The continuing saga of Kung Pao Kitchen.

The I-Ching says this:

“IT FURTHERS ONE TO CROSS THE GREAT WATER.”

What does that mean?

It means that movement is life.

We try things. We succeed. We fail. And all our endeavors further us in some way.

Thirty million years ago we were writing songs for the fifth Nu Shooz album. It was a struggle. The label hated everything we handed in. We began to doubt ourselves. But I’m proud to say we didn’t stop.

Movement is life, and by moving, we know we’re alive.

Sink or swim, baby.

Sometimes the river fights back. Strong currents want to drown us. If we struggle, we only get tired. (There’s truth in the metaphor I’m beating to death here.)

We worked hard on the songs. I suppose I could use something about rowing against the current. In the end, the label decided to shelve the record.

So now it’s now.

We dusted off the tapes and hey, they’re pretty cool. We spent the next four months scraping them into little sandcastles, adding stuff, taking stuff out. It’s obsessive work…fun work.

“The album will be done in five more days!” Then…Blamp!

The computer is dead.

This is not just a computer. It’s a Mac Pro with a Pro-Tools HDIII system running the new Version 9 software. Only guys with really thick glasses know how to make this thing go.

“Don’t worry, no data was lost.”

While this is going on, we received news that a key member of the band was diagnosed with cancer.

This put everything in a different light. Sometimes it feels ridiculous to work on music in the face of grim reality. And then…sometimes it feels like the only thing left to do.

Keep on moving.

The computer is running again.

The cancer has been stared directly in the eye. The Doctor said, “You’ll have to find something else to die of.”

Yesterday we opened up the recovered Kung Pao Kitchen tracks and listened to them. Valerie said she thought horns would be good on one of the songs. After she said that, other songs sprouted horns. It’s like the whole record went from three dimensions to four! Nothing was lost.

While we were busy fighting the tides, they were changing us, and changing the landscape around us. The roiling waters changed us in ways we couldn’t guess.

It’s going to be a great record, a different record.

We try things. We succeed. We fail.

And all our endeavors further us in some way.

Movement is life.

- JRS

9/1/11

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Swerve Magazine: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview. Incidentally, you are the first artists to be interviewed by us for our new monthly 80s feature.

John Smith: What was the question? Just kidding. We’re honored that our 80s work has become a permanent part of the culture, and in a way, a sort of brand name. The 80s were a great time to be young and alive and to have a band. We actually made a living with a nine-piece band for seven years before Atlantic signed us. Not so sure we could do that now.

SM: I caught a clip somewhere online of a show from the 80s that described you and your husband as hippies when you first met. Were/are you guys really hippies?

JS: We met at a hippie commune called ‘The First Cosmic Bank of Divine Economy’ or ‘cosmic bank’ for short. It wasn’t a cult or anything, but we were all teenagers, reading Yogananda, and Castaneda, Herman Hesse and B.F. Skinner. Valerie was the responsible one. She knew how to balance a checkbook. We called her the ‘hippie with a checkbook.’ I always embraced hippie values musically. We came up in the era where Coltrane could fill up four sides of an LP with one song! It was sort of the precursor to the extended dance remix! I wanted to mix the angry psychedelia of Hendrix with the magic paisley harmonic carpet-bombing of ‘Trane and Charlie Parker. Of course in the end, Nu Shooz didn’t come out anything like that.

SM: When did you guys form Nu Shooz? How did the name of the band come about?

JS: You know, when I was young I used to practice being interviewed. I thought I’d be all evanescent and mystical like Hendrix. ‘Yeah, dig brother…no buttons to push…didn’t even rain.’ Or maybe I’d play with people’s heads like Bob Dylan. (“I think of myself as a song-and-dance man.”) When we finally got somewhere in show business, we got asked the same three questions over and over:

A.) How did you get the name of the Band?

B.) What’s it like to be married and in a band.

C.) [...Something something....] ‘I Can’t Wait.’

So you see, the parameters of Modern Show Business don’t allow for any of the shenanigans Dylan and Hendrix used to get away with. No beat poetry,just the facts. I guess we’re living in a non-poetic age.

But to answer the question…

Valerie and I played in Latin and African bands in the late 70s. This was before they called it ‘World Music.’ I arranged and played piano for a salsa band called Felicidades. Valerie played congas and African drums with Ghanaian master drummer Obo Addy. By 78 Felicidades was breaking up. I took a trip to New York and had an artistic epiphany there. I’m not from Cuba or Puerto Rico. I’m an American. I want to do ‘American Music.’ There was this mystic happening, a God thing. I found an abandoned Motown songbook on top of a battered upright piano, sat down and started playing through it.

So, by the time I got back to Portland I knew I wanted to do a soul band.

Nu Shooz was started by me and Larry Haggin, the front man for Felicidades. We had an upcoming gig at a park, and needed a name for the group. This was in the spring of 1979. Larry and I were in the kitchen of the house where we practiced. There was this contact paper on the walls printed like an 1890s newspaper. We looked over at the same time and saw some shoes…those buttonhole shoes.

“Hey, we could be the Shoes!”

The rest is…um…History.

For years afterward I walked around thinking, I wish we’d spent like, five more minutes on it and come up with something cooler, something like…Megadeth. Now, after thirty-three years I have to admit it’s grown on me. Oh yeah, and the spelling evolved over time. I give credit for the spelling to Jim Hogan, our original bass player.

I recall him saying, ‘Spell it with a ‘Z,’ it looks more rock.’

SM: How did your sound and style come about? Was it basically doing what was the sign of the time?

JS: Sign of the time? Hah! We were the Counter-Reformation! Let me back up. I knew I wanted to do a soul band with horns. After Felicidades, I always had to have horns. But the first Nu Shooz band was just two guitars, bass, and drums. And it was a democracy. One guy wanted to do Eric Clapton. Someone (who shall now be named) brought in ‘Silly Love Songs’ by Paul McCartney. It was a mess. It taught me the value of Benevolent Dictatorship. There has to be one hand on the tiller. The Shoo-Horns came on in 1980, four horns: trumpet, tenor, ‘bone, and ‘Bari, a big fat sound. Valerie joined in ’81 after a year in music school. By then we were one of the happening bands in Portland, Oregon.

Now back to the Counter-Reformation thing. When I was in New York in 78, I saw the early punk movement happening and I hated it. Punk just sounded stupid to my ears, stupid and irritating. I loved the heavy Philly-soul production of Gamble & Huff, with the horns and strings and congas. To me that sound had dignity. I liked disco, but disco was devolving into all those bad Casablanca records, ‘Disco Beethoven’s Fifth’ and all that crap. So then came another epiphany. If I hated punk and loved disco and Philly soul and Tower of Power and Earth Wind and Fire, maybe there were other people out there like me.

The answer was yes.

So, Nu Shooz in a big way was me shooting back at the Punk Invasion. But beside that, I just dug arranging…those big sheets of music paper, the math and art and science of it. In the mid-70s, I started listening to arrangers like Toshiko Akiyoshi and Papo Luca. So, another side of the story was that I wanted a band like Miles Davis had on ‘Birth of the Cool,’ nine horns, a jazz laboratory. ‘We’ll play pop music on the side, then write these beautiful charts…’ It didn’t turn out that way.

SM: ‘I Can’t Wait’ (ICW) received regional airplay in your native Oregon. At the time, how cool was it that your song was on the airwaves? Did you ever fathom that it would blow up into a worldwide hit and one of the defining songs of the decade?

JS: Ask anyone and they’ll tell you it’s impossible to know whether a song is a hit or not. All I know is, of all the songs we were recording in the winter of ’84 that one sounded the most real, the most like an actual record. Then it took six months to make it work in the studio.

Valerie Day: I’ll never forget the first time I heard it on the radio. It was April and the sun was out – a miraculous sunny spring day in Portland, OR. I was in my little 79’ Toyota Corolla station wagon driving up Weidler Street. My radio was dialed to Z100 – the station that had first played the song and recently put it into regular rotation (a miracle for an unsigned band – but that’s another story!). And then there it was. I cranked the volume up and started singing along. Then it hit me – I was actually singing with myself on the radio! I rolled down the window and wanted to shout it to the world – hey – that’s my voice! That’s our band! That’s our song! It was an incredible feeling. But I never dreamed that I would become – as you put it – one of the defining songs of the decade. Miraculous.

SM: How did the remix of the song, the version that the world knows, come about?

VD: We had a regional hit with the song first, but couldn’t get arrested when it came to getting a label to sign us. Even though we were getting all kinds of airplay on radio throughout the Pacific NW, they thought it was a fluke that the songs success wouldn’t translate to other markets. Warner gave us a demo deal but then turned us down saying “We already have Madonna.”

While we were busy being turned down by all the majors, a DJ label called Hot Trax approached us about putting ‘ICW’ on a 12” going out to club DJ’s. We said sure. Long story short, that record was found in an import bin in Holland by a remix artist named Peter Slaghuis. His version (with the infamous emulator chirpy sound on the front) came back to the U.S. as a Dutch import and was found in a NYC dance club by a young guy named Bruce Carbon who had just started working in the Dance department at Atlantic Records. (Thanks Bruce!)

SM: You guys were up for a Grammy the year ‘ I Can’t Wait’ came out (in 1987, for Best New Artist). How cool was that? Were you present at the awards show and, if so, did you take a look around at all the artists there that night and think, “Wow.”

VD: That was an amazing moment. Sitting in that auditorium in L.A. with Whitney Houston, Bonnie Raitt,  Janet Jackson…it was too much. We had a feeling Bruce Hornsby was going to win the award, (which he did) but there was still that pregnant pause when the envelope was being opened that I wondered if my antiperspirant would hold up to the strain!

SM: Did everything hit you too fast…in terms of popularity, promos, touring etc. after the releases of ‘I Can’t Wait’ and ‘Point of No Return?” How did you guys deal with sudden fame?

JS: Um…We played for seven years before we ever got near a record label, so when the fame thing happened, we could definitely get up and play. Then we were too busy for it to really sink in. We took the band on the road and played seventy cities in seventy-three days. On our three days off we did laundry.

SM: Who did you guys tour with in the 80s? Any interesting stories?

VD: We toured with Morris Day and the Time, The Jets, Billy Ocean, The Fat Boys, Tina Turner, The Pointer Sisters…speaking of which, have you ever seen “This Is Spinal Tap”? I think pretty much everything that happened in to the band in that movie happened to ours except for the getting stuck in the egg bit.

When we opened for the Pointer Sisters the whole band got lost in the bowels of the auditorium we were playing in just as we were about to go on. The voice of the announcer “And now ladies and gentlemen…” was bouncing off the pipes as we raced around trying to find our way to the stage. We made it, but the pause was VERY pregnant between the announcement and our rather rushed entrance.

SM: What was the cause of Nu Shooz falling back into relative obscurity as the 80s wound down, even though you put out several more albums? Was it because of the changing industry, record labels, or some other driving force?

JS: It was a combination of things. First of all, to make it in the record business as it was at that time was a miracle, something like putting a camel through the eye of a needle. The people at labels change all the time, so by the time our third Atlantic record was done, the people who signed us were long gone. And let’s be honest, they’re not in the business of trying to understand you as an artiste. They have their cookie-cutter ways of doing things and — God bless ‘em, sometimes it works. But I’m not here to complain about the label.

The other factor was, I was moving on musically. I didn’t want to make the same record over and over. And I sure as hell didn’t want to go out on the road and play the same record over and over. By 1988 I was studying Bach and Charlie Parker and learning to write film scores. On the pop side, I was getting bored with R&B and electronica and listening to ’60s psychedelia, ‘Incense and Peppermints’ and all that. Making another ‘I Can’t Wait’ was the last thing on my mind. So it’s no surprise that the label lost interest in us.

Success in pop music is a blessing and a curse. The public embraces a band, then expects them to stay the same. Only a few groups in history were allowed to grow. The Beatles are the best example, but then radio wasn’t so tightly formatted back then. Would the Beatles be allowed to go from “She Loves You,” to “I Am The Walrus” today?

I was determined to stay true to my interests. That’s what got us as far as we got. And what I saw of show business turned out to be…not very interesting.

SM: Looking back at what you accomplished in the ’80s, do you guys hide from it or embrace it? Do you get sick, or at least become weary of “I Can’t Wait” and/or “Point of No Return?”

JS: Well, I never liked “Point of No Return” that much, especially the remix. After ‘I Can’t Wait’ all the remix guys tried to do the same quirky sampler thing on our stuff, except for Mantronix who did a brilliant job with “Should I Say Yes.” Incidentally, we get e-mails all the time from Zimbabwe and Uganda saying how much they love that song. I can totally picture it playing in some African club on a hot night. The version of ‘Point of No Return’ on ‘Pandora’s Box’ is closer to how I wanted the song to sound. ‘I Can’t Wait’ I’m still very proud of. It’s twenty-seven years later and it still sounds fat and funky. Thinking back to when I wrote it, it was probably the moment when I felt the most sincere and engaged by funk music. The ’80s were an exciting time, when drum machines were new and fresh sounding. That said, I can’t imagine doing that kind of music now.

SM: What have you guys been up to? I know you released several albums over the years. Without the burden of a large record label, do you guys make the music you want to, so to speak?

JS: Actually we only released one album since 1992, a jazzy orchestral record called ‘Pandora’s Box.’ It was probably too esoteric for the average Nu Shooz fan, but it was definitely what we wanted to do at the time. We also re-issued ‘That’s Right,” which used to be available only on cassette! Are we making the music we want to? Absolutely. As artists we have a responsibility to follow the path wherever it might lead. For me that path led into the world of Classical film scores, and the French Impressionist composers of the Fin de Siecle, Debussy and Ravel. After I discovered Debussy it sort of wrecked everything else. A lot of fans ofour old stuff had trouble following us into this strange new world. That’s cool, they can listen to the old records and I guess, dream of simpler times. The label never really told us what to do. They just gave us enough rope to hang ourselves, and we did!

VD: There are a couple of other albums that made their way out there in the last decade though…I recorded a Big Band CD as a fundraiser for the arts in schools that John did transcriptions for, then a jazz duet CD with smooth jazz pioneer Tom Grant. John also did the orchestrations for a multi-media cabaret/concert/science lecture that I wrote and produced with jazz pianist Darrell Grant and filmmaker Jim Blashfield (who directed the video for ‘ICW’ back in the ’80s) about the neuroscience of romantic love – “Brain Chemistry For Lovers”.

SM: It’s pretty amazing and rare that you guys are still married after being together for a long time and working together for a long time. What is the secret to your success?

JS: My secret? I’m still excited to be in a relationship with this woman. Also, we had it easier than some of our band members. At the end of the day, we knew what we’d been through. After the Shooz, we both went off and did our own thing. Valerie was an in-demand session player. She played congas and Latin percussion on every jazz record coming out of Portland for a few years. And she taught voice lessons. I worked in advertising, doing infomercials for exercise machines and boat motors, and also scored a bunch of indie films. When we came back together to record ‘Pandora,’ we both had more to bring to the table.

VD: John is one of the smartest, funniest, most creative people I know. Give us a cup of coffee or a martini (or both!) and we can talk for hours and never get bored. It helps that even though we’re very different, our preferences in music and art are similar. He’s a bit more of a traditionalist and I’m a bit more of a modernist, but that makes it all the more interesting, you know?

SM: Any plans for touring? If so, would it be part of one of the ‘80s artists lineup, or do you guys prefer to go alone and perform music from throughout your career, not just the 80s?

JS: If you ever see me on the ‘oldies circuit’ you have my permission to shoot me. I’ve always thought of the nostalgia thing as The Elephant Graveyard. I have no interest in going out with a bunch of hired guns and pretending to be Nu Shooz. That was a certain time and place that’s gone forever. Right now I’m applying for a grant to write a new score for the 1928 silent movie ‘Nosferatu,’ for the Portland Chamber Orchestra. And I’m working on a graphic novel called ‘Evolution.’ Those are the kinds of things that interest me now. Fans of our ‘80’s stuff will always have those records to listen to. There’s a lot of love out there for what we did back then. For that we’re extremely grateful.

VD: Touring would be great, but playing the 80s material is just not something I feel compelled to do right now. Plus, there’s no time! We’re working on a NU SHOOZ CD of material from our ’80’s “vaults” that no one has ever heard. “Kung Pao Kitchen” will be out in early 2012. I’m also teaching at Portland State University, performing with a jazz quartet, and looking forward to recording some more NU SHOOZ Orchestra records. John and I are parents too. Our son Malcolm is 16 and only has a couple more years of high school to go. He’s an amazing visual artist and a wonderful person. We want to make sure we don’t miss a minute of the years he’s still with us.

SM: Thanks for taking the time to do this interview. Hopefully we’ll see you guys, or ‘yinz guys’ as they say here in Pittsburg, one day.

JS: My mom was from Pennsylvania…Slippery Rock to be exact. Never been there myself. I’m from the Middle East too… Cleveland, Ohio. Anyway, thanks for listening.

VD: Thanks for asking us…and yes! If we’re out in Pittsburgh someday, we’ll be sure to let you know.

For the permalink to this article, click here.

Many of our ‘80s fans were baffled. Where were the sing-along hooks and the bright, cheerful synth lines? For those who want to know what happened after “Should I Say Yes,” Nu Shooz is proud to present ‘Kung Pao Kitchen’ — a collection of songs from the 80’s that have never seen the light of day. The best of these songs, written between 1988 and 1992, feature guest appearances by James Brown veteran Maceo Parker, and longtime Shooz collaborator Jeff Lorber.

For the past 3 months, we’ve been dusting off these previously un-vaulted tracks and re-mastering them for the masses.  While you’ll have to wait until July 31 for the full-length record, we thought we’d share a bit of our creative process in the meantime. We hope you enjoy a behind-the-scenes peek into our studio space…

Uni-Vibe: Not as racy as it sounds, but it makes the sounds good.

Juxtaposition de John

Bang-A-What?

Welcome to the Kung Pao Kitchen,

Valerie & John

Nu Shooz

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Kickin’ It Old School: How did you & John meet each other?  Was there immediate chemistry between you two?  When did you start performing music together?  Were you married previous to forming Nu Shooz?

John R. Smith: No, it wasn’t love at first sight. It took about a month…after that I knew we’d be together forever. (Awwwww!)

Valerie J. Day: We met at a communal household in Portland OR. John was hitchhiking back from Olympia WA (to L.A.) and met one of the people who lived there when they were both stuck on the same freeway onramp. We didn’t start performing together until about four years later. I finally proposed after we’d been together seven years. He would never have thought of it!

KOS: At what point and how was Nu Shooz officially formed?  How and why was that name chosen for the group?  What were your expectations and goals when you started out?

JRS: Valerie and I were part of the ethnic music scene in Portland Oregon in the late ’70′s…this was before they called it ‘World Music.’ She was studying congas, and I wanted to be an arranger. We went to music school together for a year. At the same time we were hanging around a Calypso band called Felicidades. Eventually, they let me play piano even though I wasn’t very good, and I started writing songs and arranging for them. This was around 1977. Felicidades had a horn section. After that I always had to have horns. Felicidades started to phase out around ’78. I took a trip to New York. I thought I was hot s**t, you know, and I was going to be ‘discovered.’  So, like a lot of people, I got my butt kicked artistically and went back to P-Town with my tail between my legs. But I did figure out that I was done with Latin music. I’m not from Cuba. I wanted to do something American. During that same trip I got to see some early punk, at the Mudd Club and all that, and I thought, this sucks! I hated punk and thought maybe there were other people like me, who dug Philly Soul and Disco and Tower of Power. So I went back to Portland determined to do something American…a soul band. Nu Shooz was started by myself and Larry Haggin, who was the lead singer in Felicidades. Our first gig was June 21st 1979, as a four piece. And I have to tell you…we pretty much sucked. Larry left in 1980 and I added four horns, then we were off and running. As for the name, it was chosen in desperation because we needed something to put on the poster. Jim Hogan, our original bass player, was responsible for the spelling. He was a rocker and thought it looked more ‘rock.’

KOS: Please take us back to when “I Can’t Wait” was conceived and written.  What is the backstory and what inspired the song?  How long did it take to write?  How did the core melody get developed?

JRS: By 1981 we were a nine-piece band and we were one of the hot bands in town. Portland circa 1981 was the best music city on Earth. There were so many places to play, and rent was cheap. Anyway, I worked day and night trying to keep four hours of material fresh. (An impossible task.) I evolved a system where I worked on new songs in batches of ten, and tried to have two completed every week for rehearsal. Wrote a lot of awful, embarrassing songs. My old bandmates still kid me about them. Some of the stuff I wrote makes me cringe to this day. Anyway, I got a four-track recorder around 1983, a sturdy old Teac 3440, and really started cranking them out. ‘I Can’t Wait’ was part of the first reel of tunes written on the new four-track. It was a thing I’d been hearing in my head. It could have gone a lot of different ways, and maybe we wouldn’t be having this conversation now.

KOS: Were the lyrics the last part added?  What is the intended meaning of the song? Or as the song says, “Tell me what it’s all about.”

JRS: I scrabbled out the lyrics on the kitchen table in fifteen minutes as the band was loading their gear in for rehearsal. Flashed the piece of paper at Valerie and said, “How’s this?” Valerie said, “Fine.”

KOS: When you first recorded it in the summer of 1984, did you feel you had something special?  How did it feel when you first heard it on the local Portland radio?

JRS: Out of all the songs we were recording, that one sounded the most real. For a song to work it has to be right for the singer, and the band…all of these factors have to come together. So yeah, I knew it was the best thing on the record, but you can never know what’s going to be a ‘hit.’ All these other factors come in play, mostly having to do with the business.

VJD: I’ll never forget the first time I heard it on the radio. I was driving in my car heading eastbound on Weidler St. in Portland. I even remember the intersection! The song came on Z100. I started singing along and then had the realization that I was SINGING ALONG WITH MYSELF on the radio. It was crazy and wonderful and I wanted to roll down the window and shout out to the world about what had just happened.

KOS: I saw this in your timeline for the Fall of 1985: Warner Bros. Records extends a demo deal to Nu Shooz, but passes on the band soon afterward, stating “We’ve already got Madonna.”  What else can you tell us about this?  Were they actually comparing your sound to Madonna’s?

JRS: No, they were basically trying to blow us off. In those days, Warner Bros. had this thing they’d do. If you got high enough up the A&R ladder and they wanted to blow you off, they’d give you a Demo Deal.

VJD: We always figured the thing about Madonna was just something for them to say.

KOS: Please tell us about how the Dutch remix version by Pieder “Hithouse” Slaghuis impacted the song and band’s ultimate success.  Did it lead directly to Atlantic Records signing Nu Shooz to a recording contract?

JRS: Pieder’s remix made it a hit. The first time I heard it we were on the road, down in Southern Oregon. I liked it right away because he did things I never would have thought of, not in a million years. We brought him to New York to work on a couple other songs. Meeting him was strange, because he didn’t speak English, and he had these weird guys with him. Even so, he taught me some awesome tape cutting tricks.

KOS: Finally, in February of 1986, “I Can’t Wait” is released as a single.  It reaches #1 on the Dance chart by the end of March.  It would peak at #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 by June and become one of the biggest songs of that year.  How did it feel to finally hit it big with this great song?  Could you have ever anticipated the success it would end up having?  What changed for you personally and for Nu Shooz after the huge success of this single?  Were you prepared for all of the attention by this point?

JRS: When our ‘overnight success’ happened, we had been playing four hours a night five or six nights a week for seven years! We were road warriors! So we could get up there and play. What we weren’t prepared for was the Entertainment Industry. I’ll tell you, there’s a lot of things I’d do differently now, but that’s not the rules of the game. You get one shot, and you’d better be ready.

KOS: [I ask this in most of my interviews] When you have a mega hit song like that, do you (or did you) ever get sick of playing it?  What are your feelings about the song today 25 years later?

JRS: No, I’m proud of that song. It still sounds fresh and funky 25 years later. What’s gotten a little boring is that it seems to be all people are interested in. That used to really overheat my circuit boards. Now I realize that’s SHOW BIZ, baby. They don’t call it Show ART. Musically I’ve moved way past synth pop. When I listen to music at all, mostly I like the French Impressionist composers like Ravel and Debussy, and film score guys like Max Steiner. That’s what winds my clock now. Oh yeah, and 60′s psychedelia like ‘Incense and Peppermints.’

VJD: After all the years of playing in relative obscurity, it felt great to have an original tune that people would actually come up and sing to US! They still do by the way. After all these years, it’s like “I Can’t Wait” has it’s own career. We’re grateful – and astonished by it’s staying power.

KOS: The music video for “I Can’t Wait” was directed by Jim Blashfield who has created so many great music videos over the years.  First, how did you decide to work with Blashfield on your video?  How was the concept developed?  Can you give us your take on the meaning and some of the symbolism used in the video?

VJD: We were so fortunate to get hooked up with Jim. He’s an original in every sense of the word. Turns out he completely improvised the whole video shoot. There’s a great article written about the “making of” that you can check out if you’re interested. Here’s the link: http://www.nushoozmusic.com/index.php/i-cant-wait-the-video-what-is-it-all-about/

I got to work with Jim again recently for a show I created called “Brain Chemistry For Lovers” (www.brainchemistrylovers.com) about the neuroscience of romantic love. He created the video portion of the show, edited the script, and directed. He’s the best. It was really fun to get to work with him again after all these years.

KOS: Your videos received frequent airplay on MTV at that time which certainly helped to increase exposure and popularity.  What are your thoughts on the impact that MTV had on music in the 80s?  Also from an image and marketing point of view?

JRS: Is there anyone alive who remembers when MTV played music? Check it out. What kind of crazy world are we living in when MTV plays reality shows, and the History Channel does a series about long haul truckers? When I heard there was going to be a video music channel, silly me, I’m thinking I’m gonna get to see Louie Jordan, Miles Davis, then Hendrix at Woodstock, then maybe some Rick James. Instead, it went it’s serpentine way, and changed music forever. I swear to God I felt it from the stage! Back in nineteen-eighty-whatever, the day MTV went on the air, audiences got more passive.

VJD: On the other hand, it added a whole new dimension to the music experience. I’ve always been into working the space where different art forms intersect. Not that all music videos are art, but so much creative collaboration between visual artists, filmmakers, animators, and musicians happened because of MTV. And for a while there, those artists even got paid to do it.

KOS: Your follow-up single “Point of No Return” did not have the same success, but it did top the Dance charts again and reached the top 30 of the Billboard Hot 100.  What is the backstory and inspiration for this song?  What are your feelings regarding this single?

JRS: Well, Point of No Return wasn’t as well crafted of a song, (Not that ‘I Can’t Wait’ is ‘Firebird Suite’ or anything) and the same care wasn’t put into the recording. I always felt like it was never finished. Hey…it got to No. 28, higher than some of my favorite songs. Higher than ‘Papa-Oo-Mao-Mao.’ We did a new version of it on Pandora’s Box and it came out cool.

VJD: I like (The Return Of) Point Of Not Return better too.

KOS: Who did you tour with back in the 80s?  Any particular stories or memories from while out on tour back then?

JRS: Morris Day and the Time, Billy Ocean, Tina Turner, The Pointer Sisters, The Fat Boys blew us off the stage in Minneapolis. They also ate all the bread.

VJD: We played 70 cities in 71 days. I mostly remember trying to find food after the gig and trying to get my gig clothes cleaned on our one day off. Ah yes… the glamorous life!

KOS: Please discuss the circumstances surrounding Atlantic in 1992 and why your third album for them was not released at that time.  Did this lead to the temporary break-up/hiatus for Nu Shooz?  At that time, did you feel like Nu Shooz would ever record again?  Will the Eat & Run album ever be released?  Then in 2007, what made it the right time to reform the group?  What were your goals and expectations this time around?

JRS: There’s a lot of turnover at record labels. We probably spent too much time making the third record. By the time it was done, the people who signed us were long gone. So there was nobody at Atlantic who cared about us. By then, we were tired of submitting songs to deaf ears. And we were not trying to make another I Can’t Wait, which of course, is what they wanted. By 1988 I wanted to write songs like Lowell George (Little Feat). We aren’t going to release Eat & Run, which we don’t own, but there were so many songs that came out of those four years, and we’re going to release a batch of them this summer. The album will be called ‘Kung Pao Kitchen.’

VJD: In 2006 we released a slowed down jazz/soul acoustic version of ‘I Can’t Wait’ to celebrate it’s 20^th anniversary. It was a chance to put new clothes on the song and record it with a bunch of our favorite jazz musicians in town. We had a great time doing it, and the response was positive – so we decided to do more. That’s how the NU SHOOZ Orchestra came into being.

KOS: [I also ask this in all of my interviews] Some 80s pop superstars “run away” from the 80s and some embrace the success and fans from that decade.  (If at all) How do you personally deal with and keep the 80s alive and in perspective?

JRS: Let me say first of all that I always thought the shoulder pads were heinous. I loved the eighties, except maybe for Ronald Reagan. A lot of the culture seemed silly even at the time. Go watch ‘Road Warrior.’ We had a great time in the ’80′s, a fabulous time, but we were total misfits, alien jazz hippies landed in a world of plastic fashion. We came out of the Jazz and Latin scene of the ’70′s. So we weren’t punk rockers who discovered synthesizers, or new wave pop tarts. We were listening to Coltrane and Charlie Parker, and the Fania All-Stars, and then- Bam!- we’ve got this popular dance band. I have nothing but gratitude for the legions of fans who love ‘I Can’t Wait’. They’ve made my music career possible, but no way could I keep sounding like I did when I was 25. It’s not even possible.

KOS: I have to ask you about being married and working together like you do.  Has this ever been a challenge?  Has it gotten easier or harder over the years?  Are your accomplishments even sweeter since you shared the experiences and conquered them together? It certainly is unusual for a couple like you to make it work for so long (and also something I certainly admire).  If you don’t mind me asking, what is the secret to maintaining both your professional and personal relationship at the same time?  Are they separate or one in the same?

JRS: I adore this girl. That’s the secret to a long relationship. I’m just as thrilled as I was back in ’75. How could a guy like me end up with a girl like that? Miracles do happen. Working together has gotten easier over the years. Part of it was that we both went out and did our own things after the Shooz. Valerie became a jazz singer. I scored films and commercials. So when we came back together to make Pandora’s Box, we had both lived a lot more.

VJD: The secret? Mutual admiration, respect, and a sense of humor – which John has in abundance. I always felt lucky to be with someone who’s a musician too. It’s not always easy working together, but it’s worked because we understand what the motivation to do this crazy thing is all about.

KOS: After over three decades in the business, from your perspective, how has the music industry changed over that time?  How do you see the future?

JRS: We live in a time when everybody can create, and that’s good in a way, but it also means that the audience is fragmented. Everyone’s plugged into the Internet and the iPod. It’s harder to get people’s attention these days. You know, I could go on a rant about the modern world, but who cares. Let me tell you about a conversation I had with my son today. I said, “I wonder what the next big thing is going to be, the thing we can’t even see now? Think about it. Back in the 30′s and 40′s, in the swing band era, they wouldn’t have dreamed of rock and roll, or 70′s funk, or hip-hop.” And I think we’re ready for a new thing because frankly, hip-hop is tired. If you think about it, it really hasn’t gone anywhere in twenty years. The best stuff is still Grandmaster Flash, Public Enemy, Whodini…but you know, I’m tired of hearing people talk over music. I’m like, “shut up already! What’s the new thing?” I actually like the music my son listens to. He’s into Linkin Park and Tool, bands like that. There’s some real innovation going on in the world of Nu Metal.

KOS: How have your priorities changed over the years compared to back in the 80s?  How has this affected your music, if at all?

JRS: I thought I’d have a band when I was sixty years old. (Not there yet.) I’d love to be out there playing still, but it’s not my dream to be up there chunkin’ out the oldies. I call it the Elephant Graveyard. That said, I understand that the music you grew up with will always be important, and it’s an honor that we were able to make a permanent piece of pop culture. Listen, people get into music for different reasons. We take the personality we were born with and run with it, right? I always lived to hear my band play whatever the newest song was that I just wrote. What’s my favorite song? The next one.

VJD: We have a 15 year old son. I read once that when the opera singer Renee Fleming met with opera diva Jessye Norman that Jessye told her to have children, that it would help to put her career in the proper perspective because performing wouldn’t be the only thing that she would live for or die for. Our son has been an incredible influence on us, both personally and professionally. He’s a wonderful artist and human being. I think we both feel like his presence in our lives has given us a new perspective on what life is really all about.

KOS: Nu Shooz just released a new album, Pandora’s Box, in 2010.  What are your feelings regarding this album?  Can we continue to expect more new music from Nu Shooz?  What inspires you to continue writing and recording new music after all these years?  Where do you feel that Nu Shooz fits within the contemporary musical landscape?

JRS: Well, the obvious answer is that Nu Shooz has endured. As of this writing, I Can’t Wait plays somewhere on earth every 11 minutes, and that’s just radio. That’s not counting iPods and YouTube. We’ve been sampled by the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost! Naughty By Nature, Jimmy Jam and Terry Lewis, some jazz girl in Italy, NuFuture in London. Most recently, a rapper named MANN wrote a great song called “I’m Buzzin’” over the ‘I Can’t Wait’ rhythm track and then 50 Cent did a remix of it. I dig it. As for us, we’re going to continue making music. We’ve never stopped.

KOS: What else are Valerie Day and John Smith each up to now?  Musically and otherwise?

JRS: Our son Malcolm is an amazing artist. He’s the talented one in the family. I’m working on a graphic novel called Evolution, a 16-volume epic. And of course, there’s that whole batch of Eat & Run-era songs to throw in the oven, and they will ultimately be released on ‘Kung Pao Kitchen’, due this August.

VJD: I’m on a quest to become a better musician and improviser. There’s always something more to learn – that’s what makes music (and life) so interesting! I get to play and perform with some incredible jazz musicians and am looking forward to making more records with them. I’m also working on taking Brain Chemistry For Lovers (that concert/cabaret/science lecture about the neuroscience of romantic love I mentioned earlier) to the next level and have become a neuroscience geek in the process. And I can’t wait (sorry, no reference to a certain song intended) to make the next Nu Shooz Orchestra album and see what happens next.

–

This interview can also be found on the Kickin’ It Old School blog here.

But he’s not done yet.

Now the intrepid male goes out and collects a wild array of stuff, shells, bottle caps, bits of colored plastic, the shiny wing feathers of beetles and arranges it around the perimeter, marking out a circle around the front door. This whole time he’s barely eating or sleeping. He’s wound up tight. He’s burning calories like a madman.

When the nest is just right, the male Bowerbird breaks out in song.

Four notes over and over.

If he can keep up a steady beat, any female within earshot knows he’s got good genes or whatever. Probably they aren’t thinking about genetics at all.

What strange birds are we?

I read an article in Scientific American Mind about music preferences in humans. Different personality types prefer different levels of complexity in music art and literature. Extroverts love mainstream pop, they love magazines, and Mark Rothko. Introverts love dissonance, byzantine novels, and Albrecht Durer.

Extroverts want their expectations fulfilled.

Introverts want to be confused.

These are gross generalizations, but see if they ring true for you.

(You’ll see where I’m going with this in a second.)

We were having dinner at the Bombay Cricket Club with our niece Elizabeth and her husband Don. He was talking about when they were first dating.

“Elizabeth asked me, ‘what kind of music do you like?’ Don said, ‘I like this and I like that, and…um…I like a little country.’ I was embarrassed about it, you know? Then I look at her CD collection and it’s like country, country, country.”

At this point in the story Don gives me this look like, ‘Yup…that’s when I knew.’

Zip back 35 years, to 1975.

I loved the Mahavishnu Orchestra. No girls liked this stuff. It was jazz-jock music for psychos. Music for Introverts. No girls had even heard of them.

Then I met Valerie Day.

Not only had she heard of them, she saw them play at the Paramount.

Yup.

That’s when I knew,

She was the one.

Bye for now.

~JRS

Nu Shooz Band

P.S. Weirdly enough, it was “Birds of Fire” that became “our song”. How’s that for my unconscious mind starting this blog with a bit about birds?

P.S.S. Was music a part of YOUR mating dance? We’d love to hear from you! Please leave a comment below…

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(Check out Elis Regina singing Aguas de Marco on YouTube, one of the coolest performances of all time.)

-JRS

CD Review: Nu Shooz Orchestra – Pandora’s Box

Some people might recognize Nu Shooz from their 1986 top ten hit single “I Can’t Wait”. Two decades later Nu Shooz comes back in an orchestra format with the album Pandora’s Box.

More than a third of music on this album has a distinct funk groove, but most of Nu Shooz music has a blend of textures and sounds with elements of world music, pop with a touch of jazz. On “Spy vs Spy” Nu Shooz arrangements gives the music a cinematic feel, while “Miles Beneath The Sea” starts with a classical feel before turning into a jazz waltz. Something in the lyrics on this one reminds me of Tom Jobim’s Aguas de Marco.

The brazilian influence is more evident in the modern bossa beat of “Right Before My Eyes”. Another hightlight on this release is the tango-like “Pandora’s Box”.

The jazzier tracks are the last two, the smooth jazz ballad “Driftin” and the funk/jazz “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” which contains the best improvisations on the album,

And for a little nostalgia, Pandora’s Box also includes a smooth, jazzier new version of their hit “I Can’t Wait”.

Tracks: Welcome to my Daydream, Spy vs. Spy, Right before my eyes, Pandora’s Box, Color of Everything, Looking Glass, Miles beneath the sea, Before the fall, Charade, Skeets beni, (The return of) Point of no return, Spring can really hang you up the most, Driftin.

Musicians: Valerie Day: vocals, congas. John Smith: guitar, piano. Drew Shoals: drums. Dennis Caiazza: bass. Mike Horsfall: vibes. Tim Jensen: Woodwinds. Paul Mazzio: Trumpet, flugelhorn. Lars Campbell: Trombone. Justin Kagan, Skip Von Kuske: cello.

The JazzTimes review featured in this post can be found here.

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John and I have always loved the video for I Can’t Wait. Working on it with Jim Blashfield was one of the highlights of our pop music career. Jim lives in Portland with his wife Mellisa Marsland (who also produced the video), and his daughter Hallie. We have gotten to be good friends with Jim and his family over the years. We even got to work with Jim recently on a multi media performance called Brain Chemistry For Lovers. Jim directed, edited the script, and created video for it. Over the years we’ve had a few discussions about the music business and assorted other music related topics, but because the video for ICW had always “made sense” on a non-literal level to us, John and I had never thought to ask Jim “What was that all about?”

Enter Sloan de Forest, a woman who calls herself “the Pauline Kael of classic MTV”. Sloan has a blog called “Images of Heaven: Remembering The Lost Art of Music Video”. She had decided it was time to uncover the story behind the “making of” ICW. She emailed Jim. He responded and copied us on the email.

Reading Jim’s account of how the video came together made us appreciate him even more than we already do. And what a blast to have his version of the making of! He’s a master at using images to explore that theme park of the mind – the unconscious – and give us all a great time while doing it.

Thought I’d share it with you.

Here’s a link to Sloan’s post:

http://imagesofheaven.blogspot.com/2010/09/i-cant-wait-by-nu-shooz-1986.html

Enjoy!

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Nu Shooz were a footnote in Eighties dance-pop music, hitting the charts with “I Can’t Wait” and “Point of No Return”, and garnering a Grammy nomination for Best New Artist in 1987 (they lost to Bruce Hornsby & the Range). More than twenty years later, the husband and wife team of John Smith and Valerie Day have remade themselves as a small scale jazz orchestra, crossing genres of light classical, jazz and pop. And it works.

In the tradition of the best “Lounge” or “Chill” acts like Pink Martini and De-Phazz, the Nu Shooz Orchestra plays music that can serve as more than pleasant background music for cocktails or a late night rendezvous. The ten-piece band creates soothing sonic tapestries highlighed by the vibes of Mike Horsfall and the multiple keyboard instruments plaid by Smith.

But there of flashes of something more. Occassionally, as in the floating “Welcome to My Daydream” or the title track, they move beyond their sound to genuinely interesting vocal jazz, primarily due to Ms. Day’s soft, seductive soprano voice that recalls Astrid Gilberto in its otherworldly effects. Her soaring cover of “Spring Can Really Hang You Up the Most” is truly memorable. The orchestra shows they can swing, too, on tunes like “Skeets Beni”.

Remade and remodeled versions of their Eighties hits are included, and eclipse the orginals by eliminating the dated electropop sound. “I Can’t Wait” becomes a torchy love song, hihglighted by Ms. Days’ give and take with horn player Paul Mazzio. “The Return of Point of No Return” is sparked by a Horsfall vibes solo and a Manhattan Transfer-beautiful vocal part.

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Want to know how to achieve FAME and FORTUNE in the music business? Yes, YOU can be a pop sensation. Check out our very tongue-in-cheek entry on “The One Minute How To,” as we tell you the secret of “How to Get A Hit Record and Sell a Million Records.” It’s a fun show, hosted by George Smyth. In this educational, 550-episode series, you can learn everything under the sun from how to unclog your drain to how to ride a Bactrian camel, and all in sixty seconds.

Follow along with the interview here:

GS: Hello everyone, this is George your host. On this show we’ve got Valerie Day and John Smith, and they’re going to explain to us How to Get a Record Deal and Sell an Million Records. Guys, can you first tell us a little something about yourselves?

VJD: Well, we had a band in the heyday of MTV called NU SHOOZ that racked up some Top-40 hits, one of which still plays somewhere on Earth every eleven minutes. Before our ‘overnight success’ though we spent seven years playing clubs, touring in a broken-down school bus, and recording when we could scrape up the money. So this How-To will give people a leg up on the step-by-step process we took to go from local obscurity to international stardom.

GS: OK, if you’re ready, then you’ve got sixty seconds.

VJD: How to Get a Record Deal and Sell an Million Records.

JRS: Start a band, make a poster and, oh yeah…Choose a band name.

Remember…

You’ll be stuck with it for life.

Play four or five nights a week

Four hours a night

For seven years

Oh, and don’t forget to record.

You never know

Which track

Is going to be MAGIC.

We sure didn’t know.

Get your recording reviewed in the local newspaper.

Make sure the writer says something about how you suck as a live band.

But that it’s too bad that Top-40 stations in town won’t play local music.

‘Cause the recording’s actually pretty good.

Have a DJ from the Number One pop station in your city read the review…

And put a call out over the air to bring the tape on down. They’ll pick a song and play it on the radio.

Then the next year becoming a Regional Hit.

So you can get turned down by all the major labels.

Put your single out on a 12” record for dance clubs

Have a remix artist

In Holland

Find your record in a record store bin

In Holland

Have him remix it.

So he can send HIS remix back to the states

Where it can wind up in all the New York City dance clubs

To be discovered by a nice Italian boy who happens to work at the Dance Department at Atlantic Records

Where his boss will hear it and sign you to a singles deal

That turns into an album deal

That produces more Top-40 Hits

That get you nominated for a Best New Artist Grammy

And help you sell over a million records worldwide.

GS: (Laughs) I’m hearing this and what takes me back to when I was in bands was the four-hour gigs, and you happened to mention that and I guess that’s something that’s rather common.

JRS: Oh yeah.

VJD: Back in the day. Now people have opening acts in clubs and stuff, but we played the whole time.

GS: Yeah, yeah. I can remember it would be like either an eight to twelve gig, or like a ten to two gig, and they’d give you one, maybe two breaks, and…not so easy.

VJD: No no, It’s a good way to learn though.

GS: Absolutely.

VJD: Yeah.

GS: OK, Is there anything else that you’d like to talk about?

VJD: Well, first of all there’s really no step-by-step guide as you know that can help you to get a record deal or sell a million records, but the point of the whole story is that if you really really really want to do something badly enough, you’ll just have to keep going no matter what, because you have to do it for you. And since the 80’s we’ve been doing all kinds of music, everything from Jazz to Classical, Film Scores to Funk, and we got excited about combining our favorite styles to create a new sound. So, we put together a new band called The NU SHOOZ Orchestra and we just released our first CD. It’s called ‘Pandora’s Box’ and you can find it on our website, nushoozmusic.com. We’ve got free tracks there, full streams for listening, and links to places you can buy actual physical copies of the CD if you want.

GS: And Nu Shooz is spelled N-U-S-H-O-O-Z.

JRS: That’s right.

GS: OK. I’ll have a link to that on the One Minute How-To dot com show notes.

VJD: Thanks George.

GS: Valerie and John, thanks a lot. I appreciate it.

JRS: Thanks for having us. It’s been fun.

VJD: It’s been really fun.