Words By Jeb Wright
Transcribed By Eric Sandberg
Photos of Rich by Mark Schierholz

Back in 1977 the band Kansas did one of the hardest things a commercially successful rock band can do. They followed up a great album with an album of equal greatness…or perhaps even surpassed it. 

Leftoverture and Point of Know Return are two amazing releases…to have them come back-to-back showcases the creative storm that was hovering over the entire band at the time. The two albums remain wildly popular and sales of each have surpassed Triple Platinum status.

Kansas celebrated the 40^th anniversary of the release of Leftoverture with a huge tour and live album. The idea began as a way to do something special. It turned into over 80 dates. It also inspired a celebration of the anniversary of Point. The tour was so successful that this one is starting at year 41 instead of 40!

Kansas has just started touring Point so be sure to check out the dates as you do not want to miss an approximately two hour and twenty minute set that features many surprises.

Here are the official tour dates: http://www.kansasband.com/tour-dates.php

In the interview that follows founding member and guitarist, Rich Williams sits down with CRR’s Jeb Wright to talk about the tour. We also go back in time to the Point of Know Return and discuss the making of the album.

Jeb Wright: The Leftoverture tour went on a bit longer than you originally intended.

Rich Williams: It was supposed to be ten or fifteen shows. It went on for two years.

Jeb: With the success you had, it makes sense that you would do a Point Of Know Return tour. Are you excited to be playing this one from start to finish?

RW: We put so much work into preparing for this….you're never really ready. You just have to get on the horse and start riding it out of the gate. We did the final rehearsal at the Cobb Energy Performing Arts Centre in Atlanta.

We did it old school, like we used to, where we rent the facility where we're starting the tour for the two days prior and perform two full dress rehearsals there. It's expensive but it gives us an opportunity to fine tune the show with full sound and full lights. We run the show and then critique it. We did that Wednesday and Thursday and the first shows were Friday and Saturday. This will take us through next year.

Jeb: That's incredible! Some bands are able to take ownership of what they're doing and have great success on their tours, while others can't seem to get their act together and they struggle. Your work ethic as a band must be stronger than it has ever been.

RW: This band has rehearsed more in the dressing room than any of the previous lineups combined. In forty-one years we've never rehearsed as much as we have the last four. We want to. We go get dinner and come back and start playing stuff. That's where song ideas come up, or changes we want to make to the show…like adding a song. Those things all happen in the dressing room. You've got the time, you might as well use it.

We're all spread around the country. If we want to do something, we have to fly people in, get hotel rooms, and rent a rehearsal hall. On tour we've got the practice amps, we might as well do it there. It's an ongoing process. There have been maybe two or three gigs where we didn't do that because it didn't work logistically...there wasn't anywhere to do it.

Jeb: I've had the pleasure and privilege of watching a couple of those and, as a fly on the wall, I have to tell you they are really cool. You guys are really working. I think the fact that you guys care so much means a lot to your fan base.

RW: This is hard stuff! I'm not that good (laughter). This stuff is hard to play, it really is. There are a lot of notes. You've got to hit the right ones in the right order and everything (more laughter)! A pro golfer is practicing all the time. And he has a coach watching him, telling him what he's doing wrong.

We are always critiquing each other about better ways of doing something. It might be telling someone that he's kind of slipped into a bad habit somewhere, leaving a note out or whatever. The practicing is important. The best quarterback in the NFL doesn't say "I'm the best, I don't have to practice." You have to keep working at it. To maintain your levels you have to practice a couple of hours a day. To excel you need more than that.

Jeb: How far were you into the Leftoverture tour before you said "We need to do Point Of Know Return?"

RW: As it just kept going and going, Phil [Ehart, founding drummer] and I would go "You know we have another album after this one that's even bigger." We kind of knew what we were each getting at. So when it was time to put this one to bed, we knew what the next tour was going to be.

Jeb: Tell me if I'm wrong, but I figure the most complex challenge on Leftoverture was "Magnum Opus." What is the most challenging number on Point Of Know Return? "The Spider" was certainly one you hadn't dusted off in a while. Were there any others?

RW: "The Spider" was a booger (laughter). "Hopelessly Human" has a lot of parts and it has to be done right. "Nobody's Home," as simple as it is, has to be powerful in parts and it has to be very delicate in parts. It's kind of hard to pull off.

"Paradox" we play a lot, but it's always hard. It's fast and it has a lot of notes. That song was written on keyboards. Playing those parts on guitar...it's not your typical blues scale that fits right into your fists. There's a lot of awkward stuff going on there.

Jeb: Between Leftoverture and Point Of Know Return is the latter more technically challenging?

RW: Maybe slightly because of a few things. Take "Lightning’s Hand" that one's a booger too. There are some spots in the middle that are really difficult. It has some nuances that are quick little things that are hard to play. Most of the band has a part in playing them so you've got to keep it tight. It moves right along. That's a tough one.

A song like "Portrait" is hard but I've played it thousands of times. I have muscle memory playing that one, but "Lightning’s Hand" we haven't played very much. We played that a little bit on the first Point tour and then we mothballed it so I don't have a lot of reps on it.

Jeb: Is the staging and format of this show going to be similar to the Leftoverture show? That was a massive Kansas show.

RW: It's similar to the Leftoverture tour except that the rooms we're playing are a little bit bigger so we have bigger backdrops with some really cool looking stuff. There is more involved lighting and the set is a bit more elaborate. It's a little more theatrical than we used to do in the days of yore.

Like Leftoverture, we start off with an acoustic set. We call that segment "The Stools" because we're all sitting on stools. It's five songs we perform with acoustic arrangements, three of which we've never done this way before which some people will be a little surprised by. That dissolves into the middle set which we call "The Rock Set" which is an hour of this and that. That's where we also get to pull out some surprises. They're songs that people want to hear that they don't hear on every Kansas tour, that Phil and I have been wanting to play. They're songs Phil and I get excited and, for die hard Kansas fans, will be a treat. These first two sets are really fun.

I wish we could keep a surprise back for every show because, after the show, the set list will be posted online, and everybody will know when their favorite song is coming. At least we kept the cat in the bag until the first show. Finally, of course, set three will be Point Of Know Return played in its entirety from start to finish.

Jeb: I love this concept. It is going to be so fun for the fans of Kansas. It sounds like you've made improvements to an already great show. You're certainly whetting my appetite to go see this show a few times.

RW: I'm going to say that it's an improvement over the Leftoverture show. We were kind of throwing darts at the wall thinking of things we could do. The Leftoverture tour provided the template for this tour, which allowed us to analyze it and fine tune the logistics and think of what we could do to change things up. I'm really looking forward to it and I think the fans are going to love it.

The question is "What's going to follow this?" We'll think of something. Rumor has it this tour may go into 2021! If we get three months into 2021 that will be two full years. We'll take a break in the middle. We will take June off like we did last year, and July and August we'll book a few summer dates, but that's when everyone is having their fairs and this isn't the kind of show you want to take to a state fair.

State fairs are always fun to play. Talk about Americana...the smell of corn dogs and bundt cake in the air...people wandering around stop by to see the local combo. The midway in America. Going to see a band at the fair. I like being a part of that. In the fall, we'll ramp it back up and take it into 2020.

Jeb: Being the 40th anniversary, as you dust off and work up some of these songs does it spark any memories you have about recording the album or the first time you toured the material?

RW: I remember the recording more than I remember the tours. There's nothing to compare them to, we were just moving forward and everything was a new experience. The only thing I remember about tours is when they end. Like the end of the Monolith tour. "OK, see you guys" and then you have no idea what is going to happen next. Everyone is going to go off and do their own thing.

After the first album, we were all in the same boat, but after a while people have their own lives. They buy houses…go on vacations…record solo projects. The road crew is going off to hook up with other gigs. You wonder, “Will I ever see those people again? Will there be another album? Will we tour again?”

It's kind of like being in Brigadoon in high school and it's the last performance and everyone is crying because they know they'll never do it again. The end of tours were always more memorable to me than the beginning of them. Now we tour all the time so it never really ends. There is no sadness in Kansasland anymore.

When I was twenty-five you never knew...even ten years in we didn't know how much longer we'd be doing this. "You know, we're getting up there. I'm almost thirty-five years old!" After thirty, thirty-five, forty years it is starting to sink in that maybe this is what I do. This is my job, this is my life, this is my career. If I was working somewhere else I'd be retired by now and doing this anyway. Now, there isn't really any wonder in it.

People ask me "How much longer are you going to do this?” What would you have me do exactly? Play golf? [sarcastically] That sounds fun. Ride around in golf carts, whack a ball around and say "shit" a lot. That sounds fun for a couple of weeks, maybe, but I'd be soon asking myself, "My God, what have I done? Why did I quit? I had the greatest job in the world and now I'm hanging around some crappy country club with some old geezers?” I'd rather go roadie for somebody.

Jeb: From what I remember from past conversations, Point Of Know Return was not the easiest album to make.

RW: There were a lot of difficulties with the making of that album for many reasons, starting with the personalities involved. Up to that point, the band was like a bunch of pirates out on the open sea. One for all and all for one, kicking ass and taking names. Then Leftoverture happened and kaboom...suddenly we're out of debt with the record company. Suddenly we're making money.

People were getting married, buying houses, boats and airplanes. Not that it was unfair but there was a balance differential with who got paid what. We signed away our publishing. Don Kirshner was our publisher. This was our only offer, there was no one else banging down our door.

Don said, "I'm going to be your publisher." “Publishing, what's that?" “Don't worry, it's just sheet music and crap." We didn't know it was a pie with three pieces and a third of that pie was publishing. When you see rich rock stars in their mansions, publishing bought that.

Another third of the pie is songwriter’s royalties. That was Steve or Kerry, or a combination of the two, with a little kickback to the band. The last third of the pie went to the band and its management. All the expenses like recording costs, tour support, travel, making videos, promotion, came out of that third. Any expense incurred, going back to the first album, comes out of that third before you see any money.

We signed a terrible deal. We got twenty-five cents an album. Selling one million copies only got us $250,000 to pay off all these costs. Even back then, recording an album was an expensive process. It's actually cheaper to record an album now then it was back then. There wasn't all that much money to divvy up to band members.

The record company got the lion's share with the publishing and the songwriters got a disproportionate amount of money. Any money the band would see was really from touring. Suddenly, certain people are not into working so much. Well sure, they got theirs. And so the dynamic starts to change. Is it good or bad? It's just what happens. Money changes everything. We had that going on when we got into the studio. Previously, where there was unity…In my opinion, this was the beginning of the unraveling of the original six members of Kansas, which eventually led to the split.  It was about a lot of things, money being one of them.

We were also dealing with recording equipment issues. We went back to the same place we recorded Masque and Leftoverture but now we're experiencing all kinds of equipment failures. Of course we're on a time schedule and we're losing entire days as they try to repair tape machines and the console. Finally, we said, “We've got to go” so we left there and went to Nashville to the Woodlands studio. I remember doing all my guitar parts for "Dust In The Wind" there. Robby [Steinhardt] played all of his violin parts there. The vocal tracks were recorded later in California before we mixed it. We were starting to become very mobile.

I loved our time in Nashville. We were staying at the Albert Pick Hotel, which, before that, was the Roger Miller Inn. It had seen much better days by the time we got there; it was pretty run down. Up on Music Row there was a place called Spence Manor. It was the first time I had ever seen a hotel like this. It was all suites, no restaurants. It overlooked Webb Pierce's guitar shaped swimming pool. There was no restaurant but there was 24-hour room service. Steak, lobster, whatever you wanted. A waiter in a tuxedo would roll the food into your room. It was fifty bucks more a night than the other place. This was post Leftoverture, we had some money by then.

Jeff Glixman and I stayed at the Spence Manor. The other guys wouldn't come. They said "Have you lost your minds? Fifty bucks more a night?" So they stayed at that run down old hotel and they got angry over there. They seemed to have a miserable time in Nashville compared to my experience.

Jeb: Were you guys dumbfounded by the success of Leftoverure? Did you feel a lot of pressure to keep stepping forward and not backwards?

RW: There was some pressure, yes. Most of the pressure was on Kerry and Steve being the main writers. I don't know. I was pretty stupid then. I didn't think it would last too much longer. At that point we had already far exceeded any dream we ever had. I thought there was no way I'd be doing this 30-40 years later. It's just not possible. I was feeling really good about it all. We had already climbed to the top of the mountain and seen the view. I thought that now we were approaching our thirties, this was it. Perspective is everything.

In 1969 Phil, Dave and I were in White Clover in New Orleans. We played down in the French Quarter. We used to see a lot of bands there. We saw the Grateful Dead there in a place called The Warehouse. They were just opening up and they had us as the house band. They wanted us to come in and test out the PA system so we got up on the stage and the gear was woefully unsatisfactory.

They were telling us to turn it down and I was just trying to set the super reverb! I said, "The Grateful Dead is going to be in here in two days and do you know how much stuff they're going to bring in here and you're telling me to turn this little amp down? You guys are in trouble!" We went to the show. They played an afternoon and evening set.

After the show we got in our Volkswagon band bus and went back to the hippie crash pad where we were staying. One of the girls staying with us came home with Jerry Garcia. I'm nineteen years old and here comes Jerry Garcia in his California hippie duds and I'm wearing overalls. He talked to us all night. To me he was the wise old grandfather of rock and roll. He was probably all of twenty-seven but we soaked it all up. I was like "The guy is twenty-seven and he's still doing it! He's still going. He was an old man to me.

When we drove him back to his hotel in the French Quarter early the next morning, he walked into the lobby straight into the infamous drug bust. “Busted, down on Bourbon Street. Set up, like a bowlin' pin." "Truckin'’"! I always wondered if Jerry ever put two and two together and realized that the kids he met with that fateful night eventually became Kansas.

By the time we had finished touring Leftoverture and were recording Point Of Know Return we were already getting up there. We were still getting to do this. This was awesome. It was also a natural progression. The first album came out and did okay. The second did a little bit more. By the third album we had built a foundation. The fourth album exploded. There was an expectation that it was just going to keep growing. And Point did that, but then Monolith did less. It only went Platinum. It felt like a failure. It's the cycle of things. It's only logical that it's not going to keep getting bigger, bigger and bigger. Nobody's career ever did.

Meanwhile the trends in music were changing. Here comes disco. By that time classic or progressive rock had already shot its wad. It was starting to fade away. Was there pressure to deliver? Yes, there was but all we ever wanted to do was make an album and tour the Midwestern circuit.

Our dream was to get out of the local bars in Kansas and go play North Dakota and Iowa, the Hollyhock Ballroom in Minnesota…those places you would hear about on the radio. We wanted to play where the Fabulous Flippers were playing. That was the minor leagues. We never thought we'd be playing in the big leagues, on the world stage. We just wanted to bust out of the local market which coming from Topeka, was a big dream. By the time we were recording Point Of Know Return we had so far surpassed our wildest dreams nothing really much mattered after that. Everything was gravy.

Jeb: So Leftoverture was a huge hit and they had you out on tour after tour. When did the guys have time to write this stuff?

RW: I remember the rehearsals for it. We were done touring and it was time to start working on the next album. Leftoverture we had done in Topeka over by the Santa Fe Railway shops. We were in a little rented storage facility space. For Point we were working out of Atlanta. I can remember being in rehearsals. We had a bigger, nicer space and we had more time. We had a road crew there helping us. We were able to record some of the rehearsals on reel-to-reel.

Kerry was still in that writing streak that he had going for those few years. We would be working on this and working on that. He would say "I came up with this last night" and we would say, "OK, let's work on that and develop it." That's when "Dust In The Wind" appeared. We had already pretty much mapped out the whole album and Kerry said "I've got another song to add to the pile. It's an acoustic piece and I know we don't really do that kind of stuff but I just want to add it to the pile for consideration." He played us a really rough two-track recording of just him and an acoustic guitar. He was holding a lyric sheet.

Kerry is not known for his singing ability. He was kind of mumbling the words in a falsetto. He and Steve were looking at the lyric sheet. I can remember it like it was yesterday. Everybody said "That's it! That's our next single." In the rawest form you can imagine we heard the potential in that song. Dave said "Where has that song been?" Kerry said "What!? Really!? You guys want to do this? Are you kidding me?" That was an awesome song. It was just a fingerpicking exercise where Kerry was trying to teach himself Travis picking. Then he wrote some lyrics and it was a complete accident.

Jeb: I'm looking at the record jacket right now and Steve has a bunch of co-writing credits. Were he and Kerry working that closely together?

RW: There was a lot of competition between the two for various reasons. We could be working on Kerry's song and Steve would say "I've got an idea for the middle. I wrote this at home but I think they would fit together." There was a lot of collaboration in the studio but they didn't hang around together or write songs together like most people would imagine it happens. They never sat down at a piano and said "Let's write a song." Of course, money was another factor. The incentive to get your two cents in to get your two cents out, the business of show business, became more of a focus and motivation. Again, money changes things.

Jeb: There is the legendary lore of the first time Steve quit the band for five minutes.

RW: Yeah. I don't remember specifically what that was about. We're young, we're dumb and suddenly we've got money. And we're also self-important. "The world can't wait for me to do it my way. I'll quit and go do solo albums! You guys are holding me back." That's the story of the breakup of every successful band. What are the causes? Age, money, egos, all of those things. It was a natural course of events.

You can't expect, ten years down the road, for things to be the same as when we were practicing in College Hill, across from Steam Music in Topeka. We had no idea that anything would happen. Then everything happened and we were transformed. We were shot out of a cannon into a world we didn't even know existed.

Jeb: Here is the first of two self-indulgent questions I have for you. Did you play bass on "Point Of Know Return"

RW: I don't think so.

Jeb: Somebody had told me that and I didn't know so I thought I'd ask.

RW: No, I can't imagine that I would have done that. I did play bass on some stuff later when we were working with Neil Kernon because Dave was in and out of the studio. A few things needed to have parts changed for whatever the reason. We would decide to change how a part of a song went. If Dave wasn't there I would punch in a few parts to fit the change. I never recorded or re-recorded an entire bass part of Dave's. He has his own style and his own tone and Dave always did a great job.

Jeb: I love "Sparks of the Tempest" and the way you used it to end shows where you are jamming along and suddenly you drop off and the music keeps playing. Where did that idea come from?

RW: We were just trying to create unique endings for shows. We thought, why don't we record ourselves playing it live during a rehearsal and, when we get to that point, Jeff Glixman, who was running the sound at the front of house, would run the tape and fade us down so we would then be miming to the recording. Then we would all, one by one, set our instruments down and walk off the stage. It was surprising to the audience.

Something we didn't consider when we did it was that not everybody got the gag. Most people thought it was really cool and were trying to figure out where we made the switch. Some people were really pissed off thinking we were faking the whole show and did this just to rub it in their faces. There were even printed reviews that expressed outrage about it. Sometimes you try to do something clever and it blows up in your face. That was just a cool way to end a show, I thought. Most of the people enjoyed it. It was just not for the stupid.

Jeb: You've talked a bit about perspective today. What is your perspective now on the 40th anniversary tour of Point Of Know Return?

RW: The first word that comes to mind is 'gratitude.' To get to do this. You think of all the musicians that went before us who, for whatever reason, didn't have very much of a career, that didn't have all the ingredients to keep it all together. The people who said "I'm too good for you guys, I'm going to go off and do it by myself" and it doesn't work. They look back and say "Thirty years ago I quit this and I don't know why I did." We still have something out there and we have a fan base that is loving to hear it.

The last tour was probably the most successful one we've had since the Leftoverture/Point period. Meanwhile, we manage ourselves, we call our own shots, we record when we want. We answer to no man. We do everything our way. We've got seven guys who are eager to do it and loving doing it. There is no wrong question to ask. Any suggestion anyone in the band has, they can make it and we'll suss it out and talk about it. Everyone is up for giving anything a shot. Recording new material? “Sure, let's give it a shot!” Everything gets a positive reaction.

This has been a long, long trail for me and I have a unique perspective. I can still very clearly remember rehearsing at College Hill in Topeka. Don't ask me about the 'bus years', that was a dark time when our lives were just sucked away. Other than that, I remember most of it with a lot of detail. You just keep moving forward and take another step. You finally pause and look over your shoulder and realize "Holy shit, this has been a long walk!" I'm not the sharpest tool in the shed but now, compared to back then, I'm a f#cking genius.

I was really good at young and dumb for a long time in my life (laughter). Now I'm not so young and I'm not so dumb. I've picked up some wisdom along the way. Sobriety was a big help in doing that. Eventually you start getting your life in order in all aspects and that allows you to enjoy it. What a great thing. I'm doing what I choose to do and I love doing it. And I'm still alive to be able to continue to do it. And, people actually want to see me do it. That's a good life there.

Jeb: I never got to ask you about the "Know" spelling.

RW: That was our manager Bud Carr's idea. He thought it would be one of those heavy things that would blow people's minds. Everything had to have some special extra meaning. Album covers and everything had to have all these little details. That made sense. Let's make it a little bit trippy. Something for the acid heads. Why not?

Jeb: Last one: Will there be a live album like the one you did with Leftoverture?

RW: There will and Jeff Glixman will be involved with the recording that from the get go. He'll be involved with the initial setup of the recording, not just on the back end mixing. He has the expertise in all of that that we lack.

Our other guitarist, Zak [Rizvi], is an engineering genius. He worked under Jeff. Jeff has an understanding of mics and mic placement and setting everything up to get the best recording…and then you get to the mixing and mastering. If Jeff is not involved until that process, he has to try to undo many things. He has to "fix" it before he can do anything with it. To have Jeff involved with it from the beginning will be great.  

It's really amazing to be looking through this year and through next year. Never in my life have I had this many things chiseled in stone. There is a lot of amazing stuff coming up for us.

www.kansasband.com