Rocker Pete Yorn keeps his focus on the big picture

CONTRIBUTOR

IN a tiny, sawdust-floored bar in Santa Monica -- with only two beers on tap and a grizzled, mostly elderly clientele that could give Norma Desmond a run for her faded-star money -- overnight rock sensation Pete Yorn is sequestered in the darkest booth, thoughtfully sipping his afternoon cocktail and doing his best to keep it real.

It's been a head-spinning two years for him, he sighs. Soundtrack work on the Farrelly brothers' "Me, Myself & Irene" led to a gold- certified debut for Columbia, "musicforthemorningafter," and the subsequent licensing of almost all of its peppy cuts to still more Hollywood flicks.

Naturally, Yorn says, constant touring became part and parcel of the profile, as did late hours and excessive alcohol consumption. Drunk after every concert, he'd finally hit the big time.

Then the rebellious rocker got some advice. From the unlikeliest of sources.

For the recent Ramones tribute album "We're A Happy Family," Yorn was recording a cover of the group's classic "I Wanna Be Your Boyfriend." In the process, he was befriended by surviving guitarist Johnny Ramone, who not only introduced Yorn to his vocal idol Eddie Vedder, but taught him, he says, "that punk rock isn't necessarily about excess."

"Johhny looks the same as he did 29 years ago, and he told me 'No, I rarely ever drink, and if I do, I'll have no more than two drinks a night.' And at the time I first met him, I was right off tour and partying a lot. But he told me about so many artists that don't even do that. I was surprised."

Yorn studies his half-empty glass, sighs. "So I haven't completely quit yet. But in time. In time I will."

The guy's not kidding around. "Touring just became too much," he recalls. "Every night was wild, pretty much, especially when you're on the road for 18 months straight -- booze just became a part of it. And every day I was like, 'Nah -- I'm gonna stop this.' But it became this weird lifestyle, and it wasn't real at all."

So for his high-pressure sophomore set, Yorn slowly began to see a theme developing. Released this week, "Day I Forgot" (songs from which he'll premiere Monday at San Francisco's Warfield Theatre) became an "album about getting back to a simpler time. You know, like when you've seen too much and you get cynical? Well, this is just a reminder to me to remember how to keep things simple, about how things are really good in the beginning, and they can stay that way if you keep a certain frame of mind."

The kickoff single, "Come Back Home," is prime Yorn: Vibrant with clanging guitars, sing-song hooks and the singer's deep, Vedder-ish vocals. It reiterates his back-to-basics message, he says. "And it was the first song I've ever written where I'm actually talking to myself, singing to myself. I was nervous about what it would be like when I came back to Los Angeles after 18 months on the road. All of a sudden I was home, with nothing to do, and I was like, 'Well, now what?'"

Instead of moping, he reconnected with family and old friends and made new friends like Ramone, who gave him a signature-model Johnny Ramone guitar for Christmas. Tragedy struck too, via the untimely death of his old friend, director Ted Demme. Through it all, he learned how to "keep myself grounded, and to appreciate my music for what it is and not get too caught up in it."

Maturity and rock music don't often go hand-in-hand. But Yorn, 28, has always been a quick study. Raised in New Jersey, he picked up drums from his elder sibling Rick (currently a jetset Tinseltown agent; another brother, Kevin, practices entertainment law), then taught himself to play bass, guitar, harmonica and keyboards -- all of which he wound up playing on his do-it-yourself debut.

His folk-edged music won him an instant fan base ("a buncha freaks from all walks of life who can somehow relate to me," he assesses with a chortle), as did the perpetually unkempt look he's still sporting today: Black jeans/T-shirt, tennis shoes, long unruly hair and an ever-present five-o'clock shadow. Even in the dimly-lit bar booth, he still radiates star quality.

Musically, Yorn fancies simplicity as well. His first album, he says, "was just fun -- I had a lotta fun experimenting with loops and technology and all that stuff. But this record is a lot more straight- up, more of a rock record, with no trickery at

all. I just wrote songs that I wanted to rock out to."

Toward the end of the interview, a matronly figure in glittering jewelry spies Yorn as she passes his booth, and stops dead in her tracks. He looks familiar, she says. What does he do?

Yorn shakes his shaggy head. "Nothing much -- I'm a writer. Just a writer." Disappointed, the woman totters off. And Yorn breaks into a last-laugh grin.

"See?" he cackles. "I'm doing my best to separate my mind from the whole business side of entertainment, and stay just in the pure music side. I'm doing this for what I believe are the right reasons, but sometimes my vision gets clouded.

"So now my life is all about keeping my priorities straight. Which are: Taking care of yourself, loving your family and friends, and enjoying life because it's too short. Oh yeah -- and don't worry about the little things that just aren't gonna matter in the big picture."

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