Bennett Ireland of Sky Cries Mary
Meets Up with Coffee Time News

What do you get when you have two drummers sit down and chat? ANSWER: A great interview!

Coffee Time News's Yuri Sundermeyer, who is an aspiring drummer, got lots of advice during this interview with seasoned veteran drummer Bennett Ireland, whose career has spanned decades and put him solidly in Seattle's annals of rock history.

One of many photos of Bennett Ireland with his dedicated bandmates who form the long-lived Sky Cries Mary. We can attest to the fact that his ready smile is contagious.

For Bennett Ireland, having spent his entire life in the world of music has meant he has amassed a huge collection of memories which he shared freely with Coffee Time News’s Yuri Sundermeyer. He openly talked about the ups and downs of having been a musician for over forty years. We are honored that Mr. Ireland shared so many stories from his colorful life and hope you can find a moment to enjoy a coffee and read about Bennett Ireland’s adventures from his youth to living life in his sixties while still having all the enthusiasm of someone half his age. This was the greatest gift he gave us… the secret of how the love of music can bring a true love of life that enables us to surpass even the largest of life’s obstacles.

Para Bennett Ireland, que passou a sua vida inteira no mundo da música, significou muito colecionar memorias, tendo-as partilhado abertamente com o Yuri Sundermeyer, do Coffee Time News. Ele explicou-nos os altos e baixos da sua carreira de quarenta anos. É uma honra que o Sr. Ireland nos tenha contado tantas histórias sobre a sua vida interessante e esperamos que tenha um momento para apreciar um café e ler este jornal sobre as aventuras de Bennett Ireland, desde a sua juventude até aos dias de hoje, mantendo ainda o entusiasmo de alguém com metade da sua idade. O segredo de que o amor pela música pode ajudar-nos a gostar da vida, foi a melhor prenda que ele nos deu, podendo ajudar a ultrapassar or maiores obstáculos da vida.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: What motivated you as a fourteen-year-old boy to play professionally? Most kids at that age are only interested in having fun and enjoy not having adult responsibilities.

BENNETT IRELAND: Very good question. We just have to trade places, because I was about your age. How old are you?

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Ten.

BENNETT IRELAND: What grade are you in?

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Fifth grade.

BENNETT IRELAND: I started in fourth grade, so I was nine. Two things caused it. My dad was a musician in the sixties. I was born in 1961 and he took me to a Procol Harum concert. Procol Harum was a great band from that era with Robin Trower on guitar and I had never seen a concert before in my life. This was the first time sitting there and I just saw the drummer playing and he had all this stuff. He was behind this big set and he was wailing away and I just had this feeling, “That’s what I want to do.” At that point, my path was given to me and the serious part of it all is that we’re spirits, we have spirits, and now we have a temporary body. Our goal in life is to find our passion. We find our passion and then we move towards that and we manifest our future and many people are walking around with no direction and don’t know what they want to do in life and I always had direction. I always had the drums. My father had a psychedelic band in the sixties. They had a drum set in the basement and they’d say, “Go ahead and play!” Pretty soon I was the drummer in my dad’s jazz band. My dad had a jazz group, so I played jazz. That was the start. The second thing, I was laying around and I was nine years old and there was an interview with Donovan, the singer Donovan, and they were saying how he was a multi-instrumentalist and I was listening to that and I had my Tinker Toys and so I set up all my Tinker Toys like instruments trying to be like Donovan and my mom saw that and said “You maybe should play the drums or something.” I had parents that supported me which is very important.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: O que é que o motivou enquanto criança de catorze anos para tocar profissionalmente? A maior parte das crianças da tua idade só pensam em divertirem-se e não ter as responsabilidades de um adulto.

BENNETT IRELAND: Boa pergunta. Nós só precisamos de trocar de lugares, porque eu tinha a tua idade. Qual é a tua idade?

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Dez.

BENNETT IRELAND: Em que ano estás?

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Quinto ano.

BENNETT IRELAND: Eu comecei no quarto ano então tinha nove anos. Duas coisas que causaram isto. O meu pai era músico em 1960. Eu nasci em 1961 e ele levou-me para um concerto de Procol Harum. Procol Harum era uma banda muito boa naquele tempo, com o Robin Trower na guitarra, e eu nunca tinha visto um concerto na minha vida. Essa foi a primeira vez que estive lá sentado e vi o baterista a tocar. Tinha aquele equipamento e estava atrás do mesmo e estava a arrasar a tocar e eu simplesmente tinha essa sensação, “isso é o que eu quero fazer.” Naquele momento o meu caminho criou-se e a parte mais séria disto tudo é que nós temos uma alma e, por agora, o nosso corpo é temporário. A nossa missão na vida é encontrar a nossa paixão e, quando a encontramos, só a precisamos de seguir e construir o nosso futuro. Muitas pessoas estão a andar sem direção e não sabem o que querem na vida e eu sempre tive uma direção. Eu sempre tive espírito de baterista. O meu pai teve uma banda psicadélica nos anos 60s. Eles tinham uma bateria na cave e diziam, “Vai toca!” E muito pouco tempo depois tornei-me o baterista da banda do meu pai. O meu pai tinha um grupo de jazz, por isso eu toquei jazz. Esse foi o começo. A segunda coisa aconteceu quando eu estava deitado, tinha nove anos e havia uma entrevista com Donovan, o cantor Donovan, falavam como ele era um multi-instrumentista e eu estava a ouvir isso. Tinha os meu brinquedos dos Tinker Toys, e configurei-os todos como instrumentos, para tentar ser como Donovan. A minha mãe viu isso e disse: “Tu talvez devas tocar bateria ou algo do género.” Eu tinha pais que me apoiavam, o que era muito importante.

Bennett Ireland pictured here in the early days of Sky Cries Mary. His interview provided many insights into living in Seattle during the height of its Grunge Era.

Sky Cries Mary was especially influential in the 1990s and it is easy to see why. Bennett Ireland along with his bandmates created some cosmic music which still sounds just as good and relevant today as it did thirty years ago. Click and enjoy "Nowhere".

Seattle, Washington has a big place in music history as the cradle of grunge, but it hasn't only given us grunge music as can be heard in the psychedelic sounds of Sky Cries Mary.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Would you say that someone interested in being a professional musician has to make that decision at an early age?

BENNETT IRELAND: The earlier… the better, because a child’s mind is open and if you get all these things in there, it’s natural by the time you’re twelve or thirteen. I started playing professionally when I was fifteen and I played bars and clubs and they kept me in a little room because I couldn’t be out there with all the alcohol and so I was playing in a cover band playing everything that was a popular song. Anything that was on the radio we had to learn, so I had to learn every single style that was on the pop chart, right? The other thing was I was making so much money when I was a kid. I was making 150 bucks, which was a lot of money at the time, so I was cruising. I was fortunate enough to live in an neighborhood where my neighbor and the kids I played with, well their father was the drummer for the Seattle Symphony, so I wanted classes with him, but he was too strict for me and I talked with my mom and said I didn’t want to do it anymore. She spoke with him and asked if he could recommend someone and he recommended his top student, Kathie Ramm, a woman, and she was his apprentice. He retired and she took over as the number one classical orchestra drummer. She taught me and she was strict and if I didn’t practice enough, she would say, “If you’re not interested in practicing and come here unprepared, we’ll have to quit, because I have a really long line of students who are waiting to play and if you’re not willing to keep it up to a high level, I’ll have to drop you and bring in another kid. I don’t have so much time on Earth to do this.” She said all that after only one time when I didn’t have my stuff together. I definitely would recommend that you have a good, strict teacher. It was hard, but she really kept me going.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Diria que alguém interessado em ser músico profissional tem de tomar essa decisão cedo?

BENNETT IRELAND: Quanto mais cedo… melhor, porque a mente de uma criança está aberta e se colocarmos todas estas coisas lá dentro, é natural acontecer quando se tem doze ou treze anos. Comecei a tocar profissionalmente quando tinha quinze anos e tocava na bares e discotecas. Eles mantinham-me numa salinha, porque não podia estar lá com todo aquele álcool, mas estava a tocar numa banda de covers, a tocar tudo o que era música popular. Qualquer coisa que estivesse na rádio tínhamos de aprender, então tive que aprender cada estilo que estava na tabela top, certo? Outra coisa é que eu ganhava muito dinheiro quando era criança. Naquela altura, eu estava a ganhar 150 dólares, o que era muito dinheiro, por isso estava a ter uma boa vida. Tive sorte em viver num bairro onde podia brincar com as crianças da vizinhança. Bem, o pai deles era o baterista da Sinfónica de Seattle, por isso queria ter aulas com ele, mas ele era um pouco rígido, então falei com a minha mãe e disse-lhe que não queria fazer mais aulas com ele. Ela falou com ele e perguntou-lhe se podia recomendar alguém e ele recomendou a sua melhor aluna, Kathie Ramm, era sua aprendiza. Ele reformou-se e ela assumiu o primeiro lugar como baterista na orquestra clássica. Também era rigorosa, se eu não treinasse o suficiente, ela dizia, “Se não tiveres interessado em praticar e vieres aqui, desesperado, vamos ter que desistir, pois tenho uma longa lista de estudantes que estão à espera para tocar. Se não trabalhares para manter o nível elevado, terei que te substituir por outra criança, não tenho muito tempo aqui na terra para o fazer.” Ela disse isso depois de se aperceber que eu não tinha as minhas coisas prontas. Eu recomendaria que tivesses um professor bom e rigoroso. Foi difícil, mas ela fez-me realmente continuar.

We found this photo of Bennett which seems highly appropriate given his following answer to Yuri's question. Read on to understand what we mean.

Editor's note: The graffiti is not Bennett's... he just so happened to find it, probably left by another musician who aggravated his mom too much.

Bennett Ireland with his backpack, which always contains drum pads, meeting up with Swiss musicians at Jazz Ascona with beautiful Lake Maggiore in the background. The location for our interview was perfect given Bennett's Swiss roots which he mentioned during the interview.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: What was the biggest hiccup you suffered as you built your career? Was there ever a time you thought you might quit music?

BENNETT IRELAND: Being really good at what I was doing and not having opportunities. Money. Where are you going to get your income and there were phases where I was making money and phases where I was not. It was a cycle of rich-poor-rich-poor and the hiccup came when all of these musicians and artists were living in a church and we played rock ‘n’ roll in it and that church burned down with all of my belongings… my drum set, you name it… everything was gone, even my mom’s Swiss stained glass curio that I had and my mom came to the fire afterwards and saw it all burned up and broken and she started crying. So, I had to start over and I was in my early twenties and I moved back with my mom. She was strict and I had to go work and I was working nine or ten hours a day to make money, you know, build up money and at that time my mom was saying I should go back to school, because I had dropped out and so I did and got my GED. It was hard. Here’s the hardest part. The people in my family, on the Swiss side, were surgeons, optical surgeons… really gifted and everyone was going, “What’s Ben doing? Is he going to become an optical surgeon?” And that was my thing, I don’t think I could do that. My grandfather was the first physician to perform the corneal transplant in America. He had perfected it in Switzerland. So, there was pressure on me, maybe to be more like that and I couldn’t do it. I tried and I tried. I dropped out of things and I would go into other things and dropped out, but I always went back to music. I kept going back to music. I finally just said, “Okay, whatever happens, this is my path. I’m going to follow it for better or worse.” But the hiccup was I needed to be more like my mom’s side of the family, do something like that. I had big shoes to fill, a lot of expectations from my Swiss side of my family. And to be a rock and roll musician, it just wasn’t quite what they were expecting. So, that was the hiccup. It was trying not to do music and having to go back home. It’s a tough road to be musician and I hardly would recommend it. However, if you’re good, you’re just going to do it anyway.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Qual foi o maior obstáculo que sofreu na sua carreira? Alguma vez pensou em desistir da música?

BENNETT IRELAND: Ser realmente bom no que fazia e não ter oportunidades. Dinheiro. Onde se tem de ir para ganhar o teu dinheiro? E haviam fases em que eu estava a fazer dinheiro e outras fases que não. Era um ciclo de rico-pobre-rico-pobre e o obstáculo veio quando todos nós, músicos e artistas, estávamos a viver numa igreja, tocávamos rock and roll lá, mas a igreja ardeu com todos os meus pertences… a minha bateria, mesmo tudo… tudo desapareceu, até uma raridade suíça da minha mãe, feita de vidro. A minha mãe veio para o fogo depois e viu tudo queimado e partido, até começou a chorar. Então, tive de começar do zero, estava no início dos meus vinte e voltei para a casa da minha mãe. Ela era rígida e eu tinha de trabalhar, por isso estava a trabalhar nove ou dez horas por dia, para fazer dinheiro. Sabes? Juntar dinheiro, nesse tempo, a minha mãe dizia que deveria voltar para a escola, porque eu desisti. Então fiz o que ela disse e ganhei o meu GED. Foi difícil. Esta foi a parte mais difícil. As pessoas da minha família, do lado Suíço, eram cirurgiões, cirurgiões óticos… realmente dotados! E todos diziam, “O que é que o Ben faz? Também vai ser um cirurgião ótico?” Esse era o problema, eu acho não o poderia ser. O meu avô foi o primeiro Físico a fazer transplante da córnea na América. Mas aperfeiçoou-se na Suíça. Então havia pressão em mim, talvez para seguir a profissão dele mas eu não o conseguia fazer. Eu tentei e tentei. Abandonei algumas coisas, entrei noutras e desisti, mas voltei sempre para a música. Continuei sempre na música. Finalmente disse, “Okay, independentemente do que aconteça, este é o meu caminho. Vou segui-lo, a bem ou a mal. Eu precisava de ser mais como o lado da família da minha mãe, fazer algo assim. Eu tinha um grande desafio pela frente, muitas expectativas do lado suíço da minha família. E para ser um músico de rock and roll, não era bem o que se esperava. Então foi esse o dilema. Estava a tentar viver da música e também não voltar para casa. É um caminho difícil tonar-se músico e eu dificilmente recomendaria. No entanto, se fores bom, vais fazê-lo de qualquer maneira.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Who was your idol growing up? Would you want to accept that kind of responsibility… of being an idol to a younger musician?

BENNETT IRELAND: Yes, I would. I love kids and think they’re great. I’m a kid at heart, just like you, just in a big body. I like to play and I like to have fun. My idol, going back to that, is Jimi Hendrix and Jimi Hendrix’s drummer, who was Mitch Mitchell and he was an innovator and I tried to copy him because he used jazz in a rock setting… he used an elaborate style of playing… not just his time signatures, but he was very imaginative and that was my idol and all the other drummers were not quite as good as him. More came along, of course. I liked Keith Moon, but my favorite drummer… okay, Mitch Mitchell and then as far as other drummers, I like Aynsley Dunbar. The Jimi Hendrix experience started in London and they had auditions for drummers and two of my favorite drummers were at the same audition and both were equally good, Dunbar and Mitchell. So, they couldn’t figure it out, so what did they do? They flipped a coin. Otherwise Aynsley Dunbar would have been there as Jimi Hendrix’s drummer, but Aynsley Dunbar is my other great, great idol. He played with Frank Zappa, very complex drumming. He also played with David Bowie, who is my other idol. Dunbar went on to do metal and stuff like Whitesnake and Journey, but his style of playing was elaborate. He was a little more hard hitting than Mitch Mitchell. I just totally idolize them. I mean I was out of my mind with idolization and I would listen to the records and I’d put a record on and listen and take it off. Then, I’d put it back on, until I could get it, so I did it with my head. I figured things out by myself until I could take professional classical lessons, but that’s another story.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Quem foi o teu ídolo na tua fase de crescimento? Como tu gostarias de lidar com esse tipo de responsabilidade… ser um ídolo para um músico mais jovem?

BENNETT IRELAND: Sim eu gostaria. Eu adoro crianças e penso que eles são ótimos. Eu tenho uma criança dentro do meu coração, como tu, simplesmente num corpo maior. Gosto de jogar e gosto de diversão. O meu ídolo, voltando atrás, é o Jimi Hendrix e o baterista do Jimi Hendrix, que foi Mitch Mitchell, um inovador que tentei imitar, porque conseguir usar o jazz num cenário de rock. Teve um estilo elaborado de tocar… não somente as assinaturas do tempo; era muito imaginativo e era o meu ídolo. Todos os outros bateristas não eram propriamente bons como ele, ainda virão mais, claro. Também gosto do Keith Moon, mas o meu baterista favorito é… okay, Mitch Mitchell. A respeito de outros bateristas, eu gosto do Aynsley Dunbar. Os Jimi Hendrix Experience começaram em Londres e tiveram audições para bateristas, e dois dos meus bateristas favoritos foram à mesma audição. Ambos foram igualmente bons, Dunbar e Mitchell. Como não conseguiram decidir, então o que eles fizeram? Lançaram a moeda ao ar. De outra maneira, Aynsley Dunbar teria sido o baterista do Jimi Hendrix, mas Aynsley Dunbar é o meu outro bom, bom ídolo. Pois, tocou com o Frank Zappa, e elevou a bateria a um nível complexo. Também tocou com o David Bowie, que é o meu outro ídolo. Continuou a sua carreira no “metal” e seguiu Whitesnake e Journey. Mas o estilo dele tocar era elaborado. Até tocava melhor do que o Mitch Mitchell. Eu idolatro-os totalmente. Não me passava pela cabeça idolatrá-los e ouvia as suas gravacões. Customava pôr a gravacão, ouvi-la e tirá-la. Depois, punha de novo, até entendê-la, por isso estava empenhado nisso. Decobria as coisas por mim mesmo, até poder fazer aulas profissionais clássicas, mas isso é outra história.

Bennett Ireland in the studio....................

................... Bennett Ireland on the road.

He's good either way as long as he's surrounded by music.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: You mentioned many crazy times in your career. How did you survive them?

BENNETT IRELAND: You survive by the strength of your will. I did all the drugs; I did everything, but there is one thing I had which was more important than drugs and partying… my music and my abilities, so I say this to people about drugs… go ahead and do them, however if your goal is to be great… well, drugs interfere with that. Drugs are not helping you, so, I was already good and we were on a label and were already famous, and I was doing drugs, but there is always a fun part, but in the end it doesn’t work out and you also drain your bank accounts, so it’s a mixed bag. So, I wouldn’t say don’t take them, but if you do take them, think about what your main goal in life is and if doing drugs will interfere with it. If it does, then stay away from them. You’ve got a main goal and your soul knows what to do. Looking back on it, I’d say, I would do it again, because I had a colorful career. I used to work as a show drummer. Show drummers are in Atlantic City and Las Vegas and you have to be top-notch. You have to run a big band like a twenty-piece orchestra and keep it up.

I just kept getting gigs and working towards my goal. So, I had the greatest time in my life. My whole life has been a fun thing, you know? All the bad stuff is there… all the good stuff is here. The good outweighs the bad.

I learned a lot from the bad things. I learned there’s a starting point and an ending point with drugs.

You start and it’s fun. You can go one or two years, but that third year, your account is drained and you gotta tell your mom that you’re screwed up and you have to go to rehab and so I have done three rehabs and two detoxes and the detoxes were for alcohol and the rehabs were for heroin. Seattle, at the time when I was growing up, was awash in heroin with the whole grunge scene. We all did it. It wasn’t like I was the only one doing it. It wasn’t like everyday people were taking it. It was a small group of musicians… we’d shoot a little bit, discuss stuff, play a little bit. It was an inside thing. Once in a while, you go play a gig and you get a little money and when you got enough… “let’s get a little dope.” Everyone did it, as you know, a lot of people died during that period, but I survived.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Mencionou muitos momentos loucos na sua carreira. Como é que os ultrapassou?

BENNETT IRELAND: Consegues com a força da tua motivação. Eu tomei todas as drogas, fiz tudo, mas há uma coisa que era mais importante do que as drogas e as festas, a música e as minha habilidades. Então eu digo isto às pessoas, sobre as drogas: “Vai em frente e toma-as, mas se o teu objetivo é ser grande, se isso interfere com o teu objetivo, é porque não te está a ajudar”. Eu já era bom, tinhamos um contrato com uma editora, já éramos famosos e eu estava a tomar drogas. Mas há sempre uma parte engraçada, no fim isso não funciona e ficas falido, entao é uma mistura de coisas boas e más. Eu não diria “não as tomes”, mas se as consumes, qual é o teu grande objetivo na vida? E as drogas interferem? Se sim, afastem-se de mim. Tens um objetivo prinicipal e a tua alma sabe o que fazer. Olhando para trás, consumiria as drogas de novo, porque eu tive uma carreira interessante. Eu antes trabalhava como baterista de espetáculos. Os bateristas de espetáculos estavam em Atlantic City e em Las Vegas e tu tinhas de ser o melhor dos melhores. Tu tinhas de ser um líder de uma Big Band, como uma orquestra de vinte elementos, e tinhas de ficar no topo. Eu continuava a arranjar trabalho e continuava a alcancar os meus objetivos. Por isso, eu estava na melhor fase da minha vida. A minha vida toda era muito engraçada. Todas as coisas más estavam lá e todas as coisas boas estavam cá. O bom vence ao mal. Eu aprendi muito por causa das coisas más, aprendi que havia um ponto de partida e um ponto de chegada com as drogas. Tu começas e é divertido. Tu consegues num ou dois anos mas no terceiro ano, a sua conta está esgotada, tens de dizer à tua mãe que estás com problemas e tens de ir para a reabilitação. No total, fiz três reabilitações e duas desintoxicações, as desintoxicações foram para o álcool e as reabilitações para a heroína. Seattle, na época em que estava a crescer estava inundada de heroína, e com toda essa coisa “grunge”. Nós todos consumimos. Não era como se fosse a única pessoa a fazer, não era como pessoas normais o fizessem, era um pequeno grupo de músicos que injetavam droga, conversavam sobre coisas e tocávamos um pouco. Era uma coisa interna! De vez em quando vamos dar um concerto e ganhar um pouco de dinheiro, ganhamos o suficiente… e gastamos com droga. Todos o faziam e vocês sabem, muitas pessoas morrem durante aquele período, mas eu sobrevivi.

Who influenced Bennett Ireland?
Some of the best...
Scroll down and ...
Let's take a look...

Top of the list is Mitch Mitchell who is considered one of the best ever.

Aynsley Dunbar is right up there with Mr. Mitchell. Check out his drum solo while performing with Journey.

Bennett Ireland learned much from this master musician: Kidd Funkadelic... also know as Mike Hampton.

Those influences took Bennett Ireland to the top of the Seattle scene playing with Sky Cries Mary, pictured here with iconic landmarks of Seattle behind them.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: You have had a full life in the world of entertainment. If you got amnesia and could only keep one memory, which memory would you want to hold onto? If you could only remember one person, who would you want to remember? If you started over with a clean slate, which life experience would you like to relive?

BENNETT IRELAND: That’s a multi-leveled question. When I was twenty-one, I got a gig in southern France in Monte Carlo and I was the talk of the town. The producer who was setting up … I told him, if he gave me the gig I would get a blue mohawk. He asked me if I’d do that for real and I said would, so remember, this is the 80s and I shaved my hair off and had a mohawk and it was blue. I got on the airplane and I was the talk of the town and I met this cute girl. We got together. As she was a socialite, we would go to the Kit-Cat clubs and we got the best treatment. They would rope off an area for us. We’d drink premium whiskey and every time we came in they’d have it there for us. They would be playing Lionel Ritchie and then they would go into Deep Purple’s “Smoke on the Water” and we would dance to it. So, I had this cool lady and it was fabulous and she asked me if I wanted to me Rudolf Nureyev and I said, “Sure.” I did all that and went back home. Gig’s over. I get back to Seattle and wait around for something else to happen, but it was so fun at a young age to be good enough to get to do events like those. And the one person I would remember… I had a mentor. In the jazz world an older musician might take a younger fellow musician and guide him in jazz, which is a difficult area. In my case, my mentor was Pete Leinonen and he was older than me. At the time, he was probably in his fifties and he taught me everything. I love the guy. I went to his loft in the morning and he would say, “Today, we’re going to listen to Dr. Billy Taylor”, and we’d listen to him and Pete would say, “Let’s try to play some of it together. Pete played stand-up bass. Then, the next day, he would say, “We need to learn a little bit of Latin jazz,” and we’d do that and we built up this knowledge base. Pete Leinonen’s mentor was a drummer named Candy Finch, who was the drummer with Dizzy Gillespie. So, he taught me the style… a bizarre style where nothing gets repeated. He would complain if the music was too plain and he’d say, “You’re playing it like rock and roll now. You got to make it abstract. So, then Dizzy Gillespie came to Seattle. He was doing a gig and my mentor, Pete Leinonen, took me to go see him, because Pete knew Dizzy Gillespie and he introduced me personally to him and said, “This is Bennett Ireland and he is following in the footsteps of Candy Finch.” And I was very young at the time and Dizzy was older and so accomplished and Dizzy said, “So, you know Candy Finch’s stuff, yeah?” And I was intimidated by him. Also, remember, jazz’s origins are African-American and white musicians do play it, and some of them play it well, but really, the origins of jazz are in Black American history. I love jazz and learned the best thing is integration. The best thing for people is to fuse and blend. The more cultural connections one has in life… it simply expands your mind. As far as what I would want to relive, I would relive this… I admire a band called Parliament-Funkadelic. They’re amazing. I idolized them and their guitar player named Kidd Funkadelic, because he was really young when he joined Parliament-Funkadelic and I walked up to him and said, “Hey, what’s going on?” So, we talked and I asked him if he would jam and he said, “Let’s go.” So, we’re jamming in a basement with other musicians and he’s playing guitar, a fabulous guitar player, and he’s watching me playing the drums and he goes, “Hey, how about we trade. You play guitar and I play drums.” So, we did that, and we’re playing and we stop and he says, “I got to ask you a question… why did you pick up the guitar and start to play without tuning it? That’s something you might want to think about.” So, we actually hung out all night and until two in the afternoon the following day. During that time, he told me that he was thinking about retiring from all the touring and becoming a guitar teacher and he offered to give me guitar lessons right there. I accepted and I got a ninety-minute guitar lesson with Kidd Funkadelic. He taught me so much in that ninety minutes and I would go back to relive that any day and to be able to spend time with him again. This guy taught me so much in that day, you would not believe. He inspired me so much… Kidd Funkadelic.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Tiveste uma vida plena no mundo do entretenimento. Se tivesses amnésia e pudesses manter apenas uma memória, que memória manterias? Se pudesses relembrar apenas uma pessoa, quem gostarias de relembrar? Se começasses do zero, que experiência da tua vida gostarias de reviver?

BENNETT IRELAND: Isso é uma pergunta de vários níveis. Quando eu tinha 21 anos, arranjei um concerto no sul de Franca em Monte Carlo, e eu fui o assunto da cidade. Ao produtor responsável … eu disse que se ele me arranjasse um trabalho, eu faria uma crista azul no cabelo. Ele perguntou se isso era uma oferta real e eu disse que o faria… lembra-te que isto era nos anos 80, e eu rapei o meu cabelo e fiquei com uma crista azul. Quando entrei no avião, era o assunto da cidade e conheci esta mulher gira e saímos juntos. Era uma influencer e quando íamos aos bares tínhamos o melhor tratamento. Conseguiam sempre lugar para nós. Bebíamos whiskey premium e todas as vezes que lá entrávamos, havia mais para nós. Passaram Lionel Richie, e logo a seguir passaram para “Smoke on the Water”, dos Deep Purple e nós dançáramos. Então conheci esta senhora simpática, foi fabuloso, ela perguntou-me se queria conhecer Rudolf Nureyev e eu disse, “Claro que sim”. Depois de tudo, regressei a casa. O espetáculo acabou. Voltei para Seattle, à espera que algo mais acontecesse, mas foi tão divertido, numa idade jovem, ser bom o suficiente, para fazer eventos destes. E a pessoa que eu gostaria de relembrar…

Eu tive um mentor no mundo do jazz, um músico mais velho que me ensinou e me guiou no jazz, que é uma área difícil. O nome dele era Pete Leinonen. Era mais velho que eu. Tinha provavelmente cinquenta anos naquela época e ensinou-me tudo. Eu adorava-o e ia para os seu apartamento de manha. Costumava dizer, “Hoje, vamos ouvir Dr. Billy Taylor” e nós ouvíamos. Depois aconselhava, “Vamos tentar tocar um pouco disso juntos.” No dia seguinte, dizia, “Nós precisamos aprender um pouco de jazz latino” e nós tocávamos. E, construímos todo esse conhecimento. O mentor dele era um baterista chamado Candy Finch. Era um baterista que tocou com Dizzy Gillespie, então ele ensinou-me o estilo… um estilo bizarro em que nada é repetido. Reclamava sempre se a música fosse muito simples e dizia, “Estás a tocar isto como se fosse rock and roll. Tens de ser mais abstrato. Então, Dizzy Gillespie veio para Seattle. Ele estava num espetáculo e o meu mentor, Pete Leinonen, disse-me para ir vê-lo, porque Pete conhecia Dizzy Gillespie e apresentou-mo pessoalmente disse, “Este é o Bennett Ireland e está a seguir os passos de Candy Finch.” Eu era muito novo na altura e o Dizzy era mais velho. Quando me perguntou: “Então, tu conheces o trabalho do Candy Finch?”, eu fiquei intimidado por ele. Além disso, as origens do jazz vêm de músicos Afro-Americanos, e brancos também o tocam, e alguns tocam bem, mas na verdade, as origens do jazz estão na história negra-americana. Eu adoro jazz e aprendi que a melhor parte é a integração. Para as pessoas, a melhor coisa é fundir e misturar. Quantas mais conexões temos na vida, maior fica a nossa expansão mental. Em relação ao que gostava de reviver, voltava atrás para viver de novo o momento em que estive com uma banda que admiro, a Parliament-Funkadelic. Eles são espetaculares. Idolatrava-os e ao seu guitarrista, Kidd Funkadelic, que era muito jovem quando se juntou aos Parliament-Funkadelic. Aproximei-me dele quando tive oportunidade e disse-lhe, “Olá, como estás?” Conversámos, perguntei-lhe se queria tocar e ele respondeu “Vamos a isso.” Estávamos a improvisar numa cave com outros músicos. Ele tocava guitarra, um guitarrista fabuloso e, ao mesmo tempo, a ver-me tocar bateria e sugeriu-me que fizéssemos uma troca, eu tocava guitarra e ele bateria. E assim foi, quando comecei, ele mandou-me parar e disse “Tenho de te fazer uma pergunta… porque é que pegaste na guitarra e começaste a tocar sem afinar? É algo que talvez devas começar a pensar.” Passámos a noite a ensaiar até às 2h da tarde do dia seguinte. Durante esse tempo, disse-me que estava a pensar em reformar-se de todas as digressões e tornar-se professor de guitarra. E ofereceu-se para me dar aulas de guitarra ali mesmo. Aceitei e tive uma aula de guitarra de noventa minutos com o Kidd Funkadelic. Ele ensinou-me tanto naqueles noventa minutos que eu voltaria para reviver isso em qualquer dia e para poder passar tempo com ele novamente. Este tipo ensinou-me tanto naquele dia que nem dá para acreditar. Ele inspirou-me tanto… Kidd Funkadelic.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Within the music industry, who do you most admire right now? Are there any current acts you would suggest I check out?

BENNETT IRELAND: Currently, I really don’t admire anybody. I’m sorry. I’m waiting for that person. I haven’t really heard anything recently that’s really uplifting me. I look to the past for my inspiration… Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, Parliament-Funkadelic…

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Where does music go from here?

BENNETT IRELAND: Spiritual. A spiritual path. I’m on a spiritual path now and a cosmic path and the music I do is trying to embody positivity in this conflicted world. Our band, Sky Cries Mary, was huge in the 90s, but now we’re basically underground and the reason, I feel, is that our music was too positive and spiritual and people, right now, want music that is hard and I don’t do that. I try to make music that is flowing with positive vibes for the listener and I feel it is my responsibility to write music that helps people grow spiritually and dream.

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Dentro da indústria, quem é que mais admira neste momento? Há algum acto que sugeria que eu ouvisse?

BENNETT IRELAND: Neste momento, não admiro ninguém, peco desculpa, mas estou à espera dessa pessoa. Não tenho ouvido nada que recentemente me tenha inspirado. Eu olho para o passado à procura de inspiração… Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, Parliament-Funkadelic…

YURI SUNDERMEYER: Para onde é que a música vai a partir daqui?

BENNETT IRELAND: Espiritual. Um caminho espiritual. Estou num caminho espiritual agora, num caminho cósmico e a música que faço é para representar felicidade neste mundo conflituoso. A nossa banda, Sky Cries Mary, era gigante nos anos 90, mas agora somos basicamente underground, e sinto que a razão para isso acontecer é que a nossa música era demasiado positiva e espiritual. As pessoas agora querem música que seja agressiva e eu não faço isso. Eu tento fazer música que flui, com vibes positivos, para o ouvinte, e sinto que é da minha responsibilidade compor música que ajuda as pessoas a crescer espiritualmente e a sonharem.