Smokin Herb History
Smokin' Herb came together originally in October of 2000 a few days before Halloween.
We were thrown together for a pick-up gig at the Primary Tavern in Portland CT to cover my friend Butterball's arse when he'd had a last minute cancelation.
We play Old-School Classic Rock, pretty much Allmans to Zep. We don't do dead or country or heavy hairball metal.....there's a bunch of great bands that do that stuff, and if that's what yer lookin for, go see them!
What we DO do is Rock.
And play all the great stuff ya can't hear on the radio anymore. As my friend Lefty from the LEGENDARY Shaboo Inn told me,"ya can't go wrong giveing people the cake". And that's what we do at every single show. We take requests also, which is where most of our songs all came from in the first place.
We don't do set lists, and we don't rehearse, unless ya can qualify discussing stuff in the parkin' lot during breaks as a rehearsal. Having come from the Blues - hell, I was born in Willimantic!!-I can't see no point in trying to rehearse how I'm gonna feel when I'se in front of folks.
Yah, we may do it all wrong, but it works.
Just ask the 'erb'eads that hang at our gigs.Hell, ask Bahama.....when he saw us at Dawn's Getaway in Torrington, he was one of maybe 8 people in the bar......including us and our roadie. (luckily most gigs ain't like that!!!)
The club had already cut a deal with us for bread, we only had to do one set but we did the whole show anyways.
Bahama even filmed it.
I had no idea who he was!!
And then there was the first trio SH gig......we and the crowd had such a blast.... I'm not trying to sound arrogant.
And how often do ya get asked to sign enthusiastic young ladies anatomy?
We have.
It ROCKS!!!!!
Felt just like being Led Zeppelin.
The original 4 of us were Jimi Pocius, guitar and vox, Peet Reilly, guitar and vox, Herb Lester, bass gtr and vox and Dave Bertok on drums and vox.
It freeked us out when the band kicked into such a total state of titeness, and we played almost 50 songs completely unrehearsed on our first nite.
While on break, we tried to figure what to call the band, when in a blinding flash of stone inspiration, Jimi said,"How bout Smokin' Herb and The Weed Nap?", goofing on Herb's fondness for disgusting smelly cigars.
We laughed.
And went back in the bar.
We got back on stage and announced ourselves as "Smokin' Herb............and The Weed Nap", the bikers started laughing and we knew we were onto something good.
So we did a bunch of shows, eventually playing the now-defunct Memories in Southington where we met our former agent, Sue Madera.
Sue vowed to get us in some clubs in Hartford, we were like, sure, nice work if ya can get it, and she DID.
So next thing ya know , we're in the Hartford Advocate, got this dumb little ad they gave us.
Life was good.
We played at this dive in Southington again, this time for the cameras of television's A&E, who was following up on some bad stuff that went down for one of the guys 27 years ago, and we ended up on national tv.
We didn't even have a demo tape.
But the buzz was building.
Soon after, we recorded a 6 song CD in a friend's recording studio to use.
By the next day, Herb was gone.
I'm not gonna get into it, but there were differences between us.
And, of course, we were booked that weekend.
So Jimi hired the amazing Bob Laramie, and onward we went.
Right about that time, we recieved word that Herb wanted us to change the name of the band.
Out of "respect".
So we dropped the weed nap and became Smokin' Herb.
Because Bob's schedule is so full, we knew we had to find a new Bassist. Jimi's old pal and former bandmate, Dean Sypher (formerly with bands like Ludent Tremmel's Strange Attractor and GNO, and Blue Noise with jimi and Mike Bloomer from the Bluestalkers) fit right in, so he was hired, learned all the tunes by the second gig......and we improvise alot and NEVER rehearse, so that's no mean feat for some cats.......and fit right in.
So we played a bunch more gigs. A Shitload of 'em, everywhere we could.
Then Jimi's wife fell ill, requiring surgery and recuperation, so he put the band aside for a few months. During this time, Dave and Sheryl were having a harder and harder time surviving without the extra cash flow of weekly gigs and made the hard decision to leave CT and return to their native Florida.
We figured that was the end.
Sucked.
And then Dave suggests we hire a mutual friend who'd sat in with us a few times, Rick LaPenta.
Good call. We became a 5 man band temporarily while Dave taught Rick the ropes. Smokin' Herb with two drummers was an incredible thing to behold.
If yer lucky enough to live in the Nutmeg Cablevision service area, you can see it on Mike Bosco's "the Evening Show".
Dave moved away on March 15. We ALL miss him. I've played with and met some incredible drummers; this guy was
THE BEST.
PERIOD.
So anyways, we dived right back in and have never stopped playing, tho less frequently than we used to. Besides, alot of our work comes covering for other bands when they cancel in the winter.....so keep them cancelations coming!!(LOL)
Since we started, we've added alot of both material and gear, Jimi & Peet have gone synthetic as well as being strictly guitar players, and the band goes onward.
Bahama wanted me to write this, this was what he got, poor bastid!
Also, send me your links, i'll check 'em out and if they seem cool, i'll link ya to our "Strokes for Folks" pages.
Ya can check out our Website at:
http://smokinherbband.bravepages.com/ ,
or,simply:
http:wakeup.to/smokinherb .
Keep them Herbal Jazz Cigarettes Blazin'...
peace.
Phat J.
"We're Smokin' Herb.......Hope Ya'll are too!!"

"We're Smokin' Herb! Hope ya'll are too!!"

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