In 2000 John French, aka Drumbo, was writing his account of his time in the Magic Band, Beefheart: Through The Eyes Of Magic.
The author called on Radar Station visitors to send him their questions and suggestions for the book, to ensure that he included the details that you wanted to know. Many of you responded to this appeal and John French passed on his sincere thanks.
Many of the questions were of a very specific nature and couldn’t be easily covered in the format of a biographical book. Since they were also very interesting questions well worth addressing, John suggested that his answers could be made available at the Radar Station as a preview to the book.
True to his word, here they are:
- Introduction by John French
- Questions from Eric Clark
John’s drum style. Tunings and favoured equipment. - Questions from Joe Ashworth
TMR drum rhythms. Rehearsals. TMR live. Don’s emotions. Zappa’s bonding effect. Drugs. Don’s lyric writing. - Questions from Robert
Post-Trout Mask possibilities. - Questions from Duncan Lockerbie
Drugs. Don’s psychic ability. - Questions from Cisco Garcia
Abuse. - Questions from Bob Jennings
The “post-Szabo Archtop period”. - Questions from Bruno Ghezzi
Bass clarinets. - Questions from Basil Storey
Dancing to the Magic Band. - Questions from The Artist Who May Become Known As John Ellis
Changes to the song lyrics. Heckling incidents. Animal from The Muppets. - Questions from Pierre Antaya
Antelope Valley. Ecology. John Parr. Strictly Personal guitar styles. Band input. Disappointment with Spotlight Kid. Don and science. Drummers who influenced John. - Questions from Robert Carey
Trout house. Musical influences. Band members’ personalities. Band’s thoughts on Trout Mask. Difficulties creating Trout Mask. Who wrote the music? Ex-members’ music. Don’s vision. Decals, BJ&MB & Mallard. Debra Kadabra. Voices on Trout Mask. Don and money. - Questions from Steven Ceiro
Don’s rhythmic ideas. Don’s musical training. Improvisation. Multiple time signatures. - Questions from Dan Mellamphy
John’s thoughts on Tom Waits. - Questions from Matt Janovic
Don’s meeting with Ornette Coleman. - Questions from Hans Van Hulst
Day-to-day life in the Trout House. - Questions from John Wilby
Stage-names. - Questions from Jarkko Nevalainen
Jeff Moris Tepper. - Questions from Michael H
Don’s thoughts on other artists. Influences on TMR drums. Don and religion. The relationship between lyrics and music. - Questions from Wingnut
Train-hopping. - Questions from Steven Vacca
Don’s ex-girlfriend Laurie. - Questions from Monique / Michael Cohen
Don and Frank. The Beatles. Strictly Personal. John’s work with Richard Thompson. - Questions from Marshall Needleman Armintor
TMR’s commercial potential. - Questions from Basil Storey part 2
Band rehearsals. Recruitment of musicians. - Questions from John Wilby
Beefheart’s influence on other musicians. Greg “Ella Guru” Davidson. - Questions from Ralf NygÂrd
Drugs. - Questions from Paul Lewis
Transition from blues to avant-garde. ‘Field recording’ approach of TMR. - Questions from the 5th Procurator of Judea
Steve Reich. - Questions from John Mackenzie
John’s transcriptions of Don’s ideas. Magic Band line-up changes.
The pictures on this page are stills from the BBC documentary The Artist Formerly Known As Captain Beefheart. John French writes:
This interview was done at Whites Cafe in Mojave, where Don’s parents used to take him as a child. He drove up there all the time in the seventies and early eighties when he lived here. I think it was a nostalgic look at his childhood. He may have grieved the loss of his father more than he cared to admit. I recently drove up to Mojave to go to Whites, in search of my own nostalgia, and was saddened to find that the restaurant, a local landmark, had been recently demolished.