When A Bangle Met A Cowsill

The musical partnership of Vicki Peterson and John Cowsill is a beautiful convergence of seasoned talent and deep personal connection. Their marriage, spanning over two decades, has fostered a unique creative synergy, culminating in projects that blend their distinct musical histories.

While both have established themselves within iconic bands—The Bangles and The Beach Boys & The Cowsills, respectively—their first collaborative work Long After the Fire (Label 51 Records) on April 12, reveals a shared passion for harmonies, melodies, and storytelling as told through 12 songs from John’s brothers Barry (who died in 2005 during Hurricane Katrina) and Bill (who passed in 2006). Working with producer Paul Allen, each song shows not only a testament to Vicki and John’s skills but also to the power of shared experience and love to enhance artistic expression.

I spoke with Vicki and John via Zoom and seeing their playful and supportive exchanges, one can hear that deep love and at times emotional poignancy come through: from the opening “Fool Is the Last to Know” threading through the gently rolling hills of “Don’t Look Back” and the earworm catchy “You, In My Mind” and the closing world weary dreaminess of “Ol’ Timeless,” you’re left wondering, is this where all the good songs go? No worries. They’ve been here all along.

I knew I was going to be interviewing you both, and I thought, OK, these are two ‘names.’ But seriously, can we get you in for Best New Artist at the Grammys?

John: Well, we’re the oldest new artist you’re ever gonna run into. [Laughs]

Vicki: We’re the oldest baby band ever!

This album. It’s gorgeous, although there’s a lot of nostalgia and legacy mindset. What do you both say about it?

Vicki: It’s a very current project, but reflecting music that has existed for decades in a lot of cases. For John, and for me, too. Because John’s known a lot of these songs for years and heard his brothers sing them live. I heard the songs from Barry and from Bill. A lot of these songs that are from Bill are from the [Canada] Blue Shadows era. Everything was blue for him. But yes, it’s also a very current project. Because we’re absolutely breathing new life into these songs that we just wanted to have another chance at giving them some sunlight.

John: I wanted to do a project with Vicki, and this was a project that I always thought would be a fun one, because I love singing these songs. I sang them with Bill. I listened to Barry write them. Performed with Barry. Like, the single “Come to Me.” The only version of that is from a live cassette we recorded at the Troubadour on a Monday night with nobody there.

Vicki: That’s how we know that song!

John: So, it’s very sentimental. It was a love project and a love letter to them.

Even above and beyond it being a love letter, it’s an enjoined family experience. You are the voice for people who aren’t here anymore, and also, you are surrounded by people who wanted to see these songs come alive. Has long has this been percolating?

Vicki: To be honest, as John mentioned, we talked about doing this for a lot of years.

John: But I was always busy, she was always busy, and we didn’t have our studio together. The timing wasn’t right. And then, when it was, it was. I’m so glad we have the producer we have: Paul Allen, who helped the dream become real, helped us get it over the line, and is still helping us get over the line. He’s just been so instrumental and the biggest cheerleader, telling us, “You guys are crazy. You guys gotta do this!” Because we just think of ourselves, as like: I’ve always been somebody’s drummer or piano player or background singer. Never anything for ourselves. Even in the Cowsills, I was basically a side guy. It was Bill and Bob, and Barry. Whoever wrote was the creator. I wasn’t a big writer. I’m a performer… entertainer. We have another band called the Action Skulls with Bill Mumy. That’s where I really started writing. And it’s really fun to do.

Vicki: Both John and I are in the ‘members of’ club.

John: Meaning, serial band members!

Vicki: It’s funny when you go online, looking at this from different perspectives now, neither of us has ever been solo artists. So, there’s not a lot of music under our own names, which is interesting. We’ve been on dozens, dozens, slash, hundreds of projects and albums, and songs. But since our names are not attached to them individually, you don’t know that necessarily. So, yes, we are new artists, for sure. We’ve been around for longer than any of your grandchildren! But we’re brand new.

There seems to be this weird legacy or nostalgia terminology that gets bandied around when you have artists that are moving into their mature years. From your perspective in 2025, how does that feel?

John: No, we’re not legacies. We just want to go do some gigs. It’s our retirement plan. It’s our shits and giggles tour, you know. [Laughs] I mean, seriously! We enjoy singing together. We don’t have a band. It’s an evening with John and Vicki.

Henry Diltz. You have to tell me how that happened.

John: Well, he’s been a friend of ours forever. Henry is a normal human being and very approachable, and he’s everywhere. You just run into him. He goes to concerts and shoots people with his phone. We called him up and said we want you to shoot some pictures with us. And he said okay. He came out to the house. That’s my pickup truck on the cover. That’s the first new vehicle I ever owned, and I’ll never get rid of it. And it was at the suggestion of Pam Springsteen, Bruce’s sister, who’s a photographer, who also shot us out here at the house. She said, “You need to get that truck into something.” And she was right. I mean, we’re surrounded by people we know, because we’ve been in the business so long, and it’s easy to access them, and they’re so willing to come and hang out with us. It’s a lovefest with friends. We’re just surrounded by that.

Vicki: I feel really privileged. I was sending some photo credits to our publicist in the UK. And the fact that I’m writing photo credit: Henry Diltz. Photo credit: Pamela Springsteen. Wow!

John: We feel pretty groovy! [They both laugh]

Tell me about this self-produced video —

John: Oh, my God! [Laughs hysterically]

Vicki: Which one? [Ed. Note: the couple made their own videos for “A Thousand Times” and “Come to Me.”]

John: We can’t get help with this stuff. So, we said, we’ll do it ourselves! We get our iPhone out, and I am the master of mounting things. I got this special button I can hit record, and then we just shot around the house here for the first one. But it’s this magician of a tenacious woman [gestures to Vicki] who edits this stuff. Not on Final Cut! She edits in iMovie, which means it’s like—

Vicki: Basic!

John: Manual labor! [Vicki laughs]. I would throw the computer against the freaking wall if I had to do that. But she sits down, patient, with a couple of little yells, and she comes up with that stuff. And then we needed another one [for “Come to Me”]. We didn’t know if we’d have time to do it here. So, Vicki came to London because I was over there playing with Peter Perrett. We filmed bits and pieces on the bus. And then again, this magician of a lady goes back, and she puts that thing together again. And it looks artful because we had crap lighting! It looks like we did that on purpose.

Vicki: We did! It’s all arty!

John: Vicki does all the hard stuff. I love you. Thank you. I can’t do shit!

Although I love all the others, that’s my favorite song.

Vicki: It’s romantic.

What I really loved about it was the sort of fake ending. You got a little “Strawberry Fields Forever” in there. How did that happen?

John: Paul arranged that. We didn’t know what to do. We were doing this stuff, and he sent us that arrangement. It makes me cry. It’s the most beautiful piece on there.

Vicki: But then it breaks into that ’70s rock thing. And you don’t expect it!

John: Electronically, it buzzes. The 60-cycle hum is in there. The frequency is in there, and you don’t notice it until it disappears. And you go, ‘Whoa!’ That’s so beautiful, and you feel that song. And he treated it so well to the lyrics and the content. It’s magic, and I’ve said that from the beginning. That track just sticks out for me. I mean, they all do. I think that it’s a stunning job. His production on everything was just spot on. And they’re just gorgeous.

There are very few albums that are out today that you can listen to from beginning to end.

John: I agree.

Because today’s music is so marginalized, so compartmentalized. You have playlists and tracks that can be picked out. This album has to be listened to all the way through.

Vicki: It’s a shared moment.

John: [to Vicki] Where have you shared it? I haven’t heard it all yet.

Vicki: [to John] You haven’t heard the whole record?

John: I’m kidding. [Chuckles]

Vicki: I can play it for you. I know people. [Laughs]

But on a happier note: “Sound on Sound.” John?

Vicki: He killed it! That’s one of my favorites, because it’s just fun and weird. The lyrics, we had to work to decipher from the one demo that we heard of that song from Barry. And I’m like, ‘Okay, this makes almost no sense. But wait! In Barry talk, it makes perfect sense.’

John: Barry’s talk is cosmic, and we all speak ‘Barry. ‘And he spoke cosmically when he would refer to things. He would speak in painting a picture, more symbolic than actually referencing the words. You’d have to figure out what he says “when the tree shade is coming across the grass on a rainy day.” There’s no shadow on a rainy day.

Vicki: Some of the lyrics are like a play on words. ‘He can’t really be saying that.’ And I’m saying, “It’s Barry. Yes, he can.”

John: “Good to find my boom shovel.” I mean, what the hell is that?

You serviced it so well. You just rocked it out.

John: I was living through Barry. I think I sound like him on that song. Barry was the best. He wrote things that other people couldn’t do because they’re so stylized for him. I didn’t know if that was going to come out. But I just heard him doing it for so long on a song like “Goin’ Downtown.” I remember when he wrote it, and they’re fun to sing. It comes out as me, but I use his phrasing, his words, and his command of the lyric. It works out just fine.

Vicki: And John’s got a good rock and roll scream, too.

That’s exactly where I was laying my money on.

John: I’m a good screamer, but I can sing ballads. I’m more like a ballad person, but everybody always wanted me to sing the rock ones. We have an album by the Cowsills called Global, and at nine in the morning, I went out and did a song called “What About Love” because Bob wrote it. Nobody could sing it, and so I sang it, and then I gave it the Roger Daltrey treatment, as I call it. I think one or two takes.

In the sequence that I was listening to, John kind of starts the album, and then Vicki, with a couple of leads and harmonizing, and then at the end, you come together. I didn’t know if that was a conscious effort?

John: That’s how we wanted it. She wanted to sing certain songs, and she’s such a Barry fan. She took most of the Barry songs, and I’m a big Bill fan. Bill and I are more aligned in the catalog of our youth. We are Roy Orbison fans, Everly Brothers fans, old country fans. The first record I ever bought at five was “El Paso” by Marty Robbins. I always sang country songs as a kid. I definitely wanted to do “Hearts Collide.” I just love that song. It makes me cry every time.

Vicki: Actually, Barry sang that at our wedding. That had to be on the record.

The other one that I enjoyed was “The Embers.” Very much like Gram Parsons and Emmylou Harris.

Vicki: Yep, that’s where that lies. That’s, you know, another classic song. And John has said this before. You think you’ve heard these songs for 40 years. It’s obviously an old classic.

John: And the language that Bill and Jeffrey [Hatcher] used when they wrote. It’s like old school: ribbons and bows in your hair.

The theme of this album is, it’s familiar. Not in the sense of ‘it reminds me of…’ It just sounds like love.

Vicki: You use the word ‘familiar.’ And the root of that, of course, is family. So, it comes with both those things. Etymology. Little bit of healing, a little bit of love, a little bit of family. Why not?

-Amy McGrath