At the start of the 70s, a new musical term came into vogue – “the singer-songwriter.” It referred to a swelling wave of stars that included James Taylor, Carole King, Joni Mitchell and Jackson Browne, all of whom, it turns out, hated the term with a passion. “I don’t know one musician who used it,” said Danny Kortchmar, a guitarist who played with all those stars. “Everyone loathed it.”
A new documentary, titled Immediate Family, helps explain why. “When you say ‘singer-songwriter’ it makes it sound like you’re talking about a solo act,” said the film’s director Denny Tedesco. “It was just the opposite of that. The musicians who played on the albums by all those stars were integral. They weren’t just playing along on the tracks. They were helping to create them.”
A single spin of the tracks they played on proves it. Would Browne’s Doctor My Eyes have the same punch without the bubbling introductory bass line devised by Leland Sklar? Or the melody in Taylor’s Fire and Rain have the same tug without the determined drum fills used to punctuate it? And how could the full impact of King’s It’s Too Late be felt without the melancholy guitar solo by Kortchmar, a run that has become so familiar, fans can hum it.
The story behind that solo alone establishes the load-bearing role these musicians played. When the red light in the studio came on to signal it was time to record It’s Too Late, King turned to Kortchmar and said, “Play a solo here.” The only direction she gave him? “Make it good,” the guitarist said with a laugh. “What you hear on the record is just what I did.”
Anecdotes of that sort highlight Immediate Family, a film whose title echoes the nickname for a quartet of studio players who ruled the LA music scene in the 70s and 80s. They included bassist Sklar, drummer Kunkel and guitarists Kortchmar and Waddy Wachtel. Either alone, or in various configurations, they worked with all the artists mentioned above, as well as Linda Ronstadt, Warren Zevon, Randy Newman, Neil Young, Stevie Nicks and scores more. At times, they also became part of their touring bands; some went on to write and produce songs that became hits. During their peak period, they tasted some of the fame enjoyed by the upfront stars. Only in the new film, however, are their full stories being told.
For Kortchmar, the story goes back to his teen years in the 60s when the guitarist would summer with his family on Martha’s Vineyard. There, he met a young Taylor with whom he formed the band The Flying Machine. After they broke up, Taylor went to London where The Beatles’ label, Apple, signed him and released his self-titled debut. Shortly thereafter, Apple collapsed, at which point Taylor returned to the US to record what would become his breakthrough album, Sweet Baby James, which featured Kortchmar on guitar and Kunkel on drums. One year later, the same players appeared on King’s history-making Tapestry album. After several months, Sklar became part of their circle by playing on Taylor’s album Mud Slide Slim. And within a year, Wachtel racked up enough studio work to complete their circle. Even so, the names of these players might never have become known by the general public had the producers they worked with – Peter Asher and Lou Adler – not made sure to plaster them on the album covers they performed on. That placement was especially important in the 70s when fans would pore over album cover art and credits with a Talmudic scrutiny. “On those album covers these musicians’ names were nearly as big as the stars’”, Tedesco said. “And they were odd names – like Waddy and Kootch (the oft-used nick name for Kortchmar). So, they stood out.”
By contrast, the previous generation of top studio players, known as the Wrecking Crew, went largely uncredited despite having played on hundreds of pop hits in the 60s. The differences between the players in the Wrecking Crew and those in the Family are especially clear to Tedesco who directed an acclaimed 2008 documentary titled The Wrecking Crew whose members included his father, guitarist Tommy Tedesco. Besides achieving a level of fame that the Crew never enjoyed, the Family also received greater financial reward. “People would ask my father, ‘Did you feel like you should have been paid more for the work you did in the 60s?’” Tedesco said. “He would say, ‘Listen, we played on thousands of hits but at the same time we played on thousands more bombs. And I never gave anybody their money back for those sessions.’”
The personal and working relationship between the Crew and the Family also differed significantly. The earlier players were handed charts to follow while the Family were given far more freedom by the stars. “They wanted to hear how we would interpret their songs,” Wachtel said. “That was the reason we got hired.”
It helped that they were peers to the artists in both generation and sensibility. They also lived near each other and moved in the same circles. To capture the special rapport between the studio players, the director features several scenes in the film that show them bantering back and forth. “Musicians have a language between each other,” Tedesco said. “A key part of what makes their music work is their relationships as people, not just as players.”
There’s an especially deep connection between Wachtel and Kortchmar as co-guitarists. While they could have become rivals, instead they became great friends. “From the first gigs, we realized that we could play really well together because our styles are so different,” Kortchmar said.
“Danny’s sound is cleaner than the one I get,” Wachtel said. “I have a nasty sound whereas Danny has that beautiful, clean tone. We’re never on the same place on the neck.”
Both players also migrated to the LA scene from their birthplace in New York, a place whose cheeky attitude they reflect in their personalities. Wachtel makes that clear in several choice anecdotes in the film, including one that took place during the sessions for the huge Steve Perry single Oh, Sherrie.” Wachtel was hired just to play rhythm parts but, at one point, he told the producer, with no small amount of chutzpah, that the song needed a solo. More, he knew just what it should sound like and where it should go. The producer balked until Wachtel demonstrated what he had in mind, at which point everyone recognized that his solo took the song to a whole other level. “When you know something is right, you have to speak up,” Wachtel said.
In moments like these, the musicians functioned not as just sidemen but as arrangers. At times, they even took on the qualities of a producer. Those skills came in handy when the 70s turned into the 80s and the look, sound and technology of music changed dramatically. In the age of MTV, synthesizers and drum machines came in which could have limited the studio work the musicians could get or even made them obsolete. Instead, Kortchmar said, “we found a way to make our playing fit into whatever situation was coming up next”.
Kortchmar began to write and produce for the stars, especially Don Henley for whom he penned the hit All She Wants to Do Is Dance and co-wrote Dirty Laundry. Meanwhile, Wachtel wrote or produced tracks for Zevon (including Werewolves of London) and for many film soundtracks. Starting in the late 80s, Wachtel also became part of Keith Richards’ band outside of The Stones, the X-Pensive Winos, which had a dynamic that’s every bit as tight and intimate as Richards’ main band. “Keith is one of the world’s most incredible rhythm players ever, so I would play live leads on those tracks,” Wachtel said. “I always knew where not to be when he was playing.”
Back in the 70s, three of the four Family players – Kortchmar, Kunkel and Sklar – had their own band, The Section, which released a trio of fusion-style instrumental albums. Previously, Sklar had played on one of fusion’s most important albums, Spectrum by Billy Cobham. More recently, in 2001, all four members, along with singer Steve Postell, recorded an album under the name Immediate Family. That same assemblage has recorded a new album that will be released early next year. At the same time, Wachtel has been touring with Stevie Nicks for whom he honed the signature guitar hook that powers her classic song Edge of Seventeen.
Today, the Family players seldom do session work, in part because they have other gigs but also because their old line of work has essentially dried up. Artists now have the technology to make records by themselves on computers at home, eliminating the need for expensive sidemen. “The landscape has changed for everyone,” said Kortchmar. “Most of the studios have closed down. I feel sorry for any young kid who thinks he’s going to become a session musician today.”
In that regard, the Family players feel even more appreciative of the time they had in the milieu they helped create. “We were working like crazy back then,” Kortchmar said. “It was heaven.”
Director Tedesco says he’s just happy to hail and chronicle their work in his film. “Every song is a bookmark in your life,” Tedesco said. “It’s important to know that these guys helped give us so many of them.”