"What's the most important thing?
Love, with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul and
strength. That's it. She's a tough one, and she'll kick your freakin'
ass."
-F. Kentner
This is where we
stand right now.
This group of people, this
band, is brought together by loyalty, diversity, long standing friendship
and trust...and what a difference it is being grown up. Eventually, you
discard and reluctantly outgrow those wisps of youthful enthusiasm and
pie in the sky aspirations, then graduate/evolve/crash-land to a place
of commitedness. Individually and collectively this show-business
becomes more keenly aimed and inspired towards simply doing the work.
Somehow, working at this passion turns more
comfortably toward a feeling of gratitude: Thank God we are still inspired.
How very lucky we are to be able and willing to collaborate, to write, to
be together. We believe in trying to convey in our songs what life has
done to and for each of us.
The lineage - how we was brung
to this point in time.
Mary Elizabeth Gehman
traveled north from lower New York (New Rochelle, NYC...), to attend
college in upstate NY, with Rochester the eventual final stopping place.
Following her father's lead with music swirling
in her head, Meg bought her first steel string guitar off a kid named
Lenny Kane for $75.00 in high school. Amid way too much booze and
drugs, Meg started getting a feel for performing as a way to connect with
people. "I wrote my first serious song in college, corny as hell.
Awful, really. But my friends would sing it along with me once we were
drunk enough not to care. I learned how good it felt to create
something other people could relate to."
She
joined together for many years with friends and fellow musicians in a
thing called "Meg and the Clams." It was classic: Up-on-stage at
a bar. Playing your party. Jamming old songs people could be happy to.
That "thing" lasted for twelve solid years of comradery and
training.
Somewhere in between, for a few years there
was a band called "Big Back Yard," (enter Mr. Conner, and the
beginning of a lifelong friendship between him and Meg), a happily
quirky and surprisingly infectious little combo. This was, "My first
taste of really creating original music with a band of talented
musicians," according to Meg.
She gathers now with her people in This
Other Life. Suddenly many scenarios, once only imagined, now seem
possible. She is a song writer; she is a singer and guitarist.
This is what she says:
"In this band,
there are pockets of long lasting friendships and musical collaborations
that go back 30 years. There's a comfort and openness to risks that
come with longevity like that. I certainly feel a difference when I
write a song now, knowing I don't have to try to convey the full meaning
with only the guitar and vocal. I know that the other four will feel
what the song does for them and will add their own perspectives."
I want to write about Truth and Beauty. To get
at that sometimes I write about lies and ugliness. But I have a need
now to write songs. It's energy that I can't shut off. I record songs
into my cell phone, I write lyrics on napkins and oil-change receipts.
Almost all of my inspirations come when I'm in the car, for some reason.
Maybe that's the only place I'm sitting still long enough.
As a performer, there's an energy with This Other Life
that has an intensity I feel very strongly when we play to an audience.
It's like an intimacy between us on stage that comes from writing and
creating together, then sharing it with "outsiders", for lack
of a better term. It's like we have our own little secret.
Becky Thomas and Meg met in college and have had a
particularly steadfast connection. Becky grew up in North Country
Adirondacks amongst family where music was habit; harmonies flowed with the
tasks of the everyday.
Becky's musings:
I actually came very close to attending Crane's School of Music
after high school, but needed to get further away from home at the time,
and somehow ended up at Brockport State outside of Rochester. Turns out
it was a good decision, because that's where Meg and I met, and almost
immediately began to entertain our friends with our guitars and songs.
Through the years we have enjoyed singing together more and
more, getting comfortable with each others voices, styles, and instincts. We picked up
some gigs at local coffee houses and bars, and in the mid 90's sang with
Big Backyard...where Meg first began to diversify and concentrate on
originals. That style and tradition continues today in This Other Life,
and we are all enjoying the music. Fred and Jim were both involved in
Big Backyard as well, and it's been great being reconnected to their
diverse talents.
Erika Vasquez (pronounced
Vas-Kez) is the baby of the band, the latest to join. This is a dicey
proposition for the uninitiated in this group of long standing
friendships and hi-jinx. She is classically trained and multi-instrumental; the
resident musical academic.
Dreams of being an
orchestral french horn player brought Erika to Rochester to study at the
Eastman School of Music. An unfortunate accident in which she was injured
curtailed that part of the dream, but Erika has never lost her love and
passion for playing. After the Eastman, it was onto various orchestras
and ensembles with horn and tenor/alto sax. Further precociousness
inspired self-taught drums and landed a gig to sit and bang the pocket for
the Jonathan Feldman Trio (blues and jazz).
Erika, on this
sudden and hazardous leap to "This Other Life":
I happened to be in the right place at the right time
having the right conversation. I'm incredibly grateful for that. In that
particular conversation Meg asked me if I played any stringed
instruments. It so happened that the bass player from JFT was writing a bass
course to be done online and asked me to be her guinea pig so, I got the
basics for the bass from her. So, years later, when Meg approached me, I
could tell her that I had dabbled in the bass and would be willing to
do to a rehearsal and see what happens. So that's what I did and here I
am.
Playing with This Other Life has
stretched me musically in ways I really needed to go. It's really nice being
part of the creative process. All the other groups I've played in were
playing other people's music. With this band it's all new and
spontaneous. The musicians are fabulous and the music speaks to me in ways
that other music hasn't in the past.
Mr.
Kentner and Mr. Conner made it through the woods together- running into the
same trees, avoiding the same pitfalls, getting rained on by similar
garbage. This goes back to the day- way back to the day (and discussion
of specific dates only serves to make the protagonists feel more
elderly than they need to be). There is certainly something to be said for
perseverance- at least as it pertains to your outlook and sensibilities.
It makes the pursuits more tangible and valid.
Freddy is the most "rejuvenated" as per music and talent.
Wisdom is a wonderful commodity. He has cleverly (and thankfully)
married his inclination for creating and healing with an uncanny awareness
of the potential in his playing.
According to Fred:
As the opening page to my life story reads;
once upon a time there lived a mystic, misfit, blinded by the blaze of a
bursting golden lotus, come out of the desert, Sacred fire singed, one
hand clappin', hammer swingin', can't get there from here, wherever you
go there you are, guitar pickin', pilgrim.
Guitar wise I'm not known for playing the same thing
twice, even when you might expect me to. But the sparks are there; they come
from the heart and are aimed at the heart. I think the essence of This
Other Life's process is a heap of tinder just waiting to burn down the
walls.
Music can be a bridge to there, where both the
givers and receivers are healed. I want to go there. It's an evolution;
we all need to open our hearts, realize that we are all one player and
do some healing around that. Music can assist there and that's a place
I don't mind being. I think TOL is moving in that direction."
James comes to the proverbial table with a slightly different
pace. He says:
When at that table, the work at
hand is still the same: Change things, simplify, don't give up, look
forward, never lose the pocket, and make sure it's honest. Been around
the block and back, most times with great relish (notably "Miche
and the Anglos"), and with mostly fond reckonings after. But, the
path to this table (anywhere Fred and Meg want to sit, I will also) is
considerably more deliberate, humble, and careful. Gone (mostly) are
the distractions of implied fame, concessions to fashion. In their place
are simply opportunities for fulfillment - to laugh, to gather and
think, to display a work you feel glad about. All else is churn.
We in the band, as regular people, do big things. We
nurture relationships, we raise children, we teach others, we assist
people who fall behind, we reach out, we go to work, we come home. We
also play music.
Beyond styles, beyond lights, after the
accolades, back on the ground after being in the clouds, all that
really matters is the work.
Ultimately, we hope you
involve yourselves as we do. We hope the experience is similarly engaging.
We hope you enjoy it.
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