On The Road

Welcome to Bob Bradshaw’s “On The Road” Blog!

admin — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 15:00:33 +0000

Hi and welcome to my “On The Road” blog, where from time to time I’ll throw up (pun intended) some road stories, pictures and video, of my time “out of town”. I’m not necessarily the seasoned road dog that a lot of guys are, but I have spent a fair amount of time “on the bus” as it were, mostly with my dear friend Steve Lukather and his former band Toto. But my road stories don’t start there, as I met Steve in the summer of ‘84, and prior to that I spent the better part of ‘83 taking care of Mike Landau and Larry Klein on Joni Mitchell’s world tour. And I actually hopped off a Bette Midler tour working with Buzz Feiten (with his blessing) to go out with Joni. Whew! But my road time really started in 1982 when I was asked to go out to work with Buzz Feiten, Michael Landau, and Robert “Pops” Popwell on Olivia Newton-John’s “Physical Tour”. You see, I had been working with Buzzy for the past year or two, maintaining this crazy new (for the time) “switching system” housed in a Panasonic home stereo component “rack”. There was nothing else out there like it, and who better to maintain it on a big tour like this than the guy who designed and built it? Buzzy insisted I come out with him, and this actually cost a guy his job, as the production manager (as is typical I came to find out) usually hires all the crew. Funny thing is, I actually worked with the guy that got fired on Joni’s tour.Lucky for me there were no hard feelings. Anyway, so here I am the “new guy” and I really had to prove myself around a bunch of seasoned “veterans”. I had a few hoops to jump through here. First, I’m as green as grass, and second, I was hired due to a “muso’s” insistance. Good thing for me, I’m pretty easy to get along with, and that is half the battle right there, especially in a touring situation as I was about to find out. I did gain respect early on due to my technical abilities which helped a great deal too. Nobody could fuck with me there! I have to give special thanks here to my old friend Barrie Owen (truly a seasoned road dog) who taught me a few “rules and regulations” about road life including what to wear (a lot of black)!

Olivia Newton-John "Physical Tour" 1982 crew. Thats me in red to the right of ONJ....

Here is Joni Mitchell's 1983 Tour crew lounging backstage at what was once called "Irvine Meadows" . Thats me, third from left, on the couch. The guy on the far left with the shades, Tony Leo, is the one that got bumped when I got hired on Olivia's tour.

Here is a bunch of tired hung over sob's waiting to go home from a long European run with ToTo in 1987. Thats me second from left, looking real happy.

So I hope to be putting a lot more stuff up in the weeks and months to come, so check back often. You never know when stuff will show up…and I have a lot of stuff!

MLT Japan 1999

admin — Sat, 03 Oct 2009 07:41:58 +0000

This should be a real treat for fans of Michael Landau.

In 1999 The Michael Landau Trio went to Japan for a series of shows, all at the same venue, Club Goodman, in Tokyo.I went along as “staff videographer”, and got some amazing footage.These never before seen clips are taken from a 87 minute “movie” I produced when we returned from the trip. I believe the only people to have seen this stuff is the band, myself and a few friends.

This is the only time you will see footage of this particular band in a “produced” multi-camera setting with decent audio quality. The band put on great shows, and the Japanese fans were always into the music and very enthusiastic as you will see.The Austin Powers movie was big at the time,which we all loved, so there are a lot of AP references throughout the clips!

Technical Notes:
The MLT Live in Japan 99 movie was shot with a Canon L2 Hi8 video camcorder. This was a cool machine for the time with interchangeable lenses,semi-pro feel with kind of a film look, and many other great features. The video footage was not assembled in a computer. This was all done with multiple (4) Sony Hi8 players connected to a stand-alone Videonics video mixer and separate edit controller.The movie was a nightmare to assemble, with over 100 events in the controller’s “edit decision list”. And any time there was a problem (and there were many) the edit controller assembly would freeze, and I would have to start over. I would have to sit and watch the assembly process, because often source tapes would have to be swapped at various points in the time-line. And it all had to be done in real time! All in all it took about 40 hours to put together a finished “master”.These days, with imovie or Final Cut Pro, this kind of stuff is a no-brainer, and is relatively easy to do. I have actually put the entire “film” into imovie and cleaned up some edits. The footage has a raw “dirty” look to it that I love. I especially like the “Oh My” montage. That took some time, as video and audio were not synced to time-code. Also, note that the performance video multi-camera transitions were done in real time by the club staff, using the same Videonics gear I used to mix the videotapes. Nice work there fellas!

If you watch these clips in order, you will get the “feel” I intended for the movie, but in somewhat edited form. So, in honor of the 10 year anniversary of these shows, Check out “The Michael Landau Trio Japan 1999″.

The love of the bus…

admin — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 05:08:49 +0000

These days I have a love/hate relationship with touring. Well, maybe more love/kind-of-a-pain relationship. Its kind of like bad pizza. There really is no bad pizza, right? Well…maybe. But back in ‘82 everything was shiny and new, and I loved it. Hell, I had hardly ever been on a airplane…shit, I hadn’t even seen snow! Thats how green I was. But I love the bus. Still do. And I especially love getting on the bus after a show… the gear is all packed up, you’ve had a shower, and you come out and smell that diesel fuel with the bus idling…waiting to get out of town, and on to the next one. You get on, maybe grab a beer and a sandwich or a slice, or maybe something else, depending on what you are into…and you wait to start rolling. I always grab a window seat, and have to face forward. That’s just me. I love the drive out of town, before we hit the freeways.That’s the best. Sometimes I’ll ride shotgun, next to the driver, or sometimes in Europe with double deckers,up top in the crows nest.And usually ya gotta rock the tunes. So an ipod is mandatory, but back then (in’82)it was Sony Walkman Pro cassette players. I remember a particular favorite back then was Roxy Musics’ Avalon record (they were “records” back then) as a soundtrack for getting out of town…

Avalon.mp.3

A Stateside Bus...a/k/a Home Away From Home...

European Double Deckers nose to nose...

More Olivia

admin — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 05:00:44 +0000

The Olivia Newton-John “Physical Tour” in 1982 was a whole bunch of fun for me, mainly because everything in regards to touring was new. I was extremely lucky and fortunate in that I totally bypassed that whole “get in the van” grind of touring. My touring career started at a whole ‘nother level. I didn’t experience van touring until much later, and just enough to realize that it ain’t my bag.

ONJ Cruises the Parking Lot...

Olivia herself was a sweetheart. Not that I spent a lot of time hanging out with her, but whenever I did come into contact with her, she was always sweet and nice. At the end of tour party, she even came up to each and every one in the crew and gave each of us a tour bonus check. I got $500. Back then that was a nice bonus for a summer tour. At least it was to me.

On this tour, I was responsible for 3 guys. Buzz Feiten, whose guitar rig I designed and built, legendary bassist Robert “Pops” Popwell (of The Crusaders, among many others)And a new guy I had met recently who was about to change my life in a very profound way, Michael Landau. I actually met Mike at a Tom Scott recording session for the record “Desire”.

This was a live to two track recording at Ocean Way Studios in Hollywood. Buzzy was on the date too, and that was when I found out Mike was to be on the Olivia tour as well.

The Set List

I was there doing something for Buzzy (it seemed back then I was always doing something for Buzzy), and here was this guy with his Mesa Boogie amps along with a few gizmos, and we got to talking. The rest is history. Needless to say, we became fast friends, and got to know each other a little on Olivia’s tour that summer. As the band traveled separately from the crew, I would generally see him mainly on show days, and sometimes on days off. This is where we started planning a rig for him, which took on many permutations over years. I can say with confidence that many (or most) of the early major breakthroughs I had when it comes to guitar system design came about with Mike Landau as the catalyst.

Much much more on Mike later….

The "String Section" ... LtoR Pops, Buzzy, and Mike

Mike Landau's "Olivia" Rig 1982 The box at the top of the rack was an early CAE switcher, then a Lexicon PCM 41, and a Roland Rack flanger at the bottom. Mesa Amps, and EVM12L speakers in Mesa cabs.

Buzzy had a crazy rig at the time, and it seemed we were always tweeking something, either effects, how they were in the signal path, or the guitars themselves. Buzzy was what I call a “seeker”…never quite satisfied, but appreciative of my efforts. After all, we were in uncharted territory and I was happy to have someone always open to my suggestions, as I was trying out new ideas all the time too. Check out photos elsewhere on the site to see what I mean.

Buzz played through Yamaha solid state 1-12 combo amps, and always had his sound no matter what he was playing through at the time. I had loved his playing long before I met him,and can pick him out anywhere. As you might imagine it got fairly loud at times. I’ll never forget the legendary Tom Scott, the musical director, looking over to his left and shouting …”guys…guys!!…your hurting me!!”

This is Buzz's Rig at the time of Olivia's Tour. Check out the Echoplex mounted in the top, along with a EH Micro Synth, Boss EQ, Dyna Comp, and Tuner. The blue box is a Boss CE 1 Chorus I modified and rack mounted.

Now Pops Popwell was a piece of cake. A Fender Precision Bass and an Acoustic 360 Amp/Cabinet. Speaking of cake, Pops was on some kind of wacky diet. He would carry a bag around with him, and when he would sit down to eat, he would chew his food, then try to discreetly spit the chewed food into hs hand, and put it in the bag. I guess he just wanted the taste! No handshakes at catering!