Dad Talks 11: Peter Holsapple

In conversation with the songwriter and guitarman

Lately, I’ve been playing the bass guitar with a fantastic band called The Paranoid Style. Across from me on stage (and in my basement studio where we often practice) is Peter Holsapple. Peter is an absolute monster of a guitar player and a gem of a human being who has spent time playing with R.E.M., Hootie and the Blowfish, the Continental Drifters, and, perhaps most famously, The dB’s, the inimitable power pop band he started with his childhood buddies Chris Stamey and Will Rigby.

Peter’s also a dad to three kids, grandfather to one, and an all-around great guy who I’m glad is suddenly in my life. He took time out of his busy schedule writing charts for me so I don’t fuck up the entire show to answer a few questions about being a dad.

What was it like trying to balance your career as a musician with having young children?

My first daughter was born thirty years ago when I was part of a band with her mother (Continental Drifters). And I was also working as a sideman with Hootie and the Blowfish. So there were times when I was gone from the family unit for weeks or months at a clip.

That put a lot of pressure on her mom, who was, herself, a longtime professional musician. The Hootie tours were a lot of fun, certainly, but I found it was hard to return and re-integrate myself into the family constantly, despite everyone being generally happy to have me home. I had to remember what I did around the house and how to get back into that groove after time spent on tour buses and sound-checking; I mean, the touring musician’s life is a lot of driving and killing time, with the actual ultimate work time being the hour and a half onstage. Going home meant I needed to be getting up with my daughter, fixing breakfast and hanging out with her, playing on the living room floor, building stuff with blocks, planning doll parties, reading and coloring.

When her mom and I would go on tour, we often brought our daughter with us. She got to go to Germany at an early age, and the biggest challenge with that was finding food that she’d eat. I think we brought a case of Kraft Macaroni & Cheese along with our gear, and we had to strap her car seat into the back bench of a reconverted bread truck we drove the Autobahn in. I would like to think that she has some memories of that time, and mostly good ones, but it’s hard to know.

Since then, my daughter’s mom and I divorced, and the band we were in together folded. It was hard to lose both relationships, personal and professional, in one fell swoop, but a lot had to do with my inability to handle alcohol with any degree of intelligence. I’m sad to say that my eldest daughter was brought up with the help of a nanny who’d spot for my wife and myself when we were too hungover to get up early after a gig.

But I will also note that my two younger children have had the benefit of a sober dad (and a brilliant mom), and we all have more memories to savor because of that. I did remain in Hootie’s employ for twenty-six years, and again, getting home from tour was always a challenge to fit back in. I think that I got better at it over time, but you’d have to ask my wife and kids (my son said he even thought I lived at the airport at one point).

How did children impact your ability to do your job, negatively or positively?

I think I would say that the kids had a positive impact on my work as a musician. They taught me the value of supporting the family when I couldn’t imagine where the next hundred dollars was coming from, because when you have a family, somehow you make that hundred dollars appear, and you buy groceries and diapers, and you simply make it happen because it has to happen. The rewards, of course, are having those hugs and kisses and snuggles given unconditionally by innocent little people, and I’m happy to report that, at 16 and 20 and 30, those actions still happen, albeit a little less frequently but often enough.

It’s hard to be on the road away from your family, as appealing as it is to ply your trade in front of an adoring audience night after night. All the little things, like bedtime and fixing breakfast, get more valuable.

What about beyond the bounds of your job? How did kids affect your creative approach to the guitar/music?

Good question. There was a point where I became a children’s entertainer, and I would hold pajama parties at the bookstores where I worked, if only to entertain them and their peers. But I don’t think that was meant to be, as it felt kind of rote after awhile. And I wasn’t sure that my kids actually enjoyed me as much as the cookies that were served…

What changed over time as they grew? Did you find that more freedom meant a boon to your creativity? Or, like me, do you thrive within tight boundaries? "I have one hour before the baby wakes up. I need to nail this guitar part."

Another good question. My time for recording was usually after they’d gone to bed or were at school, so it didn’t interfere with our actual sacred parent/child moments. I could squeak a lot into those slots when they were asleep or gone from the house.

I mostly felt that I wanted to encourage my kids to consider playing music or at least listening to music. I made sure that they knew how to handle records and CDs; I left guitars and ukes and mandolins out near the piano, so that they could get to them and mess around. We played music on the way to and from school, just like I did with my mom when I was a kid. I wanted them to develop open minds when it came to listening, and I would say that it’s been successful. My son asked me out of the blue recently “Dad, do you know who Bobby Charles is?” I grinned, knowing that Bobby Charles had been a labelmate of mine at one point. And I’ve gone to shows with him (P-Funk three times already) and my daughter (Soccer Mommy, Phoebe Bridgers, Beach Bunny etc.). We now turn each other onto records, and I’ve really enjoyed that back and forth.

The Paranoid Style at a recent engagement at the 40 Watt in Athens, GA. PH on the left (stage right), me on the right (stage left), thee Elizabeth Nelson smack in the middle.

What kind of father was your father? What about his parenting style did you take forward as a dad yourself? What did you consciously try to avoid?

My dad was, like me, an older father; he was forty-four when I was born, and I believe that when he died, he still didn’t know the names of the four Beatles. He’d been onboard ship at the end of World War II when my big brother was born in 1945, so I was told that I was conceived so he could be there through the whole process. Not sure if it’s true, but it makes a nice story, doesn’t it?

We had a loving relationship, to be sure, but it wasn’t a rompin’ stompin’ roll on the floor one. He would come on Boy Scout camping trips, but he was too old to really participate like a lot of the younger dads. I don’t think I ever heard him raise his voice or utter a curse word.

He was the kindest man I’ve ever known.

But I’ll be honest—I judged my own parenting by his, and it constantly made me feel that I was lacking in so many ways by comparison. Especially when I was compromised by my substance abuse. Until I finally broke free from that onus around the time I stopped drinking, and I realized that we were not the same person, not the same type of father at all, and that I was doing just fine. It was a huge weight off my shoulders. I could enjoy my own upbringing, peaceful and suburban with a generous and patient dad, and I could still be a great dad without being just like him.

I would like to think that I brought his spirit of fairness and honesty in to the conversation, along with that previously mentioned generosity and patience. I hope he’d be proud of the dad and person I’ve become in his absence.

I often tell people that fatherhood is the best gig I’ve ever had, and as time goes by, I feel that even more strongly.