VWMusic

All images courtesy of Jimmy Waldo

By Andrew Daly
andrew@vinylwriter.com

Having worked with John Fannon, Vinnie Vincent, Yngwie Malmsteen, Steve Vai, and Bob Kulick through numerous classic acts, keyboardist Jimmy Waldo knows a thing or two about rock ‘n’ roll.

As an original member of cult rock band New England, Waldo tasted sweet success via the AOR hit, “Don’t Ever Wanna Lose Ya.” And while New England ultimately wasn’t destined to last, Waldo and his cohorts weren’t done, forming the almost famous outfit Warrior, with polarizing guitarist Vinnie Vincent.

On the precipice of a record deal, Vincent would abscond with his talents in the 11th hour, eloping to the KISS fold, leaving his bandmates in the lurch. Ever resolute, Waldo and bassist Gary Shea formed Alcatrazz with wunderkind shredder Yngwie Malmsteen and enigmatic vocalist Graham Bonnet.

With Alcatrazz, Waldo and his brothers in music tasted sweet success through 1983’s No Parole from Rock’ n’ Roll before Malmsteen departed for a solo career, ushering another young six-stringer, Steve Vai, continuing the group’s guitar carousel.

As the ’90s dawned, Waldo would work with Bob Kulick through multiple projects, lending his textural keystrokes to several cult records, before eventual New England and Alcatrazz reunions thrust him back into the rock ‘n’ roll limelight in the present day.

With Alcatrazz’s momentum stronger than ever, Waldo took a moment with me to recount his origins in music, the formation of New England, Warrior, and Alcatrazz, working with Steve Vai and Bob Kulick, and what’s next for him moving forward.

Andrew:
Walk me through the moment that sparked your interest in music and keyboards.

Jimmy:
It was really as a kid hearing music in our house all the time, my brothers listening to very early rock ‘n’ roll, and lots of classical music, also lots of opera which I really like. Hearing Bach for the first time really did it for keyboards; I was really influenced by everything he wrote, especially the pipe organ works.

Andrew:
What sort of scene were you exposed to growing up, and what memory do you have of your first gig as a professional musician?

Jimmy:
I was listening to the early British scene at about 12 or 13; I was taking some piano lessons but really wanted to play guitar. I started my first band when I was 14 and was the guitar player; then, as things evolved, we started playing at local colleges and needed an organ to really play the music that would get us more work, so I bought a cheap organ and started playing organ and guitar, which gave us a much bigger song list and made us more popular, I was 15 or 16 at this point.

Andrew:
From there, how did New England form?

Jimmy:
I had a band in North Carolina that was doing very well locally, but we moved to Boston, where I gradually replaced the original members from North Carolina with guys from the Boston area that eventually became NewEngland. We played the local circuit in the New England area and were called Target then; we broke up for a year or so, then reformed without the lead singer; that’s when it became just the four of us with John Fannon and Hirsh Gardner doing the lead vocals. We decided not to play clubs and just write and do demos to try to get a deal; it really felt like doing the club circuit was a real waste of time.

Andrew:
What do you recall regarding New England’s early days on the club scene leading up to signing with Infinity Records?

Jimmy:
We had played around the New England area as Target with a lead singer; after he left, we decided to stop playing clubs and just concentrate on writing and making demos to try to get a record deal. At this point, John Fannon and Hirsh Gardner were doing all the lead vocals, so we were a four-piece. We were contacting people at labels without much success at that point but kept refining the songs and outplaying. We rehearsed six days a week and just wouldn’t take no for an answer.

Andrew:
How did Bill Aucoincome into the picture? 

Jimmy:
A friend of ours in Boston knew someone at Aucoin Management in NY and gave them our demo. Bill came up to Boston right away to see us at rehearsal and immediately signed us to a management contract. He brought all the major label presidents – including Clive Davis – up to see us at our rehearsal place in Boston, at which point it was only a matter of a few months till we signed a deal with Infinity Records/Universal. Bill was an incredible manager; things were happening very fast; we were lucky to get Mike Stone and Paul Stanley to produce our first album; we had way too much fun in the studio with those guys; it was a great combination of people.

Andrew:
Bill Aucoin’s struggles with substances around this time have been well documented. Did he give New England’s debut record full attention?

Jimmy:
Bill gave us the attention; it was really a case of the record stalled in the charts. We did have the tours, airplay, and even a great video for the time; I think the songs had just topped out at that point. I don’t really blame Bill or our label. We still continued to play, write, and do more records.

Andrew:
Despite two strong follow-up albums, New England folded. What led to the band’s demise?

Jimmy:
We should have stuck with the direction of the first album; I think that was our biggest mistake. At that point, people were losing interest in us as Infinity Records folded, and we went to Elektra, which was a mistake as we could have stayed with Universal, the parent company of Infinity, and gone right in and done another record and toured. But the negotiations with Elektra took over a year which really killed our momentum.

Andrew:
How did toy and Gary hook up with Vinnie Vincent to form Warrior?

Jimmy:
We were going to get another singer and a guitar player who was hopefully a great writer as well. I called Gene Simmons to help find someone, and he immediately said get this guy Vinnie Cusano [Vincent]. after we worked with Vinnie for a short time, we could see that this was not going to be New England, so Hirsh, Gary and myself moved to L.A., and we started the band Warrior with Vinnie.

Andrew:
How close did Warrior come to signing a record deal with the now infamous demos in hand?

Jimmy:
Very close. CBS was very interested but did not commit soon enough, and that’s when Vinnie joined KISS, which we totally understood. That ended Warrior. Working with Vinnie was great.; he was and is a great songwriter. We were really making good progress, but as I said, when he joined KISS, that was it.

Andrew:
How many of the tracks that you worked on with Vinnie were used with KISS?

Jimmy:
To be honest, we worked on so many songs, and I don’t really remember which ones actually made it in some form or another to the KISS records.

Andrew:
From there, how did you and Gary team up with Yngwie Malmsteen and Graham Bonnet to form Alcatrazz?

Jimmy:
Gary Shea and I met Graham, started working on songs together, and started auditioning players. Yngwie was the second or third guy we checked out; we all really liked his playing and energy, so that was it. At that point, we just needed a drummer.

Andrew:
Clive Burr was involved early on, right? Was this just after he had left Maiden? Why did he ultimately give way to Jan Uvena?

Jimmy:
Clive was never a member. We worked with him for three days, but his style just didn’t work with our direction. He was a great guy and a fantastic drummer, just not the right one for the band, so we continued auditioning drummers until we found Jan Uvena.

Andrew:
No Parole from Rock’ n’ Roll remains a classic. Walk me through the writing and recording of the record.

Jimmy:
We all had lots of fun doing the record. Yngwie was fun to work with, we wrote songs together, and it was all good. The record was recorded pretty old school with all of us in the same room cutting the basic tracks, then we cut vocals, a few overdubs, and that was it.

Andrew:
What led to Yngwies’ exit, and how did Steve Vai come into the fold for Disturbing the Peace?

Jimmy:
Yngwie always wanted to have his own band; it was no surprise that he eventually left. There were no bad feelings about that; he finished the tour we were on, then left. We looked for another guitar player for a while, but when we played with Steve, it just seemed right. He had this reckless abandoned thing and really good energy, which I really loved, not to mention amazing chops. Disturbing the Peace is a record I was and am very proud of, but the change in direction from No Parole from Rock’ n’ Roll really didn’t work; that is what the fans wanted.

Andrew:
Working with Vinnie, Yngwie, and Vai in such a short span, was tangible differences did they all possess beyond the ability to shred?

Jimmy:
Honestly, I really enjoyed working with all of them for different reasons. Yngwie was very young with amazing ability, and we worked very quickly. Steve had great songs, which were a real challenge at times to play, which made it fun, though we all really had to stretch to play some of his ideas. Vinnie was very easy to work with, his songs were amazing, and he brought a very solid direction to the band. Again, working with him right after New England was a big departure musically but really fun. 

Andrew:
What led to Alcatrazz’s 1987 facture in the wake of Dangerous Games?

Jimmy:
After Steve left to join David LeeRoth, it became very difficult to find a replacement. Most guys I talked to just weren’t interested; I had known Danny Johnson for some time and thought he might work as a writer and player. But Capitol Records was not happy with our songs and suggested a few by some big outside songwriters, but that never happened, and due to the lack of success of that record, the band broke up.

Andrew:
I wanted to push forward a bit and talk about your work with Bob Kulick in Blackthorne. Walk me through the group’s inception.

Jimmy:
I met Bob Kulick in New York in 1978. We talked about working together someday; we both moved to L.A. about the same time, reconnected, and decided to do a record and start a band. I had played in Quiet Riot, so Frankie and Chuck were a perfect choice. I loved their playing; we had a great time recording and were very excited about the songs and how things sounded.

Andrew:
After working with Bob for Afterlife, was it seamless transitioning to Murderer’s Row? 

Jimmy:
It was a very painless album to record. Dave Eisley was a great singer; he wrote and recorded the tracks very quickly, and he was incredibly professional. Jay Shellan played drums, and Chuck Wright played bass. It was sounding great with Pat Reagan engineering; we had written the songs with Dave and a few other writers and had all the material ready to go. We rehearsed the songs with Jay and Chuck, went to Pat’s studio in Hollywood, and recorded. The only problem was the label, which was a small label in Japan, and as it turns out, they had no staff and really didn’t have a clue what to do with the record. We had plans to play live but had no support from a label in the US, so it was really impossible. 

Andrew:
Chuck Wright is on record stating that he feels Murderer’s Row wasn’t a real band and was more of a project. Do you agree?

Jimmy:
It was more of a project in the end, as we were not able to play live. If we would have had a supportive label here in the states, we probably could have taken it to the next level and done another record.

Andrew:
Alcatrazz is alive once again with Doogie White up front. What does Doogie bring to the table?

Jimmy:
Doogie is a great singer and writer. He’s very easy to work with and really has a great feel for this music. I love working with him in the studio and live. He’s a pro, and I love his voice and lyrics.

Andrew:
Where do things stand with Graham Bonnet?

Jimmy:
Honestly, I don’t have a clue what Graham is doing. We reached a point where he said he was not happy with the direction and just stopped communicating with us, so we moved on. I think this lineup has great potential to do bigger numbers live and on record; the direction is more focused, and everyone in the band is on the same page now. We all get along very well, and it’s great to have Gary Shea back.

Andrew:
V serves as proof that with Doogie, there is life after Graham. What’s next for Alcatrazz, Jimmy?

Jimmy:
We are making a new record now for Silver Lining Music, and we’ve just wrapped up a European tour in August/September. Joe Stump has written some really cool songs along with Doogie and myself, as well as a few outside ones. It will be a strong record and should do well.

– Andrew Daly (@vwmusicrocks) is the Editor-in-Chief for www.vwmusicrocks.com and may be reached at andrew@vinylwriter.com