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HIS-STORY
Born in Northern California, while the “Beatles” were wearing leather and touring the bad side of Munich, this young lad ( We’ll call him Torn ) got an early upbringing to the music scene, and the diverse sounds being made during the sixties. From Garfunkle, to Hendrix, he showed appreciation for it all…
While his older brother was playing “Door-Gunner” in Vietnam, this five year old kid assumed the roll of “King of the Bachelor Pad”, Better known as the basement. His warrior brother had left behind a closet full of merchandise that, as you would expect a five year old to think, was absolutely astounding.
There was a chrome plated bayonet, some R.O.T.C. metals, about forty albums, a bottle of Jack Daniels, and a Record Player. No, he later admitted that the bourbon remained untouched, but the records, on the other hand, were used almost daily, along with the record player of course. Surprisingly, upon his Brothers return in the early seventies, all albums were still in tact.
Oh, but what happened to the young mind raised by his parents on Perry Como, and the Lawrence Welk Show, once the seeds of Creedence, the Stones, and Jimi had sprouted ?
As it turns out the Big Brother got married and moved out, after the war, and left the record player, the “Bachelor Pad”, but no albums. Saving his allowance to go to Tower Records once every other month it became a challenge not to spend the hard earned (Slow Earned) money on bad material. He had some hits, and some misses, but even the misses contributed to what would eventually become influences on the music that this young lad would one day, compose.
Led Zeppelin 2, was the first bought with H.E.C. ( Hard Earned Cash ), then came Zep-1, had to back track. Gordon Lightfoot to Frampton, Aerosmith to Eagles, It took years at the rate of pay he had to work with. Then came the big break…
A Job, at 13 years old, with his other older Brother, who owned a produce store. Not only that, but this guy had a gold mine of albums… More Jimi, more Zep, Jannis, Stones, and Creedence than you can shake a stick at, Twice…
Believe it , or not, one of the most influential rock n roll realities, for this kid, was when he saw the “Willie and the Poor boys” album cover, one of C.C.R.’s records, and realized that the cover photo was taken at the “Duck-Kee-Market”, which just happened to be across the street from the Jr. High school he was going to. Wow, used to get the best fried rice on the east bay that sixty cents could buy.
During this stage of Torn’s life he wanted, like most kids, to be a Rock Star. That was never to happen, but the young man did go as far as to cut-out, from ply-wood, a scale model of a Fender Stratocaster Guitar. No strings, but an inner tube from a stingray bicycle, worked wonderfully as a strap. In the Bachelor Pad-This Kid Could Rock…
It wasn’t until he was fifteen years old that his parents bought him an electric guitar. With Jimi Hendrix Posters on the wall, the first night he learned the bass riffs to “The Wind Cries Mary”, keep in mind at this point the kid had no clue what a chord was, and still doesn’t…
He played from the age of fifteen, through High School, and several bands, until the age of twenty three, when the axe was dropped completely for about five years. At twenty eight he picked it up again after moving to North Carolina. There he was introduced to such bands as Animal Bag, and Fire house, on a personal level. He used to watch them both practice, and perform, another inspiring era.
Torn purchased a few implements and began writing, and recording songs for a hobby. This lasted from 1988 to 1991, then, again, he dropped it, like a hot potato. He did not touch his equipment until march of the year 2000. He was asked, and tried out for a local band that some friends had been dabbling with for years, and ended up playing gigs with them, until a full year had gone by.
March of 2001, was time to go Solo…
“And the rest is his-story, that’s all he would tell me”.
Torn says, “It’s a hobby”, but I think it’s a little more than that…
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