the Martian Entropy Band

Bill Gracie

Benjamin Piner — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 17:59:39 GMT

Damn I miss Bill.He was my spiritual Brother.We had played in several bands over the past 21 years.An amazing drummer.The first time we played back in 1987 we both noticed we had a musical connection.We played well together.3 years later we started calling each other brothers.He made me appreciate the simple things in life , which I already did,but he opened my eyes more.I'm talking about nature,music animals etc......

He pushed me to play things that I've never played in a band situation.Very challenging music.He was his idea for me to play Stanley Clarke,Marcus Miller and others.With out him giving me the push, we would have never played it. Bill made me a better player.He will

always be in my heart.With lots of good memories.I could keep writing and writing about Bill. There was so much I learned from him

My big brother Bill Blimp Gracie.We had love for each other just like real brothers.Losing him makes me very sad.

Benjamin Piner

Star Trek Conventions in the New York Times

admin — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 03:01:17 GMT

[This article was in the New York Times today. notice it discusses the Star Trek Convention of 1972. The Martian Entropy Band performed at the Star Trek Convention of 1973. Several of the same people were at the one the MEB played. -admin]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/21/nyregion/21winston.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Joan Winston, ‘Trek’ Superfan, Dies at 77

By WILLIAM GRIMES

Published: September 20, 2008

For the “Star Trek” faithful, it was a historic event. Gene Roddenberry, the creator of the series, showed up. So did the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov, not to mention fans dressed as Klingons, Tribbles and Bele from the planet Ceron. NASA delivered a scaled-down lunar module and a spacesuit.

Jeff Maynard

Joan Winston with George Takei, who played Mr. Sulu on the original “Star Trek” series, in an undated photo.

It was January 1972, and the first Star Trek convention was under way in a rented ballroom at the Statler Hilton in Manhattan. The organizers had expected a crowd of about 500. In the end, more than 3,000 fans turned up, so many that by the final day of the event registrars were issuing ID cards made from torn scraps of wrapping paper. For fans of the series, the convention marked the moment when a diaspora became a nation.

And it made a subculture celebrity of Joan Winston, who played a leading role in creating the event and went on to achieve a second-order fame as one of world’s most avid “Star Trek” fans. She died of Alzheimer’s disease on Sept. 11 at age 77, her cousin Steven Rosenfeld said. She lived in Manhattan.

“I would put her in the category of legend,” said Dennis Rayburn, a columnist for roddenberry.com, a Web site of the production company owned by Roddenberry’s son, Eugene. “She is right up there with Bjo.”

For “Star Trek” devotees, the comparison requires no clarification. Betty Jo Trimble, or Bjo (pronounced Beejoe), won immortality in the “Star Trek” universe by leading the campaign to keep the series on the air when word got out that NBC planned to cancel it.

Ms. Winston earned the love of “Star Trek” fans everywhere by helping to orchestrate an afterlife for the series beyond the television set — initially by organizing conventions and persuading stars from the series to attend, later by appearing at the conventions as a star in her own right, a superfan whose undying devotion inspired awe among “Star Trek” devotees.

Her unstinting efforts for the cause were chronicled in “Star Trek Lives” (1975), which she wrote with Jacqueline Lichtenberg and Sondra Marshak, and “The Making of the Trek Conventions” (1977). She also edited “Startoons” (1979), a book of science fiction cartoons; wrote fiction using the “Star Trek” characters; and, moving with the times, edited Number One, a fanzine devoted to First Officer William T. Riker, a character on “Star Trek: The Next Generation.”

Ms. Winston was born in Washington and grew up in Brooklyn, where she attended public schools. After her father decided to send her younger brother to college instead of her, she went to work at Bonwit Teller as a merchandiser. She later worked in the contracts departments of CBS and ABC in New York.

She led a second life. A passionate fan of science fiction, she went into deep space when the Starship Enterprise set off on its voyage on Sept. 8, 1966. When the campaign to keep the series on the air took off, she picketed NBC. She sent story ideas to Gene Roddenberry. In 1968 she pulled strings to attend the taping of a “Star Trek” episode — the last one, as it turned out.

She made the most of her opportunity. In his book about “Star Trek” fandom, “Get a Life,” William Shatner described Ms. Winston as “bright, bubbly, and energetic beyond every law of human physiology and comprehension.” Mr. Shatner, who played Captain James T. Kirk in the series, steered clear of the earliest “Star Trek” conventions but later became a regular on the circuit.

On the set, Ms. Winston charmed the actors, rubbed noses with Mr. Shatner for the camera and impressed Roddenberry enough that he asked her to develop one of her story ideas for the series, if it should survive for a fourth season.

It did not. After “Star Trek” ended, Ms. Winston attended science fiction conventions, but like many other “Star Trek” fans felt a certain coolness in the atmosphere.

“Most of us belonged to the Lunarians, a science fiction club, and we attended Lunacon, their convention, but there was a sense that ‘Star Trek’ fans were not real sci-fi fans,” said Devra Langsam, a fellow organizer of the first “Star Trek” convention and the editor of Spockanalia, the first “Star Trek” fanzine.

Elyse Pines, a friend of Ms. Langsam’s, proposed a gathering specifically for “Star Trek” fans. A mutual friend brought in Ms. Winston, who used her show business contacts to secure tapes of 15 “Star Trek” episodes, a blooper reel and the presence of Roddenberry. She also requested a few moon rocks from NASA.

“I just assumed that a day or two before the event the mailman would bring us a little postal package full of moon rocks,” she later told Mr. Shatner. Instead, NASA dispatched a trailer truck with two tons of memorabilia that included a genuine spacesuit stuffed with a mannequin astronaut.

Ms. Winston and her associates, known to fellow aficionados simply as the Committee, presented four more conventions before withdrawing from the field, exhausted, in 1976. By that time more than 40 “Star Trek” conventions were competing for Ms. Winston’s presence as a guest speaker.

“She didn’t let the status she had among the ‘Trek’ fans go to her head,” Mr. Rayburn said. “She was just one of us.”

Star Trek Conventions in the New York Times

admin — Sun, 21 Sep 2008 02:56:49 GMT

Martian Entropy Band Reunion

admin — Wed, 16 Jul 2008 17:52:55 GMT

Well folks, the Martian Entropy Band Reunion went off "without a hitch" asitwere. The band played at the reunion jam as if 33 years had never gone by. The audience loved it. It was awesome! The reunion party at the home of Spaceman Bassman was totally off the hook. The Illuminatus Lightshow was set up in the backyard, and jammed like it was 1974. Ths spirit of Cheese was heavily imbued throughout. We hope earthlings received our message of Piece (sic), Cheese, and Good Person

Bill Gracie, Hugh J. Hitchcock, Timothy F. Prosser, Mike Gould, and Wayne Gillis

mando

Benjamin Piner — Tue, 13 May 2008 19:12:49 GMT

Tim,

I meant to write my post in this thread----ooops.

Benjamin

Mandolin

Benjamin Piner — Tue, 13 May 2008 19:09:34 GMT

Yo Tim and everyone,

Was good to play music w/you and the Blimp last night.We did really well on your tune ( Can a Mandolin Rock ? ) You make it rock for sure.

This is my 1st post. Had time today at work to check the site again.Great Web Site!! Now I'm a member. Keep that Mando Rockin.

Check u out later.

Benjamin

Ozone Parade Photo Library

hhitch — Sat, 03 May 2008 18:18:23 GMT

I have posted a new photo library of photos from the Ann Arbor Ozone Parades circa 1973 and 1974. These photos are different from the others as they are not photos of the Martian Entropy Band, but are photos of all the other oddities that were in the parade those years. Verrrry interesting. the link to the Ozone Parade (non-MEB) photo library is http://martianentropyband.com/photos/ozoneparade/default.aspx There are something like 128 photos there, in addition to the Martian Entropy Band Ozone Parade photo library which has 35 photos and is located at http://martianentropyband.com/photos/high_resolution/default.aspx

Tim has written a rap song about the Ozone Parade. I hope he doesn't mind my posting it here. Readers, please note that this material is copyrighted.

Look it Up
copyright 2008 Timothy F. Prosser

I got a cPAP machine - I can jam like Air Supply
I got a 1970 bong - I know what it means to be high
My bed's got Peter Max sheets - my Pinto is parked in the street
I been to Haight Ashbury and dug the coast
but Ozone parade was really the most
look it up

(chorus)
Look it up Look it up in the encyclopedia
I jammed out on the pre-internet media
I hung out with the jet set but they were a bore
My band played free in 1974
Look it up

My house looks like an art museum
So many cool things people wanta come and see 'em
I want to do more entertainin'
but everything needs a lot of explainin'
the impressionist, realist, ceramacist stuff
will appeal to the real sort of real art buff
no Warhol, Pollock, or soup can stuff
But it's just as cool, and you can look it up
look it up

Look it up I was there in the discount media
you won't find me in your encyclopedia
the cats were bad and our hair was long
but our acid rock was comin' on real strong
we flew high like sputnik, then went to the moon
while people were diein with a needle and spoon
and tricky dick was still playin' with his pup
he'd drop out later, and you can look it up
look it up

What is Mumbles doing today, musically?

timprosser — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 04:09:20 GMT

Thanks to Hugh (Captain Jarvis) I am now endowed with my own musical website, focused on the music I am playing today: www.mandolinmaniac.com. Hugh very kindly secured the URL and put together the site for me as a birthday present -- he said it was a birthday present for the 35 years in which he didn't give me one, and I am extremely grateful. He posted a few mp3s of my current "Politically Incorrect Mandolin" project, which I am hoping to get released on CD sometime this year.

Thanks again, Hugh! And everybody, please, come check it out and let me know what you think.

BTW, I am looking for gigs and open mic nites for my "Politically Incorrect Mandolin" trip, a

CONCERT POSTED -- Michigan Theater Gig

hhitch — Fri, 11 Apr 2008 06:52:36 GMT

Hi folks,

I have posted the Michigan Theatre concert tape on the home page. You can listen by going to the home page and selecting the Michigan Theatre gig from the selector, or just by clicking the following link:

http://martianentropyband.com/default.aspx?audioaction=1&program=3

All in all it was one of our best concerts, I'd say. And at least for a good portion of it there was an appreciative audience. At least it sounds as if I felt fairly comfortable onstage for this gig. I didn't hesitate to fill up space with lead guitar playing (maybe too much!) Tim was solid as usual but it sounded as if there were some issues with getting Tim in the mix. Billie sounds like Billy Cobham reborn on this tape -- awesome. We had a new bass player on this gig, I don't remember his name. He did an admirable job and fulfilled his function well. And he played trombone on some songs when Mike played bass, like on Music Man. I will say, however, that the main benefit we achieved from getting the additional bass player was not a better band, but the ability to learn more songs, faster. Mike (the Spaceman Bassman) was taxed with overseeing the light show, technical details as well as his own show numbers, and I had a bunch of new tunes that were all in like 267/19 and I wanted the band to learn them fast. And whereas it may have taken Mike a little longer to learn the tunes, in retrospect I truly and honestly prefer the sound and the feel of Mike's playing, to this bass player. For example, the version of Warp Factor 217 on the free concert with Mike playing bass is far superior to the version we did at the Michigan Theater with the new bass player. That's how I feel about it -- now get outta here!

sorry it took this long to get it up on the website. Enjoy :)

Hugh J. Hitchcock

Today is the Anniversary of the Michigan Theatre Gig

hhitch — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 17:32:42 GMT

It was definitely March tenth. 1974, if recall correctly.

the Infamous Michigan Theatre gig (fiasco) put on by our "Manager" Dick Reed. Lots of money was spent putting on the gig, and about 40 people showed up. It was exciting during the preparation phase! We did have a recording of it, as well. Don't know where the recording has gotten off to.

I have the poster from that gig somewhere in my attic, one day soon I will dig it out, scan it, and post it here.

VIDEO POSTED - Pandemonium Ballet

hhitch — Thu, 27 Mar 2008 21:04:27 GMT

A gracious THANK YOU! to Steve Wild of Wild and Grace who Graciously retrieved the old video from the vault and digitized it to DVD for us (along with a wonderful recording of the infamous Michigan Theatre gig which will be made available shortly as well). So We go Wild by the Grace of Steve Wild.

I have posted the video here. I have tried to put it on YouTube but they don't accept vids longer than ten minutes. So rather than cut it I got our own video streamer. It rocks

enjoy, especially the part on the third song where I destroyed my guitar strings but decided to soldier on and play my solo on the demolished guitar instead of doing what would have been the smart thing and switching to keyboards. Oh well, live and learn, right? LOL

-Hugh

by the way folks if you have tried to email me recently, it did not get through. I am having serious issues with my email server right now and am working on the problem. But I haven't received any email since 7am this morning for some reason.

my last ozone parade

hhitch — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 09:12:51 GMT

Mike and I were in the Ozone Parade without the band one year. The article was published on November 1 so I guess the parade must have been on Halloween of 1975. I don't know why the band wasn't playing that year, but after doing two years of almost falling off of trucks maybe we'd had enough of that.

But I remember Mike asking me if I wanted to go ahead and be in the parade anyway, and I said sure, so the two of us took part with him driving the van (I don't remember who or what he was portraying that year) and me hanging out the passenger window in my getup. I had assembled an elaborate costume involving a gas mask I'd bought at an army surplus store, the mortar board hat I'd gotten from Tim after I'd graduated high school, which was adorned with a mirror-strip and a doctor's examining mirror; a pair of gloves, and holding a copy of Orwell's 1984 and pointing to it with the other hand, accusingly and with an attitude! And we drove down the street in the parade like that, and some photographer from the Michigan Daily thought it was a good shot, and so I got published. "These Funny Folk" was ME folks!

this was Mike's blue van and I think I can just make out Mike in a hat behind me in the driver's seat. Unfortunately the paper is very old and badly yellowed and unfortunately there was a crease right on the photo. And although I filtered it with Photoshop, this is about the best I could get of it. Not too bad I guess... at least it didn't crumble to dust yet!

-Hugh

It's The Blimp Frank [VIDEO!]

hhitch — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 06:31:09 GMT

CLICK HERE TO LISTEN TO CAPTAIN BEEFHEART'S "IT'S THE BLIMP FRANK" FROM TROUT MASK REPLICA!!!

I am So Friggin' Proud of This Band

hhitch — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 08:09:39 GMT

We really worked our asses off on this music, that's what a friend of mine told me after he heard Warp Factor 217, and he's absolutely right.

In fact I am so proud of this music that I have featured one of the cuts, not only on my website, but I have also featured it on my MySpace page. I think Warp Factor 217 is a real gem that stands out among my other tunes and I am prouder than sh*t to show this off to anyone. Thank you guys so much for making it a reality.

yes I have doctored this take JUST a little bit. I have run it through a multiband compressor, stereo imager, parametric EQs, and I've added missing keyboard parts (the engineer had pulled me out of the mix at the end where the organ is supposed to come in) and a little "extra" -- a moog-ish synth line over the solos. I think it all fits in VERY nicely. The stereo imaging creates a balanced effect, and the compression brings out the drums and the bass.

I did have to make one slight bit of editing surgery -- you know the part where Tim drops out on the guitar solo? We missed about eight bars of his beautiful solo because, as I recall, we were on this gigantic stage, and Tim had wandered JUST a little too far from his amplifier and the cable got yanked out of the amplifier, right in the middle of his solo. (If you listen really carefully, you can hear Tim blow his siren as he runs over and plugs the chord back in -- at least I was able to hear it after applying strong compression!) For this doctored cut, I wanted everything to be really smooth so I basically cut that part out, and spliced together the first and last phrases of his solo, it still sounds great and I think is very logical with the song. So -- Tim, let's wait until we hear the Union Ballroom tape, I don't believe such a thing occurred there and we should have a complete cut, but in the meantime I have a relatively well executed version of the piece to showcase, and you still sound awesome and there's no dead air there. check it out

It's unfortunate that so many glitches happened at this concert, but right now that's what we've got to deal with. I am not sure what happened to the other recordings. Praise the Lord that Wayne has the Michigan Union Ballroom recording. There was another one we did right in the Padded Cell which was canon for a while, and there was another one we did at a summer party in a large second floor room on Main Street in Ann Arbor. I am not sure if I lost those two tapes or not. I took the padded cell tape into the University of Michigan electronic music studio and fiddled around with putting it through filters and all that to make it sound like the weird stuff Hendrix did with phasing and all that. But my firm recollection was that I gave the tape back to Mike... but I might have misremembered, it was quite a while ago. I did leave a box of reel to reel tapes at 411 N. Ingalls when I moved out, left it in the basement with a bunch of other stuff of mine. I thought it was only my previous work but there may have been a Martian Entropy Band tape or two in it. I HIGHLY DOUBT IT THOUGH! I would have protected those tapes with my life. My previous stuff, electronic music that I created in the electronic music studios at the University of Toronto Conservatory of Music when I was 14 -oh boy I wish I had those tapes now -- but I was in the mode of erasing my personal history so I sort of let fate have its way with those tapes. I really doubt I would have let MEB tapes get out of hand -- they were my life's blood at the time. but who knows, I screwed up here and there, leaving those tapes behind was definitely a screwup, but I guess I never thought I would value my own work. My father didn't... and actually I probably didn't until recently, but that's material for another blog...

my new tune "Make No Mistake"

hhitch — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 21:06:52 GMT

I have composed a new piece called Make No Mistake. It is sort of my impressionist take on the last 7 years of life in america. I produced it in my studio, played electric piano, bass and synthesizers and I invited Jesse Jones Jr. over to lay down some hot sax tracks. I also included a "special guest vocalist" who really turned out to be the life of the party on this tune. I think it came out pretty nicely :) It will be going on my new CD to be released as soon as I can get it out. I am providing a special "sneak preview" via this post.

if you can hear the Martian Entropy Band concert then you have all the moving parts necessary to preview the tune.

so if you want to listen to this tune you should turn off the Martian Entropy Concert which should be currently playing, by clicking the "off" icon on the frame at the bottom of the page, or accessing the mp3 player's controls directly.

then you can listen to my tune by clicking here

check it out and let me know what you think! leave me a comment

Hugh J. Hitchcock

Bill Gracie

hhitch — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 16:37:01 GMT

I have been working with the recording a little bit, especially Warp Factor 217, which I think is really stupendous, and amazing musicianship on everyone's part, all the way down the line.

Bill hasn't been mentioned much YET in this blog, but I just wanted to say that I've been listening to him and I just LOVE his drumming on this recording. I have applied a multiband compressor and parametric EQs to the tape and it really brings out Billy drums, because it pumps up the quiet parts in between the loud parts. So the drums really start to come alive. And man, Billy was right on top of it. I simply love his rhythmic vocabulary.

nuff said fer now

-Hugh

Pandemonium Ballet

hhitch — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 07:52:11 GMT

As I recall, one of Mike's friends down at a local TV station came up with an opportunity for us to create a video, at the station. My recollection that perhaps it was the A/V department at Eastern Michigan University, someone help me here... at any rate, we carted our equipment to this studio and set up in front of these large TV cameras which connected to a video mix control console (I guess you'd call it) where they could switch from camera to camera, fade in and out, even do superimposed special effects.

In those days, things were not virtual, were not digital, and were not easy, and certainly were not free, so we had allocated for our use about 30 minutes of studio time, so we had to load in quickly, set up, get ready, and we had one take once the cameras were rolling. It was sort of like the old days, the way Louis Armstrong and the Hot 5 recorded.

reference: the song "Heebie Jeebies" was released with missing words, and turned out to be the first recorded "scat" singing, because Louis had dropped his lyric sheet during the ONE take they had bought. without the lyrics, he invented words and it became SCAT singing.

Well things didn't turn out quite as great for us as they did for Louis, however, and here's why:

The video was only about three minutes long and it was to be of us, the Martian Entropy Band, playing my original, Warp Factor 217 which was our high energy show-closer. During the solo portion of the song, Tim normally plays his guitar for 16 bars over some chords, and then I play a solo for 16 bars while Tim plays chords. I think I was all of seventeen years old at the time, a bit green around the ears shall we say, and I had this great idea for the video -- when it came time for Tim's solo, I would strum the chord on my guitar, and then play the tom-toms with a drumstick until time to play the next chord, and do this like 4 times for the 16 bars. I thought it was a great idea, and it went off well in rehearsal. But before we got to the TV studio, I had a great idea, why don't I hot-glue my guitar pick to the butt end of a drumstick, so I could strum the guitar and then easily go right to the drums? Yeah, great idea... I had not tried this in rehearsal, however.

So when we finally got geared up to tape, the producer called "Take 1", and we wailed into Warp Factor 217. Everything went great, the engineer switched back and forth between cameras and I'm sure it looked great to him -- until the part arrived where Tim took his solo. I grabbed my drumstick with guitar pick glued on, and gave my guitar a hearty strum, but I hadn't accounted for the leverage gained by having a large drumstick attached to my guitar pick, so the pick literally hooked into my strings and yanked two or three of them right off the guitar, throwing the rest out of tune. At the same time, it the hot-glued surface popped off of the drumstick, and the stick went flying across the room, with me in hot pursuit. I lunged down on the floor and caught the drumstick before it rolled under some equipment.

But by then, it was time for my guitar solo. I put down the drumstick and grabbed my guitar pick and went to play, but my two upper strings had been yanked out by the drumstick-pick fiasco, and the rest of them were horribly out of tune. We could not stop in the middle of the recording since we only had this one take, so the only thing I could do was to go on with the show, so... I just started playing on the out of tune strings, choking them and yanking them, it sounded like some far-off Asian music (or not quite as nice). A totally different tonality altogether! Well, I did my best. I learned a real solid lesson that day, which was, never try things in a live show that you haven't worked out beforehand in rehearsal. Especially things involving hot glue, drumsticks, and guitar picks...

I remember we all left the studio feeling like, "Oh, well, better luck next time..." I remember watching the finished video a few weeks later, it was pretty hysterical, to tell you the truth, but quite embarrassing for me to watch. In between psychedelic effects, and flashing back from one camera to another, you could see me lunging across the floor after my errant drumstick, and then scrambling back to play my guitar, and then you could certainly hear the horrific squawks that came from my destroyed guitar tablature. Frankly I was glad that film was not going to be released into the public domain anywhere.

The finished video was entitled "Pandemonium Ballet". I can't think of a more apt title.

Does that thing still exist anywhere? It might be a real riot to see it again, if it does... we could put it on YouTube...

test post

admin — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 21:42:39 GMT

test

the Illuminatus Manifesto, or "What We Think We're Doing Up There With All Those Projectors

hhitch — Mon, 03 Mar 2008 05:27:10 GMT

no folks, it's nothing political.

I happened upon this the other day, when going through the archives. It is something written by Mike (the Spaceman Bassman) explaining the change of name from the Light Opera to the Illuminatus Light Show. I thought readers might find it interesting, so I've scanned it and here it is:

ILLUMINATUS

What We Think We're Doing Up There With All Those Projectors

Confusion 14 marks our 6th year of participation in fandom, a tradition begun when we hauled a few projectors to Noreascon and set up in the "Alien Environments" room. Since then we've added personnel and equipment and changed our name from Light Opera to Illuminatus, a move prompted by confusion from the operatic set as well as an appreciation of the trappings (pyramids) and pun potential of being "illuminated". We've graduated from doing shows in our hotel rooms to opening last year's Worldcon, an even from which we have yet to recover(*).

What we like doing, basically, is shining colors and images onto surfaces in front of (and sometimes, on) people in hopes of providing entertainment; edification and merriment and (if we're really hot) astonishment, consciousness expansion and awe. We do have artistic pretensions. We like to think we're contributing something positive towards a unification of art and technology. We are tinkerers, fooling around in our basement laboratory with laser and oscilloscope, hot rod slide projectors and spinning mirror discs, hot glue and super tape. We read Popular Electronics and Theatre Crafts, Laser Focus and Saturday Review, Scientific American and National Lampoon, Analog and Fantasy and Science Fiction; and out of all of this we put together visual events that reflect man's innate tendency to take perfectly good tools and make of them works of art.

Ours is an aesthetic of swirling colors, clear cut by the laser's pure straight line, abstracted by the mirrored reflections of time-slices caught by lens and photo-reactive films. Ours is a practive of power tools, projector bulbs and miles of interconnecting cable. We have as heroes Thomas Wilfred and Thomas Edison, Leonardo Da Vinci and Rube Goldberg, Stanley Kubrick and Science Fiction Writers of Association.

Stuart Brand once wrote (in the Whole Earth Catalogue) something to the effect of "If we are to become as gods, we might as well get good at it"; so we daydream of anti-gravity flying saucers projecting colors on clouds, of laser displays upon a new moon, of a zero-G, all-encompassing holographic experience.

In the meantime, we do what we can.

We hope you enjoy the show.

-- Mike Gould

[(*) - I'm pretty sure the Worldcon Mike wrote about was the big convention we went to in Washington D. C. ? Right Mike? Me, Mike and Wayne, and some folks from the Stilyagi Air Corps... there, we saw the world premiere of "A Boy and His Dog," with Harlan Ellison (except we couldn't hear the sound because there was a projector glitch having to do with the Hotels A/V setup.) In fact I think I may have blurred this with the Star Con, maybe this was the one with Harlan Ellison and Isaac Asimov having an insult contest... someone help me out here! - Hugh]

The Light Opera light show was truly awesome (or psychedelic, as might have been said back then)

timprosser — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 18:27:04 GMT

The Martian Entropy Band was graced, whenever possible, by the wonderful addition of a light show called "the Light Opera", though the term "Illuminatus" was also involved. Hopefully Mike (the Spaceman Bassman) and Wayne, the creators of the show and its equipment, will chime in here to add some detailed descriptions (and possibly pictures) of their awesome array of state-of-the-art light-art madness. The stages the Martian Entropy Band performed on were often resplendent with swirling blobs of color, sometimes oscillating in time to the music, with images such as the Starship Enterprise flying overhead, and rotating Lissajous patterns of laser light making flower shapes.

But, until I can talk one of them into telling you about it themselves, let me describe one light show accessory that Mike built, that was a real gas.

DISCLAIMER: DANGER! The following described events and actions are EXTREMELY dangerous. We STRICTLY advise that you DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME OR ANYWHERE without sufficient technical advice and supervision. If you are unsure about anything you are doing with electrical equipment like this DO NOT PROCEED further until you know EXACTLY what you are doing or have the necessary technical assistance. Contact with any voltage above 25-50 volts CAN KILL YOU, and high voltages such as are described here can arc through the air in unexpected ways.

One evening Mike revealed to us at the House of Madness that he had acquired a neon sign transformer. This 20 pound-plus object converted good old 110 volt AC current into about 10,000 volts, and would deliver it with a highly-dangerous amount of current. Of course, the first thing to do with it (we were young and relatively foolish) was to straighten out a couple of coat hangers into gentle arcs and attach them to the screw terminals on the transformer so they extended nearly vertically upward, gradually getting farther apart with height.

When the transformer was plugged in, a beautiful buzzing arc appeared where the wires were closest together, and then rose upward until it broke at the top of the wires with a loud "snap" and reappeared at the starting point. Mike had built his own Jacob's Ladder. We all thought this was absolutely awesomely cool. Mike, Wayne, and I knew, before it was turned on, that as little as 10 milliamps of current can stop one's heart, and that this arcing monster was certainly capable of that, and were wary. Everyone stayed safe, however, and to my recollection nothing bad ever happened.

Before long hard-working, creative Mike had packaged the wires in a tall wooden box with a plastic front on it, so we could watch the arc do its thing in safety. He also put a wooden box around the transformer, with a power switch on the front. He drilled a hole in the back of the vertical box, which was perhaps three feet high, right at the point where the arc would start, so that burnable objects such as cigarettes could be inserted and lighted via the arc. We were a bit afraid to hold anything while it was inserted, suspecting that someone could still receive a shock that way, but I don't remember it ever happening.

Mike wasn't going to stop there, however. As this was to become part of the light show and be placed on stage with the band, Mike painted the wood box parts black and put a number of different colored blinking lights in it, labeled with totally unrelated symbols, a Greek letter among them. Then he put a 1 rpm electric motor in side with a flourescent orange clock hand on it that rotated continuously when the unit was on, and labeled the clock face in four quadrants: High, Higher, Highest, and PHEW!.

This was just an example of the tireless creativity that went into what was truly a world class light show, and brought us and our fans many hours of laughs and entertainment. I believe Wayne has many slides (thousands?) of the light show, and I am encouraging him to dig through them and digitize some so we can show them to you here on the MEB fan-site.

Long live the Light Opera and Illuminatus show!

Mumble's guitar, and related ramblings (mumblings?)

timprosser — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 16:34:17 GMT

I still have that old 1967 Gibson SG (the cheap version with the hum-plagued single coil pickups) with the badly worn psychedelic acrylic paint on it (visible in some of the M.E.B pictures). Actually, it was a way-cool instrument in its day. As one can hear on the M.E.B. recordings, it certainly had the capacity to wail.

Still, the technology has improved so much. My newer instrument, a Gibson Les Paul Studio I bought in 2003 (I think) is a better instrument in every respect, and, accounting for inflation, cost less. It is _much_ quieter (humbucking dual-coil pickups and ... fully shielded wiring?), has much better sustain and sound quality overall, and just plays better. The old SG pretty much stays in its case unless I'm showing it to somebody, or playing it for fun about once a year.

I have a great instrument mechanic these days (Tom Murray of Custom Guitar and Bass), who lives in Harper Woods (North edge of Detroit) and works from his house. He has some of the best qualifications I know of - a fanatic about detail (verging on the OCD), and an almost fanatical, lifetime seeker of the best knowledge of instrument design and related skills including woodworking. He's a highly skilled performer, too, but his thing is really the instruments, not performing. He has redone most of my stringed instruments, new and old, and they always come out playing and sounding better than new. He re-adjusted the old Gibson SG a few years ago, and afterward it played and sounded better than it ever did, including when brand new.

He is precise, fast, and fearless, and I cringe a little when he, while chatting with me, cuts the strings off one of my instruments, half-disassembles it, and starts adjusting the neck, filing the fret-ends, and stuff like that. In the time it takes to catch up on his business and what I've been doing, the instrument is already adjusted to a much better state. I like leave it with him for a week or so, though, as I know he'll probably pick it up and play it for a minute or two sometime, and probably put a few more fine touches to it. Plus, that way he can't just hand it back to me and charge me next-to-nothing. I want to pay him well - his work is just too worth it, and he deserves to make a good living.

If I ever get the dough, I dream of a new electric guitar, possibly a Strat or PRS (Paul Reed Smith) or something, but this time a really acrobatic instrument, with the best quality and widest range whammy bar I can get. Tom understands this stuff in depth, and I will certainly seek his advice in advance. I miss the old SG's whammy bar, not having one on my Les Paul Studio, even though I am quite the purist as to my playing. For instance, I always eschewed capos, and only bought one for my Epiphone big-bodied 12-string because I keep it tuned down a whole step, and I only use it when I am jamming with people who need to read my fingers. Otherwise, I just bar the chords and play the thing however I need to, to play in the key of the song we're playing. I don't mind too much not having the whammy bar too much, as I put in a good deal of vibrato with my fingers, but ... I did get somewhat used to it on the old SG, and ... there ARE a few things I can do with a whammy bar that I can't do with my fingers alone. Someday ...

Anyway, I had to put a plug in for Tom, as he deserves all the publicity and business he can get. And, Tom, if you ever read this, let me give you some advice from an old MBA: if you ever have more business coming at you than you can handle (and I'd like to help that happen, as you deserve it), just raise your rates until you are getting about what you want. You will get more money for your valuable work, and won't be buried in the work (more than you'd like). Let supply and demand be your friend. Your excellent work is worth it.

I'll write more about the other equipment I used with the MEB - the obscure Acetone echo box, the wah-wah pedal, and the old Fender amp (I can hardly remember some of the details about those days, but ... they say if you can remember the 60's-early 70's, you weren't there ... ;-).

Keep on jammin'!
-- Mumbles
(I'll also have to write about how I got that nickname sometime ... it's amusing, but never applied to me very well ... at least, I hope people will agree.)

registered users can write blogs

hhitch — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 05:05:12 GMT

go to http://martianentropyband.com/blogs/mebblog/default.aspx

I theeeeeeeen!

How Mumbles Got That Nickname ...

timprosser — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 20:44:33 GMT

Since I was widely known as "Mumbles" back in the late 1960's and 70's, I should probably explain.

Back in high school (the '60's) I was pretty much an outcast. There were a lot of outcasts and semi-outcasts, the dregs of school society, or so the "jocks" (sports stars) and "frats" (kids bound for the college fraternity) would have you believe. We were generally ostracized, sneered at, hazed, put down, and otherwise made to feel uncomfortable and inferior to the other kids. We hung out on the edges of the social groupings, congregating with our kind because we were all pretty much discouraged from being anywhere else. Sitting down at one of the "popular" tables in the lunch room was practically guaranteed to bring on repercussions, ranging from derogatory comments to physical abuse, and possibly eggs being thrown at one's parents' house, or the sudden detonation of one's mailbox in the middle of the night, accompanied by a roaring and fast-disappearing engine sound and loud laughter (for which our parents typically blamed us). High school was not fun for us.

But, as we numbered among us the nonconformists, the brightest and least bright, the class clowns, etc. we actually related to each other a good bit, and those of us with a humorous streak tended to make light of our plight, and have a few laughs in spite of the oppression. One of the Martian Entropy Band's roadies, Flook (his last name), and I were in the same grade, and frequently bounced off one another, figuratively, in the hubbub of school. Tom was a class clown and eccentric, as was I. I had started playing rock and roll at age 15, and, having played violin since 5 and grown up in a musical family, I always played lead guitar (an instrument I started teaching myself at age 12 - more on that another time). Flook had become a primary roadie for one or more of the bands I transitioned through in high school, and we had become friends.

A couple of other guys who seemed to have the possibilities of being in the frat crowd, but never quite fit in and so wound up hanging out in the halls with us, were Bob Fischer, Richard Moser, and Steve Wild. (are the spellings OK?) Since I was playing in a band, which was cool (but not enough to make me "popular" -- and I didn't want to be popular by then, anyway), and Flook was associated with the band, we had a certain "cool" among our crowd of outcasts. Bob Fisher and his friends, also aspiring class clowns, engaged us in a good bit of banter over time, bragging of THEIR rock band and its exploits.

At some point they came up with the name for their imaginary band, "Mumbles and the Monotones", which we all thought was pretty funny, and they would usually brag that their band had performed in Tokyo the previous weekend, or given Bob Dylan and the members of The Who their autographs, or things like that. They were pretty funny, and it was good for a lot of laughs between classes. I think they did jam on guitar and drums in their parents' basements or somewhere, and I may have even jammed with them once. I don't recall them ever playing any gigs ...

If I remember rightly, not long after that my band, the Outkasts, was breaking up. We'd been discouraged not to win anything better than honorable mention at the last battle of the bands, weren't getting the number of gigs we wanted, and were not getting along too well. Most of the band reformed with a new drummer and bass player, and Flook as prime roadie, but we couldn't come up with a good name for the band. We struggled for weeks, until finally I, or Flook, or someone suggested "Hey! What about Mumbles and the Monotones?" We all had a good laugh about it, but it stuck, and the band played sporadic gigs under that name for perhaps a year.

After months of playing together, however, we still hadn't figured out who Mumbles was. I was finding myself doing more and more of the bookings, the musical arrangements, and other band work, while most of the rest of the band were slacking off on such duties, expecting to show up for practice or a gig, do as little as possible, and then leave with their girlfriends as soon as possible. This began to wear thin for me, and my resentment gradually built, and then one day, when discussing a prospective gig with a promoter, I was asked again "Who is Mumbles, anyway?" Somewhere in my feelings of discomfort with the rest of the band rose the thought that, as long as I was doing most of the work, I might as well be Mumbles, and I spontaneously took the nickname for my own.

The band didn't last all that long after that, but the nickname stuck around, even though I've never been given to mumbling. The funny thing is that, even 25 or 30 years later, I still on a rare occasion run into someone in Ann Arbor who stops me on the sidewalk with "Hey!! Mumbles-baby!! What's happenin', man?" It's always good for a laugh.

By the way, the gig that probably caused me to take on the nickname was a battle of the bands at Dexter High School, in Dexter, Michigan, a town of probably 3500 in 1967 or so. We were crazy kids playing whatever we liked, stuff by The Who, the Rolling Stones, and other bands popular at the time, with no "concept" or congruent approach to our performances or music -- not likely to win a battle of the bands, in any case.

I had set up the gig, and we were pretty stoked to play. In our usual irreverent fashion, we were dressed to be cool, and I was wearing a vest made of an army shirt with the sleeves torn off, as many girl scout and riflery medals and protest buttons on it as we could find, and a mink collar my girlfriend at the time had sewn on it. This being the Viet Nam era, and us having hair as long as the high schools would allow (but NOT over the ear, or we would be sent home), the judges (old farts) took a dim view of us. In fact, they were so offended by the army vest with mink collar that they disqualified us from the competition sometime after we performed.

The band members were mad as hell, but could do nothing about it. They didn't hold it against me at all, fortunately, but blamed the small-town stick-up-the-bu++s on the judging panel. In fact, somebody, maybe the bass player and one of the roadies, stole the school auditorium's public address amplifier, which they later ditched in a country swamp in a fit of paranoia. In any case, as usual, the band members split with their girlfriends soon after the end of the affair, and my girlfriend and I were left to take down our PA system and load the amplifiers, speakers, mic stands, etc. into whatever vehicle we had for moving it, and haul it all back to the practice house, an exhausting job that really pissed me off. I believe it was soon after that that I took the nickname Mumbles, and here, on the Martian Entropy Band fan-site, it is revived again to my amazement.

More stories of things related to the Martian Entropy Band to come! Enjoy!

my own (!) new web site.

hhitch — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 03:06:05 GMT

OK, self indulgent cheese disclaimer...

in my vain efforts to secure control over the world wide web, I have implemented yet another web site, this time my own...

http://www.hughjhitchcock.com or http://www.hughjarvishitchcock.com

I started with hughjhitchcock.com, then I noticed my sister used her whole name, susantylerhitchcock.com so I copied her and got hughjarvishitchcock.com. somehow, hughjarvishitchcock.com isn't quite as attractive as susantylerhitchcock.com, seeing that hughjarvishitchcock.com has both "shit" and "cock" in it LOL...

oh that reminds me of a good one, about Pat McCaffrey, the vocalist / hammond B3 organist of the Whiz Kids. I worked with them on bass for a summer in 1977 (78?) when they decided to go with a group format, with me on bass, Ralph Dudley on drums, Joe Mannino on guitar. It was serious Michigan rock and roll baby, with some funk thrown in (by me :) Anyway, Pat use to announce me as "Hugh Jardon on bass" ark ark ark ark...

and don't even ask me about the time Mark Morell had me paged in a Chinese restaurant ark ark ark ark... (well ok, go ahead)

I've had the basic front page of my website up for a while, but I've also implemented a more comprehensive publishing system one can access by clicking on the photo of me in the front page. Although It's not really fleshed out much yet as of this writing, I have already published an interesting article about my work with Norma Jean Bell and the All-Stars. I'll probably post the article here too in order to flood the bandwidth but it's at http://hughjhitchcock.com/articles/axels-on-8-mile-with-norma-jean-bell.aspx if you want to read it -- and also hear the show -- as I have provided an mp3 playback of a live show right on the article, from an exactly 25 year old cassette I dusted off and dragged out. I had to jam down the play button for the first five minutes to keep the tape on the tape head, but it worked out ok, I think. Kick back and get into the space of the Norma Jean Bell show. It was completely a trip. Martian Entropy Band fans should appreciate the theatrics, a real gem. And, it's only about fifteen minutes long.

Oh yeah, and in the Norma Bell group, they used to announce me as "Captain Cock" ark ark ark

(I just cain't get no respeck!)

Many more articles are to come, about musicians I've known and/or worked with. I will definitely be including and/or mirroring many articles about/from the Martian Entropy Band in my personal web site. This message has got to get out! LOL

- Hugh J. Hitchcock

Quit Cryin'

hhitch — Tue, 26 Feb 2008 20:15:31 GMT

I have just put together a mix on one of my tunes called Quit Cryin'

I have put the new mix on my myspace page at http://www.myspace.com/hughjarvishitchcock and I also have a web page for it -- http://www.quitcryin.com

the new mix is pretty hip, with Jesse Jones Jr on alto saxophone. I actually wrote the song about twenty years ago, produced the basic tracks 15 years ago, and am just getting around to finishing the tracks. Among the reasons, right when I was about to finish my album in 1994, I signed up for a credit card merchant processing account, and I used it to sell some things on the internet, among other things, my entire studio recording rig, an eight-track setup with a full mixing console and tape deck, time sync equipment, etc. So I got paid by this guy out in California and I shipped everything to him. Then, the stupid credit card company chose that instance to decide to cancel my account, and not pay me the money for that sale or any other. It was a real ripoff, and because of it I was not able to upgrade my studio as I had planned. In fact it started me in a world of financial sh*t that took me several years and a bankruptcy to get out of. That was more than ten years ago now though, and things are back on track. And now with digital music tools, it is a real joy to once again work on finishing these things, and writing new stuff (see "Make No Mistake).

So what's all this "Quit Cryin" insanity all about? Well... back in the day I used to hang out with this guy named RonRico ______. Ron, if yer out there man, get in touch. RonRico is the one who actually brought that phrase into the mainstream of my conciousness. What a personality. Ron was this incredible, I mean incredible drummer. He was a thin, wiry, extremely personable black man from Ann Arbor, about my age, whose family had moved northwards from Alabama, if I remember correctly. He had a relaxed manner that belied the powerful energy that would flow through him musically.

Ron had the fire and spark on the drums of a million cultures, but came out in an explosive R&B rock jazz feel. I played bass on gigs in those days, and Ron and I hit it off as a rhythm section. His kind of drumming style was a bit more advanced than most, if not all of the drummers in town, it was a little beyond your usual 2 and 4 beat style of playing. He could have played with Weather Report, and taken them to a whole new level, he was that powerful, and that creative. Unfortunately the level of intensity in his playing seemed to pervade his personal karma as well, as he was someone that was continually running afoul of the law. I won't go into the details here, but apparently that's what led to him disappearing from my musical life.

Ron was such a wonderful musical friend to have back in the day, because he made me learn stuff. He would alway drop by an album or two and say "Huey, check out the bass part on this!" Between him and Ron Scott, I got an education. Ron and I worked out so many bass & drum riffs, we used to show up on people's gigs, ask them to let us sit in on bass and drums, then we'd just take over! Playing all our bumped up riffs :) Smokin' the band, turnin it out, whatever. It was fun, and I'm sure many band members would shudder when they saw us come into the club. Ron knew so many people around town, and could get us next to just about anyone who was anyone in Detroit. Case in point, Orthea Barnes, with whom we would sit in. My recollection was she was playing at the Renaissance center in downtown Detroit, where we would jam.

I had my issues as a young man, I believe Ron had quite a few more, but I tended to overlook his shortcomings in exchange for the marvelous music he made, as did many people of me in those days. I had no problem getting gigs in those days, but for some reason, Ron did. Maybe it was because he was black, and there were a lot of gigging bands around Detroit that were mainly white. I don't know but I do think there was a fair amount of prejudice in the business. At any rate, my custom was to try to bring Ron into every band I got into. I think I pulled him along with me into three or four bands, some of them quite established and well-funded. He brought me into all of his projects as well. He mainly focussed on the fusion gigs, and he could get some gigs around Ann Arbor, while I was looking more at full time working bands around the Detroit area to pay the bills. So we both did both things together, and it was cool.

Ron did run into some problems, though. For example, one of the bigger bands I got him into was Air Condo, from Livonia. Air Condo was an extremely well organised, well funded and solidly booked seven piece disco band with a full time manager and sound engineer, that played a lot of fairly large venues around the Detroit area. Bugs Beddowe (the tall guy with the afro in the picture), whom I consider a friend, is still a well known Detroit artist, and we worked a few jazz gigs throughout the years after the AC days. He is another computer geek like me :) or was a programmer in those days, anyway. So Air Condo had offered me the job as bass player. I guess I had somewhat of a reputation for being a really great bass player, and I was in demand. They had their heart set on another drummer, and I insisted they bring Ron into the band. Logistically, it would have been wiser for them to hire the other guy, because he had a car and Ron didn't, for one thing. I guess I was really obstinate because finally they gave in -- "Well Hugh, we want you to be happy." So, Ron came in, and they were nice enough to co-sign on a car loan for him. He insisted on buying this old station wagon, which broke down about two weeks into the gig. Ultimately he stuck them with the loan, sadly...

In that band, we used to have family meetings at the manager's house and talk things out as a group, sort of a band encounter session. I remember one time, they all took a vote on who in the band had the strongest personality, and I was the hands-down winner. Go figure. I guess that's why Ron had a nickname for me, "Hugh Bucking-Horse Hitchcock". He'd seen me tell a few people off in my day. Oh, I always wanted it my way, all right. I guess I behaved sort of like an alpha musician in my world of bands.

I remember one sad scene when I, of all people, decided I wanted to play drums on a song one night, which was a bad idea, because I don't really play drums. I wanted to play Herb Alpert's "Rise" which was Bugs' showpiece tune. I think Ron had learned the bass part (or not) but the two of us were switching up instruments. I had been SO confident that I could play it, but guess what, I couldn't... after about thirty seconds, Bugs held up his fist in the universal musician hand-sign for "end this pig" :) Which I didn't want to do, to save face, but... the song died a sad death. I mean silly scenes from a nightmare, chapter 36...

As I recall, things pretty much deteriorated with Ron and Air Condo. I don't think it was my fault at all, but to be honest I don't remember. I do know that it wasn't easy for Ron (or me) to fit in, and the whole car issue peaked, leaving some very bad taste when Ron didn't show up for gigs and that sort of thing, and him being my friend, I probably was not always on the bread and butter side of the argument.

My recollection was that it was such a disaster with Air Condo that Air Condo decided to throw in the towel and shut down the band after about four months. To be fair, we were really trying to take the place of some very popular guys who'd been there two years before us, and all Ron and I cared about was throwing down with serious funk, no matter whose feelings got hurt, so... really it's understandable. They had a great following, but it was for a very different band before we got in. On Air Condo's last night, I remember Kent Strange and Sonny Winston of Flyin Easy were at at the gig, offering me the gig back with them, which I took. I stayed with them for about a year, and then went with a group called Frosted.

But Ron was a real trip. He would go through these heavy financial problems where he would have to pawn his drum set. A friend of mine once commented, "yeah that's like pawning your dick." LOL But in hindsight, I agree... eventually Ron got arrested for breaking into a pawn shop trying to get his drums back. The last band I'd gotten him into was Wingspan with Sonny Winston. I remember on our first gig, Ron had just gotten back a drum set he'd had in pawn for a long time. The music we played involved a lot of hitting the snare drum on the backbeat, every time around the groove. He told me that day, every time he hit the snare drum made him feel better and better. And I could certainly see it in his eyes. He didn't play like tee-tee tee-tee ta, he played like pdrdrd-bang smash kazang! Great player.

One of his less pleasant talents was the ability to make things disappear, like money, cigarettes, cars, that sort of thing. For example, he would say "I'm going to the store, you want anything?" I'd say "yeah, get me a pack of cigarettes," and hand him a ten dollar bill. Cigs were like $1.50 in those days. So he'd come back with the cigs and give me like $3.50 in change, and I'd say what the....? He'd always have some really lame, but complex series of excuses which he would run off in this sort of whiney voice. "Well, you see, Huey, man, I ran into this problem, see, I needed to get x and then y happened, man,". This whole song and dance is intrinsic to the meaning of the phrase "Quit Cryin'", for me. It embodies the entire spirit of the phrase!

One time, Ron made a whole car disappear! I'd needed a ride to the airport, so I asked Ron to give me a ride. He didn't have a car, so I let him use mine and asked him to return it to my house afterwards. I told him he could use it while I was gone, if he really needed it. When I returned five days later, the car was no longer in evidence -- Ron had another one of his great stories, about oil leaks, transmission fluid, and that he had to leave it at a gas station in Willow Run by I-94. Oh well, it wasn't a great car, my first car to be exact - a 67 Chevy Impala which cost me $300. So I sort of shrugged my shoulders and let it go. Never saw nor heard from that car again! My friendship with Ron continued, however.

And he WAS a TRIP! One time, we were with Air Condo playing at a huge dance club in Dearborn called Coral Gables (I had a Thai girlfriend in those days and she pronounced it Colly Gurbles). The stage was set up with a big drum platform in the back, the drummer towered over everyone else like a thunder god. There was another band that played the club periodically and they were called Saxony. During our break, as we watched the giant crowd dance to the loud stereo system, the manager of the club came up to our singer and gave him a napkin upon which had been written, "Announce Saxony," meaning to let people know they would be there the following week. On this napkin, the word "Saxony" was on a separate line from the word "Announce", and the singer, who was a bit of a joker, took out a pen and wrote "Fuck" before the word Saxony, so the result was that the napkin now said "Announce Fuck Saxony". A few minutes later, we went onstage and turned on our amps and got ready to go, and Ron climbed up the massive drum platform and mounted his drumset. Ron was the one that counted off the songs, so we were waiting for him to count it and start the show. Just then, the singer handed him the napkin and told him to do the announcement. No one believed anyone would actually say this, but Ron, great guy, looks at the napkin, grabs his microphone, and in a booming voice says "We are Air Condo, and FUCK SAXONY! 1, 2, 3, 4," and the band started into "It's So Funny how We Don't Talk Anymore" by Cliff Richards or some such disco nonsense. I could hardly play, though, because I was trying not to split my gut laughing.

In another band I was in with Ron, we would just do impromptu silliness. For example, once we broke into a ska version of Nelson Riddle's Batman theme. "When yer runnin round yer house, and yer tryin to catch a mouse, call for Batman," Ron ad libbed over a fast ska beat.

Ron & I drove around all over Michigan together, doing gigs. Also some gigs in Ohio. We'd smoke multiple packs of Marlboros, eat together at restaurants and "dog" the waitresses. We had a running series of jokes and a running background of the finest funk. At one point we had a notion to record under the title "Partners in Crime", but that turned out not to be such a good idea, considering his eventual fate, to which I was not a party. But is sure was fun while it lasted.

Ron was responsible for introducing me to many talented and successful musicians around the Detroit area. It was Ron who had brought me together with Lamont Johnson. He had also introduced me to Ricky Rouse, through whom we had gotten gigs with Carolyn Crawford, both of Bohannon 'fame' if you will. The were countless others I can't remember now, but before I met a musician around town, famous or not, I'd always heard of them from Ron first.

[editor's note -- if you want to know who Bohannon is/was -- I am sure you have heard the recent dance song where the woman screams "GET ON UP AND DANCE, Y'ALL" bump... bump...bump bump? That song actually was stolen from a Bohannon song called "Let's Start the Dance". Bohannon's version was popular during the 1977 and 1978 period, it had an incredible bassline and of course Carolyn Crawford is the bomb on vocals, having started that whole phrase in the first place... and Ricky Rouse? Please. What an awesome guitarist, pure excitement to be in the same room with the dude. (also on my MySpace friends list now!)]

We also did some studio work, Ron did the demo with me for the Les Harvey Band stuff. He was later replaced by Steve Bray on that project. I have some recordings somewhere, of both of those sessions, I will try to get them out. They are pretty nice actually. He also helped me with some sessions for producer Duane Freeman.

We had a great group he put together, called Sky High. Somewhere Ron had found Luis Resto on keyboards and his brother Mario on guitar, along with Pete Khan of Ann Arbor on saxophone. Luis was a funky little keyboardist, I still have tapes of us recording a tune I wrote called Sunstorm. I later brought him into a Detroit project I was involved with called the Automatix with Bruce Nazarian, for which I was then fired, for good reason, I might add -- I was too argumentative -- the ol' Bucking Horse :) Luis later became an award winner for writing and producing Eminem's music (I got him as a friend on my MySpace page now too :) Sky High was a short-lived phenomenon that truly was Sky High, in a musical sense. We did material by Tom Browne, Joe Sample the Crusaders, Ronnie Laws, Chick Corea, and other jazz greats of the day. In Sky High we had an attitude of heavenly explosion when we hit the stage. When we practiced, it was at Luis and Mario's parents' home in Livonia. But the energy just blew up as soon as we started playing, live. It was really a treat for everyone including us.

In the winter of 1977, Ron had me driving us almost daily into Detroit to hang out at Cloudborn Studios with Eugene Lamont Johnson, the bass player from Brainstorm I've written about. Lamont was in the studio finishing up his album "Music of the Sun". Ron had known that Lamont was looking for backup for a tour he'd intended to put on, and I guess Ron and I were the elected parties for the rhythm section, so we hung tough with Lamont for that season. Lamont also came to see some of our gigs, too. [Don't you think this is like the coolest album cover you've ever seen?]

While in the studio with Lamont, I met Kashif Saleem of BT Express, who was working on his own material. I later went to New York and hung out with Kashif in his practice studio there while he practiced his group for a tour. Kashif became very successful as a writer, he wrote "Love Come Down" for Evelyn Champagne King, "Personal" for George Benson, and a slew of others including his own successful albums.

So Ron really was responsible for hooking me up, either directly or indirectly, with a lot of very interesting artists, from which I learned mucho over the several years that this transpired. Ron had a way of finding the right place to hang out and the right people to hang out with. That is, if you liked cutting edge, Detroit funk and R&B.

It was during those days, and especially at Cloudborn studios, Ron coined the phrase "Quit Cryin'". It was usually in response to one or the other of us whining about something or other, like running out of cigarettes, or that he'd ripped me off for change, or something stupid. "Quit Cryin'" is an all-purpose command that really comes in handy! Try it sometime, when your boss asks you to do something you don't want to do! Or how about when your wife is in a bad mood, a strategic "Quit Cryin'" really can do wonders!

Ron's phrase "Quit Cryin'" has always stuck with me, along with his recommended response, which is "I can't help it!" Or actually, Ron had explained to me the correct inflection, which is "Cain't Hep It" without the L in help. So at some point, I decided it should become a song. At one point I even promised RonRico half of the writer's royalty on any song I wrote on the Quit Cryin' concept. Not that I'm going to make any money, but... I think I fulfilled that obligation the last time I talked to him. I will say this: Ron, I wrote the song, but you invoked the phrase. If you can get a drum set and get yer ass down here and play some fusion, dude I will put your name on the copyright.

I definitely wish Ron was still in the jazz-funk arena. I contacted him in 1990, the last time, took him out for dinner in Ann Arbor, I was overjoyed to see him, but he didn't seem to be the same person anymore, too many run-ins I guess. What a damn shame. After I went back to Miami he called me up with some kind of scam to ask me for money... which I did send him. That sucked. I honestly don't think he's playing or doing anything anymore. Someone, please correct me if I'm wrong. If you got a computer dude you might be reading this, so email me.

When I moved to Miami, I continued to admonish all my new friends to "Quit Cryin'", and it has sort of become a trade mark for me, and something we always have a lot of fun with. So, Quit Cryin! Cain't Hep it! And by the way, I have just put up a new mix of the song Quit Cryin on my Myspace page! Check it out... I think you will like the sound effects :)

Disclaimer: while this article mentions cigarettes and smoking, I quit smoking in 1982. I do not condone cigarette smoking by anyone.