The current best band in the world?

All right, anyone already sick of my long posts, you don’t want to read this, so just skip on by. This is for slaw, but may also be of interest to those wondering how many musician’s lives are lived. No Steve, my move to Portland is the combined elements of advancing age, divorce, a sold house, and my sister’s (both of whom have lived in Portland since 1971) failing health. They asked me if I would consider moving up, as both of their husbands had passed away and they could use me being around.

I actually lived in Portland in 1976-8, making a living playing five nights a week with a local singer. But then The Knack broke big, and L.A. was bursting with energy and opportunity. My San Jose (where I grew up---the Garage Band capitol of the country in the mid/late-60’s) friend Pete Curry had already made the move, so I joined him in N. Hollywood in ’79, playing with him in a band with a great guitarist who ended up drinking himself to death about ten years later. Years later Pete and I were playing together in The Hillbilly Soul Surfers (one album available) when he got the call from Los Straitjackets to audition for the bassist slot. He got the gig, and the guitarist/leader of THSS got a call from Evan Johns, the legendary (to some ;-) madman guitarist/singer who had made three albums for Rykodisc. We recorded an album with him in Atlanta, Georgia you may be interested in---Moon Tan. He also drank himself to death, passing away just a few years ago.

I was simultaneously involved in the huge underground Pop music scene in L.A., which was obsessed with Brian Wilson and The Beatles. One of the top groups were The Wondermints, whose bassist/songwriter Brian Kassan left the group to start his own---Chewy Marble---shortly before they (The Wm’s) were brought to the attention of Brian Wilson, who hired them to be his road and recording band. Doh!

In ’98 (I believe it was) Kassan and I were engaged to be in the band that backed Emitt Rhodes for his first live appearance in many, many years. Kassan had just let his Chewy Marble drummer go, and asked me if I’d be interested in playing on the group’s upcoming second album recordings. I had heard their first s/t album, and found the songwriting excellent, as well as the musicianship. Great George Harrison-style guitar solos, and wonderful harmonies.

I provide all the above information to bring us back to the question of recorded sound quality. We started the album by recording a song in the home studio of a British guy who had been in a Pop group that had a semi-hit in the 80’s (whose name escapes me at the moment), who ironically lived one block away from my house in Burbank. The song turned out great both musically and sonically. Unfortunately, Kassan and the studio owner/engineer had a disagreement (a financial "misunderstanding"), and the recording was moved to a different studio, one over in Culver City (close to LAX). Recording commenced, and though I was playing the same drums and cymbals as I had in Burbank, their recorded sound in the Culver City studio was COMPLETELY different, and TERRIBLE. After getting about half the album recorded I could take it no longer, and bowed out of the project. If you listen to the album (entitled Bowl Of Surreal), compare the Burbank track ("Reasons Why") to my others on the album. How could the drums and cymbals sound so completely different due solely to the engineer and studio?!

Not at all Steve. Another detail: while the Evan Johns Moontan album was being mixed and mastered (by Rodney Mills, who worked with Lynyrd Skynyrd, Atlanta Rhythm Section, 38 Special, etc.), a tour was being set up to support the release of the album. One day Evan started not feeling well, and went to the emergency room up in Vancouver, B.C., where he was living. He was admitted to the hospital, where he lapsed into a coma; final stages of liver failure. That was the end of the tour plans.

The week we spent recording, Evan ate one meal, the rest of the time chain-drinking 12 oz cans of room-temperature Budweiser. The band arrived in Atlanta a day after he, and on the morning of the first day of recording there were two 18-packs of empty beer cans outside his hotel room. He ended up awaking from the coma a few weeks later, and we learned this had happened twice before. He said to me: "As long as you stay away from the hard stuff (whiskey, I presumed), you’re okay". Apparently not; he died in Austin, Texas last year, only 60 years old. Really interesting, funny guy, and a great guitarist. Both he and Danny Gatton (nicknamed "The Humbler" by Vince Gill) came out of the Virginia Rockabilly/Blues/Hillbilly scene, and were in bands together off and on for years. One of the songs on Moontan is entitled "Shoot The Merle" (a play on words, i.e. the Surf song "Shoot The Curl"), a tribute to Merle Travis, the very influential Hillbilly guitarist, loved by Scotty Moore (Elvis), Jeff Beck, George Harrison, Clarence White (The Byrds), and of course Marty Stuart.