2000 [Barnes and Noble] [Image] [Image] [Digital Interviews] [Image] INTERVIEWS Vince Welnick [Shop] [Image] Don Alias Prior to his 1990-1995 stint as the [Vince Welnick] [Image] Grateful Dead's keyboardist, Vince Darol Anger Welnick first gained notoriety as a long-time member of [Image] the eclectic ensemble The Tubes, appearing on cuts like Paul Barrere "Talk To Ya Later," "She's a Beauty" and "White Punks [Image] on Dope." He has also recorded with a number of Chick Corea artists, including Dick Dale, Merl Saunders, Todd [Image] Rundgren and Steve Kimock. Charlie Daniels [Image] After the death of Grateful Dead guitarist Jerry Garcia Robben Ford in 1995, Welnick formed the Missing Man Formation. As a [Image] guest artist, he's lent his passionate vocals and chops Johnny Frigo to numerous groups on the "jam band" circuit. Welnick [Image] has recently reteamed with Dead percussionist Mickey David Gans Hart as a featured member of the Mickey Hart Band. [Image] David Grisman (posted 8/00) [Image] Mickey Hart -------------------------------------------------------- [Image] Jimmy Herring Digital Interviews: Where did your interest on [Image] keyboards come from? Alphonso Johnson Vince Welnick: When I was really young -- diaper boy -- [Image] I woke up from a nap and staggered into the living T Lavitz room, to find my mom playing boogie-woogie on a Baldwin [Image] Acrosonic Spinet. I was high enough to see the Tony Levin keyboard, and the fact that all this was going down, [Image] not all the keys were being hit, just started to Los Lobos astound me. When I was old enough, I asked my mom to [Image] teach me that. So, that was my first influence. I wound Pat Metheny up playing classical music. I had my first gig in [Image] church at St. Gregory?s. John Molo [Image] DI: Where was this? Rod Morgenstein [Image] VW: In Phoenix. I did seven o?clock mass on Sundays Charlie when I was nine. Then I got my first band at 11. I Musselwhite think we had one original song. [Image] David Nelson DI: You started playing in the Tubes soon after? [Image] Willie Nelson VW: I was 17, in Hollywood, playing in bars. I went [Image] there to get in a band, and wound up playing at a Charles Neville topless bar on Hollywood Boulevard with a fake I.D. [Image] [laughs] I bumped into Bill Spooner and Rick Anderson. Ricky Peterson Rick was my roommate for a while. Then I got into this [Image] Ferlinghetti play. I did the music to Coney Island of David Sanborn the Mind, at San Fernando State College, and I enlisted [Image] Rick Anderson and Bill Spooner. Bill had a van. He John Scofield said, ?We can?t find a drummer in L.A. to save us. [Image] Let?s go back to Phoenix and find a drummer.? We went Michael Timmins back there, and we got Bob Macintosh. That formed the [Image] Beans, and that begat the Tubes. Vince Welnick [Image] DI: Fee Waybill joined in, too? Bernie Worrell [Image] VW: He was the singing roadie in the Beans. Then we OTHER DEPTS. bumped him up to the front of the Tubes. [Image] Newsletter DI: The Tubes were a really rowdy band. [Image] Contact Us VW: Totally. We made our girls wear nothing but [Image] G-strings, and electrical tape over their nipples, so Shopping it looked like ?censored? marks. We wound up marrying a [Image] few of them -- not me, but other members of the band. Links We made them ?respectable,? but we were very sexist. We [Image] were an equal opportunity offender. We offended Home everybody, including ourselves, which was what White [Image] Punks on Dope was all about. It wasn?t really us, because we weren?t rich white punks on dope. We were hanging out with rich white punks on dope, who took us as mascots, so we wrote it about them. We knocked a lot of things, and people. DI: You played with them for a long time before joining Todd Rundgren. VW: 17 years. In fact, Todd and the Tubes broke up on the same tour. We were co-billed, Utopia and the Tubes. By the end of that tour, Todd was leaving Utopia, and Fee was leaving the Tubes. We went on as the Tubes without Fee, but that was insane, because we had created this Frankenstein. Everybody wanted ?Quay Lewd? and they wanted the big show, and we weren?t giving that. The crowds got smaller and smaller and smaller. I played for a long time without Fee, as the Tubes, a scaled-down thing. Then, Todd Rundgren started enlisting me on his albums and tours. I did the Nearly Human and Second Wind albums with him. My wife and I co-wrote a song on a Tubes album and also on a Todd album, called ?Feel It.? DI: When the Tubes released ?She?s a Beauty,? did you feel the higher profile? VW: Yeah. That was ?82, something like that. That was our first top-10 single. Up to that point, we had had small, top-40 play, but that put us into the big time. Now I?m on Solid Gold. [laughs] I?m on Snyder, you know. Tom Snyder. We were on the Tonight Show. We?re doing that stuff, and all we are is a bunch of hippies dressed up in gray flannel suits. DI: Oh, you?d gotten rid of the girls in tape by now? VW: No, there was still some tape. In fact, She?s a Beauty is, the ride was, a Beauty. You rode the Beauty, which was the big Amazon woman. And I think it was the Arquette kid who actually got to ride the Beauty. He was about six years old. They were hanging out with Toto. Rosanna Arquette was hanging with Steve Porcaro. They all came to the set because we were in Hollywood filming She?s a Beauty. We still had girls. There?s a Tubes video out around that time that?s got three girls -- but no nudity. It didn?t have any of the risquéness. In fact, the only person nude in that video is Fee. He does a scene where he walks into a women?s locker room naked. [laughs] DI: After playing with Todd, you joined the Dead. VW: I tried to get back with the Tubes. I?d trained this replacement for myself before I went off with Todd, and the guy worked out. So, when I was done with Todd, they [Tubes] were doing just fine without me. [laughs] They weren?t making that much money, so adding one other guy was going to be a problem. Lo and behold, they took off, and I got the call that Brent had died and that auditions were being held. Had I done that tour, had it worked out that way, I would have never wound up in the Gra 2000 teful Dead. DI: Did your vocals help you get the Grateful Dead gig? VW: Yeah, it didn?t hurt that I always sang high harmony, and they wanted the guy to sing the high harmony. I did all the soprano stuff for the Tubes, and I was doing it on Todd?s album. Todd?s stuff was especially demanding and exacting, and I really had it down. DI: Tell us about the Dead?s audition process. VW: I played on Brent Mydland?s equipment. They sent me a whole bunch of tapes and CDs. Of course, I didn?t have a CD player at the time, so I threw those aside, listened to the tapes, worked up some songs. They threw a few songs at me, and I requested a few songs. I did about eight songs. A lot of them were built around ?Row Jimmy Row,? or stuff that had multiple harmonies, to see how I could blend. Then, they threw in a little bit of ?Estimated Prophet,? to see how I could play in seven time. They said later on that they played back the tape, and I was the only one that didn?t lose it during the seven jam, that I actually kept the beat. That?s when I thought, ?Boy, this is far out." They said, 'He didn?t blow it.'" There was a point in the song where it was loose; somebody was losing something. I wondered who that might be. Next thing I know, I?m on the freeway in my dumpy old car, driving home, going, ?What happened?? I didn?t hear from them for a good, long while, two weeks or so. Then, Bobby called and said, ?Is your insurance paid up?? [laughs] DI: Bruce Hornsby was there as a ?buffer? for a while. VW: That was the deal. The job description was ?Bruce will play the piano until we work in the new guy. You will play synthesizer -- not the Hammond organ, but synthesizer.? I wish it would have been the Hammond, too. It was either space, or they wanted to phase out that sound and replace it with other stuff. DI: So when you and Bruce played together, you had split responsibilities? VW: I had the bogus Hammond, the one that sounded not like a Hammond. [laughs] Whenever I went to the organ, that?s what I played, and the synthesizer. I learned all those songs on the piano at home. Now I get to the stage, and, with the exception of a very few rehearsals, we were up and running on the fall tour. ?I must not be a piano player,? that?s what?s going through my head. ?Be anything but a piano player now.? It was challenging. DI: When Bruce went on his way, were you able to bring those other sounds in? VW: Oh, yeah, and Bob Bralove was supplying my midi sounds, like he did with Brent. He fires them in from afar. He sends in, not the songs, but the sounds. DI: A lot of electronics were utilized within the whole framework of the Dead? VW: There was a "wall" of sound effects. Bob Bralove would keep adding more effects. I have pedals to bring them up. If I had all the pedals on full, you could be hearing up to six different sounds blended together. DI: You also had monitors in your ears, and could talk over the microphones to each other? VW: The ?in the ear? speakers eliminated all speakers from the stage. It really pissed the bikers off, because they?re up there standing around, looking at Jerry, and they don?t hear a thing. Not a sound. His amp?s way off yonder somewhere. My Lesley speakers [are] padded, in a padded room somewhere, way off stage. All you?re hearing is the drums. It made for a controllable environment, where you could set up your own world in your ears. Also, we had a kill-switch. Your mic could be killed to the audience, but you could talk to the lighting booth, to security, anybody. In fact, I?d talk to the lighting booth before the second set. Sometimes, if we had a song planned, I would give Candace Brightman a break and actually clear it. DI: Was there a set list? VW: There was not a list in the first set. Never. It was a Bobby [Weir] or a Jerry call for the first song. If Jerry was the guy last night, then it was Bobby. That was the only thing we knew when we went up on stage -- song one, and then there was no list. Second set, sometimes we would discuss it. When I was first coming in, we would plan, maybe, a second set. But all the first sets, with the exception of the first song, were all done without a list. Except for a very few of the first ones, where they did an entire set list for my sake. DI: What were some of the favorite songs you played with the Dead? VW: The tear-jerking Jerry songs, like ?Stella Blue? and ?Eyes of the World? and ?Attics [Of My Life],? but I?d get into a lot of songs. I always thought that ?Victim Or The Crime? was a very majestic song. A lot of people thought of that as a dark tune, but I always thought of it as a very majestic, orchestral piece. I liked so many of the songs, that I could never really tell you which were my favorite. When I was learning them, it was like Christmas. You?d put one on and go, ?Oh, my god. We?re going to do this?? DI: Were you familiar with the music before you joined the band, or did you rely on the material they sent you? VW: I was into all of their ?60s stuff; it was imprinted on me. I knew the harmonies instinctively. They were already shot in my brain. In the ?70s, when the Tubes started playing 200 nights a year, all I heard of the Dead was what I got on the radio. So, I was savvy to the early years, the ?60s stuff, and then I had to learn a lot of it. I had to just sit down, listen, and write some notes, write a couple of chords down. DI: Your two featured songs were ?Long Way To Go Home? and ?Samba In The Rain.? VW: They?re the only two we worked up that I co-wrote on. I wrote them with Robert Hunter, and I?d written them for Bobby or Jerry to sing. Jerry said, ?No, man! You wrote it, you?ve gotta sing it!? So, suddenly I?m a lead singer, which is something I never did with the Tubes. Maybe they didn?t know that, but it was my first 2000 shot as a lead singer. Unfortunately, maybe because it was only those two songs, whenever they wanted to call up my song, it was ?Way To Go Home.? We burned it into the ground for a couple of years, so that everybody hated it, you know. DI: After joining the band, you started the Affordables and brought out ?Here Comes Sunshine.? VW: That was our ?Jerry opener? band. I did a five-part acapella introduction to the song. Jerry heard it back stage. He goes, ?I like that. We should do that song. Where?s a copy of Wake of the Flood?? There wasn?t one available, and I said, ?Well, I just happen to have the Affordables? version right here in my wallet.? [laughs] That?s why, when we brought it back, we did the acapella thing, because he dug the arrangement. That?s how those things happen; you?ve just got to be there at the right time. Because there are very few rehearsals, that?s why there are very few of my songs -- I?d written a lot more songs with Hunter -- but those were the only ones we managed to learn in the five years I was there. DI: What were some of the songs that you guys were thinking of bringing out in 1995? VW: I wanted ?Golden Road,? and ?St. Stephen? probably would have happened. One of the last rehearsals, we were working on ?Strawberry Fields,? with Jerry singing. ?Strawberry Fields? would have been a big, big, important piece. DI: When Jerry died, you disappeared for a while. VW: Big time. DI: How did you handle that? VW: I was a zombie, and I didn?t handle it, at all. I had to go away from everything. It wasn?t a pretty sight. DI: Did Missing Man Formation come out of that? VW: Yeah. That was when I finally realized that I was going to, maybe, be able to play again. I thought I?d lost it completely, that I was never going to be able to perform again. I started sitting in my room, got out the Bosendorfer, and I?d just sit there all day. Then I?d go back to bed. Then, finally, I played a couple of notes. ?True Blue? was the first song I wrote after my funk; that was an accounting about the funk, the story about the funk. What didn?t kill me made me stronger. I?d written the entire song -- the lyric, melody, music, everything. I?d always collaborated with people like Hunter, or guys in the Tubes. All of a sudden, I?d written my own song completely. Then, I followed it up with ?Golden Days,? which was about Jerry. Then a band got together, and more songs came up. DI: Who was in the first incarnation of Missing Man Formation? VW: Steve Kimock, Prairie Prince, Bobby Vega and myself. And Bobby Strickland played. That?s on the first album, which you can hear on vincewelnick.com. DI: How did the name Missing Man Formation come about? VW: My sister called me up. She?s a bartender at The Plank at Imperial Beach. It?s like a ?biker-Grateful Dead-surfer? bar. She overheard them talking about life after Jerry. Somebody said, ?Well, it would be a 'missing man' formation.? She called me and goes, ?Missing Man Formation.? I go, ?Yeah, it?s so right.? Later on, I heard that it?s when a pilot goes down with the plane, and they fly over his memorial service in a wing formation. The head plane goes up into the heavens, leaving a "missing man" formation. That was pretty creepy to look at it from that side, but I said, ?Sold. Now this really makes sense.? Because that wouldn?t have happened if Jerry were still around. I would have been happy to be in that family for all time. It didn?t please me to, all of a sudden, be a lead singer in my own band. It wasn?t my favorite scenario. [laughs] DI: And Missing Man is still continuing? VW: Hell, yeah! As long as people are missing, there?ll be a Missing Man. DI: What did you learn from playing with Jerry? VW: Minimalism. What not to play. How to listen. Simplicity. Playing from the heart. True emotion that can only be spoken in music. Yeah. Stuff that cannot be spoken of. DI: You?ve also sat in lately with other bands. VW: Mood Food. Merl Saunders a few times. I do that a lot now. If they have a keyboard already in place, I can just show up. There?s no assembly required. It?s a bit harder to get Missing Man together with everybody?s schedule -- they?re all playing in different bands. If somebody invites me up, and there?s a keyboard there, it?s great -- or if they rent a Hammond for me, or something. String Cheese [Incident] even came to my performing arts center in Akumal [Mexico] and played on my stage for two nights. It?s near Tulum. You fly into Cancun to get there. DI: Do you live down there? VW: In the winter, I spend a lot of time there. My wife and I built an art gallery and grand performing arts center. DI: Tell us a little bit about Mood Food. VW: That?s Mitch Marcus? band. Mitch is a 24 year-old tenor sax player -- he also plays piano and clarinet. He?s got a degree in jazz studies from the University of Indiana. I just bumped into him at a cannabis concert. I sat in with him, and my wife said, ?We?ve gotta hook up with this guy.? And we did. I?ve been recording with him, and he will probably be playing in Missing Man, as well. His band learned ?Golden Days,? the song for Jerry, and ?Smog Farm? -- a couple of my songs. Then, I?ve learned a few of theirs. We did a gig at Sweetwater; we did two sets together. We?re going to do some more shows together, where I just show up and play with them. DI: In 1998 you played atop Ken Kesey?s Furthur bus as it drove through Eugene. VW: Yeah. Stephanie Kesey managed Missing Man Formation. Her and Zane broke out the bus. I think Ken was out of town that day, but he said it was okay. We?re driving, and you?re hooked up with a little keyboard and a PA system, a PA intercom that goes down to the driver. They?re not only blasting it over the PA, they?ve got a transmitter o 1a6a n, so if you?re within a half-mile of Furthur, you?re going to get it on the air, too. They have a little sign with their call number -- it?s all very pirate-like. DI: You?ve also been working with The Persuasions on their latest CD. VW: It?s a CD of Grateful Dead songs. They?ve notoriously been known as an acapella group. They got David Gans to produce them, and it?s on Grateful Dead Records. Gans, somehow, convinced them to break tradition and have me play keyboards with them on a couple of songs. There?s a version of ?Ship of Fools? that the bass player sings. It?s just the bass, singer and piano, and I?m playing very little piano. It sounds like I?m falling off the chair, just barely able to play the notes. I had to play very mimimalistically. That?s when I was really summoning Jerry?s energy. At first, I sat down and started playing my boogie-woogie and everything. That?s going to walk all over the bass guy, and they?re carrying all the music, so it was what not to play. It came out beautifully. I love it. It?s very raw. We recorded it really fast. Nobody?s standing over there being ultra-critical. Of course, Gans is just loving everything that?s coming out. DI: Now, when will we see you playing with this Other Ones configuration? VW: I'm afraid the answer is maybe never. DI: Would you like to sit in with The Other Ones? VW: Absolutely. I want to play the Hammond organ, and I want to sing their missing high harmonies. I heard a lot of Other Ones? music when I was learning stuff for Mickey. The music?s fabulous. They don?t need another keyboardist there, although they could use a Hammond organ player, because Bruce?s forte is piano. Their harmonies are inverted; they don?t have the high harmony where it?s supposed to be. It?s not on the top, it?s down on the bottom. There was no room for improvement in the music -- it?s perfect. But there was in the vocals, for that reason. And just to hang with those guys. I would want to do that. Play the Hammond and sing the high stuff that?s missing from that band. DI: Will we see you playing with Phil Lesh at some point? VW: I think anything can happen in time. Since I don?t see anybody retiring, I think it?s inevitable. But inevitable could mean 20 years. [laughs] DI: Now you?re in the Mickey Hart Band. How did that come about? VW: I was prepared to just sit and record all year long. I was recording three days a week, and I was real happy recording all the songs I?ve ever written. I?ve got 14 in the can. Mickey calls me up on the phone and goes, ?We?re going out on the road. Do you want to play with my band?? The last time I worked with Mickey was on Mystery Box, and I co-wrote six of the songs on there, but he opted not to use keyboards at all on the album, so I didn?t play on it and I didn?t sing on it. I just wrote and I arranged some of the singing for the Mint Julep ladies. I said, ?Mickey, I didn?t even know you had a keyboardist.? He goes, ?We?ve got a great one. She?s very big on Latin.? I go, ?Well, do you want to do the Latin thing?? He says, ?No, I kind of wanted to get back into the rock thing, and I want to hear you jam out, and play some improvisation.? And, boom! He brought me in, and it?s worked out great. It was important that I got along with everybody else in the band. He brought me in, and I played with everybody, and they had a chat and brought me in. DI: Who is going to be in the new Missing Man Formation? VW: Whoever?s available. A lot will have to do with who plays on the recordings and, of those recordings, what songs I decide to do live. Mitch Marcus is very much like John Coltrane, and playing with him is as close as I?ll probably ever get to playing with John Coltrane. If I use Mitch, I would do a lot of jazzy stuff. To hear Mitch Marcus on Missing Man Formation [in] MP3, bring up a song called ?Laurie,? which I wrote for my wife of 24 years. It?s got Mitch playing all over it on saxophone. DI: What other projects would you would like to do? VW: To be honest, I?d like to get all those [Grateful Dead] guys back together on the same stage, and play limited engagements as whatever name they want to call it. With the exception of that, I?d want to record every song I?ve ever written. I hope, in a very short time, if you bring up vincewelnick.com, you?ll have a hundred songs to listen to. DI: What would you say to a young keyboardist about the music business? VW: The music business can very well kill you. If you don?t really love it, forget about it. If you?re doing it for money, forget about it. But if this is your lifelong dream, don?t ever forget about it, and don?t ever quit -- just hang in there. ### Copyright © 2000 Rossgita Communications. All rights reserved. Top of page. . 0