friends telling their Paul Allen stories, this from a pretty good blues musician (how he came to owe the 3rd richest man $25)
Posted by
zeitgeist
Oct 16 '18, 00:15
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Clint Woodbury
7 hrs ·
Just heard of the passing of Paul Allen. I guess I can now share a story I've only told a few people, and that I told no one at the time because I had signed an NDA.
This is a story called "I owe one of the richest men on the planet 25 bucks."
Maybe a year or two ago, I received an email by way of Rick J Bowen and the WBS about a recording session at Paul Allen's private studio.
Basically, the backstory goes like this: one of the lesser bits of trivia regarding Paul Allen is that he's a pretty good guitar player, especially good at the Hendrix stuff, which explains some of the Hendrix family ties to the opening of the museum now called MoPOP, but was originally the Experience Music Project.
He has his own recording studio and staff that runs it. At least one of the ways he had fun with this particular toy of his was he would hire musicians, in this case his staff must have decided contacting the blues society was the way to go, to have them write some stuff in studio for him to play with later.
Since I already knew about his reputation, I went in with the full expectation of anything I recorded would be the first thing pulled and tracked over. Didn't care, was doing a session at PA's studio. The really weird part was right after I knew when the date was, the request was to come up with stuff that combined the styles of Pink Floyd and Radiohead...
Oooookay, I thought you hired me/us for blues. I think I can fake a bit of Dave Gilmour's vibe, but though I've listened to and admired Radiohead's songwriting, I think the only song of theirs I've ever played was "No Surprises" and even then I was working up a solo acoustic version, not trying to cop their style. So I listened and tried finding some tips online.
Day of the session I struggled through traffic to get there on time, making it to the gate at the last second. The other guys I remember were Patrick McDanel on bass, Brian Olendorf on Keys and Rick J Bowen on Drums Everyone's car is let through the gate and I follow them down to the studio... oh wait, no, I had to check in at the security desk and sign the paperwork/NDA/etc. Back up the hill I go, and hope no one shoots me as an intruder before I get back.
Then back down to the studio. The main room is about a three story high chamber of glass facing out to all the natural beauty you can imagine on a nice Pacific Northwest day, and there was a. stream. running, through, the. studio! They built this building over a tiny stream, so there was a winding section of glass through the entire room, and because it was a studio, it was thick enough glass that you could *see* the stream but not *hear* it.
The rest of the building has stories on both sides, one housing the control room, the other a few stories of business offices and the break room. I could look up the rough date of when this was by this one fact I remember: they had the last cans of Coke Zero (not Coke Zero Sugar) anywhere that I'd seen.
There was themed displays of instruments and accompanying memorabilia around every corner in the office spaces: a Beatles theme, a Hendrix theme, a Seahawks theme... The studio had an amp room with all sorts of different amplifiers; and with all the exotic choices there, what does this genius choose? A Fender Hot Rod Deluxe. I knew what I needed to dial in and how it would react to the Keeley Dark Side of the Moon workstation I'd grabbed from the walk-in pedal closet. I needed to make sure I had something that would play nice with fuzz.
I think we did about four or five "write a progression and improvise" tracks in as close a style as a bunch of blues guys can conjure up on two very different but very moody bands. I thought we did OK, but we never got another call. Or at least I didn't.
We got fed, and we got paid at the end of the day. Part of the not disclosing anything, all the noises you make belong to us, and no paper trail meant included being paid in cash at the end of the day. We were paid $475 each for the session, and because I was using more of their things that needed to be packed up and put away, I was the last in line... And they only had hundreds in the "petty cash drawer" by the time they got to me. "Anyone have change?" We're a bunch of blues musicians, I didn't have twenty five bucks, and no one else there could break a hundred dollar bill. So after a quick phone call they gave me five Ben Franklins, and I think there was a note about the twenty five dollar difference on my hand written and signed by me receipt.
So for the rare person that I told this story I would end it with "And that's how I owe a multi-billionaire twenty five bucks; and if he wants it bad enough to come ask me for it, I'll give it to him."
I guess I can keep it. R.I.P. Mr. Allen. I hope there's another side that you can crank up your amp to ten and play to your heart's content.
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zeitgeist
Oct 16, 00:18
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