Live :: Gig Reviews :: Liquid Lounge, Dallas 18.09.09

Jerry's View

I had a lot of fun at this show. Many of my friends and family had
known I played for years. However they had never actually seen it. So
it was a nice and warm audience that stood behind me that night.

I started preparing the Retro Live show way back in January 2009. I've
always been told that I sounded 80's and like my heroes Howard Jones
and similar 80's synth pop icons. I used to get kind of annoyed by
that. My good friend and fellow seasoned entertainer, Joey C. Jones,
told me that I should be honored to be compared to such icons. After
hearing that I kind decided to go after that era of sound for at least
a little while and just have fun with it.

The main key thing for me to do to keep things simplified was to
eliminate the use of a computer for sequencing. I took my best songs
and stripped away the massive layers of sounds. The new-old or Future-
Retro versions of these songs would consist of a primitive drums
machine sound with limits of just kick, snare, toms, claps, hats,
cymbal and agogo. I painstakingly programmed these sounds to mimic the
1983 EMU Drumulator (www.vintagesynth.com/emu/drumulator.php).
The sequenced notes would emulate a pair of 1980 Sequential Circuits
Pro Ones (http://www.vintagesynth.com/sci/seqpro1.php). One for bass
and one for phrase sequences.

That is it, in terms of what's going on underneath what is being
physically played.

Each song would get 2-5 pre-programmed patterns or phrases consisting
of 2-4 measures. Very simple programming. Because in those days memory
was scarce. I wanted to apply similar limits to my programming.
Phrases would be assigned to the lower keys of a Roland XP-60. By
utilizing Roland's RPS (Realtime Phrase Sequencing) technology, any
intro, verse, bridge, chorus or solo could be arranged live in
realtime and kept in synchronization via the internal clock of the
keyboard's sequencer.

In addition to these already stark old sounds, I spent a great deal of
time creating custom patches to emulate pads, strings, etc.... from
late 70's and early 80's synthesizers. Roland already has an extensive
library of vintage synths in their SR-JV expansion series for the JV/
XP family of workstations. I just like to tweak them a bit more.

I use a Roland JP-8000 for the thick bass chops and lead stuff. There
is a preset called Dual Minis that I suppose represents to Mini Moogs.
This required no programming. Lovely.

Last, I took a Novation K-Station and created a Moog Prodigy lead that
I'm still trying to perfect.

All of January I programmed and began practicing. On February 7th I
did my first live audition in front of a few friends to get a feel for
how it would go. I filmed myself so I could find out if I was staying
tucked away behind the keyboards and neglecting the audience. As any
good performer knows, you have to work the audience. People want to be
entertained and that was/is my focus.

Having said all of that, September 18th at Liquid Lounge in Dallas, TX
was my first performance of Retro Live and the 'Big Deal'
album release show.

Everyone seemed to have a good time. I like to be true and tell what
my experience was like as well.

Intro and 'What's All This Confusion For?'
I had Joey introduce me and execute the verse phrase. That all worked
great. My voice felt good and all of the music was going to plan until
I executed the bridge phrase. The internal sequencer clock was never
started. With the clock going, one phrase will finish the last measure
before switching to the new phrase. Without the clock it will start
the next phrase immediately when pressed. In the midst of putting on a
performance it was a subtle 'What just happened?' in my mind but
didn't fully realize what was going on until the second time it
happened going into the first chorus. I'm sure no one cared or even
really noticed. But if you listen to the recording of that night, you
will hear what I mean. You can't fix something like that in the middle
of the song. Well, I didn't want to attempt to. So, I coped with it. I
think it worked out really well regardless.

'First Thought, Last Thought'
Everything went smooth even if I did cross a few lyrics. I think
someone told me that night that this song reminded them of Thomas Dolby.

'Tortured'
I must have gone through my set at home dozens of times. I forgot to
bring my set list to the show and drew a blank on stage and had to act
quick. It was very dark on the stage and the light was making it hard
to see the display on the XP-60 (main board). I hadn't planned on
playing Tortured and loaded it by mistake. I thought I had loaded up
'Thoughts of the Day'. So, when the song started I was playing B Flat
Minor over a backing sequenced programmed in B Minor. This must have
sounded terrible. Not sure if anyone noticed. I was disoriented for a
moment. I sang through a few lyrics long enough to get my bearings on
the situation and made the transition to the correct key. I just felt
like stopping and moving on. However, the natural flow of 'Tortured'
allowed me to finish smoothly even though prematurely.

Howard Jones' 'No One Is to Blame'
To clear my head and get a fresh start I decided to go over to the
piano and play a song the audience would be familiar with. I think
everything went ok. My performance was hindered slightly by a foot
pedal plugged into the wrong place. It was meant for sustain but was
plugged into sostenuto. So, instead of getting those long angelic
notes, they became very short and plucky. I had to overcome this by
playing differently. Funny looking back, because earlier that night on
the dark stage I had made a comment to my brother that I didn't know
why the piano had two sustain inputs. SUST and SOST is hard to see the
difference.

'Here Comes the Man'
This, of course was the highlight of the show and the song I was most
eager to play. When I first wrote the song and the lyrics, I imagined
performing it on the Liquid Lounge stage. Everything went perfect. The
K-Station patch I had going was supposed to have this mono synth with
a very long decay. For some reason with the Roland AX-1 shoulder
keyboard plugged in, there was no decay at all. It still worked well
enough and the audience were very receptive to the barefoot man
plunging into the audience playing the Egyptian theme and 'Oh! Susanna'.

'Thoughts of the Day'
Finally, my favorite song from 'Big Deal' went over spectacularly.

Information Society's 'Tomorrow'
I probably shouldn't have even said anything to the audience about
this being an INSOC song. I think they were expecting 'What's On Your
Mind? (Pure Energy)'. Maybe there was a die hard in the audience that
knew the song. Anyway, I think I lost the audience towards the middle.
I threw in some Thomas Dolby 'She Blinded Me with Science', Gary Numan
'Cars', Harold Faltermeyer 'Axel F' (Beverly Hill's Cop Theme) and
Howard Jones 'What Is Love?'.

'Stranded on the Moon'
With my set list completely improvised I had about 4 minutes left to
play and pulled out this song that my friend, Robby likes because of
the lyrics and a private joke about the song's literal meaning. This
song brought the third 'I really liked that one. You should do more
like it.' from someone in the audience that I didn't already know.
This song is still a work in progress and I don't think I've ever
played it the same way twice.

So, that's how it was for me. People were really cool and so were the
club staff. Refreshed and encouraging. I think once again, it worked
excellent from the audience POV. At least the feedback was positive.
But, there's a lot going on that people can't see or ever understand.
I'm finding new ways to disconnect myself from trying to get it all
perfect. I just want to do everything I can to deliver the best
entertainment to those who are willing to make the trip out to see me.

Thanks again to all of those who could make it and to all of those who
helped make it a great event.

Jerry