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THE PREFACE

The great thing about looking back at your own little history is that it provides you an opportunity to assign significance and/or relevance to all those disjointed events, relationships, and circumstances of the past, and make sense of them all through a mature, insightful, retrospective view. The bad thing about looking back is that, depending upon how far back you're looking, you've probably forgotten all the names and faces and circumstances that made the events so important (or unimportant) at their particular moment in time. Through my own biases and personal perspectives, my recollection of the history of Tacoma goes something like this [probably far from factual]....

IN THE BEGINNING

It was a cold and rainy night....not really. I don't remember where or when (probably 1970), but I recall receiving a phone call from Lonnie Napier. I had become acquainted with Lonnie when he was the guitar player in a band called Dragon a year or so earlier. Lonnie, Charlie Peaks (Mexican drummer, gone Buddhist, turned security guard, eventually killed-on-the-job), and I had been Dragon in the late 1960s (probably 1969). [We weren't a great band - its possible we weren't even a good band - but we had fun playing and we made a little money. We also bought some really cool Acoustic amplifiers for which I ended up paying....but that's a different story.] Lonnie knew I was a struggling song writer (struggling to write a good song, that is) and a good keyboard player (good in a local sense - there weren't many keyboard players in the South Bay area of San Diego). Growing up in Chula Vista, he also knew a band, The Generations, a group of guys that had won every battle-of-the-bands in which I had ever battled. [Oh, we hated those guys!] With his newly-earned degree from radio-school, Lonnie had landed a position at XERB, a station in Los Angeles (and the home of Wolfman Jack), and had available to him the newly built/remodeled/refurbished XERB recording studio. Zowie! Lonnie's scheme was to unite me (song writer and keyboard player) with the newly-three-pieced Generations (good players and great singers: Wayne Newitt, Greg Youtsey, and Doug Latislaw) for a recording "experiment." [Conjures up an image of Franken-band, doesn't it?] Lonnie arranged a meeting at the little Bonita Recording Studio of Dwight Squibb [unfortunately unrelated to the pharmaceutical mogul], a large, heavy-set, cheerful, school teacher who had been, at one time or another, an active member (if not the sole member) of the "management team" for bands in which each and every one of us had been (at one time or another). I suspect that, at the time, I was in a band (in its waning days) with my brother, Emmett, and Charlie Peaks - another three piece - this one called Trilogy (from the Hobbit/Lord of the Rings, of course).

It is likely that Emmett drove me and my little Hammond L-111 to the Bonita Studio [I didn't get a driver's licence until I was about 25]. I taught the guys two tunes - "Street Corner" and "Closed Doors" (not "Behind"). They taught me "Southern Man" and "Aimless Lady." It was fun, and I immediately liked these guys [although I suspect I did not admit this to anyone because they were our arch-enemies, even though they had no clue of this].

Sometime later we all made the trip to L.A. and "laid down some tracks" in the XERB recording studio. I think we recorded "Mother's Child," "You Girl," "Street Corner," and "Closed Doors" (someone - Wayne - probably still has a copy of the tape). I remember being very impressed by the studio; it was pretty plush and had an impressive control board; one wall was adorned with a huge, heavy red curtain (if I remember correctly). The session went fine, and I think we probably all felt pretty good about ourselves and the resulting tape. Soon thereafter Lonnie introduced us to a producer wanna-be, Joe Harrelson, and our recording careers were launch (see The Joe Harrelson Experience below).

At the time (1970), I believe Wayne, Doug, Emmett, and I all were students at Southwestern College; Greg was a student at Grossmont College. In the early 1970s there was still a remnant of that desire for unsuppressed artistic expression - left-over from the 1960s, I suppose - and Southwestern College (probably the Art Department) sponsored several events at which we all jammed (= expressed our artisan-ship). [I remember at least one out-of-doors and one in the cafeteria.] I'm sure I still drug around my very cool Rhodes key bass even though Greg was playing bass. [Two basses? I obviously had no taste.]

Soon thereafter (still 1970?), the Generations asked me to join their band. It was too good to be true - four really good players (for the time), two really good singers, two struggling song writers (including my brother, although he was not in the band), and all the idealism and enthusiasm for which one could hope. We had all the ingredients of a really great band. [Poody recalls trying to convince her brother, Doug, and boyfriend, Greg, not to add the new member (me) - to paraphrase "the band sounds great as a three piece, and you'll make less money if there are four of you." Lucky for me she was only 15 and her opinion was overridden by a house majority - there's my Washington influence.]

The Generations were four pieces again, but we were not to stay the Generations for long. I don't recall clearly when we changed our name, but it certainly had something to do with the fact that Greg had just bought a new set of Tacoma wheels for his van. The Native American craze left-over from the 1960s was still prevalent in popular culture, and Indian names were somewhat in vogue (remember Rick Randall's group "Blackfoot"?). "Tacoma" seemed to fit this genre.

Although it appeared in many different iterations, Tacoma lasted from about 1970 to 1981, when Greg and Keith Segal (the fourth and final drummer) opted to replace Emmett and me with Dave (alias "Omar," a guitarist from Apex Music) [or was it Mike Thomas? I'm so confused] and a keyboard player whose name I cannot remember. During those 11 years we played military bases (tons of them - we were probably a line-item in the nation's budget), wedding receptions, and high school dances, proms, and after-proms (early 1970s); teen clubs (remember Journey in Kearny Mesa?); restaurants (Iron Horse, Jamaica Joe's) and bars (Ledbetters and Bump City in the olden days, Park Place and others later); and opened for Dan Hicks at an outdoor festival (1973). Members came and went (mostly drummers), and there were far more good times than bad. During that time, most of us got married, had kids, got divorced, and grew up in so many ways.

THE JOE HARRELSON EXPERIENCE

Soon after the recording experiment with Lonnie Napier (1970-1971?), we were introduced to Joe Harrelson, a former musician (trumpet player?) and producer wanna-be from the San Fernando Valley. He had a very normal wife (who was very skeptical about all this music stuff) and a very goofy young son. Joe had the greatest of intentions; he was going to ride our coat-tails to success or drive us there - whatever it took. He had never taken a band from obscurity to stardom, and I suspect that he was going about this process in a trial-and-error fashion. Joe knew a really good tune when he heard one because it made birds fly out his ass (something similar to really good sex, I think) - an extraordinary gift. Under Joe's guidance we accumulated much studio experience, and we were exposed to professionals in the industry that potentially could help us on our road to rock stardom. My memory isn't clear regarding the starting and ending dates, but I believe this era lasted from about 1971 to about 1975.

Early on (ca. 1972), Joe realized that it was going to take money to keep our careers headed in the right direction - studio time did not come cheap and Harrelson didn't have a lot of dough. In addition to Tacoma, Joe had a country singer (don't recall his name) and a family group (the Whitneys). Joe came to San Diego and gave a pitch to our folks - a plea for money. Although they did not have much faith in Joe, my folks did have faith in the band - they forked over $5,000 to get us studio time, etc. Joe was supposed to pay me back, making payments on a monthly basis (we even ginned-up a little contract). He never had the money, and he was always just a couple months away from something big.

Our first recording session with Harrelson (1970-1971?) was in a studio concealed in a broken-down warehouse in Watts. (I remember boxes of R'n'B and soul albums stacked all over the place.) Another time we were in the country (if you can find "the country" in L.A.) in a studio built by the Robbs, a marginally successful group in the late 1960s. Once we found ourselves barging-in at the end of someone's mixing session - I remember this occasion vividly. There was this skinny, faggy, white guy all crumpled up on a speaker in the control booth listening to the playback. He slowly got down, walked over to us, stuck out a limp half-hand, and said "Boz." I thought to myself "Who in the hell is this loser, and what did he just say?" Later I was to realize that it was Boz Skaggs who Emmett and I had seen at the Winterland Auditorium in San Francisco a few years earlier (1968?): one set as the lead guitarist for Chuck Berry and the following set as the lead guitarist for the Steve Miller Blues Band. At one studio we were swapping time with Ambrosia (of "I Keep Holding On To Yesterday" fame). A year later they were sky-rocketing up the charts with "That's How much I Feel" and "You're the Only Woman." Meanwhile, we were still struggling.

Somewhere along the way, Harrelson realized that we were a good band without a hit song (no birds, I guess). Wayne, Emmett, and I were all writing, but to no avail. This was particularly disheartening for me because I had been added to the band to provide songs. I was writing a lot of tunes, but none of them were very good! Harrelson started searching elsewhere for hits and came up with some real winners (or is that wieners?). "One Way Ticket" was an incredibly bubble-gummer - it should have been recorded by the Cowsills, not by us. [Or Andy Kim - he could sing it!] We recorded an interesting ballad, "Long Way Home," but it was rather low-key and possibly a little too dark. We turned down a tune that a year latter was a big hit for Rita Coolidge (I think it was called "Without You"). ["These guys wouldn't know a good song if it bit 'em in the ass."] I wrote American lyrics for a song that was a hit in Germany (Good-Bye, My Love, Good-bye) - not quite peppy enough. We recorded a song by Dan Seals(?) - "Never Be Another." Although it never became a hit, this one stuck. We played it even during our last days at Park Place (1981). During this entire campaign (1971-1975?), it was obvious that something was missing, and none of us knew what it was.

During roughly the same period (1971-1975) we also played "auditions" for industry people, primarily at a place called the Morrill-Landes Dance Studio (if memory serves). Our hits at this time were "With a Song," the always popular "Mother's Child," "You, Girl," "Let it Shine," "Shall I Stay?," and a few others. We also performed as the back-up band for a group called The Whitneys - a black version of the Osmonds. None of the Whitney's could play their instruments; unfortunately, several of them tried. Mama Whitney apparently had been a soul star (of sorts) a few years earlier [she did a great rendition of "Midnight Train to Georgia"], before the 5 or 6 kids had arrived. Papa Whitney was tall and thin - he played bass (sort of). Glen, the oldest son, played guitar. Ray-Ray (as in Wha-chu-gonna-do-now-Ray-Ray) was the youngest, I believe. They appeared on the TV show Midnight Special - I think it was the pinnacle of their short-lived career (but I could be wrong).

There were many memorable moments in the studio. For example, during one session we had a really great pedal steel player adding a part to the Buddy Smithey song, "Empty Faces." Unfortunately, by the end of the session he was sooooo shit-faced (Wild Turkey, I believe) he couldn't remember the changes. Yipes! And who could forget that fun-filled session when we tried to record the music for a few tunes for the MacDougals? (with Scotty from Southwestern College on vibes and a piano player friend of Joe). Still, all of our writing, recording, rehearsing, and auditions got us nowhere, and by about 1976, we barely heard from good ole Joe. It was always the same story: You guys are a good band, you just need a hit song.

In the mid-to-late 1970s, we had a few sessions at Warner Brothers Studio(?) with Kim Espy, a colleague of Joe. Nothing ever came of these, but they helped keep our dream alive.

DON MILLS, ROCK ENSEMBLE AND THE ROCK BALLET

In the early 1970s (1973-1974?), the Music Department at Southwestern College offered an evening course entitled "Rock Ensemble," with "Good Man" Don Mills (rest-in-peace), a local jazz guitarist, as the instructor. Don became a mentor and good friend to Doug. For a couple years we used this class (one evening per week) as an opportunity to interact with other musicians and experiment with music. One semester we met a group of horn players, a pretty tight unit (I think they were in a band together). We played some tunes by Chicago, Chase, the Sons, and other horn-bands. One semester I used the class as a vehicle for JLS (Jonathan Livingston Seagull), the first strictly instrumental tune I had ever written. Players on this song included Don and Doug on guitars, Martie Farrell on flute, Jack Wride on vibes, bells, and chimes, Greg on bass, and me on piano. All of the parts fit together amazingly well (personal bias, duh!), and it really piqued my interest in writing instrumental music. [It might be one of the best instrumentals I wrote - and you're supposed to get better the more you write. Bummer.]

I have no idea what possessed me to do so, but I wrote a suite of tunes that together formed the foundation of what became a rock ballet (mostly instrumental); Emmett also contributed. We recorded the ballet at Bonita Recording Studio (ca. 1973) using no less than a dozen musicians. Participants included the horn section from the Rock Ensemble class, Jack Wride (a music major at Southwestern College) on various percussion instruments (tympani, vibes, orchestra bells, chimes), the members of Tacoma, Tom Kemper (a piano player and harmonica player), Buddy Smithey on pedal steel ("Day After Day") and Emmett. We performed the ballet in the theater at Southwestern College (Mayan Hall) with three dancers from the Drama/Dance Department. It was pretty cool. We also performed the ballet in a backroom at the Community Concourse as part of some contemporary music festival (recollection fuzzy).

As a result of my inability to write a hit song for Tacoma, coupled with the pleasure of writing and arranging instrumental tunes, I began to write more instrumental music (with no commercial potential). It was so much easier than trying to write band tunes (my lyrics usually were either pretty trite or pretty dark), and the songs came fast and furious - so fast that I started giving them numbers rather than names. Some were actually scored for the band, i.e., Song #3, a goofy-assed, funky thing that followed some other song. [I think it was inspired by a Frank Zappa concert.] Song #5 had a heavy, somewhat ELP/Deep Purple feel; Song #6 was sort of a Brian Auger shuffle; Song #7 was a light-weight piece in 11 that changed signature a lot. These were fun to play.

The pleasure that I derived from these pieces led me to start writing a little crazier. At this point we had two drummers, and there was no end to the variety of overlapping time signatures we could incorporate into a song! Songs like "Busy Airports," "Follow Me," and "Show Me the Way" weren't particularly attractive to the listener, but they were damn fun to play...or at least challenging. At this point, I believe Tacoma lost sight of its goal of stardom and became a band with a mission - to push the limits of what we were capable of playing and singing. In retrospect, I may have been exercising too much influence on our direction by bringing in these crazy tunes, which most of us enjoyed playing. I certainly was not leading us anywhere - I had no goal. I remember these as fun times, but I suspect that maybe they may not have been fun for everyone. We weren't playing many gigs, and we weren't making any money.

THE BAR SCENE AND MUSCLE SHOALS (ALABAMA, THAT IS)

In the late 1970s (1978?) we landed a job at a club/bar in El Cajon called Park Place. We wore our matching polyester uniforms (Angel's Flight, of course), made lots of money, and were appreciated by the patrons (drunk and sober) and management. We frequently played the Tuesday-through-Saturday shift, but I remembering going to the bar on Sunday or Monday night to sit-in with Emergency Exit. [Get a life!] During this time we were "discovered" by a fellow (Robert) who was looking for a band in which to invest money he had acquired from an insurance settlement (?) and create a rock'n'roll success story. His professional contact was a guy (Jerry Peterson?) from the State of Mississippi's Department of Commerce (or something) whose charge was to bring entertainment industry dollars into Mississippi. This relationship led to two fun-filled, exciting, slightly bizarre visits to record in Muscle Shoals, Alabama.

If memory serves, our first session was in late 1978. Keith Segal had not been in the band long, and he was unable to make the trip because he had only recently started working at Apex Music. He was extremely disappointed about this turn of events. He was sure that this was going to be the big break for the band, and he was not going to be a part of it. Talk about naive. Between Robert and Jerry, there was a lot of cocaine traveling with us. We took the red-eye from San Diego to Dallas - American Airlines (Doing what they do best). Jerry, who was a slick, smooth-talking, good-looking, southern boy, invited one of the flight attendants to meet him in the bathroom for a little blow (cocaine, that is). Well...Jerry went to take a pee and the flight attendant walked in on him (obviously meeting him for a little toot of coke). Apparently, he turned around to see what was happening and peed on her! No problem. When we landed, he went home with her and didn't make it back to the airport in time for our morning flight to Huntsville. Robert and the band continued on, and Jerry arrived in Muscle Shoals a few hours following us.

In Keith's absence, we used a local studio drummer (Roger) who had just finished a session with Paul Simon. This guy was great! He was the perfect studio player. As before, the sessions were good but the material was a problem - we didn't have a hit song - so Jerry tracked-down some tunes for us. I don't recall which songs were recording during which sessions, but there was "Business As Usual," "All Night," "Last Good-bye," and "Melanie"; the last two were songs from a local San Diego band (Listen) that, unlike us, apparently could write hits.

Our second session in Muscle Shoals was in the spring of 1979. I had just started school at San Diego State, and I had to miss a week of classes. I remember taking my bug net and collecting outside the studio (or was that the first trip?). It was hot and humid.

Jerry always had to have a babe during our sessions (his wife never accompanied him on these trips). I can't remember whether it was the first or second trip, but I do remember stopping by a local Burger King where Jerry convinced some young lady that she could have the time of her life with a bunch of rock stars from California. She was apparently more plump than her tight pants revealed, and Jerry complained the entire week about how fat she was. The band stayed at the Holiday Inn, had a rental car, and ate breakfast at the Bonanza Steak House. Our sessions ran from about 5-6 PM until about 3-4 AM. Hence, we would get up about 1-2 PM for breakfast, goof around for a couple hours, and head to the studio. It was a little strange.

I don't remember the name of the studio (E.A.R. according to E.B.), but I do remember that there was a gold record on the wall. I'm fairly certain it was "Angel In Your Arms," but I'm not positive (again, fuzzy). Greg, Doug, and Emmett brought their guitars, but I was without any keyboards (maybe I brought the Korg), relying entirely upon what was available in the studio. There was a nice grand piano but no organ. We used a synthesizer someone dug-up for the organ part on "How Long Have We Waited." There was a clavinet there for the keyboards on "Business As Usual" and "On Your Way."

I remember producing and playing tambourine on "Never Be Another" because everyone (i.e., Jerry, Robert, engineer) was so coked-out they couldn't hear, and the rest of the band had already left for the evening. On another occasion, a female singer came in and helped with the background vocals on "All Night." Some fun. The tapes were good, but the results were the same.

THIS COULD BE OUR LAST GOOD-BYE, BABY

By 1980, Tacoma had turned 10 years old, and with the exception of drummers, who came and went, the band still had all of its original members (...3 out of 4 ain't bad). By this time, we had become a bar band, with E.B. handling all the scratchy rock'n'roll tunes (along with the snappy and/or raunchy between-song banter), Greg singing all the "good stuff," and Doug, Keith, and me singing a song per set just to keep Emmett and Greg from blowing out their voices from the fatigue of singing song after song, night after night.

Somewhere along the way, Doug had become a piano tuner, attending a Yamaha school for same in Los Angeles. He tuned for a lot of concerts and frequently had backstage passes to some pretty cool shows. I suspect he became enamored with the Magic If (or at least their female members) when they came to town and he was hired to tune their piano. [I really have no first-hand knowledge of how he met them.] They were a tight, well organized, remarkably original, very entertaining show/comedy group. No one found fault in Doug for wanting to leave Tacoma (to join the Magic If) - we were going nowhere - and leave he did. It was a defining moment. What followed was a not-so-slow and steady decline. Doug was replaced by Mike Thomas, a good guitar player with a great voice, but with no commitment to the band. Things were not the same, and the promise of recording faded.

In late 1980 or early 1981 I conceived "Welcome Aboard," a song that I thought could be really good in the studio. I could hear lots of parts in my head, and they all sounded great! [Songs usually sounded better in my head than in real life!] I had not lost my enthusiasm for two earlier songs - "Feel Like I'm In Love Again" and "Love Times Two." In one last attempt to record a hit, I paid for a session in a local studio, during which we recorded these three songs. To me, they captured the sound of Tacoma better than any previous session (obviously my bias). They sounded great through the big booming speakers in the studio and okay through the speakers in my stereo at home. I added "How Long Have Waited" from the first session in Muscle Shoals and sent out numerous copies of the tape. To me, the songs were "alive," the playing was really good (lots of keyboard parts for the first time in Tacoma recordings), the singing was good (I loved those harmonies that we captured by slowing down the recorder so Greg could hit the high notes), and the production, although a bit rough, was adequate to reveal the potential of the tunes and the group. As usual, no one was impressed.

In April of 1981 Poody had our first child; in May (?) Tacoma decided to dump Mike Thomas. I was rapidly approaching the big three-O. When Greg and Keith told Emmett and me that they were going to start a new band, I was surprised and disappointed. However, a more thoughtful evaluation of the situation revealed the following: the income of playing music was too ephemeral upon which to support a family (i.e., I needed a real job); 30 years old was too old to be playing rock'n'roll; my hopes of a recording career had faded; I had a part time job in the Entomology Department at the San Diego Natural History Museum; and I was a student San Diego State University, working towards my BS. That was enough to convince me that my music career was over.

Our last week at Park Place was emotional - our last night the worst. I made signs for my equipment: going out of business sale and price tags for everything. I was ready to hang up my rock'n'roll shoes....and I did.

Emmett had no difficulty getting into a new band (Thumper, here or later?); Prophet (Greg and Keith's new band) continued in the proud tradition of bar-banding; and The Magic If made a delightfully entertaining video in hopes of attracting a television contract. I got a job working for the San Diego County Department of Agriculture, finished at San Diego State, and went to graduate school at U.C. Berkeley. The rest is history...actually, all of it is history.

OTHER MEMORABLE MOMENTS

"She Used to Dance" (Kenny What's-His-Name) and the Funky Factory.

Being ready to play back-up for the Whitneys (although it didn't happen) at a benefit for the American Negro College Foundation after watching the Ali-Forman fight on a big-screen television at the Beverly Hilton.

The Queen Bee.

After my Yamaha flute was stolen at a military base [gig] in 1975, Yil lent me a comparable rental flute from The Music Store, which we never returned. Still got it. Thanks, Yil.

Doing homework during the breaks at Park Place; studying for finals during the sets.

Acoustic recordings with Martie Farrell on flute and Jack Wride on vibes and orchestra bells.

Kim (What's-His-Name) of "Nutrocker" fame - going to dress us up in Nazi uniforms, call us the Young Lions, and make us stars. Finding his album in the "dollar bin" a month later and having a good laugh.