Yeah, so they kind of burst on the scene in 94, but they weren't just brand new.
They had been playing as a band for eight years.
They met and started the band in 86 in South Carolina.
And the story goes, Mark Bryan heard Darius Rucker singing in the shower when they were both freshmen at university.
From there he said like, hey, you got the, you have this great voice. So they started a band called the Wolf Brothers.
And then they brought Dean Felber and the original drummer. Give me a second here. I have his name. Brantley Smith started the band.
And then after university, Brantley left the band because he wanted to pursue a career in music ministry.
And that's when Jim Sonnefeld came into the band.

Bill:
[2:58] And Jim Sonnefeld's tryout, is that what they call it when they're trying it? That's a better word. When he had his audition, he said to them, I write songs too. So Darius Rucker is telling the story at a concert a few years ago. And he's like, oh boy. And they said they spent the whole day kind.

Frank:
[3:02] Or audition, I think? Yep.

Bill:
[3:15] Of with him. And they had been drinking beer all day and like, oh boy, here we go. He's got a song.
And the song that he brought to them was Hold My Hand. Even though it says all four of them wrote
it from what I gather this is Jim Sonnefeld's song I think Darius Ruckerman worked on some lyrics as well I'm not sure I mean I like the idea that they,
gave themselves all writing credit which of course was financially a great thing yeah but hold my hand was what the new drummer brought into the band and it's,
one of those classic stories where you have all these pieces and then you kind
of switch up drummers thinking of course that thing you do and then you some or the yeah was it Ringo okay sure so hold my hand which is the song we're
gonna be talking about today was written I think probably 89 somewhere around.

Frank:
[4:04] 89, yep.

Bill:
[4:05] There so there's a version of it from 1990 that is released on the Cracked
Rearviews 25th anniversary and there's another version of it on their EP Koochie Pop and then it came out again and cracked rearview.
So by 1994, a lot of these songs have already existed
for four to five years, I think. I think, I mean, maybe two to five years,
but they've been around.

Frank:
[4:31] Yeah, because Houdini and the Blowfish were huge in the college bar scene in South Carolina.
They all stuck around there.
They played, you know, they're sitting in there going from bar to bar in their van and
everything and, you know, just kind of living that musician life until they caught their big break and caught it they did.

Bill:
[4:54] And it was tricky because they were denied the South by Southwest entry. They're never allowed in from what I can gather when they were trying out.
They have these rejection letters from like Geffen Records, people saying, well, the criticism was this is the type of music people don't want nowadays.
So that was there.
So this sort of music from our early 90s. I mean, there's this big transition where suddenly it got darker.
But this music existed.
So I feel like we've talked before about this where there's this sort of dark cloud. We act as though,
Existed in those early 90s this feeling of dread existential crisis,
But the truth is who in the blowfish was out there playing? Someone's listening to country music non-stop on the radio too.
So there's other stories going on.

Frank:
[5:40] Yeah, yeah, and there isn't that, like you said, it isn't doom and gloom with their music.
It's called like middle of the road rock or like safe rock or whatever, but it's happy,
it's positive and I think that's what we needed at that point.

Bill:
[5:58] Clearly the US craved it because it was the number one Billboard album.
and our rock album going to number one for the year,
still is kind of a rare thing. But it had that heartland feel to it. It had the positive vibes we wanted,
and everyone was listening to it. And I know you feel bad about turning your back on them
but you weren't the only person who owned the album. But amongst our friends, You were the only one who was willing to say you had it.

Frank:
[6:27] Yeah, I had already established myself as being a huge Toad the Wet Sprocket fan, and I still am.
And then bringing Hooting the Blowfish into the mix as well.
I was concerned about being that guy that just liked bands with ridiculous names.

Bill:
[6:45] And I was doing my best to try to prove that I really liked early Genesis. So I'd already staked my claim in Prague Rock, Even though it's deep down, I just want to listen to Phil Collins all day.

Frank:
[6:51] Hahaha.

[6:58] Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I know that this is probably common knowledge, but I think it bears repeating. The name Hootie and the Blowfish doesn't refer to anyone in the band.

Bill:
[7:08] Right, and they have a whole sketch on Key and Peele about this. It's okay, but it's the idea that he's not Hooty.

Frank:
[7:09] Everyone thought that Darius Rocker was Hooty and the band was the Blowfish.

[7:16] Oh do they okay yeah oh yeah yeah yeah yeah that's right.

Bill:
[7:22] Yeah, yeah.
And that is a thing, Darius Rucker says, oh man, now that they're touring again, he
keeps being called Hooty. But it was Darius Rucker who describes himself as a bit of a, he says, I'm a nice guy, but.

Frank:
[7:27] Oh, serious.

Bill:
[7:34] I can be a bit of a jerk sometimes and I would give these nicknames to people and sometimes they weren't the kindest nicknames,
So he called one guy Hootie.

Frank:
[7:42] Yeah, because he had big eyes and looked like an owl.

Bill:
[7:44] Right and then another guy came out with like I don't I'm guessing he had facial features that made him look like a blowfish.

Frank:
[7:50] Yeah maybe like dizzy Gillespie cheeks or.

Bill:
[7:52] So he Yeah, so he called one of the guys Hootie and one of the guys blowfish and then he turned said
Why don't we just call ourselves hooting the blowfish to whoever was in the band at that moment? But we've always thought Blowfish was plural.
Turns out there was a guy named Blowfish
and a guy named Hooty, according to Darius Rucker. I don't know how these two guys feel about it.
But that was it. And then like so many other things,
like told the Wet's Sprocket, they said, well, we put that in as a joke because they're in a battle of the bands or whatever, right?
And then it never left. And this is the same thing. Well, we're gonna live. Well, I mean, the great thing is for search engine optimization, you type in Hooty.

Frank:
[8:21] It just stuck, yeah.

Bill:
[8:28] There's not too much that comes up outside of this band.

Frank:
[8:30] That comes up, yeah, exactly. Yeah.

Bill:
[8:33] So this brings us to, well, we've already talked about it.
Cracked Rearview is their debut album. They've had several EPs already that sold well.
I think Coochie Pop sold like 50,000 copies or something. And so they are wise enough to have already formed.

Frank:
[8:43] Yeah, yeah.

Bill:
[8:47] A corporation, Hootie the Blowfish. And they had like an office in, I think it's South Carolina or wherever they were.
They already have it and they still have that office.
But they set up a corporation and put in their own like insurance and stuff.
So they were made sure they were paid all the time. And they were wise enough by the time that they hit it big, they were 29, I think. Yeah, they were late 20s. Yeah.

Frank:
[9:10] Yeah, they were late 20s by the time everything sort of panned out for them.

Bill:
[9:14] Yeah. So that kind of gave them career longevity, even though they seemed to be a flash in the pan in terms of, I don't know, pop zeitgeist moment or whatever.

Frank:
[9:25] And like the, I don't think they were ever cool necessarily, but they were popular.

Bill:
[9:35] Yeah. And Darius Rucker even said himself, they knew that.

[9:38] Things were going great for them. But deep down, he said they
knew they weren't great.

Frank:
[9:43] You get the feeling that there's no huge egos with that, with the band.

Bill:
[9:46] Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And they didn't have that. And they're
all buddies. And they stayed together. Interesting side note
Trivia the band members have had marriages and divorces all of them right cuz that's just life in this industry. I,
Talk as though I know all about this industry. So drummer.

Frank:
[10:02] Well, your wife's in the industry, right?

Bill:
[10:06] The drummer Barry Sonnefeld Gets divorced and in 2008 he marries Mark Bryan's ex-wife.

Frank:
[10:16] Oh, seriously? Oh, geez.

Bill:
[10:16] Yeah, they all are still buddies. So that has worked out. So So that's a bit of random trivia for you there.

Frank:
[10:20] Okay.

[10:23] I did not know that. Wow.
You got to have a strong friendship for that to happen. happen. That's crazy. It's like Johnny and Joey Ramone all of a sudden.

Bill:
[10:29] Yeah.

[10:30] Yeah. I mean, they never look at each other in interviews and they don't speak and.

[10:38] I made up the don't speak part. I'm not even sure. I'm not even sure they're friends, but they still work together as a corporate unit. All right. So Cracked Rearview.
This is the album you lent me in 1994. Right? So I borrowed it from you. And back then, I mean, CDs were so expensive.

Frank:
[10:55] Did you create a tape? Did you? Yeah.

Bill:
[10:57] Oh for sure.

Frank:
[10:58] But there's something so comforting in Darius Rucker's voice. It's that that baritone.
It feels familiar and it feels comfortable and it feels safe.

Bill:
[11:09] And it has all these sort of elements all baked into it. So you have this Rock and roll heartland feel but you have a soul feel in there and then you also have a country feel.

Frank:
[11:20] You have a soul feel in there.

Bill:
[11:20] And that's all mixing into like well, basically all the modes of popular american music all in one voice.

Frank:
[11:27] Yeah and it crossed so many genres which is probably why Crack to Review did as good as it did.
It spoke to so many different people.

Bill:
[11:36] Dears Rucker said that to him, hold my hand as a protest song.

[11:41] And he said, for me, the song was always about racism, which I never thought of.

Frank:
[11:46] No, and we talked about this a little bit before some of the misheard lyrics.
I thought it was more of a romantic type of song, almost going back to like that early 60s, that kind of like, I wanna hold your hand, like that kind of a feel.
And then I just misheard some lyrics
while I was listening to it when I was younger and thought it was more about romance, but it's about the way I understood it now,
rereading the lyrics, it's about pulling people up and building them up and supporting people,
and being there for them.
The harmonies, particularly in the chorus, It just, it helps to push through that theme of what, hold my hand, what that
that resembles.

Bill:
[12:35] You always use that word. That drives me insane. Alright. So this song has three iterations to it.
So there's this one, which is the one we all know, but there was two earlier versions.
So the neat thing is hearing its development as it went. But neater still is it wasn't really developed.
It was already there in 1990.
I read somewhere where they said 95% of the sound was already on those EPs and you can
hear it. Every part of it has already been worked together by them. So the producer of this is Don Gaiman, who also worked with Mellencamp and REM in the,
past. And so they thought it was a good fit.
And it was and he did bring some things out there like he just pushed certain sounds out
there. You can hear the bass much better. a clarity and there's way more power in the chorus, which is what makes the song what
it is to me. But they already had it there. So it's kind of neat that this band knew what they were and work towards it.
It wasn't as though they were created by a producer.

Frank:
[13:45] Yeah, the producer just took what was already there and just sort of fine-tuned it a bit.

Bill:
[13:49] All right. Well, let's talk about the song.

Frank:
[13:54] Yeah, song analysis. What I like, it starts off with that nice clean acoustic guitar strum,
and it starts off with the opening line, with a little love and some tenderness. We'll walk upon the water, we'll rise above the mess. With a little peace and some harmony, we'll take the world together, we'll take them by the hand.

Bill:
[14:14] Now, that in itself is something worth looking over, why this band is so popular.
So, with a little love and some tenderness kind of brings back some of those peace and love 60s stuff.
We'll Walk Upon the Water brings in the gospel, right?
We'll Rise Above the Mess with a little peace and some harmony. And so you have this sort of all of us are together.
When I heard this originally, I just thought it was a love song,
because I have the Beatles, I want to hold your hand in my head.
that's all I think it's about. But as I'm looking at it now, the gospel throwback lines make it feel much bigger thing,
that there's something much more powerful going on. And that leads of course to the pre-chorus almost, or tease pre-chorus,
cause I've got a hand for you, cause I wanna run with you.
I just love the notion that it's holding someone's hand and then running with them.
So you're kind of taking them somewhere, you're either taking them away from something,
or towards something. And I think in this song is both.

Frank:
[15:14] You're running towards something.

[15:18] But, and it's also, you're helping them to get there. It's like, it paints this beautiful picture in my mind anyways, of like, there's an
excitement behind it too, cause like you're dragging someone's like, I got like, no, no,
no, no, no, you got to come here. This is super exciting. Come with me.

Bill:
[15:34] So you have a, the next verse or I don't know,
but it's yeah, we'll call it verse. Yesterday I saw you standing there. Of course. We don't think it's yesterday. What do we think?

Frank:
[15:47] Yes, indeed.

Bill:
[15:48] Yes, indeed. Okay, so there's music yeah.

Frank:
[15:51] Well, and that was the other in the in the first verse, it was, when he says, we'll walk upon the water, we'll rise above the mess. I was I mean, it's just a slight change. But we'll I thought it was we'll rise above the mist.

Bill:
[16:04] Same with me because I thought I matched the water but the mess is is better but I but this is the same
I'm realizing now other lyrics so yesterday I saw you standing there your head was down your eyes were red No comb had touched your hair. I said get up and let me see you smile,
We'll take a walk together walk the road a while cuz,
But what cuz as a nut cousin hasn't because that line there
where the idea of finding somebody who is down in the dumps.
Now, just off the top of my head, just thinking about this,
how about this for a reading?
You're sitting down, you're ready for this?

Frank:
[16:43] I'm sitting down, yep.

Bill:
[16:45] This is Hootie and the Blowfish talking to 1990s music.

Frank:
[16:55] Oh, wow.

Bill:
[16:56] What do you think?
They're looking at the grunge movement.

Frank:
[16:58] Yeah.

Bill:
[16:58] They're looking at the people just sitting there
with their red eyes are all upset.
And this is the band coming to us and saying.

Frank:
[17:06] The band is saving the world.

Bill:
[17:07] The band is saving the world. Yeah, cause we didn't comb our hair.
Take a look at all those grunge people. They didn't comb their hair. And he says, get up, let me see you smile. I love that. Cause like no one was smiling.
It wasn't a thing.
And he's gonna take us on a walk. We're walking together, walk down that road.
And that's of course these classics Southern songs, beautiful pictures of this sort of harmony, hospitality. Let's get together.

Frank:
[17:35] And you can see that they're walking down a country road.
There's like 100 year old trees lining the street and everything.
and it's just a simpler time.

Bill:
[17:46] So here we go. Now we're headed into it. I've got a hand for you. I want to run with you. We've heard that before. And then it goes in that chorus. Hold my hand. I want you to hold my hand.
and hold my hand, I'll take you to a place where you can be anything you want to be because I want to love you the best that the best that I can.

Frank:
[18:09] I'm getting goosebumpy and I'm getting teary-eyed right now. This is so beautiful.
This is so, so beautiful. And then, like I said, Daris Rocker's voice is just so comforting and accepting. It is, oh my goodness, why did I ever turn my backs on these guys?

Bill:
[18:31] Listener Frank's actually crying. You are we didn't take a break here.

Frank:
[18:35] I might be. Yeah, no, it's just, oh, what was I doing? What was I thinking?
My 20s were wasted.

Bill:
[18:46] Here's the thing listening to the lyrics of the song,
tweeting the blowfish is not going to deny you entrance and to hootie-halla.

Frank:
[18:55] Oh, I know. And Darius Rucker's gonna take me by the hand and he's gonna run with me to all the fun and cool things. gonna judge you? No! It's okay. Oh man, such a beautiful song. Oh, I love this song.

Bill:
[18:56] You're still gonna be able to walk there with them.

[19:04] He's not gonna judge you. It's okay.

[19:12] Alright, let's work through some more of these lyrics because I think this is pretty rewarding. See, I was wasted and I was wasting time till I thought about your problems.
I thought about your crimes.
Now, I didn't think it was crimes. I thought it was crap. I thought about your crap. Okay, all right, so I thought it was tongue crap but crimes crimes is odd to me.

Frank:
[19:26] I heard crimes but.

Bill:
[19:32] So see I was wasted is wasting time thought about your problems thought about your crimes,
Then I stood up and then I screamed aloud. I don't want to be part of your problems,
Don't want to be part of your crowd that this this is the verse where it did throw me a bit thinking about Okay, this isn't just hey, let's hold hands and we'll be okay because when Darius Rucker says he's thinking racism,
I'm trying to wonder if he's thinking about,
Maybe American history or something about the I don't know if he's thinking about your the crimes that's been done in the name of,
You know a segregation or what slavery all these sorts of things where he's now there. I,
Don't know. I feel like when I was reading it he's screaming and he's saying I don't want to be part of this problem,
Yeah, and then he's gonna grab the hand and take them away.

Frank:
[20:24] Yeah, that's the way I read it.
Cause like you can read it one way saying, like he's just, he's getting out of there.
But my understanding is he's getting out of there, but he's taking his friend with him.

Bill:
[20:36] Yeah, he's escaping but with so he is in a sense,
saving people but this sort of notion that you could pull someone out of of whatever garbage they're in.

Frank:
[20:49] Oh, the muck and the mire and the crap that they're dealing with and all that. And yeah, he's being that good friend.

Bill:
[20:49] Yeah.

[20:55] Yeah, so what this song is saying is you can be redeemed. And that's what we need to hear.
In the 90s, there was so much,
at least the early 90s, that sort of music was like,
well, to quote a Nirvana song, that was a joke,
but still it was called, I Hate Myself, I Wanna Die.
But this is Hootie the Blowfish saying, no, no, no, come on up.
and telling you who you are, right?
You know, when Koma touched your hair,
I'll show you what a good shampoo and conditioner can do.

Frank:
[21:23] And I just want to see you smile. Oh, when I see you smile.

Bill:
[21:24] And I just wanna see you smile. Yeah, yeah.
Wow, that comes back to that song you danced to.

Frank:
[21:33] Yeah, that was an early 90s song too. Yeah. And considering that, like Hootie and the Blowfish.

Bill:
[21:34] Yeah, this is all coming together. Yeah, all that stuff got destroyed
with the grunge movement and all this, but it wasn't able to destroy some peace and harmony.

Frank:
[21:47] They came like from the mid 80s. That's when they started off 86 I think it was. So you know they're putting in their time and they're this fun bar band and everything and they have this popularity but then they're they're kind of watching like you said that they got rejection letters saying,
this isn't the music that people want to listen to right now. Well obviously it was because it sold as huge as it was, but watching that huge cultural shift in terms of the music style and what was popular for about two years, but just persisting on.
They held each other's hands and they got themselves through all that.

Bill:
[22:28] And that leads to our little switch up in that next chorus that kind of takes us through to the end where they talk about what he talks about having hand for you and all that stuff but says hold my hand want you to hold my hand that's his background i guess i could read this without the background vocals let me try that again.

Frank:
[22:45] Yeah, but the background vocals before you go any further, the harmonies and they're singing, It rounds everything out so well.
And David Crosby sang harmonies on this for the choruses.

Bill:
[22:58] And this is what makes the big difference between the early versions and this is that chorus the sound of the voices pushing it forward is strong and
if you listen closely you can hear David Crosby because there's that Crosby stills Nash sound, at least one third of it moving in there and I can almost kind of perceive that.

Frank:
[23:13] This is. Yeah. Well, it really does help that chorus pop.

Bill:
[23:19] Vocal pushing the song up to the heights. Oh yeah. And so in that chorus, instead of saying, I'll,
take you to the place where you can be, it changes to, I'll take you to the promised land, capital P,
capital L. So you have two things one is a course classic gospel language, but also promised land is language of,
The abolitionist movement. Yeah, right. So so I can't.

Frank:
[23:49] Yes, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Bill:
[23:51] Unsee this now, especially after Darius Rucker saying he always felt it was a protest song,
So whatever he's looking at there in there or whatever Jim Sonfeld was also thinking when he wrote it
I'm curious what the original version was and what?
what the drummer brought to the band and then what the band did with it. Because I mean, to be fair, the song isn't what it is without that guitar bridge, right?
The song isn't what it is without that sort of moving bass line that you can really hear,
in this version. So I do like that they're all for credit as songwriters.

Frank:
[24:26] Yeah yeah yep.

Bill:
[24:29] The video for this, we'll come back to, we're going to come back to the song.

Frank:
[24:33] Yeah why's Jim gotta be the only one with his shirt off though yeah flesh.

Bill:
[24:36] But it was very odd why he's shirtless.
At one point I wondered if he had any clothes on, like, oh good, he's got cargo shorts on or something.

Frank:
[24:44] Color cargo shorts or whatever.

Bill:
[24:46] Well, we were introduced to a band who dresses like,
I mean, they dress like they're going to a university party,
but also pretty close to someone who's dressing,
like they're about to go play 18 holes of golf.

Frank:
[25:00] Yeah oh and who do the blow fit that huge golf fans all of them.

Bill:
[25:04] Yeah, I think part of the blowback against them was this felt like PGA rock to some extent.

Frank:
[25:08] Yeah.

Bill:
[25:10] But the video has all these sort of images,
of people together.
There's one point that there does seem to be
like this sort of group of friends together having a pack,
but then there's a moment where there's a guy
reading the newspaper and kids are running around him, but he never seems to get up and change his mind. Then there's another thing where a whole bunch of people,
are together in a circle running around,
but I'm looking for the guy who's sitting there reading the paper and he doesn't seem to be there. So I don't know what the subtext is of it.
Although the band didn't look like they're having a good time. And Jim Sonnenfeld has a smile that, yeah.

Frank:
[25:47] Such a goofy smile. They're all goofy guys.

Bill:
[25:50] Yeah, it's a lot of Care Bears smiles. Not quite Care Bears stares, but they got a lot of joy.

Frank:
[25:53] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I think they're I think they're just so pumped
It's just like we are recording a music video right now. We have made it. This is so exciting
Well, it's tough. I know it's cliche for me to say, but it's the chorus. It's the harmonies in the chorus.

Bill:
[26:04] Now that we talked about music video, I wanna get that out of the way. What's your favorite part of this song?

Frank:
[26:18] It just really moves everything the way that it needs to go. Second there's that great guitar bridge, which I really love.
But yeah, like, cause I got a hand for you. I got a hand for you. And it's all like everyone singing together and then the like, hold my hand.
And then Darius Rocker punches through with with his lyrics and everything. And it's just, it just comes together so nicely.

Bill:
[26:43] And that's mine too. That when they sing Hold My Hand, I know you took it. It was like, that bridge felt so familiar to the guitar bridge is like, oh, this is classic 90s bridge. But I.

Frank:
[26:47] Well, you can't have that. That's mine. Yeah.

Bill:
[26:56] Yeah, I think we're in agreement that that chorus is, you know,
the thing. And it's a long song. It's four and a half minutes. And then other versions are about five minutes or so. And.

Frank:
[27:00] Yeah, that's where it's at.
But it doesn't feel long. It doesn't feel long listening to it. But you're right though, like lyrically it paints this great picture.

Bill:
[27:07] But it doesn't feel long. No.

Frank:
[27:16] And the way that it's sung, you can feel it. You can feel and you can see in your head exactly what they're singing. it's just I don't know it's a great song I am sorry I am so sorry I turned my backs on you guys.

Bill:
[27:30] Well, you're here to stay now. Did you watch that early Letterman performance?

Frank:
[27:35] I remember seeing it videos of it after after they they had been on there but
and I'd seen them again when they returned to because they returned a few times to Letterman.

Bill:
[27:48] So the first time they played Hold My Hand there, like you could sense sort of nerves.
Like Darius Rucker is not as loose.
Like he's a bit restrained but what was going on was Paul Schaeffer's whole backing band was in on the chorus and,
They're playing along so even though the band isn't,
totally tight in the performance, but they have the support of Schaeffer's band and it is pretty cool to see and,
I know Letterman likes,
The name Hooting the Bullfish, but you could see he really liked the album and he was pushing there's certain things he pushes and that was one of them.

Frank:
[28:28] Yeah, yeah, yeah. When Letterman likes you, he really lets you know.

Bill:
[28:34] And this is like a bit over the top, but I'm going to read it because Darius Rucker mentioned it when in this interview, there's the whole thing about the hatred of Hooting the Blowfish.
One thing he said a couple things. One thing he said is people hate us because we don't write songs about how much we hate our parents or how much school sucked.
And then he also talked about the Letterman thing and he said,
this is the day grunge ended.

Frank:
[28:59] I don't think he's wrong though.

Bill:
[29:04] We had just gone through three or four years of record sales not being that good and grunge being the big thing on the radio.
And then all of a sudden we're saying hold my hand.
You know these great little hooks that were undeniable and people wanted to hear that.
They wanted to hear it again and again.

Frank:
[29:21] And he's not wrong. I think people needed something positive. After, like we said, the doom and gloom of the early early 90s rock.

Bill:
[29:30] I found something even more positive than the song and I can say it this way because it's still the.

Frank:
[29:35] Oh, yeah!

Bill:
[29:36] Song but it's on Sesame Street. It was one of the best appearances of a band that I've seen,
And so they're there with the Muffets and it's about crossing the street,
It was so good And so Elmo's there and Darius Rucker takes Elmo by the hand to help him cross the street and that's so good The lyrics are set up to be about waiting for an adult you trust to help you cross the street and it was.

Frank:
[30:00] Yeah, that's awesome.

Bill:
[30:03] Beautiful positive and the band is all in.

Frank:
[30:07] You can't go through life with a band name Hootie and the Blowfish and take yourself too, too seriously.
I think they understood and which is why they probably set up that corporation. They they probably knew it's like, okay, this might like this might be our only shot. So like, let's make sure that we capitalize on it. And you get the feeling that I can't remember if I said this or not.
but there's not really a big ego with the band. We talked about like them being in bar fights and stuff like that early on but that was you know I think for for good reason if you you can you know,
justify violence and all that but you don't get the feeling that they lived that quote-unquote rock and roll lifestyle.

Bill:
[30:50] They certainly didn't before Crack but afterwards each of them sort of had their struggles from the sounds of it.

Frank:
[30:58] Oh yeah, yeah, yeah.

Bill:
[30:59] Yeah, so they never did heroin. But there was just reading interviews with like they,
there was some crazy, yeah.

Frank:
[31:08] They partied pretty good. Well they were a party band to begin with. Well, Daris Rucker has that amazing country career right now too.

Bill:
[31:11] Right, and so I guess coming into this scene.

[31:15] I think they found their way.
They found their back on their feet, so to speak.
and things are going well for them. I mean, so it's neat, you can kind of read up on the histories of each and then they're doing okay.

[31:29] It's crazy. I remember when, yeah. We talked about him earlier for the Lionel Richie episode.

Frank:
[31:34] Which is bonkers.

Bill:
[31:35] His duet with Lionel Richie is bananas.

Frank:
[31:37] Is, yeah, it's crazy good. Can we put a little clip of it here?

Bill:
[31:44] Well, we got to. Yeah.

Frank:
[31:45] Yeah, okay.

Bill:
[31:48] All right, well, I think we got some categories we could talk about. Michael Bolton.

Frank:
[31:54] Okay, I'm going to say no.
And there's reason because of that. The opening line is with a little love and some tenderness.
I think he would get confused and just sing time love and tenderness.

Bill:
[32:08] I didn't think of that.
That's good. I would love to see Darius Rucker, Michael Bolton duet, Ala, Lionel Richie, Darius Rucker duet.

Frank:
[32:16] Oh, yeah.

Bill:
[32:17] So I would like a thing where it's the Darius Rucker duets album and Michael Bolton comes out to sing, hold my hand.

Frank:
[32:23] That would be fantastic. As long as he's singing. He's not singing time love and tenderness.

Bill:
[32:28] Yeah, I think you'd have to have people feeding lines, also restraining Michael Bolton when he wants to go full Bolton, he's gonna have to control them.

Frank:
[32:35] Like a shock collar or something. You were weakened at Bernie's I was more running man.

Bill:
[32:36] They'll have ropes.

[32:39] I was thinking of a series of pulleys and ropes,
But yeah, you went more running man.

[32:50] All right, Hallmark movie. I have written down here Hallmark Pure Flix movie, because I think this would make a great Christian movie.

Frank:
[32:59] And because there's no real romance about the song, it's all about like, building each other up and being like there for each.

Bill:
[33:02] The idea of that redemption is so much what I want life to be, that someone could come.

Frank:
[33:07] Together.

Bill:
[33:17] Along and help out somebody else.
This is what the song is about.
It's not the self-actualization of the person singing in terms of I'm going to find myself
and get there. They might be they might find themselves in the act of their,
charity towards their fellow human.

Frank:
[33:34] Yeah. Yeah. But but all they're doing is they're looking out for their fellow human. It's not a self-serving thing.

Bill:
[33:41] And so that really does feel like the band because they are always seen as
collective. There's never a sense that I could see that they hated each other or or that Darius Rucker was gonna go on his own,
even though he did, but it was amically.

Frank:
[33:54] Well, and they said they said like no we never broke up we were on hiatus. So in in 2008 was when Darius record left to do his solo career.
but they're back together and they're touring and they're releasing albums and stuff like that And he said like, no, no, like we're always hooting the blowfish.
we're always going to be us.

Bill:
[34:14] The great thing is the sort of vindication of time that 25th anniversary of crack free review finally came out like 2019. Their tour was sold out. Yes. And so I mean, it was,
like the number one tour, I think of 2019. And of course, it's it coincides with that article. I mean, I don't know if we'd fully talked about it. But you read this article in Esquire magazine, which was titled What's the title of it?

Frank:
[34:42] How our cruelty killed Hooty and the Blowfish and damaged our souls.
And then the byline is we need forgiveness for what we did in 1996.
And this is what brought up a lot of guilt and pain for me realizing just like I have not atoned for my sins.

Bill:
[35:03] But 2019 ended up being a year that was amazing for Hootie and the Blowfish and the article is kind of funny reading it Because they're like 2018 was such a bad year. We got to find ourselves again. It's like, oh, no, no, no.

Frank:
[35:07] Yeah. You have no idea what's on the horizon here. Oh yeah.

Bill:
[35:18] Yeah, yeah, and he may even met anybody's like this being January 6. He mentioned someone's like, oh you have no idea
What January 6 is gonna mean in the future too? So we have like COVID is just about to come right?
COVID-19 comes towards the end of that year and it doesn't really hit North America till maybe March,
of 2020 and now we're in 2023 now and oh my goodness so much has changed since then
where this guy had no idea where we were headed.

Frank:
[35:43] Well, we'll put a link to the article in the show notes. Fantastic article.

Bill:
[35:45] Uh, yeah, Frank, I...

Frank:
[35:48] He takes a lot of pot shots at other artists that like we give these guys a pass, but we dump on Hootie and the Blowfish and he's calling out like Deep Blue something.
I know Bill you love Breakfast at Tiffany's right? That's one of your favorite songs?

Bill:
[36:09] I don't know.

Frank:
[36:09] I don't think I've ever seen Bill shoot daggers at me before. But then like Dishwala, Dave Matthews band, Counting Crows, talking about all these bands.

Bill:
[36:13] Yeah.

[36:13] But yeah, there is something to be said about where this music fits in within the 90s.

Frank:
[36:21] Just like, why did these guys get a pass but we dump on Hooty?

Bill:
[36:32] That's a good call. Like yeah, bands were able to survive and be given passes, but not this.
Well that leads to the mixtape doesn't it?

Frank:
[36:40] Yeah, you go first. Okay, I have, it could be long.

Bill:
[36:41] Yeah. Okay I got a kind of long mixtape. Okay.
Okay.
I have a feeling we are going to cross over a lot here.

Frank:
[36:51] I'll let you go first.

Bill:
[36:52] Okay.
Well here are the songs. I wanted to cut it down but that just wasn't happening because there's so many types of songs I wanted to put in here.
So here we go. What I picked were bands from the 90s that were sort of given a dismissal by the wider
culture in the end. Like they might have been popular, but then they were cast aside, especially by critics.

Frank:
[37:20] Okay. No, no, no, no. Mine is very, very superficial.

Bill:
[37:21] It's not crossing into your territory at all.
Oh, good. Okay.
Okay. So here we go.
Enid by the Bare Naked Ladies.
to me, Delamitri. It is. I know. And I'm not sure people hate.

Frank:
[37:35] That's a great song. I really like that song.

Bill:
[37:39] Delamitri because I'm like, I don't but it has that same happy
feel. And Ian it is goofy happy feel and Bear Nickleys toured.

Frank:
[37:42] Oh, yes.

Bill:
[37:46] With Hootie and the Blowfish.
Favorite of yours here, the Goo Goo Dolls. Sorry, slide. So,
positive. I go back to them. Yeah, sorry about that. Two,
Two Princes, Spin Doctors, Run Around, Blues Traveler, Flood, Jars of Clay.

Frank:
[38:08] I think I had all of those albums.

Bill:
[38:10] Next one for sure you'd have, Toad the Wet Sprocket, Nightingale Song. I picked a yeah, I just it's a beautiful song and then I end it with Found Out About You by Gin Blossoms.

Frank:
[38:14] Oh, beautiful song.

[38:20] Oh, okay. So I went.

[38:24] I went so superficial. Songs that have body parts in the title.

Bill:
[38:30] Okay, all right, here we go.

Frank:
[38:32] So this is my head and shoulders, knees and toes, mixtape.
Put your head on my shoulder, Paul Anka. Betty Davis Eyes, Kim Karnes.
When I'm Back on My Feet Again by Michael Bolton. Footloose, Kenny Loggins.
In Your Arms Awhile by Josh Ritter.
I Just Died in Your Arms Tonight, Cutting Crew.

Bill:
[38:59] Wow. Yeah, it was definitely.

Frank:
[39:02] And then we are ending it with hands by Jewel.

Bill:
[39:08] Just know, I, you know, I should have seen that coming. And I, I know.

Frank:
[39:12] How could you not?

Bill:
[39:14] And as soon as I saw that you were going, you're still speaking like,
oh, here it comes. Well, I can't say hands doesn't fit.
Are you giving us Christmas hands or the original?

Frank:
[39:24] No, the original.

Bill:
[39:25] Oh, the original. All right. I can't say that's better.

Frank:
[39:28] Yeah, it's the same song. It just has no jingle bells in it.

Bill:
[39:29] Same song. All right. Well, I guess I get that for the Cuckoo Dolls. I like Slide.
I like that song. All right.

Frank:
[39:36] Yeah, you can like it. I like hands.

Bill:
[39:41] There's another song called Hold My Hand by Lady Gaga for the Top Gun soundtrack.

Frank:
[39:44] That's right, yeah. Yes, yeah, yeah.

Bill:
[39:47] Good tune. So I was going to have a category, greatest Hold My Hand song, but I'm like, that's,
we're not all about that. And this leads to Garth Brooks at the American Music Awards.
American Music Awards had the following nominations for Artist of the Year. And it was Hootie the Blowfish, Green Day, Boyz II Men, TLC, Garth Brooks.
Garth Brooks wins. Now American Music Awards is a bit different. It's based on sales and votes, I think, or something.
So Garth Brooks wins. And he says, I can't accept this award because when we choose one artist over another, we're,
all diminished or something like that. Yeah. And then he left it. And so I had thought.

Frank:
[40:29] He was very diplomatic about it, basically saying he didn't deserve it.

Bill:
[40:36] I had read that he'd actually mentioned Hootie and the Blowfish, but it might have come up
in interviews later where he said, Hootie and the Blowfish sold the most. This is clearly the band everyone loves. So that's why we're not picking Lady Gaga versus Hootie and the
Blowfish. Garth Brooks wouldn't want that. So Dearest Rucker is hanging out with Garth bit of a side note here, but it all comes together. And Garth Brooks said, do you ever wonder what.

Frank:
[40:52] Yeah, exactly.

Bill:
[41:00] Happened to that award I left on the podium? And Darius Rucker said, well, what happened to it?
He goes, nah, it's on my mantle at home. I love Garth Brooks. It's so great. So just for that.

Frank:
[41:08] So we took it? That's awesome.

Bill:
[41:17] I think maybe someday we'll get to friends in low places.

Frank:
[41:22] Yeah, there's a whole genre that we really haven't gotten into is then that that's country music that's really not been in our wheelhouse, but it's obviously in Darius Rucker's wheelhouse.

Bill:
[41:26] Yeah.

[41:33] Yeah, I'm open to going there.

Frank:
[41:34] Oh absolutely same here.

Bill:
[41:39] We've gone on quite a journey here, Frank.

Frank:
[41:41] Yeah and I feel a little bit I won't say redeemed but I feel it's good to get this weight off my soul and admit that I was wrong and and apologize to Hootie and the blowfish that I was one of the many that turned their backs on them.

Bill:
[42:01] So fellow listeners, you may be feeling the same way too, right?
You may be feeling that you turned your back on Hootie, but Hootie is back. And so are the blowfish.
And things are okay. So I want you to picture yourself maybe as Frank. And the band comes walking by.
And today they see Frank standing there.
His head is down. His eyes are red. He's admitted that he's turned his back on the band.
You know what they're going to say to you, Frank, and to you listeners?
Get up. Let me see you smile. We're going to walk together.
We're going to walk the road a while because we all got hands for you.

Frank:
[42:50] I can't wait for that day to happen.

Bill:
[42:53] Thank you for listening to Bill and Frank's guilt-free pleasures.