Chuck Shute Podcast
In depth interviews with musicians, comedians, authors, actors, and more! Guests on the show include David Duchovny, Billy Bob Thornton, Mark Normand, Dee Snider, Ann Wilson, Tony Horton, Don Dokken, Jack Carr and many more.
Chuck Shute Podcast
Bill Leverty (Firehouse guitarist)
Episode 95 - 🔥Firehouse guitarist Bill Leverty! Firehouse has sold over 7 million records worldwide! They have a lot of great songs including the hits “Love of a Lifetime” and “Don’t Treat Me Bad”. We discuss the whole history of the band from handing their demo to Jon Bon Jovi to touring with Poison and more. We also talk about Bill’s new solo record “Divided We Fall” and lots of other fun stuff!
00:00 - Intro
01:05 - Welcoming Bill & Firehouse
01:55 - State Diving Champion
03:45 - Ice Hockey
06:29 - Carlos Montoya & Flamenco
07:33 - Jeff Beck & Guitar Greats
09:51 - White Heat & Michael Foster
11:15 - Original Demo With Dana Strum
13:15 - Demo to Jon Bon Jovi
15:26 - The Name "Firehouse"
16:46 - "Shake & Tumble" Song
18:47 - Blood, Sweat & Beers Tour & Sequel
22:05 - AMA Best New Artist
23:36 - "Reach For The Sky" Single
25:15 - Tours with Tesla, Poison & More
26:35 - "I Live My Life For You" Single
28:42 - "Good Acoustics" Album
31:45 - Changing Record Labels
32:25 - Bass Player Bruce Waibel
35:05 - Mental Health
36:43 - "Divided We Fall" Solo Album
38:10 - "You're a Natural" Solo Single
40:10 - Live Solo Shows
41:28 - Guest Appearances
42:40 - Firehouse Subs
43:38 - Bret Michaels
45:27 - Lita Ford, Don Dokken & More
46:55 - Rock Cruises
48:16 - Status Quo, Journey & Jeff Beck
50:25 - The Wrestler Soundtrack
52:03 - Wounded Warrior Project
53:25 - Wrap Up
Bill Leverty Website:
https://m.leverty.com
Firehouse Band Website:
https://www.firehousemusic.com
Wounded Warrior Project:
https://www.woundedwarriorproject.org
Chuck Shute Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/chuck_shute/
Photo by Mario Leo Fasolo
Thanks for Listening & Shute for the Moon!
Welcome to today's show. And remember to hit that subscribe button if you have not already done so we have a legend on the show today. I don't say that often bill Laverty guitarist for the band firehouse. This band has sold over 7 million records worldwide. I think that's a lot. And they have had at least I think eight songs or so that have been on the radio, including the monster hits. Don't treat me bad love of a lifetime. When I look into your eyes and a lot of good album tracks that I really like anyways, good live band as well. I've seen them at least twice that I can remember. And they still sound great. The singer CJ can still hit all the high notes. And I really hope to see them live again soon. So Bill joins me today to talk about the history of firehouse his new solo record divided we fall plus some other fun surprises. Check it out. Welcome Bill Leverty to the Chuck Shute Podcast. How you doing?
Bill Leverty:I'm doing great Chuck. Thanks for having me. Yeah, thanks
Chuck Shute:for coming on. This is a little bit of a dream come true. For me. I was a big firehouse fan when I was a kid like and obviously Warren and all that stuff. That's what that's the year I got into Iraq was like eighth grade. It was like 92 I don't want to say it was just like on the cusp of you guys like really coming up and it was amazing.
Bill Leverty:Thanks, man. We can we can take your parents for great parenting and raising such a great kid was great musical team. They were not a fan. I would put a lot of I actually had a firehouse poster. Now I think now when they're okay with but some of the Metallica ones with the skulls and stuff. I remember my dad not being too thrilled about those. But I have a lot of the posters on my wall. So fun times. So you had this is interesting. I love doing these episodes, because I do a lot of research. So I find out a lot about the band and yourself, of course. And you actually before you got it well you got into guitar when you're really little but then you kind of took a break. And then you got into diving. So tell me you were actually the Virginia State diving champion. That's amazing. Yeah, I was. I spent a lot of time at the pool. And the lady who was the coach there, just a world class coach. She was a former Olympic diver. Yeah. And she saw me just goofing around on the diving board. And she said, you know, you should join the diving team. So I said, Okay, so I joined he had to be up here at seven in the morning, which kind of sucked, but I did it anyway. And she she taught me how to die. But we had a great, great bunch of kids on the team. You know, there was, like 15 people on the team. And some of the older guys, I say older they were, you know, under 18. They were doing amazing stuff, you know, triples, and two and a half with double twists and stuff with these incredibly hard dives. And so they were kind of my mentors in it. And so I worked real hard with him. And you know, lo and behold, I want to, I want a couple of minutes. Yeah. So but
Chuck Shute:yeah, so you're the state champion individually felt like the team was the state individually. Yeah. So then did they ever try to get you to try to keep going with the Olympics? Or what? Why did you quit diving?
Bill Leverty:I you know, I don't like to brag too much about what I was doing. You know, when I was that young? Yeah. And I don't like that much anyway. But I was ranked in the top 10 in the nation. And they did want me to keep going. But, you know, I had other plans, you know, and I still went to the pool a lot. But it was it didn't involve diving. It was just, you know, hanging out girls and girls. And then it was, yeah, and playing guitar. So yeah, so and but before you got into guitar, too, you started doing ice hockey. And then I heard that you're you were still doing ice hockey. Up until not too long ago, which seems crazy to me. Because I know Tom Brady's playing in the Super Bowl a couple weeks, and he's older than me. I can't imagine playing football. I feel like hockey would be worse. How did you keep playing that? And keep going with that? Does that hurt your body? Oh, it was killing me. And then but I still did it. And what was really tough is that our ice time for the men's league here in Richmond was you could go and start your game as late as 1030. So you get home at one. And I had to get up at 330 to fly out to go do a gig. So I wasn't getting enough sleep to recover. And you know, it would take me a week to recover anyway, from all the bruises and get knocked around. And then it was time to play another game. And it was time after that to fly out to another gig. So yeah, I hung up my skates probably four years ago, something like
Chuck Shute:that. That's a pretty long time to continue to play though. You must have really loved ice hockey.
Bill Leverty:I was doing it a lot and thankfully I only injured my shoulder and I had a surgery on that. So I did miss it. A gig or two and that kind of woke me up but I still was stupid. put enough to stick around and, and keep playing after that healed. Yeah. Because I just love that game and there's there's nothing like it when you get out there. Even when you're older you forget that you're older you're really tired because it's really cool in the rink. So it's not like you're having a hard time breathing although although you do when you're when you're skating hard, you come back to the bench and you go, Wow, I had no idea I was this tired. Whereas if I go out in the summertime and run, I'm dead after you know. Yeah. Whereas right on the rink, skating, trying to score a goal, man it's it's amazing. The the extra adrenaline you can get.
Chuck Shute:Yeah, you get caught up in the game, because that's like me when I go running all i think is I'm running. I hate this. I'm running. I hate this. But when I'm playing like a basketball or throwing a football around, you're you get caught up in the game and you forget that you're exercising.
Bill Leverty:Yeah, I totally forget that. I'm exercising and when it's really cool. In the rink, you're not. I'm sweating a lot, but you don't you don't feel as beaten up with the amount of exercise you're getting. So yeah, I was really sore after you know, the next day. And I was really bruised and I got some minor injuries, but nothing that really was debilitating. Thankfully, my hands didn't get crunched too badly. And that's good now, still, you know, still going. That's good. Yeah. So guitar, you then you eventually pick up a guitar wrench, age 15. And you learn Sweet Home Alabama. And then you know, of course you have the typical influences, the Van Halen and the kiss and the LEDs up on a lot. But Carlos Montoya, I saw him on the list of your influences. I had to Google that guy. He's like flamenco guitar. So how did you discover that when that one's a little like not the typical guitar player. My parents had a couple of his albums and they, you know, I put them on the turntable, and I would listen to them. That was before I started playing. But yeah, what an amazing inspiration to hear that sound of flamenco guitar and I think that's where I first wanted to kind of explore the sound of Spanish music. It just sounds so cool. The scales are used and everything so I like that little flavor, a little spice. Yeah,
Chuck Shute:that's cool. I appreciate that stuff a lot more and like, I don't know, like Steve Stevens, Billy idol's guitarist like he incorporates that in some of his songs. Like I think it's kind of cool.
Bill Leverty:Yeah, he's a Maestro. Yeah, love Steve Stevens. But is is Jeff So Jeff Beck is your favorite like what makes him the best like and is Eddie Van Halen would you say he's second and Randy Rhoads third? Or like what I mean? Is it just kind of personal preference or income but Jeff Beck just came, I discovered him right at the right time, right after I've been playing for maybe a year or two, maybe a year. And I had his wired record. And I was able to not play along with his stuff. But I was able to, to play along with it poorly, I guess is what I would characterize it. I was able to, and it was just such a big influence on me that I went, I've got all his back catalogue. And then everything that came out since I just thought this guy can make a guitar sing like nobody else. He's just got his own voice on a guitar that's really hard to do. And it's really such a unique player and I just really can, everything that he puts out. I really love so I wouldn't say Eddie Van Halen a second Eddie Van Halen could be tied for first and second. Randy Rhoads. It's just that, I think. And Steve Morse is another is probably my most overall, you know, that's the guy who I go, wow. If I could play like anybody be Steve Morse because he can do anything. And he does everything so well. But there's a lot of them. You know, Michael Schenker is another one that I absolutely from UFO Yeah. So when you listen to those guys, like I know for me is like an interviewer. I mean, I can listen to like a howard stern or like Conan O'Brien do an interview and I'm like, I listen to that. And I go, what the hell am I can never keep up with these guys. These guys are like, ridiculously good. Did you ever think that way with those guitar players ever listen to Jeff back and go? Well, I can't be Jeff back. What the hell am I doing? And just try them? You ever have those thoughts I've given up or? Oh, yeah, I mean, I either wanted to go and practice for hours or just quit. And thankfully, I thought I'm going to practice forever. But I I never thought I could be anywhere near as good as any of those guys. I I'll never be as good as them. But if I listen to them enough, I can get a little bit of their vibe through osmosis. And hopefully, it'll come out in my playing somehow without being a ripoff. Yeah, so that's what I'm trying to know for sure. I think you're one of the best guitar players. So you're you're a guitar player in a band called white heat. And you get this drummer Michael Foster, and he shows up with this ugly green drum set, but he's a good drummer. He can sing and play drums at the same time. I'm always fascinated by that, too. Did he ever sing lead on the songs when you guys were white heat? No, I don't think he did he, we might have played white wedding and he might have sang white wedding a couple of times. So speaking of Billy Idol, you know,
Chuck Shute:yeah, that's a that's a great song.
Bill Leverty:In the early days of the cover cover, when we were doing cover tunes and stuff, but the band he was in before he joined our band. He did sing a few songs. They had a lead singer. But he sang a couple of songs too, but he was a terrific drummer. I mean, when he showed up and set up that kit. And he started playing, I just knew that guy. I could feel that he he had the groove. A lot of other drummers, it just felt kind of stiff, like they play in time and they could put him up. He just had this loose, relaxed feel, but still a lot of power. And, and then we heard him singing it was it was it were like two debts, you know? bonus. Yeah, nice. Really well, right. Yeah, that helps for sure. So then you eventually you're able to finagle CJ snare and Perry Richardson from another band. And then you guys make this demo. I didn't know the demo you made was produced by Dana's Strum from slaughter, and it has Mark Slaughter singing background vocals and Stevie Rochelle from Tuff singing background vocals as well. We had a few songs, maybe four or five songs, maybe six, I don't know, on that demo that had kind of gang vocal opportunities. And Dana and Mark called in all their friends. And that's where we met Stevie. And we met Mark Ferrari - he came in and sang on some... I'm trying to think of who else was in on that session. But that session, we had "Oughta Be a Law", you know, and we needed 15 guys if we could make him sound like... Dana was a great producer. I mean, he had to sing it several times. And he layered them all together and made it sound like it was just an enormous amount of people. I'm trying to think of some of the other cats because a lot of the other tough dudes were there. Okay, not there. And I'm trying to think of some of the other guys that were there but but yeah, Mark helped us out a lot too with vocals and sang some of the really high stuff that... and CJ can sing anything. I think Dana's Yeah, he'sgood. He was Hey, let's get another voice. And we had another guy named Jimmy Coons, who great singer. Want to see Jays friends from Lock Haven, Pennsylvania are two phenomenal singers that came out of Lock Haven, Pennsylvania, CJ snare and Jimmy Coons and, Jimmy came out to LA and sang with us on that. So it didn't sound like CJ singing all the parts. I think Dana's idea was just to get these guys who were really good like Mark, and Jimmy, just sing some of these parts along with CJ or just to make it sound - just so it wasn't eight tracks of CJ or whatever.
Chuck Shute:Right? Okay. It was make it sound bigger for sure. So you gave the demo to somehow you got it to Jon Bon Jovi. I didn't know he was part of the band. And he said it was the best demo he'd ever heard. Right. And he helped you guys get some, some airplay. Well,
Bill Leverty:he didn't say was the best demo we'd ever heard. He said that on that Slippery When Wet tour. That was the best demo that he had heard at that time.
Chuck Shute:That's still he's probably hearing a lot of demos. At that time, though. I'm sure everybody was giving him a demo.
Bill Leverty:I gave it to him. And I didn't think he was gonna listen to it. And then we went out and we watched Cinderella. And then after Cinderella was done, the lights came on and out walked the security guy. And he found me in a crowd of 20,000 people in the Richmond Coliseum maybe 18,000. I don't know how many people it holds - a big arena. And he said, "Jon wants to meet with you when he plays Hampton -tomorrow night. Can you get the whole band together?" I was like, yeah, we can get the band together for this.
Chuck Shute:Mm hmm.
Bill Leverty:That's what Jon said. So it was it was really real high point for us.
Chuck Shute:Yeah. So then did he kind of help you get it onto local radio? Is that what happened? or How did what it was is part of it?
Bill Leverty:Jon sent the demo to the guy that signed him- Derek Shullman- Polygram at the time, and Derek called us back a couple of days later, and Derek said, I hear some good songs. I don't hear any killer songs. Can you write me some killer songs? And we said, well, we'll give it a try. And we gave it a try... and they kind of lost interest. But in the meantime, we have signed management with the Jon security guy, his tour coordinator. And Danny became our manager. Danny knew a guy in New York who had a label and we signed with them. And then with that demo with- it wasn't really a demo, it was gonna be a record that one that Dana made. We got that on the radio show and a bunch of record companies heard about it. And then that's when finally Epic Records came in and said, Yeah, we'd like to sign the band, we want to re record everything. So that's kind ofhow that happened.
Chuck Shute:And then you had to change the name from white heat to firehouse which I always thought firehouse was named after the kiss song, but you guys said no, it wasn't it was because the drummer Michael was going to be a firefighter. And he just thought that was a cool name or
Bill Leverty:Yeah, so well, we been named white heat was um, we did the trademark search after we had signed our record deal in the our attorney said, Yeah, there's already a couple of bands that have have prior usage in one band that is actually apply for the trademark. So you should change the name. So we went through everything and and no to the name sounded cool. But then Michael said, Well, what about firehouse and we said, well, then that sounds pretty cool. We could live with that. Let's sleep on it. And of course, we woke up and said, well, everybody's gonna think it's, you know, named after kisaan. But no, Michael was going to be in the Fire Academy. He was slated to become a firefighter. His dad was a police officer. And Michael wanted to be a firefighter and was going to go through all that and, and join the band. And so he thought, yeah, that's a cool name for a band. And we we thought, like it,
Chuck Shute:especially with all the
Bill Leverty:office, the trademark office showed that it was clear so we went for it. Yeah, I love it. And then I love like the theme that you guys do with the albums with the fire and like course, the first album, The legendary just, you know, self titled firehouse, got the girl with a match. I mean, that's just like an amazing cover. And you got the two of the two monster hits love of lifetime. And don't treat me bad. Of course, everybody knows those. But I really liked the song shake and tumble. Which it was funny because it was in a Sony commercial. I don't know if you remember this. But I remember hearing that commercial every time I had that commercial. I thought, what is that this would be for sure. Sam, I always wonder what is that song. And finally, I got the firehouse album. And I listened to that song. And I'm like, that's the song that I kept wondering what song is that from? Like? I don't think Sony should have put the the band titles at the bottom of the commercial or something for you guys. I sure do. I think every radio DJ every time your songs on the radio, the DJ should say what you know who that song. You know what band, it was, what was the title of the song, but you know, Phoenicia mentioned shake and tumble. That was actually it wasn't an official single, right. That was the first song that the record company released to the public, he was released to metal radio, okay. At that time. One of the biggest players in that space was called z rock. z rock had about 30 stations syndicated around the country. And that song was played and people call back and wanted to hear it again. And, and it became a hit on that station. And it was actually 30 stations around the country, like I said, so that enabled said 30 gigs right away. So we rented the cheapest bus that we could find. And we have done it and we went out we started playing those 30 places. And the record company saw that we were not a bunch of screwballs out there to to just keep partying. We were pretty consistent every night when we played and they saw some sales in the record stores that followed us like a little trail. And they thought okay, we got something here. Let's let's put out a single and they chose Don't treat me bad. So Yeah, I love that song. So speaking of partying, though, that you weren't you know, you weren't partying on that tour. But there was some partying happening on that blood sweat and beers tour with Warrington trickster. Right. And you guys are all still friends to this day. Oh, absolutely. I mean, I'm not saying that we didn't party back even before we got our record deal. It's just that we always knew. Hey, we got to work tomorrow. We got to sing tomorrow. We had a gig tomorrow. So we can't do that so much. partying. Yeah, it was the days off. I think that that we partied more or that the days before the days off, which we didn't have many days off back then we filled up our calendar pretty pretty full. Well. Yeah. And warrants were was wonderful. And we we had great times with those guys. trickster and Laurent and we are still real good friends to this day.
Chuck Shute:Is there any story? I know you're like a family man now but is there any stories you can tell? At least pG 13. That would be good for this podcast from that too, because I've heard so many stories from that tour. Just sounds like you guys had so much fun. Like it seems like a blast.
Bill Leverty:Well, from day one. They were all it was all they were so nice. The warrant guys were so helpful in making sure that we could sound good every night and the trickster guys who had already been around the block a couple of times I mean, they opened up with scorpions they opened up for you might know who else they had opened up for some other. Yeah, we see with kiss. Yeah. And so we're in it. We were living in Charlotte before we got our record deal. And we had seen trickster with the scorpions, and we had seen warrant went on there, dirty, rotten, filthy, rich tour in a club there. And so we were thinking, Man, you know, we're going to be able to tour with these guys. And, you know, we're going to try to learn as much as we can from it, and they were so both bands were so cool and helpful to us every night. Um, you know, as far as individual stories, I don't know, man. I mean, I had so many times where I'd, you know, walk by Eric, and he'd say, Hey, man, you know, what kind of guitar you plan? And I tell him and then he showed me his guitars. And so those are the things that I really remember Joey, you know, how do you know let me play his guitar every night after the gig. After gig we hang around till after the end of warrants gig, they'd let us all come up there and play a song with him. And, and Joey had let me play one of his guitars. Try this one out. You know, this is an urban as I just got. So it was just things like that. Just the camaraderie and yeah, like I say, we're still friends to this day we did. Last year, we probably I'll say 2019 we probably did 20 shows with Warren. Right? Um, you know, I miss the trickster guys. Oh, hopefully, they'll get back out and get torn again. And they're great people.
Chuck Shute:Yeah. What do you think's going on in that? Do you have an opinion on that camp(Trixter)? It's kind of a split camp right now. Do you think they'll get back together...
Bill Leverty:I love them all to death. And I hope they can work out you know, whatever it is, and that they can get back out play. But the business is tough anyway.
Chuck Shute:Would you guys all get together and do a 30th anniversary of the "Blood Sweat and Beers Tour?"
Bill Leverty:In a heartbeat. Yeah. Cuz I didn't get to see the first one. So I was like, I was just becoming a fan of that music. I think I missed the tour. So but yeah, so this is interesting, too. I know you've talked about this in many interviews, but how you guys were the was American Music Awards, Best New artists and you beat out Nirvana and Allison chains. I always wondered about that. But you said it was because you thought it was because the balance kind of went out earlier. And so those bands hadn't really blown up as much yet. Yeah, I think so. And I don't I never really focused on who we beat. I just focused on it. We we won an award. You know, it's super Yeah.
Chuck Shute:You won many awards that year. I think you won metal edge, best new band and some other places, too, right?
Bill Leverty:Yeah, yeah, we get slaughter and one at the year before. And they were presenting and we didn't think we were going to win that. And when they named our name, we all just rocketed out of our seats. And I think I was from the distance between my seat to the stage was probably 80 feet and I probably made it in three steps. Hug those guys. And it was Yeah, that was exciting. But super exciting.
Chuck Shute:So you didn't know you're gonna win like was Nirvana. There was Allison chains that were like those guys. None of those guys knew. Was there. I
Bill Leverty:don't know if Nirvana they might have had somebody there like, okay, somebody's on. So I don't know. But no, we didn't know. We don't know when we you know, we met Sammy Hagar backstage. And he said, the reason you're here is because you're probably gonna win. And I was like, Wow, I didn't think of that. But you know, Sammy knows a lot. So yeah, it was for sure. Yeah, that's a good little tip there. So then your second album, Hold your fire. I love this album. I love the first single reach for the sky. Such a cool song. And I remember seeing this video Like I remember it like it was yesterday in my parents bedroom right before school started and I was like, I don't want to go to school. I want to watch this video. And but it was interesting that that was the first signal. I think you had said on the first album, you kind of wanted a more rockin song and they went with the poppier. Don't treat me bad did you have to fight to get reach for your reach for the sky is the first thing on that one. We never had a fight because we never really had a set.
Chuck Shute:Okay? He
Bill Leverty:is the boss when it comes to that kind of stuff. We weren't we didn't have the muscle to really go in there and say, yeah, we demand this. They felt that it was a good song. It was at a time where bands like us were just starting to fall out of favor. So they knew it was gonna be very difficult. We were paying for the video anyway, we had to, they loaned us the money, but we got to pay it back out of our royalty rate. So it's kind of a loan. And it was an expensive video. And MTV played at once. So you know, you saw it that day. So I'm
Chuck Shute:glad the only time I saw I must have been lucky then yeah, cuz I remember seeing the morning that was
Bill Leverty:Michael foster introduced it. Yeah, he called him up and introduced it on whatever the show was after after school or whatever that that that show they had and now that was about it. So we were kind of bummed about, I should say very bummed about that. Um, but it was it was a tough time for bands like us. Having said that they put out the second single when I looked into your eyes, and I don't want to get ahead of you, but no, absolutely. That was a great song, too. And then yeah, you guys had the you had a huge long tour with Tesla for nine months. And I think you also toured with poison and Damn Yankees The following year, so that those are some big tour. I mean, those tours were obviously successful, right? I mean, that's still still really big bands. big draw. Huge. You know, the Tesla tour was supposed to last for six weeks. And it lasted for nine months, because it was so successful that the promoters don't ask you to come back twice. If they're not selling ticket. Right, right. Tesla was you know, I mean, they're a great band great people treated us really well. And, and then we got off of that we got we got on that poison tour, and that was poison. Damn Yankees. Leonard Skinner was on a couple of those.
Chuck Shute:Oh, nice. I didn't know that.
Bill Leverty:That was a dream come true for me being that, you know, Skinner was one of my biggest fans.
Chuck Shute:Absolutely.
Bill Leverty:Enough was on a couple days. Oh, yeah. So a couple of those shows it was enough's enough firehouse. Damn Yankees poison, and Leonard Skinner are rather Linda Skinner and poison.
Chuck Shute:I think jackal was on a couple to write.
Bill Leverty:I, we've done a lot of shows with Jacqueline, I'm not sure if they were on that tour. Or not. I don't. They may have been okay. I don't
Chuck Shute:know. Or maybe they did a different one with Damn Yankeess. But yeah, so then that's like I said, that was kind of like that cusp of that kind of music. I really love that kind of stuff. And then so then you kind of started to see the writing on the wall with some of your peers how their albums weren't doing as well. But the record label didn't drop you, they still let you go record another album, with Ron Nevison - Producer. And somehow, in the middle of the 90s when this music was not cool or popular or whatever, you guys had a single "I Live My Life For You." It was a radio hit. And you said it was just because of luck. But I don't really believe in luck, especially when you didn't have any support from the record labels. So do you think it was more just that it was a really good song?
Bill Leverty:Well, I do. I'm very fond of that song. And it became a bigger hit outside of the United States than inside the United States. And it may be our biggest song in Asia, which we went and toured over there.... on that... So I don't know. I do wish that the record company still would have believed in us in America at that time, but I know they had the deck stacked against them for bands like us. And because our history was now suddenly"hairband" and the program directors were playing anything but "hairband." So it was tough that we they had a tough slug to get Firehouse played. And I love everybody that worked for us not worked at that record label, who worked our records, they were just the most wonderful people. And they had to make these decisions on where they're going to spend their dollar. And so we didn't really get the love -"money" - out of the labelfor that third record in America, but they said, hey, go overseas, there's a market over there still for you. So we did. And fortunately, we made the decision to do it. And it worked out pretty well. That's awesome....Yeah. And then so then the next hour and this was interesting, the good acoustics with so the record label wanted you to do a greatest hits album, but you someone had told you that if you do a greatest hits album, that's the kiss of death. So you convinced them that okay, what if we record our greatest hits acoustically? And that was that acoustic city went golden six countries. And you again, you weren't given any money promoted in the US. But that is such a now I love that you love that album too. I really love that album. I feel like it like connected with me emotionally. Like were you guys emotionally like really feeling the music? It didn't feel like you're going through the motions. It feels like you were really into the music at that point. Oh man, totally. We rearranged those songs, a lot of them too. For acoustic versions, change some some keys and some of them to make it sound different. And we really went in there and worked hard on that one. We didn't have much of a budget. The a&r guy or an a&r guy Michael said, I can't get you your normal budget because normally with a record deal, you start out here, they renew your option. You get a little bump in your budget. Third record, you get a little bump, fourth record, you get a little bump. He said now we can't do that. We got to bring your way down here see my hand disappear so So I said, Well, I got a buddy of mine who owns a studio who's going to give me a really good deal in Sarasota, Florida. The Allman Brothers who Michael worked with the Allman Brothers on epic, and he knew about the studio. And he said, Yeah, it's a reputable studio. And you can go in and record it, we're going to give you I can't get too much money. And I said, well, we'll find out what you can do. I think the budget, I don't want to say the number but it was really difficult to I couldn't have done it had it not been for pulling in favors and, and a friend helping me out. Okay. And so we went in, and we recorded that record in a short amount of time. We had enough money to pay a real guy to mix it. Mm hmm. Not that the guy who was engineering it. Mark sevens is a fantastic engineer. He could do it. But he wasn't a proven engineer at that point. So we got Eric Schilling to to, to mix it. Eric Schilling was Gloria Stefan's live engineer, and he worked at her studio down in Miami. So we drove the tapes from Sarasota across Florida to Miami. And, and I sat in there with and watched him mix and learn a lot from him. And that was cool. And yeah, like you say, when gold and a lot of countries wherever it was played, and it was, it was promoted a little bit. It had gold sales. In America, we went to the marketing girl who was the head of marketing at the time for our project and asked her how much is the record company going to give us to market it in the United States? And she said, I got some bad news. They're not giving us even one penny to promote it here. So Oh, how's anybody gonna buy it? What's the point? Right? We asked to be released from the label after that. Yeah. And they said they would?
Chuck Shute:Yes. I didn't understand that. Why didn't they just drop you if they're not gonna put any money into is there some sort of like, do they owe you money if they drop you? or What is that? Why did they hang on to you, but not?
Bill Leverty:It gets you you quit before you're fired? Kind of asked if we could quit? And they said, Yeah, okay. You probably we were gonna drop you anyway. They didn't say it that way. But we'll let you out of your contract. So then we could go as free agents and get licensing deals for our next records and different contracts. Oh, that's to our advantage, actually, to be free agents. Yeah, that's cool. So you guys really haven't had a lot of lineup changes -but around 2000 Perry leaves the band. And then he went on to play with country bands. And now he's in Stryper. So you got this other bass player. I mean, this guy's a total pro- Bruce Why-Bell? Is that how I say it? Bruce Way-Bell Waibel- this guy played with Stevie Ray Vaughan and Greg Allman and Carlos Santana. He played on your first solo record, but he was also like a Microsoft, A+ certified engineer. And you said he's one of the most gracious, kind and funny people you've ever met and said, and you said that you had met him in a jam session. And afterwards, the first day you met him, he had you rolling on the floor? What was he saying that you remember that was so funny? He just had so many jokes. And the guy was hysterical. He was he was a genius, and, and played with Greg Allman for 10 years. And he had so many great lines. I can't really quote it, because I'm not a comedian. He had that comedic genius as well. But musical genius. And he could , like I said, he played on my first record, and he just came in so well prepared and added so much to songs. And, one of these guys that played, he could play with a pick, he could play with his fingers, he could play and sing really well. And then just the nicest most fun guy to be around. So the perfect band member, and unfortunately, he said, I gotta leave after he was in the band for maybe a year. He said, Yeah, I gotta go. So we said, okay, well, we'll try to find somebody else. And, so he quit. Yeah. He played with Dickey Betts after that, because she lived in Sarasota. Yeah. And the Allman Brothers have big history there. And so he went and played in Dickey Bets band.
Chuck Shute:And so I think one of the lines that when you guys were first rehearsing, he said, one of the first things he says to the band, it was like in Florida, it was really hot, and he said, "It's hotter than a VCR in a crack house." I've never heard about it. Did he made that up?
Bill Leverty:I never heard it before. I'll tell you another one. He said he said that when he was in Greg's band, the joke was that it was on Johnny Carson- that Johnny Carson said that in the in the Greg Allman divorce that Cher got the kids and the cars and the houses and Greg settled for the medicine cabinet. So that.... he just had so many things. Things like that. Were just "wow."
Chuck Shute:Yeah. So what I really, I don't want to dig into old wounds. But I mean... I just don't understand it's always puzzling when people... because he died and his death is ruled a suicide, and it just makes me so upset I had I don't know if you're familiar with the story of Tyler Hilinski, he was a college football player. In the same thing, he took his own life, his parents started this thing- Hilinski is hope I had them on my show. And one of the things they talk about is just the stigma that you know that people don't talk about this kind of thing. You never saw any red flags or anything? He was always a happy guy. You're telling these great things about him... Do you think almost that's a red flag that he never expressed negative emotions? Like he never got sad or angry? Or you just never saw anything?
Bill Leverty:I don't know. I mean... I really don't know. I don't I don't know what happened after he left the band. It was a year later after he left our band. But I never saw any signs of depression, or anything like that. So yeah... I don't know.....
Chuck Shute:Such a tragedy. It just sounds like such a brilliant guys sad to see things like that.
Bill Leverty:The most fun guy to be around it made everybody laugh made everybody feel comfortable. And
Chuck Shute:too many stories like that of people like that. Taking their own life... I just wish there was something we could do if there's a way to prevent the next one, you know, something we could look for? But I don't know, sometimes it just, you don't know, I guess. So I guess if anyone's listening to this, and they're feeling that way. definitely reach out to somebody.
Bill Leverty:Yeah, it's it's a temporary feeling. It always gets better. So don't take the permanent solution to a temporary problem. Absolutely. Well going on. So your solo career, like I said, he played on your first record, you've been making solo records since 2003. But this newest one is so awesome. "Divided We Fall" is the title. And so you said that that's kind of like if we can't come together... thne it's kind of a divided, we fall as a country. So if I go to a concert, I've seen a ton of different people from different backgrounds and ages. And the one thing we all have in common is, we're all fans of music, do you think that music can bring us all together? It sure it sure couldn't hurt. You just have to think - let your ears try to appreciate a little bit of everything, because I didn't see a lot of people that often divide people because, this kind of music isn't my kind of music, or whatever. There's plenty of music out there for everybody. And but I think it's the message of the song is more about humanity than it is about a country. Or it can be about a couple. It can be about a family, neighborhood, a community, city, state town, country, the whole world. And it really is more of we're better together. And try to find common ground. It's not that hard to find, usually and try to build on that. So that's basically it.... great. And I love the first single I'm kind of surprised is the singles called urine natural. I don't want to give away the lyric because there's a cool like little play words in there. So people's check it out and listen to it. Because like it's pretty cool. And then did the did the firehouse Guys, did they pass on that one? Because I feel like gonna hear that. And they're gonna go, Wait a minute, why didn't you put this in firehouse? I want this on our record? Well, no, I mean, actually, we were just playing so many shows, we weren't really recording. And it was just a song that came to me. So I put it together. But I'd released the first song on this album over six years ago. And I, I put it out there just as a single. And then I got on with other projects and doing other things, touring with firehouse you know, being a father husband and doing all the things that go with that. And then producing other bands, mixing other songs, recording a solo here or there for other people. And then I had another idea for a song and I'd record that. So was putting out one song at a time, over a six year period or more. And then at the end going well, I got 10 Let's, let's press them up, put out a CD and then move on. So that's that was kind of the way that that all happen.
Chuck Shute:And that song your natural is not about anyone in particular you say could just be about anybody.
Bill Leverty:No, we, I'm sure you've met a lot of people that that song could pertain to Oh, yeah.
Chuck Shute:A lot of politicians and people. Yeah, yeah.
Bill Leverty:Yeah. You've seen him on TV. You've seen him in sports. You've seen him? Yeah. You know, you know, all over the place. You've seen him, you know, as just those kinds of people. So it's just nobody in particular, it's just kind of a general person who is unnatural, right? And then I won't give away more We'll get
Chuck Shute:rid of the rest. If you don't need to listen to it, get it get those Spotify plays up. So you say yeah,
Bill Leverty:go to my website and buy the CD. And there we go.
Chuck Shute:Oh, nice. Yeah, that's very cool. Now you said you won't play live, you won't schedule any concerts because if firehouse gets a gig, then you have to cancel the concert. Could you not just go though and play like locally, just that like a local bar or something? Or
Bill Leverty:I probably could, but I'd hire a banshee that helped me out in doing that. And then a firehouse got a gig, then those guys would have blocked out that weekend. Yeah. And all the rehearsal that goes into it to do that show. And then not only do I hurt, those guys are hurt the person who is selling the tickets, and then I hurt the people who bought the ticket. So it's just it's just not worth it. I've been doing acoustic performance on stage at though so I've got one coming up on February 7 will be my next one.
Chuck Shute:Like online, you mean or?
Bill Leverty:Yeah, mine, I break out the acoustic guitar and do the songs acoustically. Okay, different take on these and you
Chuck Shute:couldn't you wouldn't want to like open for firehouse that'd be too much work to be in two bands.
Bill Leverty:I'd love to do it. I'm not sure I could sing lead on these songs. And then get up there and sing the harmonies for files. Those are way higher. And my voice is usually kind of done after five gig and I wouldn't want to have that suffer because I wanted to get up and do a you know, do
Unknown:a?
Bill Leverty:Yeah. No Liberty gig. That's cool. So besides the solo stuff, and firehouse, did you ever flirt with any other high profile gigs or big name bands or supergroups or other offers? Like I know you did a song with Ted Poli from danger, danger. And then I thought I heard you say something about you have one coming out. But you can't talk about it yet? Yeah, I've got a couple of those things where it's, you know, it's not appropriate for me to announce that that is their reveal. Sure, sure.
Unknown:I will
Bill Leverty:reveal that. But I've had played on a couple of other you know, albums of I mean, and I say nobody big meaning you know, nobody, you know, Led Zeppelin never asked me to. But there would have been cool notable bands that I played on. And it's, it's really a great honor to get to be able to play a solo or a song on somebody else's record. So I've done a few of those. So you just probably have to look up look them up on on YouTube.
Chuck Shute:We're okay.
Bill Leverty:Yeah. I don't really publicize it too much other than when they're, they release it. I'll mention it in on my Facebook page and Twitter and stuff. But I don't I don't do it too much.
Chuck Shute:Okay, cool. So I don't know if you're a sandwich fan. But there's a place a few years ago that opened up and they had the nerve to call themselves "Firehouse Subs." So my question is, how much did you get in the lawsuit? And can I have some of that money because there's probably more than enough to go around.
Bill Leverty:Well, I could say that. In hindsight, one of the mistakes that we made as Firehouse was not trademarking the name for food as well. We just we just trademarked it for music and entertainment.
Chuck Shute:Okay.
Bill Leverty:And Firehouse Subs came in. But they great sandwich
Chuck Shute:they do and they do you have good sandwiches,
Bill Leverty:They're great guys- I've never met them. But their whole story is really cool. So maybe one day they'll do a commercial and let Firehouse be in the commercial.
Chuck Shute:That's so that'd be amazing, like Ratt in the Geico commercial and they're getting all these bands to be in these big commercials. That's kind of fun. I like seeing that stuff.
Bill Leverty:I'd love to do it.
Chuck Shute:That'd be cool. Um, you've done a lot of shows with Bret Michaels and like we said the open for poison and then you do a lot with his solo stuff. You guys open when? Do you have any a lot of interaction with him? Or is he kind of separated from the other bands?
Bill Leverty:Oh, no. I mean, everybody we that we've played with? has been really cool. Brett is is so cool. And you know, we we get to walk in his dressing room and tell me why he's not at all like, you know, keep them away. Like, come on. He's just totally done. Or I mean, I'm really good friends with his guitars. Pete epic.
Chuck Shute:Oh, yeah. Pete.
Bill Leverty:So Pan American, you know, and Mike, they're just wonderful people. You know, so no, bread is totally cool. And is we have the same booking agent. And so I hear from our booking agent that Brett loves doing shows with us. And we want to be the kind of band that when we open up for somebody that we're easy to get along with and that we come off on time. That's the most important thing, because you can't make the show run late because the headliner squeezed at the end and his setlist goes from being a full set and he's gonna cut it because they have curfews and right so rather than being a no, we're doing Our whole set if you know we've got to cut a song, we cut a song. We don't argue about it. We just do it. And we it's a team effort. And Brett is a great captain of the team when it's a Brett Michael show. He's a great captain. Yeah.
Chuck Shute:So besides Brett, you've done shows with obviously warrant and La guns a bunch and Lita Ford doc and winger mean all these guys. Do you have a favorite that you really like to play with? Are they all are memorable ones or memorable shows that really stood out? Well,
Bill Leverty:I mean, you mentioned Lita, I got to get up and jam with her a song with with her and her band back to the cave, which I've always loved. Yeah, and, and it was great, like three guitars up their planet. And she's just a phenomenal guitar player, you know, and she's a really great singer and just such a nice person. And so same booking agent, a RM entertainment, and we got to open up and she said, Hey, do you want to play back to the cave? And I was like, hell yeah. So that was cool. And so I remember that, but I get to get up and play with warrant or sing with them. We do cherry pie at the end of the night. A lot of times, it's fun. I mean, those guys are great and winger, I've got to jam Helter Skelter with him one time cruise. in Scandinavia, we were we were doing gigs with him. And who else did you mention? I mean, they were
Chuck Shute:la guns and dogs.
Bill Leverty:Awesome. Yeah. Do
Chuck Shute:you see you like doing those cruises?
Bill Leverty:And you know, Doc, and another one, we're done. You know, he comes in our dressing room. And he hangs out. I mean, he's just, he's a brother. Yeah. he's a he's an older brother. So he gives advice a lot when you know. And we all need advice from him and him telling hearing the stories from guys like that. And what you know what they know and what they've learned. It's, it's helpful. And Don's another one of those cats, man, he's just really cool, dude. Yeah. Do
Chuck Shute:you like doing those cruises with the bands and stuff too? Those seem like really fun.
Bill Leverty:Oh, yeah, that's, that's like the best, because it's a vacation with all the coolest people on the boat that you could imagine, because they're all the real diehard fans of this genre. Mm hmm. And you get to meet everybody on that boat. And, and all the bands get along really well. And the guy puts it together as this guy named Larry Moran. And he's, he's a brilliant guy who took a huge risk in starting Monsters of Rock cruise. And a lot of people were in his ear saying I don't ever work, man, you got to rent out all these cabins and on this boat, and you're gonna you're not gonna be able to sell that many candidates. And he sold it out the first year. And, and every ever since he's sold that Cruise is out. And, you know, he he puts together all these bands, and gets all their stuff on the boat. And then he gets all the fans on the boat. And everybody so well taken care of that everybody goes well, it's been the greatest experience I've ever had, you know, far exceeds the expectations of the fans and the bands. And so they all want to come back. And that's that's the way it's that's the way to do it is
Chuck Shute:absolutely yeah. Leave them wanting more for sure. Is there any band that you haven't been able to perform it that's on your bucket list?
Bill Leverty:Sure, sure. There's, there's tons Oh, you know, I mean, I mean, Van Halen would, of course, we last Jedi. So that probably, but I always wanted to play with them. But I mean, I'll tell you, I've gotten to play with so many that I thought when I was younger, I never could see in a million years us, you know, opening up for journey. You know, we can open up a journey to you know that. What
Chuck Shute:about Jeff Beck? Did you ever get to meet him?
Bill Leverty:I've met him. Yeah, I met him in in London, and nicest guy and very engaging. And really cool. That was on a night off when we were opening up for a band called status quo in in Europe, and status quo over there. They're as big as the stones are.
Chuck Shute:Wow.
Bill Leverty:Kind of unknown here. But they had sold at that time in 1992. They had sold over 111 million records. Oh, wow, that's good. They are status quo as to how they pronounce it over there. Interesting. We've just been so lucky to open up for so many really cool bands. And I don't know, you know, they're sure there's a lot of them that I would love to to get on tour with. But everybody wants those tours. Yeah, big tour. So you know, it's what about, like now you've kind of come full circle. Do you have younger bands that are reaching out to you that, you know, or maybe younger artists that are successful in their own right that are fans of firehouse they're like hey, like you were really big inspiration on my guitar playing and
Unknown:I get a few
Bill Leverty:but we firehouse we most of the shows that we do when we headline we fly out to those shows. So it's not like a tour we're on a bus going around doing 40 dates around the country. As a headliner. Most of our shows are fly dates. So we fly out so we can't really bring a band with us. So it's a it's usually a local or regional act. It'll open up for us. Okay, gotcha. You had that song. Don't walk away on the wrestler soundtrack. Or you can you would finagle your way into the premiere of that movie at all because I had Mickey Rourke who's a huge movie star but also the director. I don't know if you're familiar with that. Director Darren Aronofsky who he directed Black Swan and Requiem for a Dream really some dark movies, but I would love to pick his brain. Yeah, I I went saw the movie. And I thought it was a great movie. Yeah, that song had really good placement in the movie, and it was a really good feeling to have our song in that movie, but we had nothing to do with it, to be honest with you, you know, recording the song. Sony publishing got that song in that movie. Okay, so that was really one of those lucky things. And hopefully we can get more Yeah, cuz you get a cut of that. That's pretty. From what I hear from a lot of bands. Now. That's kind of the way to make money other than touring and merchandise, is getting your songs and TV and commercials and movies and things like that. Well, we we, you know, Sony, publishing who we have a deal with. Got our song in that. And so I think there was some financial compensation for it. But it wasn't. It wasn't retirement money, but it was it put gas in a Prius. Okay. Dad should be a little bit more I would think about anything. Take it. That's awesome. Well, thank you so much for doing this. I do like to end each episode with a charity. And you said you work with the Wounded Warrior Project a lot. Yeah. I love when your warrior projects show. I that's so cool that you do this. Yeah. Thank you for mentioning that. Okay. So if people see that people definitely go to Bill Liberty's website and firehouse website, but also, if they can throw a few bucks to Wounded Warrior Project. I know I've had a few people mentioned that one. It's a great charity for sure. Yeah, one of the things that is a great reward in being an abandoned touring around the country is that we get to meet a lot of our veterans around the country, and we've met a lot of them that had been wounded in battle. And that, that, that really hits me so um, yeah, one, like kind of what we were talking about earlier with the, you know, the mental stuff. I mean, that's a big part of being in the army, too. I have some relatives that were in the army. And, I mean, they're physically they're fine. But I think, you know, they saw some stuff in the Middle East that, you know, it's kind of it's stuck with them. And it's hard. So thankfully, we have the VA, you know, to do counseling and stuff like that, too, because that's huge piece of what they go through as well, I think. Yeah, absolutely. You're absolutely right. Well, thank
Chuck Shute:you so much for doing this bill. I really appreciate it.
Bill Leverty:Thank you so much for having me.
Chuck Shute:No, it's just like a dream. Like I said, I'm a big fan. So it's very cool. Thank you.
Unknown:Thanks, man.
Bill Leverty:All right, bye. Bye. What a nice guy. He just kept saying how everyone was so nice to him that he's worked with and I just kept thinking how nice he was in this interview, total class act, great guitar player and songwriter. Definitely check out his solo stuff. The record is called divided we fall. The single is your natural follow bill and firehouse on social media to keep up with what they're doing. Hopefully some shows in your area soon. And while you're on social media, if you want to give me a follow or share an episode that I've done, I'd appreciate that. You can also write me an iTunes review, or if you want to donate to my Venmo to help keep the show running that helps. Thank you all for your support and for listening. Have a great day and until next time, remember, shoot for the moon.
