Interview with Joe Boylan, guitarist, vocalist of Taber
Q: Can you talk about the history of Taber and how it formed from the ashes of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project?
A: Years ago me and Dan Perry (the original lead guitarist of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project) always said we wanted to name a band after Christopher Lloyd's character Max Taber in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I don't know why we didn't just use that name from the jump instead of that ridiculous mouthful of a name The Disgruntled Sherpa Project. Oh, I do remember. Our original drummer, Mike Davis, objected to it because it sounded in his opinion "too ‘80s hair metal band.” So, instead we came up with the most convoluted, nonsensical band name in human history. Anyway, after Dan left that band in 2008 I always had it in my mind if we ever did something again we'd call it Taber. When the time came, Dan had pretty much retired from playing music, so I was just like, "Screw it. I'll call it Taber. If Dan ever changes his mind there's alway a spot for him."
But the whole thing with the band is The Disgruntled Sherpa Project was winding down. We did a final album High Tides and Muddy Waters in 2018. And the plan was--or my plan at least was--release it and then break up. But go out with a bang kind of. Like on a happy note. So, we had this venue called Fergie's in Center City Philly where we always got a good turnout. We got a good turn out there during a blizzard once. Some of our best shows period were there and we would always play about three hour long shows. So, I figured it would be a big CD launch/farewell show and party.
But, there were issues with the mixing and mastering, primarily scheduling issues, so the CD was delayed. We did the show, which was pretty good and all these people from our past showed up because I think they could sense it was the end. And I think by a complete coincidence there were people down front from Washington DC who were there the last time we had played Fergie's. It was a surreal night. Our former guitarists Dan Perry and George Wright were there. The bassist from the first band I ever played in, a great guy named Mike Ward, was there. We got this great photo of all of us together. But, there was no album. So, the whole idea of a last show went out the window because we had to have at least one show to promote the album release. This is just a very long winded way to say everything we touched had a twinge of disaster about it. So, we limped along into 2019 with a few forgettable shows and radio gigs. And I mean it was kind of settled that we'd never record again, but maybe it could be something where we'd do like four shows a year together. One for each season or something. Something chilled out and easy. Just show up, play a set, and "see you guys in three months."
By this time everyone was kind of doing their own thing and had other projects going, so I decided to do this Taber thing. But the point of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project was to be a democracy, and democracies only work if people are fully involved and it was clear that the level of involvement of everyone was fairly low and had been for awhile--which is totally fine. I get it, we're all adults with busy lives and other interests and believe me that band was not feeding anyone's families so we had no real commitment to each other outside of playing music--so I just figured if I'm carrying a lot of the weight and people are doing other things they enjoy, why stress out? Just do something very low key and everyone will be happy. And that's where Taber came along.
Q: Your latest release is Hotel Codorus. It was an album that was recorded throughout 2020. I’m wondering
if the pandemic had an effect on how you handled the recording?
A: Not really. In anything in life you assess your risk. And like once we got Wayne Lee's drums down it was me and Walt (Mamaluy the band's bassist) and we're family anyway, so we just worked on it together. Matt Rhine (Taber's keyboardist) had moved to Mexico and Texas--he's a fancy fella with two international homes--and since this is the 21st century and the easiest time in recorded history to be in a band during a lockdown, we just emailed him the tracks, he overdubbed his parts and emailed them back. But, that was the plan all along as Matt had moved South of the Border back when we started recording during January and February. You remember, the last two months the world made any sense at all? So, pretty much the idea was the two main people working on this stuff in person was going to be me and Walt anyway. I guess, we had wanted to include other people to guest on some tracks and that went out the window when the world shut down.
Q: What is your creative process like?
A: December 2019: The plan was to write ten songs in 2020. Write and record two songs a month for five months and then spend the next five months overdubbing and mixing and then release a full album at Thanksgiving. And shockingly, with all of the insanity of the year, we kind of achieved our goal. We were done all basic tracking in the spring and then me and Walt spent the summer and fall working on the tracks at my house. And the biggest difference between this and the old band is, I'm the only guitarist and basically the only songwriter. In the past if I had an idea for something I'd have to wait to run it by everyone (you know the democracy thing) at a rehearsal. With this, especially since most of the recording happened in my dining room, if I came up with an idea two minutes later it was already tracked and I could tinker with it as it went along, or ditch it completely if it didn't work. There was a lot of freedom in that which I loved.
Q: Can you talk about the history of Taber and how it formed from the ashes of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project?
A: Years ago me and Dan Perry (the original lead guitarist of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project) always said we wanted to name a band after Christopher Lloyd's character Max Taber in One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I don't know why we didn't just use that name from the jump instead of that ridiculous mouthful of a name The Disgruntled Sherpa Project. Oh, I do remember. Our original drummer, Mike Davis, objected to it because it sounded in his opinion "too ‘80s hair metal band.” So, instead we came up with the most convoluted, nonsensical band name in human history. Anyway, after Dan left that band in 2008 I always had it in my mind if we ever did something again we'd call it Taber. When the time came, Dan had pretty much retired from playing music, so I was just like, "Screw it. I'll call it Taber. If Dan ever changes his mind there's alway a spot for him."
But the whole thing with the band is The Disgruntled Sherpa Project was winding down. We did a final album High Tides and Muddy Waters in 2018. And the plan was--or my plan at least was--release it and then break up. But go out with a bang kind of. Like on a happy note. So, we had this venue called Fergie's in Center City Philly where we always got a good turnout. We got a good turn out there during a blizzard once. Some of our best shows period were there and we would always play about three hour long shows. So, I figured it would be a big CD launch/farewell show and party.
But, there were issues with the mixing and mastering, primarily scheduling issues, so the CD was delayed. We did the show, which was pretty good and all these people from our past showed up because I think they could sense it was the end. And I think by a complete coincidence there were people down front from Washington DC who were there the last time we had played Fergie's. It was a surreal night. Our former guitarists Dan Perry and George Wright were there. The bassist from the first band I ever played in, a great guy named Mike Ward, was there. We got this great photo of all of us together. But, there was no album. So, the whole idea of a last show went out the window because we had to have at least one show to promote the album release. This is just a very long winded way to say everything we touched had a twinge of disaster about it. So, we limped along into 2019 with a few forgettable shows and radio gigs. And I mean it was kind of settled that we'd never record again, but maybe it could be something where we'd do like four shows a year together. One for each season or something. Something chilled out and easy. Just show up, play a set, and "see you guys in three months."
By this time everyone was kind of doing their own thing and had other projects going, so I decided to do this Taber thing. But the point of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project was to be a democracy, and democracies only work if people are fully involved and it was clear that the level of involvement of everyone was fairly low and had been for awhile--which is totally fine. I get it, we're all adults with busy lives and other interests and believe me that band was not feeding anyone's families so we had no real commitment to each other outside of playing music--so I just figured if I'm carrying a lot of the weight and people are doing other things they enjoy, why stress out? Just do something very low key and everyone will be happy. And that's where Taber came along.
Q: Your latest release is Hotel Codorus. It was an album that was recorded throughout 2020. I’m wondering
if the pandemic had an effect on how you handled the recording?
A: Not really. In anything in life you assess your risk. And like once we got Wayne Lee's drums down it was me and Walt (Mamaluy the band's bassist) and we're family anyway, so we just worked on it together. Matt Rhine (Taber's keyboardist) had moved to Mexico and Texas--he's a fancy fella with two international homes--and since this is the 21st century and the easiest time in recorded history to be in a band during a lockdown, we just emailed him the tracks, he overdubbed his parts and emailed them back. But, that was the plan all along as Matt had moved South of the Border back when we started recording during January and February. You remember, the last two months the world made any sense at all? So, pretty much the idea was the two main people working on this stuff in person was going to be me and Walt anyway. I guess, we had wanted to include other people to guest on some tracks and that went out the window when the world shut down.
Q: What is your creative process like?
A: December 2019: The plan was to write ten songs in 2020. Write and record two songs a month for five months and then spend the next five months overdubbing and mixing and then release a full album at Thanksgiving. And shockingly, with all of the insanity of the year, we kind of achieved our goal. We were done all basic tracking in the spring and then me and Walt spent the summer and fall working on the tracks at my house. And the biggest difference between this and the old band is, I'm the only guitarist and basically the only songwriter. In the past if I had an idea for something I'd have to wait to run it by everyone (you know the democracy thing) at a rehearsal. With this, especially since most of the recording happened in my dining room, if I came up with an idea two minutes later it was already tracked and I could tinker with it as it went along, or ditch it completely if it didn't work. There was a lot of freedom in that which I loved.
Q: What are some of the themes that are touched upon throughout the album?
A: It's hard to kind of pinpoint themes because ideas just pop into my head and I flesh them out without thinking too much about meaning. But, I can definitely tell you 100% that there are absolutely no themes related to Coronavirus, politics or the social ills of 2020.
Q: Have you played any of the material live or perhaps virtually?
A: No. I doubt we ever will. Well, maybe. Wayne's not interested in playing out, but a former drummer of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project, Steve, has reached out and maybe we'll do something - he, I and Walt. I also was doing these virtual solo show things through this page on Instagram called DadBods Music and the whole theme of it is to give these musicians stuck at home--I guess putting on weight--without venues to play a creative outlet. And those dudes are really good and most of them put me to shame. But it's fun. And it was really a creative and positive idea those guys had. Recently, I talked to one of the founders, Steve Porth and we kicked around the idea of maybe doing a show in the future, if Doctor Dad ever lets people congregate again, and including Taber with the other guys from the IG page. Maybe we could do a benefit for one of these venues that has been utterly destroyed by these lockdowns and help some people out. I don't know, but that might be nice. But, I always hated playing live. Despised it. Only did it because it was the best way to make money to pay for recording which I love. And now that there's like no overhead with recording any more, there's no need for me to suffer through playing gigs. And to be honest, through online sales, streaming and licensing and what not, we're making more money through recordings of the songs than back in the day playing live.
Q: What else should we know about your music?
A: We're really having fun with this, which is the point. It's been a great outlet and scratches any musical itch I have. I think in 2021 hope some sanity prevails and we get some normalcy back, and if that's the case I'd like to do another recording project and this time use some of the vocalists and other musicians like some horn players, a banjo player and a fiddle player I know and maybe do some big nice Americana themed album. Get some of those dudes from the DadBods page involved. Taber was kinda meant to be a musical collective at first but situations dictated otherwise. Maybe I can convince Dan Perry to come aboard so he and I can finally live out our stupid teenaged dream of being in a dumb band called Taber.
A: It's hard to kind of pinpoint themes because ideas just pop into my head and I flesh them out without thinking too much about meaning. But, I can definitely tell you 100% that there are absolutely no themes related to Coronavirus, politics or the social ills of 2020.
Q: Have you played any of the material live or perhaps virtually?
A: No. I doubt we ever will. Well, maybe. Wayne's not interested in playing out, but a former drummer of The Disgruntled Sherpa Project, Steve, has reached out and maybe we'll do something - he, I and Walt. I also was doing these virtual solo show things through this page on Instagram called DadBods Music and the whole theme of it is to give these musicians stuck at home--I guess putting on weight--without venues to play a creative outlet. And those dudes are really good and most of them put me to shame. But it's fun. And it was really a creative and positive idea those guys had. Recently, I talked to one of the founders, Steve Porth and we kicked around the idea of maybe doing a show in the future, if Doctor Dad ever lets people congregate again, and including Taber with the other guys from the IG page. Maybe we could do a benefit for one of these venues that has been utterly destroyed by these lockdowns and help some people out. I don't know, but that might be nice. But, I always hated playing live. Despised it. Only did it because it was the best way to make money to pay for recording which I love. And now that there's like no overhead with recording any more, there's no need for me to suffer through playing gigs. And to be honest, through online sales, streaming and licensing and what not, we're making more money through recordings of the songs than back in the day playing live.
Q: What else should we know about your music?
A: We're really having fun with this, which is the point. It's been a great outlet and scratches any musical itch I have. I think in 2021 hope some sanity prevails and we get some normalcy back, and if that's the case I'd like to do another recording project and this time use some of the vocalists and other musicians like some horn players, a banjo player and a fiddle player I know and maybe do some big nice Americana themed album. Get some of those dudes from the DadBods page involved. Taber was kinda meant to be a musical collective at first but situations dictated otherwise. Maybe I can convince Dan Perry to come aboard so he and I can finally live out our stupid teenaged dream of being in a dumb band called Taber.