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Bands |
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The Nomads |
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We decided to head North and go to Phoenix. I don't remember where we got the money for gas. When we arrived, we found a club The King and I. We auditioned there and got a gig, alternating 2 bands every night. A cool club with lots of people. There was another group playing there, whose leader was Ray Madrano. He sang and also played a telecaster. Good band. The drummer's name was Jim Bastine, a good drummer, who was very technically correct, due to schooling, I think, Twirled his sticks a lot. They had a sax, flute, 2nd guitarist named Otis Hale. Otis and I became friends and he explained something about music that would turn on a major light bulb for me. It was chord structure. I knew a lot of chords, more than your average guitarist of the time. Still, he explained the structure of a major scale and had me count the notes as I played them. 1,2,3,4,5,6,7, and 8. I already knew the scale and a few others, but didn't know what I was playing. He went on to explain that major chords, even though I was used to playing all 6 strings on the guitar to reproduce them, were actually only made up of 3 different notes. Those notes were the 1st, 3rd, and 5th notes of the major scale. I played a chord and figured out what the notes were and .... HE WAS RIGHT!!! This was cool. A minor chord was just the same, except you flat the 3rd. A minor 6th was 1, flat 3, 5, and 6. My God, I began to realize that with this new knowledge, I could close my eyes and randomly grab bizarre notes on the guitar, then sit down and figure out what chord it was. This was a major event in my music education. It may not sound like much, but I remember the day it all clicked for me, the day we were leaving Tucson. I started naming off intervals and notes using that method and Otis would smile and get excited telling me, "Yeh, man! That's it, you've got it!" I am forever in his debt for that little tidbit. It has been a lifelong reference for me. While traveling, we would say something like "Here's the tonic "(1) and then hum it. "Let's sing a major 7th chord. Jimmy, you take the 3rd, Roger the 1st (tonic), Jody the 5th and I'll take the major 7th. Ready? Here we go, and then we would try to hit the chord vocally on the first try. Great fun and great experience. We did diminished chords vocally (which are a little harder), augmented, minor 9ths, we were going crazy with this newfound knowledge. For me, intervals became the game of the day for the next few years. That is, the distance between two notes, distance measured in half steps. I would hear a trucker's horn and try to figure out what chord it was. I found some of them to be tuned to a flatted 5th, which is a very dissonant interval to the human ear. Harsh. That was the point, I think, of having that truck horn tuned that way, to irritate you into noticing so you would get the hell out of the way. It's fun to try and figure out train intervals too. Let's face it, I became a real nut on this stuff and still am to this day. The entire world is made up of intervals of tones. The musician is more captivated by it than most. Music, in its structure, is very mathematical and logical. In music, if you can add and subtract and count up to 8, (usually only 4) then you can play music with just a little effort and love for it. The interpretive side of music is not so logical. This comes from within. In reality, there are no rules, only guidelines in case you need some structure to get you back on course, structure to help you play along with others. Playing by yourself is fine; playing with others is an entirely different experience. A wonderful experience, but an ever so "exposing" circumstance. While depending on each other, the little nuances show up more often as "rubbing the wrong way" if you're not right in the pocket while playing. You learn from experience that you are part of the whole and when you get good enough to listen to everybody at the same time, while you play your instrument, then you step into another category of player. Generally, it takes a few years to accomplish this, although I have found a couple of young musicians that have an inherent ability to do this, but it's not the norm. Only then can you stop playing "over" another guys licks and just causing mish mash. It comes in time. The more everybody in the group takes credit for each other's efforts, the quicker the quality of the music progresses. Instead of having only personal egos, it is so much better when you have a collective ego and can be just as proud of what your band mate is doing, as you would be if it was you doing it. Everyone starts to learn that they are the reason the other guy's part is sounding so good and vice versa. This sounds obvious, but most players miss it completely, even musicians who have been playing years. A wonderful thing sharing pride in what your band mate is doing. One day, while rehearsing at the club, a guy who had been coming down and sitting in on bass showed up. He asked if he could show us an arrangement he had of "Goldfinger." We said "sure" and we worked it up. The guy's name was Joe Schermie. Yes, Schermie. We became good friends and had fun with some music jams. On the day we left Phoenix, I remember Joe and I saying to each other "Someday, man. Someday, we're gonna be in a group together." We both respected each others musical abilities, but had no idea that we really WOULD do more than just cross paths again in the future. I recall a scary incident concerning Jimmy Harris. One night, his girlfriend was fooling around with a .22 pistol. She was waving it right in Jimmy's face. I forget the circumstances, but ultimately, the gun went off. She thought it was empty. The bullet went into his jaw and straight out the back, just barely grazing his carotid artery. As I recall, it didn't even hit a tooth. We rushed him to the hospital, but they just patched him up and sent him home. No major damage. In through the cheek, missing the teeth, then out the jaw and just a flesh wound on the side of the neck. Talk about a close call! His initial reaction? He smacked her face and said, "You dumb bitch!." The poor girl was scared to death. So was he. We all were. One of those deals where you would swear someone was watching over him. We headed back to Los Angeles and shortly thereafter, Otis Gene Hale joined the Nomads. Otis was such a great talent and a had a sense of humor that would give you belly laughs. This picture of the Nomads is how the band was before it's demise. |
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The NOMADS - 1966 (in Hollywood) The band in it's last incarnation. Top left to right: Otis (Gene) Hale (sax, flute,guitar & vocals, Jody Glasscock (Lead vocals and baritone sax), Michael Allsup (guitar and vocals) Bottom left to right: Roger Skidmore (Leader, Bass, and vocals), Jimmy Harris (Tenor sax, organ, and sometimes both at the same time), Hugh Selvy (drums). |
