Packers Drama and Comedy Legends (Hour 2)

Hey, it's producer Conrad here.

Hope you're having a fun and safe New Year's Eve day.

Pete and I are spending time with our families.

So in the meantime, we hope you enjoy this best of with some of our favorite guests of 2025.

And now a guy who binge watches TV for a living but doesn't get paid Pete Schwabba

It is my pleasure though to welcome now we can't waste any time because I don't have you guys but you got a pizza waiting for you

I

can't And if I were if I were you I'd be really upset if I just drank this

It's so angry.

I'm incredibly angry right now.

You're angry, probably.

Angry, yeah.

Those are the voices of 7,000 apart.

John and Amelie join me here in the studio as they do from time to time a great music duo that met here in Green Bay.

Let's just, if there are people that don't know your story, give us a quick thumbnail.

Absolutely, let's do it, let's do it.

You gotta get into it because it's such a great story.

So hello, my name is Amelie.

I'm originally from Stockholm, Sweden.

I came here as an exchange student, ended up

at Preble High School, where I met John.

Yeah, so we met in music theory class, my senior year of high school, became friends or music mostly, and then we became more than friends, dated that school year, and then we decided to keep dating when we were in a long distance relationship.

How far apart were you guys?

We were, you can guess.

7,000 kilometers apart, which

is like 4,000 something, something, something miles.

Yup, serious long distance

relationship.

Yeah, so we did that for three years, got married in Sweden, moved here, lived here for six years in Green Bay, became full-time with music, and then we just moved to Sweden three years ago, and that's the very short version.

Wow, you're

bi-continental.

Yes.

I don't meet many people like you.

I've met some, but so you are residents of Sweden?

I guess I didn't realize that.

So I'm a citizen

of both countries, and then John is...

Obviously an American citizen and has like kind of like a green card

in

Sweden.

Nice.

Wow, that's fantastic.

Do you guys have something?

Our question of the night is something you like to do in the buildup to Christmas or Hanukkah or the holidays like something pre-Christmas activity.

We've been working so much.

Um, we just came off doing eight shows in nine days.

Um, but like, I think like that's probably how I would want to spend it anyway.

Yeah.

Just

like do shows, play some Christmas music.

I've been singing a holy night and,

uh, it's been

great.

So like

go crazy and then completely.

die for a few days.

You've

done your last show before New Year's, right?

No,

we've got two more

before

New Year's as

well.

We'll talk about those as well, but you just said eight shows in nine days.

That's fantastic though, right?

Yeah,

no, we're very

happy.

Isn't that like when you get that adrenaline rush and you got to keep going, even though you could use the night off, like to be a working musician and not have any time off is not a bad thing, right?

No,

it's the dream.

Yeah.

And it's

so different, especially now that we are working in two different continents, like when we're here, we want to play shows

as

much as we can handle it.

Right.

And when we're in Sweden, we're more like studio rats, you know?

And so the difference is quite...

but that's the way we want it to.

We think of our life as living it in seasons kind of.

So how long did it take you to get to that point in your career where you're pretty much working every night or at least as much as you want to where you're like, man, I could really use the night off.

I mean, we started doing open mics in the area in 2016.

Oh my God.

Yeah.

Wow.

Yeah.

So it's been, it's been a while and we, we started a like a business and tried to do it very like.

You know, as properly as we could since 2017.

So it's been, it's been a eight years, I guess now.

No kidding.

Yeah.

It's been

kind of crazy.

Start.

Yeah.

Oh, I was going to say we started technically in 2014.

Yeah, that's when we started the band.

Yeah.

When we

were still in longest.

So

you're done with high school like in 2010, 2012, really?

2013, we graduated, yeah.

Oh, you're still kids.

Thank you, thank you.

I just

had my birthday and I've been sick my last two birthdays.

I feel like they don't count.

You

gotta live it up.

When is your birthday?

December 6th.

Okay.

Yeah.

So all right.

Well, that's that's exciting.

Do you think you put too much stress on yourself?

Like it's my birthday and then you get sick.

I

think it's also had to do with that.

We got to the country December 3rd.

Oh,

yeah.

And I always get sick after we travel.

Yeah.

You're asking for trouble.

But what else are you going to do?

You can't like hop a steamship and go back to Sweden.

You got to

like, you know, take a week off.

Right.

Who would do that?

That's crazy.

So what's happened with you guys?

Is there big news since the last time you've been here?

Kind of.

I mean,

John has started producing a lot and working on our fourth album.

Wow,

nice.

Yeah, so I've been producing...

a lot in Sweden as well.

So I've been, I've worked with 15 artists in

the

last three months.

So I'm doing that plus all of our music.

So I did like, I've produced like 40 songs or something.

So it's been really, really fun.

And like it's been helping a lot with our music too, just to work on random genres and try to just get better at music production.

And I think, yeah, we just had a cool piece of news, which was like, we got a song on, I don't know if you know music, New Music Friday.

It's a playlist on Spotify, but... Yeah, I've heard of

that.

It's

like a big, yeah.

But there's a Swedish, like a Sweden version of that, and one of our songs got placed on the New Music Friday Sweden, which was really cool, because

it's like

20 songs that get placed there weekly, and one of them was ours, and then the Rolling Stones were on there.

Oh, yeah, I've heard of them.

Yeah,

I don't know if you've heard of

a band called the Rolling Stones, but...

They're

coming into their own.

So that was really fun.

So what...

That's really cool.

So how does that work?

Do you have to submit it?

Yeah,

so one sits up with your distributor, Spotify says hi.

We

see that you

have

a

new song coming, and then you can pitch it to the editors.

Nice.

And we were just lucky, and we've been working hard to get to where we are,

but it feels great.

When you work with producers or artists, do you have a producer you work with

typically?

Not anymore.

John is our producer now.

And I mean, I have a lot to say as well.

I just don't push the buttons.

I would imagine.

If you ever need a second set of ears, I'm here.

For sure.

We'll play some demos.

Yeah, we can play some stuff.

Well, it is amazing.

Like, that's something I learned, I don't know, well into adulthood that it's not just like, yeah, the songs are the most important and writing them and playing them.

But man, a producer can make something.

Just take it to another level, right?

Yeah.

It's fun.

I think it's like...

Also being the artist and the producer, like you can get your vision across way more.

And we've worked with a lot of amazing producers in the past, but it's just been one of those things where it's like, I never felt like I could get my, what I was aiming for, fully across.

And

so

now it's like really cool to like do that

and

just be able to do it.

You know, it's crazy.

So

do you've been working with artists that come in, I assume they're paying you for studio time or whatever and you ever listen to go.

I've been

choosing

like people to work with largely which is a benefit of like this production is not my full-time thing so I can choose people to work with a bit and like find people that actually I'm like really excited to work with and that's been great because then I have I can learn but I'm also working with someone that I'm excited for their project too so it's been great it's been

mostly like

friends and

colleagues.

We run this

once a week as songwriting circle,

where we just

like meet with other songwriters, play each other

songs that

we've written, and then give each other feedback.

And

so a lot of the people have been from that group.

Just give them the demo, come on.

They'll just said they're not going to like,

he's got a

rap song he wrote.

Oh, I can do it.

I can do it.

I can do notes, but I don't know anything.

Give me 10 hours, Max.

Don't get it

done.

It's not very good.

I would love it if you guys would play something.

Yeah.

We're going to play our next single, we were thinking.

It's a

fun one.

So January is usually like the poorest month, right?

Because everyone spends money during

Christmas.

So we decided to release our song, Currency,

in

January.

And we release on the 7th of every month.

So we have

a new song every single month.

Really?

Yeah.

Oh, that seems to be out January 7th.

when nobody has any currency left.

So it's perfect.

I love it.

All right, fantastic.

John and Amelie from 7000 Apart, here in the studio performing their new song,

Currency.

What is a skull at the end of the rainbows?

Then the front room, the tip of my toes.

I don't want to go home.

You know I can't say no.

Get the courage.

All I got is time but no friend's place I'm really uninspired by the human race No money to my name but I have no shame Guess I didn't really learn how to play this game I just wanted to get paid for the songs that I'm-

And

what can I buy with

that?

I really wanted to say something when you looked at me like you were waiting for me and I usually don't have a problem not saying something but I didn't want to recognize something.

What can

I do with that?

I don't know.

That's what

I...

We

should have

prepped you.

I'm sorry, we should have rehearsed.

Yeah, we

should have rehearsed.

Yeah.

I was going to say lots of stuff, but then I wouldn't have sounded like I didn't really get the gist of the song.

You're welcome to stand up and dance around, Amelie, because I know, I love when you sit in the chair there and I, do you dance around on stage or you kind of do what you just did at the mic?

It depends if it's like, if it's a duo show, I keep pretty to myself, but if it's a band show, I'm all over that

stage.

Oh, that's so great.

You have so much fun.

You're just feeling it, it's fantastic.

Um, so all right, so Do you when you put out a new album?

Are there themes to it or do the songs?

Do you try to put them together somehow?

Yeah, or are they just random?

Yeah,

we I don't know if it's fully intentionally, but we kind of write Topically, okay, just about our life and then it ends up being something like so this this album is called.

Why do we do what we do?

Hmm

It's mouthful, but it's also it's one of those things where we're like, this is what this album is about.

Yeah.

Looking at our life and being like, you know, how did we end up here?

Yeah.

And why do we keep going?

Writing about what you know, right?

I mean, and so like, obviously that's going to be different errors of your life.

Right.

You

know, and our previous album, Failure Feelings was very mental health

focused.

Oh, that was great.

Yeah.

Because

that's what we needed

at the time.

Great stuff.

Yeah, that was fun.

Yeah, thank you.

I don't know our debut album was just a debut album I mean obviously we wrote about what we needed to write about then but

I

think it was more like just the songs that we had written to that point I think it's more important for me that like it's cohesive musically I

would

say like the themes make they land where they need to land and

But at the end of the day, we pick the best songs.

We write a lot of songs and then we pick the best ones and put them on the album.

That's so great.

It's a great song.

Thank

you.

It's fun, right?

Yeah, it's a lot of

fun.

With full band, it's very loud.

It goes hard.

It's nice to know, too, that a couple people like you guys who are loaded still have money issues from time to time.

We're very loaded, yeah.

Totally

loaded.

Being musicians,

working

in two different countries.

Taylor

Swift versus us, I don't know if there's any difference.

We are coming right back with 7,000 Apart.

We'll have a few more minutes with these guys who are in studio.

Merry Christmas to me.

Nightlight with Pete Schwabbe coming right back.

What is your favorite pre-Christmas activity?

That is tonight's Question of the Night here at Nightlight.

I'm Pete Schwab.

Great to have you with us on this Tuesday night, a pre-Christmas show.

I could say this show is one of my favorite pre-Christmas activities because I have great guests all night, including...

My current guess, 7,000 apart, John and Amelie are here.

It's such an outstanding music duo.

We just heard them perform and you've got a pizza waiting for you, so I'll make this as quick as possible because I don't, what did you get on the pizza I have to ask?

We got the Mediterranean pizza.

Ooh, nice.

Yeah, so some black olives, I think some feta cheese and some pesto.

That didn't

even exist, like.

I'm sure it did in the Middle East or

whatever, but

like, I love Mediterranean

food.

And a Mediterranean pizza, surprisingly.

Right, sounds good, right?

Yeah.

I'm excited.

Tell us about your New Year's Eve show you have here

in Green Bay.

Yes, oh my gosh, we get to go back to Titletown.

It's been one of our, like, favorite places this...

these last few years, just because they always put on such a great event, like there's always so much happening around it.

So, yeah, this summer we opened for Jesse McCartney, which was nuts, and now we get to play three hours of some great music from six to nine, just in the Titletown area with...

I think we got Lambo behind us, which is cool.

Nice.

Yeah.

So that's like across the street kind of on

the same

street, but across the sides.

Yeah, that's fun.

Man, that's great.

And how, how would 10 of our crowds in a situation like that?

Because, you know, here in Northeast Wisconsin, there's a fair amount of drinking that happens.

So are people mostly focused on you guys or?

Are you like fighting for the attention of a game

that's

on or something

depends

on

the venue and I would just probably assume that this is gonna be kind of like there They do have some farmers markets Okay, or like arts and crafts farmers markets during summer and I would assume that this is gonna be a little bit like that But I think the stage is a little bigger and like with heating I think we have some heat and so I think I mean we definitely know people who are gonna be there to

come see us.

But I'm sure there's going to be a lot of people tubing, you know?

Yeah, yeah.

Maybe skating.

I think they have ice skating and stuff, getting some food.

So like, we're happy to be that, like, whatever you need us to be, you know?

Yeah, yeah.

Do you want to stand by the stage and like sing along to every song?

We're

going to play fun songs and original

music, too.

But if you're just there to like go ice skating and listen to us at the same time, that's cool, too.

That's good, too.

All right.

And talk about some of these other dates you guys have coming up.

Wassa on the 26th.

Yeah.

at Malarkey's Blue Harbor.

Yes.

On the

27th.

That seems like

a fun venue.

Is that like in a big room they deck out for the holidays

or something?

No, we're going to be in one of their restaurant hub things.

Yeah.

So we actually got that show because we played on Local Five Live.

They have these like our town segments.

So they did one in Cheboygan and we did their live music.

Very cool.

Just right there on the water.

It was gorgeous.

That's a beautiful area.

Then you got the West Bend Theater January

16th.

Yes, that's going to be cool.

And Malone, Wisconsin.

Yeah,

Ziegler Winery.

It's a really, really sweet place.

What part of the state is that?

It's pretty close.

We look it up the day

before.

Yeah.

I want to say we've played in every single smaller town in Wisconsin, but then there's always more.

And it's always like, yeah, we've played in the areas.

You've got to come to Marinette.

Yeah, we go north.

We could turn out.

We could put some bus in the seats.

Yeah, let's do it.

All right, we'll talk about that too.

We'll talk about LA stuff and then

we'll talk about

Marinette.

We'll reconvene.

So then back to Sweden and then what's that like more producing or more songwriting or what?

So we do around four to six gigs a month still in Sweden.

Oh, nice.

The gigs we do there are a lot more like not all of them, but some of them are a lot more focused on like

more of like a music club type vibe, like very shorter, like an hour set, maybe splitting

nice with other bands, you

know, that world.

And then it's a lot of production and writing for us.

As we said, working on another album, like the third one is in like still being released, but we were like always trying to work in advance.

And since we released music on the seventh of every month, so we're prepping already for April and beyond.

Yeah, it's a great gimmick.

I love that.

People come to expect it, I imagine.

That's the plan, right?

That's the dream.

That's fantastic.

How's the tour been so far?

Have there been any memorable shows or are they

all memorable?

Do you

have any unique experiences?

We did a beautiful show at the Mulva Center in Depeer and their auditorium.

We did like a gorgeous.

So nice.

So we did like a combination of our music and some Christmas songs, holiday music.

Got a standing ovation there.

It's amazing.

So

cute

sold tickets like it was so that was really special Yeah, we played some wineries all around Wisconsin also just like it's Such a chill vibe compared to summer because summer we do a lot of band shows.

It's very like high tempo.

It's big

Production like it's all the lights and all the speakers and at every gig yeah, and here we've been doing a lot of duo shows and Just taking it very chill.

You get to talk to

the people in

the audience a lot

more Very intimate.

So it's

cool.

Do you have people that come out that knew you from high school?

Do they

I mean we had like we had people that drove up from Chicago to see us at Anduzzi's

yeah,

which

is

crazy.

So like

it's it's weird like There's people that are like, oh, I've seen you

four or five times and you're like okay I kind of remember you

but

also and and then sometimes yeah people from high school we met some people this summer that knew us in high school

yeah

they were freshmen when we were seniors and like oh nice they're like we've been following what you're doing and you know it's yeah it's super fun to meet people that know who you are and

yeah anytime you see like like

Faces that you know in the crowd.

Yeah, that is always so special Because then like you just feel a little safer and a little happier your friends are there, you know,

that's so cool Do you guys we only have about less than a minute left?

But what do you when you get in the car and you drive to Malone, Wisconsin?

What are you listening to?

You guys

listen to so here's the thing we because we work with music We don't listen to music in the car

We listen to podcasts.

Okay,

so we listen to Dungeons and Dragons podcast

largely.

I

don't

know

if you know anything about that, but that's a whole topic.

Not like since it started on television video games like in the 80s.

It's a whole thing.

I know it's

great.

We have a very nerdy side.

We do have a very nerdy side.

It comes out in the band.

But when we have the band, we usually just talk.

But when it's just John and I, we usually turn on a little podcast and rest my voice.

That's

your cool side with the band.

Your nerd side with Dungeons and Dragons.

John and Ommily from 7,000 Apart.

Knock them dead.

Have a great tour.

Thank you so

much.

When you come back, please come back again.

We love that.

For sure.

We look

fantastic.

We are coming right back, folks, after news, sports, and the weather.

Ben Reiser is here for some movie talk.

Steve March tour may come up.

Lots to get to tonight.

It's Night Light with Pete Schwabba on the Civic Media Radio Network.

Oh, the weather outside is frightful, but the fire is so delightful.

Welcome back.

Since we've no place to go.

All right, we are jamming through a Tuesday night edition of Nightlight Broadcasting Live statewide from beautiful downtown Green Bay.

What could be better, folks?

Christmas is right around the corner.

And we're talking about the things and life that make us happy.

Movies, TV, comedy, music.

and all the fun stuff happening in Wisconsin this time of year.

And the food that we're gonna eat over the holidays, which we shouldn't.

What are you gonna eat, Steve?

More stuff than I should.

Yeah, same old.

Mac and cheese, turkey, desserts.

That is the voice of Steve March Torme, who joins me here in the studio.

He is a crooner, a master of many genres.

He is one of the leaders of the band Steam.

They play all over Wisconsin, and they will go to Iowa, right?

You went to Iowa?

Yeah, we were in Olawine, Iowa, which is not far from the field of dreams.

Oh, nice.

Yeah, when we went last year, I checked it out.

Now, of course, in winter, the field of dreams isn't quite as alluring.

It's covered in snow.

Hockey rink of dreams, yeah.

That's right.

There was no Kevin Costner there.

Steve, you...

You have a famous dad a famous crooner and you mentioned your father in the previous segment and tell us about Mel Torme and How how did he influence you because a lot of people won't follow their very famous parent into That line of work you did that must have been somewhat intimidating a

very very good question Which I will clear up immediately so Mel Torme is my my

real father, my birth father, and a wonderful musician, terrific singer, drummer, arranger, writer, all that stuff.

But my folks got divorced when I was two and a half, so I never really lived with Mel Torme.

My mom married a guy who at the time was better known than Mel Torme was in the entertainment field.

His name was Hal March, and Hal was the host of the $64,000 question show, which was a huge television show.

And then he was on Broadway in a play called Come Blow Your Horn, a very, very talented guy.

And he's the person that got me into sports.

When I was a kid, I wanted to be a Major League Baseball player.

That's been my first love from the beginning.

It's been baseball.

Yeah.

So when people ask me, so what's it like being Mel's son and all these musicians you were around?

And then did you meet Count Basie and Ella?

No, I was around Hal's friends who were all the Borsch Belt comedians.

So our dinner parties every weekend were Jan Murray, Lucille Ball, Milton Berle, Buddy Hackett,

Jack

Carter.

This is who I was around all the time because Hal had a great sense of humor and he was funny and he liked, my mom and dad liked having dinner parties and having these people over.

Why wouldn't you?

You're gonna laugh all night.

So being a little kid, I had to be in bed by nine o'clock.

I'm in my bedroom, I'm, you know, 11 years old, and I'm going and listening to the door.

And after dinner, they would all go in the living room and start, you know, drinking some Chevis.

And

they'd all start competing with each other.

And it just got dirtier and dirtier, you know.

But he had

these two Jews walk into our bar and I'm hearing my mom laughing.

And that's, that was my childhood, which doesn't mean I wasn't influenced by my real dad.

I'm, I'm thankful that.

I think I have some of his genes and hopefully a good ear.

But I was really not influenced by him, but I'm thankful that I had a great stepfather and a great dad.

I got lucky.

And you have both their names.

That's why I have, that's

why it's Steve March Torme.

I wanted to honor both of them.

I was Steve March for a long time.

I said, you know, people are going to know that Mel Torme is my dad and I should get this legally changed.

So I did in Wisconsin.

Nice.

Yeah,

yeah, yeah.

So, all right, I'm wondering what's a better segue, asking you how you ended up in Wisconsin.

You

know, a kid born in

Manhattan.

Yeah.

And then you lived in Beverly Hills, you're around.

That's what I got excited about when I was reading about you

the other

day.

Oh, my bio?

Well, the bio and just that, like, I thought it was cool that you were Mel Torme's son, but also when I saw who your stepfather was, I was like,

I mean, I was a nationally touring comedian for seven years, then I got lucky and sold the script.

So I kind of segwayed out of stand up, but you're always a comedian and I love comedians.

And I was so envious of you reading about who you grew

up around, you know?

Well, you know, I've been asked many times, you ever thought about doing stand up?

I said, not for a second.

Yeah.

Not a chance.

That's the hardest gig in the world because you could be the worst singer in the world.

And when you finish a song, people will applaud just like, this song is over.

They'll applaud.

But if you're not funny, you don't get laughs.

Yeah.

I mean, if you tell a joke and it's not funny, people don't go, oh, gosh, that's funny.

Right.

They'll just sit there in silence.

No one fakes a laugh.

Because we've all seen comedians bomb.

Yeah.

And it's brutal.

I mean, that's flop sweat.

If it's a friend of

yours, it's pretty funny, though, watching them bomb.

All right, so that's exciting.

But let's talk about

how I got

here.

Oh, yeah.

You live in Appleton with this bicoastal upbringing.

How did

you end up in Wisconsin?

I was born in Manhattan in Doctors' Hospital, which is long gone.

My mom and dad, Mel and my mom, Candy, got divorced when I was two and a half.

And she married the love of her life, really, in Halmarch.

And we moved to West Chester County.

And that was really my upbringing.

That's when I became a baseball nut, because the Yankees were my team.

Yeah, and it was those Yankees team.

It was the great Yankees teams There's a whole nother story with that with myself and Tony Kubek, but we don't have time, but we'll see okay, so anyway We lived in Westchester County one day my mom and dad announced What do you think about the we're moving to Beverly Hills?

I went what I just got I just got Patsy Bloom to notice me the girl it was in

our dance thing.

She

noticed me finally

They said, well, we're moving to Beverly Hills.

I said, but I hear all the kids there are snobby and they have stingray bikes.

I don't want to move there.

I didn't have a lot of a lot of pull in this.

Not at that age.

So we had five.

I've got four brothers and sisters that were one full tour may my sister Melissa and my mom and Hal had three other kids that were marches.

So the five of us moved out to Los Angeles to Beverly Hills.

And the first guy I met there was a knock at our door.

We'd been there about, I don't know, a week.

And there's a knock at our door, and we open up my desk, and, well, you can't hear a man in the house, open the door.

I was 12.

And I open the door, and there's this kind of, kind of chubby, good-looking kid, my age, obviously.

And I said, hi.

He goes, hi, I'm Desi.

I'm going, oh, I'm Steve.

And Desi Arnez Jr.

became the first person that I met.

Wow.

Because Lucy lived to block up the street.

And next to Lucy lived Jack Benny.

And next to Jack Benny lived Jimmy Stewart.

This was the block we were on.

And so when people asked me,

What's it like?

Well, to me, it was just normal because I didn't think about it.

I'm just kind of growing up there.

I went to school with those guys with Dean Martin Jr., Dino, Lorraine Newman from Saturday Night and I was in my class.

What's her name?

I'm going too fast.

From Star Wars.

Oh, Princess Leia.

Yes.

Come on.

Carrie Fisher.

Yeah, Carrie Fisher was in my class.

So these were the kids that went to Beverly Hills High School.

And again,

I didn't even think about it.

We just kind of went there.

And I got lucky because my stepfather was not a disciplinarian, but he was a really good dad.

And there was no way he was going to let me go off the rails.

Not a

chance.

Wow, nice.

So, you know, these kids were driving expensive, exotic cars.

And he said, you're not doing that.

You want to you want to buy a car?

You go to work and earn it.

So I'm thankful for that.

Because I could have spiraled out quickly and I didn't so thanks to my stepdad for

that Steve March tour may is my guest here in the nightlight studio for the first time And we're talking about his upbringing and some of his music and all the famous people he grew up around I carry Fisher actually

When we lived in Valley Village, she lived across the street from us.

I thought that was like the

quality.

Valley Village

in LA.

In

LA, yeah.

In the Valley?

In the Valley.

She lived in-

I

know Valley Villages.

Yeah.

Of course

I do.

Oh, it's everybody.

A ton of people.

It's not Beverly Hills,

but we had- It's the grocery store.

On the other side of the hill.

Yeah.

Oh, yeah.

And I was like, we found that out like the first week we moved there.

It's like,

wow.

What?

That's like the coolest thing ever.

I never saw her, but- Very white with the Valley

Village.

Probably didn't know that.

Very white?

Yeah, he had a house there.

Wow.

Well, it's so funny because that's like blue collar

LA houses by the

time we left were million.

Oh, sure.

Three bedroom in a bath and a half.

Yeah.

1.5 million.

Well, when I moved out to Wisconsin to Appleton, I mean, the going joke was in West LA was, well, what do you want for 1.5?

Yeah.

And we know we're, I'm telling the truth here.

Fixer.

Yeah.

Absolutely.

What if the demolished the kitchen in 1.5?

I'm sorry.

I hope you're handy.

The prices are astronomical.

Ridiculous.

Occasionally, for a while, my wife would talk about going back.

I'm like, once you leave

that money, you can't

really.

You're priced out.

Yeah, it's hard to go back unless

you sell something

or whatever.

Exactly.

You're going to live in a really crummy part of the valley for about $650,000.

Right.

Exactly.

You're right.

But Koima.

Thank you.

So how do you like Appleton?

It's very different from either coast.

Very much so.

Yeah.

moved out my wife's family mom and dad live in Berlin okay Berlin Wisconsin which is about I don't know 18 19 minutes west of Oshkosh is a town of 5300 when we talked about that when we were in we were living in a decent townhouse in in Santa Monica not posh yeah but nice you know and fairly expensive we were lucky to have it

And my wife one day said, what do you think about the idea of us moving closer to mom and dad?

Because we would come out and spend time with her parents.

And we had just had our first child.

And my brothers and sisters are displaced.

They're all over the place.

We had no help with our baby.

And my mom and dad were gone.

And I said, what do you mean living in Wisconsin?

Because what do you think about moving there?

I said, hun, I like visiting mom and dad, but I don't see me living on a plane.

of property with silos.

That's just

not me.

I'm from Manhattan.

Come on.

And we made a pros and cons list and realized, you know what?

From what I do for a living, which is doing concerts and singing, I can do it from the middle of the country.

It'll be easier to go to East Coast and West Coast than it will be to go all the way from LA to Florida or New York and come all the way back.

I convinced myself, okay, let's go out to Wisconsin.

Maybe, maybe we could actually own a house.

one day,

which we had

no chance of in Los Angeles.

Right.

Just

too expensive.

Yeah.

And that's how we ended up there.

We ended up moving to Berlin, Wisconsin.

We bought my wife's grandparents house.

They both passed away recently, but the house had not been sold yet.

We bought it and fixed it up, made a little bit of money.

And then we started looking around, you know, what would be a nice place to live.

And everybody said, check out Appleton.

Yeah, they've got good schools.

It's pretty safe.

It's a nice area.

And there's a bar every 12 feet, which I didn't really

care about, but it's the truth.

You don't have to drive.

If you've been to College Avenue in Appleton, not unlike Rain Bay.

Right.

And that's how we ended up in Appleton.

I like it.

I mean, my two daughters have gone to school there.

They went through the Appleton school system, which surprisingly, which is unfair for me to say, is pretty good.

Yeah.

The school system's pretty good.

I mean, they went to Appleton North, which is a good elementary school.

And they're out of high school, and both my girls are in college now.

Wow.

That

went by really quickly.

Yeah, no kids.

So you've been here, they were young, and so you've been here 15-ish.

I've been here at least 19

years.

Okay, 19 years, wow.

Oh my God.

It's a very,

like- How's that, I'm only 32 years old, and how did that

happen?

You have that, you have that look about you that, and I don't want to say it's like an LA thing, but like, you look younger than you are.

I sold

my soul.

You're 94.

I sold my soul to the devil a long time ago.

But it is an easy place to live, right?

I think so.

In

northeast Wisconsin, you've got some culture.

There's

a

bustle here.

It's not

LA.

Well, it's not a college town.

Lawrence University makes a big difference.

Exactly.

If it was just a little burg in Wisconsin, it'd be different.

But that school is very good.

Gets very good teachers, good musicians.

Yeah, Apple, it's got a Fox Cities Performing Arts Center, which is legit.

I mean, not just local people.

I saw name is there three years ago.

It was great.

And I'd

seen it.

other places and it was just as good, like it's fantastic.

And they get local acts, you know, they get Diana Ross, they get the Temptations, they get people that are touring Broadway shows.

Fantastic.

All

right, Steve March-Tourmet is here in the studio.

When we come back, he is going to sing a classic for us.

He's already agreed to do this before I paid him.

Did I pay you?

What did I have for you to be here?

We'll get to that, because the price just went

up.

Conrad, go to the petty cash.

And when I say petty, I mean really petty.

We're coming right back to close this thing down with our new pal, Steve March Torme.

It's Pete Schwabba and Nightlight on the Civic Media Radio

Network.

you

Welcome back.

I'm Pete Schwab, and this is Night Light.

We are in the home stretch here, folks, on our last live show of the week.

But for the rest of the week, you'll have the soothing voice of Lou Ragani, and he is going to be playing the Christmas music of the stars.

to fill your holiday coffers for the next three days.

It's gonna be a lot of fun.

We'll be back live next Monday.

Steve March Torme is here.

He is a musician, singer, songwriter, band leader, all kinds of stuff.

He is the master of all musical genres.

And our pal, Terry Barr, who we do bar band Friday night with here is listening.

And she says, this interview with Steve March Torme is

awesome.

Great stories.

Thank you, Terry.

I love when Terry's listening to the show.

You're talking about all these people you grew up around, Steve.

And I find that fascinating.

But also, I'm sure at some point, they're just people.

They're your neighbors.

And that's what you're used to.

So you still went into this crazy business with a famous father and a famous stepfather.

And was

that

intimidating?

How did you?

That takes a lot of guts in a way.

Yeah.

And again, when people have asked me about that, they said, does it, you know, what's it like having that last name?

I said, well, to be honest with you, if you have a famous last name and you're not very good at what you do, it's not going to matter.

It's not going to help you one bit.

And if you have a famous last name and you're good at what you do, it's not going to matter.

You're just going to do it.

Right.

So I do my homework.

And I mean, the last thing I want to do is get on stage and have people say, well, he's okay, but he ain't no Mel Torme.

I mean, the guy, I heard some flat notes there and his intonation isn't so good.

His timing isn't that good.

I've never tried to be like my dad.

There's no reason to.

He did what he did and he was very good at it.

I do what I do and try to be as good at it as I can.

And again, if you got a famous last name, it's up to you to do what you do best.

And to be brutally honest with you, I can't do anything else.

I really can't.

I mean, I'm a performer and I sing and I write.

I play piano.

I play guitar.

I wanted to be a baseball player.

I was pretty good, but not good enough to be a pro.

So it was like, this is what I enjoy doing.

So that's a simple answer.

That's great.

And

as an artist, all you have is yourself.

Whether it's a comedian, artist, or musician, your point of view, what you bring to it, that's what makes you special.

You have to sell you.

We're not selling shoes.

They can speak of themselves.

You can be a horrible human being.

But I like those shoes.

But when you're in the entertainment business, you have to sell you constantly.

And that's tricky.

You know, you don't want to alienate people.

You want to be true to yourself.

So it's interesting.

I'm preaching to the choir.

You know this.

Yeah.

You know, sometimes selling shoes, though, doesn't sound like that.

Hey, you offered to sing this earlier.

I would love it if you sang the song your dad made famous, the Christmas song.

So

acapella, which is very impressive.

So I wrote a song and not to not to compete with dad.

It's a song that we do in all of our shows.

And we played on 91.1 the Avenue.

They're playing it right now, as a matter of fact, during the holiday season called I Remember Christmastime, which was a reminiscence of kind of looking back on my life when I was living in Berlin and saying, you were born in Manhattan.

I mean, you met Mickey Mantle at Toot Shores.

You lived in Beverly Hills, and now you're living in Berlin, Wisconsin.

Population is 5,300, and you have two young daughters.

And I was at a park with my girls.

And I was hearing them laughing.

I started thinking about how different my life had become.

And it was good.

It was like, oh, this is great.

My girls feel safe.

They're secure.

And that's how that song came about.

Dad's song.

And some people might not know this story.

In 1945, it was one of the hottest summers in the history of Los Angeles County.

And in July, do you have two seconds for this?

Yeah,

listen, we're done at eight o'clock

on the

nose.

But whatever one you

want, I better start saying something

personal to you.

Go for that

route.

I'll tell afterwards, OK?

OK.