Remembering Chris

chis squire

 
It was a bit of a shock to open Facebook and discover that Chris Squire had died last weekend, although I knew he was quite ill from a friend who knew Chris well. Chris was such an important influence on me growing up, especially since I started playing bass at 14. I was exposed pretty young to his amazing lines from the Fragile record which my parents owned on cassette in the early seventies. But during the summer of 1980, I heard the strains of Tempus Fugit blasting from a boombox and something switched on in my 12 year old brain. I was already a Beatle fanatic, having spent a year with a tennis racket tied around my neck perfecting Lennon’s triplet strumming to All My Loving. It took another year of maturation for me start to fully appreciate what this man and this group were doing. The catalyst was probably hearing Rush’s Moving Pictures through Sony Walkman headphones for the first time the following summer. It was a revelation. I was now a teenager and my neurons were starving for more of this kind of stimulation. I had caught the Prog bug and had it bad. Of course the air drumming to Neil’s masterwork never ceased. But Geddy’s bass lines captivated me with the melodic rumble of lead bass. I was already a professed worshiper of John Entwistle and this quickly brought me back ’round to Chris Squire to complete the holy trinity. It was years later that I realized how much they all owed to Paul McCartney in terms of melodic counterpoint.

But, It was Chris’ parts that I obsessively learned note for note over the next few years. I bought my first effect pedal, a Cry Baby Wah, to be able to recreate The Fish and On The Silent Wings Of Freedom. But, I also just loved the way Chris sang those countermelodies and harmonies. His special gifts as a choral singer and arranger were often overshadowed by his epic bass excursions and his literally huge stage presence. That Rickenbacker 4001 looked almost tiny in his hands. I found a used one I could afford in black that sadly had been turned into a goth style lefty with a flipped around bridge. I seriously considered having its body shaved down and repainted to match Chris’. I got to see Chris with Yes for the first time in 1983 during the 90215 tour and now I had to find a pair of those green boots as well.

chrissquire2

After some time away from the band’s activities in the 90’s, I was lucky enough to catch Yes on its 30th anniversary tour. The band were in great form with Rick Wakeman back in the band for the last time. But in 2004 I had the privilege of seeing Chris perform with The Syn (including Alan White sitting in on drums) at Joe’s Pub in NYC. I had taken my young nephew Max, who is a very talented bass player, and we went backstage hoping that Chris might be signing autographs. We were disappointed to find out he wouldn’t be coming out of the dressing rooms, but couldn’t believe our eyes when we saw his basses, including his iconic Rick, just sitting there unattended in the hallway. Max remembers that we just bowed down to the bass, but I like to remember that when no one was looking we plucked a string.

Years later on Chris’ second to last tour with Yes, I got to meet him at a meet and greet. As I recounted in a previous blog about my song “I’m Your Fan”, I tried to think of the perfect way to express how important Chris was to me by telling him about this experience at Joe’s Pub, but what came out was a mumbling ramble. He looked exhausted and certainly didn’t want to try to decipher what this awkward grown man was incoherently describing. I wished I had quietly just thanked him for being such an inspiration and strong influence, not only as a innovative bass player, but as a singer and a songwriter as well. When I approach writing a bass line for one of my songs I basically have two automatic modes: John or Chris. While I can decently imitate a McCartney bounce, that’s not what comes out naturally.
So even though he’s gone, I’ll just say it now..thank you Chris

Behind the Music- “It’s About Time”

 

GWcdlabel2I started writing songs at 17, so as I approached 40, I knew I had to do something with the best of these songs and that became the first album, “Sum of Its Parts”. Some of the lyrics from Half of Harry date back to 6th grade, when I tried to write a poem in a John Lennon style. This collection of songs written over a nearly 30 year period, clearly represented the many artists who influenced my songwriting, and I wanted to pay homage to them by keeping the arrangements and production styles fairly authentic. One reviewer quipped it was “so meta it hurts”. Anyway, The Beatles, The Who, Elvis Costello, Squeeze, Neil Finn..you can guess which songs pay tribute to each. The lead track was so clearly a combination of Fountains of Wayne and Weezer styles, I didn’t bother trying to name it anything else and “Fountains of Weezer” just stuck. When I listen to it now, I realize how much I always wanted to play guitar like Eliot Easton of the Cars.

I was already writing new songs while I was making the first album and seven short years later emerged “It’s About Time”. A prolonged gestation and complicated delivery- life is busy with a family and a day job. This record reminds much more of the music I heard when I was really little in the early 70’s. The indelible influences are still there, perhaps a little less transparently so. But new obsessions were filtering through, especially from brilliant singer songwriters like Mike Viola and Adam Levy (if you have never heard of them, leave this page and go grab one of their records right now!). But Wilco’s ‘Sky Blue Sky” was the sonic starting point for the new record- the warmth of that analog tape and musically so adventurous- Dad Rock my ass! Even newer music, like The Head and the Heart, probably the closest thing to the Band making music today, influenced this production.

I was lucky enough to have the same brilliant musicians join me again for album two. The drum parts were definitely a bit different this time, more of a Glenn Kotche out of the box approach; Greg Trabandt was totally game and nailed what I was asking for. Special thanks to my nephew Nathaniel Coffey, a great young drummer, who helped come up with some of these drum ideas. Jeff Batter is a professor of all things keyboard who can play any style and just brilliantly knows exactly what to play to elevate a song. I was wise enough to have him play practically all the keyboards this time around. Paul Opalach and Andy Abel helped out wonderfully with some parts I felt needed a different approach from what I usually do. Wim Oudijk scored a brilliant and beautiful orchestration for Spinning ‘Round that really elevates the song. Thank you Wim! Jeff Cannata, my producer and engineer, has amazing ears, instincts, and experience, and he always pushes me to play better. My favorite moment with Jeff on this record was when he was working the board and simultaneously manually controlling the wah pedal for my No. 9 Dream style guitar bend on “Saccharin…”. Having my daughter Emma singing with me in the studio was such a pleasure and I couldn’t be happier with the cover art- an original concept designed by my middle daughter, Sofie, who also designed all the Gornpop logos as well. I love album packaging, which gets totally lost in this digital age, and Ioannis did a great job capturing the warmth I was trying to convey in this Steam Punk/Arts & Crafts hodgepodge.

The title “It’s About Time” has its obvious literal meaning, but these songs are really about the passage of time, looking forward and backward. It’s not about mid life crises, but more about mid life observations.

GWpanel1

THE SONGS:

The Ugly Inside:

This song is about the disagreements that can grow into seemingly permanent rifts in relationships. Lots of blaming one another and little introspection going on to allow us to see from the other’s perspective. The potential for misunderstanding gets much worse these days because we rely on written emails and texts to avoid the extra discomfort with direct verbal confrontation. All the emotion gets filtered out, however, and we can pay a dear price. Sometimes things don’t get repaired and we are left with that interminable silence. Musically, its sort of “Too Much” Part Deux.

I’m Your Fan:

One of my favorites and kind of the first single. This song is about being a serious fan (“it’s not a casual thing”). We have to have every unreleased track, the bonus tracks from the Japanese release, the new super remastered edition of the album we have bought five times already. But it’s not enough to just collect; we have to meet the artist and be their friend too! So we go to a meet and greet and stand in line thinking of the perfect thing to say. When we get up there we stammer, mumble, and gush simultaneously and then it’s over. Many years ago I went to meet the Smithereens and brought along my ultra rare copy of their second EP on Little Ricky records for them to sign. They all thought this was pretty cool. I had saved up to buy an identical tuxedo white Rickenbacker 370 that Jim Babjak had used, but they were now using Fenders and Gibsons. My brilliant question, “what happened to the Rickenbackers”? Jim’s response- “I hate that question”. Pat DiNizio was super nice and extended his hand introducing himself, “hi I’m Pat”. My response, “I know”. Needless to say that did not go how I planned it. Fast forward 20 years and I got to meet Chris Squire, one of my childhood heroes. The guy ahead of me in line was doing the impress them with your knowledge of their session work thing with Alan White and I thought, I’m not taking that embarrassing approach. I kept enough distance between us so I wouldn’t be mistakenly associated with him. Everything was cool as I approached Chris Squire at the end of the table. I tried to explain to him how he was such an inspiration to me, but out came a garbled mess of adoration and cryptic references to the time I almost touched his bass backstage at Joe’s Pub. And he just stared at me like I was a lunatic. Actually he looked exhausted, like he would much rather be sleeping back at the hotel room. I wonder if he was already feeling ill. Our musical heroes are actually human beings.

In the Facebook era we can actually “friend” our favorite artists creating an illusion of a real connection. But interestingly this has enabled me to meet and even spend non-virtual time with some wonderful indie artists through events like house concerts. So now it’s not enough to meet your hero, you have to hang out and get them to endorse your own music (i.e. the plea, “please listen to my demo”).

In terms of the music, the layering of the counterpoint melodies and the drumming on the verses was actually inspired by the song “Deeper Down” off Wilco (The Album). This was a blast to sing Beatle style, face to face on one mike, with my daughter Emma, who had great ideas for vocal harmonies on many of the songs.

Saccharin, Aspartame, Splenda, You, & Me:

“Artificial you, artificial we…” A sad song about being disingenuous in our friendships and relationships. But the silly sweetener references lighten it a bit. My kids think the ”true via” (Truvia) line was a bit too much. And soda puns too? Oy. I like the guitar parts though, and especially the wahed bits that I wanted to sound like No. 9 Dream. Nice harmonies by Pete Hodson and Bill Welch.

Sticky Thoughts:

The OCD song- really. My attempt to write a Honey Pie/Tin Pan Alley style song. Jeff Batter did some wonderful mellotron parts for this one. Andy Abel played the guitar on this one, going for that jazzy sound that we based on Richard Tandy’s lines on Strange Magic.

About Time:

The title track. Where do we come from, where are we going? Can we escape the destiny of our genetic programming? Will people really understand who we are before we die? Ok maybe it’s a bit pretentious and it’s long. But it has my favorite Hemispheres chord in it…(yes I admit it, I love Rush).

The Great Imitator:

Yes this is about the criticism I received for trying so hard to imitate my heroes on Sum of Its Parts. “He wears his influences on his sleeve, and says I’m proud of it”. But it’s meant to be a parody, with the obvious musical quotations. I do love the circus atmosphere of the choruses and the chance to play balalaika. We found a great chamberlin sound that is essence of the Little Rascals theme. Just adore those tape driven keyboards…I think my favorite part of visiting the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was getting to stand so close to John Lennon’s mellotron.

Thanks I Get:

I was able to rescue the opening riff and chord progression of the choruses from a very old song I wrote in medical school. But the song really shows how much Pete Townshend has affected everything I write and play. So yeah, this could have fit neatly on Sum of Its Parts with its bits of Substitute and Bargain infused here and there. I learned to play bass by playing along with Entwistle night and day, so I used a Hiwatt emulator pedal turned way up to break up on the bridge to try to capture that vibe. It stomped all over Jeff Batter’s incredible one take synthesizer soloing though, so maybe a remix is in the future? Greg Trabandt’s Moony drumming is just perfect too (and always with a Bonham quad riff at the end of the big fills). Lyrically, despite all the complaining about being underappreciated and running out of time, the sentiment is: it’s not too late to enjoy life, so please grow old with me.

Spinning ‘Round:

Really one of my faves from the record, mostly because Wim Oudijk did this absolutely wonderful string orchestration for it. Jeff and I are thinking about doing an alternate mix that’s just acoustic and strings to feature them more. Wim is brilliant and such a gem of a guy. Please check out his music (https://www.facebook.com/wimoudijk). This song was written about my time with my youngest daughter Ruby, taking long walks with her as an infant and imagining what she was thinking and dreaming about. But it’s also about being a father (again, nine years after my second kid) and worrying about what the future has in store for all of your kids.

My Love Still Grows:

This is a nice little song to end the record. It’s also about being a parent and how your original love for your spouse/partner spreads and grows in many ways when you raise children, despite how hard it is and the strains it places on your relationship. All the gardening metaphors felt genuine to me. I really did plant bulbs upside down one year (duh), and they really did sprout flowers under ground! I love the vocal harmonies on the bridge (thanks again Pete and Bill) and I even got Jeff to sing a little on this one. Paul Opalach’s bass is really sweet and I apologize that he didn’t get credited for this one on the album liner notes.

Welcome to the Blog

Welcome to the new website and my very first blog. I thought I might use this blog to talk about some of the music that I’m listening to and just discovering. This would be a chance for me to share some thoughts about old and new influences and hopefully to let readers know about some amazing indie artists they may not have heard before. So stay tuned….