Dave: Rebecca Pidgeon, thanks so much for taking some time to talk today.

Rebecca: It’s really great to be here. Thanks, Dave. 

Dave: Well, I’m always interested in what kinds of music people were first exposed to when they were growing up and what they responded to. Maybe even just music heard around the house – you were born in the states, but your parents are British. Did they introduce you to any particular type of music?

Rebecca: My dad was listening to The Beatles’ albums when, when they were coming out. So that was my first, you know, love of music. Um. My mother says that he was playing one particular Beatles track over and over again when she was sick. You know, she was pregnant with me and sick, really feeling queasy. And then she said, you know, the first record that I could, that I put on when I could toddle over to the record player was that, piece of music, that had made her feel that, you know, she associated with being so queasy. But, um, and the Beatles, of course, have remained, you know, my, my favorite John Lennon.

Dave: Oh yeah, he was by far, by far my favorite. Yeah, my favorite Beatle was John.

Rebecca: Yeah.

Dave: Not a bad first introduction to music. .

Rebecca: Yes. And, and then, you know, they had the collection of, of the American writers like James Taylor and Joni Mitchell, and people like the Lovin’ Spoonful.

Dave: Love it.

Rebecca: And then growing up in, in Scotland, I was. Um, exposed to or grew up hearing all over the place, Scottish folk music. So I was always very influenced by that. And then I was influenced by British bands, you know, in my youth. I loved Kate Bush.

Dave: Yes.

Rebecca: And then more indie bands like, you know, Siouxsie and the Banshees and The Clash. And I like Ian Dury and who else? All sorts of people, the Cocteau Twins and This Mortal Coil.

Dave: All that 4AD stuff. Very nice. Um, how old were you when the family moved to Edinburgh?

Rebecca: I was six.

Dave: Wow.

Rebecca: Or five. I was five. I was turned, I just turned six in Edinburgh. Yeah. So I was a real American child, um, and went to, started going to school in Edinburgh and. An oddity for the kids there. I remember the kids approaching me and saying, “Speak! Speak! Because they wanted wear my American accent 

Dave: Right. My one time visiting Edinburgh, I was only 19 and stayed in a bed and breakfast and I have vague memories ’cause it was many, many years ago. But I remember really loving the experience. Uh, went from, London up through Wales and then into Scotland.

Rebecca: Oh, what a lovely, magical trip. Yeah. Edinburgh is a magical, haunting city that’s got very dark undertones, but immense beauty. I was always aware of the beauty there. 

Dave: I do remember it being very beautiful, beautiful time.

Rebecca: It’s a goth, kind of a gothic part of the town. And then there’s this magnificent Georgian Newtown they call it, which is not new of course, but. Like Bath, that, that same kind of architecture.

Dave: Now that you mentioned that that was one of our stops. We stopped in Bath for one night, uh, and ate at a restaurant and, uh, stayed at another bed and breakfast. But, um, was guitar the first instrument you learned to play?

Rebecca: Yes. Uh, no. I’m sorry. No, it was the piano. I had, I played the piano as a child. I had piano lessons, but I never practiced. It was always an incredible burden to me, so I never learned that properly. I wish I had stuck with it. But, my friend, uh, Roger Fife and I used to sing at parties in Edinburgh, and he’d play the guitar and. He asked me if I would come and write some songs with him, which he would then send to independent record little labels, and I said, sure. I was at, at this point, a drama student in London, so I’d come back for their summers and we’d create these songs. I didn’t really know that I was a songwriter until I got with him and was writing songs. I was just, the way I did it was I, I was thinking, you know, what kind of songs do I like? What do I want? What would I write if I were a songwriter? You know, what do I want to hear? What, how do I want this harmonic progression to go? What you know is interesting and through him and his playing of the guitar, you know, I would say to him. I want this melody to go to this place. And he’d play chords until I say to him, yes, that’s the chord I need. And it got so tiresome that eventually my then boyfriend bought me my own guitar, and that’s when I started learning. So I was about, I think I was about maybe 19 when I started learning the guitar. And just by ear, you know.

Dave: And that became the band, Ruby Blue, right? Okay. Yeah, I, when I, I learned, I did take some lessons when I was, eh, like 12, I think. But then, yeah, I, I got to a point, which I’m really glad, but I, I realized I could just kind of pick things up by ear. I could kind of tell what they were playing and, or I, well, I was determined to figure out what they’re playing.

Rebecca: Yes. And the guitar is an easy instrument for that. Much, much easier for my brain than the piano anyway.

Dave: Yeah. Well, at that point, were you already torn? I mean, going to the Academy of Dramatic Arts, were you torn between pursuing a career in acting or moving into music?

Rebecca: Yes. There was a point when I was a bit torn actually. and then I, everything changed because I met my future husband and immigrated to the states. And so that really put the kibosh on our band, Ruby Blue. They did carry on for a little while. Uh, but then they, they broke up. That was a shame, um, because we were kind of going great guns in Britain and we were accumulating a fan, good fan base, and we were signed to a major label. But, you know, my life was going in a different direction and I, I started a solo music career. And I went with a, a label called Chesky Records out of New York, which was an audiophile label. And I made a few records with them as a solo artist. you know, and I met a bunch of wonderful musicians who, you know, I collaborated with and who helped me on the journey. Yeah.

Dave: Well that’s actually kind of a nice segue. You mentioned meeting your husband, meeting David Mamet, and I’m realizing I should tell you how I discovered your music.

Rebecca: Yes, yes.

Dave: And it was by way of your acting career. And I can, which is sort of natural, but I can explain. I’m kind of a film nerd,

Rebecca: [laughs] 

Dave: Well, in the nineties I saw The Spanish Prisoner and I was already a fan of like, uh, Ricky Jay and of course Steve Martin. Uh, all the casting in the film was just great. And, uh, not to mention the score by Carter Burwell.

Rebecca: Oh, it’s so beautiful. Yeah.

Dave: I’m a big like Coen Brothers fan. I have a big collection of film scores and, um, of course I was already familiar with your husband’s work, particularly Glengarry Glen Ross. 

Rebecca: mm-hmm. 

Dave: You played a key role in that film and you were very, a very memorable role and were wonderful in it. So that was my first awareness of you, was seeing you on screen. Um, and then I did, you know, I started noticing you in another film State and Maine and Heist. I was a huge Gene Hackman fan too. Um. I remember going, it was like a film festival here in St. Louis and I went to see you Redbelt and I realized that you had provided songs for the film that were really great. and I guess what, were the songs written for the film specifically, or did they just end up being chosen to be included in the the soundtrack .

Rebecca: They were kind of written with that film in mind ’cause Dave said, I’m making this movie this and I’d like you to do some music for it. And it’s a Brazilian Jujitsu. And I was working with Larry Klein, whose wife is a magnificent Brazilian, um, uh, singer and musician called Luciana Souza. And, um. So she, that music was inspiring me anyway at that moment, coincidentally, and so I wrote a couple of songs. I mean, as far as that, in that vein as I could go, um, I’d always loved Brazilian music and I just loved adored her work and Luciana and, and in fact, she came and did a, a duet with me on that record for one of the songs. And also she appeared in that movie as the nightclub singer singing one of  the songs.

Dave: Hmm.

Rebecca: So, yes. And in fact, she, uh, translated my lyrics into Portuguese, for her version of the song. Yeah. So that all kind of coalesced nicely. And in fact, they were written with that, that film in mind. But they weren’t, you know, they were, I sort of stepped into a character. Write the songs so that they didn’t have any, you know, the themes were love and betrayal.

Dave: Right.

Rebecca: I guess. Yeah.

Dave: Well, somewhere along the line, and I forget the chronology or the timing, but I did start noticing your music on social media channels and you know, it was becoming more aware that oh wow, she’s got a lot of music out there. So I started following you and really enjoying your stuff. oh, you wanted to mention too, the soundtrack. Redbelt Behind the Velvet Curtain, featured another guitarist. I love. Dean Parks – I was a huge, uh, Steely Dan fan, so…

Rebecca: Yes.

Dave: I’ve always been obsessed with all the different guitar players, and I know they employed, they employed many, but, uh, Dean Parks was great that, uh, that solo on “Haitian Divorce”. So good,

Rebecca: Oh, yeah.

Dave: Oh, and , I saw that Walter Becker appeared on your album Tough On Crime. 

Rebecca: Yeah.  He did. Yeah. You are, um, very knowledgeable, aren’t you? Yes, he did. He is a, was a great friend of Larry’s and we were making this record tough on crime and Larry said, you know, I think Walter would be great on this particular song. And he called him up and Walter. Did this fabulous kind of jagged odd solo and sent it to us. And I, I was just bowled over and I said, gosh, you know what, what should we pay him? And, and Larry said, oh, he just wants a bottle of red wine. He’s a red, he loves red wine. So I sent him the best bottle of red wine that I could find. Yeah, he’s so unique.

Dave: Poor Walter. He was so great. 

Rebecca: Yes. 

Dave: Fantastic guitarist, but also he was pretty damn funny when I would see them live. His banter on stage at Steely Dan shows was pretty funny.

Rebecca: Yeah. He was quite rye and dry. I, but I eventually ended up meeting him. Of course. Yeah. Just so charmed by him. Yeah. 

Dave: Well, you’ve also contributed to other people’s albums like Madeline Peyroux, on her album, Bare Bones.

Rebecca: Yeah. Yes, I did some backing vocals for her. I loved, uh, because again, this was a sort of stable of musicians that Larry was working with, and he was working with her and at and myself at the same time. So I came and did a bit of singing on her record and on Lucian’s record as well. Yeah. And she’s just such a fabulous, uh, singer. Madeline’s just extraordinary. She opens her mouth and you’re just kind of bowled over. Yeah.

Dave: Very interesting backstory too, how she kind of played on the streets of Paris, I guess.

Rebecca: Yeah. Yeah. The real troubadour – the real thing. She’s the real thing. Yes.

Dave: Well, your discography, you’ve got, I think now 12 albums, a dozen albums out. 

Rebecca: Yeah. Isn’t that mad?

Dave: Which date, back to, I guess, was it the early nineties or was it…

Rebecca: Yeah.

Dave: Nineties, I guess. Yeah.

Rebecca: Yes, this body of work. I, I made the records in Britain in like ’89, so I don’t really count those. And also that, that, that was with the band Ruby Blue. So… 

Dave: Well, it seems like you’ve managed to have kind of like simultaneously, or at least along the way, a very. Successful, uh, career in both acting and music and yeah, it’s very, I mean, it’s very admirable that you were able to do both and uh, with a lot of…

Rebecca: Well, oddly, I think it was helpful that, you know, in the music world, nobody really had heard of my acting and in the acting world, nobody had really heard of my music, so I could sort of get away with it. People can’t get it into their brain. When somebody kind of does two things, it kind of, it doesn’t sit right. So I was kind of glad that nobody was in the music world. Nobody’s really interested in the acting. They didn’t act, ask about it and, you know, it didn’t come up. And, and same within the acting world.

Dave: Wow.

Rebecca: Yeah.

Dave: Well, I just remembered something I was gonna mention that I think you’ll appreciate or maybe even get a kick out of, this is a while back, but there was a great diner on the outskirts of St. Louis. It doesn’t even exist anymore, but when it did, it was a great. Spot and I would go there for breakfast and coffee. They had great lunch too. Anyway, I was there I wanna say maybe [00:13:00] seven or eight years ago. And so I went over to the little station where you refilled your coffee… 

Rebecca: mm-hmm. 

Dave: …above this coffee station, they had this wall-mounted CD player. It was kinda high-tech kinda looking thing, right above where that station was. And it had a clear front. So whatever CD was in there was very visible. And it was one of your albums.

Rebecca: Gosh! That’s, that’s fame for you. I am. Wow. love that story.

Dave: Yeah, because it was not too long after I did discover a lot of your music, you know, I was familiar with the uh, I was familiar with the movies and I was familiar with all that, but I was like, wow, that’s very cool. And I, I never did, I wish I would’ve asked, you know, the owner, whoever, like who put who, who was in, who was responsible for that? That’s very cool.

Rebecca: Wow. I’d love to know that actually. Yeah. That’s in St. Louis, is it? yeah. 

Dave: Yeah. I think it was Slingshot maybe, but the, at the time, the timing would probably be about right, I think.

Rebecca: I wonder if that, you know, because I went, I toured with Mark Cohn to, to support him.

Dave: Oh.

Rebecca: And was, was, had that record with me on the, and we went all across the United States and I, um, I remember signing lots of copies of that record. So maybe it was somebody who’d come to one of his gigs who got one of the records.

Dave: That all makes sense. And was that the, I think that had a cover of Warren Zevon “Searching for a Heart”.

Rebecca: Yes.

Dave: Yeah. Great, great song. And you did a beautiful cover of it. I was a big Warren Zevon fan too.

Rebecca: Oh, I loved him. Yeah.

Dave: Well, let’s talk about the new album Unillusion, which is pretty stripped down in a good way compared to some of your other recordings.

Rebecca: Yes. Yes. And that that is on purpose actually. I wanted to get an acoustic sound rather reminiscent of my earlier records that I had done with Chesky, although those records were. Um, performed with an acoustic band, but it was a large band actually, and we were performing it live at these, uh, studios, the Kaufman Astoria Studios in New York, but it did have a, an acoustic. Just vibe. And so I wanted to kind of get back to that with this record in, in a way, in a new way, but in a way because I, I have so many people, fans from those Chesky record days, um, and sort of devoted people who loved that side of my sound, where they, it was very voice centric and also my guitar. My acoustic guitar was the focal point around which everything was built. So I wanted to kind of revisit that a little bit with this record and have it be quite, um, dynamic.

Dave: Yeah, sort of an unplugged. 

Rebecca: Yes, exactly. And, and I, and I went into the studio and I was trying to describe it to Fernando Pomo, who was my co-producer, and he, and then he’s – the way he kind of got his brain into it was through the MTV Unplugged. And he, he said, oh, you mean MTV Unplugged? And he started playing me a whole bunch of these sessions and I said, that’s it. Exactly. Yes. That’s it. You know, you work with different producers, so they bring their, their style of course, and the style of Joel Diamond, who’s this maestro pianist who is producing us with the Chesky records and magnificent producer, but his style is sort of gentle and flowing. And Fernando, on the other hand, is really, really from a sort of rock background. So it’s quite a, it’s edgier sound, but nevertheless. And so his version of that was kind of MTV Unplugged really. So, which I loved.

Dave: Yeah, it’s really nice. I love this album and I was happy to get a listen in advance.

Rebecca: Gosh, I’m, yeah. I’m glad you did. Oh,

Dave: Well, I wanted to mention too, I noticed Eszter Balint plays some very beautiful violin on a couple tracks. That’s another, that’s another person I discovered through film first and then discovered her music.

Rebecca: Right. 

Dave: As a musician. 

Rebecca: Exactly. But she’s another actress and musician like me. Yeah. She’s a wonderful actress. 

Dave: I love the films of Jim Jarmusch and uh, yeah, I remember, again, I used to go to all these film festivals, but I remember Stranger Than Paradise just kind of knocked me out and she was just so, just kind of, I don’t know, hypnotic in it.

Rebecca: She has got a real quality, hasn’t she? Yeah.

Dave: Very natural and it was just, but yeah. Then the same thing I started noticing, wow, she’s a musician. She’s got some great stuff out there too.

Rebecca: Yeah. Yeah, she’s great. Yeah. I, I got to know her actually through, A mutual friend and an uh, artist called Tammy Lang who, whose stage name is Tammy Faye Starlight, who is her outrageous comedian. Do you know her? Her

Dave: I know the name. Yeah.

Rebecca: Yeah, yeah. She’s absolutely fantastic and she has. An act where she does, um, Marianne Faithful, and she does Nico from the Velvet Underground and she’s just outrageous and funny. And anyway, Eszter plays a lot with her and Tammy and I were playing together and so I met Eszter through Tammy. 

Dave: Very nice. Well, you’re going to be playing at one of my favorite guitar shops, McCabe’s in August. I love that. I love that shop and whenever I’m in L.A. I try to get over there.

Rebecca: It’s a magic place, isn’t it?

Dave: It is.

Rebecca: And it’s got this magic venue at the back where all of these luminaries have played. I, it’s quite astounding who’s played there. And so that kind of lives in the walls there, doesn’t it? I mean, when you go see, see acts, it’s just got a special, magical, atmosphere. Is enchanting and you always have a wonderful time there.

Dave: Yeah. Years ago, it does. I have on vinyl an EP. It was, Michael Stipe was in the store and did, I think “The One I Love” and “Maps and Legends”, I think was the, the B-side to that. But, uh, I was like, wow, they do in-store performances. So I have a brother who, he’s been living out there for well over 30 years, but he was in Santa Monica for a while. And I would always make my way over to, to, especially, especially if somebody was playing, but even if not, I just liked looking at, looking at the guitars.

Rebecca: Oh no, it’s the best place and they can squeeze about, I don’t know, like I think it’s, the capacity is like a hundred ish people in there. So it’s intimate.

Dave: So that coincides – if it’s late August, you’re gonna be performing …

Rebecca: It’s gonna be a, yeah, it’s gonna be a record release show and I’ll actually have physical CDs there and everything.

Dave: Great.

Rebecca: Mm-hmm.

Dave: Wish I could transport myself. Maybe I can come up…

Rebecca: I wish you could come

Dave: …I could come up with an excuse to get out there.

Rebecca: Yeah. Well, I’m totally bowled over by your level of knowledge. You are amazing. You really know a lot. You’re just like, you have you win the gold medal. Actually, nobody else knows as much as you do about my stuff – it’s great.

Dave: Go on. No really? Go on.

Rebecca: [laughs]

Dave: Well, Rebecca Pidgeon. Thank you so much for this. This has been a lot of fun.

Rebecca: Dave, it’s been so much fun. You are great. Thank you for having me.

Dave: Thanks again. Alright, thanks Rebecca.

Rebecca: Yeah, you’re so welcome. It’s a pleasure and, and, uh, stay in touch. You’re a fab.

Dave: Bye-bye.