RIP Hiram Bullock

[dick swifter]

Hiram Bullock died yesterday. Great player. Bummer...

[Silvertone]

Originally Posted by dick swifter

Hiram Bullock died yesterday. Great player. Bummer...

No way, what from?

Was he sick?

Too bad, what a great player and way too young.

RIP Hiram.

[dick swifter]

Originally Posted by Silvertone

No way, what from?

Was he sick?

Too bad, what a great player and way too young.

RIP Hiram.

This is what I saw....

Hiram Bullock, onetime barefoot guitarist for Paul Shaffer's World's Most Dangerous Band, dead at the age of 52. Bullock had been fighting a tumor in his throat since January.
Bullock played guitar behind Shaffer from the debut of Late Night With David Letterman in 1982 until 1984; rumor had it that he suffered from an attendance problem. He also played on Steely Dan's Gaucho, Paul Simon's One Trick Pony, Michael Franks' Skin Dive, Barbra Streisand's A Star Is Born, and a whole slew of jazz albums.

[dbbubba]

That's sad to hear...

I met him and mixed him live once.
It was in about '86 when he played in a version of "The Blues Brothers" with Danny Aykroyd and Paul Shafer.

Great player.

[dbbubba]

A great quote from Hiram Bullock:

I played bass in my high school rock band (like a million other teenage boys). One day our guitarist, who was slightly older and looked like Eric Clapton, passed out while in the middle of the solo on “Mississippi Queen" (he said later that he was “tired"). Immediately, ten girls jumped up onto the stage, stroking, consoling, and otherwise “reviving him". At that precise moment I decided to switch to guitar.
-Hiram Bullock


Then again... IF you played Mississippi Queen JUST RIGHT... it could induce you to pass out.

Scarey that he died so young.... 52....
I'm 52 and nearing 53... Yiiiiiieeeeeee!!!!!
'cept I don't smoke, drink alchohol OR cold drinks no mo'
(lost 10 lbs. by dropping the Dr. Pepper habit!)

[doorknocker]

Sad news, I just listened to 'Gaucho' yesterday, actually checking the liner notes and learning that Hiram played on at least one track. So it's weird to learn of his passing now.

I remember reading an interview with him where he talked about doing his 'appliance test' for Berklee (or maybe Miami), the teacher in charge was Pat Metheny...... Pat suggested playing some standard, Hiram said he didn't know it, Pat suggested another tune, same answer. So finally Metheny said 'Let's play a blues' and Hiram went 'Yeah, i can do that' and went on to do some pentatonic playing in one position while Pat did some incredible jazz-blues stuff. After jamming for a while, Pat decided to put Hiram into the most advanced group of students. He said that he heard something in his playing that very few student had. 'All this other stuff you can learn'. After a while of studying with Pat, Hiram asked him some very advanced jazz theory question and Pat answered by saying 'Are you sure that you really want to be a jazz player?'.

I found that little story very inspiring and obviously Hiram was somebody that was able to do his own thing without copying anybody.

RIP

[henryrobinett]

That's a drag. I kind of met him once at a Mike Stern gig in NYC. This was probably mid to 80s. Mike was going into the studio the next day and Hiram was producing.

Last year a buddy of mine was playing in NY at a jazz festival and spotted this guitar player, who was playing great. He couldn't place him. Everyone laughed and told him it was Hiram Bullock. He had apparently ballooned up in weight.

[Digitar]

What a loss. He was an enormously talented player. His years of heavy drug use must have taken a toll. He said on his website that he paid a high price, emotionally, spiritually, and physically from all the years of abuse. Quote " It's an ass kicker ".

He will be missed. RIP

[dick swifter]

Why was this thread moved to the Moan Zone?

[Toad]

Originally Posted by dick swifter

Why was this thread moved to the Moan Zone?

I was wondering the same thing?

[Remoteness]

I have a great Hiram story to tell about the time we recorded the Grammy winning live recording "Bud & Bird" by Gil Evans and the Monday Night Orchestra from Sweet Basil's in NYC.

I'm in the middle of prep, so I have to post the story after this weekend's barrage of gig dates.

In the meantime, FYI:

Hiram Bullock will be celebrated at a Memorial Next Week on Tuesday August 5th at 6PM at the SGI Buddhist Cultural Center, 7 East 15th Street (right off Union Square) in New York City.

[paultools]

Saw him live at a small club in Cambridge, MA...Charely Drayton on drums...
one of the best performances I've ever witnessed!
I loved his work on Late Night, as well as his contributions to Luther Vandross, Change, and many others.
I always hoped back in the day to go to 7th AV South to hear him with the Brecker Brothers.

RIP, and thanks for your art!

[Geert van den Berg]

Originally Posted by dick swifter

Why was this thread moved to the Moan Zone?

I agree, I have no idea why this is, do you know in which forum this thread originated?


RIP Hiram!

[dick swifter]

Originally Posted by Geert van den Berg

I agree, I have no idea why this is, do you know in which forum this thread originated?


RIP Hiram!

It started in "So much gear so little time"

Another of my posts got deleted in this thread explaining the nature of his death. I don't know why or who's doing the editing 'round here.

[henryrobinett]

Originally Posted by dick swifter

It started in "So much gear so little time"

Another of my posts got deleted in this thread explaining the nature of his death. I don't know why or who's doing the editing 'round here.

Can you please post that again?

[Jules]

Originally Posted by dick swifter

Why was this thread moved to the Moan Zone?

Originally Posted by Toad

I was wondering the same thing?

Originally Posted by Geert van den Berg

I agree, I have no idea why this is, do you know in which forum this thread originated?


RIP Hiram!

Originally Posted by dick swifter

It started in "So much gear so little time"

Another of my posts got deleted in this thread explaining the nature of his death. I don't know why or who's doing the editing 'round here.

Originally Posted by henryrobinett

Can you please post that again?

Although the Moan Zone is forum where threads that spiral out of control wind up. It is and always has been a place to post things that get you down (that relate to the industry) and has often been the first choice forum for many peoples RIP notices. I moved it here but didn't perform any editing or text deletion. I hope this post is understood as well intentioned, This is the correct forum for it. if not, please dont spoil the sentiment of the thread and contact me via PM to discuss it further.

Jules
GS Admin

[Mike Caffrey]

I don't know how I missed this thread. Many of the highlights of my life were with or because of Hiram. I just came from his memorial and I'm still sad.

I first heard him while at Berklee in 1986 and he became my all time favorite guitarist. I spent years emulating key components of his playing and noticed two key things about his career that I believe are common patterns and again, sought to emulate. One was that he worked as a sideman and release his first solo album as an artist at 35 and the other his he fell into being a musician rather than set it as a goal. The latter was a little odd for me since it was in conflict with my situation of planning to be a musician. However, it did prove to be true as I fell into producing and engineering as it's not what I set out to do, but what I'm meant to do.

Cut to 14 years later, Hiram is look for a place to cut his next album and multiple sources direct him to me. The first day is tracking with Hiram, Jeremy Gaddie, Frank Gravis and Dave Delhomme - who knew Hiram's songs when he auditioned for his band because he had played them in Berklee recitals with me.

From there we kept working and Hiram brought some great musicians in for me to record - Charley Drayton, Jeff Watts, Horatio Hernandez, Randy Brecker, Lew Solof, Will Lee. We had two separate dates booked to record horns with the horn section lined up as Randy and Michael Brecker, and David Sanborn. Both were canceled due to Brecker's health.

I wasn't supposed to mix, but I made a rough of one of the tracks and he liked it so much he had me mix it. From there the was the track (Shine The Light) where the entire rhythm section existed only on a two track cassette and there were balance issues. I figured out a way to fix them and he added guitars and vocals so one of the tracks on his album is 80% from a two track cassette recording. He had me mix that because he didn't trust any one else to make it work. The there was the track that he did with Charley that he decided to mix with me so Charley could be present - part of his advance was mix time in Germany, so every track I mixed was costing him double. In the end I mixed more than half of the album.

That overlapped with my work on my second album with a major European artist. Hiram over heard a phone call about renting a Motif *, which he had and they ended up renting his. A bunch of things led to Hiram playing on that album as was. I played on some of the tracks, Will Lee and Omar Hakim were the rhythm section. They asked us all to participate in a short tour later that year, where we added Clifford Carter on keys. SO it was the 24th St Band, with me and Omar.

So this funny thing called life led me me from my years at Berklee when Hiram was my idol to working on his album and playing with him in front to 10,000 people. Any one who's seen him knows that at some point he always ventures out into the audience while playing . I made sure to bring my wireless and went out into the crowd of 10,000 people with him at the T-Mobile arena in Prague.

The reality is that I am phenomenally lucky to have had these experiences. I think in any field, very few people get to meet an interact on a peer level with their idols. I went out to dinner with him a few times - late night at Blue Ribbon - and had a blast. The stories were endless and he told them so well. I saw him about a month ago and we discuss a really creative approach to his next album. If we had been able to follow through it would have been a really special project.

Without a doubt, many of these moments will make the highlight reel of my life. I've done things recordings that are more prestigious and have gone gold and platinum, but they don't means as much to me as my time with Hiram and there will be very few things that can top it.

I didn't talk to him on a daily basis, so it's not that kind of immediate loss. I am just so, so sad that he's gone, and so thankful for the time and experiences that I had with him.

[henryrobinett]

Thanks for sharing Mike!

[dick swifter]

Wow. Yeah. Thanks for sharing Mike. Great stories. Sorry for your loss.


PS: I went to Bezerklee in the late 80's too! Congrats on your many accomplishments!

[Mike Caffrey]

His stories were the best.

Jaco and his misadventures. The Jaco seance after he died where the medium said the he told her to tell everyone that they shouldn't have unplugged life support because he was still alive.

The CIA employed drug dealer who kept 50lbs of pot in his refrigerator, who's apartment burned down and was trashed by FDNY who knocked the refrigerator over on to it's door, so no one noticed and it all survived the fire and he went back and retrieved it all the next day.

Stories of week long events where none of the details can be repeated here.

A hilarious story about the time a woman in NYC put out an actual hit on him and when he didn't make the tour bus in Portland, the had to send the road manager back to find him. Again, certain details are excluded, but the end was the road manager finding him and when Hiram came to the door he described them looking eye to eye through the peep hole and recognizing each other's eyeballs.

The story of applying for a job as part of rehab where he describe himself as having no job skills, so he had to apply at blockbuster which was awkward because he was not permitted to use his name in case anyone had heard of him. He described filling out the application, having no experience, no skills, yet a last salary of $9600/week as MD for Sanborn. Then having the whole thing fall apart anyway because even though he was clear, Blockbuster was drug testing with a hair sample. He said "You better not test my hair. It will break your machine!'

I don't know how funny these come across here, but I practically had to put my fingers in my ears to take a drink unless I wanted to risk blowing it all out my nose.

Then there was the China Club gig with the purple pants and the turkey leg.


Then there was the time at the end of one of the rare sessions when I use an assistant, where he listened intently and empathetically to my assistant's story of seeing his girlfriend get hit by a car a day or two before.

That's just him as a person. At the gathering after his memorial there were several people who told me stories of how he was responsible for making them who they are. Dave DelHoome used those words. Katrisse Barnes told me how he made her always feel comfortable being herself and how he made he less up tight as a musician. Even Omar Hakim told a story of being really young and nervous touring with the Gil Evens orchestra. Hiram told him "Just do your thing. That's what he hired you for."

And then as a musician...

I was pretty surprised to hear how many people say that he could add musically to any context. Clifford Carter said that. An old Baltimore friend told a story about him sitting in with a Celtic band who loved him so much the wouldn't let him stop and at one point he turns to his friend and says "what kid of music IS this??"

I was surprised to see Paul Schaffer's comment about Hiram possible being the best guitarist short of Hendrix. At a certian level it's all subjective, but that's a fairly big statement.

One of the most interesting things I'd ever heard came from my friend Rob Bailey - this was years ago. He said he'd never heard Hiram play a wrong note. Ever since then I paid attention for that, and I can say that from the point I was paying attention, I never heard a wrong note. Maybe a little out of tune, especially with that heavy stereo chorus, but never a wrong note.

We tracked one song on an album I brought him in on where the guitarist asked him to play a 4 minute guitar solo - basically jsut A minor for four minutes straight, and it never got boring. That was pretty amazing.

I'm rambling. Enough for now.

[henryrobinett]

Thanks Mike! Ramble on. Enjoying every word.