In a summer filled with cancelled shows, it’s strange to realize that Joy on Fire’s debut gig was 11 years ago, at the Hexagon in Baltimore. First and foremost, thanks to Carlos Guillen, of The Expanding Man and The Expanding Band, for booking that show and doing sound. Carlos has been a friend for a long time, and we did a gig together recently at The Lou Costello Room, also in Baltimore, and we look forward to gigging with Carlos in the future…if and when gigs start happening again!
The band that night 11 years ago was Cory Tallarico on drums, Erich von Marko on guitar, keys, and vocals, Anna on saxes, and myself on bass. Two of the songs we played that night—“Double Dub” and “Red Wave”—are songs that the current version of Joy on Fire still plays. Though the version of “Double Dub” on 2018’s Fire with Fire—with effects added by Mat of Mobtown Studios and the addition of bari sax during the coda and a strong live performance all around—is now the ideal, I have fond memories of the version we played that night at the Hexagon. Cory and I had been working on the tune since before Anna and Erich joined the group, and had the rhythm section tight and dynamic, bouncing with the pulse created by the delay on my bass. Erich played a Fender Jaguar, or maybe it was a Jazzmaster, with a tremolo bar, and the echoed out wigglies he created were perfect for the vibe of the tune. Anna recreated the middle section of the song, and continues to recreate it today, soloing with no accompaniment until the band blasted back in underneath her. In our current version, Chris adds percussion during Anna’s break—even better!
“Red Wave” is the first tune Anna and I ever played together, in the basement practice room of Cory’s Pigtown rowhouse, near the harbor in Baltimore. Various recorded versions of this song had been floating around, unfinished. When the first version of the group split into two groups, with Cory and Erich forming Track & Stream, Carlos stepped in and sequenced some beats for the tune, which we worked on at Mobtown Studios, but this version of the track remains, for the moment, unfinished. Until recently, a version of the song engineered by Anna at Princeton Studios also remained incomplete. But thanks to Brian Erickson and his Demos for a Difference project (with all proceeds going to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund, buy it here!), and to Chris for suggesting the song, a version of the tune, which will eventually be the title track of the Red Wave album, is out in the world. Check it out!
Header photos by Tali Mindek, July 26, 2009.