Green Door

Not much to describe, here. This is the sound of Green Door as smoking originally intended it to be.

Another very early Green Door effort. Here are a few interesting facts about "Tadpole": - The actual phrase is "Bite The Wax Tadpole". I misremembered said phrase when I wrote the words. - POINT: what if you ate something, and it grew inside of you... and decided to start eating! Weird, yes. - As you might be able to tell, the lyrics were written in (roughly) five minutes. I can tell. - Mat Mangold wanted to sing this one. I took it, for some reason. I regret my decision (Mat ALWAYS sang my lyrics, best). He ended up twanging a guitar - but he got the "solo". Speaking of the vocals: I tried to sing this (with myself), while listening to it in my car. I couldn't do it. I guess I've finally achieved puberty. - The 4-track (Tascam Porta 2) that Brian owned sometimes received weird CB, and/or radio signals. Our minds were blown when we received (and captured) some of those signals (towards the beginning of this song)! Happy accident! - "Who writes crap like THIS?" I do.

We recorded some really cool pop songs during the Green Door phase of our existence. This one went on to become a big hit - but not on this planet, fortunately.

Sorrowful Mysteries is an improvisational instrumental piece, recorded live (if memory serves) in 1992. Mark Milano was our guest, that evening, and I'll credit him for establishing the tone of the piece - ominous, indeed!

Recorded in 1991, Fred was kind of a "character" that I invented during the very early days of recording with Green Door. For a time, he was the identity that would shoulder the brunt of the abuse that my lyrics had to dole out. He didn't last, as things moved along - but during many of our early recordings, he was all over the place. Poor Fred. Where is he, indeed?

Do the Johnny is an intriguing piece, in a variety of ways: - It was the last "song" that was recorded by Green Door. - Two seperate potential songs were spliced together to create Do the Johnny. - The subject matter for my part of the song was similar to the very first Green Door song (Lust Bites the Dust) - date night goes horribly awry. - I'm assuming that the title is an homage to the song, "Do the Freddie". I don't remember even considering a title for it, but it is heard spoken at the beginning of the song. - The "Johnny" of the song title was Johnny Boerger (pictured), a friendly fellow from the neighborhood who used to hang out (and record) with us. - I do not remember if our drummer (Greg "Doc" Wagner) was there for the recording - a drum machine was used - but Mat Mangold was not present during the final days of Green Door. - This recording was realized by Chris and Brian Gomien, and Chris Lockhart - a few recorded experiments followed, but for all intents and purposes, the Green Door had closed.

ANOTHER amazing early GD / Steve song! This was one of the pieces that we took back to the 4-track, after an evening of live, recorded improvisation - the same evening that yielded such GD greats as SUPERFUNKY 3000, LITTLE WOODEN BOX, TURKISH CIGARETTES, FRED'S STORY, and others. The lyrics were made up... on the spot - a testament to the mind-boggling abilities of Steve Gatch!

Not a GREEN DOOR piece, per se, but from the same era, and DOES include a couple of members (Brian & myself) - recorded in a "real" studio, in Chillicothe, Ohio in 1990. The architect of this adventure was Mark Griffin (pictured above), an incredibly gifted musician, and friend. The solid drum work was performed by a gentleman called Chris. Although the final mix is somewhat flawed, I personally find the piece enjoyable, with oodles of potential.

Like many of our best recordings, this one was written AND produced over the course of an evening. I don't remember who wrote the lyrics (probably Chris G.), but it's Green Door at its best - being absurd, abstract, and defying reality. Guaranteed earworm material!

This instrumental was one of the earliest recordings to feature our "new" drummer, Greg "Doc" Wagner. After many attempts with the drum machine, and guest drummers, we finally found the person who was best suited for our bizarre antics - until the very end! Smooth and catchy! We even fall apart on purpose.

Another very early sound piece, performed by Brian (drum machine, bass guitar), and I (pause button, farfisa organ). I remember wanting to create more "Art Damage" style material, around this time. I sing this to myself, these days, when I'm feeling a bit paranoid.

Peel away the skin of my face. You do the same to yours. We sew our flesh together - and now we become one. That pretty much sums up what Freak of Romance is all about, as you'll hear. It means absolutely nothing, but it's weird - in a fun sort of way. Great horns, as always!

Another early Green Door tour de force, culled from the same session that yielded "Little Wooden Box", "Plaid Slacks", "Fred's Story", and "Turkish Cigarettes". Steve made sure that we had plenty of "hits" in our cache to start our illustrious career as explorers of the slightly unusual. This one was actually reviewed as one that "gets under your skin, and wiggles around". Yeah. I agree.

We decided to cover Run Joey Run, the tragic bubblegum rock classic. I remember us wanting to butcher it beyond recognition - really tear it up! I think we failed miserably, because we did a better version than the original recording, in my humble opinion. And Mat, playing the part of "Julie"... absolutely DEMENTED!!

Steve Ostrov wrote this one with a Green Door collaboration in mind. I feel that we pulled out all stops, and treated the material in the best possible way. I'd like to think Steve enjoyed himself, but he said only a very few things about the session. We DID "busy it up", a bit - and in typical Green Door fashion, took the ending to a whole new galaxy.

August 7, 1994: Green Door were the featured guests on the Sunday Night Live radio program, hosted by Duane Adams, at WAIF. We played two sets with an interview in between. One of the high points was this song - Mat had NEVER heard it, because he had just come back from a break. We figured he would just honk along with the song, as usual, but he had other plans - live, and over the airwaves!

Green Door wrote and recorded a large amount of spoken word pieces, as well. The vast majority have turned out very funny, unusual, and intriguing. I think that our idea for this one was to present the Holy Trinity as God, Santa, and Elvis. We each contributed a verse, and Chris voiced the results... then things get REALLY weird.

This is the second recorded version of FLESH. The first recording was a bit rushed - my vocal tone was all wrong, and Doc played on squeaky drums. This is the refined and preferred version of the song. I seem to remember Chris and I writing it very quickly - I hummed the basic line, and he worked out the part changes. Brian supplied the amazing back-up vocals, as always. The words are among the most unusual that I've ever written. They mean absolutely nothing.

I don't remember many of the specifics on this one. It was just Brian and I - and by the sound of it, we were both in the mood to create a rather unique (to Green Door) result. Use headphones for MAXIMUM desired damage. I mean heartfelt emotional impact.

On April 1st of 1995, Green Door entered the home studio of Chip Gilchrist to record some of our recent work - on EIGHT glorious tracks, no less! Chip was amazed that we had SIX fully realized pieces prepared for the event. As happy as I am with Big Machine, I'm still plagued with questions regarding the "implied" sexual images within, none of which were EVER intended. It is a silly song about encountering the odd-ball frustrations that life has to offer, at times. No more, no less. Do you hear that scream? That's Brian, folks. I wanted to double-track my vocals, but settled for the old mic with some warm distortion.

Another very early (1990) four-track recording by Green Door, featuring the amazing vocal stylings of Steve Gatch and his soon-to-be-created performing partner, Bluddy Hatchet.

Originally performed live by Green Door at the Uncle Dave Songbook benefit on 8/17/91. This is the polished 1992 "studio" version of the piece, which I'm very proud of. We were instructed to make up the last verse, which we did, using Dave's original "potato" verse as a springboard.

A very early (1990) recording from GREEN DOOR. Brian Gomien - Mat Mangold - Chris Lockhart. We were hung-over, if memory serves.