Ukulele Player Interview

I knew who Bliss Blood was and we have actually been MySpace "friends" for a good while now, and I knew about her band, "The Moonlighters" but when putting together this article and accompanying interview, I was blown away by what I found. Bliss Blood is one of those talented people that never stops working. She is not just the singer-songwriter and founder of The Moonlighters, she also plays music with FOUR other acts. In no particular order, Bliss sings and plays with The Moonlighters, Delta Dreambox, The Cantonement Jazz Band, Here's How, and Voodoo Suite. The Moonlighters play 20s and 30s jazz. Delta Dreambox plays Delta Blues, The Cantonement Jazz Band plays 20s jazz. Here's How plays 50s "Cool Jazz", and Voodoo Suite plays "lounge and exotica", no, not erotica... exotica. Think of tropical island paradise music, food, and romance.
Bliss has one of the busiest calendars of any performer I have seen that is not "touring". With her list of engagements, she doesn't have time to tour. She plays the Big Apple and from the reviews I have read, the people there love her. This article was really going to be primarily about Bliss and the Moonlighters, but, truthfully, there is so much more to tell. Bliss Blood began her career in Texas and she made her was East to New York City to pursue the music she grew to love. What I'm going to do is let Bliss tell her story in her own words. So, let's get on with the interview. We will finish up with a review of The Moonlighters new CD, Enchanted.


Q: How long have you played ukulele?
A: I got my first ukulele in the summer of 1995. It was a Harmony with a plastic fretboard, I got it from a guitar dealer for $40.00 with a Mel Bay's Chord Book. I am completely self-taught, though working with a bass player really helped me develop into a strong rhythm player. Someone once compared me to Freddie Green, Count Basie's guitarist, who they called the "Tie Up" man in the rhythm section. Though now I am also trying to begin playing some simple lead parts and riffs too. I am learning the entire Village Green Preservation Society album by The Kinks, and trying to fill in some of the songs because I'm playing it solo on baritone ukulele.

Q: How many ukes do you have?
A: I recently sold a couple of them. I have a battered Kamaka Concert, a beat up revarnished Martin Tenor, an old Harmony Baritone, a Pohaku custom soprano, a flat body soprano made by Jere Canote, and a old junky Hawaiian souvenir. Not many for a working musician, and most of them are in crappy condition. WorldSound is working on an endorsement deal for me with Pono Ukuleles in Hawaii, hopefully that will be a done deal soon, I like their ukuleles a lot.

Q: You started your musical career in 1985 with a band called "The Pain Teens". You made a bunch of "tapes". How many? How well were they received? How would you describe the "Pain Teens" music?
A: The Pain Teens started out as an experimental band using tape collages over music a la "My Life In The Bush Of Ghosts", it was all done by Scott Ayers, my band mate. I joined the band and we began adding vocals of different types and adding more rock music into the mix. Scott was an excellent guitarist and multi-instrumentalist. We just made home recordings for a couple of years, released a bunch of cassette only releases (nine in total), then started playing out live and releasing our music on LP. After we did two albums on our own label, Anomie Records, we got signed to Trance Syndicate. We did four albums on Trance, a total of six official releases and nine casette-only releases on Anomie. All of the Pain Teens music is supposed to be available on iTunes beginning this month. All of the Moonlighters material is already available on iTunes also.

Q: You were signed with King Coffey's label, Trance Syndicate. Did you get a chance to meet the Butthole Surfers?
A: We stayed at King's place in Austin and met the other Surfers for the first time at a club in Houston called Numbers, around 1990 or so. Still write back and forth with King, friends with Pinkus and Paul Leary on Facebook and Myspace, and see Gibby around New York City occasionally. I also was fortunate to see their "School of Rock" tour last summer at Webster Hall here in New York. It was great to hear them with Teresa back in the band. I always loved the dual tribal drum sound.

Q: Was Coffey an influence?
A: His tribal drumming, with Teresa in the early years, was a huge influence, as was the crazed psychedelic grunge delayed guitar of Paul Leary and the digital delay soaked surrealist poetry and singing of Gibby. They influenced a whole decade of weirdo bands, certainly lots of the Touch and Go bands, and definitely lots of the bands on Trance.

Q: You headed for New York City in 1996 and started to play Twenties and Thirties jazz and originals. What brought on that switch?
A: Frankly, I was tired of never being heard over all the noise onstage, and tired of Scott monopolizing everything musically and dictating what it sounded like. I always loved Bessie Smith, and I had gotten into Billie Holiday and some other jazz singers and actually done a two-set performance in Houston between tours in 1993 with a piano player, because I was interested in learning to be a really good singer, I was also into Fats Waller and that got me started loving stride piano and swing. I also acquired a collection of 1920's and 30's music on LP's at the record store where I worked, when someone sold several hundred albums which had obviously been donated by a music lover of that time. So I got a crash course in old music, right when I was learning ukulele, which led to a crash course in chords, modulation into the right key, music theory. Then a dream project came my way, I'd really been into the compilations of "Reefer Songs" on Stash Records and loved them. I played them for Scott and he couldn't hear anything beyond the surface noise, and didn't like the music, but my friend Danny Lilker from a death metal band called Brutal Truth actually asked me to be the singer on a collection of those same songs played by himself and the members of Exit-13, called "Smoking Songs". I came to Lancaster, PA in August of 1995 and recorded the album with them, it was released in early 1996, my first jazz album. It's actually really well played and funny, and my singing's not bad, though I have come a long way as a vocalist since then.

Q: You kept the "stage name". Have you thought about changing it?
A: No way. I am Bliss Blood, have been since 1985.

Q: You formed "The Moonlighters" in 1998, is that correct? Making beautiful music is your passion, helping A: No, actually I met Henry you do it is ours. Bogdan (bassist from rock band Helmet) in the summer of 1996. He had gone to Hawaii on tour with them and fell in love with the Hawaiian lap steel guitar music of the 1920's. I had one Sol Hoopii LP so I understood where he was coming from, and we got the idea to combine our influences to create a new style of music, Hawaiian swing. But I had to wait two years, until he quit playing in Helmet in 1998, to start actually playing and writing songs.

Q: Again, you play twenties and thirties jazz numbers and original tunes. Who are the band members?
A: Myself, on uke and vocals, Cindy Ball on guitar and vocals. Cindy, like me, is a total affictionado of 1920's music, language, fashion, and culture. We are currently working with some different lap steel and bass players, no definite lineup right now.

Q: You have a sort of "Goth" image. Have you tried other "looks"? You do carry it off pretty well.
A: I don't think I've looked "Goth" since around 1991 or so, I went from that to sort of a Bettie Page style, and now I sort of combine that with flapper dresses and shoes, and interesting tights and legwear, which is sort of my trademark, I think.

Q: The band consists of a steel player, bassist, guitarist and you play ukulele. Do you play anything else?
A: I used to play some saw, slide whistle, stuff like that at first, we were a little more on the "novelty" side, but quickly found we really didn't need that stuff, the main thing is the vocals.

Q: What is the biggest venue you've played with the current band?
A: Das Kurhaus Goggingen in Augsberg, Germany, and also the civic center in Buhl, Germany for their bluegrass festival. They both hold around 1,000 people.

Q: Have you thought about adding a percussionist drummer?
A: I don't like the raise in volume that drums add to the mix. It's better as a string band.

Q: You just released a new album. This is the fifth one. How long did it take to put it together? Did you record it in a studio or with a home studio setup? If you were in a studio, which one?
A: We recorded it at Olive Juice Music, a home studio in Manhattan. It took six days of tracking and three days of mixing. We worked on the songs and arrangements over a period of about two years.

Q: Do you have any plans to hit the road and tour to promote the CD?
A: I hope so, but not sure where or when at this time.

Q: Tell us about your custommade ukulele.
A: It was made by Peter Hurney of Berkeley, California. His company is called POHAKU, and it's a great instrument, curly maple back and sides, ebony fretboard, custom red varnished top. Super heavy duty varnish to keep me from scraping it (I play with a hard pick). Here is the URL... http://www.pohakuukulele.com/index.html

Q: What lies ahead for Bliss Blood, and "The Moonlighters"? Any goals? Dreams?
A: I feel very fortunate because I have been able to support myself solely on playing music since 2001. That was the dream I had when I came to New York from Houston, and it only took me 5 years to achieve. I also play solo around New York, and play with other groups, notably my 1920's Bessie Smith-style blues band, DELTA DREAMBOX. I play baritone uke in that band. Now of course, I would love to have my music heard by a wider audience, collaborate with more talented musicians, write more music, learn how to play more instruments... maybe even find the man of my dreams. But for now, life is good. I'm hoping our new record label, WorldSound, is going to help me achieve some wider recognition and allow the band to travel to more interesting places and meet cool people. Everywhere we do play, people seem to love the music and tell me it makes them happy and gets rid of their anxiety and stress, so we just have to get it out there for more people to enjoy. Thank you for including me in your magazine, it's a real honor to be acknowledged by you and I hope you like the new cd.


Thank you, Bliss, for taking the time from your busy schedule to do the interview. Bliss has attached a discography and some other information that our readers might enjoy reading. I'd encourage everyone to check out her website and also MySpace page. There are lots of songs online and video clips to enjoy.


DISCOGRAPHY:
THE MOONLIGHTERS:
Dreamland
Hello Heartstring
Live in Baden Baden
Surrender
Enchanted (check out the review in this issue)

PAIN TEENS:
LPs/CDs
Pain Teens
Case Histories
Born in Blood
Stimulation Festival
Destroy Me, Lover
Beast of Dreams

Cassettes:
Psychoactive
Cathy
Manmade Disasters
Pain Teens IV
King God
Obliviated
Narcolepsy
Dog Spirits
Collective Unconscious
Mythology & You

EXIT-13 with BLISS BLOOD:

Smoking Songs

Fifth time’s a charm. The Moonlighters were among the first and remain the best of the oldtimey bands who started popping up around New York around the turn of the century. The last century, that is, although their sound has more in common with the one before that. Frontwoman/ukelele player and main songwriter Bliss Blood is the sole holdover from the band’s original 1999 incarnation, a torch singer par excellence and onetime college semiotics major who perhaps better than any other current-day writer captures the droll effervescence and innuendo-laden wit of classic ragtime, early 1920s swing and hokum blues. The clear, soaring beauty of her voice blends with the harmonies of another period-perfect singer, guitarist Cindy Ball, backed by the fluid bass of Peter Maness and Mark Deffenbaugh on fiery, incisive steel guitar. As consistently excellent as their first four releases – including the ecstatically good Live in Baden-Baden cd – have been, this looks like the album that’s going to put them over the top. This time out the band blends their irresistible Hawaiian-inflected makeout music with vintage-style ragtime, swing, a bouncy hobo song and even some vintage European film songs. It’s playful, sexy, often poignant and sometimes very subtly funny.

The cd’s opening cut sets the tone with Blood and Ball’s (Blood and Balls – now that’s a side project waiting to happen!) fetching harmonies, a winsome Hawaiian swing tale about breaking a hex and finding love at last. By contrast, Winter in My Heart is gorgeously plaintive yet ultimately optimistic. A couple of cuts, Blood’s Give Me Liberty or Give Me Love and Ball’s Don’t Baby Me channel a 1920s flapper vibe – those women reveled in their emancipation, and they weren’t about to take any grief from guys! The best single track on the album might be Night Smoke, written by Ball, a vivid Henry Mancini-esque salute to the pleasures of the wee hours. The cover are good too. They take the old Benny Goodman/Rosemarie Clooney standard It’s Bad For Me and reinvent it as a sassy Rat Pack-era come-on, jump into silent-film character for Fooling with the Other Woman’s Man and take their time, deliciously and tongue-in-cheek, with Al Duvall’s Freudian innuendo-fest Sheet Music Man. The album closes with a medley of Marlene Dietrich songs, doubtlessly inspired by the Moonlighters’ success touring Germany over the past few years. Look for this on our best albums of 2009 list toward the end of December. The Moonlighters play the cd release show tonight, August 7 at Barbes at 10.

The Moonlighters’ new label, WorldSound has also brought Blood’s teenage S&M industrial punk band the Pain Teens‘ catalog back into print, a welcome development for people who were into Ministry and that stuff back in the early 90s. In case you’re wondering, they didn’t sound anything like the Moonlighters. But they could also be very funny.