Todd Interview

Keeping it real, keeping it modern
By Paul Freeman For The Daily News

Quite a few rock musicians who launched their careers in the '60s are still going strong. But many of them are simply living off their early efforts. Some of them view technological advance as, at best, a necessary evil, if not something to be ignored entirely.

Todd Rundgren stands at the opposite end of the spectrum. Always enthusiastically embracing change -- musical and technological -- this innovative artist has never been one to rest on his creative laurels.

"There have always been plenty of artists who have sought a personal style and once they hit on that, mine it until you wind up playing casinos for the rest of your life," Rundgren says, laughing. "But I always thought my purpose was to tempt the audience, kind of like a carrot-and-stick thing. Every once in a while, I'll do something that's easy to assimilate, but then I'm going to challenge myself and my audience to try something new, every once in a while. So it's one of the things that I feel differentiates me from most artists."

At Redwood City's Fox Theatre on Jan. 11, Rundgren will perform with the help of a terrific band -- guitarist Jesse Gress, bass player Kasim Sulton, keyboardist John Ferenzik and drummer Prairie Prince.

Rundgren first earned attention with the band Nazz, which emerged from Philadelphia in 1967. His solo hits include "Hello It's Me," "I Saw The Light," "Can We Still Be Friends" and "Bang The Drum All Day." Albums like 1972's "Something/Anything" and the follow-up, "A Wizard, A True Star," sound fresh and modern even today. Through the decades Rundgren, a creative chameleon, has continued to explore a wide variety of styles and sounds.

As a producer, Rundgren has enhanced the work of such artists as Cheap Trick, The Psychedelic Furs, Felix Cavaliere, Meat Loaf ("Bat Out of Hell"), The Tubes, Jill Sobule, Hall and Oates, Grand Funk Railroad, Patti Smith, Badfinger and New York Dolls.

Of his role as producer, Rundgren says, "As time went on, I got a little bit better at trying to figure out what the artist's vision was and work around that, as opposed to filling in the blanks for them."

His success in production gave him greater freedom as an artist. "I had a whole other career, often a more lucrative career, making records for other people. And when it came to making my own records, I never felt like I had to get into that whole game of trying to figure out what the audience expects from you and constantly deliver that."

Rundgren says he has kept his mind and his ears open. "Sometimes you may lapse into a sort of a comfortable space, a habitual way of making music. Every once in a while, at least for me, I have to shake that up. So, like a couple of albums ago, I did a whole lot of research into what was happening, not only in the most popular music, but also what was happening in the fringes and the cutting edge. And I learned a lot.

"I was also reminded of the approach that I had, when I was first making records. By the time I got to 'A Wizard, A True Star,' and the records following that, we were pretty aggressive in our experimentation in the studio. And that's become an earmark of some of the modern music -- how aggressively you can manipulate the sound. So I learned a lot, even just recently, from a whole new generation of artists. That's what makes it continually interesting and challenging, that music still has possibilities that may not have occurred to me, that there are still mysteries about it," Rundgren says.

Over the years, Rundgren has leapt to the forefront of music videos, computer software development, conceptualism and interactive arts.

"Part of what makes life in these times interesting is the pace of change, how quickly things get replaced by new things and how it actually affects human beings to live in times like this, where so much is happening so fast," he says. "And it kind of indicates whether you have a natural liberal or conservative mentality. I guess my natural mentality is liberal. I like new ideas. I like trying to get my head around how they work and how I can get something out of it. And trying to figure out where things are going to go as a result of these new discoveries and new memes. It comes naturally to me in a certain way, but I also feel obligated to represent that in my so-called art."

Rundgren says he is committed to authenticity. "I've always felt that there are two kinds of artists. And what you get out of it depends on how you approach music. I always considered Michael Jackson as, in a way, an obfuscater. You present a picture of yourself that isn't actually real and you know that. You're trying to create some sort of ideal of yourself, or some ideal image, and you convey that in the way that you express yourself.

"Then there are artists who are revelatory, who are actually trying as hard as they can to expose themselves to you, to get you to know what they really are, in the deepest way that they can express it -- an artist like Laura Nyro. I've always felt like I am in the latter category, in that I'm constantly trying to delve into my subconscious and drag things out, sometimes that I don't even recognize. The process of discovering and exposing that and putting that in a certain setting is palliative for me. It makes me understand myself better and brings me a certain amount of contentment. In a way, I need to do it, just for my own benefit. And the audience, the reward they get out of it is watching me go through the process, as opposed to me, essentially, trying to woo them with every song that I write."

He knows how to woo the muse. "I find it more and more is a process that takes place, or should take place, in the subconscious. So when I'm making a record, I'm filling my head with various ideas and putting off the final realization of the song until the very last minute. I record the entire track, all the instruments, and then in about a half-an-hour or an hour, I write and perform the actual song itself. And it comes out almost as automatic writing.

"Maybe some artists, they torture themselves over a song. It'll take them weeks to come up with exactly what it is that they think is necessary to convey the idea. For me, I may invest some amount of that time in coming up with the musical aspect of it, but the actual song itself comes out almost without me having any control over it."

In April, Rundgren, 67, released his 25th solo album, "Global." He doesn't plot out what he'd like to accomplish next.

"If there was a specific goal, that's like the end. You get there and what do you do then? It's about the journey, I guess, as opposed to the destination. Once you get to the next mountaintop, you see another mountaintop you want to go climb," Rundgren says, laughing. "So there is no ultimate goal."

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