Yah, it's been a wild ride for sure. Rags to riches and everything in between, several times. Lots of miles and lots of music.
A fair bit of drama over the years along with plenty of hilarity.
Many unforgettable characters & moments.
My first guitar was mail ordered from the Montgomery Wards catalog. Loved it from the start. When I was ten Dad helped me build my first amp.
My journey in recording began with a pair of cassette recorders, bouncing tracks between 'em in the family dining room.
Was given a Minimoog as a graduation present in '75 and bought a four-track reel to reel shortly after.
Soon got deeply into electronic music & experimental recording; was already familiar with splice editing from studying film.
Did a handful of projects in university audio labs, helping friends get what they wanted from the big modular synths..
This sorta led to a side hustle as a synth programmer when synths got smaller & cheaper and became ubiquitous.
I wound up choosing to play rather than pursuing the tech side, though.
It's my true love, and where my meager talents lie closest to the surface.
But I was perfectly poised for the 80s synth-pop boom when it hit.
Have spanned a broad spectrum of genres over the decades.
(Wrote a partial list but deleted it 'cause I figured it'd be too long & boring for in a post.)
Excluding ethnic music, I've played nearly everything I can think of aside from bluegrass, orchestral, and death metal.
Even did sound design for a rock musical once.
Achieved some measure of success (and excess!) as lead guitarist of an 80s pop band. Beautiful-people parties, day trips to the islands, abundant debauchery. Married a model. Bought a house; opened my first commercial studio in the basement. Got clean, had a son and moved to a bigger home farther from the city. Finally leased a large space and built a real studio, great soundroom with a tunable damping system. Opened just in time for the crash of '87. Got divorced; she got the house but I kept the studio. By then I was in a group whose singer had been in a big punk band back in the 70s and knew everybody. Man, did he have some stories - made my wildest ones seem pedestrian.
For now I'm still walking around. Thanks for the well wishes.
