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![](\"https:\/\/lh4.googleusercontent.com\/-vtBZT2HWbTg\/TtQaG2pkuuI\/AAAAAAAAAi0\/Y0vkONbGVAw\/s500\/Rick%252520Steff.jpg\"\/)
\nPhoto by Brandy Munsell<\/center><\/p>\n
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Rick Steff, to me, is one of the best things about Lucero<\/a>, so I jumped at the chance to speak with him at Mercy Lounge<\/a> in Nashville. We discussed life in Lucero, his incredible career as a journeyman, and, last but certainly not least, his daddy. (Turns out, his father and my grandfather may have played together with the Ringling Bros. Circus.) Long ago dubbed by yours truly as “The Nicest Man Alive,” Rick is as talented as he is nice. I think you’ll agree.<\/p>\n What have you been working on recently?<\/b><\/p>\n Well, I do a lot of records. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve been on more than a couple hundred records. Most recently, the records I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve done outside of Lucero, that I think are of certain note, are the Amy LaVere<\/a> record, Stranger Me<\/i>, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s on Thirty Tigers<\/a>. John Stubblefield also performed on it, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s just a really unique record by a really unique artist that we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve had out on the road with us before. Her back-up band, at that time, was Paul Taylor<\/a>, who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s worked with John and went to school with John, and Steve Selvidge, who played with Lucero during Brian Venable\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s tenure away, and he\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s now in The Hold Steady<\/a>, who are all friends of ours. They aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the guys on this record, but that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s kinda where she comes from. The record was produced by Craig Selby, who did the Arcade Fire<\/a> record, The Suburbs<\/i>, that won Grammy of the Year this year, so yeah, Stranger Me<\/i> is a real great record. It was kinda put together last minute, so we kinda built this record from scratch, so I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m real excited about that.<\/p>\n I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m always working on different projects. Last year, it was Huey Lewis and The News<\/a>.<\/p>\n Did you, really? I love that.<\/b><\/p>\n Yeah, I did the Huey Lewis and The News reunion record, which was really awesome. He was hilarious. Huey was recovering. He had had a stint put in his heart.<\/p>\n It all kinda started in the previous year. I had done this record and movie with a guy named Klaus Voormann<\/a>, who was the guy that drew the Revolver<\/i> cover for The Beatles and was the bass player on John Lennon records and George Harrison records. He\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really one of the guys who discovered the Beatles. Anyway, he was 70, and he was going around the country reuniting with all these people he had worked with throughout the years and making a movie. So he came to Memphis to do a track with Bonnie Bramlett<\/a>, and I played on that. We hit it off, and ultimately I got to play on the tune that he cut with McCartney and Ringo, so that was really cool, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s in the movie as well, which is called A Sideman\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Journey<\/i>. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Klaus Voormann and friends, and it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really just a movie about people who do what I do. Journeymen.<\/p>\n So back to Huey. The cool part is, he was getting his surgery done, and I loaned him the film to watch while he was in the hospital, and I got a voicemail from him \u00e2\u20ac\u201c still have it on my computer \u00e2\u20ac\u201c \u00e2\u20ac\u0153Rick Steff. Huey Lewis. Big fan of your work. Just wanted to call and tell you that I love that you were in that movie.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d So I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ve got a voicemail from Huey Lewis thanking me for a movie I was in. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, like, really surrealistic shit which doesn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t really happen to me. So, yeah. It was awesome. So, ya know, sometimes you get to do stuff that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really cool.<\/p>\n So you really keep busy.<\/b><\/p>\n Yeah, and that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s not all! [laughs]<\/p>\n Oh! [laughs] Do tell!<\/b><\/p>\n Just got through working with a young girl, who\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s record I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122ll finish next week, called Alex da Ponte, from a band called Yeah, Arturo<\/a>, and I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m really excited about that. I think she\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s gonna be someone to watch. She\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really good.<\/p>\n So yeah, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s all. I just try to play on\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 Well, sometimes you play on things for money, and sometimes you play on things for art, and usually the things that you like playing on the most aren\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t the most lucrative, but that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s the way it is. But me, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m just glad to be able to do some of everything.<\/p>\n I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think we can do an interview without mentioning your dad, Dick Steff<\/a>, and his legacy.<\/b><\/p>\n Oh, yeah, well Dad, ya know, played on all these great records: Isaac Hayes’ Shaft<\/i>, Dusty Springfield’s Dusty in Memphis<\/i>, Rufus Thomas’ Do the Funky Chicken<\/i>, Elvis\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 Complete American Sound Studios Sessions, which was the “Suspicious Minds”\/”Kentucky Rain”\/”In the Ghetto” time period. I would go with him to sessions, and I just wanted to be Dad. I just wanted to do what he did.<\/p>\n There\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a gentleman here playing horns for Lucero who studied under your father, correct?<\/b><\/p>\n Yup, Scott Thompson. He did our most recent record and played live with us, and he was one of Dad\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s main students and worked with him for a long time. He plays probably closer to my dad than anyone else I know. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s wonderful. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s a personal thing that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s also nice for me.<\/p>\n Jim Spake<\/a> also studied under dad. Dad taught Jazz Theory and things like that at Memphis State, now the University of Memphis, so if you were a music major in the ’60s and ’70s, you kinda almost had to take something from him if you were a jazzer, and most horn players tend to be jazzers to some degree. <\/p>\n So it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s incredible. I mean, these are people my mom knows and loves.<\/p>\n As a fan of things in general, and as a fan of you, and as a fan of Lucero, I think it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s really awesome to see you being a fan.<\/b><\/p>\n Oh, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m a super-fan! Are you kidding? I am a super-fan. I have never worked with a songwriter who I respect as much as Ben Nichols in my life. Ever, in my career. I have never worked with a band I am more comfortable playing with, both musically and the integrity of the people involved in this band. So, yeah, I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m an uber-fan, all the way.<\/p>\n How did you first start with Lucero?<\/b><\/p>\n Oh, that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s an interesting story. Again, doing journeyman kind of stuff. A guitar player I worked with a lot is a mutual friend of John\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s, named David Cousar<\/a>, who worked on Amy LaVere\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s record. John was helping coordinate a session for this poet friend of ours named City Mouse<\/a>. I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know him at the time, but it was a spoken word thing, and he wanted an accordion, upright, acoustic guitar, and drums, so David Cousar, John Stubblefield, Roy Berry, and I played the backing track at a guy named Chris Scott\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s studio. So we did this record, and I hit it off with Roy and John, and they were toying with the idea of having some keyboards, because there had been keyboards on the records in the past, before I came. So we tried it, and I didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t leave. We just hit it off, and it was awesome, and I felt very lucky. It came exactly through a journeyman type of situation.<\/p>\n When someone you\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re an uber-fan of, like Ben Nichols, says how much integrity and talent you bring to Lucero, how does that make you feel?<\/b><\/p>\n I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m glad he feels that way, but I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m very not\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6 I don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t know. It\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s wonderful. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m glad he feels that way. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m honored. I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m totally honored that he likes what I bring to the table, but I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m the lucky one out of this deal, as far as I\u00e2\u20ac\u2122m concerned.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n![\"YouTube](\"http:\/\/i.ytimg.com\/vi\/y0_rrbf8npg\/0.jpg\")