Tired of the same ol' cookie cutter radio hokum that only makes it to the airwaves after a station manager collects his 100 grand from the label? Finding it hard to relate to the latest bling-adorned prison-bound thug who can't count to three but somehow has a multi-platinum recording career? Do you miss the music that had more than two chords and was actually played by people?

Do you miss the REAL SOUND OF PHAT AND PHONKKY GROOVE BANDS whose records sound as killin' as the live show???

Well, so did we. So we stopped complaining about it and did something.

Enter- LIVE FUNK NOUVEAU

This band has been my passion project - culminating from my years of soaking in all the great elements of live music that I have been a part of and grew up listening to.

What an undertaking. A 12 piece funk "supergroup" is not easy to just throw together and record. Who do I think I am, anyway? Well, the end result met my expectations so completely that I must say that I AM SPARTACUS!!! The album's phenomenal musicians and collaborators, who I also have the honor of calling friends, gave so tirelessly and delivered so solidly that the weight of a single CD copy belies the raging girth contained within.

They believed in the project. And, given their successes and busy schedules, did NOT need some kooky "visionary" to latch on to.  One horn session was done on the hottest day of the year with no air conditioning. I can't believe those guys still talk to me.

WHY?

Over the years of playing with many incredibly funky friends and creating some of the most gut- bustin' rump-shakin' grooves in various fabulous and NOT so fabulous live settings, I've had the insatiable desire to recreate and share those moments with the music-lovin' world at large. Perhaps as penance for allowing so many great nights of music to disappear unceremoniously into the floorboards of NY clubs and event halls. When you have to play the same aging dance floor anthems eighty times a week, you develop insanely fun ways to do it as a matter of self preservation, but don't bother taping it. Oh, what to do with those fleeting groove gems and lost epiphanies of band interplay? The concept for a group playing new inspired electric soul based on the live energy and grooves from these otherwise forgettable cover gigs began to shape in my head.

We spent over four years writing and recording the resulting album. I know that when you listen to it you will be transported back to groove music's glory years when said cuts were fun, funky, musically satisfying, and were, for the most part, positive and uplifting. Our influences from electric funk's golden age may be obvious in this effort, but that's the point, friends.

The wonderful humans on this record include:

Myself on Rhodes, synths, organ, talk box and occasional synth bass.
Greg Novick on bass and EFX
Tony Ormond on guitars
Harvey Morris and Dan Atherton on drums
Chuck Stanley, Ron Anthony and Roslyn Brown all sharing lead and backing vocals
Anibal Rojas on tenor, baritone saxaphones, flutes and EWI
Chris Anderson and Don Harris on trumpets and flugelhorns
Walter Hawk on trombone
Robbie Gonzalez on Percussion