Neil Giraldo Remains Pat Benatar’s Musical Voice (INTERVIEW)

“Did you notice our pants match?” Pat Benatar says with a laugh to her husband, guitar player Neil Giraldo, about mid-way through their recent concert in Biloxi, Mississippi. Sitting on a stool center-stage while Giraldo begins to tinkle out some opening notes to “We Belong” on piano, Benatar is a lovely vision in black, long wavy auburn hair framing a face that appears to have never aged. Once the rocker belle of the early MTV days, Benatar has grown into a classy singer who can still handle her songs from the 1980’s – something not all vocalists from those days can claim to do. Alongside her husband of 31 years, Benatar has carved out a fruitful and satisfying career, starting with her 1979 debut album In The Heat Of The Night.

But Pat Benatar has never been “Pat Benatar.” From practically the beginning, it has always been Pat Benatar and Neil Giraldo. It was the powers-that-be who chose to play up the petite belter as a solo artist with an ass-kicking backing band. But to the both of them, that was a frustrating side of the business that they were almost shackled to adhere to…at least for a while. Nowadays, there is no “Pat Benatar.” There is simply, Pat and Neil, as it should be.

If you have had the pleasure of attending one of their concerts over the last decade, you know of their flirtatious rapport, their comfortable smiles at each other during songs, their genuine enthusiasm when one or the other is doing something spectacular on stage, and the freshness of their music after all these years. From “Invincible” to “Love Is A Battlefield,” from “Promises In The Dark” – “One of the first songs written about our relationship,” said Benatar when introducing the song – to “Hell Is For Children,” the song they promised “to keep playing until every child was safe,” the duo gives 110% because not only do they love it but their fans deserve it, sticking with the couple for almost 35 years.

But how much do we actually know about Neil Giraldo? Often overshadowed by the powerful spotlight shining on his wife, the man with the still-rocking pompadour certainly knows how to rip out a roaring solo on guitar, as proven in their Biloxi set on “So Sincere,” “Hell Is For Children,” “Everybody Lay Down” and during a climatic encore finale of their “Heartbreaker,” Johnny Cash’s “Ring Of Fire,” into Zeppelin’s “Heartbreaker” riffs and a little bit of “The Godfather.” It’s strange how some guitar players get so overlooked.

A few days before the concert, I had the opportunity to talk with Neil Giraldo about his life and career. The father of two daughters with Benatar, he has not lost his boyish enthusiasm for creating new music, and even though he was the first guitar player to appear on MTV, which Benatar lovingly cracked that it “makes him older than dirt,” Giraldo backs up his chops with still-feisty, sassy and bluesy chords on a big red guitar he affectionately calls Pain. And, by the way, his response to his wife’s assessment of being old, he flexes a bicep and says with a wink, “That ain’t dirt.”

It is so apparent that you and Pat are still having fun performing together after all these years.

Oh yeah, we’ll have a blast and that’s not made up, that’s the truth. It is fun and what makes it fun is we’re really relaxed and we both know where each of us is going so it’s not complicated, we don’t worry. We kind of share the same brain so we just have a blast (laughs) and we do something we love. I mean, what a gift I was given. I’m humbled by the life that I have. It’s incredible. I wish everybody had it, it’s fantastic.

It doesn’t look like you’re going through the routine. Some bands do the same songs and it sounds the same old way. But that is not the case with you.

Oh no, if you did pick that up you would have been misreading it. I call it the Jerry Lee Lewis blood and the reason I call it that is the minute I hit the stage, I turn into a different person. I’m much more aggressive, I want to live the moment, I want to be there and I’m going to give it everything. Just like a football player on the gridiron, just like a basketball player in a championship game – that’s what I’m going out there doing. And when I come off, then I melt down, then I become real passive and easy-going (laughs). That’s kind of my nature, you know. But on stage, forget it, I’m Jerry Lee Lewis (laughs)

And you’re still rocking that hair.

Thanks. I got real hair and that’s a good thing (laughs). Yeah, I got that going on and I’m thankful for that, yeah.

Tell us who is in your band right now out on the road with you and Pat.

Ok, Chris Ralles, he plays drums, and Mick Mahan plays bass and that’s our band. We make a lot of racket (laughs) as you’ll hear.
We make a lot of sound just coming from three pieces.

Where did you grow up and what kind of kid were you like?

I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, very close to the urban city lines, so to speak. I was in the suburbs but I was right across the railroad tracks from inner city Cleveland. It was a very tough place to live, a tough place growing up. The music scene was small; a lot of clubs and I got snuck in the backdoor playing in these things cause I was too young to play in them. I started very young. I wasn’t really a good school person (laughs). I did have ADD but who knew anything about that then. But I couldn’t concentrate at all and the only thing I could concentrate on was box scores of baseball games and football games and chords and music. But school, it wasn’t for me. It was very tough – a tough place to live and a tough place to grow up in, but I’m happy I did it.

How did you discover rock & roll?

My uncle was four years older than me and what he did was he actually came in and lived with my family – my sister and my parents – because my grandfather passed away so he kind of wanted to hang with us, so he was like a big brother to me. So anytime anything was coming around, he would take me to concerts and had me listen to the right music and he truly was the most inspirational person, other than my father or my parents, but he was the one that really got me going in music. He was just the best. He had me listening to the Kinks and to the Stones when the Stones first came out and the Yardbirds and all those great bands.

What is your all-time favorite album and why?

I don’t have an all-time favorite because that would be too prejudice because it changes, you know. But I think Who’s Next by The Who. I think that’s one of my all-time favorites.

When did you know you wanted to be a professional musician?

He took me to a concert to see The Who, and this was in 1967, I think it was, the very first tour of America for The Who. I was twelve years old and as soon as I saw that concert I went, “My God, this is exactly what I want.” And then from that day forward I didn’t stop. I got rejuvenated with rock & roll blood and I couldn’t stop. It hit me big. That did it and I’m still doing it.

What do you remember most about recording the first Pat Benatar album?

Well, let me see, we had only rehearsed for a short time. I put a band together, there was no band, nothing. Patricia and I were introduced to each other and we formed a partnership, her and I. Even though Pat Benatar is the name, I am on the record and it’s really the two of us. We’ve always been a partnership. It’s just that it wasn’t published that way. So what I remember about it was that I found some other musicians. I found a drummer and another guitar player and a bass player – the bass player was actually floating around playing in these little cabaret bands that Patricia was doing at that time. I just remember putting that band together and rehearsing for just a short time. Went to California and 28 days later the record was done and it was pretty simple. None of the people that were in the band had any kind of rock & roll experience. I played with Rick Derringer, and many other rock bands before that, but none of them did, including Patricia. They didn’t play in any kind of rock & roll bands. It was way, way different. I knew I had a great singer and I knew that I can make a great record and we went in there and bashed it out.

When she opened her mouth and sang, what was your first reaction?

Well, here’s the deal: She sounded great but it wasn’t what you hear today. What it was was a very clean, clear, pristine voice. It wasn’t the powerful voice that you know of. It was really smooth and beautiful and pretty, and I said, “Wait, hold on a second. We got to change, we got to dig you in a little bit here. We got to get this.” (laughs) So I played way aggressive. The more aggressive I played, the more she had to compete to get through it, to get heard. I worked with her for so long trying to get her to do this little switch and then I heard the switch happen, where she switched from a clean falsetto to her regular voice. And as soon as I heard that I went, “That’s what I want and that’s what we’re going to do.” And that’s how it worked.

The industry has changed so much since you guys started out. What do you like most and what do you like least about everything?

Well, what I like best is that you have many avenues to have your music be heard on, like YouTube and iTunes and all these places. I love that. It gives people freedom to be able to do what they want. They don’t necessarily have to be tied to a record company to get their music heard. So I love what’s going on about that. The process of making records, the idea of having digital and being able to fix as many things you want to fix, I think that’s like a safety net. I do believe that people take it a little too far, homogenize things too much, and they’re missing a moment in the mistakes which makes great moments on great records sound the way that they do. So that’s the bad part. The good part is you have a net so you’re fearless, you can do anything that you know of. If you screw up, you can at least fix that little thing if you need to. And that’s what makes that good.

How do you create music? Where do your ideas come from?

Well, a lot of words happen in your sleep and sometimes melodies do as well. The mornings are real prolific for me because I’m in a state of like a staggered mental state and creativity comes from when you try not to block it. So in other words, most of the time it feels like it’s not even me doing it. I’m just a conduit for it to come through, coming from some other place that I have no idea where it’s coming from. And that’s where it comes from. Driving in my car, taking the kids to school, I’d come home, pull out the guitar, get a little cassette player and sing and play some stuff. So yeah, it comes at all times cause my mind never stops. I’m in constant creativity mode. I’m just a conduit and it’s coming from some other place and I’m just lucky enough to translate it.

You’ve done a couple of film scores. How does the creation process differ doing that from making a rock record?

Not much because I consider myself a cinematic-type of arranger. In other words, with the song “Love Is A Battlefield,” there are a lot of elements in the song, lots of little keyboard parts, little drum transitions, little machines, little of this, little of that. And every piece has a purpose and it’s cinematic. When you listen to it, it kind of paints you a picture. Film scoring, you have the picture first and then you’re kind of trying to get the feel of what that is. Then you write along the lines of what the mood is and what the scene is, obviously. And there’s a lot of stuff to learn about film scoring but it’s a feel. You just got to get it by feel. It’s maybe not that much different than making pop songs, rock songs.

Do you find it hard or pretty easy for you?

It’s harder in a way than just writing a song, just because you’ve got to edit more, you have to go in between scenes. You don’t have a three and a half minute song that goes continuously. You’ve got to take a piece here and you’ve got to take a piece here and you’ve got to change this, so it’s a little more mechanical. You need to have a little more mechanical chops, so to speak, rather than just making a three and a half minute piece of music.

When Pat kind of changed direction and did the blues album, who’s idea was it to do that and why?

That was mine, my idea. I had been trying to make that record since 1981. It’s just the record company didn’t want to hear about me making a swing record. You know, I’m a big fan of Count Basie cause I play piano. Love Duke Ellington, love Count Basie, love the blues, love big band swing, love BB King, early on when he used his big band on his records. And I grew up on that too, grew up listening to these people. So I just mentioned it to the wife, maybe how about giving it a go, doing something different. And I get bored too, you see. I start off with an idea for a record and then I do it. And when that record is done, the minute that record is done, I’m on to something completely different. I don’t want to repeat myself and I’m not going to let radio dictate to what they’re going to play. I just did it because I was fearless at that time (laughs). Still am.

What can you tell us about the beautiful big red guitar you play and why you love that one so much?

(laughs) Pain. I call her Pain. I love Pain. She’s great, yeah. I love it because she’s not perfect and she’s difficult to play. It just feels really good when I have her on me and I’m playing it. It’s not the perfect instrument, that’s what I love about it, and it just speaks to me, you know. It’s kind of a weird thing but I love her (laughs). She’s great and she was resting comfortably for so long and then something just said, “Take me on the road, take me on the road.” (laughs) So I took her on the road and the rest is our great little relationship. She even gets mad at the wife sometimes (laughs)

Do you have anything left to learn as a musician?

Oh sure, are you kidding (laughs). All the time. It never runs out. There is always something to learn.

What do you want to do next?

There’s a couple things I’m working on. I like to cross-breed genres so I’m probably going to pick up a banjo pretty soon and kind of mess around with a little mandolin. Maybe go to like a marching drum feel. And I got some wacky things going out of my head that I’m ready to throw out there (laughs). So it’s coming.

You worked with Beth Hart a while back on “California Dreamin’.” What was it like working with her?

It was fantastic. She is brilliant. The only thing I regret is not being able to work with her more. Her manager wanted me to make a record with her, like a whole CD, but I was just too busy and I couldn’t finish it, couldn’t do the whole thing, so I had to not do it. So I just put her in one of the films I was doing. Wow, she gives everything. She is like a modern Etta James. She’s just a monster, I love her. And she’s so in tune. When she’s singing, I have her singing in the studio and she’s looking right in my eyes while she’s singing and she’s just looking, she’s so deep. I love her. Great, great artist.

Are you and Pat going to be recording some new music anytime soon?

Yes, we are. I don’t know what it’s going to be called or under what name it’s going to be but we will definitely make some racket and it will be really cool and interesting.

What are your plans for the rest of the year?

Well, we’ve got a lot of dates and we’re working on a book. We’re going to be doing a cookbook, an interesting cookbook that’s going to have stories attached to recipes, which is going to be kind of cool. And since you love the True Love record so much, there’s some really great stories that came from recipes with that particular session that you’ll see when you read the cookbook. So we’re doing that and working on a TV show. I’m going to continue to write. I’m working on a Christmas record that I hope to have finished by the end of the year. And we’re going to tour a lot and eat really good food (laughs)

And hopefully not gain weight while you’re sitting back eating all that great food

(laughs) I know, I know. That’s why I like to run. I’m going to have to run as much as I eat.

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