John Cowsill | The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan
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What unique experiences shaped John Cowsill's early music career?
Yeah, my career picked me. I didn't pick it. I just did it.
Nine years old is nine years old.
Yeah. He sees us and he sees two little kids and, you know, just, hmm. So he's handing us songs like Don't Put Your Feet in the Lemonade. We just left Johnny Nash playing some serious stuff. And now we're here. I love my Siamese cat because she's not very fat with a toy piano.
And I can't think of any other... In the 70, 80 years of rock history, I think your family stands alone in this dynamic. I can't think of anything that even comes close.
They were telling us, you're going to be living in California. We're going, no way. And we went from nothing, from zero to 100. Don't jump ahead.
I can do it all at once.
Thank you so much for being here, John. I'm so excited. So let me explain to you how this whole thing came to be. Because you did ask. We never met before today. So I saw you playing with the Beach Boys a few years back. My wife, I love the Beach Boys, but my wife, who's a lot younger than I am, wanted to go see the Beach Boys play. And we live close to Ravinia, outside of Chicago. And so you were playing with the Beach Boys then. And I thought, who's the handsome young drummer? Obviously not part of the original band. That would be you. And swagger and some charm and a full head of hair. And as you do these days, I started... who's playing drums for the band? And I saw your name and I thought, from the Cowsells, the family band?
And so I found myself after that gig thinking,
How did family dynamics influence The Cowsills' musical journey?
I really should know more about this band. I love sixties music. I consider myself a bit of a snobby aficionado. And I thought, you know, I really don't know much about your family band. Like I know the basics, but I'm a guy likes to think I know the depth of things like who signed who and who played on what records. I'm one of those guys. And I thought, wow, it's really weird because I do like the band. Why have I never kind of done the deep dive in the band? So then I jumped into the catalog for the first time. I thought, wow, there's a lot of talent in this. You know, because you get the thing where it's like, well, there's a couple of hits and it's like, no, there's a lot of depth of talent there.
And then the whole story of the band, obviously the TV show that followed and all this, the mythological stuff, but the nuts and bolts I'm very interested in. And then, you know, watching you play on Ed Sullivan when you're 12 years old or something. I mean, that's a pretty rare. That was fun. Yeah, but I'm saying it's a pretty rare thing. You know, very few people touch the zeitgeist in the way that your family did. And then obviously the family dynamics, I think, make it even more fascinating because as we know through rock history, when you put family and music together, it can yield incredible results, but oftentimes there's like these other kinds of sparks because it has more to do with the family relationships then.
So I don't know if that presages what you were after, but that's why we're here. So I'm a fan to start with, so I've done the deep dive. So here's a place to start. Playing in a band with six siblings, obviously you're one of the six and your mother, that's pretty unique setup. Is that anything you could have envisioned Because you're just a kid and you're kind of in a circumstance. Is that a fair way?
Yeah, my career picked me. I didn't pick it. I just did it. I mean, I was four when I first heard my brother singing in Ohio. We lived in Canton, Ohio. And my brother Bill is the oldest one. So he's, everybody thinks my mom or my dad started singing. This is my brother Bill. I refer to him as our Brian Wilson of the family. And he's the, if you ever did a deep dive on Bill Kousel, you would see. Oh, I have. Okay, because he was like, he's amazing.
He's super talented in a unique way that very few people are.
He's like the real deal Elvis, you know, and he just means it every time. But, yeah, it picked me, so. We always sang around the table, you know, folk songs, Boil That Cabbage Down, Boy, and Hang Down Your Head, Tom Dooley, Stu Ball was a racehorse.
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What unique experiences shaped John Cowsill's early music career?
0:00–1:52
2
How did family dynamics influence The Cowsills' musical journey?
1:52–10:43
3
What was the significance of performing on The Ed Sullivan Show?
10:43–14:36
4
How did The Cowsills transition from local fame to national recognition?
14:36–18:21
5
What challenges did The Cowsills face during their rise to fame?
18:21–23:18
6
How did personal struggles affect the band's dynamics?
23:18–28:28
7
What led to the eventual decline of The Cowsills' popularity?
28:28–32:00
8
What current projects is John Cowsill involved in today?
32:00–1:20:53
Speakers
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