- [Kelly] Would You like some ice cream?
- First of all, very good job
on the Power of the Love.
- Thank you! (audience cheers)
Thank you. - Very good.
- It's hard to sing a song that's so classic!
You know, when you hear that song,
you think of your voice, no matter who else sings it.
So it's an amazing thing to, ("Power of Love")
oh you were watching! (audience laughs)
I'm really glad, I'm really happy I didn't know that.
But, did you write that song for Back to the Future
back in the day?
- Yeah, sort of.
I mean, when Amblin Entertainment asked
to have a meeting with us, and they said,
"we've just written this film
"and our lead character, Marty McFly,
"his favorite band would be Huey Lewis and the News.
"So we thought, how would you like
"to write a song for the film?"
- That's amazing. - And I thought,
"Well, great, I'm flattered."
I told them I'm flattered but I didn't necessarily know
how to write for film.
And I didn't fancy writing a song
called Back to the Future actually.
(Kelly laughs)
And they said, "No problem." - It's a little on point.
- Yeah, but they said they just wanted
one of your songs, do whatever you want.
And so the next thing we wrote was Power of Love.
- But you were also in Back to the Future.
You did a cameo, right?
- Oh, well, sort of, yeah.
- That's amazing!
- They thought it would be fun, you know,
if we did it kind of as a uncredited disguise thing.
- Perfect. - Turned out great.
- Yes, and what a killer song, oh my gosh.
Have you ever played in Cincinnati, on the road?
- Not more than 30 times. (Kelly and audience laughs)
- I was gonna say, I was like,
"That might be the dumbest question I've
"ever asked an artist, yeah."
- Cincinnati's a great town. - Yeah.
- We played Riverbend a bunch, we played all kinds
of places there, yeah.
- I love all the audience, being on the road,
there's nothing like it.
- And you get to live like a teenager, right?
- Yeah!
You get to sleep 'til noon. - Food everywhere,
somebody does your laundry, it's great.
- Yes, until it catches up with you
and you gain weight.
So you're working on a Broadway musical, though,
in spite of the hearing loss and everything, right?
- Yeah, we're very excited.
We've been working on it for about 10 years
and we put it up in San Diego at the Old Globe.
It's called the Heart of Rock and Roll
and we've just partnered with Tony Award-winning producer
Hunter Arnold, who just produced the hit Hadestown.
- Yeah. - And we're gonna bring it
to Broadway next season.
- That's so cool! (audience cheering)
I love Broadway.
- I do too, I do too.
- I love, I grew up in theater, so I love it.
Any kind of musical theater. - And you know what else
is great is the people, right?
- Yeah. - They're so talented,
smart, funny, and generous, and genuine.
They're just great people to work with.
- Yeah, agreed, agreed.
A lot of my friends do Broadway as well, now.
But, despite your hearing loss, though,
you still put together the album, right?
Weather, right?
- Well, all that stuff was cut
before the two years ago.
That was all in the can.
- So it was only the seven-- - We were assembling,
collecting, and writing.
It took us, you know, we're not very prolific.
(Kelly and audience chuckle)
First of all, we were doing 75 shows a year.
- Yeah. - Wow.
- So, that's busy, and with traveling,
that's what, 120 shows?
So we're busy and we have lives and,
as I said, we're not really all that prolific, so.
And songs, you know, are just hard to write.
I mean, especially when you've written a few of them.
But when we would get an idea, we'd record it
and just put it in the can,
the theory being as long as we were good,
and my band, we were as good as we ever were,
then we would just wait 'til we had 10 songs,
release the record.
We had seven songs, my hearing collapsed,
we waited kind of a year
to see if I could recover.
No help, so we thought, let's release them
and share them with the fans.
- Yeah and it's called Weather, yeah.
(audience cheering)
So, what do you remember from the earlier days
of being with Huey Lewis and the News, the whole band.
What do you remember from those days in the beginning?
- I remember being booed off a lot of stages.
- Shooed off! (laughs) (audience laughs)
- I'm serious! - So were a lot of the greats.
- No, our first tour, we opened
for the Doobie Brothers, who were good friends
and great people, and they really cared about us.
And we pretty much got booed off every stage,
every night. - What?
We got so good at going from song to song,
you know, without any silence.
- Amen, don't give 'em room. - Silence was deadly,
that's it.
And so, at the end of one song,
we'd hold the sustain. (imitates chord)
And if the guitar played had to switch
for the next song, while we're holding
the sustain, he'd switch the guitar.
(snaps) (audience laughs)
One, two, three, four, boom, next song! (laughs)
- Don't give those hecklers any moments,
yes, that's amazing.
That's horrible, who does that?
Just drunk, unlovable people, that's who does that.
That's mean. (audience applauds)
I mean, I have had to listen
to some people sing that are popular
and it's one of those things where I'm like,
"Booing would be applicable,"
but you don't do it, that's rude!
- I tell ya, a funny story.
We were playing with the Doobie Brothers,
same thing, on that tour.
We're in San Antonio, Texas,
which is a big town for the Doobies,
- They like alcohol. - 'cause they wrote
China Grove and all that. (audience laughs)
And now, and I'd never been out in the hall.
We were playing the big arena, whatever it is,
and I thought, "Tonight I'm just gonna go out
"and see what it's like."
'Cause, you know, the lights are down,
the Doobies are up, nobody's gonna know
who I am, I got a baseball hat.
And plus we were just starting out,
nobody knew who we were anyway.
So I walked to the very back row of the arena
and sit down, place was sold out.
But in the very back row, there were a few seats empty
because people had moved up.
And my nearest guy was maybe where the end of that couch.
There's a guy over there and it's dark.
And now, I suddenly realize, as the Doobies are playing,
oh they're at the spot where they're gonna
introduce themselves and how about a hand
for the opening act?
And sure enough, and I said,
"Oh, this'll be interesting".
And I sit there and Pat Simmons goes,
"Well, hi everybody," you know,
"We're the Doobie Brothers, great to have you here.
"And how about a big hand for our opening act tonight,
"Huey Lewis and the News?"
And this guys right here goes, "Boo!"
(audience laughs)
Right here, right here.
- Oh my gosh! - I wanted to go
over there and grab him.
- That is an unlikable human!
That's so mean!
- He paid his money, he can do whatever he wants.
- Yeah, you know what, I woulda been like,
"Still got your money!" (audience laughs)
That's what I (laughs).
Goin' to the bank!
Who's laughin' now?
That's a jerk, we hate him, okay.