Long Ago and Far Away; A Tale of Hair and Art
A very long time ago I was in high school at a catholic academy. I had transferred there from another catholic school for senior year. My graduating class was a group of 30 absolutely pathetic dimwits, charlatans and vanity/hubris-laden dolts for the most part, but the junior class was stacked with interesting people, most notably the two Jennifers. Both bore the initials of JK, both were very bright, very good natured and interesting. One had a sister, Liz, who was singing in a local band called VOS (and who was a case of a very big voice in a little body)*. I ended up doing some preliminary sketches for a possible promo poster for VOS, but that never really took off.
VOS had also a firecracker guitarist barely larger than her Satch model Ibanez, and staggeringly attractive in a late Daisy-dukes-and-biker-boots-with-guitar-and-80s-big-curly-hair way. I ended up working for another band, Sandbox, of which the guitarist would eventually marry the other JK, and would eventually also sport Liz as the vocalist, replete with name change to Drivin Like Buddha. Both incarnations were big-fame worthy, and I never understood fully why some A&R monkey didn't jump at the chance to sign them.
They made one indie release of their own and dissolved.**
Liz was at the time, dating a Joe Satriani protege/student, Jeff Tyson. Jeff was a staggeringly good player, who had a whole Satch and Nugent listening to Holdsworth and channelling Ian Crichton thing going on, with his band T-Ride. As hair-metal bands go, they were superior in almost every way. They could write real songs, had multi-part harmonies that worked, technically proficient without constantly wanking notes everywhere, and knew how to exploit the burgeoning tech of the day to great effect.
They made one album and disappeared, I thought forever.
The only person who up until very recently I even knew had made a post TR career was drummer/programmer Eric Valentine, who had made quite a name for himself producing bands of various levels of quality: Smashmouth (really, really bad) to The Dwarves (not so much).
Well, recently I had been listening to my old cassette of T-Ride (replete with autograph from Mr. Tyson) and wondring what on earth happened to these folks. Well, you can't say no to the in-tar-web.
Jeff Tyson is now Geoff Tyson, and recording his own material as well as in a band called Stimulator, that recently opened up for Duran Duran, and who sounds petty good. Retro 80s trashy electro-pop. Very catchy and from the video footage, looks like a decent live act.
Liz Kok now does fashion. Good for her, but I hope she has not totally given up on singing. She shows up in some other spots, like on a demo by Paul Cordero.
Long ago and far away indeed.
* To this day I am not sure exactly what VOS stood for. I was under the impression it was Voices of Saturn, but there were always anecdotes about other possibles: Vibrators On Steroids, Very Obnoxious Sirens, etc. Liz had a great set of pipes and was an above par frontperson.
** there is a lot more hostory to the Sandox/DLB saga, and a lot of it is really interesting -- but not for here on this post.
VOS had also a firecracker guitarist barely larger than her Satch model Ibanez, and staggeringly attractive in a late Daisy-dukes-and-biker-boots-with-guitar-and-80s-big-curly-hair way. I ended up working for another band, Sandbox, of which the guitarist would eventually marry the other JK, and would eventually also sport Liz as the vocalist, replete with name change to Drivin Like Buddha. Both incarnations were big-fame worthy, and I never understood fully why some A&R monkey didn't jump at the chance to sign them.
They made one indie release of their own and dissolved.**
Liz was at the time, dating a Joe Satriani protege/student, Jeff Tyson. Jeff was a staggeringly good player, who had a whole Satch and Nugent listening to Holdsworth and channelling Ian Crichton thing going on, with his band T-Ride. As hair-metal bands go, they were superior in almost every way. They could write real songs, had multi-part harmonies that worked, technically proficient without constantly wanking notes everywhere, and knew how to exploit the burgeoning tech of the day to great effect.
They made one album and disappeared, I thought forever.
The only person who up until very recently I even knew had made a post TR career was drummer/programmer Eric Valentine, who had made quite a name for himself producing bands of various levels of quality: Smashmouth (really, really bad) to The Dwarves (not so much).
Well, recently I had been listening to my old cassette of T-Ride (replete with autograph from Mr. Tyson) and wondring what on earth happened to these folks. Well, you can't say no to the in-tar-web.
Jeff Tyson is now Geoff Tyson, and recording his own material as well as in a band called Stimulator, that recently opened up for Duran Duran, and who sounds petty good. Retro 80s trashy electro-pop. Very catchy and from the video footage, looks like a decent live act.
Liz Kok now does fashion. Good for her, but I hope she has not totally given up on singing. She shows up in some other spots, like on a demo by Paul Cordero.
Long ago and far away indeed.
* To this day I am not sure exactly what VOS stood for. I was under the impression it was Voices of Saturn, but there were always anecdotes about other possibles: Vibrators On Steroids, Very Obnoxious Sirens, etc. Liz had a great set of pipes and was an above par frontperson.
** there is a lot more hostory to the Sandox/DLB saga, and a lot of it is really interesting -- but not for here on this post.
posted by theloniusfunk at 2:35 AM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home