 Coming To A Billboard Near You! Oregon Jamboree, 8/4/07
Oregon Jamboree w/ Hal Ketchum
Big In Vegas Reunion Gig at The Hut 10/18/06; photo courtesy of Ken Paul Chernock | 
Now that I'm completely rural-ized, I've discovered the simple joys in life are best - a good hat, and a '51 (reissue) P-Bass! | 
Jerry Jemmot at BP LIve in NYC, 10/04. Jerry is one of my big heros, it was a real honor to meet him. | 
Doing my time/groove schtick at BP Live. | 
| Trying out a Benevente 7 string in the peaceful surroundings of the NAMM show. | | Rarely captured on film - "The Look". This is what drummers get when they don't keep time. Can you feel the love? 
|  | | Here's a demonstration of the dreaded Cowboy 6 String technique. It don't work without the hat ma'am. That's an Ab7-13 for all you finger watchers. | 
D'Oud, a Morrocan/Jazz hybrid group that played around Tucson for a year or so, the guitarist is Matt Mitchell, a very cool, eclectic player that runs the gamut from avante-garde to bop to metal, and he totally shreds classical dude. The guy on the doumbek is Brahim Fribgane, he also plays Oud. Brahim has played with a lot of heavy people and is currently touring with Hassan Hakmoun. | 
Probably 1990, Johnny and I in Edmonton, we flew up there in the middle of winter for a one-nighter. | George Porter of The Meters, one of my favorite bands of all time! 
|  A little known fact: I was once the lead singer for Guns N' Roses! Really. Okay, maybe not, but they tried to make me LOOK like I was in the Boston Opera Company's production of Leonard Berstein's "Mass". I was in the "rock" band onstage playing this ridiculously hard music, it changed time signature every measure. 11/4 - 7/8 - 3/4 -5/8 - maybe even a bar of 4/4 once in a while (usually "tacet bass"). This stuff made Rush sound like Country music! I don't miss the jacket, but I wish they would have let me keep the wig..... |  Yes, my dirty little secret is out. I...used...to be...a GUITAR PLAYER! A-A-A-H-H-! Well, I played guitar on 1 song when I was with Barrence Whitfield & The Savages in 1985. It was a fun experience being in the most popular club band in Boston for a few months. We toured Europe, and parts of the US, but ultimately I went broke and had to go back to being a commercial bass slut. I was so broke at the time I had to sell my old Tele, sniff. Yo Ed, close your mouth, something might fly in there. |  Another great moment in Rock N' Roll history. Barrence Whitfield & The Savages open for The Ramones. Their road crew was ...less than acommodating. 2 channels on the board for a 7 piece band. Words were spoken, plugs were pulled (during our set AND their set), ears bled, beer flowed, fists flew. Check out the very cool '65 slab body P-Bass, painted to match my shirt just right. Rock and Roll excess triumphs over reason once again. |  | | The Dickie Thompson Trio at our bi-monthly gig at Plush. We've there the 1st and 3rd Fridays of the month from 6-8 for over three years. They said it wouldn't last..... | |  Lee Sklar |  Hangin' with Will Lee, BootsyCollins |  Playing Piccolo Bass at SOBII backed up by the groovin' Mel Brown |  Backin' up Lew Tabackin |  Double Trouble's Tommy Shannon |  "Twin Peaks" With Tony Levin - separated at birth? |  Dawn (Mrs. Friedland) and I onstage - "You're going to take ANOTHER solo?" |  My big boy, Django - 150lbs of good dog. He's loving the ice storm that hit Austin last winter. |  A lean, mean version of Lazy Ed & The Stratoloungers play the Tucson Fall Club Crawl. Arthur Migliazza on piano, Sidney George (of Dr. John fame) on sax, and Pete Torberg of Big In Vegas on drums; photo courtesy of Ken Paul Chernock |  A recent gig at the Oro Valley Jazz Festival featuring from left to right - Matt Mitchell, myself, Dave Jeffrey, Dickie Thompson, and Ed DeLucia. |  | | The Dickie Thompson Trio taken at the Tucson Jazz Society's Guitar Night. | A gig with pianist/singer Dena DeRose. She came out for a Tucson Jazz Society show and totally knocked me out. Her playing is as serious as it gets, and she sings beautifully. On occasion she gets into scatting unison lines with her right hand, or she'll sing different melodic textures against her chordal voicings. Very hip stuff. On drums is Fred Hayes, my rhythm section soul brother in Tucson. 
Photo: B Josh |  This was taken a few years back at the first National Guitar Workshop Bass Summit. Rocco (you know, Tower of Power) was a clinician, and there was no guitar player to play with him. Having my trusty Piccolo bass at the ready, I volunteered to play "What Is Hip" with him. He gave me a sideways glance when he saw the Piccolo, like he was looking at a two headed baby or something. I guess the concept of Piccolo bass is about as antithetical to Rocco's world view as you can get. Well, we played it, and naturally being the guitar player, I was kind of loud, playing as many of the classic licks from the original I could. Afterwards, Rocco said to me in his typically understated style, "You're a clever guy, next time... turn down!" Next time! Wow, you mean, I get to do it again? When does the tour bus leave?!
| The Friends Of Shooby Taylor. Named after the legendary cult hero, this band was a conglomerate of bizarre individuals. Jeremy Patfield sax, Matt Mitchell guitar, myself and Aaron Bonsall on drums. | | | | 
| New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival '91, Rayban Stage performing with Johnny Adams. Undoubtedly one of the greatest singers that ever lived, he was an amazing talent, and...a complicated guy to work with. But, now that he's gone, I remember only the good times, like a 20 minute version of "Please Release Me" at quarter note = 20bpm. 
| Bass Player Magazine Contributing Editor Chris Jisi and myself play at the BP 10th Anniversary show in LA. Ah, the first ten years were the best... 
| Drummer Ed Scheer and me in Italy on tour with Johnny Adams. We played in some seriously OLD venues. This ancient Greek amphitheatre was on top of a mountain in Sicily. Ed is now the frontman/singer for a great jump/blues band called The Love Dogs.  |  Did somebody say "Country Music"? This is what happens when people in Boston try to look country. Actually, this was the band from the 1993 Charles Playhouse production of "A Closer Walk With Patsy Cline". We packed houses for a solid year in Boston, then went on to record "Stop, Look and Listen" (check the discography page). The musicians are all top notch, and I really came to appreciate the music of Patsy Cline. Wish they would have let me burn the hat.... | Check out some MP3 samples from "Stop, Look & Listen". #1 and #2 | | 
Soundtrack Studios, Boston - sometime in the early'90s. I used to do a bit of work there - jingles, library music, demos, record projects etc. Then one day, they got a Synclavier. One guy played everything on the machine. Eventually, they realized that live bass made a difference, and I started getting calls again, alot of fretless mostly. Here's my old stable, a Peavey Dyna Bass 5 fretless (surprisingly good), a Warmouth Jazz 5 and a '65 P- Bass. | |
