OHO MACH III (1985-2003)
Hanne Blank, Baltimore’s Grand Dame of erotica, once wryly commented, “Musicology only discovered feminism in, like 1986.” Coinciding with this discovery, give or take a year, Grace Hearn became the first in a succession of women vocalists who introduced themselves into the OHO musical theater. Feminism concerns itself with the daunting task of restructuring gender arrangements in order to achieve what has proven to be a tentative balance, a teetering on a fulcrum producing a motive that mystic Alan Watts called “the harmony of contained conflict.”
This conflict is between the archetypal woman and the archetypal man, forces of the transpersonal psyche felt by us humans to belong to a different level of reality. The drama is as old as time and longer than sorrow but it is acted out by flesh and blood persons in the here and now.
This event heralded the beginning of an era that for OHO was often productive, lasted at least 16 years, crossed over the millennium marker into the 21st century, and at its apex (1989-90) appeared about to bring the band to the seemly threshold of success. OHO experienced their own microcosmic version of this gender reconstruction in the lives of its members, in the band’s live performances, and especially throughout the songwriting and recording processes.
Please also keep in mind that, as Marvin Hamlisch said, “there’s a marriage between song and performer.” Even in the world of music we sometimes employ the language of relationship to intimate the vast range of the myriad connections, nuances and subtleties contained therein.
Mythologist Joseph Campbell used to tell the story of the ordeal of the “Perilous Bed” in order to illustrate the masculine experience of the feminine temperament. As a male is spinning this yarn, here might be a good place to begin, especially in light of the premise Ms. Blank proffered at the outset of our story.
Many never-before-experienced perils visit a knight lying upon a bed chambered in an enchanted castle. His test is merely to hold fast throughout. In the endgame, the knight lay broken and bloodied, thrown to the floor from a bed destroyed by the fierce violence of his ordeal. When things settle, ladies of the castle enter and lean over the candidate, one holding a small feather before his nostrils. If the feather flutters, the knight still breathes. His breathing signals his survival and so his passing of the test, disenchanting the castle and proving him to be worthy as an equal member in an engaging relationship with the female principle, with her boons and blessings.
As there can be no relationship to that which is totally “other,” there are fortunately, as Peter Gabriel posits (echoing Jung) in his “Blood of Eden,” “the man in the woman (animus), and the woman in the man (anima).” As challenging as the way of relationship can be in a unisex band, there is also some hope, and the promise of some very rich rewards should the candidate survive the above-described ordeal.
Let’s “take a little trip back with father Tiresias,” crossing “between the poles,” where for him “there is no mystery”, and where “there is in fact more earth than sea.” (Tiresias, a blind seer of Thebes, who had been magically turned into a female and, after a spell of 7 years, back into his male form again.)
By January 1985 the OHO that had molted out of Food for Worms a year earlier had finally disintegrated, leaving only multi-instrumentalist David Reeve and me. I had these ideas to record a “solo” album and to invite as many of the musicians who had played with us in the past to contribute in some fashion. Perusing the credit list for the UP CD I can say that this intention was realized more successfully than then imagined.
There were other contributors who are not listed, whose performances never made it to tape, but whose indulgence, suggestions and hunches provided a reliable matrix through which to filter our nascent ideas, thus adding significantly to the final product. They have our gratitude.
Ultimately we decided to carry on as OHO, believing that our opportunity to bring into play everything we had learned up to that point had finally come. From here on out OHO would no longer refer to the first initials of the last names of founding members O’Connor, Heck and O’Sullivan except as regards the OHO of 1974-77, the subsequent 1995-97 reunion version of that band, and their attendant body of work. Through attrition the trio had moved on, one by one.
There is a Guitar Craft aphorism that reads: “The gates of heaven open to persistence.” The OHO of 1985 would not only be a metaphor for persistence, but the moniker would also function in its dual role as an interjection defined in The Oxford English Dictionary as an “exclamation expressing surprise, taunting, exultation; as in a shout to arouse a sleeper.”
Why should we give up the notoriety we had earned from our previous exploits when we could use it as a foundation on which to build our musical future? We might also retain some level of connection to fans we had made thus far, rekindling their interest through name recognition. As drummer David Reeve told Maryland Musician in January 1989, “We’re just not going to let this thing die.”
The decision to retain the name, by the way, has proven fortunate for each of the four editions of OHO by virtue of being connected with the lynchpin of an unchanging core membership.
We began working at Steve Carr’s Hit & Run Recording in Rockville, MD (where we had recorded 1984’s Rocktronics) experimenting further with drum machines, sampling, synthesizers, and a hybrid electro-acoustic guitarism in search of our new sound. The music was lyrically progressive (moving forward in some way), especially as regards subject matter, our overall attitude of openness, and as far as our scope and the instrumentation we employed.
The songs often revealed what, according to astrologist Rob Brezny, the Kiriwana society of the Trobriand islands refer to as mokita, “the crucial subtexts everyone is aware of but inclined to ignore, the unspoken mysteries that need to be named, and the illusions we can no longer afford to feed.”
From the ‘felix culpa’ of “Shouts In the Street” (that happy fall from grace, taking one’s destiny by the hand) to the search for redemption in “Dream Lifted Up” and “Lost and Found,” the material (e.g. “Controlled Substance”) wrestles with the riddle posed to Oedipus by the Sphinx (not the great Egyptian variety, but the Greek: its forepart, the head and bust of a beautiful woman; its rear, a lithe animal form) at the gates of Thebes. And, as the lyrics are not gender specific, singers of either sex could convincingly render them.
We tackled making the unconscious conscious through the incestuously erotic imagery of “It Will Not Be Late.” The ladies sing of diversity in “The Secret,” toxic codependence in “Til Death Do Us Part,” alienation/separation in “Orphans” and “Where Have You Been?” respectively, risk in “Scared Money,” the destiny/fate dichotomy in “Danger and Play,” and freedom (doing what one must do) vs. license (doing what one feels like doing) in “Breaking Away.” “Give Yourself Away” deals with regulation of the ego and the “head” and their tendencies to usurp power from our other organ systems.
“Long To Be Latin” addresses our yearning for connection and authentic life experience in accord with the “music of the spheres.” “Dot On Your Door” deals with the hard transition from dependency-based reaction (the nursery) to creative response (the living room). Threads of bliss, joy, hope, liberty and love are stitches holding the collection together. The songs somehow still entertain, even while urging the honing of discriminative faculties in order to say “yes,” the full and grateful response of the human heart to reality, as it is.
We were, however, determined to trim some of the excesses typically associated with the progressive genre to make room for our own. We intended to separate the wheat from the chaff, sowing the remaining kernels into a fertile “pop” cultural field. After decades of exposure to commercial radio, we believed certain structures were ingrained in the collective subconscious, and these might draw attention out through the chinks in one’s shock-absorbing emotional armor, rewarding a bold move with a well-crafted tune.
Our approach was also principle-based and intended an economy founded on a sober reckoning/stretching of our limitations, where “less is more” except in the rare situations when “less” was merely lacking. Why execute a 10-minute guitar solo, when the same effect can be generated in only 5 bars (especially if one’s “virtuosic” musical vocabulary would likely recycle into redundancy before the first 30 seconds had expired)? If the listener must have these 10 minutes, they can readily be found elsewhere. We were true to our roots, true to our respective natures, and true to our tastes.
We should be able to say our piece in 3:30 or thereabouts, in accordance with the time tenet that generally governs radio play and the patterns of the hits of yore. These recordings inevitably reflect the era, its technology, the processes and the context in which they were made as well as the human contributions of all the players.
“It was definitely a studio band’s album,” stressed co-producer Steve Carr, “to record Jay’s songs and make them as good as possible on tape. So we did each song, one at a time, and we let each one develop on its own.”
“OHO sounds like Jefferson Airplane landing on top of Genesis,” wrote Jeff Lindholm in Dirty Linen #106, “and then taking a time machine ride with Fairport Convention to play at H. G. Wells’ birthday Party.” “The lyrics, in the best prog tradition, “ he continued, “are dense and, like the music, definitely swirly.”
We were also doing our own singing, but not to a qualitative level that generated any contagious enthusiasm either inside the band or from without. In earnest we went looking, listening for “the voice.”
Grace Hearn sang for a nightclub band, Rock Island, that also featured guitarist Carl Filipiak, who has since earned a modest yet respectable reputation in the jazz/fusion genre with his burning electric guitar riffage and critically acclaimed albums. Our friend Jeff Pivec, a drummer who moonlighted with Grace earning extra cash in various weekend wedding ensembles, encouraged me to check out one of her performances, which I eventually did in the early spring of 1985.
I could not believe what I heard. She possessed what was, as Toni Childs sang, “the voice of a dream I had.” Her voice caressed the words and the notes, and yielding in trusting resignation, they allowed themselves to be carried to their glory or to perdition, or to any destination in between where she willed. I gave her a cassette of “Change in the Wind” and “Ethiopia.” She agreed to listen and at a mutually convenient time we scheduled a session at Steve’s studio. She showed up.
Her housemate at the time, Gina Kuta, later told me that Grace had not bothered to listen to the tape I had given her. In fact she told me that Hearn was apprehensive to sing the songs. These revelations made her impromptu performances all the more awesome. The usual concerns about musical key signatures or questions about phrasing never came up. She whisked through both songs in just a few takes with minimal overdubs. She was in tune, in time, and had a convincing tone that communicated just how the lyrics are supposed to feel.
Steve, David and I just looked at each other in amazement, and we began to conjure ways in which to lure her back into the studio, but as it turned out the music seemed reason enough for her return. Grace later told Chris Schaub from Maryland Musician, “I can really identify with the lyrics Jay writes. I believe in what we’re saying through our music. To me it’s different from any of the other new music around.”
Not that everyone enjoyed Grace’s singing, especially as regards her vocal interpretations of certain OHO songs. This was likely due to the vocal gymnastics the team urged her to perform rather than any inherent stridency in her voice. Only partially cognizant of her potential, we asked her to push her envelope, attempting to experience firsthand the full blast of her power. On the other hand, one can hear in her rendition of a song like “Lost and Found” the level of control and finesse she exhibited even at the very limits of her incredible range.
Jane Brody (who sings three of the 19 songs on the OHO UP compilation and who ties with Grace in terms of who I believe has the best voice for our music) once told me that Grace’s voice was “water.” An apt metaphor for “truth,” I think, what with its connotations of birth/rebirth, liquidity, refreshment, clarity, coolness, purification, initiation, and ironically even a sympathy with death. These qualities transform upon application of the requisite stimuli, eliciting a state of intoxication somewhat likened to the glowing effect one experiences when imbibing a vintage wine. (We advise listeners to direct a bit of their attention toward something outside their listening experience in order not to be completely swept away.)
Inversely she could also scald you, be murky and scary, tepid, or even freeze you out if these interpretations were called for.
Marvin Hamlisch also once said, “The best thing that can happen to a songwriter is to hear the song sung by somebody else.” And with this sentiment the undersigned concurs.
Up to this time for bass, we relied upon the charity of old friends Gyro (Outrageous), Gene Ingham (Orange Wedge), and Mick McMick (Food for Worms). When they weren’t available either percussionist David Reeve (“Flip Side”) or keyboard wizard/arranger Richard Lake would play the bass patterns as needed using a keyboard to trigger the lower frequencies.
On a random visit to Hit & Run Recording to check out the studio during an OHO session, bassist David Appleby was badgered by David Reeve into learning and laying down the bass tracks now featured on “Breaking Away.” Within an hour we had a great take that we used in a final mix that later helped send the band on an all expenses paid adventure to perform at the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles. I never met the man again after that afternoon.
Serendipitous events like this were happening all the time. Also if someone knew someone who knew someone who could do this or that, they too were encouraged to contribute depending on the musical requirement presenting at the time.
Steve became more interested in becoming a permanent member of the team. Not only was he an engineer/producer running his own studio with savvy, but he was also an accomplished guitarist with gifted listening skills and sensitive ears. Steve was quick to clarify, “I made life miserable for all their other bass players. They couldn’t take it anymore and they all quit. Then finally, since no one else wanted to play for them, I snuck in.”
“The best thing about the OHO recordings is how good they sound,” wrote Geoffrey Himes in the Washington Post. “Steve Carr is not only the band’s bassist, but also the music’s co-producer/engineer, and his ability to make every element in their intricate arrangements shine without sounding cluttered is most impressive.”
The contemplative Thomas Merton wrote, “Art is constantly at work restoring things to a condition that is beautiful.” In this spirit we might all be thankful to Mr. Carr for his incredible remastering job, revealing the material’s full dynamic range.
“I wouldn’t even say we were a band at that point,” Grace told The Washington Times, “I would go to Steve’s and put down my part after David had put down the drums. But every time we won a contest, we’d feel better about things.”
OHO entered “Change in the Wind” in The Best Unsigned Band Contest sponsored by Musician magazine in the fall of 1985. (“Wind” was later included in the soundtrack of David Moreton’s award winning 1998 “coming-of-age” film, Edge of 17. “Wind” was also one of 4 finalists in the “Music for Film and TV” category for 2003’s Independent Music Awards judged by Steve Vai, Ray Davies, Joan Baez, and Lou Reed, among others.)
We were chosen out of thousands of submissions as one of five finalists and each of these was awarded the prize of a really nice JBL sound system valued at around $6000. These final recordings were reviewed by a celebrity panel (I remember one of the judges was Felix Cavaliere of the Rascals) and the winner was to open for Adrian Belew’s Bears at an upcoming musical trade show in Chicago.
OHO did not win but parlayed the prize into studio time, generating more enthusiasm for the project and increasing the momentum toward its aim of creating a fine album. We were getting some timely breaks.
Then in November 1985, in attendance at Guitar Craft VII in Charles Town, WV, I had a guitar epiphany of sorts. Participating in a weeklong and a number of weekend courses hosted by “Boppin” Bobby Fripp, I was introduced to and encouraged to wrestle with Level 1 Guitar Craft principles. Trey Gunn (KC) and Bert Lams (CGT) were also on the roster of Guitar Craft VII.
There we were, most of us with our new, discounted Ovation 1867’s, intending to straddle the boundary between heaven and earth while the fingers of our left hands (and vice versa for the southpaws) hovered ever so slightly above and between the third and fourth strings, in equipoise.
We were often “doing nothing,” waiting to respond with our entire beings in the moment that music or opportunity deigned to fly by. While we waited, however, we were to practice 8 hours a day. At least, that’s my succinct recollection of one salient aspect of the courses.
In “A Preface to Guitar Craft I” Mr. Fripp wrote, “The musician acquires craft in order to operate in the world. It is the patterning of information, function and feeling which brings together the world of music and sound, and enables the musician to perform to an audience. These patterns can be expressed in a series of instructions, manuals, techniques and principles of working.”
A healthy skepticism was also encouraged. This is somewhat of an oversimplification and one really had to be present, but there you have it. Anyone interested in guitar playing should treat him/herself and check out the craft at www.guitarcraft.com.
Although I consider myself a Guitar Craft “dropout,” I have learned enough through osmosis to declare that its principles are reliable. Build your craft upon them, and I suspect all will be well. Matthew, our son and a gifted acoustic guitarist attended a Level 1 course in February 2002. We were introduced to a new-standard C pentatonic guitar tuning (C-G-D-A-E-G, from the lowest to the highest string) and 9 of the 19 songs on the enclosed anthology would not exist without it. I came down from the mountain with a head full of new ideas and 18 years later, I’m still working with this tuning, which any “crafty” will tell you “is just better” than the “arbitrary botch” of the old standard tuning.
For the next 2 ½ years the band worked on their album and by early 1988 OHO had 11 songs completed. We entered the Yamaha Souncheck competition and were chosen as 1 of 8 national finalists to be flown to Los Angeles in September of that year. We had never performed before an audience up to this point and knew we had our work cut out.
“We thought, ‘My God, I guess we better start rehearsing.’” Grace told Baltimore’s City Paper. Steve added, “The live group came about as a necessity because of this contest. The Yamaha people said ‘We want to see you play live.’ That’s why we started playing out as a group, because we were forced to. And if that did not happen we might have still been a studio band.”
The existing quartet recruited Glenn Workman (Crack the Sky) for keyboards and backing vocals, Bill Janssen (who recorded with The Bears and later performed with the California Guitar Trio and Icons) on woodwinds, along with multi-instrumentalist Tom Hirschmann to round out the ensemble. The band rehearsed intensely, playing two dress rehearsals prior to boarding their plane to the West Coast in mid-September.
On September 16, 1988 before a team of judges that included Peter Asher, Paul Atkinson (Zombies), Jon Bon Jovi, Walter Becker, Larry Carlton, Quincy Jones, David Paich, Tom Werman, and Brian Wilson among others, the Yamaha International Soundcheck hosted the country’s best unsigned bands in a concert at the Universal Amphitheater in Los Angeles. There were some substantial cash prizes and the winning band went on to Japan for the World Final, the international leg of the competition. OHO played “Breaking Away” and “Til Death Do Us Part,” the songs responsible for their participation in this competition.
The finalists’ performances in front of an audience of 5000 were followed by a Cheap Trick concert. Their incendiary hit “The Flame” was burning up the charts. The evening concluded with a jam session featuring an array of hair-sprayed guest stars, Whitesnake’s Tommy Aldridge, Vivian Campbell, and Rudy Sarzo, as well as Bon Jovi’s David Bryan, Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora.
The big winner was Kevin Gilbert, fronting his band, Giraffe. It is my understanding that his acclaimed album with Toy Matinee, subsequent solo career, and membership in the Tuesday Night Music Club came about as a direct result of his exposure here. One may review partial scans of the event’s program by clicking on the “Soundcheck” hyperlink at Kevin’s official website, www.kevingilbert.com. It was a sad day when less than a decade later I picked up The Washington Post and read his untimely obituary.
Note also that Happy the Man guitarist Stan Whitaker in his group at the time, One By One, (also based in the Baltimore/DC area) competed as a finalist in the 1989 version of this competition.
Although OHO did not come home with any of the prizes, the experience proved to the band that they had a viable product. Now whittled back down to the original quartet, we began to perfect our live act in addition to recording, hoping that with this combination we would create a swell.
Vocalist and keyboard player, Angela Lazaroni, joined us in the fall of 1988 to help translate the complex vocal arrangements of the recordings into the band’s live performance vocabulary. “We have great lyrics and great music, so if we don’t get the audience one way, we’ll get ‘em the other,” asserted Angie in an interview with Rox magazine.
Then we got a manager. Not only did he book the band, serving as our liaison, but he also maintained our mailing list and published a monthly newsletter of band happenings titled “The OHO Beat.” Suzie Mudd, editor of Maryland Musician, wrote, “I’d like to tell you about OHO manager, Bob Phillips. This band is very, very lucky. This guy is everything a manager is supposed to be and more. He genuinely adores the band and its music and he believes in it with his heart and soul; someone to believe in what you are doing and someone willing to get involved, bust his ass, and make things happen.” Bob responded, “Managing can be fun, or it can be a nightmare. Fortunately for me there is OHO.”
Dealing with 5 complicated personalities, four that were also conflicted and whose actions forced Bob to question if they did, truly, have a common aim, eventually took its toll on this extremely generous and mild-mannered human being. The honeymoon ended soon thereafter. In July 1991 I received his resignation letter that read, “I am resigning for the sake of my sanity.” Do the math.
In the meantime we played regularly in the Baltimore/DC area and were creating a “buzz.” OHO often shared the billing with such notables as Alan Holdsworth, Aimee Mann & Matthew Sweet, Marty Balin, Trip Shakespeare, and The Tragically Hip. This buzz attracted the services of entertainment lawyer/keyboardist Scott Johnson who agreed to represent the band. With “Where Have You Been?” and “Out of Thin Air” recorded we were ready to release a CD.
“We held a fund-raiser,” David told Mark Bounds from Maryland Musician, “and we invited all those who wanted to be a part of it, and everyone who did, has his/her name listed on the album credits.” It was a rainy, dingy day, but our families, fans and friends showed up. We raised enough funds to release Audition, a baker’s dozen of OHO songs, 12 of which appear on UP.
Our latest recording “Out of Thin Air” was placed on 1989’s WAMA DCCD III (Washington Area Music Association) sampler opening the disc. It ended up in the “goodie” bags at a NYC music industry convention where a rep from independent label Sky Records (Norcross, GA) heard the song. The label liked what they heard and requested more.
When A&R director Abbe Myers discovered that we had a ready-to-market CD, she and promotions director Jim Parker flew to Baltimore to catch OHO’s October 20, 1989 performance at The Grog and Tankard where they offered us their promotional services. We passed due the prohibitive expense. The next day Sky offered OHO a contract and their standard $8000 advance, kind of like an early 80’s minor league baseball contract. We went back and forth over the contract language. After much procrastination/trepidation and walking circles around the table where lay the unsigned papers, we contracted with Sky.
It is my suspicion that for some of the members this might have occasioned their first confrontation with the idea of a real commitment. In reality it was a generous proposal where any party was free to withdraw at any time after giving appropriate notice. The agreement’s impact would become proportionally more significant depending on the number of albums sold, and E. Scott Johnson, Esq., had designed one of the best possible contracts for an unsigned band in our circumstances. This was an unprecedented event in our musical history, especially since OHO retained the songwriting and publishing rights to their music.
We attributed our signing directly to the initial exposure garnered from release of The WAMA DCCD. Steve Carr commented, “It was the best investment our band ever made for promotion. What impressed me most was the speed with which the CD generated results for OHO. Within two months of its release, OHO was signed.”
A watershed event for OHO occurred when the Washington Area Music Association nominated them for 5 Wammie Awards. The band was nominated for artist of the year and best new artist. Our CD was nominated for best recording (rock/pop). “Out of Thin Air” was nominated for best song and Grace Hearn was nominated for best female vocalist (rock/pop).
Our timing was a bit off though, as mid-Atlantic regional artist Mary Chapin Carpenter was about to explode onto the international music scene. She too had received multiple nominations and Mary ended up the big winner that evening. OHO also performed a rocking and spirited “Out of Thin Air” during the ceremony that was held in the Washington, DC Hyatt Regency ballroom on June 10, 1990.
However disappointed we were at not winning, being nominated in so many crucial categories said something positive about the band. Le Marquis de Rhythm concurred in Rhythm magazine: “Although the material is not in my favorite domain, OHO certainly delivers on their promise. The confidence of their presentation kept my attention reeling. Because the music had reached that zone of objectively fine quality, it was as if I was doing myself a favor by listening.”
OHO continued to play live and record. David and Grace were becoming more involved in songwriting, whereas the arrangements usually revealed themselves to us during the recording process. In October 1990 Grace told The Washington Times, “A lot of the stuff we’ve been doing lately has been more of a band project. I wanted to try writing songs—it’s been kind of neat. Jay will come to practice with basic chords, and I’ll put a melody line to it.” On the other hand, David was working out full-blown orchestrated arrangements at home on his computer using sound modules to augment the quintet’s live show and as regards recording demos.
We had a decent contract but could the Sky/OHO team generate enough enthusiasm so as to have it reflected in record, tape and CD sales? Manager Bob Phillips scheduled a short East Coast fall tour and a CD release extravaganza at the 8X10 Club at home in Baltimore. For 12 weeks Sky’s promoters peopled the phones to college and semi-commercial radio stations across the US, faxxing us our chart results on a weekly basis. We even spent a week at #1 in Juneau, AK. Although OHO had strong label support and received great reviews, our eponymously titled release peaked at number 108 on the CMJ top 150.
Some members had difficulty making the decision to tour. Within the band, a delicate interpersonal structure was collapsing under the weight of its accumulated baggage. Angela was pregnant and her due date coincided with this tour. Her participation was unlikely. David and I were wrestling with how we were going to negotiate even minimum touring due to our both having families with small children and demanding day jobs. Steve’s livelihood was Hit & Run Recording, and any time away from it would likely result in lost revenue. Grace had been collaborating and performing with other people, and her ambivalent attitude made her status in the band increasingly tentative.
There was little inter-band member communication and quite a bit of denial going on. Angela gave birth to daughter Mariah. Grace’s penchant for acoustic, jazz-tinged folk music drew her to the more fertile music scene of Seattle, where she now makes her home.
David later told The Baltimore Sunpapers, “It’s a fear of flying thing. All of a sudden you have to adjust to a major shift in your lifestyle.” We had all the things every band wants, a great manager, a competent entertainment attorney, a bass player who owned his own recording studio, and a record deal. Our music was getting played somewhere for an entire year at least once every 90 minutes on college and some commercial radio stations, according to the Sky airplay reports and BMI royalty checks. Our record also received many complimentary reviews.
OHO was even listed by CD Review as an “editor’s choice favorite selection” and among that magazine’s top releases for 1990. Still we didn’t have the ability to respond to the challenge of taking everything to the next level.
The tour was eventually cancelled after much weeping and the gnashing of teeth by some members of the team, and to the relief of others. And then there were three: David, Steve and Jay. And though we established a “revolving door” policy as regards future vocalists, this was basically the way it stayed for the next 12 years.
We held auditions and eventually welcomed the lovely and talented Mary O’Connor into the fold. Music Monthy columnist J. Doug Gill wrote, “I adore Mary O’Connor. She is nothing short of spectacular. I consider O’Connor one of the region’s most under-acknowledged (and under-utilized) female vocal talents.”
Mary stayed with OHO, recording and performing for about 8 months. She sang back up with me on “Dot on Your Door.” The advent of music for disenfranchised youth (grunge) signaled the beginning of a period during which OHO’s progressive acid folk was rendered temporarily impotent. It was difficult to get gigs, our previous momentum had been stifled, and Mary yielded to the lure of the sea, hired by a cruise line as a lounge singer on a “Love Boat.”
Decisions about the appropriate rhythm patterns for OHO recordings were often a struggle, mainly between Steve and David. My attitude was “there are 52 cards in the deck, pick one.” This tension came to a head during what was already a tough time and it reached a point of impasse where very little was getting accomplished. David resigned and Harry Maben took over playing drums. Harry was a solid drummer, hard working and a pleasure to be around.
After Mary it was Sue Ellen Sacco on vocals. She had coincidentally replaced Ms. Hearn in Rock Island when the latter joined OHO earlier. Her demeanor was usually cheery but the level of her attention was often challenged by her busy lifestyle to the point where once a last minute scheduling conflict prevented Sue Ellen from showing up at a performance. This necessitated therefore that I sing the entire set, being the only one who actually knew the words (the “Perilous Bed” again). 3 to 4 semi-tones beyond my range, I could feel my testicles being sucked up into my body as I went reaching for the notes, or any note that reasonably belonged in the scale of each song’s respective key.
This experience was revelatory, however, in that I had this opportunity to apply the maxim I learned in seminary school, “one achieves the possible by striving for the impossible.” We somehow made it through the set. George “Spanky” McFarland’s words come to my mind when he was asked about his stint as a Little Rascal, “I wouldn’t trade the experience for a million dollars,” he said, “but I wouldn’t give you a nickel to do it again.”
Sue Ellen’s contribution to UP can be heard on “Dot on Your Door.” One day she just stopped showing up and this communication was clear to me. Harry followed suit and although Steve and I piddled around with the tracks we had recorded for the next few years, I would refer to the period 1993-98 as a sabbatical for OHO.
In other respects it was a very productive time. Steve and I remastered all the 70’s recordings from the OHO of that decade. I made 2 trips to Bavaria where we had been signed by the German Refugees label. They released Vitamin OHO for the first time ever, the Ecce OHO CD in 1998, and the complete Okinawa as a set of 4 10” EP’s housed in a metal box with a 32 page booklet.
David and I had been working with Bill Pratt in the studio as The Vulgarians. I also played guitar in grunge band, Lunar Merchant, with a singer who sounded uncannily like Jim Morrison. Rocktronics era OHO vocalist Gyro (who had played bass with us in Lunar Merchant), along with David Reeve and myself teamed up to record as St. Joseph’s Ass. The resulting music was christened by former OHO bassist, Steve Heck, as “Thrash Symphonix.”
In 1995 David and I also reunited with Dark Side (1977-1981) members Mark O’Connor and David Jarkowski for a live-to-digital-2-track recording and a number of live reunion shows. We were keeping busy having some good fun reacquainting ourselves with old friends and our musical past. There was even a 2-year on-and-off reunion of the surviving members of 70’s OHO to support the efforts of their German record label.
David & I spent 1999-2000 playing acoustic gigs as the OHO Duo in small coffeehouses, restaurants, taverns, and at private parties, taking it to the street.
As refreshing and relaxed as it was to be working again solely in a band of men, none of our efforts were eliciting responses anywhere near what we were used to experiencing in the unisex OHO. We still had a dozen or so basic tracks in the can that seemed to be begging for completion, and so we once again dared to go looking for “the voice.”
We found it in housed in the silver throat of Jane Brody though she proved to be the most difficult of all the ladies to convince to give OHO a go. In fact it took about 7 years and a little cash to motivate her to sing 6 songs for us before she moved to the San Francisco Bay area of California in 2000.
The Village Voice: “Her flying spirit (is) anchored by a thrilling, strong voice and clear mind. Jane is on a wild pop ride.”
While I might have had reservations about Sue Ellen’s reliability and I suspected Mary O’Connor of “withholding,” being overly protective of her delicate voice, I had no such misgivings about Jane’s singing. She was perfect for the material we were recording, at least as regards her vocal compatibility with our music.
Jane also played keyboards and guitar and was generally very musical, writing and arranging her own material. Waterboy Mike Scott, on each of whose 1997 stateside tour dates Jane performed an opening set, referred to Ms. Brody’s songs as “brilliant music from a sexy, sultry dreamtime…coooool.”
The band courted her early on in late 1990. David had (and still has) this habit of approaching strangers and asking them if they sing. We noticed this strikingly “wicked” (the very adjective Jane used to describe herself) redhead at a Don Dixon/Marti Jones concert we were attending. He popped the question. His intuition proved to be “on target” and we engaged Jane in a conversation ultimately leading to our proposal. Turned out she was familiar with us, and was a Grace Hearn fan.
We rehearsed. There was great promise. We liked her material and were enthusiastic about integrating it with our own. She met with our attorney. There was this, then that, ad infinitum and ad nauseam. I was looking at my watch and mumbling something about delay and the seemingly endless minutiae that had to be dealt with. We had an answer for every question until there was nothing left for her to ask. It was time to cut the corn.
Something was holding her back. My hunch was that she was uncompromising concerning her own career. A distraction of this magnitude would cut into her time significantly, requiring her to divert some of her attention from something she was convinced of to something uncertain. Or maybe she could sense success (and how scary is that?) ahead, wisely choosing to let the cup pass by. It is a crucifixion, you know. This is my theory, which is mine, which belongs to me.
Being in OHO was no picnic. We were wounded, doubled over in a denied grief. Was the dream really over? This seemed a desperate time for the band. One had to be ready for a robust confrontation at any moment. I’m certain Jane sensed this and I understood her reluctance, unacceptable as it was to me at the time. I can imagine how difficult the prospect must have seemed to one whose outward appearance suggested the presence of a gentle soul within.
Of course, I would not let it end there. Jane gave singing lessons and I signed up, incorrectly figuring I could coax her into the band over time. At worst I would be a better vocalist as there was a good chance that I might really have to sing my own songs. Her communication before this was mostly in a politely ambiguous language of unconscious gestures. At least now I was hearing her “NO!” loud and clear. I had to be certain, though. She was THAT good. By then Mary O’Connor had joined and I discontinued Jane’s tutelage attending to the challenges of the era that followed.
Sometimes years will go by before another specific intuition reveals itself as a possible solution to an unresolved problem. If I can, I will finish what I began. When one works in the “pastpresenture,” time is not a big concern.
Another Guitar Craft aphorism reads, “Let us embrace our mistakes as friends and teachers.” I continue to work in this way, trusting my intuitions. And even in this lament over huge but nevertheless deliberately ignored opportunities, I must bear witness to being both pleasantly surprised and severely disappointed.
Anyway, 7 years later but before she moved west, Jane agreed to sing 6 OHO songs for hire. This arrangement seemed to work well, very clean…at first. She did, however, appear then to become mired, flailing about in the slough of her despondency. Apprised that there was “no rush” she made us wait 22 weeks before fulfilling her commitment to the band. Even then she had to be cajoled and prodded into action by way of a written communiqué intended to appeal to her sense of professionalism.
OHO’s “It Will Not Be Late” featured Jane’s vocals and the soaring fiddle work of Sue Tice, another talented woman. Sue recently wrote to me, “I have found that I absolutely love recording and have gotten enough experience through you and your friends that I’m cautiously considering a project of my own. Just thought you’d like to know about the ever-widening ‘ripple’ from that first OHO thing I played on. I’ve learned a lot from working with ya!”
The band won the Sheffield Studio “Career in the Recording Arts” contest in 2001. This netted the band a trio of wonderful prizes, including hours of 24-track time at Sheffield’s state of the art studio, a slot opening for Joan Jett at the Maryland State Fair, and a quality microphone. OHO’s “The Secret” (also featuring Jane’s vocals) was chosen as one of the top 5 winners in the Contemporary Acoustic category of the Great American Song Contest 2002. We still had our mojo working. Jane is featured on the first 3 songs on UP.
We’re still recording, mixing, and diddling around with the recorded estate the ladies left us on a number of unfinished tracks. We have worked with Elise Major, an aggressive, younger singer/guitarist, and are currently recording with 21-year-old vocalist, Kelly Grochmal.
The technology available today even at the basement level is just short of miraculous. Tom Petty recently told Music Connection, “With technology these days you can chrome a turd, but it’s really an empty exercise if you don’t have a song.” One can import tracks to and from various tape and disc formats, auto-correct the pitch of anything, and equalize or effect your tracks to taste. Editing is at the click of a mouse. Everything is an amalgam of 0’s and 1’s, the simplest grammar of expression.
We’re working on songs that are composites of about 9 different vocal tracks featuring 5 different female singers (one had better diction, the other got the pick-up words, and a third just did something amazing). We have named this composite woman Sophia Vajra (Sophia-Greek for “wisdom,” Vajra-Sanskrit for “thunderbolt” and “diamond”). Sophia is kind of an abstract Paleolithic goddess figurine, singing with many voices. Looks like she will be our singer as we finish up these remaining tracks.
So, what have we learned as a result of all of this, in respect to our experience with women in music? Well, of the vocalists referred to in the above tome, two are not speaking to me, and I am not speaking to three of the others. Those singers whose whereabouts are known were invited to contribute their memories and perspectives to this story. I have yet to acknowledge receipt of even one word from any of them.
There is another Guitar Craft aphorism that reads, “The performer can hide nothing, not even the attempt to hide.” Listening to UP you may then hear their verbal and intuit their non-verbal communications in their performances and in the subtext thereof. Draw your own conclusions.
But I will say this: someone very smart once wrote that the hardest thing for women to give up when they begin to achieve equality will be the habit of an alibi.
And…as long as directness is perceived as threatening, or worse, as a trick, the road to hoe will likely be a hard one for us all. Notwithstanding what has been said about the difficulty men have in expressing their feelings, I have observed not only a significant poverty in these women’s abilities to articulate emotion, but also a stubborn unwillingness to do so. There are those of us quite capable of clearly speaking to our feelings, but as I scan the horizon, and despite protestations to the contrary, I find nary a one of this specific group of female entertainers willing to offer or even witness testimony against this phallus-y (sic).
Their “against-ness” may have been merely a form of passive-aggression. Outwardly having agreed to do something they did not want to do, they subtly undermined achieving the aim through delay and confusion.
The atmosphere of confusion, already rife with mischief, was then misted with the “whiff” of sexuality. While these pheromones were flying about, potent, lure-laced, psychological cocktails were served up to predisposed targets for the purposes of gaining leverage in controlling otherwise unsuspectingly innocent people and manipulating situations to their respective and varied advantages, with little or no accountability on the part of the perpetrators.
These manipulations often worked at cross-purposes to the declared, common aim of the team but did satisfy the requirements of a covert, personal agenda; usually at the expense of others whose naivete insulated them from any awareness of what was happening, thus further reinforcing the passive aggressive persons’ advantages.
Some were elitist snobs, snickering behind veils of lace, in competition with and neurotically divided against themselves (“Danger and Play,” track #6), harboring delusions of grandeur about talents that were gifts.
A smug, inflated sense of entitlement was concomitant to their often intentional withholding of the necessary contributions crucial to the success of any collaboration.
Spectators on the sidelines, some motivated by jealousy, ready to invest in the spoils of the group’s demise and convinced there was something to gain from it, whispered their “bright” (subversive) ideas into certain of the singers’ ears. A hard truth I have learned in my lifetime is that the passive observer is as entangled as the active participant and to that extent in OHO it was a (dysfunctional) family affair.
This miasmic dynamic was also sinister in that, while working itself simultaneously both from within and outside the band, many of the key players on our team began to believe that these singers were indeed as special as they imagined themselves to be. Employing a vengeful brand of emotional blackmail and leaving no good deed unpunished, they succeeded in smothering virtually everything, bringing 5 years of hard work to a blistering halt, our credibility having suffered the most severe damage.
What chance did a delicate dream have in front of this voracious, vampiric dynamic? What happened to these people that they would become so adept at such subterfuge? The lamb really does lie down on Broadway.
From Robert Fripp’s diary (and few have said it more clearly), July 12, 2003: “One person...can cause disruption far beyond the quantitative scale. Small mobile units, of varying degrees of intelligence, are able to do damage to larger, unwieldy units that are inevitably vulnerable. A small act can cause repercussions that spread far beyond its original target and, where the act is violent, has a knack of turning round and inflicting all manner of damage to those parties nominally represented/defended by that act of violence. One act of violence is a reaction to another, and generates another in turn. This is gravity working. We all lose, although the ways of loss are different.”
I have since monitored, as best I could, these women’s musical progress since taking leave of OHO. It was epiphanic to observe how many of our strategies that were relentlessly criticized and maligned by certain of these women while they were members of the band were readily incorporated into their respective post-OHO modi-operandi, exposing an arbitrarily applied and suspiciously convenient “double standard.”
Deluding themselves into thinking that OHO’s fortunes resulted disproportionately and largely from their efforts, they soon found out that they may have unwittingly diluted their own potentialities by leaving. The bar for musical aspiration had perhaps been lowered and the resulting products of the remaining atrophic splinter groups were, in some cases, relegated to the realm of “vanity” releases.
Seems to me there was a much easier way without the fallout or unnecessary casualties. These ladies were so talented that all they had to do was sing the songs enthusiastically, and with patience the world would have had no other choice than to unfold its bounty at their feet.
Attempting to redeem what can be redeemed of the past has been a long, stinky, and arduous task (like trying to get rid of some annoying dried dog poop lodged in the sole crevices of one’s “sneakers”). With the release of UP, that task has now, I pray, been accomplished to the extent possible. That is, our presentation of the material is intended to showcase those aspects of the band’s legacy that are sublime. Some things are just incorruptible. Perhaps one’s character is truly one’s destiny as well.
OHO currently performs as a quartet of men…without women. We’re making some very raucous, testosterone-propelled music these days, but in the spirit of Odysseus strapped to the mast, we have heard the sirens seductively singing our songs and in successfully skirting their perils have survived.
Although sometimes it doesn’t feel like it, I’m certain that deep down where all paradox is resolved, we somehow know that this is how it is and probably always will be in unions so electrically creative and therefore erotically charged. Defying all reason, the interplay somehow and nevertheless makes for some passionate music and an engrossing if all-too-familiar tale. OHO indeed!
Enjoy the FREE downloads available at www.ohomusic.com or give yourself a treat and buy OHO’s UP for a very reasonable price by clicking on the CDBaby icon on our HOME page. OHO and out! –Jay Graboski, (Christmas, 2003)