In the beginning, there was Vanilla Fudge. The band’s combination of explosive drums, thundering bass, droning guitars, grinding organs, and soulful vocals set the path for all hard and heavy music to follow. Of course, a group of English bands would especially be drawn to their pioneering sound, expanding upon it and inventing what we know today as heavy metal. Those bands were Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple, Uriah Heep, and Black Sabbath. Taking this into consideration, it was an absolute honor to sit down with founding vocalist/organist/arranger Mark Stein to discuss the life and times of Vanilla Fudge, as well as his upcoming solo album, There’s a Light.
Greetings Mark and welcome to Defenders of the Faith! How are you doing this afternoon?
Mark Stein: I’m doing great man. A very good afternoon to you and all your readers. I hope everybody’s feeling good and getting through this crazy world.
We’re feeling good and excited for this new record that’s coming out, There’s a Light. Why did now feel like the right time to embark upon a solo album?
MS: This is something I’ve had on my mind for a number of years. After the pandemic made itself known, I guess it was March of 2020 it was officially stated, about five weeks in when I got over the belief that this is really happening like everybody else, seeing what was going on in Italy and seeing the virus spread here and all over the world, I was sitting at the piano and these lyrics came to me. We’re right in the middle of this reality. Here we are batting down the hatches, afraid to shake our neighbor’s hand, hug our children. What’s the plan to survive now? We had so many chances to spread some love and human kindness all of our lives. To me, it was like this karmic thing was happening to humanity. That’s what this pandemic is maybe. I don’t know.
We’ve survived world wars. We’ve survived other pandemics. We’ve survived great economic depressions and divisions in the country, political or otherwise. The country, to me, is so screwed up that this is a karmic thing. This song came out called “We Are One”, under God, under the sun. When this battle’s over and done, will we be one again? This is the song I wrote. I was excited about it. Because of the pandemic, the studios and everything was shut down. I didn’t know how I was gonna put this production together, so I called my buddy Alan Hewitt, who is the keyboardist with The Moody Blues and John Lodge. He said, “If you want, you could come over to my place. I got a cool home studio.” So I did. We laid down a click track with just a piano. He got really busy at the time, so he sent the files over to my buddy Joey Z in Stuart, Florida, at his place called Blue Porch Media. We proceeded with the vocals. I put down the keyboard orchestrations and was excited how everything was sounding, but I needed drums and needed bass and some guitar.
I called my buddy Stevie D at the Sound Spot in New Jersey. He’s worked with me on a bunch of my tracks and Vanilla Fudge projects over the last few years. He really liked it and he said, “When I have time, I’ll put some guitar on it.” I said, “Can you play bass too?” He said, “Yeah, I can do all of this.” “What are we gonna do for a drummer?” “I’ve got some ideas. I got a drum program that sounds great.” “Well go for it!” Eventually he put down bass, drums, a little acoustic and electric guitar on it. I told him the direction I wanted, kind of like an early Elton (John) thing with a lot of rich harmonies on there. That’s what we came up with.
We were both excited about the production and I started shopping it. My manager said, “If you had a whole album, that would really be great, instead of a single or an EP.” So I had a bunch of songs in the can. Oddly enough, all the songs I recorded were social songs. It just seemed to fit into the theme of everything that was going on. I thought, “Hey man, we’ve got a really cool album here. All the songs are interwoven. We started pitching it and Deko really loved it. He (my manager) put the songs up on Soundcloud and sent them over to Deko and they dug it. After a few meetings with them, I liked what they had in mind. They seemed like a really great team. So that’s it. We put an album together. We put an album deal together and released the first single, “We Are One”, about two weeks ago. It’s getting a great reaction. The album will be out on November 26. All systems go!
Can we expect any guest appearances on this album?
MS: “We Are One” is just me and Stevie D. It sounds great. The production is really cool. Songs like “Racism” and “All Lives Matter” and “Lyin'” have Steve D playing guitar and Liberty DeVitto playing drums. He’s a great drummer, a friend of mine for many years who played with Billy Joel and a whole bunch of people. On bass I got Pete Bremy on two tracks, who’s played with Fudge for the last ten years. Kasim Sulton is a good friend, great bass player from Utopia. He played on “All Lives Matter”. I’ve got some cool guests on the album. On some of the other tracks, like my reimagined “Ball of Confusion”, I got some of my friends from south Florida like Jimi Fiano, who to me is an unsung guitar hero, and Steve Oragie, a really cool bass player who played with Clarence Clemons and a whole bunch of people in years past. It’s a potpourri of a lot of talent, but the songs and lyrics all tie together. It’s an album about how I felt the country and the world was, how it is, and where it’s going now. It closes with my version of “America the Beautiful”. It’s like a Ray Charles inspired song. I’ve got the great fusion bass player Jimmy Haslip playing with me on that, and Bobby Rondinelli who played with Black Sabbath on drums. It’s a whole cool thing going on.
Musically, will this record be in the vein of Vanilla Fudge or will it be a little different?
MS: This is the other side of me. This is my solo effort. There’s a reimagining of “Ball of Confusion”. The lyrics, even though The Temptations did it in the early 70s, are so relative to what’s going on today. The world is a “Ball of Confusion”. This is gonna be my second single off the album. So it isn’t Vanilla Fudge. This is Mark Stein, the singer/songwriter/arranger side of me, which I do for Fudge anyway, but this is a whole different approach.
As you mentioned, There’s a Light features a cover of The Temptations’ “Ball of Confusion”, as well as The Rascals’ “People Got to Be Free”. What inspired you to choose these songs?
MS: A number of years ago, I produced some songs for a movie called Rockin’ the Wall. The theme of the movie was music’s influence on the fall of the Berlin Wall and the fall of communism and providing freedom. There was a time when the poor people behind the wall weren’t allowed to listen to American rock or anything. It was so confined to a horrible world. Music definitely had some influence on the end of that thing. These songs were produced for that movie and again, oddly enough, a few years later, fit into the theme of what I’m doing with There’s a Light. There’s “Ball of Confusion”, “People Got to Be Free”, and “America the Beautiful”, which I rearranged.
One band massively influenced by Vanilla Fudge was Deep Purple, who arrived in early ’68 with their debut that largely featured psychedelic arrangements of pop songs. Was there ever a sense of rivalry between Fudge and Purple?
MS: Actually it was the contrary. It was a sense of brotherhood. It was a sense of respect among both bands. When we (Vanilla Fudge) were kids, we did our first tour of Europe. The Deep Purple guys, Jon Lord, Ritchie Blackmore, Ian Paice, they came to see us and were really knocked out by what we were doing. They wanted to be us! In the beginning, they were actually called “the English Vanilla Fudge”. You can read about that in the chronicles. Ritchie Blackmore’s got a lot to say about that. Jon Lord, we became friends. I know my style influenced him in the early days, which I’m honored and proud to say that. He was a great gentlemen, a great guy, an amazing rock organist, and not only a rock guy, but a symphonic arranger and composer in his own right with philharmonics. He went on to really spread his career out in a positive way. Unfortunately, he passed from the dreaded cancer. We were in the process of him being interviewed for my book at the time, which is called You Keep Me Hangin’ On: The Raging Story of Rock Music’s Golden Age. I got a lot of great classic cats that were interviewed for the book. He was gonna be in the book and he suddenly got sick. When I didn’t hear from him anymore, I was wondering, “What’s going on? I thought we had an agreement.” Ultimately, it lead to his demise, which was very, very sad. But life goes on.
You speak of that influence on Jon Lord. What attracted you to that heavy B3 Hammond sound? You really were the first to make it that abrasive and as prominent in the mix as the vocals and guitars.
MS: I appreciate that man. When I was 18 years old, I went to see a band called The Young Rascals in New York at a place called the Phone Booth Discotheque. I saw this cat named Felix Cavaliere. It was the first time I saw a B3. This guy was so soulful with his playing. The sound of that organ was so rich and so righteous. The way he sang with so much soul…the whole band. Dino Danelli was an amazing drummer back then. All of them, Gene Cornish, Eddie Brigati. Blue eyed soul blew this young guy’s mind. I had to get a B3. I said, “Dad, you gotta help me get this instrument. It’s gonna be great. I know I can do this.” And that’s who I wanted to be. Felix was my young influence. He was my mentor. By the way, over half a century later, we’re still great friends. We still do stuff and we still talk about music.
There was another cat that was an influence on me, that very few people probably ever heard of. There was a band called The Vagrants, which spawned Leslie West back in the early to mid 60s. It was a cat by the name of Jerry Starch. When I first heard this band, it was just earthshattering the way they were reimagining songs with all this drama. That’s what I wanted to do. I wanted to approach music in that format, along with the soul of The Rascals. This cat (Starch) had all these really cool sounds he was getting out of the Hammond. He was so cool because when the Fudge started playing I used to hang with him. He used to show me certain tricks. The way Jon Lord got tricks from me, I got tricks from Jerry Starch. It really lead to a lot of the sounds I was doing on the first Vanilla Fudge album with the Hammond. That’s what it’s all about man. We’re all a product of all our influences. It starts when you’re kids. You’re influenced by somebody, then somebody’s influenced by somebody, and it grows. Everybody today was influenced by somebody before.
In an instance of things coming full circle, I read that in 1977 you auditioned for Rainbow. Could you tell us the story of that audition?
MS: That’s the first I’ve heard that to be honest with you. I don’t believe I ever auditioned for Rainbow. I did play with Alice Cooper in 1977, but I’m sorry to tell you. I’m as shocked about it as you are to find out I never heard of it *laughs*.
Then there is a Rainbow biography that needs to be edited. I’m forgetting which one, but that is in there.
MS: Really? First I’ve heard of it. That would’ve been cool. I would’ve loved to have played with Ritchie and Rainbow. Didn’t Don Airey play with them?
Yeah, I believe he joined in ’78 or 79.
MS: He’s great. We actually played on the same bill. It’s a great story. Not too many years ago, Deep Purple were playing Pompano Beach Amphitheater. I went to say hi. I went backstage and it was great. We’ve always had a great camaraderie. Don Airey says, “Man, it’s great to see you. Why don’t you come up and play “Smoke on the Water” with us tonight?” I said, “Don, that’s awesome, but I don’t know the song. I’ve never played it! What key is it in?” *laughs* I was all excited, so I went up and played “Smoke on the Water” with them. I didn’t really know the song, so I asked Steve Morse’s son, who was jamming that night with Deep Purple, “What’s the changes to the chords?” *sings* “Smoke on the water!” I couldn’t figure it out. He told me and I said, “Bless you.” He says, “I’m jamming with them!” And I said, “I’m playing keyboards, not guitar.” “Oh, cool.” *laughs* I went up. Don Airey had his keyboards on the right with some synths. He had this monstrous Hammond high powered C3 with these two fantastic Leslies with crowns in them. That was heaven for me. It came off great. Here I am playing “Smoke on the Water” with Deep Purple. The ground was shaking. I was doing these windups and getting so into it that my hand started bleeding on the organ. Ian Gillan said, “Now leave the blood on! It’ll have Stein’s blood! Let it dry off on the organ!”
That was a great night man. It was so cool that they asked me if I could get the Fudge back together for one night so we could open for them at Radio City Music Hall in New York City, which we did. I called Carmine (Appice). I called the late, great Tim Bogert. I said, “I got some exciting news.” We all organized it and did the show. It was very, very cool to have Fudge open for Deep Purple. I guess it was maybe 10 years ago. That was so great.
Going back to things that actually happened in the late 70s, you were the touring keyboardist for Alice Cooper. Are there any shows or memories from that era which stand out to you?
MS: I played on the Welcome to My Nightmare show, which was an amazing album at its time. All the songs were weaved together for Alice’s nightmare. What a creative thing that was. The stage show was not to be believed. Visually, it was incredible. I flew with the band to Australia. We did all the major cities in the southern hemisphere, in Australia and New Zealand. I was down there for about a month. It was the biggest grossing tour of all time in the southern hemisphere. We played all sold out coliseums and outdoor festivals. It was quite an event. What was really cool was I never knew Vanilla Fudge was so popular in Australia because we never played in the southern hemisphere. When I arrived, to be frank, the press was all over me. I was like, “Wow! This is great!” I don’t think the band was too happy about that, to be honest. Alice was always great. He had nothing to do with it, but the rest of the band I think was a little uncomfortable about it. I’m just telling it like it is, but it’s not my fault we had number one albums over there. I was promised a tour in America when I came back, but when I came back I found out they had hired somebody else to do it, which was a big letdown for me at the time. It was in the pipeline that there was a little weirdness going on over me being in Fudge. It just didn’t work with them, but that’s cool because a month later I ended up joining forces with Dave Mason. If that didn’t happen, it wouldn’t have lead to four years of a great time playing with Dave and recording with him, and meeting so many fantastic musicians and stars on the west coast scene.
You speak of Fudge’s popularity worldwide, even after the band broke up. Back in the 60s, did the band ever embark on a world tour or did you just play the States and the UK?
MS: We didn’t play the southern hemisphere. Besides America, we played Europe. We played Paris, London, Germany. All the countries in that part of Europe. That was primarily where we did play. I’m trying to remember. It was a long time ago. I’ll tell you one thing. There was a point when James Brown was the number one hardest working band in show business. Vanilla Fudge was number two. We were constantly on the road, so much so that we got in each other’s faces. We were together too many times. It was like being married not to one person, but to three other people. That was probably what ultimately lead to the breakup in 1970, which is common among a lot of bands that only last three or four years.
Vanilla Fudge’s legacy has lived on thanks to the use of the band’s music in various movies and TV shows. Perhaps most notable is “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” being featured on the final episode of The Sopranos, as well as the climax of Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood. What was your reaction to these uses of the song and do you prefer one over the other?
MS: “You Keep Me Hangin’ On” has been used a lot. The Tarantino edit was cool. What’s great about that is we got a real nice fee for licensing *laughs*. That helped pay some bills. The cool thing was it introduced a whole new generation to Vanilla Fudge. It became obvious in our royalty statements because they tripled, which was great to see happening. It was on The Sopranos, but it was also featured on one of the final episodes of Mad Men, which was a huge TV show. I thought that was awesome. It was also in the movie War Dogs with Jonah Hill, which I thought was a real cool movie. That song has paid some dividends in different areas over the years and kept the name Vanilla Fudge alive. It’s also been used on some Audi commercials, the Audi Spider. It only played for a short time, but the Fudge song was used at the end. It was a very hip commercial.
This year marks the 50th anniversary of the first and only album from Boomerang. How did this band come together and what are your memories of making that self titled album?
MS: After Vanilla Fudge broke up in 1970, I was thinking, “Am I gonna do a solo thing? Are me and Vinny Martell gonna carry on with a different rhythm section?” It just didn’t feel right. I was so heavily influenced at that time by Led Zeppelin. We were all friends. We all toured together. I came up with this thing Boomerang, which was a very hard rock oriented, English oriented rock band. That first Boomerang album is really critically acclaimed. The coolest thing about that is we opened for Emerson, Lake & Palmer at the Providence Arena, which was a whole other mind altering experience. When I first saw Keith Emerson, he was shockingly amazing, as was the band. To this day, ELP rules the 70s. They were amazing. Visually speaking, the sound. You just can’t say enough about the talent in that band. And I don’t think they’re in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame either yet, are they?
Unfortunately, they are not.
MS: Give me a break. Aside from Vanilla Fudge and so many other people. What’s going on over there?
Yeah, that could be a whole discussion for another day. Finally, what’s on the horizon for yourself and Vanilla Fudge in 2022? I think there were some Midwest dates set with Robby Krieger (The Doors) that have since been moved to next year?
MS: Yeah, we had a couple dates in the Midwest and they were canceled because of the pandemic, but they all got moved to April of next year. I’m actually leaving tomorrow for five gigs with the Fudge in the northeast. We’re gonna be playing in Virginia and Philadelphia. We’re playing in Connecticut with Robby Krieger on this run. The second leg of the tour is in November. The 15th and 16th, we’re gonna be playing the Sony Hall in New York with Robby. That should be a really cool couple of nights. We’re also supporting our latest release, a reimagining of (The Supremes’) “Stop in the Name of Love”, which is out and getting a lot of attention. It’s another crazy Fudge template for psychedelic rock.
There’s a Light comes out Friday, November 26 on Deko Music. For more information on Mark and Vanilla Fudge, visit www.vanillafudge.com.