Was to Vets: Help Me Make It Through the ‘90s

Youth is where the action is in pop music, right? So if you’re starting a new record company, whom would you sign?

How about Beach Boys leader Brian Wilson, 51, troubadour and actor Kris Kristofferson, 57, and former Rascals singer Felix Cavaliere--49 and out of the music business for 15 years?

It’s not a major surprise that the man who recruited this long-in-the-tooth core roster for his new Karambolage label is Don Was--the record producer who helped make veteran singer Bonnie Raitt’s “Nick of Time” a 4-million-selling Grammy magnet.

“I’m just attracted to good artists, who in many cases tend to be older,” says Was, who owns the MCA-affiliated Karambolage (a German word meaning an unavoidable collision) with his managers Ken Kushnick and David Passick.

“I like the fact that older artists have not only well-honed technique and artistry, but a depth of experience that a 19-year-old kid is gonna lack, and as a result has something maybe deeper to say.”

Was, 41, launched the label because he was frustrated about producing good records and watching them get lost in the marketplace, such as Willie Nelson’s ambitious “Borderline” earlier this year.

“It sold more than his last five records put together,” says Was, “but I felt that that should have reached the people who bought the Bonnie Raitt album. I thought it would have struck a nerve there.

“I think there are ways of aiming at that alternative adult audience. I don’t want to go into it in detail until we actually do it. I have a number of ideas, and beyond that I still am searching.”

Cavaliere’s album will be the first release, in February or March, but Was--currently producing sessions by another geezer band, the Rolling Stones--doesn’t want Karambolage typecast as a musical old folks’ home.

“The label’s certainly not committed to older artists. My biggest problem is that I’m in the studio all the time, and I need to get out and hear people more. Man, if I could find a guy like Paul Westerberg, I’d sign him in a minute.”