Dan Lebowitz, perhaps better known as simply Lebo, has been a steady face on the California music scene for years, most notably with his work in ALO, but there’s a newer, more specific scene that Lebowitz has begun to readily embrace recently. The Bay Area jam culture pre-dates the guitarist and vocalist by years, but thanks to a younger batch of musicians playing and collaborating at venues like Terrapin Crossroads and Sweetwater Music Hall, the scene has never been more vibrant, and Lebowitz revels in the inclusive and collaborative aspect that is being fostered in the area.
Can you tell me about your side band Magic Gravy with Garrett Sayers and Dave Watts from The Motet, and how that came to be?
It’s super fun. It’s like an all improv trio, we just kind of have a couple heads. We just got a little bit that we used to get into it and then we just run along for a half hour or forty-five minutes, never know what it’s going to be, and then find our way back. So a show is two maybe three tunes. That’s usually how it works out. It’s fun. Those guys are such a dynamic rhythm section. I always feel, as a guitar player, that it’s like getting into a fine automobile? It’s like, hit the gas and fshooo . They’re just so good and powerful. Garrett’s got a lot of cool melodic ideas, and Dan’s got the rhythmic ideas, so it’s cool. A lot of dialog, that’s the idea of it. Whenever we can get together, it’s special.
It’s actually kind of a neat [origin] story, though. The band started because there was this guy that we know who was turning 30—this was like ten years ago. He was this crazy dude, and he decided to have his birthday party in Mexico at this place—I forget what it’s even called, but it’s basically an oasis in the middle of the desert where these hot springs come up. So it was this whole little canyon area, a kind of mountain, all green and lush. No roads—you have to cross creeks to get to it. It’s totally crazy, but he somehow got all of us to do it. And originally, he was trying to get ALO, and ALO couldn’t do it, then he was trying to get Motet and Motet couldn’t do it. And I was like, “Well, I’m into it. Sounds fun to me.” And then those guys were there, so it was like, “Well, that’s a band.” It was so funny—they trucked a generator in, you know, crossed creeks with it and stuff. And then we set up and we just played out there in the hills, and we had so much fun. So ever since then, we’ve just kind of done it. Some years there’s more and some years less, but it happens every year at least a few times. Sometimes we’ll do a little run where we’ll get ten shows in or so a year. Usually it’s a few shows a year.
You debuted a song on Jam Cruise about the ethos of Terrapin Crossroads. Can you talk about the scene and culture around that venue?
It’s been awesome. Basically, with Terrapin, and then Sweetwater too, both those venues have been really good about fostering the scene. Especially with Terrapin—they’ve got such a cool thing. Every day there’s three bands in there, in the bar. Three bands a day, and on the weekends it’s about four. And it’s awesome. They bring the musicians in, and it’s work for musicians, but more than that, it’s the community it’s built around. The way they do it is that they don’t actually do very many bands in there. The Grate Room has the bands. So, we’ll do Lebo and Friends in there or, you know, I’ve played with Phil a bunch in there. But the bar is cool, because it’s more just a group of musicians that they pull from. Because I travel a lot, I basically let them know when I’m going to be around town, when I’m going to be available. Then, it’s so cool because they just pair you up with. It’s all a like-minded scene, so that’s why it’s such a community. It’s not like bands coming in and [saying,] “You have to play our songs.” You just come in, and everyone brings some tunes in—original tunes or cover tunes, whatever you want. We played a Jackson Browne song the other night. You know what I’m saying—whatever you want. You just bring in your charts, get on stage, and it’s real loose. You just kind of stop in between songs and tell everyone, “Okay I’m doing this.”
Do different musicians take control of different songs?
It moves around, yeah. And the way they organize it, someone is leading a night usually. So whoever’s responsible for leading the night might get a little thread going: “Send me some tunes you want to do.” And a lot of it just happens in the moment. It’s real loose. I’m definitely on gigs a bunch where I know the guys and we’ve all played together a bunch, so we literally just call tunes as we’re going—“Oh, you want to play this one?” “I think I know that one!” “Yeah, where’s the bridge go to?” “Oh, it goes to beat five.” “Cool, just give me a nod when it’s coming up.” “Here are some lyrics, you want to sing some backups here?” A lot of us have iPads, so we just air-drop charts around. It’s funny.
Wow, twenty-first century.
Yeah, it’s super weird. But it’s amazing, because everyone’s song book is growing so much from the scene, because we’re all just sharing tunes with each other all the time. And it’s funny, because you like a tune, so then the next time you lead the night you might pull it out and say, “I want to sing that one tonight.” And, I should say, a big part of it, too, is just Phil’s vibe with it, because he’s so into that vibe himself. He just did a whole run of nights in the bar himself. I did a couple with him. It was called the Dead of Winter. He just did free shows in the bar. That’s the other thing that’s cool about the bar—it’s free. The musicians gets paid, but they don’t charge anyone at the door. That’s another thing that makes this casual. People can go, they don’t have to be like, “I don’t want to go pay twenty-five bucks to go.” Come out, get a beer, you’re going to see some good music. Phil pops in all the time, a lot of times unannounced. He shows up, jumps on the bass. It’s cool. For me, it feels the most alive I’ve seen the Bay Area scene since I’ve been here.
It seems to a big goal of Phil’s, to foster that sort of community out there.
I think, for him, he doesn’t want to just get on a bus and tour around—he did that for so much of his life. So now, he’s got it set up where he has the scene there. When people travel to the Bay Area, it’s almost like a destination, you know? Especially anyone who’s into this music scene, they want to go to Terrapin Crossroads. He set it up so people can just come to him. I also feel like there’s another element, where it’s like this next generation of musicians. He’s got a real teacher vibe about him, too. It’s my impression that he enjoys bringing all of us in and passing on that stuff. It’s so cool. I’m always amazed that he’s such a conceptual guy. He’s got these tunes he’s played a million times, but then he’s always so excited about it and has a new idea for it. It’s so inspiring.
What is it like actually playing with him?
It’s great. He’s such a singular voice on the instrument. There’s no one who does what he does. I mean, it’s totally his own. It’s powerful. It’s very creative. And, like I said, the conceptual side of it I really dig. Because, I like that music. I like talking concepts and stuff. I respond a lot to that.
Does he usually take up the bandleader role when he sits in?
Yeah, but, but, what’s also really cool about it is that he creates a lot of space, too, for other people to lead. Especially, you know, when you’re singing a tune or an improvised section. He definitely moves around. It depends on the type of show. Some types of shows he’s more on the moments than other times. At some of these bars shows we just did, he was real hands-off, actually. He was the bass player at the bar with you. It was that kind of vibe. It was cool. All sides of it are really fun. I like hearing his ideas, so it’s cool. He has a microphone set up where he can talk to the band when we do shows in the Grate Room, that just the band can hear. During those kinds of shows, a lot of times while we’re moving from a section he’ll get on the mic and talk to us and tell us, “Okay, I want to take it to this section.”
I mean, there’s a lot built into that music, especially as a guitar player, or when you’re singing. There’s a lot of leadership built into that role. He’s very open to that. I almost get that part of the fun for him, too, is putting these different lineups together to keep things different for him. And a lot of times, there’s not a lot of pre-talking about the set list. There’s some, but a lot of times not, so you really have to rely on your musical intuition. There’s guys that know every one of the songs. I know a bunch of Dead tunes now, but I don’t know the whole songbook. But, it’s cool, because I think he might dig that. You’re forced to rely on your musical intuition. You take it somewhere where it wouldn’t have gone if you had just memorized all the parts. Especially for him, who’s played all those songs—he was at all the best shows—so I think it’s fun for him to have different stuff.
That’s great that there are both diehards who know all the songs and newer musicians who bring a different perspective.
Exactly, and I think he digs that. It brings in other stuff. Starting in December, I did a residency at the bar, which was really fun. I did it every Tuesday, just because I was around for a consistent day. It was fun, man. We just did different lineups. One of them was with Reed Mathis. Then, some of the ALO guys did some of them. I did a really fun one in there the other night, actually, the Dead of Winter stuff with Phil, Jay Lane, Holly Bowling, Ross James and Cass McCombs. Really cool group. You never know what the chemistry’s going to be.
How was the chemistry with that group?
It was awesome. I think we’re going to do it again. They all are talking schedules. They want to assemble that same lineup. It was cool. It got to good places. I like playing with Holly a lot. I just met her not too long ago. Everyone thinks she’s solo, but it all translates really well. It’s funny, because I only knew her as a solo act, too. Actually, it was in the bar, on the night before Thanksgiving, maybe, and they did a Cosmic Twang night—one of the groups that plays there a lot. They invited everybody down, so I was in the bar, and there were five guitarists. People were rotating in and out. She was down there, and we ended up playing together, and I remember thinking, “Oh, that was really fun.” Then, I called her up for some shows. We had a good time, and we’ve played a couple since then. She totally flows really nicely.
Can you talk about what ALO is up to? Any studio plans?
Yeah, we actually started working on some stuff when we were together for a New Year’s show, which was fun. It was out in the mountains in Santa Barbara. It was crazy. It was outdoors, and it was cold, actually, because it was an outdoor festival in the winter. But, I mean, it’s Santa Barbara, so it’s like West-Coast cold. We had heaters on the stage, so we were good. Those people are kind of hardcore. There were a lot of RVs—less tents, more RVs. We played all night, until four in the morning. It was really nice, actually, having that freedom to just start at 9PM and play late. We could get into all sorts of cool tunes. It was like a little festival, with some other bands form Southern California.
But yeah, we started talking about some tunes when we were rehearsing for that, and we were going through some stuff. We actually have an album, just an EP for Tour d’Amour. It’s called Love Songs, and it’s covers. We each picked one. It’s four covers that are love songs. It was really a cool process, because we didn’t go in the studio together. Two of us live in the Bay Area, me and Steve, and then Zach lives in Santa Barbara, and Dave lives in Utah. So we each picked a song, and then we laid down tracks in our home studios and then sent it out to everyone to build from. My tune was “Bizarre Love Triangle” by New Order. ALO does that once in a while. We really tried to keep to our band vibe. Even though it was a studio project, we didn’t go big on overdubs; we tried to keep it to like how we would do it live. I really like the take on it; it came out really cool. Zach sings “Better Together,” and that’s really cool, too. We used a lot of stuff from the original recording, but then it’s also got some kind of weird, almost Flaming Lips textures in it at certain parts. I try to lean a little more psychedelic. Steve led a song called “Hold Me Tight” by Johnny Nash. He’s the guy that did “I Can See Clearly Now,” that was his big hit. He’s an interesting dude. He’s an American guy, but he was going to Jamaica really early on, so he was one of the guys that brought some of the reggae sound over to the United States, before Bob Marley was really popular. So, this tune, “Hold Me Tight,” is cool. It’s totally a Jamaican band—it was recorded in Jamaica. You know, we’re not a reggae band, we’re not going to try to sound like a reggae band, so we just borrowed elements from it. In general, when we do covers, I think everyone in the band feels this way, and I feel really strong about it. I don’t actually like the idea of trying to create a cover. I think a lot of times, as a musician, it’s easy to do that, because we love music and it’s like, “I want to learn that part.” But I almost feel like it’s cooler to take a song and do it the way your band does it, not to try and sound like the original.
You kind of pretend you wrote it.
Yeah, I mean, to me, in a way, that’s the beauty of bands like The Rolling Stones. They just loved American blues, but they couldn’t do it. They were trying, but they couldn’t, and then what came out was a whole new thing. I like that vibe. Borrowing is cool, but just elements, rather than trying to go full. And then, Dave did “So in Love” by Curtis Mayfield. I think “Bizarre Love Triangle” is the only one we’ve actually done live before, so these new one’s will be nice to incorporate into our live set.
