Episode 9

The Armadillo and Jeff Berlin

This is the first in a series of several conversations between Anuj and Pat. Often Pat narrates stories to Anuj about the days of music (especially his experiences with Austin Music) during the 60s and 70s. A decade Anuj only knows through records and hearsay as he was born in 1979. The conversation is filled with a fascination for the nostalgic and an increased respect for memories.

P:... playing in "One Hand Clapping" with the Electromagnets in the 70s got us into the Armadillo. That went over really well with the people in Austin. That show was just incredible.

Newspeper clipping from the Armadillo

A: It was like a showcase?

P: It turned out being a showcase. It didn't start out being one but it ended up being one for us. The buzz was amongst the Jazz Fusion people in Austin though. People who knew about us. Nobody in the radio / music business / or in the real world knew who we were. They were like - who? Nobody knew who we were... But we did make some fantastic connections after playing at the Armadillo.

A: wow... that's cool...

P: you've got to include this part... -- The Armadillo was the coolest venue I've ever played and we were treated the best there. The gigs we played there each time was a great experience. It was like an airplane hangar. A huge building. The stage was really big. They had a great backstage area - that had rooms and separate bathrooms Each band had their own changing room, that was actually comfortable. They provided you with drinks and food - as much beer, soft drinks, water and food you wanted.

The Armadillo restroom

I didn't eat before a show.. but they most definitely provided hot meals.

A: Was it a restaurant as well?

P: It was a restaurant / bier garden outside. They had a band playing outside as well - they served Nachos and Mexican food and stuff like that. It was a very friendly atmosphere. And right after the food they would bring hot towels to the musicians so that they could clean up right before going on stage.

A: Wow. That's unheard of nowadays.

P: It was like 'God - this is incredible'. They were treating us like we were stars. And at that time we weren't anybody - we were Joe Nobody's. I was just so impressed with that. I thought, at least there's this one little place in the universe where people are treated the way they should be treated.

And.. so anyway.. back to the original story....

We did these shows there and made some good connections. Because of that we ended up doing shows with Bill Brufford and Larry Coryell. And a couple of other big name jazz acts that we backed up.

There's this really cool one when One had Clapping opened for Bill Brufford I had a chance to meet Jeff Berlin there and being a big huge Jack Bruce fan and not knowing who his inspirations were - I asked him who he listened to - well.. .he said Jack Bruce and that just blew me away. It made me feel like I was at least on some kind of right track.




Actually If you listen to the early Brufford albums, where Jeff Berlin is playing you can see that he is getting a lot of stuff from Jack Bruce - especially the singing. So I was really happy to make that little connection.

A: That must have definitely been inspirational...

P: It sure was. The Armadillo had some great memories.