Pop’s chia-chested hitmaker opens up about his legion of Guatemalan seamstresses, trash-talking with Bob Dylan and his secret gangsta past.
Neil Diamond is eating a pork chop. At least he thinks that’s what it is. “That’s one of the problems with this diet I’m on,” says the 67-year-old singer, poking the unidentified meat with his fork. “I can’t really tell. They just bring me food, and I eat it.” Diamond is sitting in a conference room at West Hollywood’s ArchAngel Studios, his headquarters for the past three decades. He’s looking cool in head-to-toe black—boots, jeans, button-down, baseball cap—and his voice, rich and growly, still bears the traces of his native Brooklyn. “Sam Cooke built this place,” he says, gesturing to the platinum-plaque-lined walls. “I don’t really need it anymore, but I can’t let it go. It’s got so much history.”
Diamond has some history himself. A New York University dropout, he began his career in 1962 at legendary song factory the Brill Building, peddling tunes for $35 a week and selling vitamins door-to-door to make ends meet. He went on to become a massive star in his own right, with a list of am-radio staples that reads like a master class in pop craftsmanship: “Cracklin’ Rosie,” “Song Sung Blue,” “I’m a Believer,” “America,” “Sweet Caroline.” Though he’s been covered by everyone from Elvis to U2, Diamond has never quite been able to shake his reputation as a hopeless square—a sequined-shirted schlockmeister who makes the kind of music your parents listen to. But he’s also been adopted as an icon of cool by retro-minded hipsters including Quentin Tarantino (who put a cover of Diamond’s “Girl, You’ll Be a Woman Soon” in
Pulp Fiction) and très chic French DJ duo Justice (who take the stage to “Sweet Caroline”).
Diamond is gearing up for a busy summer. Next week he heads to the Netherlands to kick off a world tour. (Thus the diet.) He’s also releasing his 26th studio album,
Home Before Dark, a twilight-tinged collaboration with rock sensei Rick Rubin. “My son told me it’s the most personal record I’ve ever made,” Diamond says. “But I
have to be the best I can be now. I’m not sure how many years I have left.”
The man has seen a lot over his 40-plus-year career. But is he ready to face
Blender’s readers? He shrugs and takes another bite of maybe–pork-chop. “Let’s do it,” he says. “At this point in my life, what have I got to hide?”
You went to high school in Brooklyn with Barbra Streisand. Who was more popular? Hughesnews, Nashua, NH
I don’t think either of us was very popular. We sang in the Erasmus Hall High chorus for two years together, but we never met. She was 16 and I was 17. But years later we did compare notes about the conductor. Mr. Di Pieto—always “Mr.” He was this beautiful, aristocratic Italian man with a spectacular head of hair that had a streak of silver in the front. The girls loved him, and the boys feared for their lives from him.
So, do you still have that awesome all-denim outfit you wore on the cover of Hot August Night? Shoepebble, Millbrook, NY
I have the belt. I’m not sure about the rest. It’s stored in a climate-controlled vault: all my costumes, my belts, my guitars. Sometimes I visit them. It’s like whiplash—it takes you back to another period in your life. And for the record, those were glass beads on my shirts—not sequins. Sequins are little bits of plastic; glass beads are a thing of beauty. They were sewn on individually by nine ladies from Guatemala, and they were exquisite.