FM: But we didn't expect that. I actually went out there with my head down as if we were about to be fed to the lions. I went out there and prayed to God, and people stayed and people enjoyed it. We played 90 minutes and we got encores...it turned out to be a really good performance. You also have to understand that a band like Ted Nugent or Aerosmith are paid like a quarter-million dollars to do a show like that [even back then], we were paid five thousand bucks! [Laughs] What were we doing on after Aerosmith? It made absolutely no sense but that's the way it worked.
BN: It seems in a strange way it may have actually worked to your advantage.
FM: I guess in a sense it did, even though it wasn't planned. The truth of the matter is I can say all the right things about my experience with Cal Jam...'It was cool man, playing to thousands of people'...but the fact is, it was really one of the worst days of my life because I had to ruminate on that situation all day long and I had to see mistrusting things going on backstage with all the bands. And coming from the late '60s...to me, Woodstock was the festival concert...and to see that kind of thing going on was almost like watching the death of rock and roll. So there I am sitting in that mood all day and then they tell me I have to go on after Aerosmith...it really was a bad day for me!
BN: Well, it certainly didn't show in the live performance I saw...
FM: I've played that same exact performance to eleven people...for three hours, it really doesn't matter to me. I don't say to myself, 'there's only eleven people out there tonight so I'm not gonna give it my best performance. I'm just doing what I do. I don't even realize how many people are out there. The one thing people can be absolutely sure of if they attend one of our concerts is that they won't get that lackadaisical attitude from us...not only because we feel that we owe it to them but that's just exactly what we do. Even at practice, that's exactly how we play.
BN: I think most would agree that you are definitely a 'live' artist...
FM: Oh yeah, way more so than studio.
A Conversation With FRANK MARINO Page 5