John Novello!

Here is part 2 of my interviews, this with keyboardist John Novello. As you'll see John's had quite a career, and we talked about that, as well as Niacin, and his love for the Hammond B3! John also teaches and has other various projects on the 'go'. For more info on John Novello, and/or to check out his line of music products check out his web site www.primenet.com/~novello Q: What can you tell me about yourself as far as your earliest bands, previous recordings - that sort of stuff!? JN: I grew up in Pennsylvania, and then I went to Berkeley College of Music, and studied jazz and stuff. And at that time I was touring with various unknown bands and stuff. And then I went to Boston and very intensely studied music and arranging, and composing, and sort of am the 'well trained' guy of the band, I would say. So they count on me to write all the charts even though they don't read them! So that's kind of fun. Then I came out to California and became a session player, and did all kinds of sessions for a variety of different people. I've worked with Manhattan Transfer, Donna Summer, Taste Of Honey, all the different Laws - Ronnie Laws, Hubert Laws' sister; did some stints with Edgar Winter, played with Mark Isham on the one album that he won the Grammy on, I think, back in the early 90s. I did all the B3 work on that. Mostly session playing stuff. Then I had my own project as well. I had a solo album out in 1986 - 87, it was called John Novello "Too Cool"; it was sort of jazz/funk project that was on Spindletop Records. Other than that I've just been doing lots of sessions and touring with a variety of different acts. Q: With Niacin, you mainly play the Hammond, I assume on your solo stuff you play a little more ........ JN: Yeah, the piano, a lot of Fender-Rodes synthesizer - stuff like that. But my first love is actually the B3. If somebody really asks me, i don't know why - but I always feel more at home on the B3. When I was growing up, playing all the different bar bands and stuff, all I played was B3. Q: What sort of stuff did you play back then? JN: I'm a blues kinda funk player; it's what I grew up in. Everything from the Motown, to the stacks, to old soul stuff -- Sly And The Family Stone, old Tower of Power; all that kind of funk-blues type of stuff. I got into jazz later; and of course there was always rock floating around, so anything from Cream to Vanilla Fudge to Jimi Hendrix to Led Zeppelin , all those kind of bands. Like Billy, I was influenced by then crept and gravitated to more jazzier things after I started studying a little more I got interested in contemporary jazz and that. Q: Biggest influences and favorites players growing up? And what got you into it? JN: Keyboard wise I'd say people like Jimmy Smith, Keith Emerson, Brian Auger, Jon Lord -- those kind of B3 players; Mark Stein [from Vanilla Fudge], Stevie Wonder, Larry Young - who's a jazz kinda God, and Groove Holmes, Jack McDuff, Jimmy McGriff -- all those B3 players, Chester Thompson from Tower of Power - those were the cats that inspired me on the B3. It's funny sometimes people will ask me who was one of my bigger influences and they'll laugh when I say Jimi Hendrix because he's from a guitar; but I think I learned more expressiveness and feeling and honesty from his playing. When I first heard him play, I was just always taking all his licks and playing them on the B3 and adapting them, ya know. I don't know why, but that's true. Q: How do you see the importance of the Hammond in rock history and where it's at today? JN: It's an interesting instrument. It was such an ahead of it's time by Lawrence Hammond. When he invented this thing I don't know if he actually knew what he'd done because, for some reason, it became the main staple in bands in the 50s, 60s, 70s, and early 80s. you look at the play-list back in those days and you go from James Brown to Tower Of Power to Vanilla Fudge to the Young Rascals to Emerson lake & Palmer to Genesis to Soft Machine to Yes , and I could probably name 100 of them and every one of them had a B3 in it......Humble Pie. You couldn't even find a band in those days...and if you were a keyboard player and didn't have a B3, you almost closed the door if you were trying to get in bands and get out there. Of course, it fell out of favor with the advent of the DX-7 and all these little wimpy synthesizers, and everybody got into all that kind of stuff for a long time. But I never got rid my B3, I always had a couple of B3s. And when I moved out to California I kept them with me, and in my own projects around town I would always use them. People would think i was crazy always carting this B3, but once i got it set up and started playing they'd go 'oh man - that's the real thing!' So when Billy asked me to dust the cobwebs off and try and do something together I was kinda like 'Hey yeah - let's do something!'. It's kind of cool that in actual fact 3 albums later we're in the black and causing a bit of a stir with music that we love based upon sort of retro sounds and retro music. Q: I got the new album and you can't really categorize it, there's funk, jazz, rock - all those sorts of things. where do you see it? JN: Well, because of the nature of the 3 guys in the band, and none of it's contrived, It's just what comes up. Me and Billy do most of the writing. And even though I have a blues-funk-rock background, and Billy is more of a wide range of rock - progressive rock, what i think the music comes out to be is I use a lot of jazz harmonies, but still putting it over rock and funk and blues grooves. Usually when you've got rock, funk and blues grooves you don't have jazz harmonies that much. If you get too jazzy then it starts going in to fusion. So I think Billy kind of grounds the band with his rock-blues vibe, and Dennis grew up as the funk player with P-Funk and even though he can play anything his roots are pretty much a funk drummer, and I grew up [like i said] playing blues and funk, and a little bit of jazz; so i think we got jazz harmonies over blues-funk grooves, and none of it's contrived because we just do what we do. We're not sort of slaves to the hit machines or the radios because we didn't anything would ever happen with this anyway. We just did it to have fun. So it's kind of nice that it's already in the black and creating a bit of a vibe, and now people are starting to e-mail us. And guess we're starting to develop our own sound, and that wasn't intentional as much as just what we love to do. Q: How do you approach putting together the songs? JN: Well, me and Billy both have pretty sophisticated home studios; they're very similar. So he's always in there playing around when he's in town and so am I. And since I write for a variety of projects I just put sketches down and when it comes close to record time for Niacin me and him get together and sort of listen to the sketches and pick the ones that we mutually like and start jamming; put the drum machine on or program some drums, start recording some of the stuff, and when a certain magic happens and we find a tune that could be on the record then I usually take it back to my studio, being more of the arranger, and I'll finish the demo from all the input that we just did and then Billy comes over and listens to it and we do final tweakings, and once it's in the ballpark we just do it til we have 15 - 20 songs, and usually by that time it's time to record, so then we make a DAT, send it to Dennis, Dennis listens to it, and literally shows up. We don't really rehearse, we just go into the studio because everyone's supposed to know their parts at that point. Then we just do a couple of takes per song, and that's what comes out. It's a pretty simple project to record because you've only got 3 guys and there's not a lot of over-dubs; there's hardly any over-dubs at all, other than to correct a few clams or if i have to add a piano part. Q: Now the Hammond's the main instrument.... JN: That was the original idea and we're kinda keeping it that way. I had a couple of synth things on this record; some piano. Q: I liked the one piano part you had... JN: "Best Laid Plans" - the intro. That was just an improv that I did, and it worked. Q: Does any of the stuff just come out on improv there? JN: Well, that whole piano thing was an improv, and all the solos are improvs. So any time you here a solo - that's an improv. The melodies of course, are worked out in advance, and a lot of times with Dennis we just let Dennis do what he wants. He listens to it and comes up with his own grooves. Q: What can you tell me about Dennis as far as how he is to work with and what you knew about him before-hand? JN: I always admired his playing, and I didn't know that Billy did too. And when me and Billy were writing the record; it was a labor of love and we were using our own money to produce it, we didn't know if we'd ever get arrested or care. We just like 'hey let's write an album's worth of material and when we're done and we like it, we'll find a drummer and we'll go into the studio and record and see it we can get a deal'. It was that simple to us. So when it was time and we had the demos and stuff I said 'Let's go in the studio'. And he looked at me and i looked at him, and I said 'there's a drummer that I've seen a few times live that I don't really know personally but I'd like to play with him; he's amazing talent and it'd be great to have him on the project!' and before I said it he said 'yeah I got a guy like that too!' And i never thought Billy would even know of him, because Dennis is not in the rock world, ya know. But Billy had seen a couple of videos with him on - "Super-Sessions" where there's a bunch of different drummers playing and Dennis blew him away. So at the same time we both said 'Dennis Chambers' and we started laughing. I phoned a friend of mine - Ron Moss, who manages Chick Corea, and he sent him the demo and Dennis liked it and we flew him in, and the rest is history. He's an amazing talent, because he's a very natural drummer. He's got his own style as well. I think that's what makes the band unique because Billy's got his own style, Dennis has his own style, and I've got my roots, and I'd like to think that i have my own niche and style, although I'm not really a blues guy like Jimmy Smith and I'm not totally a jazz guy like Roy Defranchesco [sp?] and not a neo-classical guy like Keith Emerson -- those guys all influenced me. But somehow I've got my only little niche between funk, blues, and rock; and if you put all 3 of those things together and it's very unique. I mean, if one guy in the band changes, the sound would radically change. If I got Markus Miller playing the bass, we'd be a smokin' band - Markus is unbelievable, but then I think we'd be a normal funk trio. Or if we changed drummers and we got Vinnie Calehoutou [sp?] - who's a friend of mine and is a monster, it would still be great, but it would take on a different slant. If we play with different drummers, like on the last record we had some 'guest' drummers because Dennis was only free for about 7 or 8 cuts and then he was on the road, and the others did amazing jobs but me and Billy both noticed that the band just kinda changed as soon as you change the one guy. When you have a trio there's no way around that because you're down to the bare minimum. Q: Where did the name come from? JN: That was sort of a joke, because when we wrote the first tune we needed a name for the tune, and Billy goes 'hey man Vitamin B3 is Niacin, so let's call it Niacin - there ya go - B3!" And I said "well nobody will get that", and he says "it doesn't matter, we'll know what it's all about". Even the name of the new record is a play on words 'Niacin - Deep'; say that fast...... Q: How do you actually come up with titles for instrumental tracks? JN: Well, usually we have working titles, stupid things like "E-Minor" or "Jimi Hendrix Blues", ya know, and name some goofy things. But once we're done with it and we're ready to go master it we seem to get a vibe together and start listing titles that seem to work. It's pretty simple; not too much significance. Some songs get a name right away; for some reason you name it like "I Miss You" and it sticks. Q: What did you think of the vocal track with Glenn and Steve? JN: Oh, i loved it! I thought it was so cool. Q: Have you worked with any of those guys before? JN: Yeah I worked with Glenn a couple of times; Steve I'd never worked with, but it was fun to work with him. Both amazing talents!

Q: Glenn's on a few albums I've got.... JN: He's an amazing singer; from his Deep Purple days on.....And that's the only reason we called those guys; that wasn't planned but that was one of the sketches we had come up with and we were both looking at each other going "ya know I could play the melody on the B3, and we could make a ballad out of it" and that would be typical of Niacin, I think, "but this tune almost seems like it wants a singer - so we either don't do it on the project and save it for some other project or maybe it's OK to get a singer for this one tune". So then i was in the studio writing some songs and with Glenn and I called him up and said "hey are you going to be around in February? Because we got this tune that me and Billy wrote that might be fun for you to come and sing", and he'd already been a fan he'd come and heard us a few times live, and he said "yeah I'm free!". And then when I found out he was available I thought "OH - now we need a guitar player!" [ha ha]. So that's how that happened. Q: Where do you see the band going? and what else would you like to do with it? JN: Well the fact that we made it this far is pretty aussum. And like I said too - it was just a labor of love, and we actually sell enough records and are touring once a year and we're in the black, so we sort of all made a pact to just keep it going. It's sort of a hobby project for us because we've all got other things that we're doing. So it's kinda nice if you have a hobby project, you don't put that much obsession in to it because it's a labor of love and when it's in the black and you kinda go "Wow!", so you sort of don't want to change your view point because the moment you get too serious about stuff like that it's like 'Murphy's Law', ya know. So, we're just going to try to put out a record a year and you know - if it clicks and becomes ... like the fusion bands of the 70s - some of them clicked, some of them didn't. Weather Report was going on and all of a sudden they get a hit out of "Birdland" and next thing you know it's all "oh Weather Report's the next biggest thing..."; the same thing happened with RTF - they were playing in small places and the next thing you know RTF blows out of proportion...So if that happens with Niacin that would aussum, and we'll of course milk it and have some fun; but if it doesn't we're already at the point where we seem to be able to at least put out a record a year and every year we gather more and more fans and more and more momentum. When you keep a project going that's the secret of it's success; if 6 albums later you're a big thing then everybody thinks you're an overnight success. A lot of people didn't know we had 2 records out in the States. I mean in Japan we're like 5 times bigger than we are in the States; so there's a lot of room yet in the States, but now there's a nice underground kinda cult following starting. The only way you can get moving in this industry is word of mouth, especially when you have sort of a 'none radio friendly' project like Niacin. It's not very radio friendly except for certain progressive rock stations or certain college stations, but other than that it'd be very difficult to fit in to a category of how these radio stations run nowadays. And without radio support you've got to rely on the internet and word of mouth, and that stuff, ya know. Q: What else would you like to do as far as composing, like with this band - more classical or more rock oriented, anything that you'd like to try? JN: Well, I don't think we want to pigeon-hole ourselves in to one thing; that's the whole idea behind Niacin that it is a fusion of all our roots, so every time we go in to the studio we try to bring out the blues and the funk and the jazz harmonies, rock -- the high energy of rock, we got a lot of bluesy-funky stuff going on, and jazz voicings and it seems to be where all our love is. I don't think I'd want to go "hey, let's make this album more rock!" or "Let's make this album more jazz!", every time I've seen bands do that I think they fail. So I think we just go in and do what we do best. I personally, once we get a little bigger, is go in a write a Concerto for Niacin, you know - with a whole orchestra. That'd be aussum. It'd still be Niacin, but write it in an orchestral setting around us, but make it a concerto that features the band within an orchestral setting. That'd be fun. But that wouldn't be a whole record, that'd just be one side of it or maybe a 15-20 minute concerto. I might start penning that and see what happens. It depends on the budget though because you've got to pay an orchestra a lot of money [ha]. Q: As far as the live shows go, how do you see the reaction and what do you enjoy playing the most live? JN: The band live is even 20 times more aussum than any of the CDs; the band live is ridiculous. I don't think we've even captured on record the energy that happens live, because a lot of people come in to see a trio and they don't think it's going to be like that; it doesn't sound like a trio it sounds like a Gawdawful big band! It's very screamin and heavy and fill, and everybody's playing their ass off, and there's lot of energy and sweat. It's an aerobic work-out for all 3 of us every time we go on stage we know that an hour and 20 minutes later we're going to be exhausted; it's not a wimpy band for sure! So live it's really fun to play for us, and it's fun for the audience; and I probably enjoy that part of Niacin more than making the records. The records are at times a pain in the a*s, because you know what you've got to do to make a record. But playing live is what we all grew up doing. We've got one live record that's available as an import called "Blood, Sweat and Beers". You can check that out on the internet, it's available. That was cool because it captured the live sound. Q: How does it differ from the studio stuff? JN: Well, the tunes are a lot longer, more improvisational, the concepts are going on. .... Live we extend a lot of solos, and we'll let Dennis of his leash sometimes, and he goes crazy! And the same thing with Billy and with me - extended intros, like that piano intro to "Best Laid Plans" I may play for 5 minutes. So there's a lot more extension, and that's what people want live anyway. I like making albums different than live for that various reason though, because when you get too self-indulgent on a record it can be exciting the first time, but keep putting it on and "Oh God - here's this 10 minute piano solo !", you know!? Where as live you've got the audience there interacting with you and it's way more different and way more justified. So i think the next studio record's going to be more concise. Q: Do you have any favorite tracks on the new album? JN: Yeah I like "Panic Button" a lot. That one is a little more of a rock-fusion tune. I remember when I wrote that line I was [in my mind] thinking of "In The 7th Galaxy" type of concepts from the RTF days. I also like a lot of "Blue Mondo", the one that's got the synth intro, and it gets in to this heavy little weird demented bass lines; i kinda like that tune a lot. But I like the whole record. Q: What do you derive a lot of the riffs from? anything you're currently listening to? JN: I'm always listening to new stuff. One of my favorite piano players I've been listening to lately is Gonzalo Rubicabo [sp?] - a jazz Cuban guy, amazing. Dennis turned me on to him actually. An Amazing jazz pianist, and he comes from a Cuban / Latin background of course, and chops up the wazoo, and taste. So I've been listening to a lot of him. Most of my stuff in Niacin I keep sort of contained slightly into the area; like I told you most of my soloing I kind of keep within the realms of blues and funk, and maybe a little bit of jazz going, but there's more jazz harmony than there is jazz solos. Where as my own John Novello solo project [that I'm working on] is a little more jazz-funk oriented, where as this is a little more rock and blues oriented. So in my other project sometimes I'll go a lot more outside, a little more jazz-fusion kind of concepts as well too. That stuff in Niacin, a lot of that comes from Jimi Hendrix, Steve Winwood, Eric Clapton, Cream, Traffic, Blind Faith - all that era of sort of rock/blues, R & B/Soul playing. And i think that kind of soloing over the Niacin kind of 'pocket' works really good; if I went a little too outside I think it wouldn't sort of work in this project. Q: What else do have going as far as your own stuff? JN: Well, I've got a project - 'The John Novello Project' that has Melvin Davis in it, Eric Marinthol [sp?], a variety of different guys that I'm working on right now, playing around town, stuff like that. It's all my own compositions, and like I said it's a little more jazz-funk-r & b oriented, so I've got a lot of material written on that, and a lot of it's recorded. So when I finish that I'll probably try and get that out sometime this year. And then another project I'm going to try and do is going to be another trio, but it's going to be me playing hammond, a sax and drums - where I'm going to kick pedals on the B3. That should be fun. I've always wanted to do that because i used to play a lot in strip clubs in Boston. And I just did a project with Andy Summers [the guy from The Police]; I played B3 on his record. He did a tribute to Charlie Mingus [sp?] that I played on. Q: You do teaching and stuff as well!? JN: Yeah I have a whole product line now called "The Contemporary Keyboardist". It was published on Warners, now it's on Hal Leonard [sp?]. I do a lot of clinics, and not so much one on one teaching, I do a little. But The Contemporary Keyboardist I have 2 books out and 3 videos, and I'm developing a whole line of Contemporary Keyboardist for them - which is my own line. It seems to be getting popular and it's endorsed by a lot of the top guys. It's for professionals or amateurs that want to be professionals. Q: And you also work with Gloria... JN: yeah my wife Gloria Rusch Novello. I just finished a CD on her that I'm going to be getting out very shortly. It's called "Tightrope" and it's got a lot about 13-14 songs on it, which is cool. She's an aussum aussum singer! Q: What kind of stuff is that? JN: It's kind of a R & B project, but it's a very sophisticated R & B, it's got a lot of jazz overtones in it. So, she scats and sings like Sarah Vaughn and Ella Fitzgerald, but it's not straight ahead jazz tunes it's over funk and R&B kind of grooves. It's sort of sophisticated Anita Baker - Steely Dan kind of concept. ... I do all the writing and she wrote most of the lyrics. [Talk ensues on my 'thoroughness', Heepsters, ... ] Q: Have you ever seen Uriah Heep at all? JN: yeah. Q: What did you think of them? JN: They're great. We did the NAMM show a couple of years ago and Ken was the guy that put it together; he was the host actually. So it was kind of fun having him introduce the band. Q: As far as the 'definitive' hammond albums in rock - what would you pick? JN: There's 2 favorite bands, one is called 'Quatermass' - a late 70s German band, a trio. Unbelievable! You have to get this band. I think Pete Robinson was the organ player. Amazing stuff, because he did orchestrations, mix, and it was very weird stuff. It was sort of rock-funk-jazzy-classical- avant garde stuff. And of course I loved Soft Machine. They used to open up for Jimi Hendrix when Hendrix did his first tour. Mike Ratlidge [sp?] on organ. They were another English band that was really aussum. And then of course how can you discount Keith Emerson who's probably the father of rock - hammond playing, and then Jimmy Smith who's the father of the hammond period, as far as his blues stuff. But for me there's no 'definitive'; that word doesn't work for me because every one of those guys I mentioned and all the others that were my mentors all definitively inspired me. Lee Michaels was amazing, let alone Jon Lord, Rick Wakeman, Brian Auger, Felix Cavalliere, Mark Stein, Tony Biggs, Stevie Winwood, the list goes on. Some of those guys weren't top guys but they were so stylistically amazing... Mike Finnegan who played on "Electric Ladyland" with Hendrix. All those guys were inspirational for me, and their licks and concepts wore on me. [Thanks and Good-byes] Interview by Kevin J. Julie, 2000. Copyright KJJ.