Though he was already a seasoned pro by then (with a resume that included musical journeys with the likes of Dave Mason, Huey Lewis, and the Rembrandts), Bay Area guitarist Mark Karans career really took a turn for the jam when he was added to the Other Ones roster in 1998. Karan (and fellow unsung guitar hero Steve Kimock) faced the formidable task of filling the Jerry role as the surviving members of the Grateful Dead returned to live performances as a group for the first time since Garcias death in 95.
Lesser hands wouldve cranked up the envelope filters and digital delays and tried to mimic Garcias tone and licks, but Karan and Kimock both handled the situation tastefully, capturing the heart and vibe of the songs while retaining their own voices. Bob Weir was impressed enough by Karans talents to draft him for duty in RatDog in the fall of 98. Karans ability to not only hold his own in a spotlighted solo, but to comfortably nestle into the ensemble jam setting that RatDog is known for made him a natural for the job.
When not out on the RatDog bus, Karan’s other main musical focus for years has been his own band, Jemimah Puddleduck. Featuring Bob Gross (Albert King, Delaney Bramlett) on bass, JT Thomas (Bruce Hornsby) on keys, John Molo (Phil Lesh & Friends) on drums and Karan on guitar and vocals, a Jemimah Puddleduck setlist will routinely include everything from Karan-penned originals to classic R&B and raunchy funk covers with big slathers of jam spread over it all.
Karan faced the challenge of his life in 2007 when he was diagnosed with throat cancer. A long siege of treatment kept him from performing live for nearly a year (Kimock stepped in on guitar with RatDog in the interim), but by spring of ’08, Karan was back on the road – and in the studio working on the first solo album of his career. The recently-released Walk Through The Fire is a great representation of what Mark Karan is all about – good vibes; cool groove; smiles; good tears; and, most of all, a lot of heart. We recently had an opportunity to talk with Mark Karan while he was home between ‘Dog and ‘Duck gigs. Although the main focus was his new album, the conversation covered matters far and wide – from old friends (and even older guitars) to whistling and natural grease. And throughout it all, Karan’s wit, humor, graciousness, and just general good vibes reigned supreme. The man has been there and back – but never lost the wob-bop-a-loo-bop in his stride.
I’ll spare the reader the first few minutes of our interview; I’ll only say that most of you folks should be thankful you’re not trying to do this sort of thing with a Downeast Maine accent. (Note to MK: Remember – it’s no’theast, man. Not nor’east.) Eventually, between roars of laughter, we got so we could actually communicate …
BR: Okay – down to business: when did you actually start working on Walk Through the Fire?
MK: That depends on how you want to calculate it: if we’re talking about when I wrote the first song that’s on the album, that would be about … oh … 35 years ago? (laughs) I was about 19 when I wrote “Bait The Hook.” But as far as working on the actual record, that process started about 4 years ago. We were down at JT’s place – he’s got a great little studio in LA – and we tracked, maybe, 6 or 7 songs as a jumping-off point for a Jemimah Puddleduck record.
From there, between my schedule with RatDog, John’s with Phil and Friends – and John Fogerty, too – and JT touring with Bruce Hornsby and whatnot, it was almost impossible to get us all in the same room to work on the record, you know? Then the cancer hit, and when I came out on the back side of that experience, I had a sense that it was time to get on with the album. As much as I love Jemimah Puddleduck, as much as I love the guys in the band, I simply felt like I didn’t have the time or the interest in waiting any longer. I knew I had to go ahead and get working on the record; the Dead were out on their reunion tour, which freed up my time … it was my window of opportunity and I had the enthusiasm of having just come through the cancer treatment and feeling healthy and really ready to do something. I decided to move ahead with the album and shift the focus, make it a Mark Karan record and get it done … I felt like I had something to say. We ended up keeping four of the original full JP tracks and going on from there.
Bob Gross had some health issues and wasn’t available to play bass at that point; and as much as I love Bob, I just had to dive in. That’s how Hutch Hutchinson wound up being called in to do the bass tracks on the remainder of the tunes. We just jumped right in: a couple of sessions up here in the Bay Area, then another 2- or 3-day session down at JT’s place to finish up basic tracks … I did everything else here at my house.
BR: Why don’t we start ticking off the tracks on the album and talking about how things came together. “Annie Don’t Lie” kicks things off – that’s one of the songs with the basic lineup, right?
MK: That’s right – that was one of the original tracks we laid down.
BR: Glenn Hartman plays some wicked accordion on that cut.
MK: Oh, yeah. Glenn is a friend of mine. He plays in the New Orleans Klezmer Allstars – that’s kind of his main squeeze band – along with a bunch of other stuff. Glenn’s just a really sweet guy who’s an accomplished accordion player. His stuff adds a kind of New Orleansy-Cajuny flavor to it.
BR: It’s a cool song – I remember hearing it on the first JP album. It’s a see-ya-later tune, but it’s still got this joyous, upbeat vibe to it.
MK: Absolutely – that’s one of the reasons I’ve always liked the song: it has this sense of irreverence to it along with a very playful “go-fuck-yourself.” (laughs)
BR: Exactly – that’s it! (laughter) The addition of the Persuasions on vocals gives the song another layer that I’ve never heard on past versions …
MK: Oh, yeah; having those guys on both that song and “Rock Your Papa” was a ball – a real kick in the pants to both songs. I was a fan of the Persuasions from my childhood days. I grew up listening to KSAN and KMPX in the Haight – they were like the first underground hippie stations out here – and they played a lot of Persuasions back in the day. It was a real thrill to have them on the RatDog tour with us a few years ago … just a great group of warm, talented guys. I knew I wanted that kind of old 50s/60s doo-wop-meets-soul kind of thing and they were perfect for that. With the wonders of technology (laughs) we did it all over the internet – it’s pretty amazing.
BR: Don’t tell me that – I want to imagine you guys all in one room … (laughter)
MK: Well, there was a lot of that on the album, too, but I have to tell you – it’s pretty exciting to be talking to these guys on the phone and kind of playfully banter back and forth with ideas and stuff … and then all of a sudden you open up your e-mail and there’s a link – and you go to it, and there’s your track! It’s like, “I’ve never heard this before and I’m dropping it into my song … it’s like magic, you know? (laughs)
BR: I know “Leave A Light On” was written a long time ago and about a totally different place in life than where you are now, but still … what a powerful piece of music … The weaving of your guitar and the Rowan Brothers’ voices at the end is really beautiful.
MK: Well, thank you …
BR: Hey, that’s not a compliment – that’s a statement of fact. (laughter)
MK: It was fun to layer all those parts in there.
BR: That’s one of the tracks that Wally Ingram is on … was there a conscious thought to include him as part of the “brotherhood” – a fellow cancer survivor?
MK: Well, that’s definitely not the only reason, ‘cause Wally’s such a great player. But, having said that, yeah – I was aware of Wally and really liked his work, but we really didn’t know each other until the throat cancer experience. He offered me a lot of support where he’d just gone through it himself; he was able to give me a heads-up about what to expect when things were starting to get a little rough. Wally’d say, “Yeah, this is part of it, but it’ll get better again – hang in there.” So we developed a friendship from there and when the time came to work on the album, Wally was the obvious choice. I always loved what he did with David Lindley –
BR: Oh, man – those two together … you listen and ask yourself, “How many arms do they have between the two of them?”
MK: (laughs) Exactly – exactly. Classic drums and ethnic drums and weird little toys and things that he finds … he just makes all these great sounds happen.
BR: And you play bass on that cut, right?
MK: Yeah – and there’s an interesting little story that goes with that: Hutch played bass on the track when we cut it and for whatever reason, it just wasn’t the feel I was after for the song. I ended up doing a scratch take on bass myself just to get the approach. Robin Sylvester tried playing a bass part using my ideas and his version was great, but I think because it didn’t start with him, it didn’t have the same feel, the same connection to the track. I ended up saying, “Well, screw it – I know what I’m hearing in my head.” I punched in the parts that were kind of lame on my scratch track and ended up doing the bass track myself.
BR: The song has taken on a different meaning over the years, hasn’t it?
MK: Since I originally wrote it? Sure – definitely. There are a couple of these tunes that I massaged the lyrics before I went ahead and laid the vocal track down. If you listened to some of the older, live versions you’d probably notice that some of the lyrics are slightly different. One reason is they were first drafts and I’d never done any rewrites; I’d never gone back and grabbed some of the lines I didn’t like and massaged them. Also, years have passed and some of the lyrics were from the perspective of a younger, maybe angrier or less secure kind of a person. I was able to come at them now with a little more mature perspective … which probably came from surviving the cancer and whatever else I’ve been through in the last 10 or 15 years.
BR: “Bait The Hook” has you doing a sweet acoustic guitar part underneath it all … you just kind of sat back and let JT go at it on the keyboard.
MK: Well, I figured between what he was up to and what Molo was doing on the drums, I had a choice of either getting in the way (laughs) just for the sake of “look at me – look at me!” or saying “This track is really working; what can I do to support the mood?” Between everybody, we created a good place for me to sing the song. It was a real opportunity vocally and lyrically for me to connect with the song that I wouldn’t get to do at a gig.
BR: And then Gloria Jones and Jackie LaBranch from JGB are in there on vocals, too …
MK: Oh, man – meeting them was a thrill. They were definitely a pleasure to work with.
BR: Now, do I have the story right on the title track, “Walk Through The Fire” – you wrote that as you were starting your chemo treatments?
MK: Yeah, they had me do my first session of chemo in the hospital so they could keep an eye on me – they’re basically introducing a lot of poison into your system and they want to see how you’re going to react, you know? And we checked in with books and guitars and pads of paper and pens and all kinds of crap because we knew we going to be there for a week.
So that first day, I’m in my bed and my wife Maile is sitting next to me and I asked her, “Honey, can you hand me that guitar?” So she handed it to me and I started poking around on it. And then it was, “Honey, can you hand me that pad and pen?” In about 15 or 20 minutes I had the whole damn thing – it just sort of barfed out of me. It was one of those things that was like a gift; not like “I had to do this and it was hard work,” but more like “I had to make this happen by being available when it was offered.”
BR: I hear you. It’s like when you’re writing – especially fictional stuff – and it’s as if you’re just watching the movie in your head and trying to keep up with it.
MK: Exactly – and not let it outrun you.
BR: What are you playing for a dobro on that track?
MK: It an old 1930’s National Style O that I found about three years ago at a guitar show here in the Bay Area.
BR: It’s got a great sound …
MK: Yeah – and older than my mom, too! (laughter)
BR: It feels like there’s a couple different levels to that song: there’s the acknowledgment of what you had ahead of you at that point, plus it feels like you’re shedding some old skin, as well.
MK: Absolutely. It’s like the old thing about the sword in the flame – tempering the steel in the flame, you know? “Walk Through The Fire” means a lot of different things, really.
BR: I really like the mix on “Love In Vain.” I knew Delaney Bramlett was on that cut, so we were looking for him … but the first time you hear his voice and the way that he’s mixed on the cut – wow. Powerful and haunting – it’ll make the hair stand up on your arms, man.
MK: You know, the interesting thing about that was the actual sound quality we got on Delaney’s voice didn’t lend itself to being real dry and crisp and in-your-face as much as the sound that we got on my voice. The way that we ended up dealing with that was to put a bunch of ambient reverb sound on Delaney’s voice and the dobro he’s playing.
BR: Oh man – it’s perfect. I mean, now that he’s no longer with us …
MK: Oh, exactly – exactly. And the song was already mixed before Delaney passed … when we went back to it after he died, there was Delaney with all this reverb and stuff, almost like he was singing with me from the other side.
BR: Yeah, that’s what it feels like – but not creepy at all … just sweet. When did you first cross paths with Delaney?
MK: Oh, gosh … I first met Delaney in Southern California back in ’96 or ’97, I guess. There was a blues jam that I used to go to every Sunday night and Bob Gross would play bass. Bob was also Delaney’s bassist for many, many years and he brought Delaney to one of those blues jams one Sunday. We just fell in love with each other, man – I ended up playing on a bunch of his recordings over the last dozen years or so; hung out at his house a lot and demo’d a bunch of tunes that haven’t been released yet.
BR: Oh, cool.
MK: Yeah, I think his wife may be planning on releasing them at some point. We probably did the sessions for “Love In Vain” about six months before we lost him. He was a great man – a real mentor for me.
BR: “Rock Your Papa” is another one of those songs that anyone who’s followed Jemimah Puddleduck has heard before, but not quite like this – with the Persuasions doing their thing and Billy Payne letting it fly on the keyboard.
MK: Oh, yeah – I mean, you don’t put Payne on something and then tell him “hold back.” (laughter) My big regret, though, is the fact that Mike Finnigan’s on there and he doesn’t really get a chance to stretch out. I’m hoping that one of these days Mike and I can do something live together and really give him an opportunity to play and just stretch it out, you know?
BR: Next time – there’s always next time …
MK: (laughs) There you go.
Where did “Memphis Radio” come from?
MK: A friend of mine from L.A. named Susan Sheller wrote “Memphis Radio”. I used to do shows with her: everything from guitar gigs where we did a ton of covers and snuck in an original every ten songs or so just for fun – to the little around-town showcase sets where you go play 45 minutes for a bunch of record execs. Susan’s just a really sweet gal, a great songwriter, and a warm, wonderful person. I’ve always loved that song and when we first put the Puddleduck thing together, I asked her if we could cover it – she was all for it.
BR: Did the original have that cool guitar hook at the beginning?
MK: I made that up – when she introduced us to the song, I came up with that riff for it.
BR: There’s a moment during the solo on “Memphis” where your guitar has totally taken flight and all of a sudden, it’s JT on the keys leading the way … there’s just this cool, seamless transition between the two of you.
MK: Well, thanks. (laughs) I love that you’re picking up on all this stuff that I planned! (laughter)
BR: How about “Time Will Tell” – when did you write that?
MK: Probably ’93 or ’94 – I was about 40 when I wrote it. That’s a good example of one of the songs where you could go back and listen to one of the earlier versions and hear how it’s changed. There were some lines that were more the dig-in-the-heels angry young child stomping his feet, as opposed to the man with a little bit of wisdom and maybe some grief under his belt …
BR: I’m 51 and I’m waiting for the wisdom that comes with age.
MK: Well, I’ve got you beat, man: I’m 54 and I’m still waiting! (laughter)
BR: I remember hearing that for the first time on the original live Puddleduck album – a great emotion-filled jam that swirled into “The Other One” and eventually ground to a smoking halt back at the main theme.
MK: That’s cool – that’s a great description. It truly is meant to be a journey, you know? I think John Molo’s drumming really drives this version in particular … the whole band just rides the rollercoaster together.
BR: And then everybody gets a chance to catch their breath with “Love Song.”
MK: I wrote that one a long time ago – I was probably about 20 at the time. That’s another song that took on new meaning with time: when my wife and I got married, I sang it at our wedding. I wanted to include it on the album.
BR: An audio bouquet …
MK: Exactly! (laughter)
BR: There’s a neat moment towards the end when you modulate from the key the song’s in to the jam – is that the original arrangement?
MK: Actually, I rearranged it for the album to give the song somewhere to go. It originally was just this simple little acoustic number that was always done ala James Taylor, you know? I’d never had an occasion to play it in a band setting – maybe waayyy back in the 70s in a country-rock band I was in – and without an arrangement, the song is all of about two minutes long. We laid down the basic song in the studio and I really didn’t feel like it warranted a big, structured solo, but at the same time, it was like, “Two minutes is just too damn short – we’re not making a Kinks record here.” (laughs) So it ended up just kind of going into this loose jam sort of thing – basically because we were just screwing off. (laughter)
BR: And don’t forget your recording debut as a whistler. (laughter)
MK: Again, that was just something that I did off the top of my head while we were tracking vocals … it was kind of cool and funny and we ended up leaving it in.
BR: No – don’t tell me that. I want to imagine this all-night session where you did, like, 97 takes to get the whistle track down right.
MK: Oh, right – absolutely. (laughs)
BR: And then the dobro takes over …
MK: Yeah – I really liked the way the dobro almost sounds like a sitar at the very end.
BR: Randy Newman’s “Think It’s Gonna Rain” – what a neat band song.
MK: Absolutely. We tracked that song exactly the way it went down: all together in the room with no overdubs, nothing punched in … that’s just the way it happened.
BR: That’s cool to hear because that’s how the track feels on the album. And it’s another good example of even though the lineups change from track-to-track, it all feels like one session … there’s a common thread, a common vibe throughout the album that ties it all together.
MK: You know, one of my favorite albums is Eric Clapton’s Journeyman. He does the big produced pop numbers, he does the real raw bluesy stuff … and yet, no matter how eclectic the mix of songs is; no matter how different they all are from each other, it creates a work, you know? That’s what I was hoping for.
BR: Well, you nailed it. From Randy Newman we go to Joe Jackson’s “Fools In Love” – man, you play some sweet white-boy reggae. And that’s another full-Puddleduck track with JT unleashed on keys once again.
MK: JT really is one of my all-time favorite piano players and I’m blessed to play with him. You know, he gets to play with Bruce Hornsby live, but Brucie doesn’t always let him run free on his records … so my theory is, “Let the boy run!” (laughs)
BR: And the album closes with “Easy Wind” – you caught the raunch on that one. People can try to cover Pigpen, but if they don’t have that natural grease, they’re going to end up sounding like Perry Como, man.
MK: (laughs) You know, I grew up a huge blues freak – I listened to a ton of blues in my life; played a ton of blues in my life. I was also fortunate enough to be around the Dead a lot and caught a lot of shows in ’66, ’67, ’68, ’69 – you know, living here in San Francisco, all of us little junior high school kids could get into the Fillmore. (laughter) So I really cut my teeth listening to Piggy; he was definitely one of my inspirations for doing this … by observing him first-hand as a kid, it really got deep inside of me.
All these many years later, it just feels natural for me to go there, to play a song like “Easy Wind.” That was all one take, by the way – we just went in and did it, front to back.
BR: All right, well thank you for taking the time to do this, Mark. I know you and Maile have gone out of your way to thank everybody for their love and support while you were tackling the cancer, but you know … it’s all a function of what you put out there yourself – it reflects right back at you.
MK: Well, thanks, man … it’s true. And it’s one big family, for sure.
