00:00:00.160 - 00:00:13.060

Unknown: Gotcha. Sorry. Let's see the only My name is Frank hofsky, and I'm doing this interview for jazz and pops magazine, and the only ground rules are that I'd like to have you say your name before you say anything, because otherwise,

00:00:13.060 - 00:00:24.620

technically, six voices and the transcriber's gonna have a hell of a time picking things up, attributing them to the right person. But you can use any kind of language you want, one and won't be censored out. You can talk about anything you want

00:00:24.620 - 00:00:39.140

that won't be censored out either, because we're not a teenybopper magazine. We're not interested in your favorite color, just really the social circumstances of the music and how it goes about being made. So okay, my first question that I

00:00:39.140 - 00:00:51.100

wanted to ask this band in particular is about the union. I've heard that in the early, early days, you refused to join union, and it was a big Hans. We thought that maybe somebody liked to tell me why they did one band and want to join union.

00:00:51.700 - 00:01:08.400

And what was the outcome of that? How it finally was decided. Well, okay, Steve and the union. The union is the way we conceived it. When we first, we first were in the

00:01:08.400 - 00:01:22.300

music thing. It was, it's a kind of a protection racket, and so we we thought, and we were playing for quite a while, for a couple years, we played almost for a couple years. We played without getting any unions professionally. We played money.

00:01:22.300 - 00:01:35.560

We played the film, or a couple three times before, before the incident with the who, which was our the time when we joined the Union. Tell me about that, because I don't know about that. Well, the union finally told us that they would take the WHO off

00:01:35.560 - 00:01:44.860

the stage. This was a month ago or so. They would take the WHO off the stage if we played in the film or with them. How could they do that? Who is an American? Aren't even American music?

00:01:44.860 - 00:01:59.680

No, that's, that's the thing every time, every time musician in Britain or any place else comes here, they have to make an agreement with the American Federation of Musicians. And so they made an agreement that they would play by according to the

00:01:59.680 - 00:02:15.600

AFN rules, which were no scat Hans. So us being a scab, and we were going to get taken off army. They were going to get taken off if Greg let us play. They had no control over us, since we were not no union, but who, often we didn't want the

00:02:15.600 - 00:02:26.900

WHO to take off to just be, you know, screw to their game completely. So, so what we were going to do, if the union had pulled anything like that, we were going to let we split, and let them play the gig, because it was their gig. But nothing

00:02:26.900 - 00:02:38.120

happened. Nobody showed up. So you played non union and the who played, and then nothing happened. Nothing happened, absolutely nothing at all. But after that, within a couple of weeks, the union just demanded and Brahms that he wouldn't be

00:02:38.120 - 00:02:52.180

able to hire us anymore, and we decided we underwent a change in our view of the union. The union was becoming so much of a hassle that was getting the way of our making music professionally, trying to make records, getting the music to the people it was,

00:02:52.180 - 00:03:02.580

it was like it was something attached on to the music we were trying to make that we wanted to get rid of. One of the, my name is Bob, one of the one of the things happened that convinced as well. Was like other people were

00:03:02.580 - 00:03:14.460

ending up taking a rap force, and like Bill Graham, for instance, hardest a couple of times, knowing that he could have gotten screwed up by Hans, and then this time with the holy Harrison. And after the gig, the union found out about it, and

00:03:14.460 - 00:03:23.960

instead of canceled this whole summer series, I mean, they called all the musicians and said, Call Bill Graham and cancel, because he's no longer a union hall. And then the thing is, it this wasn't really a move to force us to join the union.

00:03:23.960 - 00:03:35.780

All he did was, well, they want to burn Bill Graham for some more money. So they went, took the payoff, and, you know, he got his summer series back again, or, I think they made him sign a statement that he'd never, you know, hire another

00:03:35.780 - 00:03:46.960

Union on union band. They enforcement of that position a couple times. Why did Graham want to employ you in the first place. I hope he likes music. He also knows that we draw from the Bay Area and everything as

00:03:47.080 - 00:04:04.860

about as much as the dead or some people like that. Have you undergone a personnel change recently? I understand you used to have a girl singer in the band? Yes? Steve again, yes, we had a girl named Suzy who sang this for the

00:04:04.860 - 00:04:28.100

past eight months or more, and and she is also teaching, and didn't want to do both things, and so she's teaching on stage. The rest of the band's personnel unchanged? Or so she simply left? Is that it? Yeah, did she form a group of her own?

00:04:28.100 - 00:04:48.040

Or no, she's just, this is true. She just just Santa, and she's still sitting things like jazz casuals that don't take as much do standards, see. So that's one of the things

00:04:49.600 - 00:04:59.860

I wanted to ask you about. We have a new This is Bob again. We have another singer is out of sight, named Johannes. Named Johannes, and she sings very heavy blue.

00:05:01.440 - 00:05:16.800

A spelling name. Once I get that down to D, u, p, r, E, E, S, I'm sure she wants to get esoteric about it. Why do you have the rehearsal? Just out of curiosity, that's Paul. She

00:05:16.800 - 00:05:28.520

we had one rehearsal with her, and she got something gum trouble, and had to go to a Dennis. We were gonna, she was gonna play with us at Fillmore,

00:05:28.520 - 00:05:38.600

but she can't open her mouth. She's not just getting her out or something like that. Some little thing, maybe she came to an audition and really flashed us, because we didn't expect to find

00:05:38.600 - 00:05:50.680

a good little singer. So you audition for another female vocalist, yeah, three or four, and she was so much better than the rest. But then she also, the next day she came down with this Gulch.

00:05:51.520 - 00:06:05.820

Is this a communal band? We all live in this house. That was Steve, yeah, and stop getting too personal. I mean, you split the money all

00:06:07.320 - 00:06:25.160

speaking, yeah, we just take in all the we take in all the money and and we don't even the individual positions. Don't even get us. We don't get separate salaries. The money's taken in, and instrument payments are made. The rent in the house is

00:06:25.160 - 00:06:38.060

paid for the bills, you know, all the bills are taken care of first, and then there's always, you know, there's some money left over for food, and the food is bought and cooked for the large number of people.

00:06:38.060 - 00:06:49.720

So it's pretty good, 14 people living here. We have, you know, we have movers and a sound match, right? Was that part of the double of the Union trying to operate a communal man? Well,

00:06:54.700 - 00:07:08.940

there was ball there. It's sort of like when we tried to talk philosophies about, you know, living with them. It's just, you know, it's not happening because they're businessmen, and their whole thing is a business thing, you know. And that's what they

00:07:08.940 - 00:07:20.180

kept saying. So every so anytime we'd start to say, Well, look, you know, we just want to do our thing, and we don't want to do cats to hassles, and we're not hassling, you, you know, and all this, they'd say, Well, you know, business is business, and

00:07:20.540 - 00:07:37.100

you know, life is life. And I've been through the Second World War, and it's rough, boy. So we just decided, you know, it's ridiculous to keep fucking around like that. It came down to they were stronger and

00:07:37.100 - 00:07:48.040

obvious that was, this is Bob. It was an obvious compromise. I mean, unfortunately, I mean, we really wanted to play the music, and we really wanted to make a record and play for as many people as we could, as much as we wanted, you know, to, and

00:07:48.040 - 00:07:57.880

not, you know, high school gigs in Stockton. I mean, you know, gigs Weldon dig the band, and they were effectively stopping us from, I'm sure they would have effectively stopped us from, you know, making any kind of record with a established

00:07:57.880 - 00:08:06.840

label. And they also stopped us from a lot of the better gigs. So I'll tell you, Hans, consolation, I signed the loyalty oath when I taught at Berkeley, again, when I taught la state, so

00:08:06.960 - 00:08:16.140

you have to sign one for the unions. Ridiculous. It's the only way they have certain ways of controlling your economic activity. Unless you're content to be a dropout, pure and simple,

00:08:17.160 - 00:08:29.600

they can damn well bring you in the line. If you're any kind of entertainer, you're not a dropout. That's all I was gonna get what motivated you. The last thing was, Bob, by the way, what motivated you to become a communal man? How did

00:08:29.600 - 00:08:46.420

you hit on that? Was it economic necessity, or was there some something else involved? Steve, economic necessity. There were, there were a bunch of people who knew each other, some of whom were forming a band that

00:08:46.420 - 00:09:08.340

was Paul and Bob and Peter. And they were living in a house. Some of them were living in a house, and they played. They worked on this band in that house. Then they then I joined them, and this was with another drummer a long time ago, and

00:09:08.340 - 00:09:24.440

then we moved to another house altogether, because, mainly for the reason of living together to make the band understand each other and work right way, and also, because all these people can live much better if they pull all their money.

00:09:24.680 - 00:09:38.360

So we got kicked out of our rehearsal hall on victory by the police. Why? That's what they said, Yeah. Well, have you been on the road yet in any I mean, not just a night out in stock or something. Would it be in any road trips?

00:09:38.840 - 00:09:48.880

This is George. We played in Sun Valley avenue for two weeks study, and we also played three different shows in Vancouver. Do you take the entire entourage with you? In

00:09:48.880 - 00:10:03.540

the whole household? When you go, just people that Steve, people that helped move, people that chicks that are living with some of his friends, the sound man? Oh, about 12 right now, the sound management manager at the same

00:10:03.540 - 00:10:14.640

game that they work, well, I noticed he, I saw on Ralph Nelson, signed a contract with RCA Victor. And I imagine you have something in their way. What? What happens then, if you put out a record market becomes

00:10:14.640 - 00:10:28.220

a hit? Are you going to continue with the communal start become pop stars and make lots of money and all that you thought about what the problems of maintaining communal existence are going to be. Get involved. Steve, the maintaining

00:10:28.220 - 00:10:45.880

communal existence, to me, doesn't mean living in the same house necessarily. It means understanding and knowing each other and living most of your daily life together. A communal house can be as big as three houses, as much as 10 months

00:10:45.880 - 00:11:04.440

apart, if you have the communal idea in your mind. But, but, and that's what may happen to us. That's me. It may, may end up that we, what we're thinking about now is finding houses for some of the couples alone cottages, so that they can be

00:11:04.620 - 00:11:22.220

away from people at times. Yet, we're going to also have a central house that has this kind of setup. The band room for practicing and sound for taping. We're going to be taping our own. We're going to be, if possible, if we, if we can do

00:11:22.220 - 00:11:34.880

the, get the money, and if, later, if we, for sure we'll have the money, we'll be able to make our own master tapes, so you'll be able to short circuit that studios. What was there anything

00:11:37.520 - 00:11:55.660

in particular that probably do to locate in the heart of the open ghetto. Yeah, the whole house cost 120 $5 we just a friend of ours, you know, was just happened to find the house. And at first he was living there with a couple of

00:11:55.660 - 00:12:07.080

experiments. But then it just so happened, coincidentally, at the very same time that he found the house. We were all sort of homeless. What was happening, and we didn't have any

00:12:08.160 - 00:12:21.680

place to practice, and things were just really shitty. And so then this cat decided, you know, same as James Taylor, he decided he would live here, which really switched things, because, you know, it's

00:12:21.680 - 00:12:37.280

a giant house. It has three floors, you know, and this, this set up here, has really been out of sight, exactly. Yeah, you can, you know, this is a sound room. You can listen to records here and then walk right in there and play, play the stuff.

00:12:37.280 - 00:12:51.580

Or you can tape. Are there any other people with long hair? Are there any other whites with long hair living in this general area? Oh, no, not really. I mean, you know, that's the only hassle about the

00:12:51.580 - 00:13:05.400

neighborhood is that I don't like, I mean, I have, on occasion, walked around, but it's sort of a drag, because vibrations aren't particularly good.

00:13:07.740 - 00:13:19.440

Steve, fortunately, we place fake music. So I know I was going to ask you about that too. We was. We always thought if the rise were going to start, we would put these speakers, which are boom speakers, up on the

00:13:19.440 - 00:13:36.440

roof, and get everybody do the Boogaloo play, cold sweat. It's almost, this is Bob, this neighbors. I mean, with the, you know, people, I mean, it's like, when you go down to the shopping

00:13:36.440 - 00:13:46.420

area, like, that's not very cool, because, you know, communicate these people and they really, you know, I mean, the fact that you're white, just establishes, you know, the relationship right away. But with our close neighbors, we may

00:13:46.420 - 00:13:56.980

able to talk to like people across the street and stuff like that, you know. I mean, there's no problem at all after, you know, a few weeks, we know most of them and their kids come over here and play. You know, it's, it's too bad that you can have

00:13:56.980 - 00:14:07.320

that kind of relationship with everybody, because, I mean, it's the chicks who do most of that. The chicks can't even walk around the neighborhood. What you say, do you find that there's any hostility because you play spade

00:14:07.320 - 00:14:22.220

music, is that resented? No, not, hasn't I mean, just on a couple of occasions, my son Cabrillo, was really uptight. But most of the time, even if they are, even if you know a bunch of spades are at first

00:14:22.220 - 00:14:37.940

uptight because they, you know, if they listen long enough, so they start dancing. Well, we played once it out at Hunter's Point with blue cheer. And it was a digger thing, blue chair or white band, by the

00:14:37.940 - 00:14:52.720

way, yeah, yeah. And it was sponsored by the diggers and the Black Panthers. And, you know, we didn't know what to expect, man, so we showed up for this gig, and there's all these cats, like, about 15, you know, sort of wandering around, man up,

00:14:52.780 - 00:15:07.320

knocking over tables that had punch on them and stuff. You know, everybody was like, blowing weed right in the. Eight man just sitting around, and the Panthers were sort of patrolling the whole thing, like cops, you know. But there weren't any

00:15:07.320 - 00:15:22.640

cops. There was just the Black Panthers. And so we went out to take a ride, and, oh, as we left, cats were throwing oranges at us and stuff, you know, was that before you played, before we played. So we got in the car and went out to get stoned, and

00:15:22.760 - 00:15:35.000

we came back really paranoid, because we figured, let me came to take Lou. Okay, so you came back all paranoid and And would there was music coming out of the thing. So we

00:15:35.000 - 00:15:46.360

figured blue cheer was playing, and they were and, you know, that space didn't really dig it. They were just sort of tolerating it well. Now, I understand they have three, three cats in the band,

00:15:46.360 - 00:16:02.700

and they're on sort of a Jimi Hendrix strip, real super loud volume, guitar, bass and drums. But then they had guitar, bass, drums, organ, and maybe one more guitar, but they were playing White, blue sort and, you know, there was something happening,

00:16:02.700 - 00:16:20.840

so the cats weren't too uptight. But then when we got on, you know, I don't know, it's just we play, you know, black or music, and plus, we have the big Hans, you know, thing happening, and they dug that, and, oh, then a cat came up out of the crowd and

00:16:21.620 - 00:16:35.720

and some really stone cat in a gold suit came up and started singing funky Broadway and lamb, 1000 dances, you know, we're backing him up. And he took off his coat, didn't skate and stuff. That's it. This, Steve, they could dance. That

00:16:35.720 - 00:16:46.060

was a trip. After, yeah, like three quarters of the night, they finally could dance, yeah, because the funk, you know, his fault, the funk was there, and the shingling beat, whatever was there, and they dug on it,

00:16:46.480 - 00:17:04.620

whereas they can't, you know, they don't. They don't like it. Just straight rhythm, straight, straight rhythm and volume. They don't dig putting your music together, do you consciously try and imitate

00:17:04.620 - 00:17:17.340

black artists? This is Bob. This black artists. Well, should I say the rhythm blues artist, which has been black? I mean, it's kind of the only, as far as I can see, the only, you know. So I say popular art form has

00:17:17.340 - 00:17:31.460

been continuous for, you know, couple decades, and that's it has a very developed technique. And the heaviest musicians are in there, I mean, that are playing pop music, and that's the reason, you know, we're trying to they have far more

00:17:31.460 - 00:17:44.140

developed rhythmic thing going and just heavy technique that it's very good to emulate. Yes, I recall. It's not like, you know, it's true a lot of the tunes, you know, we do other people's tunes, and it's for

00:17:44.140 - 00:17:56.500

the, you know, for this album and stuff, or for the recording we're gonna, you know, we're working up originals now, but we never seem to be able to get into that too much before, because we were afraid, you know, it's like originals are

00:17:56.500 - 00:18:06.360

really a status thing, you know, you've got to have them, or you're not different, man, you Know. So catch this right originals, and they're pretty simple and they, but they might, they might be pretty well polished too, you know, like,

00:18:06.420 - 00:18:19.200

I'm speaking of a number of San Francisco, yeah, yeah. In fact, you know, some of their songs are pretty are, you know, pretty well thought out, pretty well arranged. But let's see what was I thinking?

00:18:20.040 - 00:18:34.040

You were saying that you were doing mostly other people. Oh, yeah, we were doing mostly other people's stuff. And we are now. And, I mean, you know, we plus our originals, but we It isn't like a direct copy,

00:18:34.100 - 00:18:49.180

because it's always gets that, you know, zone shading somehow, you know, although what we're trying, what we're trying, what we're going for now is super heavy, tasteful arrangements where everything works like cold sweat by James Brown, wherever

00:18:49.180 - 00:19:01.860

you know, and where everything's functional man and you know, and far out rhythmically. But you know, it's not. There isn't going to be that much lengthy improvisation. It's going to be all much more. And see when Johannes gets back, we'll have

00:19:01.860 - 00:19:10.860

really heavy singing too. And so then, you know, we'll get that happening, Paul, when you sing, you try and sound black. Or, do you try? Or doesn't enter your

00:19:12.060 - 00:19:26.780

thinking, yeah, you could, I could. You could say, I try to sound black. Or, I mean, you pronounce words late, yeah. Oh yeah, definitely. In fact, I mean, a lot, lot of the folk rock bands or white blues bands were a white blues band. But I

00:19:26.780 - 00:19:43.720

mean the other cats that are the sound whiter do the same thing, but it's like, it's really, you know, you have to get down in it and sort of, you know, it's figure it out, analyze it in detail. Because, you know, what makes a voice like Holland wolf

00:19:43.720 - 00:19:54.640

or like Sam and Dave? It's, you know, the one that, what the disadvantage I have is that these cats have sung that since they were little kids. That's gonna ask you. Don't you think that it

00:19:54.640 - 00:20:08.760

kind of is disadvantageous for a white singer to try and sound black? Oh. Are, I don't know how. There just isn't any other way to do it with the music. I mean, if you just, if I just sang white

00:20:09.000 - 00:20:18.660

with the funky stuff we do, it would sound pretty bad. Well, I'd sign to my blue pill about that. And he said, Sure, I can say blows. But when I, when I have a line, that one word is a go and

00:20:18.660 - 00:20:31.700

the other word is floor, I can have the floor. I don't say flow, because, even though that would keep their arm, I don't care about the rhyme. Yeah, oh, I don't go to that extent. But it's sort of like

00:20:33.500 - 00:20:48.280

it's just funky here, you know, I mean, the way the cats sing and the way they talk fits the tune, and so, I mean, it isn't that you go to extreme lengths to sound, you know, like a 40 year old spade cat, but you just it doesn't work unless you get

00:20:48.280 - 00:21:00.220

into that you want to harm another singing, yeah, I don't, I don't even think, yeah, I want to fit the singing in with the with the with the feeling of the tune, whether it's mellow, whether it's uptight, whether it's, you know, slow, or what

00:21:00.280 - 00:21:14.160

you Got to do it somehow. And the best, you know, I mean, I don't sound like, you know, I don't sound exactly like a spade singer. So what comes out is sort of, you know, my own trip, in a way. And then a lot of the stuff in it is my own trip. But

00:21:14.160 - 00:21:27.560

it's just that that's just sort of helps the singing to ease in with the dressing. Steve thing is how wolf has sung and played guitar on streets and things in clubs and gotten blast drunk and whiskey burned out

00:21:27.560 - 00:21:46.300

voice for however long he's lived, 60 years, 55 of them. So Paul is not gonna be able to have the voice, but yet, the trips that Howell wolf has gone through in his 55 years of life are so heavy and painful that that's the music. Kees singing,

00:21:46.300 - 00:21:55.900

and Sam and Dave are singing from gospel from church. They're singing from little kids from church. And they're singing about trips they've gone through, and they're, you know, they've gone through a lot too, and they're and it's painful

00:21:55.900 - 00:22:09.540

things. And so the music is written, the music, the idea, the music, and all the punch and everything, all the group things that we dig about it are just all this, all this high emotion. And so you a white singer, when he sings from his own personal

00:22:09.540 - 00:22:24.730

experience and feelings, and he sings in his own voice, he doesn't have any experience, much experience, he doesn't have any spade experience, not black, and it doesn't fit. And so you get Ian Whitcomb, which is I just, this one person that

00:22:27.910 - 00:22:34.570

you know high heel sneakers. It was supposed to be a space. It was nice high heel thinkers, but it was, I guess you know that

00:22:34.570 - 00:22:53.560

Ian of Ian and Julia, seems like right now, with in copying these people, you know, you're emulating somebody who, you know, certainly, you're picking up a lot of their ethnic mannerisms and things like this,

00:22:53.560 - 00:23:04.200

but you're also picking up an extremely Weldon, you know, technique that doesn't, doesn't happen anyplace else. I mean, you know, you really need to emulate somebody for a while. I mean, you know, in order to, you know, develop some kind of chops

00:23:04.320 - 00:23:15.360

in some kind of spot. I mean, yeah, everybody starts almost imitating somebody else. What actually, this fall, it's not, in my case, like I can't really attribute my organ playing to any one person,

00:23:15.360 - 00:23:27.620

and I really can't attribute my singing to any one person, because I've heard so many different styles. And somebody like, especially singing styles that I get, you know, I might get a little something from this, a little something for

00:23:27.620 - 00:23:38.840

this by the time, once you've done it enough, something just starts coming out that's, you know, maybe spade sounding, although I'm white, but it's not like, it's not an emulation of Wilson Pickett

00:23:39.080 - 00:23:51.160

mall, still, overall, totally closer to Stevie Wonder than Esther Frank Tara, right? Oh, definitely, you talked about improvisation before, and you seem to be going

00:23:51.160 - 00:24:00.700

counter to the other trend I've detected that is what most of the dancing be putting along improvised solos. What's the reason behind your decision not to do that? You want to remain a dance man? Or what

00:24:02.860 - 00:24:21.680

do interested when we'd rather play more songs and have more more song ideas, rhythm ideas, coming through and flashing people's heads. If they, if they're dancing and they've got a rhythm, they dig, they dig the groove, then it's, it's, you can

00:24:21.680 - 00:24:32.900

hold it for a while, but there's a time to take them somewhere else, and you're leading the people. I mean, they're out there waiting for you to do something. Turn, just trip them out, you know. And if you keep flashing, if when they don't

00:24:32.900 - 00:24:46.300

expect it, but yet, you know, they're almost in the point, but they don't know it's, you really work with the audience. You turn their heads around again and make them do something else. Tara, Oh, yeah. Just turns them, keeps them moving and and you

00:24:46.300 - 00:24:56.200

move them all the way through the set. At the end of the set, they fall down. That's the that's the idea you get more satisfaction of that. Oh, we're not playing for ourselves mainly. We're playing for them

00:24:56.200 - 00:25:13.620

mainly. And so we try to understand what they're what they want do. They don't really I mean, long solos, wow, this fall, Yep, see with the Fillmore, the Avalon. The Avalon started out with a few Negro artists, you know, and then

00:25:13.620 - 00:25:29.420

gradually you don't see them there very often. On the other hand, Bill Graham has moved in that direction, definitely with Sam and Dave, you know, Otis Redding. And when I saw Otis Redding at Fillmore, and I'd seen, you know, most of I'd seen

00:25:29.420 - 00:25:46.480

Butterfield there, the who we played with, the who, you know, people like that, or even the Yardbirds, you know, I'd seen the Yardbirds live there, but nobody did it to them like Otis. I mean, you know, I don't care, you know, whether they were

00:25:46.480 - 00:25:58.060

little chicks with, you know, from suburbia that don't know anything there. They were just sitting there, coming for the first time. It didn't matter. The whole fucking audience just exploded when Otis hit the stage, and for the whole time he

00:25:58.060 - 00:26:09.540

was up there. Man, they were just insane. Did they dance? Oh, they dance that. If, you know, some of them were just too excited to conventionally dance, so they just flipped, man, and we're just yelling and screaming, and the cat was and

00:26:09.840 - 00:26:22.100

he just, you know, he just keeps building. And when you think that he's that he's got to stop, because it's, you know, it's not humanly possible to get any higher than that, the cat just smashes you with a couple more man, you know, the whole, the

00:26:22.100 - 00:26:36.620

whole place, which is just torn apart by the cat, and it's, that's, that's the sort of trip that we're trying, that we're, you know, trying to get happening a show that turns you on. You don't have to come stoned on acid, so that you can

00:26:36.620 - 00:26:50.740

sit back and trip on an hour and a half long solo because you're stoned on acid, because we, I mean, we're not really, we're not playing for the masses of kids who are still, who are, you know, stoning it with acid and going to the film or the Avalon

00:26:50.740 - 00:27:02.580

and just lying back and stupor and, you know, because when you're in that state, man, you can turn on a transistor radio and listen to it for hours and hours and hours and trip on all kinds of things. But that's not, that's not the trip. We're

00:27:04.140 - 00:27:22.340

playing for people so Paul, we're playing for people who, who dig, not freaky things. But, I mean, we do do some pretty freaky things, but coordinated together, musical freaky things. You see the tram with these other people seems to be, you

00:27:22.340 - 00:27:37.820

know, getting so far out that ice, you know, you had, it's like, I wonder where the line is between music and noise. Some names please here, Jimi Hendrix, The Who, and probably half a dozen other

00:27:37.820 - 00:27:49.240

bands that are going on the trip, you know, maybe cream, although I've heard real good reports about them. Someone, yeah, I didn't see them, but a bunch of people went to see them, and they said, you know, that they really had their thing

00:27:49.240 - 00:28:01.980

down. And, I mean, I still think the art hurts, because, you know, they've always, whenever I seen them, they've always had their thing down. And even now with Jimmy Page, is their lead guitarist. Now I didn't see them either. We played a gig with

00:28:01.980 - 00:28:12.180

them. I saw that was Steve there. They're fantastic. They're right underneath the line there. They draw you into the freaky, but then they come back lamb into redness, driving Bob.

00:28:12.180 - 00:28:23.720

Thing about the yard boards is they have form, and they really do have arrangements. I mean, we're not talking about doing a thing much different from them, in a sense, because I'm wearing different style, but they are heavily arranged, man, doesn't

00:28:23.720 - 00:28:34.640

that too? Yeah, you know. And the thing about, the thing about, you have to be, you have to be an amazingly good soloist to be able to carry a solo for, you know, 64 majors or so, and still have form all over the whole solo, you know. I mean,

00:28:34.640 - 00:28:43.960

you know, to remember the beginning of the end, you have to be very, you know, very, very, very qualified. And I just don't think that well being for ourselves. I mean, I don't think we are that qualified now, you know, and you know that's built

00:28:43.960 - 00:28:54.160

to communicate with the rest of the band amazingly well. I mean, that's happening, but it's not to the point where we feel qualified take a really long so then I take a jab that influenced you thinking

00:28:54.160 - 00:29:10.740

musically too much. Or would I be wrong, Paul, it has mine, I know, and to an extent, Bob's, because we used to play when, I mean, I've, you know, I played piano since I was six, and I took classical piano until I was 17 or 18, and

00:29:10.740 - 00:29:22.520

then when I went on to college, I majored in piano. But that lasted five weeks because I realized, you know, that all this other time I had just been sort of goofing off, and now they were saying, Look, you know, if you're going to be a

00:29:23.300 - 00:29:36.620

piano major, you've got to, you know, man, it's freaked me out, so I couldn't take that. But Bob and I used to play in the, you know, in a trio. I had a trio that I, you know, would have different bass players and drummers in, and Bob just

00:29:36.620 - 00:29:51.400

happened to be one of them. George, too, played, yeah, what am I talking about? Of course, George has played in lots of jazz. And jazz, see, jazz and rhythm and blues are pretty close. In a lot of yeah, they shake off, yeah. I mean, Elvin

00:29:51.400 - 00:30:03.360

Jones has played on many, many rhythms, yeah, on many rhythm blues records. Oh yeah, Coltrane. And then then, of course, then you have somebody like the jazz Crusaders. Oh. Of Felder. I mean, you know, it's just by Felder's tone, you can

00:30:03.480 - 00:30:20.660

tell, you know, he's got that vibrato, that junior Walker thing down, yeah, and I, you know, I've we played jazz. I mean, I never really got into a heavy, non commercial jazz trip because we were playing, you know, wedding receptions and

00:30:20.660 - 00:30:31.460

stuff like that to make bread, man. But we also, you know, got into, you know, mozalison bags and stuff like that. Oh, Horace silver, Kees, we used to do too. Who did you like to who

00:30:44.500 - 00:31:05.280

we were talking about jazz, yeah, right, jazz influence. And when we, when we first got this thing happening, I was playing a far feasible compact organ, which is, you know, little plastic Davies that you unfold like out of a suitcase. And, I

00:31:05.280 - 00:31:21.080

mean, it's early days, we were running through such fantastic amplifiers as magnet box, Magneto, Weldon, stuff like that. And it just sounded, it sort of sounded like a, oh, you know, I've kind of country Joe the fish use that type of sound.

00:31:21.080 - 00:31:34.220

And a lot of groups have it's sort of, you know, for Teenies, and it just didn't make it for what we were trying to do, right? Okay, so, I mean, but even then, I took lots of solos because I could do it, because I'd been doing it for a long

00:31:34.220 - 00:31:55.180

time. I took lots of solos in those days, even on this AX happening. I don't, I can't, let's play back and see and but then, I mean, after about a year and a half of this,

00:31:55.180 - 00:32:16.620

of that shitty AX, we got it. We made enough money somehow, I guess was, yeah, we went down to Sherman clay and and got a b3 with a Leslie and a Hammond speaker. And so then, at that point, then I, you know, I was still taking the same number of

00:32:16.620 - 00:32:30.620

solos, and it was sort of like it was different for other cats, other groups, because most rock groups, if they had an organist, he was just, you know, chorus. But in our group, you know, it was more like, it was more like an organ trio with guitars, you

00:32:30.620 - 00:32:39.680

know. And what we're doing now is trying to balance it out more. So, you know, there's still going to be organ solos, but there's going to be guitar solos and eventually, horns. Yeah, I noticed

00:32:40.220 - 00:32:56.140

a number of bands seem to be going direction of adding horns. Yeah, that too, but I can't remember, yeah, this is Paul again. I The other day, we were over at somebody's house, and they were playing kmpx, and all of a sudden this

00:32:56.140 - 00:33:06.840

tune came on with this funky bass line and a ham and organ, you know, and stuff like that. And all of a sudden somebody said, Hey, isn't that, you know? I said, Wait a minute. We don't have anything out that's on the air. We don't have any nobody's

00:33:06.840 - 00:33:19.740

playing our stuff. And I kept listening for a minute. I thought it was us too. But then I realized we've never played that tune. And it was then when at the end of the thing, they said, you know, it's electric flagging, yeah, man. I mean, you

00:33:19.740 - 00:33:33.800

know, it's very it was very close, it seemed to a lot of the things that we do, although history at all. Yet, history is my of the band. That's Mike, the yogurt eater.

00:33:35.780 - 00:33:52.420

We talked about Willie. Oh no, there's no sense to bring that. Oh, but it's colorful. When you were well, you still listen to jazz now, and if so, who do you like?

00:33:54.100 - 00:34:06.420

Just George. We listen to some jazz, but mainly we listen to James Brown or Santa Davies or Lou court. Lou court is that for enjoyment purposes or for learning? Oh, I

00:34:06.420 - 00:34:17.040

mean, you know, it's funky and we dig it, but it's also what we play. So we Steve, what you enjoy is what you learn. Okay, true,

00:34:20.340 - 00:34:31.160

yeah, well, what rodeo into going into this area rather than staying in jazz? And some of you were motivated.

00:34:32.540 - 00:34:45.160

Well, I don't know when I first did it, so I thought it was, I did it for the Brahms, and I really didn't have much respect for the scene. I mean, you know, I mean, you know, I mean, like, I, you know, I, I got this AX, and I came down, I played it.

00:34:45.160 - 00:34:55.780

And, I mean, I didn't play. I really played badly, you know, because I wasn't into it. But the more I started, yeah, and I, you know, got this, like, a bass, and I used to run and do anything I couldn't play these fraternity gigs. And they like

00:34:55.780 - 00:35:07.800

to play rock and roll. So I do that for a while, you know, because otherwise we'd never work. And because I found out more and more that that wasn't even happening, and then I realized that, I mean, I started listening to it. There's so much

00:35:07.800 - 00:35:17.640

to it. I mean, you know, it sort of took a while for me to change my attitude about it, but there's just so much into it. If you listen to it, and if you have a span of attention, Miss Paul, you're talking about rhythm, yeah, right.

00:35:19.140 - 00:35:45.940

I'll change your mind. Can I I was, when I was doing that jazz, commercial jazz trio thing, I was like, 16 and 17. You know, I'm still the youngest in the group, but, of course, but i Let's see. Oh yeah, okay,

00:35:46.000 - 00:35:59.620

okay. In that bag, we were like playing these wedding receptions, you know, Polish weddings, Italian weddings, polkas, man these, you know, fat women would come up and embrace you and, Oh, you're wonderful, you know. And it was just a

00:35:59.620 - 00:36:13.140

drag. I didn't care if they dug us or not. And, oh, Arthur Murray used to play for Arthur Murray dance days, and so I was it was really bumming me, because there were other cats my age that were in surf bands or something, you know, and

00:36:13.140 - 00:36:28.160

everything, all the peers dug them. So it was like, you know, that none of my peers dug what I was doing, except the cats that understood, because they were doing the same thing. So then, oh, it all happened. It all happened for me. Anyway, when I

00:36:28.160 - 00:36:44.080

was working at this summer camp and as a dishwasher up in Yosemite, Bob in the drummer of our group, the little trio at the time, was working out there with me, and then Bob came up to replace them. So we started out the stones had just come out,

00:36:44.080 - 00:37:00.540

and the Beatles that had previously come out, of course, but the stones had just come out. And everybody was really flashed about the stones. So they started. They were having dances, and Bob and Elliot Josie was the drummer there. And I

00:37:00.540 - 00:37:16.260

started playing stuff like Little Red Rooster and stuff with piano, upright bass, drums and harmonica. And I was singing into this army surplus mic, you know, play harmonica with one hand and piano with the other hand. And we were doing stuff

00:37:16.260 - 00:37:25.880

like, oh, down home girl, all the stones too, and which they, in turn, had gotten American blue artists. Yeah. Right. I mean, you know, we were at first, at that stage, we

00:37:25.880 - 00:37:40.360

hadn't even formed any group at all, and we were just, you know, fucking around with that. And then we formed this very temporary group called Captain America and the Legion of SuperHeroes, and we played one fraternity gig with an upside

00:37:40.360 - 00:37:55.600

down, American flag behind this and all this shit. And I had the parfeas of them. And we did some tunes, like Big Boy Pete. Oh yeah. Everybody had electric stuff by then. But that lasted like one gig. And then we then we heard that the marbles had

00:37:55.600 - 00:38:09.180

broken up. The marbles were one of the first family, the first bands in the family dog scene over the airplane, the Charles and shit like that. They played, you know, long Charles Hall and Peter and Steve, plus a bunch of other cats were in that group.

00:38:09.600 - 00:38:21.560

And so then we heard the marbles. Bob said, oh, you know. He says, hey, you know, we can try out with these couple cats that used to be in the Jefferson Airplane. Oh, yeah, Jefferson Airplane, you know. And they were real, you know, they were

00:38:21.560 - 00:38:32.420

just starting out there. And so I was sort of flashed by that. But then it turned out that it was, wasn't the airplane, it was the Marvel, but that was, you know, just about as good. So then, you know, Bob and I went over to this house, and there

00:38:32.780 - 00:38:46.780

was this cat named Ted playing drums, and Peter Shapiro Tara, and so it was Bob and Ted Pete and I were the first members of the loading zone. And that first day was such a flash. We just sort of flashed all of us flashed each other because we

00:38:46.780 - 00:39:06.060

fit together and we could play, you know. So within, I think, two weeks, we were in fantasy studios, auditioning with with a rock version of, if you live by Mo's Allison and parchment farm and some other tune that that was an original or something.

00:39:06.360 - 00:39:20.220

And, you know, they just said, Bad voices, yeah, Max and whatever, Max was the one who's coming down on us, you know, he just said, I'm not, you know, I don't even want to stay around here to

00:39:20.220 - 00:39:30.200

record this shit. So that's sort of, you know, showed us where we were. Of, you know, showed us where we were at, sort of there was something, but where they were at, or something. No, you know, they give free auditions to all these bands, and you set

00:39:30.200 - 00:39:44.320

up a date, and then you come in, you play your tunes, and they listen, oh, now they get into it much more. They're doing a lot rhythm blues. I mean, they always, yeah, yeah. They do a lot of, you know, they release

00:39:44.320 - 00:39:55.900

on in, you know, unheard of small labels, and Capitola like that. They do stuff for rodeo Martin. But while we were in there, it was really funny. There was a, there was some, you know, 3040, year old Spain organ player who was, you know, really

00:39:55.900 - 00:40:07.260

into that fun fact, you know how that's a real tote, you know, tight scene anyway, and closed, you know, and he. Was just standing back there in the back listening and looking so paternal. I think I never he wasn't, you know, that wasn't

00:40:07.260 - 00:40:16.740

the organ player there. That was Johnny Taylor, yeah, little Johnny Tara was just sort of standing back there, man, like this. He's just sort of shaking his

00:40:18.840 - 00:40:31.280

head. I mean, it didn't make it for him, obviously. And it's, you know, what we were doing then is nowhere near at all what we're doing now. I mean, that was just the very beginning thing. And

00:40:31.280 - 00:40:43.240

what happened then was we started playing at the open theater up on college, you know, it was like one of the first psychedelo joints in Berkeley with a light show. And we were playing in the dark. It was really spooky. And then, so we

00:40:43.240 - 00:40:55.600

played there for a while. And then the open theater had a part in the trips Festival at Longshoreman's Hall. And so they said, you know, you want to play Longshoreman's Hall? We said, yeah, what's that? Then we showed up, man, we were supposed

00:40:55.600 - 00:41:06.480

to show up at 1030 because that's when we were going on 1130 we showed up. There was this huge hall. There were about, you know, 400 people out in front, mashing against the doors, trying to get in. And the cops were all standing there.

00:41:06.480 - 00:41:21.320

All these San Francisco he were just sort of, what's happening? What are all these people doing here? I've never seen him. What is this? You know, they were just freaked. And so we carried all our we had to carry all our axes through 4000 5000 people up

00:41:21.320 - 00:41:35.360

to the stage and sweating and set up our stuff, and they've been sitting there, bored, you know, for two and a half hours with with acid heads up there, mumbling and stuff, I you know, and everybody was saying, what's happening? We want to actually,

00:41:35.600 - 00:41:49.420

you know, the loading zone we start playing, you know, we weren't that good, but in our ants just weren't caring for that. Hans, you know, but they didn't care. It was music, man, and they just flipped and everybody started

00:41:50.800 - 00:42:03.600

dancing. Why is it taking so long in the loading zone to get that habit? That was coincidence. It was goofy. I mean, it was goofy because they needed it so bad that we had a lot of work to do. I mean, you know, we still have a lot of

00:42:03.600 - 00:42:18.660

work to do, but, I mean, at that time, I usually didn't have a nationally marketable product. Don't forget, also, there was many sort of unique policies. For a while, last spring, we went on a total nonprofit basis

00:42:18.960 - 00:42:33.680

for wearing second, frankly, Kees and all those things. You know, this is a scene where, to a large extent, the image or the PR rap or that determines, quote, success, unquote, we've never gone in for that. And I think that explains what large

00:42:33.680 - 00:42:45.880

extent you were playing three gigs in, like the parking Oh, yeah, no, I got but, you know, we just never went in for the freaky psychedelo, interesting that much. We kind of do it as a

00:42:45.940 - 00:43:00.360

joke. Festival things with flags. Oh yeah, this Paul they Yeah. I mean, we're always written up, like in Time Magazine, you know, they say, you know, Jefferson Airplane, grateful, dead Quicksilver, big brother in the

00:43:00.360 - 00:43:14.280

loading zone, you know, as sort of your San Francisco sound packet. And it's the only reason we're there is because we played the film war, and we played at the original church festival. And somehow, we're, you know, we're really, we're associated

00:43:14.280 - 00:43:29.060

with San Francisco sound, which, you know, those bands are somewhat like it, but we're not that way. You know, we don't, we don't really play folk rock or rock blues or anything like that. I mean, we're, you know, on a funkier trip. And, yeah,

00:43:29.180 - 00:43:43.900

we're always and that's why, you know, RCA Victor signed us without, you know, from what I heard, they never really heard us much, but they signed us. Oh, yeah, the word is definitely out there millions of cats with contracts running

00:43:43.900 - 00:43:54.460

around the underbrush. Now I want to catch it. Yeah, that's yeah, oh yeah. We're from San Francisco. We're on the real trips festival. Our name has been in all the magazines and yeah, I mean, I don't think any San Francisco

00:43:54.520 - 00:44:08.760

band that a big company signed yet has failed to make money. So that's we got a real good contract. Steve, this, this has to do with what Mike, what Paul was talking about before, about originals when we were first, when they

00:44:08.760 - 00:44:20.400

were first playing, I was they were playing, and they were trying to write originals, originals, obviously, we didn't sound good to them even. And, you know, it, rather than just pretend, rather than just put together some, a bunch of

00:44:20.400 - 00:44:33.980

original material that, of course, is original because you original because you voted yourself and just become, you know, come out, play, get on a record, movie, great and and be, be what you are, right there. We just kept working on our musical

00:44:35.240 - 00:44:50.500

ability to come out with originals. I mean, it's my own opinion is there, they have a much higher level of specification and usable content. And most of the what's original. There is no such thing as a real original. It's, you

00:44:50.500 - 00:44:59.920

can start hashing out sort of food grade stuff out of your brain. Or there's a lot of cats who take, I got rhythm changes calling original because it's a status and.

00:45:00.000 - 00:45:11.580

Will happen? Well, yeah, I think it's, it's far more valid musically in terms of what you learn, in terms of performance, everything, if you call it coffee or whatever, if you use other material that is difficult, sophisticated. I

00:45:11.580 - 00:45:20.760

mean, we have something happening in it. I mean, how many bands around here, Brahms, originality, could do James Brown shorts? I noticed that the generations out there doing James Brown

00:45:20.880 - 00:45:33.980

things. Yeah, this bob is strange out there, there. The thing is, I was just kind of so connected with that, because they're all

00:45:34.160 - 00:45:49.900

time jazz buddies of ours, the horn players in that band. And the thing is funny to me is we're, before we even got on this trip, we're all fairly you know, we've been in music for quite some time. I mean, you know, George and I have been in

00:45:49.900 - 00:46:03.060

jazz, and we played fast music for just about five years, you know. And Paul was an excellent pianist, yeah. And the thing is, I sometimes wonder why we decided to work on it so long before doing originals, when a lot of these concepts came in,

00:46:03.060 - 00:46:13.200

you find people with, you know, these amazingly short backgrounds. And I play nothing but folk music, you know, which is, you know, structurally not very complicated. I mean, it's mostly the message person. This is part of the San Francisco

00:46:13.200 - 00:46:22.340

trip. So, I mean, their music is, I think, of course, lesson transcendental in one way, because it's concerned with messages. And they have things to do with now. And I mean, they're kind of, you know, the, you know, pied pipers of this

00:46:22.340 - 00:46:34.400

little trip. But in the that thing, I mean, they're the words are extremely important, but I mean it awfully out of date in five years, you know. And the thing is, I music is less attached to message than it is to musical message, I think, has

00:46:34.400 - 00:46:43.840

more. There seems to be a definitive schism between the people who want to play a message and those who don't. Quicksilver messenger service doesn't want to either. They said, pretty much the same

00:46:43.840 - 00:46:57.220

thing. Music is the message. Mike, that's what I say. You know, it's like, I mean, really are lyrics a message is a sound message. I mean, it strikes me. I

00:47:09.840 - 00:47:21.020

like, here, okay, Mike's going on about the message is the music, right? Well, what I was saying is that the message equals lyrics. Then I say that doesn't really involve music that much, because

00:47:21.020 - 00:47:35.180

if you have a really simple background and quote, message, lyrics, unquote, then you might as well just write it down on a piece of paper, because the music is what you're doing, and just because it doesn't involve words and doesn't contain a

00:47:35.180 - 00:47:49.480

message and Outlook, emotional opinion, some people like Dylan, for instance, although, like, he wasn't an extremely experienced musician, was such a inherently talented musician, they did very well with, you know, combining,

00:47:49.960 - 00:48:01.860

you know, his words primarily the most important thing with the music. I mean, music made some sense with the words, but it was, you know, 90% words and 10% music. But I don't think that most of the other, you know, psychic message bands,

00:48:01.860 - 00:48:13.500

whatever there, did half as well. I mean, you know, even with their big organizations and five guitars and such, and combining music with some kind of a, you know, contemporary message, which was their trip

00:48:14.520 - 00:48:30.740

to Dylan. Was Dylan one of the people who made it possible for you to go into popular music in the sense that they made it that's why I say respectable for you to play it. You mentioned Beatrice and stones earlier, wondering there was a time when

00:48:31.040 - 00:48:42.820

jazz musicians would like, as you all know, look down. I know is a popular music and wouldn't have any part of it. And obviously something has changed. And I wonder, you know what, what it is, I might say for one day, popular music has changed.

00:48:42.820 - 00:49:00.160

Yeah, I know rhythm and blues, if you go back four or five years ago, was funky, but all the drama was doing. Bass lines were pretty simple and but now you look, right now you look at rhythm and blues, and especially in the area of the rhythm Welch,

00:49:00.160 - 00:49:17.700

except for a few jazz drummers like Tony Williams. As far as the bass is concerned, really out of sight current in the blues bass players, party clubs, anything happening in jazz now, in terms of bass playing, I think,

00:49:19.920 - 00:49:39.560

my opinion, holiday, I disagree, just in terms of, in other words, it's just to me and her was the bass and the drums are so important in terms of the sound. I mean, in many, many tunes, the bass is the tune, and I just think it's

00:49:39.560 - 00:49:54.940

doing more, I mean, maybe not in terms of chops, but at least overtly, it's very powerful. This is Bob, I think you know this rhythmically trip that he's talking about to me. It's like, you know that same, you know,

00:49:55.120 - 00:50:06.000

the same licks were happening in jazz, and they are now. I mean, you know, and even far more complicated licks that I've heard. You know. And the thing is, really loses. It's almost become like orchestrated jazz. And there's overall, like, I

00:50:06.000 - 00:50:14.820

keep talking about overall form, there's overall form with the rhythmic things, and they're very, very complicated rhythm things with then, you know, overall it's very, very complicated, but it's very, you know, carefully, carefully

00:50:14.820 - 00:50:32.060

arranged, you know, to build tension and such. Whereas in jazz, these things happen, but some with only a few artists, I find that they built the way they do it together. It's all you could it's almost, it's almost like a classic

00:50:32.060 - 00:50:45.520

composer in a symphony orchestra. It's almost that way, because you have a cat that writes the tune and either he arranges it or someone does, and then you have excellent musicians to carry out the Kees On other words, especially like

00:50:45.520 - 00:51:03.420

the temptations on the latest they're the very latest stuff. They're out of water soul. It's just amazing what they do. I mean, the voices for just alone are very complicated. Chorus lead things. Then you put on top of that, you know, a funky group

00:51:03.480 - 00:51:20.160

with, you know, funky blades player, Funky Drummer with the Detroit, Detroit Symphony string section. And then on top of that, you know, it's, but it's never busy. I mean, the, you know, the Grateful Dead or the Jefferson Airplane are busier

00:51:20.160 - 00:51:34.640

when they go off on these improvised things much busier than these cats, although these cats are doing much more, it's just that it's all, it's all fit in by the master plan, you know, so that all and so the cats just and it, I mean, you can get into

00:51:34.640 - 00:51:46.120

that. I mean, it's not at first, you know, when we first started going on this arranged, heavy, raging trip, you know, people were saying, Well, when we lose some spontaneity and stuff like that, and therefore, you know, lose excitement. No, you don't.

00:51:46.120 - 00:51:57.280

Obviously, by looking at cats like Ohta spreading a Salmon Day, because they're really heavily arranged, and yet, man, just knock you down. Mike speaking, I just wanna say, this gets into an area where I

00:51:57.280 - 00:52:11.520

think we, I don't know, I see something developing. So that is, do that is pretty much with the space. This Rhythm and Blues thing is a tightly arranged thing, although all the Kees that are playing really fine chops, but I see something at

00:52:11.520 - 00:52:24.140

least a certain gig you're playing live, we're at it out of these rhythm and blues chops. We also have an improvisational thing that happens which is different. It's kind of improvisation, a little bit blues. And this gets better and

00:52:24.140 - 00:52:36.500

better the more that you're able to play more and more difficult arrangements begin with. Because just working on the theory of chops, the Mort you're, in other words, if you work, if you can play an arrangement that is really done in depth and really

00:52:36.500 - 00:52:52.360

works. And then when that's the musicians head, he feels that way. He has his bag, more or less, so that when he then goes on to do improvisational thing, and he's, I think, I don't know. In other words, I think by doing heavily arranged things and also

00:52:52.420 - 00:53:06.420

at same time doing propositional things, you can eventually get an improvisational rhythm. Years ago, yeah, it's not quite the same. Well, a big band, right? Well, I

00:53:06.420 - 00:53:20.580

see this developing in this funk bag. More here, I don't know. Ray Charles Dance was pretty funky. Oh yeah, when there were 10 white people in the Oakland Auditorium, 2000 blacks.

00:53:20.580 - 00:53:35.000

Yeah? Jay, blocks, yeah, where that niche that Ray Charles vacated? Yeah, with Ray Charles nine, really funky, but it was, it was really fun.

00:53:35.600 - 00:53:54.460

Stage performances have changed. What I'm talking about was when he had the small band and and played dances like play the film auditorium when you couldn't get 10 students. Well, let me get back to the thing about jazz for a minute. If you had your

00:53:54.460 - 00:54:03.000

choice, you know, playing any kind of jazz you wanted, making on commercial, commercial terms, doing that or playing what you're playing now, would you still choose to be in this kind of

00:54:03.060 - 00:54:21.680

like group? George, yes. I mean, this fall, it's funny, we use, I mean, we just like the, just like in rhythm blues are using, you know, pretty far out chords, jazz chords, but with, you know, with funk

00:54:21.680 - 00:54:37.700

context, more. I mean, you know, like the jazz Crusaders were more on the jazzy side, and yet they were funky, Horace, silver, funky, but cannonball, cannibal, Adderley, you know, that type of stuff. I mean, we have that, a lot of that in us, and so do the

00:54:37.700 - 00:54:49.240

temptations. And so do you know the cats that play in the band, because they played us. They used to play stuff like that, cats that are 30 years old and playing James Brown, or 25 years old or whatever. And so it's all, you know, sort of merge,

00:54:49.540 - 00:55:06.060

merges together. But it's just the thing that the black cats have always had, as far as I'm concerned, and the white cats have always been trying to. At it or something, do their sort of, their own thing, you know. But it, I don't know it's, it's

00:55:06.060 - 00:55:23.960

like, because of the differences in experiences and environment, you get one, it's much, that's much more you can use the term. So I don't like to, because it's just been, you know, blown out finance, but it's really true, emotional or soulful or

00:55:23.960 - 00:55:37.820

whatever. I mean, the cats really lay it in there. And some white cats do that. I mean, in fact, the Beatles, which, you know, who didn't play, really play rhythm and blues, were, you know, up until when they just quit, extremely soulful cats,

00:55:38.120 - 00:55:50.020

you know, and they really had a really, you know, emotional, direct thing happening, where they so they made you think that you could, like, realize yourself playing this kind of music, not necessarily meant to

00:55:50.020 - 00:56:03.300

play jazz and realize yourself, yeah, but it's more like, I just didn't I see being that was younger and in this, you know, the thing, I mean, I don't know what happened to everybody's head three, four years ago, when

00:56:03.300 - 00:56:19.620

something happened. I mean, something changed. It's not like, I mean, I thought, I thought I was a hippie two years ago. I don't think so anymore. I mean, I don't, you know, I just don't. The term doesn't fit. Why not? In general, it does. I

00:56:19.620 - 00:56:34.940

mean, what's a hippie, yeah, but what's a hip, yeah? Well, I mean, I mean, two years ago I was, I was, you know, really on the well, you know, you know, I didn't know what was happening. I was just spewing, you know, spewing out all these doctrines,

00:56:34.940 - 00:56:49.960

these things that everybody else was talking about. And we were all smoking grass, and some cases, you know, and smoke grass long before then, you know, but when I got into it two years ago, it was the family dog was just starting to happen, and

00:56:49.960 - 00:57:04.740

everything sort of came together there, and we all went through the changes that everybody else seemed to be going through, and jazz wasn't making it there, because, you know, The beat, the rhythm, the pulse. And I've always been a rhythm man. From

00:57:04.740 - 00:57:21.260

the very beginning, when I was playing classical music, my teacher would, you know, hand me some something by for instance, you know, and I couldn't get into it, but he'd hand me something like bar talk, you know, or these contemporary

00:57:21.260 - 00:57:36.680

composers with real rhythmic thing happening, I just really freak out and fast things too, that were block just, you know, precision in the rhythm of that. And it's always been my natural trip. And so this just completely makes sense, because

00:57:36.680 - 00:57:52.540

it's much stronger rhythm, much, you know, heavier than in jazz, most jazz, yeah. Bob, right, right. There's something out of this. There's something in wanting to turn people on, and wanting to be

00:57:52.540 - 00:58:04.140

able to turn, you know, I mean, you know, wanting to be able to be, you know, they'll communicate with you music and with your contemporaries. You know that, you know, got me into it originally and still has a certain amount to do with it. I

00:58:04.140 - 00:58:14.700

mean, you know, I really dig the idea of being able to play for somebody and, you know, communicate my thing. You know, can't do that. And I can't do that in jazz, not too many, it's, you know, jazz is an idiot that, that not too many of my

00:58:14.700 - 00:58:27.380

contemporaries understand too well, and also it's very introverted. I mean, I don't think too many jazz positions are concerned, you know about you know? I mean, don't look at it that way. I mean, they don't consider themselves entertainer.

00:58:27.380 - 00:58:42.040

Jen, yeah, Mike, I think that's a real basic difference is in rhythm and blues, especially Mallea space show I've seen. It's a show. That's what it really is. I mean, people go there, and all you have to do is just watch the stage, and pretty

00:58:42.040 - 00:58:55.900

soon, you know, you forget what you're doing, you're yelling and everything like with jazz. I mean, sometimes it would always kind of, even when I really got turned on by it would just kind of start within and then kind of come out as a sort of more

00:58:55.900 - 00:59:09.600

intellectual process. Steve, yeah, I've got, I've just thought of jazz. And I, when I first heard of John handy, I went to see him four nights in a row at the both end. And every night I just, I, he took me, you

00:59:09.600 - 00:59:23.540

know, just sort of tore me apart. But the reason was Terry Clark was the first reason the drug. And because of his time, it was just, it was like he was watching a mentoring room or something, and it was in it. So it would just flip the back and

00:59:23.540 - 00:59:36.380

forth, and Thompson, the bass player, the two of them, really. And then, and then Hans, beautiful things going all over the place. But what I still tripped out on with Andy's quick that was the rhythm. The way everything worked, tightly. Of

00:59:36.620 - 00:59:56.260

course, rhythm is a basis of jazz too. Did you ever see Cole famous group? Yeah, oh yeah, that's the consensus. I didn't see I've never heard him live, and I haven't listened to many records since he started doing things with Archie Shep,

00:59:57.520 - 01:00:15.660

oh, Paul. I mean, as far as jazz, things like. You asked earlier, what stuff we like to listen to. I like, I like any music that is real. And I it's like, I really can tell the difference, yeah, you know, and lot of most people can't, to

01:00:15.660 - 01:00:31.100

varying degrees, but it's like, Mingus at Monterey, that album, or Mingus live, usually miles, Davies, you know? I mean, sure, there's all kinds of things that I dig in jazz because, because the cats are really doing it, and they're not just doing

01:00:31.100 - 01:00:44.200

what's done to do it. I mean, in that sense, we're really doing it too. You take it to listen to, but you don't want to play. Well, no, it's just,

01:00:45.580 - 01:00:57.700

it's because you don't feel, you feel you could do what is done, and maybe it isn't what you really want to do. Maybe you can't weigh all the same way, yes, or maybe you can't wait on the same way as culture in that music and you

01:00:57.700 - 01:01:10.500

can in this. Is Steve, does get started out with we were talking about before, started out with rhythm. Lose man. You just, you just work and you do the next thing comes along to you right now,

01:01:10.500 - 01:01:25.700

what's in our heads is we, before I was a folk musician, I sat around a friend of mine and with the fox and the hounds, which is now called the coffee and confusion, and played two guitars and Monica. And that was, that was an extent of my

01:01:25.700 - 01:01:34.040

musical talent. And then I got an awesome extent of the power you could get. Yeah, that's my whole feeling about never was very powerful.

01:01:34.100 - 01:01:46.780

And then this, this is the next thing, oh, well, went through, you know, single with our blues, and then we got into this rhythm blue is arranging, trying to get horns and beautiful things. And that's power. And so there's more power in jazz too, but

01:01:46.780 - 01:01:58.720

it's, this is what I'm at now. This is one of the things you might, you might, that points up an obvious thing that's happened in the music in the Bay Area, and that is that, you know, these people, the people that

01:01:58.720 - 01:02:10.800

are playing folk, decided they want power, so they turned up. Yeah, all kinds of people, but that's all they knew about. Power is to turn up eventually. That's only one. That's a gimmick that works, but no, it's only one. Just 1000 techniques

01:02:10.800 - 01:02:19.920

you have to learn to get some kind of a composite. If you don't have anything in your music, I don't think putting an amplifier on it's gonna help you very much. It does something for a short

01:02:19.920 - 01:02:32.540

time. Yeah, this this is Mike for a personal experience. I mean, like when I go see Grateful Dead or someone like that live. I mean, it's so loud and the face is just vibrating my chest. It is in powerful but then you do this little record

01:02:32.600 - 01:02:50.980

and play like a normal wine here, what's really going on? It's really different. So you start to hurt after a while. Yeah, acid rock. This Paul,

01:02:50.980 - 01:03:06.660

when I mean, we, you know, Henze came out with everybody was, you know, wow. Wait, go check the dude out. You know, we just played with the who, you know, pretty ferocious along those lines. And I did dig the who's drummer. He was really a trip to

01:03:06.660 - 01:03:21.680

watch the cat was in all kinds of two bass drum things, you know. But then at the end, when they destroyed their axes, I thought that was sort of funny. But then, then we, then we went to hear Jimi Hendrix and I.