It’s one thing to be a creative quadruple threat (film actor, stage actor, television actor, musician); it’s another thing entirely to excel as a quadruple threat for the better part of 43 years. From multiple Tony nominations—and wins—to starring roles on Fame and Treme, Michael Cerveris may be best known for his versatility as a thespian, but he proves just as formidable behind the mic on his long-awaited sophomore solo album, Piety. His sonic pedigree is unsurprisingly impressive, having shared the stage with the likes of the Breeders, Bob Mould, Teenage Fanclub and Frank Black. Cerveris will be guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read his MAGNET Feedback.
Cerveris: When I was a kid, my classically trained piano professor father decided that he owed it to his life’s calling to insist his three children at least attempt to acquire some skill as musicians. We were allowed to pick the instrument of our choice and then had to study for at least one year, after which we were free to put it down and never play another note if we chose. It seemed and seems a very reasonable thing for a father devoted to music to ask of his offspring. Piano is a hard thing to learn at home from your father, so after a short, vain attempt at that, I began looking for my instrument. Even at the ripe old age of 11, my budding rock curiosity was putting distance between me and the ’70s folk music I’d first been drawn to, and Appalachian music was still a long way off from making clear that it was planting itself in my soul. Probably as an attempt to bridge the gap between long hair and guitars and my father’s classical realm (though to be fair, Beethoven, Liszt, Bach and those guys had long hair, too), I was the ideal candidate for … prog rock. “Look Dad, Yes are writing symphonic rock songs in several movements! Emerson Lake And Palmer are playing Mussorgsky! Gentle Giant have Baroque breakdowns in their tunes! Kansas has a violin player—my friends and I just saw them at the Memorial Field House!” Dad was unconvinced, but I decided violin was going to be my instrument, and it was—for a while. Apparently something about the way I played violin as a young boy made my teacher suggest I switch to cello. Don’t ask me why. And I fervently wish I’d followed through on either of those instruments, as I would love to have more than a rudimentary skill with either of those two favorite instruments. But it was fourth grade and, not knowing it would take much more than this to be cool, I switched to guitar. I finished out my year of study, put it away for a couple years and then retaught myself by ear. To this day, what limited playing skills I have are really self taught more than anything else. Trial and mostly error.
I can pinpoint the day my prog-rock phase began. It was while working my first job in the local National Record Mart, where I spent the bulk of my salary every week buying LPs that I’d never heard or heard of only vaguely. ’70s radio was actually much more varied than today’s bland megastations, but this was pre MTV and I had no older brother and lived in West Virginia, so I was doing a lot of pioneering listening for myself. And then one day, out of the blue, I picked up the first Peter Gabriel-era Genesis live record, proving that sometimes you can judge an album by its cover. I was hooked. And that led me quickly to their 1974 surreal concept album, The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. And that led me to Steve Hackett. And that led me, on “The Carpet Crawlers” (one of my favorite tracks) to one of the earliest recorded examples of the EBow.
For those who don’t work at Guitar Center, the EBow, short for Electronic Bow or Energy Bow, was the “original type of monophonic handheld electromagnetic string driver,” according to the history webs. Invented by Greg Heet in 1969, it’s a hand held device that creates a feedback loop that drives a string to vibrate continuously. Crucially, this can result in a guitar player sounding almost like a violinist. The planets had aligned. I had my cake and was stuffing my face with it. I dutifully sought out my first EBow and spent hours experimenting with it. By moving the device closer or further from the string and up or down the neck, you could control volume, intensity, tone. Slamming it into the strings made some crazy clattering electronic sounds. Using it on an acoustic, though more limited than its customary use on electrics, elicited flute like tones. Even the higher strings of a bass could sing sweetly under the EBow’s magnetic spell. None of this qualified as mastering a classical instrument with my dad, but I do think the theremin-like whale sounds and endless electric wails coming from behind my closed bedroom door probably drove both my parents nuts, so I was at least fulfilling my responsibilities as a teenager.
This humble little handheld tool has been used ever since by artists as varied as the aforementioned pioneer Steve Hackett, Stuart Adamson of Big Country, Christian guitar whiz Phil Keaggy, Radiohead’s Ed O’Brian, Blondie, the Bongos, Smashing Pumpkins, Pearl Jam and, even, avant garde composer John Cage. Peter Buck even gave it pride of place in the title of R.E.M.’s “E-Bow The Letter.”
Now, gear is fun. Machines have made some amazing sounds and make capturing them faster and easier and cheaper than ever (for better and for worse). And I love a good stomp box as much as the next guy. At one point, my pedal board was about five-feet long and lived in a flight case affectionately nicknamed “the coffin” by the bandmates I was always trying to persuade to help me lift it into the van. And when I toured as Bob Mould’s rhythm guitarist, at my feet were four distortion pedals, an overdrive and a tremolo (and though I don’t think Bob believed me, a good tuner). But what I think I have always liked best about this anachronistic piece of handheld ’70s hardware is that, like the Peter Frampton/Joe Walsh Talk Box, it existed at the tipping point where the future that would lead into MIDI and wholly synthesized music was still being manipulated by an actual human engaged in more than simply triggering sounds that a machine makes. It was the bottle-neck slide for the modern man. It’s quaint to think that back then it sounded like the future, like outer space in a little black box with its little red eye glowing. But it was a future that still needed humans to acquire a skill to utilize it. And while I’m much more invested in the music you make with wood and steel boxes these days, I still have a fondness for this geeky little device.
Oh, and I took up the fiddle again. I still play a bit like a fourth grader. But I’m working on it. Dad will be proud.
Videos after the jump.
