DownBeat 1979 09

 

 

 

Carol Kaye On John Guerin

 

1977 Rock/Jazz Fiesta Drum Clinic (Part 1 - John Guerin) | Professional Drum Shop

 

John Guerin Blindfold Test

 

Joe Porcaro On John

"John Guerin was one of my favorite drummers ever. His feel and musicianship were incredible. We did many sessions together. He like my son Jeff, left us too soon. I did some jazz clubs with Emil Richards and John would come in to hear us. It happened a few times. John would come up to me after the gig and was freaking out over my cymbals and asked if he could borrow one of them for a gig at Donte's Jazz club. I never got them back. I loved him so much that I didn't care. This happened three times".

The Unbelievable True Story of the Wrecking Crew’s Max Bennett

In the category of minimalist torch—if there is such a category—“Fever” by Peggy Lee has to be the assumed pinnacle of the form. Ms. Lee’s voice, accompanied by little more than a creeping bass line and snapping fingers, captures not only a genre of music, but a specific milieu in a specific era in American life, where cocktail glasses clink, eyebrows raise, and pent-up prosperity percolates insistently in the body politic. The song is feral, assertive, and unrelenting, and an unequivocal classic.

“Fever” was suggested to Peggy Lee by jazz bassist Max Bennett, a veteran of the Chicago, New York, and West Coast jazz scenes, and Ms. Lee’s close personal friend. It boasts a bass line for the ages.

“One day she said to me, ‘Oh by the way, I’m looking for a torch song,’ ” remembers Bennett, now 88 and alive and well in San Clemente, Calif. “ ‘If you hear anything like that, give me a ring.’ So I was working on Western Avenue, not the nicest area of L.A., with, like, a jazz trio. And a young kid walked in and said ‘Can I sit in?’ and we said, ‘Sure why not, what do you want to sing?’ He said, ‘I want to sing a song called ‘Fever.’ I’d never heard of it. But it has like two chords. We played it, and I thought, perfect for Peggy. So I called her up and told her about the tune, and the rest is history.”

It must have been a heady moment for a young man who, not that many years earlier, had left the unjazz capital of the world—Oskaloosa, Iowa—with just the clothes on his back, to seek his unfortunes in the music business. Now here he was, laying down one of the iconic bass lines in the American music canon with one of the most eye-popping and ear-caressing vocalists of the era.

“Oh, I didn’t record it. Peggy wasn’t working, so I was out with Ella Fitzgerald. So she recorded it with a friend of mind named Joe Mondragon. Howard Roberts, who was a great guitarist, was going to play but he didn’t. All he did was snap his fingers.”

Through the twists and turns of being a gigging jazzer and go-to session guy living in L.A.—he was a member of the mythical “Wrecking Crew”—Max Bennett would, however, leave his low-end imprint on many other important performances and recordings across several decades. Following the dissolution of his original Mothers of Invention, none other than Frank Zappa would tap Bennett as something of a de facto new Mother. That’s Max all over arguably Zappa’s meisterwerk Hot Rats, featuring the gorgeous and much beloved, “Little Umbrellas.” That’s Max on the sublime “Twenty Small Cigars” on Chunga’s Revenge. And those are just a couple of the Zappa albums on Max’s CV. It must have been a very special and inspiring period to be working with Zappa at the height of his powers.

“I was not familiar with Zappa’s music. Our paths never crossed. I was never a big fan of avant garde music in that sense. It was while I was working in the studio, what was it, 1967, I think? And I got a call from John Guerin. He said, ‘Get your stuff over to TTG’—that was in Hollywood—‘I got a double session for you with Frank Zappa.’ So we get there and we worked two double sessions for two nights. And that was the album, that was Hot Rats.”

“I was talking to someone about that, and they were telling me that that particular album got the best write-ups of any of the stuff he ever did. What’s interesting, I was on the computer the other day, and I’m seeing I’m on these other tunes. As it turns out—we would play the same chord changes for forever, you know, after we got through, just keep going and going—Frank took those takes and made other songs out of them. All of a sudden I realize I’m not just on Hot Rats, I did five Zappa albums! That was cool. I don’t mind.”

It’s easy for him to shrug off these stops along the way. Max Bennett is a jazz guy. His jazz life is what looms largest in his memory.

“When I started in Oskaloosa, I was a jazz musician from Day One. I just wasn’t a very good one. I was never interested in anything else. I didn’t play on any pop music—literally none. I never did any casuals, I didn’t play any commercial music till much later. I got started in Chicago, the late-’40s, used to go to Clark Street, there were a whole bunch of strip joints, and they used to hire groups from the South Side. They were good players—but the strip clubs wouldn’t hire bass players, so those guys were glad to see me. I would sit in with them. I was just getting started, so I learned quite a bit from them. From there I went to New York and hung out there for a little while and then joined Georgie Auld’s band and we went on the road.”

Great things would follow. “My jazz influences are essentially, like, Chicago and New York. But I was fortunate, even after I moved out to L.A., I went on tour with Ella Fitzgerald, and when we got finished with the tour, she and Oscar went home—Oscar Peterson was the headliner—so when we got back from France, we went out with Jazz At The Philharmonic. That had Dizzy Gillespie and Stan Getz and Roy Eldridge, Big Joe Turner, Sonny Stitt—I don’t know if you know who that is—all those guys…”

Eventually, West Coast jazz and points further afield were in the mix too, with Max joining Stan Kenton’s band, and at some point doing a stint with a more Middle America jazz head. “Believe it or not I was working with Roger Miller, the country guy? All the guys he was playing with were jazz guys. He loved jazz music, he just couldn’t, you know, play it. And he didn’t like most country music. He was unique. He was very hip. He didn’t want to be characterized with, between you and me, ‘those goddamn hat singers.’ He was a great guy to work for. I went on a couple tours with him.”

His journey would eventually have him cross paths with saxophonist Tom Scott, and the two would embark on a fruitful and influential collaboration in the mid-’70s.

“The L.A. Express—that was actually all my idea. Tom Scott and I worked in the studios together—for a long, long time doing movies and TV and that whole thing that studio players do. But he had a quartet, it was a bebop quartet. He was working at the famous club in Hermosa Beach, The Lighthouse. On Sunday afternoons—he had a really great bass player, stand-up player, Chuck Demonico. He couldn’t make it one Sunday, called me and asked me if I could come down and sub for him. I said sure, and I took my Fender bass, and I played that. And we played the first tune I ever wrote, a tune in E, called ‘TCB in E.’ We played that and…something, just, happened.”

“We would play the same chord changes for forever—Frank [Zappa] took those takes and made other songs out of them. All of a sudden I realize I’m not just on ‘Hot Rats,’ I did five Zappa albums! That was cool. I don’t mind.”

“Joe Sample was down there playing with him—Tom probably called him for this job, because Joe was pretty busy with the Crusaders—and I think the drummer was Ed Greene at the time. And something just clicked. So Tom said, ‘Well let’s do it again next Sunday.’ And I brought some tunes and he brought some tunes, and he changed all the tunes he brought so they kind of fit that format that I already started. And I kept writing. So that kind of started it, and we were working at The Baked Potato in North Hollywood—well actually Studio City—and we were doing it every Tuesday night, late, because that was the only time we could make it. And the crowd just got bigger and bigger and bigger.”

“That was the quartet, we didn’t have a guitar yet. I began thinking about ‘Boy, the group sounds good, like it’s real powerful’…so I got this name ‘Express’—I didn’t know what to put in front of it. I had a concert one night with Lalo Schifrin downtown at Dorothy Chandler, I think. So backstage I was waiting to go on, I was talking to this buddy of ours, Louie Shelton, and told him…and he said, ‘Well, how about L.A. Express?’ And that was it.”

One of those in attendance at The Baked Potato was John Guerin’s girlfriend, a famous folk singer by the name of Joni Mitchell. “She flipped for the band,” remembers Bennett. They would go on to work together on four of the strongest albums in Mitchell’s career, among the strongest by anyone in the ’70s. One can imagine that it must have been rewarding and a little surreal for a contemporary jazz combo to ascend to working on the likes of Court and Spark, The Hissing of Summer Lawns, Hejira and Miles of Aisles.


“We ran into the studio—I honestly didn’t think much about it. I didn’t even know who she was! We were buried in the studio. Her kinda music just didn’t get to me. It wasn’t that I didn’t like it—I didn’t know anything about it! Tom knew a little bit because he did some soprano sax on either For The Roses or Blue. Joni was great to work for. She really was. She had really good time, and she gave us carte blanche pretty much. I talked to her some time ago, and she had written something about how impressed she was with the band because if—she’d drop notes, she dropped time, stuff like that, which was her format, you know—we didn’t mind that at all, she’d worked with people before that were kinda perplexed about it. But it wasn’t real straight-like. So she really liked the band and it worked.”

“She was intrigued by jazz. Once she got playing with it, she was really stoked about it, she kind of developed a real affinity for it. Like I did that one song with her on Court and Spark, ‘Twisted’—Annie Ross did it first. There was actually a blues to it. But it was just John Guerin, and me, and her. It turned out nice, on the record. It’s wonderful.”

Max Bennett—in the neighborhood, and often right in the house, while music history was being made. Gigs with Charlie Parker and Billie Holiday and Aretha Franklin loom larger in his story, and sessions with Marvin Gaye and Harry Nilsson and Mel Torme are just the tip of that iceberg—a mountain of music considering those menager beginnings.

“I told you about when I was in Chicago, starving? We used to go to the High Note and have a jam session every night. 450 North Clark. They had headliners there, but they closed the doors at 2, but they left the back door open, and we’d have jam sessions from 2 till 6. All the strippers and hookers and musicians would come in the back door, because they’d serve alcohol but with the front door closed.”

“So I’m sleeping in my car one night in front of a hotel, and there’s a knock knock knock, and it’s these two hookers that I knew that were real nice gals. Took me to breakfast, and, uh, then I moved in with them. They said if they had a run, rather than take a cab—I had a little Chevy convertible, so I could get them to their job, that way I could stay at their place for nothing. And, ah, I won’t tell you the rest of it. It’ll be in my book.”


Rest In Peace Mr. Bennett.

Carol Kaye Talks About The Wrecking Crew Drummers

Carol Kaye:
Also one wrote a lot of gibberish about how the "wall of sound" is so "tricky" to get (a whole philosophy about it), I had to answer no, nothing like that at all. We all just played too loud, at Gold Star what some had called "dirty" echo (but which I thought was great, built by Dave Gold), and leaked into each others' microphones ... that was the "secret", in my opinion, to the "Wall Of Sound" as well as Dave's special echo that ran right through the women's rest room.

About drummers:
Question:    Carol, what do you know about a drummer named Nick Martinis. His name shows up on a few PET SOUNDS and SMILE-era Beach Boys session sheets, but I've never heard of him otherwise. Was he another occasional player like Richie Frost?
Answer:     Nick is a fine jazz drummer who, like a few others for a little while, started doing some occasional record dates ... but he (like others) didn't invest into getting a rock-drum setup, plus didn't take the time to really get his rock chops together. Richie Frost did quite a few dates for awhile but never was a #1 call drummer ... before Earl Palmer and Hal Blaine, both shared the #1 call spot for drummers (both of them neck and neck in amount of recording dates done).
Sharkey (Ed) Hall and Jessie Sailes were doing the drum recording dates along with Charlie Blackwell - all 3 were jazz drummers as well as a couple of others doing drum recording dates then: the fine Jack Sperling and Jackie Mills ... other drummers doing the more elite record dates were Alvin Stoller (who could sightread 4 line scores of written drum parts as well as Frank Sinatra's drummer, Irv Cottler, "Mr. Swing."
Earl Palmer moved here from New Orleans (in 1957) where he'd already recorded many hits for great artists such as Fats Domino, Dave Bartholomew, etc. for years there since 1947 and is the most-recorded drummer with certainly the most credits - he was already established since 1947 as a hot recording drummer in New Orleans before arriving here in Hollywood in 1957 and is accomplished in ALL styles including fine jazz, not just rock and roll.
Nick did on a few record dates but was a fine jazz drummer and a good scat-singer in jazz also. He kept playing jazz live and has been with the Pete Jolly Trio (usually with Chuck Berghofer string bass if he's not busy) for years now, has cut many CDs with Pete, other jazz artists in LA.
Earl Palmer, John Guerin, Paul Humphrey, and most of the recording drummers were fine jazz drummers (as well as Sharkey Hall, Jessie Sailes, Charlie Blackwell, Jack Sperling etc. before them), and great to work with in the recording studios. These fine musicians made the switch, got their rock drums sets together (totally different heads, setups, mutes etc. than the finer jazz styles of music), and even Hal Blaine played a few psuedo "soul jazz" gigs (for H.B. Barnum) but no, he wasn't a jazz drummer and didn't do jazz in the nightclubs with the regulars at all - he was a always a "rock-pop drummer" only. Hal did get his well-known rock drum sounds together for rock and roll yes and did a lot of record dates and was instrumental in starting the multi tom-tom rock licks, and heavy-sounding rock styles etc.

 

Earl Palmer jazz drummer from New Orleans, started the "funky" paradiddles, and famous great drumstyle sounds of his own too (Boogaloo, Swamp Beat, tasty Jazz Fills and Sounds etc.) - I enjoyed many a record date with Earl. He had that great groove, taste and sparkling technique - he loved to play music, and wasn't into "stardom" role much either, a real musician and wonderful human being, fine family man who successfully raised 7 wonderful kids. Jim Gordon, while not known as a "jazz drummer" could hold his own in all styles, being a schooled musician early-on as part of the drum corps, think it was the Blue something corps that was widely known world-wide.
As far as Richie Frost is concerned, he was very busy here and there for a few short years (a sometimes-jazz drummer, mostly a groove drummer on recordings, could play all styles of music) but like jazz drummer Jack Sperling, other drummers of that period, his work dwindled pretty fast at one point and I remember and about the late 1960s, he moved out of LA up to Oregon. He did more recording work than Nick ever did but still was not that popular as a popular recording drummer (not like Earl, Hal, Paul, John, others).
The public still have little idea of all the creativeness of the totally-experienced studio musicians on all those dates. At first we had to write down the chord changes on most early dates - there was no music usually, then later on more arranging / writing was done but we all still had to create parts over the arrangements.
If people stop to think of the background of musicians in those days: HARD bebop jazz, the GREAT big-band era of the 40s and 50s which produced the finest musicians in the world, years and years of combo work in nightclubs, and the all-important MULTI-CHORDS of all the HUNDREDS of STANDARDS we all had to not only play and read, but INVENT on BEFORE any of us did studio work ... only the drug-free booze-free musicians made it into the studio musician work which was taboo to anyone who had drug or booze problems. It was a highly self-disciplined business.
And ... for movie studio work, it was necessary background experience especially for drummers to come from the big-band era and the jazz era, for the heavy big-band experiences they needed to do studio movie-TV recording with, that was a given if you wanted to work in the heavy major film studios.
That musician experience is not really available today like it was in the 1950s ... today, many will play in big-bands but it's more sporadic than like the huge demand for prolific traveling famous big bands of the 1940s and 50s who played dance & concert gigs almost every night. We paid our dues like everyone did back in the 1950s where you're playing almost every night, doing some rough traveling, and playing all the time. There's not much chance today to play to develop musicians'creativity like it was back in those hard-working professional musician days.
Musicians today are not trained in the standards chordal education of those times either. Today's educational system is much different in training fusion players, rock-soul, and elevator music but not the real jazz of the 1950s, the real music it took to play all the chord changes of the Standards which was so common back then unfortunately ... which limits the kinds of any creativity musicians can do today.
The musicians of those prolific times were mostly the STUDIO MUSICIANS of the 60s, hardened by years of professional playing, on the road, playing so much music that when I teach it today, sometimes students wilt fast - they had no idea the music we played was that complex compared to the easy rock-pop-country-blues they're used to playing.
But usually, because of the good materials they work on plus no-fluff teaching, they do get it with some dedication to a little time with steady practice. Experienced teaching does work well in passing along the important theory, chordal progressions, how to create etc. ... they do eventually "get it" just fine ... the system works.
There's just not a lot of teachers out there who know how to teach the chordal real-jazz stuff and surely don't teach the right ways unfortunately - between that and not enough opportunity like there used to be when real music (instead of stage-shows etc.) was important. The scene has changed and yet there are places to play, a lot of them, and places to jam too if not right in your own home with a few musicians. It's amazing what you can do to get that kind of joint-practice with other musicians. Playing in front of the audiences is another percipience to get used to also.

There's a reason why you don't quite hear the musicianship today like the many who played in the great Artie Shaw, Goodman, Ellington, Basie, Harry James, Woody Herman, Chick Webb, Fletcher Henderson, even the Glenn Miller and Glen Gray bands of yesteryear. The spirit, the tightness, the total grooves, the intensity, the "hungry" sounds ... if you don't play good, you don't eat - that's the way it was back then.
Today, most people would rather have career jobs and just play for fun on the weekends, which works well too, it was too hard of a life to be a full-time musician back in the 40s and 50s. Today, you can have good gigs and just play part-time and enjoy a lifetime of playing some good gigs if you've learned the right stuff.
The chordal music of the 1940s and 1950s standards and jazz (and even the pop of those years) created a musical era that can't be duplicated, not today, with the ignorant inexperienced teachers out there teaching nonsense non-workable studies to students. Some younger teachers are making it a point to learn from the more-experienced older educators to get the great chordal system that spawned real jazz soloing, standards, etc. ... I surely hope the young teachers will do more to learn (and teach) the great chordal system that created this past era.
Other popularly-working fine studio drummers in the movies, TV-film shows, and non-rock elite record dates include: Sol Gubin, Louie Bellson, Ed Thigpen, Jake Hanna, Panama Francis, Larry Bunker, Nick Ceroli, Joe Porcaro, Harold Jones, Cubby O'Brien, Mel Lewis, Duffy Jackson as well as most of the work done by jazz heavies ... Johnny Guerin, Earl Palmer, Paul Humphrey, Ed Shaughnessey, Alvin Stoller, Shelly Manne, Irv Cottler, etc. all wonderful people by the way, and fun to work with etc.

Record date (non-movie except maybe for 1-2 films) drummers also included: Sharky Hall, Jesse Sailes, Hal Blaine, Jim Gordon, Ron Tutt, Frankie Capp, Ed Greene, Jim Keltner. note: Frankie Capp was popularly-hired in movies as a percussionist, as was another very great jazz drummer-legend: Larry Bunker.
PS. Like Jack Nitzsche, Leon Russell, Al Kooper etc. have always said, and others in our business also, we were never known by Hal Blaine's later-invented name for his book (1990) as "the wrecking crew" ... that's his self-promoting name.
We studio musicians were all independent of each other totally in recording, and never were a "formed group of musicians."
We all had our own separate professional careers way before ever doing studio work and many of us were well-known before ever doing studio work. We were sometimes known as the "clique" but never 'wrecking crew' as promoted by one who would like to think of himself as "the authority" on our history, it's simply not true as others like Nitzchie, Leon Russell, others have often said in the news media ... we were never known as the Hal Blaine term 'wrecking crew' but that's not the worse of it.
Hal is totally off-base and wrong when saying "the older studio musicians called us that" ... he never was hired for movie work with those movie studio musicians he slanders by saying that, they never said that, plus what they sometimes said was in praise of us, totally the opposite of what Hal says! I know them all well, and worked daily with them, Hal did not and there-in might be the problem.
I've always publicly said nice things about Hal Blaine in all these years, as you can tell in my past correspondence, and interviews with the news media. But enough is enough, I never got along with Hal Blaine, tho' I did a lot of record dates with him yes, but I was never close to him and I never "had a feud with Hal" either as Denny Tedesco lies to people about to cover himself since he refuses to accept I reject his film for what it is, in one journalist's opinion a "piece of Hollywood fluff", telling lies that sometimes makes the public angry at us."

Nothing could be farther from the truth!! We really liked the music we turned into hit records tho' sometimes yes, it was boring at times (surf-rock stuff) etc. ... Denny cannot accept the fact that his misbegotten film is simply NOT who we are nor what we did ... it is skewered to make money for himself and for Hal Blaine and a couple of others, that's the truth of the matter. We were ALL duped into appearing in this film, it was misrepresented to us!
If you wanted to get Earl Palmer, Plas Johnson, others including myself really angry, say "wrecking crew", and it's not just those words but what they stand for: Hal Blaine's invented self-promotion to make people think we were all part of "his band" ... totally false. And Denny Tedesco, who sometimes calls Hal Blaine "my real father", slanders me by saying "there's a feud between Carol and Hal" to make an excuse as to why I don't endorse his phony film too! He has threatened me from time to time to "take down your statement about my film" but I refuse to do that, as he's telling lies about me, and illegally posting something I never said on his website.
See our Music Connections Interview for more info.
Knowledgeable top journalists now shy-away from anything called "wrecking crew" since they know it to be a phony term, and is frowned upon by most of the studio musicians (yes, a few go whichever the wind blows as to that for sales of their CDs etc.) who were never called that at all ... we were ALL totally independent of each other and were never part of a "band" let alone a "band by Hal Blaine called the 'wrecking crew'" ... He should not set himself up as "the person defining who we all were" ... most of us had thriving wonderful (mostly jazz) music careers before we ever saw the insides of any studio work.
And Hal gets very angry when someone doesn't "agree with him" about his self-promo term of 'wrecking crew' ... he's been angry at others and at me for years about this ... and, like he does with others he gets angry at, he slanders too. He even got angry at Sonny Bono because Sonny didn't see him and so didn't say hello to him one time.
Also, Hal Blaine stole one of my recorded tracks (see my home-page website), and uses it as "his own" recording.
Again, Denny Tedesco's film of 'Wrecking Crew' is NOT representative of the true story of our group of studio musicians and has been purposefully skewered to omit some key players as well as play up the importance of many others who were minor, and invent "stories" in this considered-to-be-fluff film - it's totally wrong and while some might not say anything about it, most of our group of studio musicians are irate about being USED for Denny's true purpose.
Also, Hal's "credit" of The Way We Were is wrong, that was Paul Humphrey on drums on that (listed on the contract too), and also Jim Gordon on drums of "These Boots Were Made For Walkin" by Nancy Sinatra as Nancy herself remembers too ... Hal played on the Goodyear ad of that tune, not Nancy's hit recording, maybe he confuses what he did with that, and not the gold record he bought ... the contract on Nancy's recording can't be found.
Hal and Earl were neck-to-neck in Hollywood as far as amount of record dates go, and my fav of course was always Earl Palmer, who had many hits before he ever started to record in Hollywood in 1957 (hits with Dave Bartholomew, others in New Orleans since 1947). And then I loved to record with Paul Humphrey and many others like John Guerin, both like Earl were top pro's, well-known fine jazz drummers. You can go from jazz drums to rock-pop and soul drums easily but not much the other way around.
I did a lot of recordings with Hal Blaine, true, but we were never close and his ego was such you had to bite your tongue sometimes especially when it comes to his idea of "women" and his incessant complaints about his ex-wives etc. and his carrying ons, i.e. ... he sometimes has an odd habit of putting a flashing red-light on top of his car ...
Earl Palmer, myself and many other top musicians like Leon Russell, Jack Nitzchie have always spoken out against the phony term of "wrecking crew" ... and tho' at first, not being aware of the manipulation ... we were all fooled by Denny.
From a dedicated wonderful journalist:
>>>>And thanks for putting me right about the Wrecking Crew expression. I had kind of wondered why I had never seen the expression in my older music books and now I know, it's banned now.

“When you hear somebody with balls, that’s me.” — Carol Kaye

Audio Interview 1999

DOWNBEAT July 14, 1977

Skip, thank you.

HITMEN - Recording Drums

HITMEN - An Inside Look At The World Of The Studio Drummer

By Sam Bradley

Thanx to Skip, again.

Remembering John Guerin

From Kim Richmond:
Yes, John was a special musician, a BRILLIANT drummer, an irrepresible  spirit. Very early in my career, we were doing a jingle recording session together, one of my first sessions, and he came over after one take and whispered in my ear "I think your pitch is a little sharp," so as not to embarrass me. I was always in admiration of him musically, especially his free (for the time) drumming style. I didn't have a chance to play any jazz with him (he thought of me primarily as a composer/arranger until about ten years back, when we had a chance to do a jazz gig together). He complimented me by saying "Hey Kim, I had not idea!" That was a personal triumph for me because I admired him so much.
Just two little-known examples of his genius (in my eyes) are playing an entire film cue for Lalo Schifrin for just drums (all improvised by John) on the movie "Kelly's Heroes." I was at the session listening, and John made it very creative. The other example was his playing on "Gate of Dreams" by Michael Colombier. I enjoyed playing in Mike Barone's band with John, especially at rehearsal where I faced him. I could always tell how we were doing from John's face. He was an expressive guy. He's given me some great memories and inspiration. Thanks John!






From Carol Morell:
John has been so much a part of our lives. I remember when I first met him he was playing at Bonesville, but I was too young to get in the club. He was a part of all our important occasions – birthdays, anniversaries, holidays, weddings, etc. He was an integral part of our boys’ lives, whether participating in Justin’s musical growth or going to Chris’ baseball games. Some of my best memories were of our weekly poker games that went on for a number of years. We took a percentage of each pot and put it into the kitty. At John’s suggestion, we took the money and all went to Mexico. What fun. Be it conversation or music, John was a great listener......and a great audience. His musical legend is well known to all. But not many were lucky enough to have him in their lives as we did. John was a very private person. We were so lucky that he chose to let us in.
We will miss him so.






From John Beasley:
When I first got to town, John was playing a lot at a club called Snookeys on Pico in West LA. (1979-80 ?) I was a skinny, snot-nose, arrogant 18 year old hanging out and trying to learn form a great lyrical trumpet player named Don Sleet. Don and John had come up together years earlier in San Diego. John got Don a gig there and I ended up playing with the two of them 2 nights a week for 6 months or so. I was, of course, completely in awe of John's playing and reputation, so I was blown away when he made me feel as though I was "one of the cats"! That's the way he was. I'll never forget that look he would give me when I was comping too rhythmically or playing too many notes or especially not swinging! He was a great bandstand teacher! I wish I would have told him how much those gigs meant to me. I'll miss knowing he's out there somewhere playing that fantastic > shuffle beat.






From Alphonse Mouzon:
I'm in shock and I'm saddened by the sudden death of John Guerin. John was a great drummer who displayed an impeccable feeling for pop and jazz. I saw John playing  with trumpeter Carl Saunders last year at a club in Santa Monica. John played great that night, as always! I will miss him dearly! Heaven is procuring one swinging drummer!






From Benny Golson:
I met John Guerin when I first came to Los Angeles in 1957 to write for
television. The first thing that caught my attention was his style: loose, yet very controlled, never getting in the way, but rather adding to whatever was going on around him. There was a particular beat he had that I tried to use when I went back East to record. Unfortunately no one played it quite like him. Years went by before I saw John again after I left for New York once again. But we came together again on a recording I was doing for Lou Rawls just a few months ago last year. Rather than sounding the same, which would have been great, he sounded even better, in the tradition of Dom Perignon wine ... getting better with age. During the date, and after many years, I finally told him about his beat that I tried to duplicate so many times while back East. We laughed together. After re-discovering John, I decided that when coming back to Los Angeles for various projects in the future, he would be my drummer. Did I have a choice? Of course not, not if I wanted the best.
When I received an e-mail from Mike Melvoin about his passing, my heart sank deep, deep down into the darkest shafts of my existence as I uttered a few harsh words at reality, and feeling a great desire to turn the clock back to much happier times. John Guerin I loved what you did and I loved the kind of guy you always were. How I will miss you, especially after I just found you again. Time and unforeseen occurrences have been extremely cruel this time.Sorry I cannot be there, but I am there.






From Dr. Lou Fischer:
As a bassist, I have been tremendously blessed through the years to have performed in so many settings with so many of the world's greatest drummers. Publicly, John and I never had the chance to perform together, but we did have the ocassion to spend many days together in the studios back in the mid to late seventies in Dallas, Texas and again in LA in 1979. John made a significant impact on my decision to become a jazz player full time. After working one particularly long and grueling jingle session in Dallas, John was in the audience that evening listening to a performance with a group called High Rise, co-lead by myelf and another great drummer Steve Houghton. John and I spent many days talking about my performance of that particular evening. He was one of the first individuals to encourage me to look beyond making money in the studios, to visit my inner most thoughts... to focus in on what it
was I wanted to contribute to the world as a musician. It is hard to imagine that such a small encounter as we had, would actually play out into a major direction change for me. I thank John so much for sharing his encouragement, his wisdom, his insight into my true calling life....jazz and jazz education. Without it, I personally might have
missed out on what has now proven to be some of the most memorable musical times in my life. Be at Peace, my friend.






From Jerri L. Parker:
I was deeply saddened and shocked to hear of the death of John Guerin through a fellow classmate of San Diego High School. John was a special and supportive friend, as we shared youthful experiences in several classes, including drama in high school. I always knew he was a talented and serious musican, even in thoses days gone by. We were so proud when he was offered a professional gig prior to graduation from high school. I knew he had what it took to be very successful.
John Guerin was not only a talented musican, but a gentle and kind spirit, who made his mark in the world successfully, and will be deeply missed by this old friend.
I pray that the Lord will give you the strength to withstand the pain and loss of your husband, father, brother, relative and/or friend.
We share the loss. Godspeed.






From Chris Colangelo:
I was so surprised when I heard of the passing of John. He was a great musician and he will be missed by all who knew him. He taught me a lot just by playing with him. When I played with John, I always got the sense that he was listening so hard to everything going on around him that you always had to be on your toes. The first time that I played with him he wanted me to give him more energy and he asked me while we were playing but, John did it in such a positive and nice way, I couldn't help but learn from it. That's the kind of guy he was. I never played the same after that gig, I always gave my all. It was always nice to see that smile he used to give when everything was swinging. I saw that smile on Dec. 6, and will miss that and him. I'm fortunate that I had the opportunity to play with the great John Guerin. My thoughts and prayers go out to his family.







From Phil Johnson:
On Monday, Jan 12, my oldest son called me in New York and told me about John's death. He had heard the news on the Bay Area jazz station KCSM.
After hearing that John had died, I woke up in the middle of the night and couldn't stop thinking about him. I felt like part of my childhood and youth had disappeared with his death. I couldn't go back to sleep, so I got up and searched for an hour and a half on the internet for any sites that had information about him. It was like I was trying to recapture him. I found your web site, created with love and care. I look at the pictures and see the feeling in John's eyes.
John was born on October 31, 1939. I was born on October 17. I grew up with John through elementary school, junior high, and high school in San Diego. He was a good friend, the first person my age with whom I could share my love of jazz.
Even in elementary school, John was the hippest guy around. At the age of nine or ten he gave a little talk in our class about jazz. I remember him saying that the guys were called cats and the women were called chicks. If memory serves me, John's Uncle Jack was a drummer with a local band. I remember hearing that his uncle put John up on the drum stool and let him play when he was just a little kid.
When we were in junior high, John and I would go to the five and dime stores in our Hillcrest neighborhood and ferret out jazz 45s from stacks of pop records. I have a lot of great memories, going over to the old two story house where John lived with his mother and aunt near Balboa Park, listening to records in his room, hearing him practice on his drum set. I remember John telling me when Charlie Parker was coming to San Diego with Jazz at the Philharmonic. John would always tip me off to the latest sounds: a super fast up tempo track of It Don't Mean a Thing by Stan Getz and Dizzy Gillespie; the first 10-inch lp by the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet on EmArcy records.
When I was in high school, I borrowed my grandmother's set of marimbas and I was trying to play them. John came over to the house with his friends, piano player Mike Wofford and trumpeter Don Sleet. They improvised some pieces, using the marimbas, and recorded the music on a little portable recorder.
In the late 1950s-early 1960s, I used to go see John play in a quintet at a jazz club in a little beach town north of San Diego. The club owner played bass, Mike was on piano, Don on trumpet, the tenor player was Gary, and of course, John was driving the group on drums. They were playing great hard bop.
When I was writing songs and lyrics in the 1970s, John was very helpful. Max Bennett wrote a tune called Velvet Lady that the LA Express recorded. I wrote a lyric for the tune and sent it to John, who gave it to Max, who liked it. In those days I used to stop off at John's place in the San Fernando Valley and visit when I drove down to San Diego from the Bay Area. I remember when he started producing recording sessions for vocalists like OC Smith and Terry Garthwaite. He played me the reel to reel tape from a session he had just produced for Terry.
I can still feel John's presence on Joni Mitchell's Miles of Aisles, Court and Spark, and Hissing of Summer Lawns.
I last saw him play when my father and I went to see Joe Farrell, with John on drums, at the Bach Dynamite and Dancing Society in Half Moon Bay.
Recently I moved from the Bay Area to New York City. I phoned John a month ago. We had a long conversation. He said he was coming here to play at the Blue Note in February or March. I was going to go hear him. I told him I was looking forward to seeing him again. He said, "Oh, we'll talk before then. I keep thinking of things I want to say to him.







From Mitch Holder:
In the mid '60's, I was still in high school and had the good fortune to study guitar with the great jazz and studio guitarist, Howard Roberts. HR's group was the first to play at the famous jazz club in No. Hollywood, Donte's. Howard told me about this new drummer he had met and hearing Mr. Guerin for the first time, well, mindboggling is about the only word I can come up with to describe what I heard that night..
Subsequently, I vividly remember being at Donte's from then on and whenever John was due to play, he'd come strutting in right before the band's first set, probably from just getting out of a studio call and usually in a turtle neck shirt as I recall and I also remember all the ladies eyes falling on John as he walked in, how could they not with his classic good looks and that boyish face.
A few years later I started my studio career and one of the highlights of that work is being able to play with some of the greatest musicians in the world. The first session I ever did with John was at Universal as I recall and all 
I can say about my reaction to working with him the first time was, well, mindboggling. Besides being the consummate musician, John was the true definition of that all too used phrase, 'Beautiful human being'. Well John was the 'real' definition of that. As others have stated, he helped musicians in a supportive way by letting them know if they needed to pay attention to the time, or play simpler, or whatever, which when you're first getting started, is always a huge help without everyone else knowing what had transpired between John and whoever he was 'teaching'. He was so nice to me when I started and straightented me out on a few things as well. I thank John for that.
It's been a pleasure to have worked with him all these years and I'll forever remember the last session I did with him, which was just a few weeks ago in November. It was for Mike Melvoin, who had John in his trio for years and years and the date was for the movie, Something's Gotta Give. Tony Dumas played bass and we did an Oscar Peterson cover song for the movie. I'll be forever grateful that the last time I played with John was in a jazz setting and, of course, he played as great as ever and was as he always was, the one and only Johnny Guerin. My very best wishes to all of John's family. You are forever blessed with his presence watching over you.






From Trevor Feldman:
I just wanted to say that John was the first drummer who really got me excited about playing drums. Just as I really became conscious of music, John was playing with my late father, Victor Feldman, who joined the L.A. Express just before Tom Scot left the band. I will always remember how riveted I was watching and listening to John. His exquisite and emphatic touch; his otherworldly sense of swing; his uncanny talent of imbuing jazz with a felicitous dose of rock, and rock with an elegant dose of jazz. All of this brought so much joy to my soul back then, and just thinking about it now has the same effect. My father loved John's other wordly sense of time, and because both of them had such a great grasp of true rhythm, the combination of my father on piano and John on drums was simply glorious. When I think of genuine fusion or jazz rock, I think of John, Max Bennett, my father, et al jamming in the L.A. Express. These guys were genuine jazz musicians who crossed the boundery into rock, creating a magical world of musical syncretism that makes almost all other fusion that followed them sound like inferior rehash. I will always be trying to improve my drumming and piano playing by listening to John, and I will always be struck with a feeling of ineffable felicity when thinking of the days when I was lucky enough to come home from school and have one of the greatest drummers of all time rehearsing with my father. His rhythmic eloquence will live forever. I love you, John
Sincerely

From Tommy Vig:
John Guerin was truly one of the greatest drummers ever lived, and I considered him a friend. We lost another irreplaceable person.
Sincerely






From Bill Courtright:
In 1976 I had the thrill and pleasure of working with John Guerin. We were recording an album in Orange County. I was a young beginner. He was with Joni Mitchell, and had already become a legend in the recording industry. I was thrilled to be in the same room with him. I was awed by him and envious of him.
By the time we completed our project, "Making Our Dreams Come True," the theme to TV's Laverne & Shirley, I had grown to love this kind, gentle and generous man. His talent was awesome, his sparkle was contagious.
May he rest in peace. I, for only one, will never forget him.







From David Grossman:
The year was 1975. I was 19 years old, and a huge John Guerin fan studying music at Berklee College of Music when L.A. Express came to Boston. I asked after the show if there was a way to speak with John and moments later there I was face to face with the man himself. I tentatively asked (out of fear of rejection by this monster of a player) if I could buy him a meal before he left town. While explaining he would love to, but didn't have time, he said "I tell you what, kid - come back tomorrow night as my guest and I'll put you as close to my drums as possible." Wow - how cool was it that the musician I admired so much was a really nice guy, as well !! I'll never forget one moment in that show when , as I sat in awe as he did some superhuman polyrhythmic figure, he looked at me and gave me an all -knowing wink. I took John out for lunch a while back and thanked him again for inspiring me as a musician, but also as a sensitive human being. I often remember that moment when I am approached by new talent. While I never did know John well, it is very clear that this is a very great loss on so many levels.






From Linda Root:
Back in the late '50's, San Diego was the place to be if you loved live jazz. There was nothing better than Johnny Guerin in a drum battle or Don Sleet, making mellow on a trumpet that could make you laugh or cry. Theseguys were kids when I heard them play, and they were already the best. My Dad had known Gene Krupa, and talked alot about his style, but when he heard Johhny at a practice session in a Rolando Park neighborhood when I was in high school, he admitted that John could get more emotion out of a drum than even Krupa. Back in those days in eastern San Diego county, you didn't buy a CD to hear the best of the best. You just drove around in the neighborhoods not far from San Diego State, and you heard it coming from garages and backyards.






From Rob Throckmorton:
I am so saddened and shocked by the news of John's passing. My father, and fellow drummer, introduced me to Tom Scott and the LA Express when I was a youngster. I would play along with Tom Cat every day, windows wide open - the neighbors hated me. I even transcribed the drum solo - a several week project. Then finally mom told me I was old enough to watch a Clint movie - Dirty Harry, and there was that unmistakable sound that can be only one person. Then one day on the car radio, 'Help Me' came on and I told my mom that was John Guerin playing. I went to the store and looked at every Joni record to find the one with that particular song on it. Then the neighbors liked me because at least I was playing to some new music. Then there was Patrick Williams' 'Threshold', then Michael Franks, the examples go on and on. I couldn't get enough. He was "my drummer." He had the greatest influence on my playing over the years. But as accurate as my transcription of that smokin' solo from the Tom Cat record was, to this day, I just can't recreate that "John Guerin sound." John, while I never met you, I'll will miss you!!!! Deepest sympathy to all that knew and loved John Guerin.







From Tim Turner:
I too am saddened by the loss of John Guerin, one of my all time Drum heroes. I was blessed by having known the Guerin family when they were living on Riverside Dr. in Burbank in the early 70's. I was a close friend to both his son Shaun and step son Scott. Being a young musician myself, just 14 years old , I was in awe by John, who was then playing with "Victor Feldman and the Good Vibes" a pre Tom Scott and the L.A. Express ensemble. The family and I would go watch "Mr. Guerin" at such jazz venues as "The Baked Potatoe" "Donte's" "The Pilgramage Theater" and "The Lighthouse' in Hermosa Beach. I would spend hours and hours listening and absorbing this incredible live music.
There were other times when Tom Scott, Jim Gordon (fresh out of Derek and the Dominos) Chuck Domonico, and Victor Feldman and others would meet up at John's Riverside Dr. home (where we were hanging out in the pool) and jam in the back music room for hours! As I became aware of John's recording studio history I was amazed by his creativity, versitility and his groove. He was always pleasent to me and on numerous occasions dropped me off at my apartment on his way over the hilll to Hollywood for another studio gig. He always drove the coolest sports cars and was also seemed interested in my music. Even now it is still very special to hear Johnny's wonderful music on the radio. I will never forget those inspirational and magical moments with John Guerin.



http://johnguer.ipower.com/

Joni Mitchell Meets Don Juan's Reckless Daughter

Nineteen Seventy Eight is a watershed year for Joni Mitchell; DON JUAN's RECKLESS DAUGHTER (Asylum) is the superlative singer-songwriter's tenth album; its release marks the tenth year of her association with 'personal manager' Elliot Roberts. While last year's European tour was cancelled on account of exhaustion, sources close to Roberts claim that Joni 'just may' play the States in '78. But whether Our Lady of the Canyon opts for seclusion or the road, her new, deluxe double-set crowns a decade of ambitious record making.

She was born Roberta Joan Anderson, in 1943, in Fort Macleod, Canada. Her early inspirations, like those of Jackson Browne and Linda Ronstadt, were drawn from the well of folk music. Like them, she travelled the folk festival and concert route during the early and mid-sixties. Primarily, she began as a song-writer, only incidentally plucking a guitar and singing her tunes. In those days it was virtually impossible to get anyone to 'do' your songs. So you sang them yourself.

Curiously, it was the opposite of this formula that became the foundation for Joni's recognition. Married to American folksinger Chuck Mitchell and then divorced, she continued to ply her trade in the States while, almost without effort, other performers began to include Mitchell material in their programs. Among others, Tom Rush and Buffy Saint Marie recorded Joni's Circle Game, in 1967. Buffy's version, with its rockabilly background, became a hit and listeners began to wonder about the name behind the song. In 1968, Judy Collins' version of Both Sides Now sold a million copies, Joni was poised and ready for public acceptance as a performer in her own right.

And circumstances were in her favour. Buffy's manager, Elliot Roberts, was so taken with Joni's presence on stage that he left his management position to devote himself full time to her career. He signed her to Reprise Records in 1968 and then, when he joined with partner David Geffen, brought her to Geffen's fledgling label, Asylum.

Joni eventually settled in LA's fashionably rustic Topanga Canyon where, for many years, she shared the company of peers Crosby, Young, Nash, Browne and assorted Eagles. Most of the material for the series of albums that followed, though gathered through her travels, was formulated there.

DON JUAN is an all-studio double — but, at just under an hour, it runs only six minutes longer than 77's stunning HEJIRA single LP. DON JUAN is only one song bigger than HEJIRA's nine, but what a song: the seventeen minute autobiographical epic sprawled across Side Two, complete with full symphony orchestra, called Paprika Plains:

"I would tie on coloured feathers and I'd beat the drums like war…"

Joni sings, forecasting Side Three's Tenth World, the pop poetess's first instrumental track, a conga jam featuring ace Brazilian percussionist Airto Moriera.

There's much more: an all-rhythm (cowbells, congas, shakers, snare drum, sandpaper block) back-up on Dreamland, Joni's gem-like contribution to Roger McGuinn's 1976 CARDIFF ROSE LP. Mitchell's rendition evokes her '75 HISSING OF SUMMER LAWNS set, with its startling Jungle Line track courtesy of the Warrior Drums of Burundi.

Jericho on the other hand, is a straight studio re-make of the delicate tune which Joni debuted on her live MILES OF AISLES package, with Tom Scott's LA Express. Here, drummer, and sometime lover, John Guerin is the only Express holdover, cooking with the likes of Weather Report's Wayne Shorter on sax. Report veteran Jaco Pastorius, who shared bass duties with Max Bennet on HEJIRA, defines DON JUAN's moody sophistication with a haunting, single handed vibrato.

Around Elliot Robert's office, they're calling DON JUAN "Joni's best album in years. She's grown from the jazz proficiency of the Express to the sheer virtuosity of Weather Report." And, more to the point, "DJRD was the highest FM add-on the last week in December."

Three months and "lots of money" in the making, DON JUAN assumed many names — including "some really long, weird ones that nobody remembers" — before taking its title from "the song with the ankle bells."

According to a studio assistant, Mitchell decided, mid-session, that she really needed "ankle bells" for "tempo and atmosphere." Longtime engineer Henry Lewy put out a frantic call, with no luck. "Finally," the assistant laughs, "somebody came up with a dancer named Alejandro Acuna. They dimmed the lights, stuck her on a little stage, and ran the tapes. I think they got her from the Screen Actors Guild, actually. But she is a real Indian."

Real Indians — the North American kind — tend to recur ("They cut off their braids and lost some link with nature") throughout the lyric, as do Black Men, mostly pimps with dizzy, adoring White Broads. All three prototypes figure on the cover photograph — and all three are Miss Mitchell, in degrees of disguise. "Norman Seeff took a bunch of pictures," tut-tuts a friend, "and Joni happened to like these the best. So they cut 'em up, and stuck 'em on the sleeve." What the friend fails to mention is that, among her ten album covers — all designed by Mitchell, who once studied at Alberta College — DON JUAN may sport her most provocative image. Joni Goes Jolson: how could it miss?

It couldn't. Between her professional family of Roberts, Lewy, Steve Katz, David Geffin and what Billboard calls "her steady legion of fans," Joni carved a comfortable, serious and significant niche in the barracuda-heavy record biz. Her smoky, folky jazz will always make money for Mitchell and Asylum, even should DON JUAN take a tail spin in the year of You Light Up My Life. But what's she like to work with, this auteurist who hires orchestras, handles graphics, disdains the press and rarely performs? Is Joni a sublime Barbra Streisand?

"Believe it or not," the studio assistant swears, "she's always running around hugging and kissing everybody between takes. She's real affectionate, isn't temperamental because she surrounds herself with friends and pros. There's always David Crosby hanging out, and Henry Lewy getting skinny. Joni doesn't have to be 'demanding,' either, because she always knows exactly what she wants." Pause. "And she always gets it."

by Wesley Strick

March 2, 1978

Interview with Max Bennett

Max Bennett is perhaps the most recorded bass player in the world, having recorded every year for 63 years, and counting. His work with Joni Mitchell (1974-77) represents a small portion of his vast discography; he has, over the decades, worked with a broad range of artists ranging from Billie Holliday to Frank Zappa, Mel Tormé to The Monkees.

I contacted him to see if he would grant me an interview to talk about his work with Joni Mitchell and he graciously spoke for an hour about that phase of his life, a time he still holds dear.

DB: Hi Max, I really appreciate you taking the time to talk to me. I'm looking at your website, utterly blown away by your discography! You've got to be the most recorded bass player ever!

MB: (laughs) Well, I've been around awhile and got really lucky as a kid you know, and I've had a great career and I'm still playing. [note: Max turned 83 last birthday]

DB: Let's talk about your time with Joni, since talking about your overall career would take weeks! Your website says that Joni heard you at The Baked Potato one night and asked you to play on a couple of tracks for, I suppose, what would become Court and Spark.

MB: I wasn't yet familiar with Joni at all. You know I was buried in the studio, working day and night and we started the L.A Express and were playing at The Baked Potato. Tom had worked with her, I think on either For The Roses or Blue, one of those two acoustic albums [ed. For the Roses] - he played some soprano sax on it - so somebody mentioned to her to come and see the band, because she knew Tom, and she came in and loved the band and asked us if we'd like to play on a couple of songs on her next album. Well, of course we were recording musicians, so we said "sure, fine." So we went to A&M where she recorded, and there was me, Joe Sample, John Guerin and Tom Scott - it was a quartet at the time. It became a quintet when we added guitar player Larry Carlton.

So, we listened to the songs, and Joe looked at me and I looked at him, and we thought, "I'm not sure if this is going to work or not," because it was so different. The harmonic structures that she used - it was so unique. Help Me was the first tune we did. We did the whole Court and Spark album there, and after that she asked us if we'd like to go on the road.

DB: So, obviously you guys were all crack readers. Did she have charts?

MB: There wasn't anything to read! She played, we made sketches of what we needed - she pretty much had it set what she wanted to do on a lot of her things. Tom wrote some background stuff too for her; you know he was very good at that. I didn't have much to do with that. I just made up my own bass parts, and everyone else made up theirs and we just worked it out. That's the way it happened.

DB: So did you spend quite a bit of time in the studio or did these sessions go quickly?

MB: I don't remember exactly how much time we spent, but I'm sure it was several days. It went pretty smoothly, particularly after the first tune. And then, you know, it was one tune after the other. Of course we weren't involved with the mixdown. We were all so busy we kind of took it lightly at first, because we were just working day and night jumping from one date to another. At that time I was running between 20 and 25 dates a week - movies, TV, commercials and whatever studio musicians do.

DB: That was the golden age for studio musicians wasn't it?

MB: Yes, I was so lucky I got in just at the right time. I started really getting busy about 1960. I'd been working a lot before that too. I was with Ella Fitzgerald in '58 and then I went back and worked with Peggy Lee, but I got so busy I couldn't go out of town, so I didn't work with Peggy Lee anymore; from that point on I was busy day and night.

DB: So if you were that busy in the studio it was probably a difficult decision to go out on the road with Joni?

MB: It was. It was a difficult decision. The money (touring with Joni) was pretty good, actually, and we loved the music and wanted to play it. We kind of took a loss in income but we thought we'd just go out for a short period of time; so the first tour we did, we didn't stay out all that long. Then the second tour was a much longer tour, later in 1974. Then we were off for most of 1975, but we did do some short touring with the L.A Express and Joni came along and hung out with us too. The extensive tour was in 1976 but the end of that tour was canceled after we worked the University of Maryland, but I'll get to that later...

DB: I'd like to know more about how the sessions went. Did Joni record her parts first and then you add on or did you all play live or what?

MB: As far as the rhythm section we did all that live. She played guitar with the rhythm section but most of her final vocals were overdubbed. Once we did the basic tracks we were off and running to the next thing, so we weren't really involved with the final process.

DB: I wanted to ask about what part Henry Lewy played because not much is written about him and I guess he and Joni were kind of the production team even though there was nobody credited as the producer.

MB: He was her engineer, pretty much, as far as I remember. She did all the producing pretty much herself. What happened when we weren't there I have no idea but I'm sure Henry made suggestions and so on, but she knew pretty much what she wanted to do. All the overdubs and everything, she took her time and planned all that out. She was really good at producing herself, she really was.

DB: So that's rather remarkable that she had such studio savvy herself.

MB: I thought so. Of course she'd done many things acoustically before that and I think that probably gave her the experience in the studio, down the road, do exactly what she wanted to do. She was very sharp about all that. Even though she couldn't read a note, in every other respect there was nothing amateurish about her approach at all. She really didn't understand harmonic structures as far as talking about this or about that; she just played and we sketched out what we needed and made up our own parts as we went.

DB: That's so extraordinary. I can understand that she didn't quite have the formal vocabulary to convey what she was doing, but the records sound so beautifully made and crafted it's amazing you were kind of figuring it out as you went.

MB: Yeah, well we were used to that. First of all, I must say, we were all jazz musicians and most of her contacts previously had been with folk singer-type guys and CSNY, and that was her whole bunch to hang with. But when she asked us she immediately became involved with what I would consider dyed-in-the-wool jazz musicians - there wasn't anybody there who I would say had some real commercial background. Jazz musicians were the best musicians, pretty much, in the studios because they were more flexible. The rock and roll guys weren't good at jazz and certain other things, and the legit guys weren't good at either one of those two. But the jazz musicians were very adaptable...rock and roll, funk, whatever you want to call it. So we were fortunate in that sense, and we ended up doing the bulk of the work too [ed. the session work in L.A]

DB: I got the impression that the Funk Brothers did the same thing for Motown too. They were all from jazz backgrounds too.

MB: At that time in the studios there were so many rhythm section players and they were all busy too, but you hardly ever saw a date with less than three guitars on it. One guy to do the "chinks", one guy to do acoustic rhythm, and the other guy to play something else...

DB: Tell me a little bit about the touring years with Joni. You said you took a bit of a cut in pay to do that but was that a pleasurable time?

MB: We were making good money, if you stopped to think about what we did, we were doing very well, but we were doing so well in the studios that it didn't really compensate completely, plus the fact that we were out of town and missed a lot of dates, and so on. But the tours were wonderful. Everything was first class. We had limos everywhere, we had private planes and private buses and she treated us beautifully. Great places to stay, good food always, and wonderfully appreciative audiences... I remember one gig in particular, we were back east somewhere, and we would do our bit with the L.A Express, then there would be an intermission, then she would come on and do about five songs with the L.A Express, then we would get off the stage. She would do her acoustic set, and when she was doing that we had nothing to do so I used to walk into the back of the audience, as they were watching her, and you could hear a pin drop. People were so attentive. We had great, great, appreciative audiences; it was wonderful. As far as tours go - I've been on several tours - this was the epitome of any great tour I've ever been on. Everybody got along great, even the roadies... It was just great. Great tours.

DB: You can kind of tell that on the Miles of Aisles album that the audience was hanging on every word.

MB: Yeah. The Miles of Aisles album - all that was recorded at Universal. That's before they had the inside thing...we were outside, and they had heaters underneath the floor of the stage so we could stay warm! Wally Heider did those recordings. He recorded every night for I think a whole week, and then they picked the best out of that. The picture on the front is from Pine Knob, outside of Detroit.

DB: Let me ask you about A&M studios. Was that a studio you worked in all the time?

MB: Yes, I have no idea how many dates, in the hundreds for sure. They had several different studios: studio A was a big studio. As you walked in the door, on the left hand side was the studio we used quite a bit with Joni and she definitely used that studio for all the mixdowns. That might have been studio C I think. There was studio B on the right hand side and behind that there was a D studio. There were actually four studios at A&M -that studio used to belong to Charlie Chaplin.

DB: Did you like the sound they got there? I guess what I'm asking is, when you got the finished albums that you had played basic tracks on, were you pleased with the results?

MB: All the studios there were good. Two things make a good studio: good acoustics in the studio and good engineers, and the ease of playing, how everything is set up and so on. But I was always very comfortable at A&M. As a matter of fact, all the L.A Express albums were done there except for the very last album which was done up in the mountains above Denver.

DB: Specifically, did you run direct or mic your bass cabinet for your bass parts back then?

MB: If I remember correctly, they started with the mics but were able to get a little more sophisticated as we went along. I remember when 8-track came in it was a big deal. Then all of a sudden it was 16 track, then 24, then 32. Once they had more tracks they would mic the amp and run a direct signal and use a combination of the two.

DB: Did Joni arrange her own background vocals?

MB: Yes, yes, all overdubs. Once we did the basic tracks we were off the scene but she did sing with us at that time [ed. during basic tracks recording] but I imagine those vocal tracks were just tracks so we could hear what was going on 'cause hearing her voice made a big difference in what we would play, at least from my point of view. I'm sure it was everybody else's too. You know, listening to her sing is an inspiration because you want to fit whatever you're doing into what she's doing. Particularly when there's a vocal I do not like the idea of making tracks first, unless it's some commercial thing where it's already cut and dried. That's obvious, but for something creative like that, I want to hear the vocal at the same time, even if they don't keep it; generally speaking they'll take it off and put a different vocal on depending on how good it was to start with.

DB: Once Joni and John Guerin were together as a couple did that change the dynamic of working together as a band?

MB: Not really. Of course they were living together - I guess that's common knowledge, I don't know. It didn't change anything as far as the tours were concerned, or the music. They were very tight but she was very good about including the guys who were doing all the work with her. It was more of a personal relationship as opposed to a business relationship.

DB: Going back to recording with her vocal in your headphones were you paying attention to the lyrics or getting ideas from the lyric content?

MB: I don't know if I'd have been specifically aware of that but I'm sure it played a part, because, you know, we would run the tunes down and everything and develop what we wanted to do within the music, and of course we did make up our own stuff because nothing was written. Naturally we'd make some notations on our own charts so we had a format to follow etc etc. But when you finally get that together plus the vocalist everything sort of complements the other thing in a way.

DB: But Joni as a lyricist was supreme and she paints these wonderful pictures with her lyrics and I was wondering how much that inspired the performances?

MB: It's hard to say but I'm sure it did, even in a subconscious way. Because she would always sing on the basic tracks and I always appreciate hearing the vocalist when we're doing the tracks, especially in the situation with her, as it's far more a creative process than it would be if it was just a commercial recording you were doing.

DB: Was there ever a song of hers that you heard and didn't particularly care for?

MB: Not really. I think all of the things that she did, when I was involved, I really liked. I can't think of anything she did where I thought "oh, don't do that." Her later things, some of the tunes I wasn't that in love with, but that doesn't really mean anything...that's just personal preference.

DB: Are you talking about her 80's and 90's projects?

MB: Yeah, some of the projects didn't appeal to me as much, you know, just personal taste. It's interesting you know, because that was such a great time; everything was so spontaneous, and that with the crowd reaction, the whole thing together was so good, and so right, and so musical that it's difficult to compare what I heard later in her approaches. But that's the way she was. I would assume that probably for anybody that does that there's little things along the way that aren't as great as maybe something before or something that's going to happen afterwards, but she was great on experimentation, and I give her kudos for that.

DB: She probably wanted to feel like she was not an anachronism and wanted to stay current.

MB: Not too long ago, a couple of years ago, my wife and I had dinner with her and went back to her house and spent quite some time listening to a ballet, a brand new ballet that was using all her music. So, she was always interested in doing something different, which is great. For a talent like that, I think it's a given.

DB: It's fascinating to us devotees to see how her painting and her music are kind of intertwined. She wrote music and lyrics that had a very painterly quality and I don't know how the music infused the painting but it always seemed like they were intertwined to me.

MB: Yeah. Great lyricist. I mean, if you just take the time to listen to her lyrics there's really a great message there.

DB: Herbie Hancock said recently something like 'I'm a jazz man and I've worked with some of the great singers, but I never paid any attention to the lyrics until I worked with Joni Mitchell and I realized I'd missed out on this whole world.'

MB: I discussed that with her quite a bit and she mentioned that when they were recording that she pointed out a few things to him - shall we say, they were subtle, polite corrections in his playing, as opposed to what he was doing behind her. She mentioned that to me - it was kind of a laugh, in a way. He's a great musician, but the reason I get that is that when I first started as a jazz musician I didn't pay much attention to the lyrics either. I grew up in the swing era and the bebop era - that's what I got into. And my first influences were Duke Ellington, followed by Nat Cole. Then I got into the big band things although I still like Duke's band far more. Woody Herman's band I loved. Tommy Dorsey had a great band, but too commercial for my ears. But then down the road as I started playing with more vocalists - I didn't do that until later... Peggy Lee was the first person I worked with where I really started paying attention to the vocals and saw how they affect the music; she, by the way, was great to work for; very intellectual and very particular. She did a lot of commercial things but there was a special way that she did everything. And of course I got to work with Ella Fitzgerald, and I also got to work with Lady Day too, [ed. Billie Holliday's nickname] and Barbra Streisand...but that's another story! So I know where he's coming from there.

[ed. The subject of Herbie's Grammy winning album River: the Joni Letters did come up, and Max does not have a favorable opinion of it. Here's what he himself posted on Amazon.com about it:

The most boring album of the year!, April 9, 2008
I'm a professional musician. Along with Tom Scott, I started the group L.A Express in the 70's and performed on Joni Mitchell's albums, Court & Spark, Miles of Aisles, etc. This CD, which won the Grammy album of the year, is not worth buying. The musical wanderings of Herbie and the almost unrecognizable songs of Joni's are an exercise in musical futility. Herbie needs a tinkle-ectomy and most of the vocalists are totally underwhelming. Obviously, this was a politically motivated choice by NARAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Max Bennett, bassist and composer.]

DB: You keep referring to commercialism, and it seems like the artists you most enjoyed working with had a kind of un-commercial streak to them, if that's fair to say, and yet the L.A Express was kind of 'instrumental' in making jazz more commercially mainstream again.

MB: I don't get that.

DB: Well, you were introducing funk and more of a contemporary groove to jazz, which had maybe lost some of its audience in the 60's.

MB: Possible, yeah. I think what happened is Bebop kind of wore itself down. Although I must tell you, I'm not a purist. I'm for anything that contributes to the overall situation. For instance I got a lot of static from good jazz musicians 'Oh, you sold out' because I started playing electric bass. "What do you mean, 'I sold out?'" If the music is good, there's very little difference in real contemporary (jazz) ...I'm not talking about this Cool Whip crap! This smooth jazz - rule that out totally. To me it's mundane, starts nowhere, goes nowhere, singsongy, repetitive crap. There's no intrinsic value to it whatsoever. But it doesn't make any difference if the rhythm section happens to be electronic if the songs are good, they have substance and the soloists are great and play really good solos. That's all you need. This whole thing about 'well, you've got to be a purist.' String bass, acoustic piano...that's great, but I did that for fifty years. But let's move on here, okay? I guess some people thought because we didn't use acoustic instruments and all that, the L.A Express when I started it - because it was my concept... Tom Scott had this Bebop quartet signed with A&M and they dropped his contract because he wasn't selling any records.

I'd worked with Tom in the studios. I got a call from him to come down to the Lighthouse and play on a Sunday afternoon, and I said "great." It was Tom, Joe Sample, and I can't remember who the drummer was - I think it was Ed Greene, who was a studio guy - and I said "is it okay if I play Fender?" and he said "sure" because he had been using a really great bass player called Chuck Domanico on string bass. [ed. Chuck plays upright bass on Blue Motel Room] Chuck never took to electric bass. So I went down and I took one tune, the very first instrumental I ever wrote, called "TCB in E," and we started playing, and something just clicked. It was just different. And Tom was kind of excited, and said "can you come back next Sunday?" So I went back the next Sunday and he brought a couple of tunes, and we revised his tunes to fit the format that I had started. So we did that for two or three weeks. The next thing you know, John Guerin had come back off the road with Roger McGuinn, and we started doing Tuesday nights at The Baked Potato. That started it - we had a quartet. By the time we'd played three or four Tuesday nights there the place was totally packed, because of the concept of the band. But I kept telling Tom we needed a guitar player so I could write the double line, the tenor and the guitar together. He wasn't sure - it would destroy the space dadadada...he didn't know if Joe Sample would like it. I said, "I play with The Crusaders and they've got Larry Carlton, and that seems to work out okay." So finally we hired a guitar player whose name I won't mention - he was okay but he just wasn't right. Larry Carlton walked in one night and that was it! And that's what became The L.A Express. But we didn't have a name yet. One night I had to go to work with Lalo Schifrin downtown at The Dorothy Chandler. And I was talking to Louis Shelton, guitar player, and I said "Louis, we've got this great quartet and it's got this really strong feel, like an express train" and he said "how about The L.A Express?" and I said "yes!" So I went to the payphone and called Tom Scott and said, "I got the name for the band... L.A Express." So it became, because of Tom, Tom Scott and The L.A Express.

DB: So Larry Carlton was a monster from the start!

MB: Yes, he was great and fit the band beautifully. It's a very subtle thing with guitar in a rhythm section like that; you have to learn what not to play, cause it's so easy to start playing a bunch of rhythm and it gets in the way, and that's what the first guitar player did. The concept of L.A Express I would say was rock-ish, latin-ish, blues-ish jazz. It had all those elements, exactly like the band I have now. (Private Reserve)

Another thing is, I played all the great standard tunes for so many years that I wanted to write some tunes. So, this 'you sold out' thing is crap. They're just jealous because nobody wants to sit down and listen to a guy play fifteen choruses! If they want to keep doing the same thing they've been doing all their life, fine, but for me, I like to move on now and then! And I got lucky with that concept.

DB: Steering back towards Joni... you played on several Joni albums that have proven to be some of the finest albums of the last forty years: did they seem that special when you were cutting them?

MB: Work was work, but it did seem like extra fun, it really did. We were pretty serious about the whole thing and just tried to do our very best. I don't remember being totally ecstatic about any particular thing but it was just a great pleasure to work with her. I loved her songs - it was a totally new concept - none of us had been involved with anything like that. With all due respect, we weren't very much into what was known as 'folk singing,' but she was above and beyond that. She used to tell me guys used to tell her "that's not the way you tune a guitar!" "Well, that's the way I do it," she told them - it was totally unique. I asked Robben Ford "how is she doing that?" and he said "I have NO idea what she's doing!"

DB: So, if Larry was the original L.A Express guitarist by the time Joni discovered you guys, where does Robben come into the picture?

MB: Larry decided he didn't want to go on the road, and he was working with The Crusaders. We were both working with The Crusaders at the same time... I don't remember who knew of Robben or who contacted him first. He was only twenty when he joined the group.

DB: You worked on the Joni albums through Hejira. Then I guess Jaco came along and she started using him. Were you friends with Jaco or what was your impression of him?

MB: You mean as a person or as a player?

DB: Well obviously he sort of took the world by storm as a player, but did you like what he was doing and did you know him as a person?

MB: I knew him a little bit as a person. The very last tour we did with L.A Express was what I call 'the circuit.' - L.A, San Francisco, Portland, Seattle and Vancouver. So we went up the coast with us opening for Herbie Hancock. I don't know who was playing bass with him at that time but all of a sudden he got up one day and said "I can't do it anymore, I gotta go home." So in an emergency they called Jaco, and he came on the road. So I got spend two or three days with him, and I loved what he did. He's a marvelous, marvelous player, and a complete.....what's the word... he was really off his rocker! He had some serious mental problems. He had to take certain medication all the time just to stay even, and lots of times he went off his medication. He drank a lot, I remember. But, I liked him as a person and I LOVED his playing.

DB: So, I guess on Hejira, Joni met him and brought him in after she'd completed the album already. This might be a touchy question but did he replace any of your parts?

MB: Not that I know of. But I haven't listened to that album in a while, so in fairness I couldn't really answer that question. I'd have to really listen to it. I'm sure I could tell the difference, cause he had a different sound than I did. I did use a couple of different sounds on that album.

DB: Well, we've covered a lot of ground and it's been really fascinating, Max. Do you keep in touch with Joni to this day?

MB: It's been a couple of years, and she's changed her telephone number. But we've always been friends, and like I say we went to dinner and she invited us back to the house to listen to the ballet thing. She's a great gal, she really is. I have the original watercolor she did of I'm a Radio, that she gave me for my birthday. And also, for the last L.A Express album we did, Shadowplay, she did the cover art. And then she made that into a print on cloth. And I rolled it up and put it away. Now thirty years later I found it and just had it put in a frame. It just looks great; she's a great talent, a wonderful artist.

DB: One more question, not Joni related... could you talk a little about your experience recording with Frank Zappa; in particular the Hot Rats album from 1969?

MB: Yeah, I had an evening off, I think it was a Tuesday evening, and I got a call from John Guerin and he asked if I was working that night and I said "no, I was going to stay home." He said "I've got a double session for you," [ed. a 'session' is a three hour block defined by the Musician's Union, and pay is per 'session,' not per hour.] I didn't know Frank but I'd heard about his music of course, so I called the cartage company and they delivered my stuff [ed. studio musicians were so busy they had their equipment delivered and set up by cartage companies so the player could walk in the door and be ready to record in minutes, often at several studios per day.] I got there and we proceeded to do the Hot Rats album. That was interesting because, there again, we just made it up. Frank would have a skeleton idea of what he wanted to do and we just put it together. It was kind of like the stuff we did with Joni, although he wasn't quite as specific as she was on what she was doing. We did a lot of tracks and a lot that would run 10-15 minutes. As a matter of fact, after I moved down here, I realized that he had cut those up and re-arranged them, and overdubbed different things; so, as it turned out, I ended up on five different albums of his! I know we did at least three nights of double sessions. And then I played some shows with him in L.A and San Diego. He was a great guy. I liked the first music we did with Hot Rats because it was more jazz type, you might say, where everybody was using their own input to make this thing happen. From what I understand, that album got the best reviews of any album he did. I got a call from Frank about a month or so after we did the album and he wanted to know if I could work with him, and I told him I didn't think I could because I was too busy working in the studios. And he said, well let me send you the album, and I'll call you back in a couple of weeks, so he sent it to me and I thought, wow, this looks like a lot of fun! So I started doing a few jobs in L.A with him and we started rehearsing at night, but I had to quit because I was just working too much. The band I played with was Ian Underwood, Sugarcane Harris, I can't remember who played drums at first. [ed. Wikipedia lists John Guerin as the other drummer.] Later on, Aynsley Dunbar joined us. And of course there was Frank himself. I know we worked the Olympic and several other places including some out of town jobs.

Frank was a real taskmaster. And then the rehearsals when we started involved a lot of reading and the music had a lot of super duper ethereal kinds of things and it's not my trip. I don't really enjoy that that much. I appreciate atonal music but it's not really my cup of tea. I wasn't all that comfortable doing it and I realized I didn't have the time either so I told him "Frank, I love the band but I can't do it anymore; I'm just too busy." I was playing till 1 o'clock in the morning in the studios and rehearsing from 1.30 to 4am and then having to get up and make an 8 o'clock call at Universal. I couldn't do it!

DB: Speaking of rehearsing , did you rehearse with Joni much, especially before tours?

MB: Yes, we did. We usually spent two weeks before the tour rehearsing. It was interesting because the music was so elusive harmonically that if we were away from it for more than two weeks we usually had to run it again in rehearsal because it was so unique that we really needed to bone up on it again, just to make sure we had all our ducks in a row, you know. A friend of mine who builds basses wanted to do an interview with me recently and he wanted me to sit down and play with the album along to Help Me, and I had to get the album out and run through it; if you held a gun to my head I couldn't play it just from memory!

DB: I don't suppose you have any of those scratch charts that you did stuffed in a drawer somewhere? Those would fetch some money on Ebay!

MB: No, I don't. We probably pitched them. I guess I don't think very commercially like that! The same thing happened with the name "L.A Express." Since I had come up with it I went out and had the name copyrighted. But after a few years it was going to cost me a thousand dollars to renew it, and I thought, we don't have the band, so why don't I just drop it? Well, guess what? It wasn't more than a month after that the football team picked it up. If I had still owned that name and they wanted to buy it I could have made some money for myself! Coulda, woulda, shoulda!

DB: Regarding the keyboardists on the Joni tours. If Joe Sample was the keyboardist in L.A Express how come he didn't tour with you guys?

MB: When we went on the road with Joni, Joe said he couldn't go because he was one of the original members of The Crusaders and couldn't leave town.

DB: I want to thank you so much Max for taking the time to talk to me. This has been so fascinating to learn about that time from someone who was right there.

MB: Well, I'm glad to do it. I hope you don't feel I was overstepping my bounds talking about the jazz thing, but I'm really sick and tired of purist guys telling me I was selling out. I did all that, playing string bass for many many years and loved it. But I got tired of just playing standards, and that's why I started to write. How many times can you play How High The Moon before you get really sick of it?!



by Dave Blackburn