"Ok, We're Rolling...On Two"

Ever since I can remember I have wanted a drum set. I can remember being about 10 or 11, and digging different sizes of boxes out of a nearby dumpster. I drug the boxes home and assembled them in the walk in closet in the shape of a drum set. There were probably 5 or 6 boxes total. I went to the kitchen and raided Mom's large spoon drawer for some large wooden spoons. I "borrowed" Dad's AM/FM radio, which was pretty big for that era and had plenty of volume. Tuned in a Top 40 radio station and began playing my "drum set". I think Mom lost more spoons through my drum set adventures.

Years later when I was 15 or so, I got a little more inventive with drum set creations. By this time I had my own room separate from the house. I had an old recliner that I would tilt back for the perfect "tom" height, put a hardshelled suitcase on the floor for the base drum, and I had gone to the lumber yard and bought a dowel rod and cut to the approximate size of drum sticks. I sat all this up near a wall in my room so I could use that as a ride cymbal. By this time I had a stereo and albums. I was jammin'.

Finally in 1977 I had saved enough money at a part time job to get a used drum set. Whoo Hoo! The real thing! I was playing every day to all kinds of music, Legs Diamond, Moxy, Rush, Kansas anything I could get my hands on. Mom became kind of concerned as she saw "Rock Star" all over my face. How is it Moms know everything? One day she asked me "What are you going to do with your life if you don't make it as a rock star?" That was an interesting question that I did not have an answer for.

So I thought about it for quite a while. I knew I wanted to be involved in music some how, but if I could not play what would I do. Then it dawned on me, I would be a recording engineer, I could actually be involved in making music, just not performing. Even at that age, I could see one the benefits of being an Audio Engineer, I would not have to be on the road all the time...go figure. Mom and I never finished that conversation, but I had solidified the thought of being an AE in my head.

In 1980 it was time to graduate from High School. I knew what I wanted to do, there was just no financial way to pull it off. Back in those days very few Colleges had Audio Engineering programs. There was an independent tech school in Florida that was offered an associates in Audio Engineering, but the school was not accredited, therefore no traditional funding sources were available. So, after graduation I attended a local Junior College for three semesters floundering around in the Liberal Arts program. I really felt like I was wasting my time so I dropped out.

I was going through some counselling at the college I had been attending, and the councillor had a contact to somebody in the music industry. She did some research and found out about a class put on by the RIAA at a major studio in San Antonio. The cost was around $500 and it was a 40 hour hands on class. Mom and I talked about it, and she agreed to help me accomplish this goal. I was working for Holiday Inn at the time as a bartender, so I transferred to a Holiday Inn in San Antonio taking a job as banquette houseman. I stayed in a cheap hotel room until I could find some place to stay.

I will never forget walking into the studio the first time, I was completely awed! The live room was so huge, the grand piano looked tiny. The control room was equally impressive a 32 channel mixing board, 2 1/4 inch 24 track MTR, and outboard gear out the wazoo. I was completely dazzled. Most of the people in the class were there for fun, but I was there for business, the business of learning. I was taking notes in every class, and absorbing everything I could. To complete the class there was a final written test, and each student got a chance to mix down the material we had recorded earlier in the class. We also had a final interview. After reviewing the mix down I had done the engineer giving the class said he had noticed that I was taking the class very seriously. I told him that I wanted to be an AE. He said I had potential as my mix had impressed him. He told me that if this was what I really wanted to do, go to an electronics tech school, as studios will almost always take an intern with electronics in their background.

So, off I went searching for a school to attend in the San Antonio area. I did attend a tech school for a year and was doing good in class. Love ended up getting in the way, and I missed to many days in one semester and got booted from class. Funding dried up, and I ended up in the US Army Signal Corp.

My last duty station was a mountain top in Northern Germany with six guy on a Microwave radio site. I had been playing acoustic guitar as opposed to drums, as guitars fit better in a wall locker! So I was still playing music while I was in the service. The last 6 months I was in Germany, I decided I wanted to engineer and produce a demo tape. So, with three $20 mics bought at the PX, two cassette decks, my home stereo equipment, and a small consumer mixer, I worked my butt off in almost every spare minute I had, to track and mix a 7 song demo tape of my original music. I was proud of my accomplishment.

Upon honorable discharge from the Army in 1989, I went to work in Houston working in the telecommunications industry. I was making more money than I had ever made in my life and all of the money was going to buying gear and instruments. After 3 years of hard work, and a lot of luck, I ended up building a small demo studio. I began producing demos for local musicians and bands. I was having a blast and producing some pretty good recordings with the limited equipment I had. I was beginning to get a small reputation in certain circles as being a good engineer.
That all came to a screeching halt in 1996, when somebody decided they wanted my gear more than I did. They kicked open the front door and walked off with almost $8K in gear. By this time, technology had replaced my telecommunications job, so the good money I was making was not there anymore. I put what equipment was left in storage and gave up on my dream. I did not want to play anything, or have anything to do with music. Heck, I couldn't even listen to the radio for over 6 months.

Fastforward to 2004, I am out in the office, and I get the bug to play my acoustic. I dig it out of storage, tuned it up and played for almost 2 hours. The connection to the music was back, and along with it the desire to record again. I decided, it was time to begin the rebuilding process. Little by little, piece by piece, I am rebuilding the dream of playing and engineering/producing music.