Recordings:
My parents believed in me, appreciated me, as the poet and songwriter; they were scared for me, but supportive.
I performed in public for the public for the first time with Tom as the drummer, like I'd always dreamed. His influence was stronger than my parents' for some odd reason. Perhaps because he was genuine in stronger ways. We played for The International Club dinner in 1983. I played again in 1984, the same year as the first demo.
My first recording experience was solo, in late 1984. A man named AdZe MiXXe (RIP 1997), to me to be known in the future as "Astrologer Extorinaire". (more later)
I first thought Tabula Rasa would be a great band name just after I wrote a song of the same name. It was 1987. For a short time, I would jam out with these brothers who were both geniuses, each in their own way. The Luckowski brothers. Eric could wail Jimi Hendrix before he was 16. Steve was a keyboard mastermind. In my mind, I imagined the universe in our undertakings. Young adulthood took us all rapidly in different directions, suddenly – but always with fond memories.
I would love it if any audiotape survived from that era – just to listen, not to publish. That stuff takes considerations we didn't have then.
There are a mere few who could still posess original audio recordings of mine that I myself lost posession of, albeit not but a few people and a few songs. I don't count errant recordings by fans. I mean master sound recordings on archaic media.
Long before Bucketstomp™. But, I'm jumping ahead.
I may have another post somewhere about my otherwise adventures in choas that led to a strong season of my songwriting...
There were survival and bills to navigate through, then as always. Young adulthood came for me with quite a bit of responsibility. For a couple of years, I just worked. After my first brief, embarassing stint at college, I embarked upon the field of corporate restaurant management. My songwriting was something I still worked on, but had no idea what to do with. (Yes, I do not mind the informality of ending sentences with prepositions.)
An analog/tape cassette 4-track recorder cost $1000 in the late 1980s. I did not have that kind of disposable income, bills as they were. My guitar was very sad...a generic acoustic, very warped. I used to jokingly refer to that guitar as a cheese slicer; the strings were so far from the neck – especially on the higher frets – that one could slice a block of cheese on the strings. Upon a visit to the farmer's market, I saw a guitar someone was selling for $100. This was to be my first acoustic/electric guitar, the Kay. This was the beginning of 1990, the year my grandfather died.
Did I mention I wrote "Time To Go" for my Grandfather? That was February 1990.
It was in April 1990 that I met Chris McDonough. I was hanging out in West Chester (In PA — in the Southeast, one of the 11 boroughs of the Philadelphia metroplex) with my friend Tom. We used to go to this bar back then called Jitters. They used to do this thing called Mug Night, where one bought a mug for $1, and got $1 beers in the mug all night thereafter, and could bring the mug back the following week for $1 beers. At first their mugs were giant. Then they half-sized them before stopping the trend. It was usually packed with people. That's where I met a favorite local artist named Brendan McKinney, the Thursday night mainstay solo rocker at Jitters in those days. Tom said a friend of his - a guy named Dave – I'd met him before - lived across the street and that he wanted to stop over and say hello, so I went to randomly say hey too. Chris was this guy's roommate at the time. That's how we met.
Chris was a graduate student at the local university working on his Master's in Philosophy while managing a video store down the street. He also casually mentioned he had a degree in classical guitar. I casually mentioned that I wrote a song called "Tabula Rasa", which happens to be a philosophical tenet coined by 17th century philosopher, John Locke. This mildly piqued his interest. We left it open-ended that we'd get together and jam sometime.
Shortly after that, I brought my guitar, the Kay, over to his new apartment and I did a demo performance of top tunes I was working on at the time. While I very much admired his ability, he called my tunes "like Sesame Street". I remember having felt insulted by that and didn't fathom we would jam again. I remember I played for him "Time To Go", and "Planet Earth"...I forget the other one...perhaps "Father".
Tom became Chris' roommate shortly thereafter. A few months later, I rented the apartment across the hall from those guys. I would stop over after work and hang out with Tom here and there. Tom had excellent taste in music, so oftentimes we would listen to great albums, or watch music videos on VHS. His influence on me was great since we had been friends since young childhood. Tom was a drummer as well. Even back when I was taking piano lessons, Tom and I would jam out. We always loved singing, "Help" by The Beatles, and "Another Brick In The Wall, Part 2" by Pink Floyd. Lots of stuff.
One of those times I was over there, Chris came in and told me he had something worked out for "Time To Go", a riff. What he played was exactly what I envisioned for the song. We've been jamming together in one band incarnation or another off and on, ever since.
Of course among my inspirations all along the way, I credit Chris. He challenged me in every creative way, which changed the course of my music and my life.
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