Category: Field Recordings of the Future

I’d like to bring our cd poster to every gig but that would be rude to the rotating artists. The band barely fits in the photo above and the photographer would need an even wider lens to get us all in tonight when Jack brings his bass clarinet. Then again Melissa may not be able to find a sitter.

We and people in a dozen cities across the country watched the same version of the Eno movie last night. The one hundred year old theatre with the brand new sound system was packed. I’m pretty certain I saw yesterday’s date in the code that scrolled across the screen in one of the montage segues. Our version of the film opened with Eno previewing a loop on a monitor. He apparently was in his home studio, a brightly lit room with Albers like art on the white wall behind him. His work area, monitors and white Apple keyboard were impossibly clean and orderly but Eno was warm and immediately engaging. He had us laughing with his first story.

The film is compiled from a pot of over five hundred hours of potential material, some shot for the film, of course, and clips from performances and sessions with all the bands he worked with. Material is still being added to the database today. The pieces of the film are arranged by an algorithm created with guidance from the director, Gary Hustwit. We learned that this very Enoesque concept was the director’s idea and it was born out of desperation as Eno had made it clear he was not interested in one person presenting a profile of someone (him.)

The film is energizing. It feels so fresh you don’t want it to end. The clips cut across time and space and yet hold together perfectly. Eno is full of so many ideas and this presentation makes them all sound like fun. The movie is something like a joyride and I can’t wait to see a different version.

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Peggi and I came across a cicada coming out of its shell while walking in the woods years ago. I took some photos and a short movie and I was waiting for the perfect song to attach the visuals to. I found it in Margaret Explosion’s “Sleepwalk,” one of 17 songs on our new cd “Field Recordings.”

I put the video online yesterday and texted a link to Bob Martin because Chicago had an invasion of cicadas last summer. Bob replied” “In the first couple days they were fascinating to look at. I’d actually move them out of the way when mowing. 4 weeks later, they were deafening, at one time registering nearly 100dB on my Apple Watch dB meter, and a brief trip outside would have you brushing them off your clothes and hair before coming back in. After six weeks, as they were dying off, we were raking them into piles as big as leaf piles in the fall. And just when we thought we were done, itch-mites began multiplying, feeding on the eggs that the cicadas had laced into the tree branches (thus killing the branches) and then said itch-mites began feeding on us, leaving scars we still see. And then there was the smell of rotting carcasses. We didn’t have any concept of how crazy it was going to get despite the warnings. Ours had red eyes and grey wings, though there was the occasional blue-eyed ones, which we referred to as “Sinatras.”

The song was recorded live at the Little Theatre Café (naturally.) Peggi Fournier plays soprano sax, Jack Schaefer plays bass clarinet, Phil Marshall plays guitar, Melissa Davies plays cello, Ken Frank plays the double bass and I play the drums. Arpad Sekeres mastered the audio.

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My last post got 5 stars so I’m doing a second part. I’m happy to find Max Roach is featured in the book that Bennie recommended. He is rightfully everybody’s favorite drummer. The first jazz record I ever owned was Charlie Mingus’s “Town Hall Concert” from 1974. I was still in high school and didn’t know what to make of it at first but I eventually fell in love with it and Danny Richmond’s playing. Brad Fox could sing that whole lp.

My favorite drummer though is Ed Blackwell. Trained in New Orleans, he is what they call a melodic drummer. He plays on Ornette’s “Science Fiction,” an album that turned my head around. I got to see him playing with Don Cherry at a club in New York. I shook his hand even. I was talking to Hamid Drake when he played here and he told me he studied with Ed Blackwell. Don Cherry and Ed Blackwell recorded “Mu” first part and second part, released on a separate lp, in just one session! Just listen to a few minutes of the second track on “Mu First Part.”

And don’t you love the Actual label. The lower case, sans serif typography, the sparse placement of the image on a white sleeve and the logo! In a box with the stylized “A” next to it. The number, flush right at the bottom, indicating a whole series of recordings. Actuel albums looked like anthropoligists’ collections, carefully notated field recordings.

After Bennie showed me a few jazz licks Peggi joined us on sax. Bennie played her panadero, and I played drums. Any time you have two drummers you are jamming. It has to be the easiest path to “jamming.” I never liked bands with two drummers. It is so messy. The most valuable tool in a drummer’s kit is space.

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When my brother was in town for Christmas we stopped out to see Brad. We were sitting in his living room and I remembered when we used to set up our drum sets in the living room, that very same living room. We were in high school and Brad’s mom was at work. Brad had studied at the Eastman and he showed me all that I know – very little. His first lesson was I, 2, 3, 4, on the hi-hat, drop the kick in on one and then add snare on two.” I was sitting with Marc Weinstein a few months ago when he told me how little he knew of the fundamentals. Marc plays with Pat Thomas in Mushroom, he played with MX-80 after Dave Mahoney and he’s currently playing in a blues band in Buffalo. We were laughing and trying to outdo one another with what we can’t do, rolls etc.

Our friend, Bennie, has been studying Brazilian percussion. She was leading the drum section in the stadium at Flash matches when we met her and we’ve seen her play in various settings. She occasionally brings a Brazilian instrument to Margaret Explosion gigs and sits in for a few songs. The last time I saw her I asked if she would stop by sometime and show me a few simple jazz beats. She came over on New Years Day with a paper bag of IPAs and a soft pink case with her panadero inside (a tamborine-like instrument that in the right hands can sound like a whole drum set.) Bennie has the right hands.

Specifically, I wanted to learn how Al Foster does what he does with his left hand in the last couple minutes of of Miles’ “He Loved Him Madly.” That’s all! Bennie had me start with a brush in my right hand while she sang chic, chic, ch-chic, chic, ch-chic, chic, ch-chic, chic over and over and over and over. And she wanted me to keep my right hand over the ride, not pull back and drop beats like I do. I did this for a half hour or so while she scat sang. I had the other brush in my left hand and couldn’t wait to start using it but Bennie would snap, “no backbeats” when it touched the snare. No backbeat? I live for the back beat. When the cymbal pattern was relatively smooth she had me doing it with four on the floor. I tried a snare beat again and got scolded. Bennie suggested I place a quick snare beat just before one of the kick beats. She sang the beat and I tried it. It was exhilarating. I know there is a whole world in there, in and around that simple cymbal pattern.

Bennie had a book with her and I told her I didn’t know how to read the notated drum patterns. She said don’t worry about that just read what the drummers have to say.

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Melissa and Phil were both out of town last Friday so Margaret Explosion played with Bernie Heveron on guitar. Bernie is shown here playing keyboards, some twenty years ago, sitting in with Margaret Explosion at one of the holiday shows at the old Bop Shop. Phil Marshall, who joined the band about six years ago, is playing guitar on this minor key holiday song.

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When I first met Rich I couldn’t get over how he could ever have gotten through high school without a grounding in rock n roll. All my other friendships were formed over passionate responses to rock music. How exotic could Wantaugh, Long Island be that you could grow up without Mitch Ryder and the Stones? I found out when I visited him at his parent’s home. Later it was Rich who turned me on to Bitches Brew.

Rich was a guest dj on Howard Thompson’s WPKN “Pure” show yesterday. His theme-centered show looked at sisters, brothers and brothers & sisters who make music together. You know, Van Halen and the Ramones. I should have shared this link before the show but it will be archived here for the next two weeks. Rich has such a great radio voice. I told him so and he shared a few of his secrets. He used two vocal effects, plus a de-esser and he sped it up 5%. He sounded so smooth, like Adrienne Barbeau in John Carpenter’s Fog.

Madison, a young woman who has been coming to ME for the last six months or so asked me what I was listening to. I told her mostly 45s and she asked if I could share a playlist of them on Spotify. I have a short stack of 7 inchers, ones we’ve played recently, sitting next to the turntable so I limited myself to those. I found most on Spotify but I couldn’t find the single version of “Black & Tan Fantasy” so I had to skip that gem. And because I’m not a subscriber I can’t order the Spotify playlist so I’d recommend shuffling it.

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Speaking of winter, Margaret Explosion will celebrate the solstice on Friday night at the Little theatre Café. The holidays can take care of themselves. The solstice deserves top billing. We played on this same date last year with a different lineup. It is probably a good thing that the whole Margaret Explosion band doesn’t seem to ever show up at once but this week we learned that cellist, Melissa, will be out of town with family, Phil, guitarist, will be in New Orleans with his son and Jack, bass clarinetist, has work duties.

We have played as a trio a few times and resigned ourselves to do that again. Bob Martin, in fact, had already requested we send him a copy of the trio date so he could play along with it in Chicago. But then we thought we could try something new so we invited Chris Zajkowski to play piano. Chris was ready to do it until he heard the weather forecast calling for snow. He has snow-removal customers that take precedence. Bernie Heveron was on our mind because we had just finished the reissue of Bob Martin’s remixed Personal Effects “This Is It” album. So we contacted him via Facebook and he will join us on guitar.

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I like the idea of having all my stuff in the cloud, accessible from my iPad wherever I am. One of my favorite psychedelic trips was at IU in 1969. I think I might have been flying solo. I remember getting off in the student union and going out back where I laid down and looked up at the clouds. The ever shifting formations were so intricate and fascinating I felt like I was there at the creation. I thought of that trip when we watched Janet Planet the other night. The little girl liked to lay down and space out.

Bob Martin created two new videos for the Personal Effects “This Is It – Remix 2024” release. He masterfully synced old footage of the band performing live to his new mixes of the album tracks. When Peggi and I told him how much we loved them he told us how he overlapped footage on two tracks in iMovie. I didn’t realize you could do two video layers, I had always relied on long cross-dissolves, so I tried it for this video of the first song from the new Margaret Explosion cd, “Field Recordings.” I laid my iPad on the table out back and captured some time lapses of clouds. I grabbed some footage of the band performing a completely different song, stripped the audio and didn’t even try to sync it up to the song. I sent a link to Bob after I posted it. Bob used to be in the band before he moved to Chicago and I thought it was really big of him to be so generous with his compliments:

“That is wonderful at every level. Literally has my heart beating a little harder. Not only is the song great, not only is the image shifting and blending painted beautifully, but the band visual adds an imagined polyrhythmic layer that becomes part of the music. What you see isn’t what you physically hear, but I felt myself “hearing” the aural aspect of the video in perfect sympathy with the audio performance. Sorry, I am usually a little more succinct. Great stuff.”

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Not only did Bob Martin remix 1984’s Personal Effects album from the original eight track tapes. He synced his new mix of “Fascinating Game” to old footage of Personal Effects performing live. He did this without using AI. He’s saving that for the 80th anniversary reissue. “This Is It – Remix 2024” is available now on all the streaming platforms.

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The original dimension of the photo above was 1152 x 864 pixels. I enlarged it slightly (with Photoshop’s AI feature) to 1620 pixels wide, my current standard for the photos I post. The photo was taken in 1998 with my Kodak DC210 digital camera. The DC210 was released that year and is a significant model in the evolution of digital photography, one of the first cameras to feature a compact flash card for storage, a 2x optical zoom and a 1-megapixel sensor. My father worked at Kodak and he and I followed the birth of digital photography closely. Here is one of his early spreadsheets. He got me into the Kodak Camera Store on Lake Avenue and I bought this camera when it came out. I’m guessing Shelley took this photo in a moment when she wasn’t playing maracas.

This ad from City Newspaper helps date the band. Margaret Explosion started playing a regular Friday evening Happy Hour at the Bug Jar in late 1997. Twenty-seven years later on Wednesday, November 27 at the Little Theatre Café we celebrate the release of our newest CD, “Field Recordings.”

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Still finding more uses for the unused billboards I got from Dave Mahoney’s father back in the eighties. The front sides make good collage material and the paper is heavy enough to support paint on the blank backside. I projected an image of the cd cover on the wall in our basement and we painted the shapes and lettering, an extra large facsimile of our new cd..

I was looking at Jean Arp when I came up with the design. I started with a few layouts using photos and Peggi pushed me to do something catchier like our earlier cd, “Skyhigh” That one was named after the place Peggi’s only relative, Zimmy, lived with her life partner, Stevie, in the Smoky Mountains and it featured a flat white cloud.

Promoting a show at the Little makes for a noisy crowd. And with no mics on the bass and drums it is hard for the band to rise above the din. The espresso machine and the sound of chairs dragging across the floor are all part of our sound but we don’t do solos and there is a no room for the crowd to solo either.

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We recently turned to our friend, Rich, for some legal advice. He told us he enjoys talking about the kind of issues we like to put off. He was very helpful, of course, but he is the same individual who coined the phrase, “Often in error, never in doubt.” He told us that a song of his, the instrumental, MX-80 version, had caught on in Russia, probably in TicToc circles, and he was recieving respectable royalties from it.

Peggi and I played with Rich in a band called “Chinaboise” before moving to Rochester at the end of 1974. Rich gave Peggi her first saxophone lessons. Hava Nagila was the first song she learned. We played Self-Conscious Pisser (the lyrics were written about another friend of ours) and I guess I hung onto the sheet music. It belongs in a museum. The Chinaboise, with new members, recorded a 1975 album with SCP on it. Rich Stim and Dave Mahoney left Chinaboise and joined MX-80 Sound. They recorded a version of SCP in 1976 for their “Big Hits” ep. The song was also included in their 1990, all instrumental smash, “Das Love Boat.” And today it is big in Russia.

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I wrote a review of Greg Prevost’s fabulous new lp a few weeks back. And at the time I did not want to mention that Greg had reviewed our recent lp. “per la prima.” This wan’t payback. We really love the album, mostly because it appeared to us that Greg had really transformed himself, stepped into another realm. No longer just the former lead singer of the Chesterfield Kings but Greg “Stackhouse” Prevost. Now is the time to reprint Greg’s review of our lp – taken from his Facebook page.

“Really enjoying the latest album ‘per la prima’ by the Margaret Explosion led by Paul Dodd (drums) and Peggi Fournier (soprano sax). I have known Paul since his time as the drummer in New Math back in the late ‘70s; in fact one of the first times I ever appeared in public was with New Math (when I was invited onstage by Gary Trainer and Kevin Patrick) at a Record Archive party circa ‘79. Paul was the drummer at this time so we go WAY back! I met Peggi shortly after this when my former now-defunct band opened for Paul & Peggi’s band, the Hi-Techs at the end of 1980. For those that may not know, the Hi-Techs morphed into Personal Effects who made a number of hugely successful albums and were a staple in the Rochester scene through the years that followed.

Paul and Peggi then re-invented themselves as the Margaret Explosion and are a constant in the Rochester music scene, performing intimate shows at the Little Theater where this album was recorded-LIVE. A perfect NATURAL recording the way albums are supposed to be recorded. Other members appearing on the album are Jack Schaefer (my close friend Bob’s brother, on tenor sax, bass clarinet and guitar), old pal Bob Martin (guitar), Ken Frank (double bass), Pete LaBonne (piano) and the lovely Melissa Davies on cello (thanks to a chance meeting Caroll and I had with Paul and Peggi at Durand Park, Melissa appeared on my latest album). It is nearly impossible to describe the album. If I had to, I’d say surreal, freeform and euphoric. Comparing to other artists would also not do justice since the group is so original, but think on the lines of early Popul Vuh, Lol Coxhill (at times), Ash Ra Temple, Traffic at their most experimental, Miles, Coltrane … Yeah! Hear for yourself!  Beautifully mastered and pressed on vinyl.”

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With a little bit of editing, looping of intros, abbreviating mid-sections and cutting off the extended, musicianly endings we squeezed seventeen songs onto our new cd,. The Margaret Explosion crowd still buys cds and a few even complained that our last release was only available on vinyl. Our distribution amounts to the record stores in Rochester and the people who come out to hear the band at the Little but they are a reliable market. I prefer streaming and I’m happy to announce that our new release is available on all the streaming services today.

Field Recordings includes 17 improvisations recorded live in stereo at the Little Theatre Café in Rochester New York. Various combinations of the following players are featured. I hope you enjoy it.

Peggi Fournier – soprano sax
Ken Frank – double bass
Melissa Davies – cello
Phil Marshall – guitar
Jack Schaefer – bass clarinet, guitar
Paul Dodd – drums

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Our Hi-Techs single, “Screamin’ You Head,” was getting some play in New York clubs and found its way onto the Rockpool charts when Cachalot Records contacted us about making a record for the label. We were in the process of changing course and we had just changed our name to Personal Effects. Eric came up from New York and worked on the project at PCI Studios, we went down to New York and did some work at Sorcerer Sound and we recorded an ep with five songs.

We did a series of dates in New York (Peppermint Lounge, Danceteria, Ritz) and Eric invited execs from bigger labels. At one he told us the sound sucked and he wanted us to fire our sound man. Eric doesn’t remember it this way but for us it was a turnig point. In 1984 we started our own label, recorded an album in the basement where we rehearsed and released “This Is It” on Earring Records with the catalog number EAR1. Bob Martin copied those original half inch, 8-track reel to reel tapes to DAT in the early eighties and is in the process of remixing that lp (along with three additional tracks) for a digital only 40th Anniversary release next month.

Personal Effects, Absolute Grey, Colorblind James Experience, Wilderness Family, The Essentials, Urban Squirrels, Invisible Idiot, Pete LaBonne, SLT and Margaret Explosion all recorded projects for Earring Records. There is no hierarchy in the organization, no execs and, of course, no distribution outside of Rochester.

Here is a track from the upcoming Margaret Explosion cd “Field Recordings” EAR20

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Peggi and I are camped out in the basement while workers repair some cracks in the ceiling upstairs. Upstairs, our living quarters look like some sort of art installation with mounds of furniture wrapped in plastic.

After reading the NYT obit of Herbie Flowers I sent a link to Ken, the bass player in Margaret Explosion. He replied, “I had been playing bass for about a year when that song came out. That bass part was revelatory. I spent a decent chunk of time trying to play it. I didn’t find out until today that it was two tracks. No wonder I could never get it right.”

Flowers referred to himself as a “jazzer” but he played bass on over 500 pop rock songs. His contribution to the Bowie produced, Lou Reed classic, “Walk on the Wild Side” is considered the mother of all bass lines. In fact it is two parts. Flowers played the glissando downwards on double bass and overdubbed a glissando upwards on bass guitar.

What blew me away was reading Flowers also played the bass on David Essex’s 1973 smash, “Rock On.” That 45 and “Walk on the Wild Side” are in constant rotation in our house. I can’t wait to free our turntable from the plastic wrap.

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It was just past noon on Saturday and there was already a giant sheet pizza on the table in front of Greg and Mike Murray. We were at the great House of Guitars where Greg was signing copies of his book and new cd while Mike was celebrating the 40th Anniversary of his “Whole Lotta Shakin” radio show.

We’ve known Greg a long time. In his book he describes his first public performance in Record Archive’s back room, same room that MX-80 Sound performed in. I was playing drums with New Math and Greg took the mic for a few songs. His performance was electrifying. In the book he says he was drunk, something he doesn’t do anymore. New Math did a gig in the seventies with the Chesterfields in the old Coronet Theatre on Thurston Road. And then, as Hi-Techs, we played with the Kings at Scorgie’s. How many records did we buy from Greg during his time at the HOG?

Greg “Stackhouse” Prevost has outrun the Chesterfield Kings and that is saying something. Greg left the Kings and that should have been it but someone stole the Kings. A ludicrous idea but how do you claim ownership of a cigarette brand? Greg was the Kings. His newest release, “After the Wars,” is a tour de force.

Greg is a musicologist so the songs he picks are choice cuts from Rocky Erickson, Armand Schaubroeck, Buddy Holly, Johnny Paycheck, Phil Ochs and David Bowie as well as traditional tunes and a few of his own. And instead of the Kings, he was able to take his pick of musicians to suit the songs. Phil Ochs’ “No More Songs” with piano, is beautiful, a word I doubt you would find in a Chesterfield Kings review. The production , from Dave Anderson’s Saxon Studio, is perfect for this project. The guitars ring like the Byrds. Raucous, lively and warm, “Twelve Gates to the City” sounds like it was recorded in a gospel church. Greg’s “No Hallelujah for Glory” could be an early Stones track. Melissa Davies (from Margaret Explosion) makes Buddy Holly’s “Learning the Game” sound like a Marianne Faithful track with her cello. From Gospel to country Greg brings a forever young rock ‘n’ roll spirit to everything he touches.

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Our friend, Pete, was given an old copy of Milton’s “Paradise Lost” with illustrations by Gustave Dore. Really old, like 1878. The pages were worn and brittle at the edges and the binding was falling apart. Pete painted and drew over the top the pages and brought the ancient text to life. Pete is always at the Little Theatre Café when Margaret Explosion plays. He was sitting at one of the front tables a few weeks ago when we came up with this tune. We named it “Paradise Lost.”

Dick and Lucinda Storms were showing their recent paintings. The crowd was more chatty than usual. We trust the conversations were good interesting. We were having our own musical conversation. Paradise Lost tells the biblical story of the temptation of Adam and Eve and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. I have to say the fall of man doesn’t look so bad from our paradise.

Margaret Explosion plays Wednesday night with the full line-up in living color.

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