Re: (TV) Liner Notes For CC's Re-release of Dreamtime

[Phil Obbard <pobbard@yahoo.com>]

Thanks for doing this, Leo. Interesting notes. So part of DREAMTIME had to be re-recorded...

How does the sound compare to the 1994 Infinite Zero CD release?

--Phil



----- Original Message ----
From: Leo Casey <leocasey@comcast.net>
To: tv@obbard.com
Sent: Thursday, August 7, 2008 10:09:01 AM
Subject: (TV) Liner Notes For CC's Re-release of Dreamtime

Not sure how much the MM List's e-mail system will change the original formatting of
this.   Leo

Liner Notes For Collector Choice's Re-release of Dreamtime

An oral history of Dreamtime (originally released 1981); Interrogations done by Jason
Gross, editor/perpetrator of Perfect Sound Forever online music
magazine<www.perfectsoundforever.com>

"Dream we dream our dream!"  poet Paul Verlaine, 'O'er the Wood's Brow'

CAST OF CHARACTERS
Bruce Brody:  Keyboardist:  Patti Smith Group, Pretenders, U2.
Jay Dee Daugherty:  Drummer:  Patti Smith Group, The Church.
Ritchie Fliegler:  Guitarist:  Former SVP Fender Guitar.  Now runs Fearless
Marketing.
Donnie Nossov:  Bassist:  John Waite, Pat Benatar, Lita Ford. 
Fred Smith:  Bassist:  Television.  Co-owner of upstate New York winery.
Rich Teeter:  Drummer:  The Dictators, Twisted Sister.  Does education sales for Sam
Ash Music.
Tom Verlaine:  Guitarist, singer:  Television, solo career.

PRELUDE
Jay Dee Daugherty:  I'd played with Tom at sound checks at CBGB's when Patti and
Television were on the same bill, and we'd always see each other.  For his first 1979
record, he would just say, "Show up at the studio.".  For Dreamtime, we did prepare
for it.  It was a little more cohesive and planned out.  Most of the attention was
paid to what Ritchie was playing......  Getting the parts with the guitars was more
of a preoccupation with Tom.

Fred Smith:  He asked me to play on his first record and we remained friends for all
these years so I continued working with him on Dreamtime.

Ritchie Fliegler:  I knew Fred already - we worked at a guitar place together.  Bruce
Brody and I were playing with John Cale, who shared management with Television and
Patti Smith.  Also, Bruce and I were playing in a band with Donnie and Teeter called
VHF before working with Tom.

Bruce Brody:  Everyone was so close - you just knew everyone.

DREAMTIME, VERSION  I
(Mr. Blur', 'Down On The Farm', 'There's A Reason', 'Without A Word', 'Penetration')

Ritchie Fliegler:  We did lots of demo work first.  I also played all the 12-string
parts.  Tom did all the solos and the color work, but a lot of the other parts were
played by myself.  

Jay Dee Daugherty:  When you play with someone over time, you know what to expect and
anticipate.  

Fred Smith:  Recording with Tom was pretty much the same as recording in Television.
The only difference was for Television's album Marquee Moon, we played that stuff for
years live.  You have a year or two to develop a part if you're touring.  But when
you get into a studio to do new songs for the first time, you may only have a week to
figure out what you're going to do.  So most of the time there was stuff that
developed in the studio.  

Ritchie Fliegler:  Bob Clifford (engineer), who co-produced (Dreamtime), had a lot to
do with its sound.  He was a big part of it.  He engineered the demos, and was there
for all the rehearsals.  It had a lot of that 'big room', early 80's sound to it.  

Tom Verlaine:  It's good to give engineers production credit as it helps their
careers...

Ritchie Fliegler:  For 'Mr. Blur,' I'm playing (Henry Mancini's) 'Baby Elephant Walk'
and the intro too. 

Jay Dee Daugherty:  Tom oscillates between being funny and serious/demanding.  But
we've known each other for a long time so it's a friendly atmosphere.  

TAPE TROUBLE
Bruce Brody:  There were problems where the tape was shedding.  It was one of the
24-track, 2-inch tapes and the oxide was coming off onto the playback heads.  The
tapes weren't made well.  

Jay Dee Daugherty:  Fred and I had recorded the whole album with Tom and Ritchie.
Tom spent a lot of time in the studio and did a lot of overdubs, and it's great on
the tapes but he got a bad batch to use.  One of them fell apart and he had to
re-record some of the songs, but Fred and I were unavailable for that.

Fred Smith:  We were working with Willie Nile so maybe we were busy.  But (as) for
the tapes, Tom used to do a lot of editing.  Those tapes would go flying by - you'd
see a lot of splices.  Some songs he would compose in the studio, edit things
together or chop them in half.  The tapes did get punished a bit.

Tom Verlaine:  There was a problem with the tapes.  At the same time, I was
interested in working with some different players.

DREAMTIME, VERSION  II
('Always', 'Mary Marie', 'Fragile', 'The Blue Robe', 'A Future In Noise')

Donnie Nossov:  I got a call from Ritchie saying, "You wanna play on a couple of
songs?".  The three of us played together for some time (VHF) so it was easy to drop
in as a rhythm section.

Rich Teeter:  When I got there, we recorded the songs pretty quickly.  It only took a
few days.  We recorded live in the studio...Tom overdubbed vocals and some guitar
later too.  It was well established in Tom's mind so it was easy for him to tell us
his ideas for the arrangements and have them all fall into place.  

Donnie Nossov:  It was really fast and really musical.  He knew what he wanted and
was a very down-to-earth guy.  He was business-like in terms of getting the music
down and across ... very clear in his concept of what he wanted to hear.  

Ritchie Fliegler:  During the demos, Tom would play a part, I would come up with a
part as a response, then he would come back with another part ... that's how we
worked out 'A Future In Noise'.
  
Bruce Brody:  After they recorded the basic tracks, I came in later to do some
overdubs - just for a few days (on 'Always', 'Marie Marie', 'Penetration').  

Rich Teeter:  I left a (Twisted Sister) gig to get back to the city to do this
session with Tom.  It was funny to go from playing goony rock to something extremely
artful and sophisticated that rocked just as hard.

Donnie Nossov:  Just to be able to go in there and not even care about what kind of
music you were playing was refreshing - rather than saying, "I'm gonna play this kind
of song!".  Instead he just let the music happen.  

Rich Teeter:  I still freakin' love 'A Future In Noise'.  It's an incredibly powerful
piece of music.

Donnie Nossov:  'Always' is a song that really sticks out for me.  It's got that
post-punk edge, but it's really melodic too.

Rich Teeter:  I didn't think he'd put 'The Blue Robe' on that record.  It was just a
really fun jam that we did.  

Donnie Nossov:  I like that experimental side of his music with 'Penetration' and
'The Blue Robe'.

Jay Dee Daugherty:  I thought that the second rhythm section was faithful to the way
we originally played it.  

Rich Teeter:  It's amazing how art happens ... to see a guy with creativity oozing
out of him and knowing what he wanted.  It was his vision - his ideas.

POSTSCRIPT
Jay Dee Daugherty:  There's an improvisation and intensity to his music with dynamics
and tension that builds and subsides.

Ritchie Fliegler:  I remember this album fondly, much more than a lot of other things
I've worked on.

Donnie Nossov:  After doing Tom's record, I guess I gained a certain amount of
'post-punk cred.  

Rich Teeter:  I got tons of respect from the community from being on that record at
that time and since then.

Donnie Nossov:  I thought that artistically it was a very successful record.  I'm
sorry that more people didn't get to hear it but maybe that will change.

[demime 1.01d removed an attachment of type application/ms-tnef which had a name of winmail.dat]
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