INTERVIEW: Grand Funk Railroad’s Don Brewer still funky after 50 years
Photo: Grand Funk Railroad continue to play music almost 50 years after the band’s founding. Photo courtesy of Jim McGuire / Provided by Ann Leighton Media with permission.
Grand Funk Railroad, the quintessential American band, are still going strong almost 50 years after they first debuted. The band in 2018 includes original founding members Mel Schacher on bass and Don Brewer on vocals and drums. Rounding out the present-day grouping are singer Max Carl (38 Special), lead guitarist Bruce Kulick (KISS) and keyboardist Tim Cashion (Robert Palmer).
The band’s hits are numerous, including “We’re an American Band,” “Some Kind of Wonderful,” “The Loco-Motion” and “I’m Your Captain / Closer to Home.” The strength of these hits has kept them touring throughout the years, and there are no signs of stopping. In 2019, they will reach the 50-year mark for years on the road.
“We do a high-energy Grand Funk Railroad rock ‘n’ roll show,” Brewer said in a recent phone interview. “We try to focus on the hits. Everybody wants to hear ‘Footstompin’ Music’ and ‘Rock & Roll Soul,’ ‘We’re an American Band,’ ‘Some Kind of Wonderful,’ ‘Loco-Motion,’ ‘I’m Your Captain / Closer to Home,’ ‘Inside Looking Out,’ as well as few new things that we work into the show. … It’s a great show. It’s a great performance. I hate to brag, but I’ll brag.”
Brewer said the current lineup of Grand Funk Railroad, which has been together for several years, features members who have a similar taste in music. In their hearts, their all R&B fans, and Brewer identifies the band’s output as a mixture of rock and R&B.
“It’s kind of like R&B pumped up on steroids,” he said. “We love what we do. We appreciate the music, and we get out on stage and have a good time.”
Growing up, Brewer would listen to rock ‘n’ roll and some big band music. His father was a swing band player, and he showed the budding musician how to sit behind a drum kit.
“But really I’ve always been a rock ‘n’ roll guy,” Brewer admitted. “I got bit by the rock ‘n’ roll bug when I saw Elvis Presley on The Ed Sullivan Show doing ‘Blue Suede Shoes.’ I must have been probably 4 or 5 years old when that was going on. I just had to do rock ‘n’ roll from that point on.”
Brewer’s instrumental journey began like many other children: with a tonette, which is essentially a small flute. He learned how to read music on the instrument, and that early introduction took him to the clarinet in the junior high band.
“I played some guitar, too,” he said. “In elementary school, I played some guitar. I used to have a band called the Red Devils, and it was me on guitar and a drummer that just had a snare drum and a cymbal, and a trumpet player. And we used to do Peter Gunn at lunchtime in the gymnasium, so that was my guitar time. But then I played clarinet for probably a couple of years. I worked my way up to first chair and then down to last chair because I just hated it. One day the band instructor was looking for guys to go back to the drum section because marching band season was coming, and it was all girls in the drum section. And they needed a guy to carry the bass drum, to walk with the bass drum in the marching band. It was a no-brainer to me. It was all girls in the drum section, and I hated clarinet. I put up my hand, and I got the job.”
Brewer is the writer and singer of Grand Funk Railroad’s most recognizable hit, “We’re an American Band,” which is something of a calling card for the group. The song came in the early 1970s after a difficult stretch for the young band.
“We used to do two albums a year, two tours a year,” he said. “Music was changing at that time. Radio was changing from being an FM underground format to hit radio, so you had to write three-minute songs. So I figured, well, I’ll take a swing at writing a hit song — verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus out. That was my formula, and that’s when I wrote the song. … Took little tidbits of what was going on on that tour: 4 a.m. chiquitas in Omaha; and sweet, sweet Connie; and Little Rock; and up all night playing poker with Freddie King. So I put all those little stories together, and finally I came up with the tag, ‘We’re an American Band.’ And that’s really where the song came from.”
When Brewer first heard the song on the radio, he realized they had a hit on their hands.
“I was on my way driving from my house over in Flint, Michigan, over to Mel’s house, and it came on the radio for the first time,” he said. “And I pulled off the side of the road, and I just couldn’t believe how great it sounded on the radio. It just sounded like, hey, I’m a hit record. It gave me chills the first time I heard it on the radio.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Grand Funk Railroad are currently touring the United States with scheduled stops in Nevada, Arkansas, Oklahoma and Florida, among many other places. Click here for more information and tickets.
