Book Review: 'Long Train Running: Our Story of the Doobie Brothers' by Tom Johnston and Pat Simmons with Chris Epting
5 / 5 Stars
'Long Train Running' (352 pp.) was published by St. Martin's Press in 2022.
[ As I write this in early August 2026, the Doobies still are together, and touring the nation in the Fall of 2026. This core lineup includes Tom Johnston, Pat Simmons, Michael McDonald, and Jeff McFee, but of course, you never know who just might show up for a number or two]
If you're a Baby Boomer then you know about the Doobie Brothers, whose songs were ubiquitous on FM and AM radio from 1972 to 1982.
[ For those under age 60, the term 'doobie' was sixties-era slang for a marijuana joint. I don't think I've heard anyone use the word 'doobie,' since I was in high school in the late 1970s.......]
The band was formed by San Jose residents Tom Johnston, Pat Simmons, Dave Shogren, and John Hartman in 1970, who consciously modeled their approach to composing on the San Francisco band Moby Grape.
Over the years the Doobie's lineup has undergone considerable changes (the band's Wikipedia listing of members scrolls for several pages), but Simmons always has served as the foundational member and leader of the band.
Back in the 1970s and early 1980s, before the days of the internet, the band was somewhat 'faceless' in the sense that if you didn't subscribe to Rolling Stone, Creem, or Crawdaddy, you had no real sources for up-to-date information on the status of bands, their members, and their activities. So 'Long Train' fills in a lot of gaps in my own (rather limited) knowledge about the Doobies.
'Long Train' is constructed around reminiscences from Johnston and Simmons, starting chronologically from their childhood days, and ending up in early 2021. Interspersed with the comments from Johnston and Simmons are contributions from other members and associates, such as producer Ted Templeman, bassist Tiran Porter, road manager and publicist Dan Fong, and vocalist and keyboard player McDonald, among others.
As a co-writer, Epting does a good job of keeping the narrative flowing, while allowing Johnston and Simmons to provide the sort of in-depth, first-person recollections of days and times gone by that fans of the band, and seventies music, will be interested in. Johnston and Simmons provide plentiful insights into the songwriting and recording processes that will be enlightening to Doobies fans.
At times Johnston and Simmons temper their observations about what likely were the more strained incidents in the band's history, but that is to be expected.......One thing the book delivers is those 'you are there' accounts of how things were in the 70s and 80s, when wine, women, drugs, and excess were commonplace amusements for rock stars. I mean, guitarist Jeff 'Skunk' Baxter, in a hotel room at the Sheraton Universal in L.A. with Jaye P. Morgan, famed for her breast exposure on The Gong Show ?! Jaye now is 94 years old, but she knew how to have a good time, back in the day......
The book contains two lengthy sections of black-and-white and color photographs which are effective in chronicling the personnel, shows, and social interactions of the Doobies.
Needless to say, as you go through the pages of 'Long Train' you'll want to have your phone or tablet at hand to look up and listen to the myriad tracks and LPs that are described in the book.
For fans not just of the Doobies, but of the Seventies and Eighties rock scenes, then 'Long Train' will be an engaging read. Five of Five Stars !
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