For the last six or seven years, the most frequent comment I tend to hear from audience members after our show is, “are you guys ever tight!” For non-musicians, I should explain – this doesn't mean we won't spring for drinks or that we walk funny; it pertains to rhythmic cohesion. I'm happy to hear that response, but somewhat bemused by it. We've never consciously tried to be tight per se, but we have logged a lot of time on our instruments, we love bands with very propulsive rhythm sections... and Curtis and I have played together for 17 years.
17 Years! The figure blows my mind. For what it's worth, it certainly seems like less than 17 years – and when we'd met, I'd probably have been flabbergasted to learn that this is the guy with whom I'd form my longest-lived musical partnership. To explain...
Back in the Summer of '96, I'd been without a band for over a year, and was hungry to get playing again. I'd started hanging out with local bassist/guitarist extraordinaire David Augustin to chat about the craft of songwriting and to 'workshop' song ideas. Dave was starting to get the itch to play live again too, so he rounded up a couple of locals for a jam. We agreed to meet at the drummer's rehearsal studio in a storage complex near Saanichton. Dave had raved about this drummer's skills on our way out to the studio, as he'd caught Curtis in live performance recently. This drummer, apparently, had tons of slick, professional chops, and could play live to click-tracks and sequencers effortlessly. I prepared myself to be impressed.
The guy I met was laconic to the extreme. He spoke very little, and our few verbal exchanges weren't exactly Hallmark moments. Here's our first exchange, for example:
Me: Hey, Curtis, would there happen to be a power outlet in this part of the room for my amp?
Curtis: Huh. Guess you should have brought an extension cord. (goes back to reading a book as Dave and I set up).
Curtis, years later, explained to me that he was very jaded about guitarists in general at that time, having played with many recently who were musically disappointing and professionally lacking. Fair enough.
I don't recall having any planned repertoire beforehand – the three of us jammed on a few tunes we all happened to know (the singer didn't show at the first jam), liked what we'd heard, and agreed to meet again with singer in tow. Then, something strange happened. I'm not sure who started it, but Curtis and I started jamming on 'the Crunge' by Led Zeppelin. This is akin to a man with three heads happening upon another man with three heads. The Crunge is a very obscure song from the Zep repertoire, and is metrically bizarre. If you could imagine a Charles Ives arrangement of a James Brown tune with stream-of-consciousness lyrics by Richard Pryor, you'd be in the aural ballpark. Naturally, it's one of my faves – and it happened to be a favourite of Curtis' as well. To top it off, we didn't just like it – we could both play it (hell, I could sing it and play it simultaneously - even Page and Plant can't do that)! Two men with three heads (each) meet and discover they can both juggle chainsaws. What are the chances?
Naturally, it wasn't all harmony and happiness from then on. I had a bit of a habit of micro-managing drum parts for my songs, and Curtis had no reason to trust my suggestions for his musical contributions. He also despised non-drummers trying to change his approach (with good reason – he's ten times the drummer I could ever hope to be). Things were a little tense between us for the first year of working together, and the band fell into a natural division: Dave and I as the formally-trained strait lacers, Curtis and Jeff as the road-weary, laid-back pros.,
The longer we worked together, the more we grew to value the musical partnership. As we had a rhythm section of guys who enjoyed playing demanding, intricate, yet groove-friendly parts, I started writing music that made use of such firepower. Meanwhile, I began noticing how much Curtis' distinctive playing coloured the band's sound, giving it a coolly powerful, yet very organic flavour. I was also shocked to learn that Curtis actually paid attention to and valued good lyrics. In all my previous bands, I could have been singing in Swahili for all my band mates cared. This guy, a voracious reader for as long as I've known him, would often quiz me about lyrics I'd written or complement something he liked. I should also mention – if he and the other two gents in Victoria Secret (which is what we named this little quartet, thanks to Dave) hadn't all got behind the idea of playing original music, let alone mine – the band would likely have run its course by 1998. Lucky for me, my music with those boys turned out to be a very good fit.
All good things come to an end, though, and Dave and Jeff moved on to other music and other parts of the world, respectively. Curtis and I continued to collaborate in writing music (“Pretty Good Joke”, “Everything's For Sale” and “Caesar's Palace”, for example, all began with an intriguing Leippi drum-groove), jamming, and working with various singers, keyboardists and bassists. While we have substantial musical common ground – we were just recently discussing how much we both loved Ritchie Hayward's drumming when he worked with Robert Plant, in fact – it's fair to say we're pretty different people. Curtis' idea of a good day would likely include drumming, getting out toward the BC interior (rather rapidly) on his motorcycle, catching some live Shakespeare or live fusion phenom like Marco Minnemann, sharing a good scotch with a diverse assortment of friends, and instigating provocative conversations that alternately make you think hard and laugh harder. Me, I'd tend to replace the motorcycle and drums with a coffee, notepad and guitar, the scotch with a gin and tonic, and the rest with well-meaning inertia. Despite initial impressions from our first meeting, it's Curtis with the people skills. Whodathunk.
Just this week we've been in the recording studio together for the first time in at least six years. I have the pleasure of hearing my tunes come to life, as they're transformed from home demos (on which I use a 20-year-old drum machine – Alesis HR16 for you gearheads. Curtis despises it, I might add) to living, breathing music with Leippi drum artistry. Seventeen years? Bring on another seventeen. This just never gets old.
17 Years! The figure blows my mind. For what it's worth, it certainly seems like less than 17 years – and when we'd met, I'd probably have been flabbergasted to learn that this is the guy with whom I'd form my longest-lived musical partnership. To explain...
Back in the Summer of '96, I'd been without a band for over a year, and was hungry to get playing again. I'd started hanging out with local bassist/guitarist extraordinaire David Augustin to chat about the craft of songwriting and to 'workshop' song ideas. Dave was starting to get the itch to play live again too, so he rounded up a couple of locals for a jam. We agreed to meet at the drummer's rehearsal studio in a storage complex near Saanichton. Dave had raved about this drummer's skills on our way out to the studio, as he'd caught Curtis in live performance recently. This drummer, apparently, had tons of slick, professional chops, and could play live to click-tracks and sequencers effortlessly. I prepared myself to be impressed.
The guy I met was laconic to the extreme. He spoke very little, and our few verbal exchanges weren't exactly Hallmark moments. Here's our first exchange, for example:
Me: Hey, Curtis, would there happen to be a power outlet in this part of the room for my amp?
Curtis: Huh. Guess you should have brought an extension cord. (goes back to reading a book as Dave and I set up).
Curtis, years later, explained to me that he was very jaded about guitarists in general at that time, having played with many recently who were musically disappointing and professionally lacking. Fair enough.
I don't recall having any planned repertoire beforehand – the three of us jammed on a few tunes we all happened to know (the singer didn't show at the first jam), liked what we'd heard, and agreed to meet again with singer in tow. Then, something strange happened. I'm not sure who started it, but Curtis and I started jamming on 'the Crunge' by Led Zeppelin. This is akin to a man with three heads happening upon another man with three heads. The Crunge is a very obscure song from the Zep repertoire, and is metrically bizarre. If you could imagine a Charles Ives arrangement of a James Brown tune with stream-of-consciousness lyrics by Richard Pryor, you'd be in the aural ballpark. Naturally, it's one of my faves – and it happened to be a favourite of Curtis' as well. To top it off, we didn't just like it – we could both play it (hell, I could sing it and play it simultaneously - even Page and Plant can't do that)! Two men with three heads (each) meet and discover they can both juggle chainsaws. What are the chances?
Naturally, it wasn't all harmony and happiness from then on. I had a bit of a habit of micro-managing drum parts for my songs, and Curtis had no reason to trust my suggestions for his musical contributions. He also despised non-drummers trying to change his approach (with good reason – he's ten times the drummer I could ever hope to be). Things were a little tense between us for the first year of working together, and the band fell into a natural division: Dave and I as the formally-trained strait lacers, Curtis and Jeff as the road-weary, laid-back pros.,
The longer we worked together, the more we grew to value the musical partnership. As we had a rhythm section of guys who enjoyed playing demanding, intricate, yet groove-friendly parts, I started writing music that made use of such firepower. Meanwhile, I began noticing how much Curtis' distinctive playing coloured the band's sound, giving it a coolly powerful, yet very organic flavour. I was also shocked to learn that Curtis actually paid attention to and valued good lyrics. In all my previous bands, I could have been singing in Swahili for all my band mates cared. This guy, a voracious reader for as long as I've known him, would often quiz me about lyrics I'd written or complement something he liked. I should also mention – if he and the other two gents in Victoria Secret (which is what we named this little quartet, thanks to Dave) hadn't all got behind the idea of playing original music, let alone mine – the band would likely have run its course by 1998. Lucky for me, my music with those boys turned out to be a very good fit.
All good things come to an end, though, and Dave and Jeff moved on to other music and other parts of the world, respectively. Curtis and I continued to collaborate in writing music (“Pretty Good Joke”, “Everything's For Sale” and “Caesar's Palace”, for example, all began with an intriguing Leippi drum-groove), jamming, and working with various singers, keyboardists and bassists. While we have substantial musical common ground – we were just recently discussing how much we both loved Ritchie Hayward's drumming when he worked with Robert Plant, in fact – it's fair to say we're pretty different people. Curtis' idea of a good day would likely include drumming, getting out toward the BC interior (rather rapidly) on his motorcycle, catching some live Shakespeare or live fusion phenom like Marco Minnemann, sharing a good scotch with a diverse assortment of friends, and instigating provocative conversations that alternately make you think hard and laugh harder. Me, I'd tend to replace the motorcycle and drums with a coffee, notepad and guitar, the scotch with a gin and tonic, and the rest with well-meaning inertia. Despite initial impressions from our first meeting, it's Curtis with the people skills. Whodathunk.
Just this week we've been in the recording studio together for the first time in at least six years. I have the pleasure of hearing my tunes come to life, as they're transformed from home demos (on which I use a 20-year-old drum machine – Alesis HR16 for you gearheads. Curtis despises it, I might add) to living, breathing music with Leippi drum artistry. Seventeen years? Bring on another seventeen. This just never gets old.