Texas Friends

Here are some bandmates and whoever else I may have found while going through pictures.  I didn't take enough of them, in retrospect.

The bass player in the middle of the picture to the right is my friend Pete Kerezman, formerly of NYC and now musician and proprietor of the Kingsville Bicycle Clinic in Kingsville, Texas since 1973 (right downtown, you can't miss it).  Pete sent me this photo and I'm not sure who the rest of the musicians are, but it looks like they do some serious South Texas cojunto music judging by the squeezebox.  Pete's favorite bass player is Victor Wooten, who plays with Bela Fleck and the Flecktones, one of our favorite bands.

To the left is The Broxton Band, the last full time night club band I played with before going into engineering.  That's me on the left, next to Mike and his new puppy, and the Pharis brothers, Tom & Larry, who owned the hottest club in The Valley located in McAllen Texas in the mid-80s.  Mike, Tom, and Larry were fantastic players and the playlist was terrific, just the kind of rock I was listening to at the time.  I thoroughly enjoyed working with these guys.... it was a LOT of work to learn their playlist but it was time well spent and a labor of love.  I was going to school full time trying to finish up and get on with it... this band came along and I felt very fortunate to find a gig like this to call my "music retirement" gig.  Halloween 1987... what a hoot that was! I think we had about 30 people working 6 or more hours to decorate the room.  I have a lot more pictures of Broxton's but I'll just put them away for future cadging.

To the right is Robert Joe Dickens, my neighbor and songwriting partner for 5 years when I lived in Carrizo Springs, TX.  Robert Joe is an uninhibited ideas man, which is probably the most important talent you can bring to songwriting.  We spent hundreds or maybe thousands of hours writing and recording, and it was a blast!  I've never met anyone with more raw determination to make a mark in the music business, and I hope someday Robert Joe realizes his dream.  He is a prolific writer and his songs are chock full of good ideas.  It was great working with him, I learned a lot about life in South Texas.

More to come...