©o©onuts 1973-2006 www.oftf.com All Rights Reserved.
SKIP
FRONTMAN & WHIRLING DANCER
Born in 1957 in Brasov (Kronstadt), Carpates, he grew up the son of vagabonds, poor and always on the run. By the age of 5 he was elevated into the world of showbiz – ANDRO (his father) had taught SKIP and ADAM acrobatic skills.Unfortunately, they gained little compensation for their risky aerial manoeuvres in the marketplaces. The Romanian people got rapidly used to the high-wire routine of the young brothers and soon went back to gunrunning, kidnapping and bestiality.
In 1969, halfway through national service, they borrowed a vehicle from their employers and briskly left Brasov. It was tough driving through the Carpates them days without a good old 45 and a bottle of Valium by your side.
SKIP learned to sleep with one eye open while ADAM nailed the pedal to the metal and dreamt of better days ahead. The further they drove from their kitchen table the more the road turned into a labyrinth of sticky-fingered gypsies, murderous whores and Boris Karloff look-a-likes. In daylight SKIP tried to get some real sleep, but hyperactive ADAM didn’t rest, singing and practicing his skills on the un-tuned mandolin.
SKIP clashed many times with his hard-nosed brother – driving for two years, hitting the same driveways and same short cuts in the wild, unbridled East. Whenever one of them drove out of misery by day – the other one was pulling the wheels right back onto the old tracks by nightfall.
One evening with the run-down vehicle audaciously parked on top of a steep bluff, ADAM considered the dark night with its gleaming starry sky. He then inaugurated his younger brother to his whimsical skill of counting the stars.
After a few days SKIP got into it and pointed with trembling fingers into the sky, picking out two signs: The Centaur, and the winged horse: his instant favourite, the Unicorn. That night, upon realising the unpredictable way out of their everlasting one-way street, they gunned the motor toward Paris – in search of dope Jazz, Moroccan Black, and on to experience a life less lifeless.
------------------------------------------------------------ --------------
Adam
Guitarplay
------------------------------------------------------------ --------------
Two years older than SKIP, ADAM, was always thrashed with the coarse end of the stick. And so it was to be: While ADAM counted and salted away the small money, his younger brother was out and about swindling rich housewives in splendid restaurants – never looking back. When SKIP would sneak home, late at night into the tent, ADAM was always practicing on the 12-string guitar and strumming on his borrowed mandolin.
ADAM eventually found his reward and salvation as he revelled in his first experience of the PARIS Jazz scene. He became mesmerised: Daytime was spent in front of the Montmartre strumming for small money from tourists with one aim in mind.
It was In May 1976 that he realised he had enough saved. He could now afford his true big love – the national steel guitar. And so the romance began: Jam sessions without endings – often waiting all night just to step into the realm, then blowing cats away till his fingers bled and his clothes dripped and ran with hot perspiration: this was ADAM’S sweet opium – this was his addiction.
------------------------------------------------------------ --------------
ANDRÉ BORROS
DRUMS & SHAKES
------------------------------------------------------------ --------------
October 1974. 9am, London Heathrow.
Twenty one year old BORROS arrived from Havana with nothing more than some borrowed leather underwear, a camera obscura, a beard trimmer, and, of course, his drumsticks.
Having no contacts whatsoever and with only rudimentary English at his disposal, BORROS, spent much of that winter living in Hyde Park, until fate blew his way in the shape of CHAS CHANDLER, the one-time ANIMALS bass player.
CHANDLER had been exercising his French Poodles when he’d spotted BORROS in the bushes. He instantly recognised the beat that the half-freezing drummer tapped on an old Oak tree stump to keep his blood pumping in the sub-zero conditions.
CHANDLER had seen the wicked drummer 3 years earlier, in a jazz club in SEATTLE, the very night the club was raided and BORROS was deported for hitting an unholy beat in the heartland of the holier than thou.
In his early years, ANDRE would earn a crust and cigar butt playing his way through the Havana samba scene – then hitting on the roads with various rhythm n blues bands. It’s impossible to know if BORROS’ mojo was born of real fever for the dirty beat or from shear desperation of his circumstances – but one thing for certain was his mojo was working: and there was a deal with the devil that had to be paid.
And so a young life full of destitution was blown away one icy morning in London. BORROS moved into a small flat next to the ANIMALS legend and fixed a Hendrix poster to his wall under the watchful gaze of none other than BOB DYLAN.
Here BORROS experienced a new cosmos filled with unlimited free sex, premium head candy and dirty rock n roll.
CHAS CHANDLER was not the one for restraining BORROS’ excesses, although he’d remarked that if anybody was going to hell an innocent, it was this kid.
Three years filled with Class-A debauchery only lead to introspection that brought sorrows, pain and indeed homesickness. One day he wrote a short letter to CHANDLER, telling him about his state of mind.
And that was the end of the Big Smoke for BURROS: back to his roots – back to CUBA. The down in London all cried a tear for losing its greatest drummer: all except KEITH MOON.
------------------------------------------------------------ --------------
STEVE M. FITZPATRICK
Synthesisers, Keyboards ------------------------------------------------------------ --------------
Beware: the hushed one with the honest smile-attack and a six blast BUCKY at the hip.
STEVE M. FITZPATRICK an eminent Pina Colada shaker and a NIGGA on the rocks. His mask covers his face but not his rage. His mood courageous: his truth a shame on humanity.
The tall keyboarder of the COCONUT CREW engages the world with the dejection of middle-American UTOPIA and all of its bigoted blues.
"We always had to hide our feelings, our anger, my people nowadays have to wear a mask, like we lost our native identities“.
Together with uncle J.T. BROWNE the young FITZPEE grew up in FAJARDO, jingling on a Hammond in the run down HOOD. Practicing 24/7 the kid got invited by beach bars and tourist joints to play the evening shows. His uncle sorted a KORG-E-Piano and half a year later they both got onto the big wave.
FITZPEE offers a range of kick-ass methods to the truth – from Gospel and Memphis Blues to the Honky-Tonk-Jukebox Sound: DIG IT, OR STAY IGNORANT.
YOURS, ROYAL CREWNESS---------------------------------------------------- ----------------------