I've been playing in bars and clubs in New Jersey for 44 years. Here is one experience I had in 1970. I was playing in a band called Godzilla. We wanted to be "real heavy", thus the name. We were playing 5 nights a week at a club called "The Pandemonium" on Rt 35 in Ocean Twsp. just west of Asbury Park. (There's a Burger King there now). Up the road about a mile was a surf board factory where renaissance man Tinker West conducted his business. It was also where a band he managed called Steel Mill rehearsed.
By this time Bruce already had a pretty heavy rep among South Jersey musicians and I had seen him play at Neptume H.S. and the Upstage but didn't take him too seriously. He didn't seem to play out much. To me, if you weren't playing full time you weren't serious. I did notice a lot of people were talking about him though.
one night he came in with Steve Van Zandt and some other other guys in his band and watched us play. Our first set always consisted of a 40 minute free form jam, no designated key or time signature. We were just warming up. (After a few weeks more people seemed to come for the jam than to hear us play our originals).
On a break, I approached Bruce, and being the nervy young man I was at the time, suggested I come up to the factory with my amp the next night since the band was off and he and I could just jam some blues. He said OK.
When I got tho the front door the next night Bruce didn't seem too thrilled to see me saying he was feeling a bit tired. Since I had already unloaded my very heavy Fender Twin with 2 massive EV 12's in it I said something to the effect of, "Ahh, come on, we'll just jam a little while". He graciously relented and we proceeded to this huge room with a beautiful Hammond B3 organ on a little platform, drums, Marshall stack, etc. Very impressive! My band had been rehearsing in my very small living room. We cranked up the amps and traded verses for a while and discussed the relative merits of Marshall's vs. Fenders. (Bruce remarked he couldn't believe the volume my amp was capable of), I said I couldn't believe he used Fingerease on the neck of his Gibson Les Paul. After a while, without saying anything, he put down his guitar. He wandered over to this broken down, out of tune, old upright piano over by the door and started plunking away on it. I was left holding my SG thinking, "well, I guess the jam is over". By the way, the previous year I had graduated music college as a piano major and had played an half hour of memorized classical music in order to graduate. Debussy's Cathedrale Englute, Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata, and Debussy Opus 80. I thought I was pretty good on piano by that point.
Now, instead of going over to the piano Bruce was playing and listening, perhaps making some helpful suggestions about fingering or inversions, I just said, "well, I guess I'll go now, thanks for jamming," and left. Just imagine, I might have missed hearing a seminal version of Jungleland!
We later got to open up for Bruce a few times, Once at the Sunshine Inn when Bruce put together Dr. Zoom, But that another story.
By this time Bruce already had a pretty heavy rep among South Jersey musicians and I had seen him play at Neptume H.S. and the Upstage but didn't take him too seriously. He didn't seem to play out much. To me, if you weren't playing full time you weren't serious. I did notice a lot of people were talking about him though.
one night he came in with Steve Van Zandt and some other other guys in his band and watched us play. Our first set always consisted of a 40 minute free form jam, no designated key or time signature. We were just warming up. (After a few weeks more people seemed to come for the jam than to hear us play our originals).
On a break, I approached Bruce, and being the nervy young man I was at the time, suggested I come up to the factory with my amp the next night since the band was off and he and I could just jam some blues. He said OK.
When I got tho the front door the next night Bruce didn't seem too thrilled to see me saying he was feeling a bit tired. Since I had already unloaded my very heavy Fender Twin with 2 massive EV 12's in it I said something to the effect of, "Ahh, come on, we'll just jam a little while". He graciously relented and we proceeded to this huge room with a beautiful Hammond B3 organ on a little platform, drums, Marshall stack, etc. Very impressive! My band had been rehearsing in my very small living room. We cranked up the amps and traded verses for a while and discussed the relative merits of Marshall's vs. Fenders. (Bruce remarked he couldn't believe the volume my amp was capable of), I said I couldn't believe he used Fingerease on the neck of his Gibson Les Paul. After a while, without saying anything, he put down his guitar. He wandered over to this broken down, out of tune, old upright piano over by the door and started plunking away on it. I was left holding my SG thinking, "well, I guess the jam is over". By the way, the previous year I had graduated music college as a piano major and had played an half hour of memorized classical music in order to graduate. Debussy's Cathedrale Englute, Beethoven's Pathetique Sonata, and Debussy Opus 80. I thought I was pretty good on piano by that point.
Now, instead of going over to the piano Bruce was playing and listening, perhaps making some helpful suggestions about fingering or inversions, I just said, "well, I guess I'll go now, thanks for jamming," and left. Just imagine, I might have missed hearing a seminal version of Jungleland!
We later got to open up for Bruce a few times, Once at the Sunshine Inn when Bruce put together Dr. Zoom, But that another story.
