John Sebastian

I think I'm at either 14 or 15 members of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

I've got King Richards, I've got Eric Clapton, I've got Bob Weir, I've got Bo Diddley, I've got Bonnie Raitt, John Sebastian, Buddy Guy, Joe Perry from Aerosmith, Bruce Hornsby, Michael McDonald.

Chuck Lavelle has been the keyboard player for the Stones for decades.

Al Cooper, the founder of Blood, Sweat & Tears.

And my favorite story...

And that's saying a lot because there's a lot of great stories that are told in my film.

But I read that when John Sebastian and the Love and Spoonful went into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2000, Sebastian gave an interview to People Magazine saying that he didn't think it was right that rock and roll pioneers like Johnny Johnson weren't in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

So now all of a sudden, okay, I've got to track down John Sebastian.

She met him when she was 14.

She later worked with Rick Danko, Richard Manuel, John Sebastian, and Jerry Lee Lewis.

She's married to Ralph Scala of the Blues Magoos.

Becky grew up playing lead guitar with Yank Rachell, and in 1983, was invited to Woodstock, New York, where she now lives, by Rick Danko and Richard Manuel from The Band.

So I was back in Indie for about six years.

The marriage broke up, but I got to play with Yank Rachell all those years from '91 till he passed away.

Plus, I ended up playing with Jerry Lee Lewis, which was great, and John Sebastian.

I finally hooked Yank up with John, who was a massive Yank Rachell fan.

That was a boogaloo cover.

Ralphy Pagan, or Pagan, covering Didn't Wanna Have to Do It, and this is another John Sebastian song.

It's really true how nothing matters.

No mad, mad world and no mad hatters.

Huh.

And he said, what about if we get Eric Jacobson to produce it? And I said, oh, well, we've become friends with John Sebastian and the Lovin' Spoonful, and he made those records.

I said, well, that would be great.

And so that's how that happened.

It of course is after Travolta, being the thing that kicked off Travolta.

The theme song, uh, the John Sebastian theme song is definitely what it's most famous for.

It went to number one, um, on the pop charts.

Let's see, I have the...

I have my full Fred Bronson Book of the Billboard Number One Hits that I have, um, used in the bathroom many times.

Let's see what the actual d-...

So, uh, 434, the num- 434th number one song in history of the Billboard charts is "Welcome Back" by John Sebastian, 1976.

[clears throat] Here's the rest of the top five that week.

Hey! ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? Thank you.

Well, we might just fade out the Tedeschi Trucks band there and Darling Be Home Soon, a song written by John Sebastian and made famous by The Loving Spoonful way back in the day.

But the Tedeschi Trucks band with Susan Tedeschi on lead vocals there does a great version.

And what a band if you ever got a chance to see them live.

In 1975, the iconic high school sitcom Welcome Back, Cotter officially premiered on ABC television.

The show launched John Travolta into television stardom as Vinnie Barbarino, and his famous theme song by John Sebastian eventually climbed all the way up to number one on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart.

Of course, that song called Welcome Back.

In 1975, Paul McCartney and Wings kicked off their highly anticipated 13-month Wings Over the World tour at the Gamont Theatre in Southampton, England.

It also hit number two on the Billboard R&B Albums Chart.

It had Respect, Spanish Harlem, and Bridge Over Troubled Water.

In 1974, John Sebastian released Tarzana Kid.

This was the fourth studio album from the former frontman for the group The Lovin' Spoonful.

John Esterly from Rare Bowser FX.

John Sebastian.

John Halverson.

Justin Jones.

Who would have thought they'd reach out? Who would have thought they'd reach out? Yeah.

i did have the honor of working with john sebastian and i got to tell him dude ingenious how the words to the song say welcome back and it's talking to the audience welcome back to our and it just was such a great theme song so yeah i learned a lot from a lot of those folks okay here's some useless trivia Long before I had earned the title of full-time composer, I was a studio musician.

The studios treated me like a Swiss Army multi-purpose utility tool for musical chores.

And one of those chores was I played the piano for Father Mulcahy.

So I think... their impact was probably more profound than their actual sales in the UK.

I don't know how many hits they had there, but, but for us, and to me, John Sebastian is one of the underrated songwriters of the sixties.

To me, he's like, you know, like Hoagie Carmichael or Johnny Mercer.

Like he's from that school of American music.