Cas
Nearly one year employment
Electronica Wizard

Miss Ess: What's the first music you remember hearing when you were a kid?

Cas: That's tough, mainly because my head is kind of flooded with musical memories, so much so that it's hard to tell where it all started. Both of my parents are music lovers so there was usually some kind of song being played or sung around the house. I've inherited my mom's habit of playing music in the morning to get myself going. She usually played some kind of contemporary R&B music and the occasional gospel album. My dad was in a singing group that performed around New Orleans in the late 70's and early 80's. When the guys in the group weren't having practices at our house, my dad was usually going around singing songs by artists they were influenced by: The Temptations, Luther Vandross, Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes. I used to think my dad was Teddy Pendergrass.

Erin
Rock Floor Person Extraordinaire
2.5 yrs employment


Miss Ess: First, let's talk about something we both love: the new Joanna Newsom record. Tell me, what is it that makes it so fantastic for you, and what are your favorite tracks?

Erin: Okay, so I am really into the new Joanna Newsom record [Have One on Me] for a number of reasons. I was obsessed, totally in love with her last album, Ys, but that album was very structured, very rigid compared to this one. It was definitely a song cycle, whereas this one is a little more free form. She's loosened up quite a bit and her singing has improved. The things I love about her are still the same -- her love of words, her incredibly poetic turns of phrase -- but she has relaxed a little in a way that I'm enjoying. Some of the songs on here, like "Good Intentions Paving Company" and especially "Baby Birch," are some of the best she's ever written, I think. She's really only getting better. 

ME: What else is turning on your record player these days?

Erin: I've also been listening to Greg Gardner's comp In A Cloud -- all really great local artists. My favorite track on here is the Paula Fraser one. And the first Giant Sand record -- Valley of Rain. 

ME: I know you love Montreal. What bands from Montreal are you favorites? What do you think of the music scene up there?

Tom Lynch
12 Years Employment
Buyer Extraordinaire

Miss Ess: How did you end up at Amoeba?

Tom Lynch: I was working at Car City Records in Detroit, my co-worker, Geoff Walker, had just come back from his vacation to the Bay Area and told me about Amoeba opening in SF and looking for used LP buyers. Geoff had applied on a whim, got interviewed, and offered the job. Geoff came back , decided to go to grad school, declined the offer, and told me that I should give it a go. I was up for a change, not to mention I had just been in a  wreck and had no more van and had no money to buy another one. So fate really forced my hand. I've always felt that they never really got over Geoff turning them down.  

ME: What is the best live show you have ever seen?

TL: Being one of three people in the audience as The Replacements ripped through their set at St. Andrews Hall in Detroit, July 1983. Everyone else was in the bar below the club watching Siouxsie & the Banshees videos. My pal John Maxwell & I and this weird short guy were the only people watching them -- they were opening for R.E.M. -- and this short guy was wearing a cowboy hat and cowboy boots, doing these sliding dance moves and was yelling at the 'Mat's to get off the stage. They were blazing hot; when nobody was looking they would crush you with their ferocity. They just laughed at him, threw lit cigarettes at him.

Tarin
1.5 yrs employment
Promotions Gal

MIss Ess: What was the moment you really got into music? What were you listening to? Where were you?

Tarin: The first music memory I have was when I was in a car set in the back of my parents baby blue late 80s Mazda. I remember trying to slap my hands on my knees to the beat of the music, and most likely we were listening to Bonnie Raitt, Elton John, or The Beatles… possibly even The Judds. Those were the tapes that always seemed to be in the car when I was little. Once I figured out how to be on rhythm to a beat there was no stopping me, no one could get me to stop singing or dancing. My toes have been tapping pretty much my entire life.

Miss Ess: Whose posters did you have on your walls when you were growing up?

Tarin: I had so many posters on my walls growing up I don’t even know if I could name them all. But from what I remember; Beatles, Dave Matthews Band, Black Sabbath, Bob Marley, Michael Jackson, Hanson (I thought Zak was such a hunk!... I was also 11), typical teen dream pics, and various years of Monterey Jazz Festival posters.  

Miss Ess: What brought you to Amoeba?

Tarin: I was living in LA, going to Musicians Institute and I kept hearing about this magical place where you could find anything you wanted. And even though it was only about 6 blocks from where I was living, it took me a year and a half to finally make it in. When I walked in the first time I felt so overwhelmed and so excited I thought I was at an amusement park… but for music. I ended up spending 4 hours and way too much money but I was instantly in love.

Scott Walker
Years of Employment: "Since the turn of the century."
Jazz floor dude

Miss Ess: What initially got you into jazz?

SW: A horrible answer: I don't remember. Most probably, like many people, it was a mid-era Miles Davis [record]. Pinpointing which one, twenty something years down the road, I would only be guessing.

ME: What album do you consider to be the pinnacle of the form?

SW: To me, there are different forms: Free/Avant, Bop, Trad, so I am tempted to answer one example for each, but won't at risk of boring/alienating readers. I would say an early [Thelonious] Monk recording: one of the late 40s sessions.

ME: What present-day jazz artists do you enjoy?

SW: Seeing Marilyn Crispell last week was pretty heavy: solo piano. I like solo piano stuff a lot, it's kind of like listening to a demo of a song -- it's distilled down to an essence, whether it's Fats Waller, Monk, or Sun Ra. It's hard, because like blues, jazz is so much about re-releases and focusing on history, standards, and regurgitation.

Is there a jazz record you love that crept up on you-- maybe one you didn't love it at first but grew to adore?

I didn't like electric Miles Davis when I first heard it. It was probably parallel to when people first hear electric Dylan: "Is he really serious/allowed to do this?" Now I listen to the electric stuff more often than the acoustic.