Shmoont

Posted by davenative on April 24, 2013

John Epstein, Native‘s funky, non-sequitur spouting keyboardist came up with a word to describe moments there are no words for — shmoont.

It’s the perfect catch-all word, neither fish or fowl, noun or verb, Earth-based or non-Earth-based. And since all those things could be equally applied to Mr. Epstein himself, the term not only stuck, it became a part of our everyday lexicon.

“What did you think of that guitar solo?” “Shmoont.”

“How are we going to get from Buffalo to Bar Harbor in twelve hours?” “Shmoont.”

“Is that a truck heading straight for us?” “Shmoont.”

“Did you hear that Epstein’s quiiting the band?” “Shmoont!!!”

The general reaction to John’s departure was a mixture of grief and relief that can only be summed-up by the wonderful expression he invented in the days before his departure from our happy little dysfunctional-family in the late spring of 1995.

It must be said that Native was set back on its heels by his absence. We spent an unsettled summer playing keyboardless shows in our five-piece formation, but in many ways it was good because it kicked us all into a higher gear as we tried to balance the loss by upping our individual games: Mat & Woody really turned into a true songwriting machine; I took drum lessons; Matt Lyons & Liz Jaimes were quickly becoming Matt & Liz Lyons; Fitz was ensconced at Marmfington Farm, determined to turn our rehearsal space into a recording space; Karl’s posters became even more elaborate and evocative.

We knew, however, that there was something missing in our sound — Mike, especially, was desirous of that carpet of organ riding under everything like a magic carpet.

‘Twas at that time that the heaven’s parted and, lo — a keyboardist of extraordinary prowess stepped among us, took that empty seat in the van and became known to all the world as John Watts.

To which, we all simultaneously commented — “Shmoont!!!!!!”

In no time at all, the estimable Mr. Watts was familiar with every song in our playlist (although, it was at this time that a quite a few older tunes from the Anthony Balsley era were sadly dropped).

Fitz attained a newer model of TEAC’s 8-track cassette recorder, and off we flew into a new series of demos, starting with today’s selection —

Up Or Down

Native — The Cover Band

Posted by davenative on April 16, 2013

Every band has songs in their repertoire that are not of their own making — cover songs is the term for them. Some bands do nothing but covers, others adapt them to their own style.

Native played tunes by The Clash, Chuck Berry, and Taj Mahal at our very first gig. Of course, we were very motivated to write original music, but were aware from the start that a good cover version says a lot about you to your audience.

Over the years, we took on a lot of cover tunes, some for our own amusement, others as requests. We played everything from Jimi Hendrix, to The Beatles, to Pink Floyd… shoot, we even did a U2 song at someone’s wedding. And then there’s Hava Nagila!!

But, the band we loved to cover the most was The Funky Meters from New Orleans. The mostly-instrumental numbers they came up with had a bubbly, percolating patina that distinguished their brand of funk with that ‘something extra’ that we learned from constantly.

When we added John Epstein to our roster, it enabled us to really dig into The Meters style even more so than before. Everybody, it seems, does a version of Cissy Strut, but, with Epstein’s organ prowess giving us that funky undergroove, we were playing Funky Miracle, Fiyo On The Bayou, Look A Py Py, Pungee, and many more.

So, the day Epstein came in with a yen to do an all-out monster version of Stevie Wonder’s Ordinary Pain ( from the Songs In The Key Of Life album) we hopped on that train and rode it all the way to Funkville.

So, today we offer up this Motown epic, done Native-style. Recorded by John Fitzwater in the spring of 1995 at our luxurious studio accommodations known as Marmfington Farm, located on the sunny plains of West 26th Street in Manhattan.

Ordinary Pain

Mike Jaimes — The Jazzie Hippie

Posted by davenative on April 3, 2013

Mike Jaimes wrote an instrumental piece called Jazzie Hippie around the time Native was formed. His self-recorded demo is a part of Nativology Vol. 1 and makes for an interesting comparison to the version we humbly present today.

As an arrangement, and as a showpiece for his guitar prowess, it’s up there with the band’s best tunes, but it also highlights his skill at linking musical passages that, on paper, might seem too disparate to ever work together.

Mike would employ this talent in so many songs over the next decade. Whenever you hear a musical motif, or a bit of bridging material — chances are that was Mike’s donation.

Interestingly, there is a point of pedantry associated with this song, an odd thing for an instrumental production — the spelling of Jazzie came up upon the first occasion of writing it on a tape cover. One might expect it to be spelled Jazzy, as that’s the way we normally see it used. But, (and here’s where I contributed to the final usage, although I remember it being a group-wide discussion) Jazzy Hippie looks weird in the sense that it employs two differing ways of spelling the same ‘ee’ ending.

So, my point of pedantry led to the present-day, nicely consistent title. It also offers a view into the biotelemetry of the band.

And — what a song!!!!

As a opening number (when we’d had no sound-check) it served to let the sound-technician get a working mix going before having to worry about vocals; as a middle-of-the-set number, it rocked and gave Mat and Woody a chance to rest their voices. The key thing here is — it always worked.

From day one, it was a perfect fit within the architecture of Native’s distinct persona.

Indeed, we did not record an officially-released version until And Then What in 2001, but that version is cut from the same cloth as this wonderful demo, made in the dizzying, chaotic, exhilarating year of 1995.

Recorded and mixed on analogue tape by John Fitzwater at the legendary Marmfington Farm — kick back and spend some time with —

The Jazzie Hippie v. 2

Taking Out The Trash

Posted by davenative on March 25, 2013

Leave it to Mat Hutt to pen an ode to housework, albeit it’s been said the song also works as a metaphor on the subject of ridding oneself of unnecessary, destructive, hurtful alliances.

Recorded as part of Native‘s winter songwriting sessions in early 1995, today’s featured song became a staple of our set lists for a year or two and then disappeared, perhaps in part due to a misperception that it was about judging people negatively — the metaphor was taken too far!!! And being negative about things that are negative, can lead one down a virtual rabbit-hole of unabashed negativity. Perish the thought!

But, since it’s been taken too far, let’s explore this particular metaphor further, shall we? Grab a flashlight! Into the rabbit-hole!!!!

Let’s have a show of hands. Who amongst us does not have an acquaintance that drags down the quality of their life?

Ah, no hands raised. No surprises there, really.

We tend to let these relationships go, being nice people that we are, but they rarely turn into shining beacons of positivity do they?

No, sourpuss people tend to remain sourpusses and we don’t need them at all, nor do they serve much purpose except perhaps as examples on how not to live. And yet, we allow them to fester in the hope that we are not being diabolically judgmental.

Horses for courses, we say with an air of pompous humility.

Equally though, we all have the capacity to be that person. I know I have skirted the periphery of being a useless, needy Wormtongue of a friend on past occasions. I’ll leave out the fact that I have changed, because that would undermine my pompous humility.

But, this song is not about me, anyway! No, no, no! Perish the thought! Nor, is it about anyone else specifically — Mat was not big on metaphors, you see.

Very literal, that chap.

So, when I listen to this one — I just like to simply dwell on housework — cleaning carpets, dusting the dishware, shaving the cat, and how nice it would be if some needy, moany person would pop around and take over, instead of me having to soil my hands with it.

So, the moral of today’s lesson is — negative people have their place, and at times are quite useful, but this song is not about them.

Trash

Everyone’s a kid in a thunderstorm

Posted by davenative on March 18, 2013

Native‘s on-going recording project, overseen by the redoubtable John Fitzwater was proceeding apace throughout the early months of 1995. By this time, the band were a gigging machine. There was no need to tour, the entire northeast lay before us in verdant symmetry: easily reached from our New York City vantage-point. The entire upper east coast was a corridor down whtich we strode with great alacrity; dashing to a gig in, say, Amherst, and back again to our beds and futons in the self-built cubicles of The Loft, conveniently located in the garment-district environs of midtown Manhattan.

We had made an home for ourselves that was all about developing as a band. We could rise in the afternoon and already be at rehearsal, since it would take place in an adjoining studio — the infamous Marmfington Farm. By combining our forces, instead of having separate apartments, we’d found a way to do nothing but what we wanted to do — play music all the time. Granted, Mike and John Epstein lived elsewhere, but the idea and principle of total focus on music was in place…. and working.

We were playing three and four nights a week on a regular basis — Paul Ducharme, , our manager, made sure of that. Then, rehearsal/writing/recording took place on two days of that selfsame week. We were like clockwork angels in our productivity.

In that context, we offer this snapshot — a demo made in the heady days of yore.

This is another of Mat & Woody‘s collaborations, although they would probably give each other most of the credit. My Cherokee roots are evoked in the recurrent tom-tom pattern in the intro. Mike came up with a typically beautiful guitar-driven theme, and later — a textbook example of how to play a solo; the citing of the theme followed by a stunning flight of light-fingered fancy. I dare any guitarist on the planet to match it.

And then there is the wonderfully-evolving collaboration of Hutt & Wood. More and more, they were approaching the vocals as a duet, like all great duos they held the curves of the melody like race-car drivers in Ferraris at Le Mans.

Add in Matt Lyons‘ signature basslines and the solid support from Mr. Epstein and you have another classic Native tune that somehow defied making an appearance on any of our albums.

Inspired by a particularly violent storm that seemed centered over The Loft, and beginning with an observation on our totally scared reactions in its duration, here is

Thunderstorm v. 1

Digging Holes Again

Posted by davenative on March 11, 2013

Welcome to Nativology — where, each Wednesday, we take a listen to rarities from Native’s secret underground high-security vault while enjoying a steaming hot slice of cornbread, slathered in farm-fresh butter, washed-down with generous amounts of kickapoo joy juice!

Or is that coffee with Nutrasweet and extra dried-out creamer? And the cornbread has that weird digital taste to it… mmm, jpegs!

Anyway, we are Native and we are as surprised as anyone to find such a surfeit of riches in our tape library. We were actually quite productive for a bunch of “lazy” hippies!

The studio where we indulgently delved into our every musical whim, was custom-built by our percussionist, the daring and able John Wood, a.k.a. Woody, a.k.a. Toast, a.k.a. Woodtoast, and many other variations, most of them printable.

It was not a large studio, being as it was a room within a room. But, with heavy sound-reinforced walls, and sitting on a bed of thick rubber so the neighbors were not bothered too badly by our twice-weekly rehearsals, it was sanctuary to us.

We dubbed it Marmfington Farm, named after a mis-remembered town we’d passed through on our way to a gig in another mis-remembered town, and that name would become a sort-of catch-all phrase. It meant paradise. When we issued our first (and thus far, only) live album, we named it Live From Marmfington Farm, Vol. 1. Not because it was recorded there, but because we felt that wherever we played — that place became an extension of our paradise.

The song we’ll examine today had it’s origin in that hallowed place. The year — early 1995, in the era when John Epstein was our keyboardist and Native was on fire.

I remember sitting behind my drums watching Mat & Woody working out the lyrics as Mike helped with the chords Mat was trying out, whilst Epstein kibitzed with his often inscrutable observations. At one point, they were stuck for a lyric and I chimed in, “How about — If it doesn’t kill me, it’s made me stronger?” “Nah, too many syllables — If I’m not dead, it’s made me strong. Yeah, that’ll work.”

Like many of our songs, it was born well before we put it on an album, preferring as we did to letting our songs evolve through performance. Happy accidents arising from spontaneous invention are not to be undervalued, and cannot be overstated in their importance. It was a system that worked well for us, although it must be said — it’s amazing how closely this demo from ’95 resembles the track on our ’97 album, Exhale On Spring Street.

So, here it is — one of our best-remembered songs —

Digging Holes

Rolling Thunder

Posted by davenative on March 5, 2013

In the late winter/early spring of 1995, Native was in the midst of preparing the follow-up to our eponymous first record. Having traveled far & wide to promote that effort, we’d had a whole year to write new material. John Epstein had delivered the excellent Hot Day; Mat Hutt & John (Woody) Wood were coalescing into a formidable songwriting team; I was coming up with my own small contributions; Matt Lyons did not write (but rather chose to lend a big hand on arrangements); and Mike… well, Mike left us gobsmacked and astounded at the sheer genius he could summon when he decided to compose.

I have a distinct memory of thinking that the amount of goodness Mike packed into the two minutes and some odd seconds of today’s featured song had few comparable antecedents. The world in which we operated was the early jam-band scene, where longer is normal, and even longer is even more normal. But, as we finished the first run-through I clearly remember thinking that Mike seemed to have the composition skills of a Jerry Garcia, and the astounding sense of brevity found in that other great California-based tunesmith — Brian Wilson.

The song I compared it to that day was This Whole World, a brilliant two minute plus opus found on The Beach Boys Sunflower. Mike, of course, had not heard that one, and in fact he was not aware that he had packed so much goodness into such a small time frame.

The song was so short that our Sound Wizard, John Fitzwater took a recording Woody had made when he lived on 99th Street at the Hippie Hotel. With a microphone lowered out his window, he’d captured the sound of dogs barking furiously in the courtyard below. Now, those sounds were incorporated into the opening and closing moments, a touch that Mike absolutely loved.

When we played it live, Woody & Mat barked like those courtyard canines, bringing a smile to the listeners, and certifying the wonderfulness of the choice Fitz had made. After all, if most people were looking for a sound effect for a song with the title this one has, they’d have probably reached for a sound-effects record with a thunder track. But, Native was not ‘most people’.

The multi-tracks of this (and all the songs we’ve presented recently) are lost. If anyone ever finds them, let us know. It would be fun to remix them. But, if a remix were possible, the dogs would still be inserted right where they are now.

(Click on the following link to go to our Bandcamp page. This song, like all the selections in our Nativology series, are free to listen to, and download in the file type of your choice.)

Rolling Thunder

If you don’t risk anything, you’re gonna risk it all

Posted by davenative on February 27, 2013

This is Nativology.

Every Wednesday, Cornbread Wednesday, that is, my band, Native posts an unreleased song from our vast underground archives in the Cave of Dave.

I, the just-mentioned Dave, as Archivist, Historian, Rockologist, and all-round Pain in the Ass, do ascribe to scribe some scribbles about said unreleased songs, in the hope that the listener may have some contextual coherency, greater musical understanding, and less of a need to jump out the window.

Music can do that. Especially good music. And, music that is damn good — well, that might actually make you feel like shutting the window, cracking open a tall, frosty one, and telling Ethel to put on that crazy flannel thing with the straps.

Today’s selection hails from the mighty year of 1995, when men were men, and women were getting sick of it.

Mat Hutt is the main songwriter of this piece, and it comes to you today as an unreleased tune for a fine, very understandable reason. But, it’s one we’ve forgotten. Now, armed with the 20/20 hindsight of our 20/20 foresight, we can see that it was more like 20/20 shortsightedness. We rarely played this wonderful song much, and it never really got its’ day in the sunlight; it was left on the shelf like a can of dried tomatoes.

Mat, our chief songsmith, really delved into transcribing and translating our tacit belief that if we put ourselves out there, on the line, performing all the time; if we were perfectly willing to starve in the process & utterly fearless in the face of the vast Dali-esque plane of existence that is an artist’s life (complete with melting watches and Madonnas made of bees), that we would persevere.

To do otherwise, to waste our talent and bend to conventional wisdom, which says: “Get a job, Jerkface. Music is a nice hobby for special people, of which you are not one.”

But, the problem with conventional wisdom is that it is rarely conventional, and never wise.

Mat got it right. Not just for us, but for anyone with talent who dares to throw themselves out there, Candide-like into the sometimes fulfilling, oftentimes uncaring, always-changing Tilt-a-Whirl world a performer faces each night:

If you don’t risk anything, you’re gonna risk it all.

So, I’m going to sing for you

Even If I Fall

A Hot Day in the Studio with John Epstein

Posted by davenative on February 19, 2013

In the wintry months of early 1995, Native was in the midst of an extended song-writing period. Our self-titled first album had been out for a year, and it seemed to the band that, as good as it was, the issues we *did* have with it all centered around the fact that we had little control over the aspects of its production. With that in mind, we set about preparing an album we would produce ourselves. And with our ever-growing prowess at songcraft, it was sure to be a far, far better thing we would do than we had done before.

Native was touring quite a lot during this period, as well as enjoying residencies at two NYC clubs — Wetlands on Mondays, and McGovern’s on Wednesdays. With rehearsals on Tuesdays & Thursdays, and longer treks out to the northeast corridor on weekends, we were in our first prime period. We were starting to headline our own shows more & more, and gigs at larger venues like Tramps (opening for the Dixie Dregs) loomed ahead.

In this hothouse period, the band arrived for a session at Marmfington Studio one frosty Thursday wherein John Epstein unveiled his newest song which, in my not-so-humble opinion, ranks easily as his greatest contribution to Native’s catalogue. Considering the freezing New York City winter outside, we were bowled-over by the warmth of both the out-of-context setting (Florida) and the emotions conveyed (love & respect) John so eloquently infused in every measure.

To this day, I find myself amazed at the completeness it had. Usually, the band would work hard to expand on our songs. Mike, especially, was great at coming up with bridges and musical passages. But none of this was needed for this unexpected delight, which went to the top of our shortlist for the projected album due to start in the spring.

Unforeseen events would make that album an impossibility, so now all that exists of this rare song is this demo, recorded live to DAT by John Fitzwater one very, very cold evening.

Hot Day

The Return of the Nativology: Call My Name

Posted by davenative on February 12, 2013

Nativology Vol. 2 resumes as we harken back to those thrilling days of yesteryear, and explore the songwriting and evolution of Native.

Native toured constantly throughout the nineties. The five core members of the band lived together in a Garment District loft, just steps away from Madison Square Garden. The living environment suited the hothouse atmosphere of creativity that was surging and burgeoning in the nascent psyches of the band.

Everyone was writing tunes and had the luxury of a band at arms’ length to give it a go and see what the darned thing sounded like. Today, we call that Protools, only that software is not programmed to have opinions or tell you that you smell bad.

When John Epstein joined up in late 1993, all attention was given to catching him up on the songs that existed before his entrance, recording an album with two hurriedly-written songs by him, and playing an endless amount of gigs to support the eponymous album.

By the early winter of 1995, all that was done & dusted. It was time for some new tunes.

We already had today’s featured tune on the back-burner, and had done an interesting version of it at Epstein’s old alma mater, the Institute for Audio Research (IAR), in late ’94.

But now, armed with a new Tascam 8-track cassette recorder, we gathered with our live soundman, John Fitzwater, to initiate a series of recordings that would run throughout the Spring of ’95.

This, and the mixes that will follow in the coming weeks, no longer exist in the Native vault in their multi-track form. So, we will be presenting them in all the glory of their original mixes, done by Mr. Fitzwater, with us looking over his shoulder and being really annoying.

Call My Name