Chords for Andrew Gold discusses the making of "You're No Good" by Linda Ronstadt.

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[E] _ [D] Welcome to Inside Tracks, a revealing look at the backstories behind some [Am] of your favorite recordings.
I'm your host, Mike Botts, and our guest this show is singer, [Am] songwriter, producer, artist, and long-time close friend of mine, Andrew [F] Gold. _ _ _
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_ _ _ [Am] When I first met Andrew, I was made aware that he had worked with Linda Ronstadt on a single that was a huge hit for her, a big breakthrough, and that was You're No Good.
You're No Good was written right before you joined the band, as you may recall.
_ In fact, that's one of the reasons [N] that I ended up playing drums, because all of our drummers, until you, were so bad, including a couple of them that would get so drunk and try to drive the bus away from the truck stop while everybody's still inside.
There was all [B] kinds of stuff, and we said, we've got to get a drummer that wasn't crazy, and we got you, which was a total_
Big mistake.
He was crazy, but he actually played pretty good.
[F] I was the one that said, Linda, you've got to get this guy.
But everybody else agreed with me.
So, You Owe Me Your Life, You're No Good, was actually_so
I ended up playing drums, because we didn't have a decent drummer.
And I don't know why they thought, well, we can't find a decent drummer in LA, [E] so we'll just use Andrew, who doesn't normally play.
It doesn't quite make sense, but Peter Asher, the producer, was comfortable.
So, it was Kenny on bass, _ Ed Black, a guitarist with Linda at the time, playing a sort of rhythm thing, and me playing some [N] borrowed drums.
I borrowed it from a guy named Gene _ Garfin, who was in our band with me and Kenny.
Well, I'm sure we all remember Gene Garfin.
Yeah, it's not slightly diminished.
No, but really, these were borrowed drums.
Borrowed drums, it was just a little sort of a candy cane.
Now, when you cut the basic track, were you playing drums first?
I played drums.
Then you added all these.
I played drums and kind of a pseudo _ Motown thing.
And we left a big section in the middle, 16 bars I think it was, _ with just the sort of reggae beat.
Because we had no idea what we were going to put there.
We really didn't.
So, we just left it, and then I sort of kind of played along and kind of built it up a little bit, but then we didn't know what we were going to do, and in the end we just repeated that.
Then afterwards, I started putting on the keyboards, which were _ like this Fender, I mean a Wurlitzer.
Like the old Wurlitzer?
Yeah, Wurlitzer.
We sort of did two tracks that one octave higher than the other.
And then we put more guitars on, and then we said, okay, now we've got to address this issue of this middle section.
So, Peter Asher and Val Gray and I stayed up one night, fairly late as I recall, doing this solo, which was just sort of this double-track, George Harrison-like thing.
One of my favorites.
Which was my want in those days, and still today.
It's good to see I've grown.
Anyway, _ so we did this whole thing, and then we did a thing at the end, which was originally the solo was through an amp.
It was like a Fender amp, and I had borrowed Linda's Black Strat, which was a 62 Strat.
I remember it well.
And we just double-tracked it, and then I did a little solo on top of the little_
_ And it's funny, because I'm sort of jumping ahead, but a few weeks later, Val Gray, right before he mixed it, erased the first_
_ On one of the tracks.
Oh no.
And everybody's going, oh my god, this is_
It was forever.
And what he did was, just took the second lick, which was the same as the first on the same track, and flew it in.
But it's manual.
It's just like, try to start the machines at the same time and just do it until you get it right.
Nowadays, you could cut and paste.
Yeah, pro tools, you cut and paste.
As a matter of fact, you could just press undo.
_ _ _ Wouldn't that be nice then, huh?
So we did the end of it, and we had this old _ German EMT_
It was a disc that was like an Echoplex, but it was actually a little tape disc.
But it was warped.
It was actually sort of broken, but it created kind of a subtle chorus effect.
One of those fortunate accidents.
Yeah, it was just one of those things, and we all went, oh, you know, because back then it was like_
That's the sound!
Can we have that?
That's great, we like that.
It's broken, and Peter would say, no, that's great, and Valgo, but there's something wrong.
Technically, it's not right.
Technically, it's not right.
Who cares?
_ So we did that, and then we were all happy, and we went home at 2 o'clock in the morning, 3 a.m.
So the next day, _ I slept late, and I came in, and we were starting at 1 o'clock.
So I came in about 3, and Linda had been there at 1.
She hadn't heard, and she had no idea what we were going to do.
But she heard it and said, what the hell is all this sort of Beatle stuff all over this track?
Well, there's a definite Beatle influence, you can't deny it.
And it was the first time that she'd heard me sort of go to town on this thing.
So at first, she thought, wow, this is kind of too much, and she didn't like it at first.
And Peter was trying to convince her, you know, just give it a chance.
And then she heard it about five or six times, and then she went, you know what, it is really good.
So they were going, boy, it's good you're late, so you didn't have to live through that.
That was like the biggest shocker.
That, to me, was a major breakthrough record for not only Linda, but for you as an artist.
That was the first time you got a chance to actually make Andrew Gold's statement.
That's right.
Well, it's funny, because I was listening.
This was one of my first [Gb] ever experiences of hearing something I'd done.
[N] _ I heard it on the radio, you know, when I was driving along in my little Toyota that was, you know, with bashed windows and dented.
It's an indescribable feeling.
Oh, just like I went, oh my God, this is the record that we did, this is me.
And at the end of it, the disc jockey said, _ I've got to find out who is this guitar player on this thing.
It's so great, [F] because I, you know, and he kind of shuffled some papers, and then he said, oh, this guy, Andrew [Bb] Gold.
He mentioned my name, and I just, I [Bbm] died in my day.
[Bb] I had to pull off to the side of the road.
No, it was great. _ _
Feeling better, now that we're through.
[Bbm] _ _
[Eb] Feeling better, because [Bbm] I'm over [Ebm] you.
[Gb] I learned [Ab] _ _ [Db] my stuff, [Bbm] now [Eb] I see.
[Fm] How you really are _ [Bbm] no [Eb] good, you're no [Bbm] good.
[Eb] Baby, you're no [Bb] good. _
[Eb] I'm [Bb] gonna say, [Eb] you're [Bbm] no good, you're no good, you're no [Bbm] good.
[Eb] Baby, you're no [Bb] good.
[Eb] _ _ [Bbm] _ _ [Eb] _ [Bbm] I broke [Ebm] the heart, [Bbm] it's gentle [Eb] and true.
[Bb] Well, I broke the [Eb] heart [Bbm] of someone like you.
[Gb] I'll burn [Ab] it, _ [Db] _ _ _ [Bbm] I [Eb] will reclaim it.
[Fm] If you said to me, you're [Bbm] no _
[Eb] good, you're [Bbm] no good.
[Eb] Baby, you're [Bb] no good.
[Eb] _ _ [Bb] _ _ [Eb] You're [Bbm] no good, you're [Eb] no good, you're [Bbm] no good.
[Eb] Baby, you're no [Bbm] good.
[E] _ _ _ _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
[Eb] _ _ [A] _ _ _ _ [Ab] _ _
[Eb] _ _ [Gb] _ _ _ _ [Bbm] _ _
[Eb] _ _ [Gb] _ _ _ _ [Bbm] _ _
[Eb] _ _ [Gb] _ _ _ _ You're [Ab] _ _ [Db] _ _ _ _ [Bbm] _ _
[Eb] _ _ [Fm] _ _ _ _ _ _
_ _ [Bbm] _ _ [Eb] _ _ [Bbm] _ _
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_ no good, you're no good.
Baby, you're no [Bb] good.
[Eb] _ _ [F] _ _
[Eb] You're no [Bb] good, you're no [Eb] good, you're no [Bb] good.
Baby, [Eb] you're no [Bb] good.
[Eb] You're _ [Bb] _ _
[Eb] _ _ no good, you're no [N] good.
Baby, you're no good. _ _ _ _ _
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[Eb] _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
[Ab] _ _ [Bb] _ _ _ [Db] _ _ _
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