How I Got This Way

[mynan]

Is that an eyebrow peeking out above your classes?

 

[AnthonyD]

Great stories - and great picture!

I had the same hair around '79-'81... Permed, of course...

Then came the mullet.

 

[sloshep]

Great picture and story to go with it. It's a shame so many musicians out there have a tenancy to be unstable. Everybody knows some.

 

[bovinehost]

....My drummer and good pal has left the world too about ten years ago...demons baby.

Fred did some great work, Biff, with all those desert rat guys that the youngsters love so much, but he was, at heart, a Beatles/Pink Floyd sorta guy and it showed in his solo work. Dan Lanois loved Fred, which says something, although I'm not entirely sure what. But if you want advice on buying microphones, Dan Lanois is a good place to start. Heh heh!

Fred, although he did love to smoke things, never had a serious demon. He was diagnosed with HIV in 1984, a real pioneer in the AIDs scene, and somehow got into an experimental treatment deal with Jonas Salk. Can you imagine having Jonas Salk as your personal doctor? Anyway, Fred was a long-term survivor and I had really started to not even think about his 'medical status' because he was so damned healthy for so long.

But with that disease, it's unfortunately always a matter of time, it seems.

He was surely a great drummer and maybe an even better engineer and producer - ask Josh Homme if you think I'm kidding.

And a great human being. I miss him something fierce.

You know the difference jack...these days the kids dont jam like us old farts.........It is funny how many young players cant play the blues......Oh well its the evolution of what we did and instead of a garage its a laptop....

I remember whenever the guitar player was unavailable, Fred and I would go out to our rehearsal space and just work out odd timing stuff that never made it to the light of day. When you're young, you see the value in that. Now, I'd be like, "What? Just me and a drummer? Um, no."

And way before that, back in Mississippi, my teenager buds and I could and often would spend entire days down in the basement that was our rehearsal space, playing and playing and playing and playing....just because it was joyous to make a big noise.

Youngsters don't have what we had? Generally, I think that is absolutely true, but then I meet someone like Tyler and I know there is hope for music in general.

I know you're like me in some ways, and the one thing I believe we agree on is that progress is good. Some things, I don't get, and technology and I have an uncomfortable relationship, but that's how it is when you're an old fart. If I were eighteen right now, I'm sure I'd have a laptop recording system and drum simulators and.....well, whatever is working now, but I don't even have an ipod.

I'm lame, I know it - and I don't even mind so much. Maybe it's cool in some way that I remember when having a 4 track reel to reel at HOME was just mindblowingly radical. There were such limits to what we could do, but you know what? We weren't even smart enough to recognize those limits. Fred and I used to toss drum cases off his balcony, record it, then slow it down to half speed to simulate explosions. God knows what his neighbors thought.

Now, you'd just grab a sample of an explosion.

Why not? If samples had been available, that's what we'd have done, too, I promise, but it was fun to try tossing a drum case off a balcony and get a decent level.

I remember the first time Steve Morse was going to play in Biff Baby's....it was totally foreign to him and I said "we will have a rehearsal".....It was cox albert and John Ferraro was on the road so Chad Wackerman subbed and we just kind of stumbled into radar love and it lasted 45 minutes and went to the moon and back and lasted 45 minutes. I said "OK, I guess we can start" and Steve said Im not worried anymore Lets have dinner and then jam somemore

Your friends are at a slightly different level than mine. But musically, it's not usually about that, is it? I remember a night not so long ago - San Antonio at a blues jam - about 12 people in the bar and I just ended up with a good group onstage, which was odd enough, given the usual participants - and we were doing some standard blues jam - Cissy Strut, maybe - I don't remember now. But it was STELLAR. And I came off stage after that ten or twelve minutes, and someone I respected (Chuck Moses) said, "Wow! I wish we had a recording of that!"

You know, I wish we did. You never know where the magic is going to come from, or who is going to make it.

Jackie

 

[T-bone]

Jack,

All I can say is:

"We're not worthy!"

Man, that is some great stuff!! You really need to write a book. I know, how about B.P.'s biography. Plenty of good material there

Thanks for the story, Jack. Sounds like there's a few more bouncing around in that fro.

tbone

 

[oli@bass]

Cool pic! And great stories! Thanks for sharing!


Oh, yeah, and you guys should write that book

 

[Big Poppa]

Hey I understand the difference between today and yesterday...The Battle of The Bands has had nearly 100,000 bands. WHen we started the musicianship was spotty and the recording and production was weak....Probably because 1995 was a dark era for music and recording had not made the gains we see today.

The youth has the benefit of being able to study it all....we got it in real time and got to live the most important section and as old farts most of us stopped listening or growing.

It is funny to think about Chet Atkins, LEnny Breau, Howard Roberts, Tommy Tedesco, and a slew of palyers session cats and rockers that are no longer with us and when I talk to kids about music and they mention someone like that and I say..." I met him" or"I knew him" crazy.....

The playing chops are usually replaced by technology chops....Which is better? Will the playing catch up and make for great playing and super producers? That is what I think.

I keep hearing new stuff and am very positive about it....but I still miss the days of the garage or basement and the days of thinkn what you just did was really important....like dropping the cases off the roof...ro finding the lost chord on ly to lose it again.

THe production and distriibution in todays markets makes record companies about as useful as a disco ball. They know it but are desparately trying to litigae and lesilate their future security.

I just bought a Line 6 tone port.....,what a blast that thing is.

 

[oddjob]

Jack... is that an eyebrow that I see peeking out from behind the specs??? If that is the case, then that bass does have some serious mojo

Seriously great stuff (always fun to look back, isn't it?)

 

[AnthonyD]

Seriously great stuff (always fun to look back, isn't it?)

Important to never forget where you've been... It makes it easier to know where you're going.

 

[RMS]

Jack, I'd love to here what that experiment stuff sounded like. Anyway to share some of that music with us?

BP, I like your optimism, but my fear is that the increasing "instant gratification" society we live in pushes against overall musical innovation and development. When I was a teenager, there was nearly a full page of musician wanted ads in the free rag - now there is literally 3-5.

Still there will always be people somewhere pushing the envelop, and with 21st technology there is a better chance than ever of finding that music.

 

[strummer]

I'm just reading, big grin on my face, thanks Jack and Biff, you guys just deliver the greatest reads

 

[high mileage]

I'm just reading, big grin on my face, thanks Jack and Biff, you guys just deliver the greatest reads

You know, I was just thinking the same thing - cool to be hanging around the campfire and listening to the stories...

 

[Smallmouth_Bass]

You kind-of look like Adam Clayton back in the early 80's. If you search, you'll be able to find a picture of him with similar glasses too.

 

[fly]

nice.................thanks for the great read fellas.........