Tokyo Today

The following interview was conducted by Yotaka Yamazaki, Arts Editor, Tokyo Today, at the Hilton Tokyo, March 23, 2007.

Y.Y.: Dusty Carr, there is so much cultural mythology that you carry. Do you see yourself as belonging to a heightened sense of creation, one of the immortals, an electronic or chemical god?

D.C.: Sometimes I do, but usually when my brain is sick with drugs and my gut is bloated with fear—which is quite often actually. Other than that, I’m the guy you see late at night in a dim bar on a weekday, alone with a scotch and a bowl of peanuts, and you say to yourself, ‘Please god, may that never happen to me or my children.’

Y.Y.: Do you like Japan? We like you.

D.C.: Pal, I like whoever pays the bills.

Y.Y.: Are you an artist or an entertainer?

D.C.: An entertainer is an artist who has figured out how to make money. Poverty is for punks.

Y.Y.: Why don’t you like Jayne Mansfield? I like her.

D.C.: You nitwit. I like Jayne Mansfield. All I said, in some lousy interview, was that I thought she was more of an exhibitionist than an actress. But in a way, it was a compliment. The fact that we’re even talking about Jayne shows you she was on to something. Most entertainers are exhibitionists. But the really good ones are introverts.

 

Mansfield & Carr: She was on to something

Y.Y.: You never elaborate on your romance with Marilyn Monroe. Why?

D.C.: Because there are certain things a man doesn’t do, and that’s one of them. I’ll just say that if she had of had a better upbringing, she could have made it. But it was a freakin’ miracle she made it past thirty. In the end, there was nobody to look after her. Too bad Elton John wasn’t around back then. He could have been her little pal. Next question?

 

Dusty, Marilyn & George Raft: He’s not telling

Y.Y.: I can tell you don’t like me. Do you wish to put me to death?

D.C.: No, not death. However, I wish to see you suffer. You don’t inspire confidence. You’re a small man drawing on a tiny canvas. I suppose you disgust me.

Y. Y: What was your best performance?

D.C.: Probably at the Hammersmith Odeon in seventy-four. Hard to remember.

Y. Y.: And the worst?

D.C.: Lou’s Crab Shack in Key West in eighty-two. I couldn’t stop vomiting. I’d sing a few bars, then vomit. It happened for the whole evening. The crowd really dug it but I was on the verge of tearing my stomach. There was nothing left. Could have been the clams.

Y.Y.: What about Anita Ekberg?

D.C.: What about her?

Y.Y.: Did you not have a role with her in Fellini’s La Dolce Vita

D.C.: Right, I did, but it was cut from the film. We had this scene where I stole her from Marcello Mastroianni and we made love in the Trevi fountain. She was a gorgeous woman. Just stunning. Lots of flesh. Built to last. Very little talent. But she caught the light.

 

Carr & Ekberg: Living La Dolce Vita

Y.Y.: Does it pain you to talk about Anna Nicole Smith?

D.C.: Not at all. Actually, she had a lot in common with Ekberg, except Smith had too many screws loose. What a shame. So pretty. We had a lot of fun together. She had a good voice. But there was a real degenerate aspect to her. Couldn’t handle drugs and she attracted wretched, desperate people. But like I said before: in the end, you have to look after yourself; nobody really gives a wet shit. You’re born alone; you die alone, and in between, you just gotta swing baby. That’s all there is.

 

Anna Nicole Smith & Dusty: You gotta swing, baby

Y.Y.: Why are you so reluctant to talk about your contribution to the classic Beach Boys album Pet Sounds?

D.C.: Where do you hear all this stuff? It must come from bad translations. I’m not reluctant, I just don’t want to. It happened around nineteen sixty-five. Alright, here we go: I was hanging a little with Brian Wilson. He was getting fat and sloppy and I knew he was gonna crack. Brilliant guys always crack. It’s a test of character if they can come back. Anyway, I told him, ‘Brian, you should orchestrate pop music for christ’s sake, score it, and get away from the damn drums-bass-guitar set-up and silly-ass surfing stuff.’ And I wrote the basic progressions for a few songs. It’s odd, but when I see Brian nowadays, I know he’s in there somewhere, beneath his skin. He just can’t get out. In a way, Brian never left the sandbox.

 

Brian & Dusty: Wilson never left the sandbox

Y.Y.: Why do you find Hillary Clinton revolting?

D.C.: Revolting? That’s a little strong. I’ve partied with Hillary in Reno and Miami. I admit she’s unwholesome, really into some sick stuff. But that’s okay. It’s her gig. But you’ve got to be careful when you indulge too deeply in midnight tastes. I’d like to see her in the White House. I partied there with Nixon, and Nixon knew how to party hard. Hell, Nixon practically lived on booze. I’d love to party there again. Bill Clinton is pathetic. Hillary is where the action is. Her instincts are razor-sharp and she has a bloodlust for revenge. Plus, she’s in a constant death struggle with failure.

 

Bill, Dusty, Hillary: Midnight tastes

Y.Y: Do you want to talk about Doris Day?

D.C.: Well, that’s a tough one. I knew her in her prime, long before the cocaine and heroin stuff. She had a nice voice and knew how to dress. But she couldn’t handle the powder. That’s why she suddenly disappeared. I’ve never seen a more committed free-baser in my life than Doris Day. She made David Crosby look like a choir boy. She put pounds of candy up her nose. It ate up all her money.

 

Day & Carr: Too much nose candy

Y.Y.: Overall, who are the most gifted pop artists you’ve ever worked with?

D.C.: Impossible to answer. The names Johnny and Edgar Winter come to mind, but they’re not really into pop. We did a concert tour together a few years ago. Those brothers are so talented it’s sickening. Maybe it has something to do with being albino, but I can’t see how a problem with skin pigmentation could affect musical ability. Can you?

 

Carr & the brothers Winter

Y.Y.: Please, readers do not pay for my opinion…. In nineteen sixty-nine you were on the Dick Cavett show and you physically attacked William F. Buckley. You shattered a cheekbone and then kicked…

D.C.: …Wait a moment pal! I didn’t attack him. That makes it sound like I planned it. I just punched him, a few times, maybe more. I might have given him the boots. He was getting hysterical. It was for his own protection. I apologized later. No big deal.

 

Carr on Cavett: Buckley got the boots

Y.Y.: People often cite that incident as a turning point in television talk shows. Everything became much more charged up after that.

D.C.: Maybe, but everything back then was getting charged up. Nowadays, there’s a soft, feminine floss coating everywhere. That’s the way women thought they wanted it. It’s goddam sickening. So hard for a man to be masculine, and I think women miss that. Nobody swings anymore but everybody thinks they’re hip because they carry electronic gadgets. What a bunch of robots. As my old pal George Saunders said just before he capped himself, it’s a freakin’ cesspool.

Y.Y.: Last question. You have outlived many of your friends: if you could bring one friend back from the dead, who would it be and what would you say?

D.C.: Depends. Off the top of my head, Francois Dorleac. You know her?

Y.Y.: I am an ignorant man.

D.C.: Well put. She was a French actress. Died in sixty-seven. Car accident. Catherine Deneuve’s sister. What a beauty and she was a helluva lot of fun. We had unfinished business. Baby, I miss her… I wouldn’t say anything to her npw, except maybe ‘goodbye’, or ‘hello’. Who knows. It’s a stupid question to ask me. I think if you saw a dead person come back to life, you’d ask them what it was like to be dead, and then you’d ask them to leave. I can barely tolerate living people, let alone dead ones. Get the message? Time for you to go. I’m on stage in an hour and I have to shake off the ghosts. You know what you’re looking at? Last man standing—and I love it!

 

Dorleac & Carr: Unfinished business

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