Digging Holes Again

Posted by davenative on September 18, 2013

Greetings Nativophiles! And, welcome back to our ongoing excursion through the musty corridors of the Native Tape Vault!`

Before we took a summer vacation (to work) we’d spent a year listening to the many splendid demos, rarities, and anomalies* found in our tape library, as curated, annotated, pixelated, and carbonated by our illustrious drummer, Dave Thomas, HBE**.

Back when Dave was what psychiatrists like to refer to, euphemistically, as “sane,” he undertook the massive task of going through the mountain of recordings we made in our salad years, when all we did was eat salad and make tapes in our studio that Woody built.

Under Dave HBE’s tyranny, Nativology has endured two iterations — Volumes 1 & 2. Now, the planet is faced with the even graver crisis of Vol. 3, and already the Untied Nations General Assembly has issued a statement saying, “Who needs salad when Nutella Hazlenut Spread can feed the world?”

Today’s example of John Fitzwater-engineered analogue-based goodness is a song we have visited already on Vol. 2, in a version from the John Epstein epoch which, much like the Jurassic era, ended in early 1995.

Following a brief, salad-munching summer, the effervescent John Watts joined the band, and a new round of demos were made on the trusty Tascam 8-track cassette recorder, which now sits enshrined in The Museum of Dave’s Storage Locker In Englewood, NJ.

Matt Hutt had come up with a dilly of a song that would eventually be the kick-off tune of our best-known album, Exhale On Spring Street. Woody collaborated on it, and Dave kicked in a line or two. Mike Jaimes and Matt Lyons kibutzed in the corner, and a landmark tune was regifted to the many varied nations of Midtown Manhattan, between Chelsea and Hell’s Kitchen, sorry, Clinton.

So, settle back with a quart of Sangria, a bowl of Nutella, and a big honking doobie! Click some keys on your favorite computer, and marvel at the majesty embodied in a little number called —

Digging Holes v.2

* A subtle reference to Dave’s current project, a graphic novel called ANOMALIES, which can be found here.

** Half-Baked Empire

Sunned, Stunned & Zooted

Posted by davenative on September 11, 2013

How was everyone’s summer vacation?

Ours was fabulous, minus a cataclysm or two.

The main thing is — the keeper of our vaults, Drummer Dave Thomas (or, as he’s known semi-derisively — Hollywood Thomas) took the summer ensconced in his Dave Cave working fiendishly on all manner of mad things, including new music he’s preparing for a solo or band release. He can’t decide if he’s a band or not — it was that kind of existential summer for Dave!

Anyhoo, he’s back on the Native tip, and starting to sift through the tapes that will comprise Nativology Vol. 3. He hasn’t really given us a report on what’s available, but by the oohs and ahhs we hear emanating from the Dave Cave, he’s either on to some great stuff, or he’s found that online photo of Olivia Munn and ScarJo he’s been searching for!

What can we expect when these recordings find their way into our Bandcamp site?

Good question, Jasper from Omaha, Pennsylvania!

All Dave will say is that Vol. 3 will pick up where Vol. 2 left off — somewhere in the John Watts era, featuring more demos from our Exhale On Spring Street period. But, Dave has that shifty look in his eyes (okay, he always has that shifty look, but go with us here…), a shifty look that suggests something special is forthcoming, or fifthcoming, in addition to the Vault tracks that will turn up on Nativology Vol. 3.

Can it be that a new live Native album is in the works??

Great question, Tanya from Stalingrad, Ohio!

All we can do is wait until Dave gets that shifty look off his face and tells us. But, we’ve got next week’s new round of Nativology to look forward to, and that is excitement unparalleled in all of our accumulated human experience. (Edit: Dave: “Except for that online pic of Olivia Munn & ScarJo!“)

Before we say orderve, a big ol’ BTW — right now is a perfect time to go back to Volumes 1 & 2 of Nativology, which can be found here and here. You’ll find a treasure-trove of great unreleased Native goodness to warm the shackles of your heart!

So, welcome to Fall — it’s all downhill from here, except for the uphill parts!

Drinky, drinky, smoky, smoky!

Happy Summertime fun!

Posted by davenative on July 10, 2013

Hey Cornbread Wednesday people!!!

We here at Native Central hope you are doing what we are doing — having fun, and enjoying a little time off. We haven’t even cooked up any cornbread this week!

We hope you enjoyed the visits our drummer, Dave Thomas, made into our vaults. The results, Nativology pts 1 & 2, are amazing, even if we do say so ourselves!!

Dave is working on some music of his own right at this very second, but he will return to scouring the vaults soon.

In the meantime, he is planning a Native live album to be taken from multi-track sources. He’ll have more on that, and other Native goodies he’s planning, in the near future.

Meanwhile, there is great Native music to catch up on at our bandcamp site — just click on the music links in the sidebar and it’s party time!!

To which we proudly say — “Drinky drinky, smokey, smokey!”

The Wild Atlantic Sea

Posted by davenative on June 25, 2013

There are times in your life when you remember right where you were, and what you were doing when you first heard a bit of music. This is the case for me with the song we are featuring in this week’s edition of Nativology Vol. 2.

Mat Hutt’s dad, Sam Hutt, sometimes known as Hank Wangford strolled into the apartment Mat & I shared on 16th Street, told us he’d written a song on the flight over from the UK, picked up a guitar and played us this brilliant tune. It was full of wistful, faraway chords, haunting melodies, and the loveliest poetry.

I was sitting on our couch, quite probably with my mouth hanging open in sheer awe at the effortlessness Sam displayed in his performance, especially in light of the fact that he’d had no guitar on the plane. That moment forever defined the the long road I’d be on to be a real songwriter, not just somebody poking around with some chords and random words.

It was also at this the time of this visit that Sam asked a very cogent question as we viewed an old gangster serial — why do gangster’s henchmen simply accept their orders to go knock off an adversary? Or, as Sam put it, “How come nobody ever asks ‘And then what’?”

Years later, that question (sans question mark) would become the title of our third studio album.

I tell that story, not as a digression, but to illustrate how long we’d hang on to good ideas before incorporating them into our work.

It would be years before Native took up the song. But, once we did it became a tentpole of our shows, often popping up at the end. And there was little that could follow it.

When I produced the Exhale On Spring Street album, I somehow left off Sam’s writer credit — a fact that I regret every time I hear it. So, let me publicly apologize to Sam for the egregious oversight. It was not a slight, but rather a mistake made by someone just a bit over his head on his first album production. I’m truly sorry for it, Sam!!!

This version is our demo from 1996, featuring Mr. John Watts on keyboards. And, just as it served as a closer to our sets, the same is true today as it will be the final song in this volume of Nativology.

We will resume our scouring of the Native Tape Vault with Vol. 3 in the coming months. In the meantime, we are preparing a live album release, the details of which will be disclosed soon.

But, for now, sit back and enjoy a tour of the beautiful, rocky shores of —

The Wild Atlantic Sea

Twisting, turning, flying, burning…

Posted by davenative on June 19, 2013

Adding John Watts to the band had really paid off and, by the summer of 1996, the band was really running smooth on all cylinders. Constant, relentless rehearsal and gigging resulted in a band that was air-tight, confident, and armed with the largest playbook of our existence!

In the midst of all the chaos, we continued to write new material, and we were sure-enough of ourselves to play the new music in public, letting it grow and evolve before laying down the demo on our trusty Tascam 8-track recorder.

This week’s tune is a very impressive Mat Hutt composition, inspired by a comment made by our manager, Paul Ducharme.

Paul, ever vigilant against the incursion of fake-hippies into our real-hippies scene, had coined the term ‘krevelers’ to describe those who look, sound, and dress like hippies, but who were actually predators — taking advantage of the naiveté exhibited by so many of us flower children.

Paul’s comment came in the early hours of morning after a gig, when most folks have gone home, but there were a few still hanging around that seemed to have an awful lot of energy considering the hour. “It’s just another junkie sunrise.”

That was all Mat needed to put on his dramatist’s hat and put himself in the place of a lost soul, on the brink of destruction, living not from day-to-day, but score-to-score. He envisioned that soul having a moment of clarity, perhaps the only one of the day, as a stark colorless sun rises overhead.

I’m pretty sure he got some help from Woody and Paul along the way, but however it came about, and whoever helped develop it — it’s a Native masterpiece, in my opinion.

This version comes from August, 14, 1996 and, appropriately, it was the last song of a long set which puts it at the right hour — around four a.m.

Our good buddy and compatriot, Kregg Ajamu, can be heard trading off with Mat at the end.

The band would pack up, go home and sleep, but for some tortured souls in the room, what awaited was a —

Junkie Sunrise

Older? Yes. Wiser? Perhaps. But, we’re all still kids in a Thunderstorm

Posted by davenative on May 28, 2013

Native was humming along on all cylinders in the fall of 1995.

We had endured the loss of keyboardist John Epstein, and a summer wherein we toured as a five-piece band. John Watts had come on board in the fall, and we hardly missed a beat — he assimilated our old material, even as we were coming up with enough new stuff to fill another two albums.

Speaking of albums, our first effort had floundered, due in no small part to a poor mastering job which nobody on our team recognized, but which kept radio from playing it.

We were hungry, hunkered-down, and humbled. We kept stumbling & rumbling along, oblivious to any muse but our own. The places we visited were farther-flung than ever, Buffalo, Rochester, all ports of call up the east coast, and of course — Bar Harbor, Maine. Aside from New York City, there was no place we visited more often, or felt more at home. The names of the bars there kept changing, but the faces of friends in that incredible place were as important to us as any we would ever know.

When we were back in NYC, our regularly-scheduled recording sessions kept us busy. The John Watts period saw us refining and improving songs we’d already demoed with the mercurial Mr. Epstein, and today’s song is among those on that list.

John Fitzwater, our erstwhile soundman, had developed a technique for recording the band on only eight-tracks. Since we were limited to that number on the Tascam Cassette recorder we were using in this project. Fitz would record the rhythm section of the band on DAT, and then transfer that to the first two tracks on the Tascam. We would then have six tracks left on which to overdub guitar, keys, and vocals. The hard part was getting a perfectly-balanced take of drums, bass, percussion, and rhythm guitar on the DAT. But, when we re-recorded today’s featured tune, an awful thing happened.

I was beginning to make demos of my own compositions on the same DAT machine, and one fateful day I accidentally recorded over a completed take of today’s song before it could be transferred to eight-track. The band was furious, Mat Hutt was ballistic (and, indeed, could not even talk to me for quite some time, such was his anger). I was devastated, and the event only made it harder for me to bring in material of my own creation.

source: imgur

For a time, I was quite isolated within the structure of the band, and a bit of a pariah. To make matters worse, when we re-re-recorded the song yet again — although it was a fine take, and the overdubs went well (with Mike surpassing himself on lead guitar), we did not take the care we had exhibited on all the other demos, and we found ourselves out of tracks and unable to do the harmony vocals.

At that point, lethargy and inertia set in. We took a break from recording, and the song languished, never getting a proper mix as all the other songs had done — which is too bad because it’s really quite splendid, as I think you’ll agree.

So, here it is — one of Native’s finest efforts, and a lost page from our playbook —

Thunderstorm v.2

Barefoot Girls

Posted by davenative on May 22, 2013

Before Native, your humble narrator was in a band called Kitchen Ethics. Based in Hell’s Kitchen, and helmed by Joel Golden, Mick Ryall, and Ron Brice, we were lucky enough to play gigs with Blues Traveler, Spin Doctors, God Street Wine, and were a part of the burgeoning New York Rock Club Scene in the pre-Wetlands days when small clubs like Nightingale’s, and McGovern’s ruled the roost.

It was during this period that I started to take up a guitar and attempt to write songs. As a drummer, I’ve always tried to play with really good songwriters, and the day came when I had collected enough influences and arrangement practices that I was compelled to take it a step further and write the darn thing myself.

I was like Candide, throwing myself into the role of writer and hoping that sheer luck and effort would make up for things like not knowing the names of the chords, or how to play the guitar.

But, I had one very good advantage, as a drummer I knew very clearly what the beat was, and how I wanted it played. This may not sound like much, but let me tell you something, most of the songwriters I worked with, as good as they were, usually had no idea what they wanted, beat-wise. Quite often, I’d be playing a song and wonder if I had it right, and I seldom found out!

So, I was motivated to write songs from the beat up, and with the encouragement of the Kitchen Ethics guys, I wrote a little ditty called The Better Part Of Valor. Good title, but that’s about all that’s good in it. Oh, the band plays it fine, it’s the lyrics and melody, and singing that makes me absolutely sure that I’ll not be playing it for anyone.

Kitchen Ethics broke up, sadly, and I was left with The Radon Room in Mott Street. Two years later, at the same location, Native was getting going, and I decided to dust off this tune and give it a revamp. Inspired by the intoxicating sight of beautiful girls dancing around an open fire after a Grateful Dead concert, (and with Something Worth Remembering already under my belt) I proceeded to work up a tune that worked out pretty well, and would stay in our setlists for the rest of Native’s touring days.

We never recorded an album version, other than the epic live version found on Native’s cd – Live From Marmfington Farm Vol. 1. But, we *did* tape a demo of it during the sessions from Fall 1995 that have made up a big part of Nativology Vol. 2

In my humble opinion, it’s one of the best things we did in these sessions. So, take a trip back in time, to a Grateful Dead parking lot bonfire, and the silhouetted dancers around it, those —

Barefoot Girls

Fragile Clown

Posted by davenative on May 14, 2013

Welcome to the Native blog! If you are just joining us, this is a blog dedicated to the band Native. Each week, we post a rare song from our archives for free downloading or streaming. And the bonus (or the catch) is I get to walk us through a bit of background on what you are about to hear, and you have to read it or we send attack dogs to your door to relieve themselves on your welcome mat!!!

The period of 1995/96 was perhaps the bands’ strongest period; we were writing songs so fast we could barely keep up with ourselves. We managed to play and compose constantly for almost a decade, and much of that material never saw the light of day, or was played a few times in our shows and later dropped, and of course many songs went on to get re-recorded for our albums.

In our studio, Marmfington Farm, we were working on a Tascam eight-track cassette recorder, and our Producer/Engineer was John Fitzwater.

But, today’s track was overseen by Mat Hutt, and was a song that developed so quickly the band never did a full recording of it before it was thrust into our playlist for a hot minute at the tail end of ’95.

Mat’s early demos, before forming the band, were done on the same set-up and he was quite familiar with how to demo a song quickly, using all the tracks as he does here. He laid down two guitars and three vocals over a stereo drum machine track. Matt Lyons provided the bass. No involvement from myself, Mike Jaimes, or John Watts — eight tracks done and dusted!

It was one of the few times that a song was demoed in order to show the band, as opposed to just running the chords at rehearsal and recording it later. And it worked!

It was so perfect for our sound that we were playing it on stage within days. Sadly, the song was dropped after a period of a few months and never received its due in the studio. But, I love it!

With this tune, Mat shows his continuing growth as our front man and main songwriter. His mastery of vocal-stacking is something I took note of as I got busy with the same kind of demos for the songs I was bringing in.

It’s also a very personal song for Mat. He was going through a lot of changes, growing up, getting tougher, and one thing was for sure: There would be no more —

Fragile Clown

The Smallest Moon

Posted by davenative on May 8, 2013

Native’s chief songwriters are Mat Hutt and John Wood. Mike Jaimes wrote a few really good ones, and I was always champing at the bit with one of my little epics.

But, Matt Lyons very rarely brought in any compositions, being satisfied to contribute to the details of the various arrangements. However, there exists in the Native Vault one item that I’ve always loved — it’s a song that began life in the days when Anthony Ballsley was our singer, and we had a harder, more Rock sound.

It existed for a couple of years as an instrumental that only got played as we warmed-up during rehearsals, and was known informally as Ham & Eggs. It was never played at our gigs, but it was very strong, and we all thought it had promise.

I asked Woody recently about the transformation the song underwent in the Summer months of 1995:

“The song, as I’m sure you’ll remember, was originally called Ham & Eggs. It predated me, and I don’t know if Matt Lyons wrote it, or if it was a collaboration. I always thought it would be a great song to try to write a melody for and I specifically wrote this song to go with the riff as opposed to how I usually write.

I had mostly always started with lyrics, then wrote the melody to fit. I learned a lot, writing that one. It was also very personal to me.”

When he brought the new lyrics in, renaming the song in the process, it was an immediate hit with the band, and for a brief time it enjoyed a regular place in our set lists. But, time and tide move on, and what was one day a sentimental favorite soon became a remembrance of pained separation and loss, and would be played nevermore.

Thus, the short lifespan of one of Woody’s all-time best lyrics, and Matt Lyons raging power chords was limited to a paltry few live tapes in our library. But, I cannot help feel a pang of nostalgia for those days, surely a golden period for Native, when the high point of our show would unquestionably be —

The Smallest Moon

Smoke In The Desert

Posted by davenative on May 1, 2013

The summer of 1995 was a tumultuous time for Native. We had lost our keyboardist, John Epstein; we’d continued to tour as a five-piece and were not satisfied with our sound minus piano and organ; the album we’d worked so hard to achieve was now over a year old, and although it had garnered some radio play, it had not got us to the big goal of every band (back then) — a record deal; and the strain of constantly being cooped up together in a van was taking it’s toll – we were, for the first time, starting to bicker and get persnickety with each other.

In addition to that, my father, Hal Thomas, passed away, leaving a four-piece Native to struggle through a few torturous gigs without its drummer.

In short — it was the summer of our discontent.

Out of that tumult came some very good things, however — Mat, who had been growing by leaps and bounds as a songwriter and frontman, really took it to the next level; and, John Watts joined us to tickle those ivories that we were missing so badly.

By the early fall, we were recording again and had a new batch of songs featuring the stripped-down sound we had developed over the summer. Today’s song is one of the fruits of those sessions, and it’s a pip, in my opinion.

We’d been doing a lot of shows with a band called The Grasshoppers – Jason Appleton, Marcos Joachim, Chris Wilford, & Dave Hamburger – and they had a strong influence on us all, but Mat especially was drawn to their tight songs and cogent lyrics. It was a sound not derived as much from the jam band scene we were in as much as it was just pure, classic rock music of the highest order. We thought they were as good as The Beatles.

The affinity between to two bands would extend for years, indeed Mike appears on the cover of their great album, A Night At The Hoppera, and their influence would continue — but it starts right here with this great song from the pen of Mat Hutt.

Smoke In The Desert