Montreal
[ PETER ERSKINE ]
I first became aware of Lyle by way of the Lab ‘75 album that he composed, arranged and pretty much produced all by himself, supported by a young and fearless band that followed him to the edges of college jazz band impossibility (kudos to Leon Breeden, the director of Jazz Studies at North Texas State University, for knowing a bona fide genius when he saw one).
I had just left the Kenton band after 3 years and five albums and this recording totally kicked anything I had done or experienced in the pants. Lyle’s introduction to the musical world at large was a stunning one.
Fresh. Innovative. Original. Proficient beyond reasonable expectation. And so on.
Meanwhile, I already knew Pat Metheny from one of the summer jazz camps that the Stan Kenton Orchestra hosted in Springfield, MO (he was a guest artist who had flown in from his school in Miami, I think he was visiting family in Missouri) … and so, when I happened to cross paths with Pat Metheny and his band a year or so after I had first heard Lyle, I put 2+2 together and realized that this was a super-group in the making (modest beginnings, however, with all of them and their gear stuffed into a van that was about to embark on an all-night drive to their next gig … I was in Maynard Ferguson’s big band by that time, where we at least had a bus driver and a pair of seats each to call our bed, office and home.
Once the Metheny group albums started coming out, the prolific outpouring of Pat & Lyle’s collaborations was the bountiful gift that just kept on giving. We can all be forgiven for thinking that the feast of music from Lyle would never stop.
Fast forward. Lyle released his first solo album. 1986. Alex Acuña played the drums on it. Perfect choice. And then Lyle was going to tour the album. Perfect sense. Alex was hired to do the tour. Perfect planning.
Alex bails out for whatever reason at the last minute. Perfect nightmare. Lyle reaches out and asks if I will do the tour on short notice. Marc Johnson will be playing the bass. Of course, I say, “yes.”
We meet in Boston (I was living in New York at the time but was getting ready to move to Los Angeles with my bride-to-be from Tokyo, so managing to fit this tour into my life plans took some doing). Rehearsals go well the next few days with Lyle, Marc and me but they also include his keyboard tech from the Metheny Group, Niki Gatos.
Lyle’s music involves a VERY ambitious incorporation of a very new Kurzweil synthesizer plus assorted other gear including some vintage Oberheim synths and the latest Macintosh computers, all of which required Niki’s constant button-pushing, baby-sitting, massaging, rebooting, loading sounds and so on … all to say that it was a very “pay no attention to that person behind the curtain” kind of production.
First concert somewhere in Vermont. Man, this is fun and it sounds great! Spirits are high and all of our hard work is paying off. A lovely drive up to Montreal the next morning, I’m so glad I agreed to do this tour.
The next morning. As we draw closer to the border, I ask the driver (an agent from the booking agency who is functioning as the band’s tour manager for this trip), “Hey, what about our work permits to enter Canada?” and he replies, “Oh, we don’t have permits but we won’t need them …” and my eyes get kind of big and I’m like, “whoa, waittaminute, we can’t enter WHAT ARE WE GOING TO SAY AT THE BORDER? This is a terrible idea,” and he cuts me off with a, “What are they gonna do, separate us and INTERROGATE us? I’m just going to tell him that we’re going to Montreal to party…” These are the instructions that some genius at the booking agency in Boston gave him.
And, right on cue, there’s the border crossing.
No line, so we drive right up to the Canadian agent after clearing the US side … I have my passport ready but am quietly freaking out, especially when I hear the following exchange:
“Good morning. Passports, please. How many of you are there, four, eh? So … why are the four of you entering Canada?
“Uh … to party?”
“Pull the car over there, park it and follow me into the station, please.”
He reads our names aloud from the passports he has collected, and I notice that everyone’s ears perk up and they all have an odd expression on their face. We are, indeed, separated and seated in small rooms, where we await our, you guessed it, interrogations.
What none of us know is that the promoter in Montreal has been calling this particular border station all morning long, repeatedly spelling out our names and asking that we all be given the swiftest of courtesy entries to Canada so that we may arrive in Montreal in good time and spirits. Meanwhile, we’re entering under false pretenses … and they can’t figure out why.
An immigration officer comes into the small office where I have been seated. “So, Mr. Erskine. Why are you going to Montreal? What are you planning to do there?”
Fuck. I guess I have to go along with the official cover story so we can get on our way to Montreal and play the show … “to party with my friends …” which is about the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard myself say. And the officer asks me what I do for a living. “I’m a musician.”
“And what do Mr. Mays and Mr. Johnson do for a living, Mr. Erskine?” and I reply, “Interestingly enough, they are ALSO musicians …” at which point the guy reaches and pulls out a book that’s as big as a toaster oven and SLAMS it down right in front of me, turns to some random page in the middle of the book and begins YELLING AT ME right in my face about how many years I could go to prison. And so on, and I’m thinking “Where’s Alex right now? I’m helping Lyle out and now I’m in THIS fucking situation?”
The truck hauling the equipment comes pulling up to the crossing station and David Oakes, a VERY experienced soundman and calm person to boot, quickly sizes up the situation (when he sees each of us in a separate glass-walled room being interrogated and Lyle is in tears, and it’s a scene) and I don’t know what he said or how he said it but he got us out of there.
We all feel like criminals. I feel like wringing the neck of this agent. I feel bad for Lyle.
We are treated like heroes in Montreal.
(Oh yeah … the immigration officer told me that my name would have an asterisk next to it in their computer system for years to come. This made my next few border crossings into Canada a nerve-wracking experience. I finally told this story to a (friendly) Canadian immigration officer, and he just smiled and assured me that there were no such things as asterisks next to names on their computer system, and that this bellicose officer was just messing with me.)
Whew.
The remainder of the tour was without incident but was filled with plenty of good music. The trio enjoyed a terrific empathy and the combination of Lyle’s writing with the playing sensibilities and experience that Marc and I enjoyed together made for a memorable series of concerts.
My consolation prize for the border crossing experience was being invited to play a couple of tracks on Lyle’s second solo album, Street Dreams. This reunited the trio and I remember the one-day session as being fun, with the awareness by everyone in the studio that this was something very special. I was very proud to be part of that album.
Street Dreams
Marc Johnson playing Peter’s drums at Lyle’s Street Dreams session (Power Station, NYC). Photo courtesy of Peter Erskine.
I later saw and heard Lyle when he came to Santa Monica with his band, and I would run into him here and there in Europe during Metheny Group tours (including a wonderful concert in Paris) while I was doing my own myriad work.
Lyle and Pat’s mid-concert acoustic duets were the stuff of legend and they provided a lovely respite from the wall of sound that the Group produced in concert. I do not know if the following anecdote is true, but it’s a good story: once, during a sublime duet, an audience member yelled, “FUCK. ING. SUBTLE!!!!”
Followed by, “PAT!!! YOU’LL NEVER DI-I-I-I-I-E!!!
Pat might never die.
But, sadly, Lyle did.
We are all the poorer for it.
Lyle was one of those people whose brain and soul and spirit and creative energy is all just too big for his body to contain or for the rest of us to absorb. He was more than just a shooting star. Lyle Mays was a cosmos. A cosmos that went to Montreal to party.