DRUMMER: Farm Boys, Secret Goldfish
A a kid, my friends and I would ride our bikes down and see the b lovers if they were playing an all ages show. It was thrilling.
Once I went into Record Service and said to Nick, ‘We’re the Farm Boys and we want to warm you up.’ Apparently I was the third guy from the Farm Boys that had been in that day. Nick was doing a crossword and I can see it now like it was yesterday. He looks up and says, ‘Oh yeah, okay, thanks man.’
He wasn’t mean, but he didn’t have any follow up questions either. He was always polite, but a little bit on another plane.
He didn’t suffer fools. I never felt like he needed validation. You know, lots of musicians would be a SPONGE for any passing compliment but he never needed that, he always wanted to just do the thing, and maybe, you know, maybe that’s why he never made that jump to the next level, cause he was never about that. I mean, he was as close as you get to being a true artist.
Nick and I did the Secret Goldfish thing and I was playing drums, but I didn’t really get it so Nick had to dumb it down for us. You know, Lars was formidable, but I was terrible, I mean, how did Nick feel playing with me on drums vs somebody like Brian Reedy or Jeff Evans? Like playing basketball with a giant turtle or something! What am I DOING??
Sitting there while he was creating, even just tuning his instrument was like watching someone in his element, you know? He’s a guitar player. Watching Water Between Continents, seeing he and Brian play off of each other—that’s like seeing Television at CBGB’s. Unbelievable.
Adam, sort of a low key dude great guitar player …always putting it in the context of a pop song… but with WBC, you know holy smokes, the you start doing it with that daring you know, without a net stuff…
I remember when Soul Light Season came out. HOLY HELL, just holding it in my hands. I was happy to hold the Vertebrats record in my hands and my friends were in the Combo Audio video and we’d only heard about the Elvis Brothers, but these guys (Turning Curious) were right out of our family! We expected them to be swept up immediately and become stars. I mean everybody who bought that record loved those guys.
I remember once when my band opened for Nick and I was trying to impress him and said something like, ‘Don Dixon really ripped you off with Grasshopper, that’s the same as Three Sisters and Nick just smiled and said, ‘which is the same as Joe Jackson’s Is She Really Goin Out With Him…soooooo…I’m not really sweatin’ it!’
When I really came to appreciate Nick’s voice was when he was in Weird Summer, when he was complimenting somebody else’s voice — that’s a really versatile voice. When you sing solo it’s undeniably you, but when you can also back up someone who has a beautiful voice like Bob Kimball, and it sounds…you know, fantastic. Nick had a natural timbre in his voice, just vulnerable enough to make it really stand out.
When Nick was playing those songs —his physical stature delivered with authority…his physical presence never betrayed any nerves. He was always able to show his true self when the lights came up.
I was really spoiled with the talent I came up with. We had some of the best.
At the Ten Shitty Guys House gig we played Velvet Underground songs all night as The Velour Underwear: Lou Rudd, Sterling Gustafson, and Don Cale. It was so much fun, part of my education really educational too because Nick has studied those VU records. He knew them and he taught them to us. On the one hand it was just a lark, a kegger and an excuse to have a good time, but he took the time. That was Nick—music educator and generous.