What’s in a name...

I remember the first time I connected with the band Pink Floyd. My family and I were watching a benefit concert on Mtv. (Yes... when they still played music videos)

As we are watching the star filled, multi performance event. Pink Floyd is performing live from Knebworth (via satellite) They play a handfull of some of their more well know tunes and then... the moment happens... It’s raining and not just a little rain either. The band goes into the song Sorrow.

The song starts with droning synth pads and then the guitar comes in with long sustaining notes that fill everything with a thunderous and wonderful reverberating sound. As the song progresses, it reaches the solo. David Gilmour’s red strat (rain soaked) as he powers through the guitar solo. Rain pouring down, Gilmour is warbling every sustained note with the slight touch of his hand to the whammy bar and with the vibrato in his fingers.

The way only Dave does.

The song ends with the whole band vamping and then, as the band hits it’a last bombastic chords! Lasers everywhere, and Fireworks exploding above the stage with brilliant colors! (At least that’s how I remember it).

That was the moment... a Pink Floyd fan was born.

A change in direction...

Years later there would come a band that would shake me off my then, metal head high horse.

I was all rapped up in Punk and Metal in the late 80’s and early 90’s. (“I thought you were a U2 fan”) Was, am and always will be!

With grunge plowing through and demolishing the hair metal scene, there were quite a few bands that were catching my attention.

Green Day (not grunge), Stone Temple Pilots and of course, Nirvana but...

the first time I heard the cracking of Johnny Greenwood’s Telecaster through his solid state amp, with a Marshall Shredmaster plugged into the signal chain... “Cuh Kunk...Cuh Kunk!!!” a teenage musical genre preference was flipped on it’s head.

I mean, I knew it all along. There’s just more to music, more out there to discover.

The band that changed my musical perspective... Radiohead. The song was Creep.

I became a forever fan... (well at least till they got a bit too avant-garde).

Radiohead would be dubbed by a music critic as “Punk Floyd”. I believe in a Rolling Stone article?

I can see clearly now, the smoke is gone...

Fast forwarding the tape a bit.

I often went to Karaoke to sing and enjoy a beer or two with friends. (Mind you I was still a minor at this point armed with my gently altered ID, Wait!? maybe I was of age at that point? Is it smoky in here?)

The bar is filled with smoke (so it seemed); someone who believed he was Elvis reincarnated, is belting out Unchained Melody...

I sit at the a table across from my friend. Her glasses laying just off to the side of her.

Picking them up to peer through them, trying to discover how blind she was. Suddenly everything became clear! “Wait! What!?! It’s not that smoky in here?! I need glasses”...

Heading to the optometrist, I was trying to work out in my head what type of frames I would get. I thought... “If I’m going to wear glasses, I’m going all in! Full Buddy Holly”.

Armed with my rectangular but Wayfarer looking black frames and my dad’s trusty Takamine Acoustic, I would often gig at the local Coffee shop that I worked at previously . (Where I met my to be wife, breaking into cars... Another story for latter...). People started remembering me... well my glasses anyway... “Hey! You’re the guy with the glasses, that was playing music the other night”

“Maybe I should just go with it?” I though.

I think it was David Byrne (of Talking Heads fame) that said something along the lines of “People will remember you better if you always wear the same suit” (Well at least I think he said it. It’s a bit smoky in here... or I just need my glasses.)

And at that point I would perform under the monicker “Foureyes“,which is the name I would gig under for some time after.

Mix it all up like a chef at fusion food restaurant and a name floats to the top... Like finding a word in the bowl of your alphabet soup.

Hi! My Name Is... What? My Name is... Who? My Name is... Chika...Chika....

Punkfloyd4eyes