Jack Casady

Jack Casady and Hot Tuna
Insight and integrity from a seasoned fish

By Dominick Scala

Set against the tumultuous political and innovatively musical backdrop of the late 1960s, Jack Casady and Jorma Kaukonen of San Francisco-based psychedelic rock band Jefferson Airplane formed a more folk-bluesy style side project called Hot Tuna. Recording the first Hot Tuna album in 1969, the project would carry on long after Airplane split up, trailblazing the county blues genre. In addition to constant touring, the two keep busy with teaching, solo projects and other jam bands such as Moonalice. I was lucky enough to catch Casady when he returned from Italy and just before going back on the road in the States with Hot Tuna.  

You live on the west coast now, but you’re originally from back east.
Both Jorma and I are from the east coast, born and raised in Washington DC. That’s where we started out playing in the late ’50s, so we’re really east coasters at heart. That’s why I think our fan base has kept so strong from DC up through the New York area. As the old story goes, I moved out to San Francisco at Jorma’s request after he had joined Jefferson Airplane. But I moved out to NY in 1985 for five years and then I met the love of my life, Diana, in Los Angeles during a project in 1989, and eventually I moved there and I have been here ever since.

The first half of the Hot Tuna tour is billed as acoustic, with the second half as electric. What are the differences between the shows?
The acoustic set is Jorma on guitar, myself on bass and Barry Mitterhoff playing not only mandolin but also tenor guitar, banjo, baritone mandolin and ukulele. In the electric version we experiment a little bit. Barry’s been playing some interesting instruments that do not fall into the regular category of the way a lot of electric bands are set up. We get a different kind of sound from him working with four-string electric mandolins, baritone instruments and tenor guitar, so the band has a very different overall sonic quality. From Aug. 20 through Sept. 5 we’ll welcome guest drummer Skoota Warner, who has a great soul and gospel background, having played with artists such as Santana, The B-52’s, Arto Lindsay, Lionel Ritchie, Cyndi Lauper, Matisyahu, and Mary J. Blige.

You and Jorma have been working together for like 50 years. What are the Hot Tuna shows like these days?
Well, there is a little of both, we have a wide repertoire now and we reintroduce songs we’ve done in the past as well as new songs. Jorma is constantly writing and searching out music, he has done three solo albums in the last four years. So we glean some of that material, put it in different formats and combine it with our great catalog of Hot Tuna music.

You put out a solo album. Are you working on anything new?
I have started recoding material for it, and as soon as I get some time (laughs)… You know, between touring with Hot Tuna and Moonalice… I mean the good news is there is work out there but it eats up all your time.

When you’re not touring with Hot Tuna or Moonalice or thinking about your solo work, you teach music at the Fur Peace Ranch in Ohio with Jorma and your manager Vanessa Calkin.
I have been teaching out there since it started 11 years ago. As a musician it really does keep you sharp. Teaching gives you a different outlook, I think, because you kind of turn it around and instead of being so subjective and inside the music, you get outside of it and hone your skills about how to present it to somebody and how logically to put it together.

Do you teach one-on-one there?
Almost all the teaching is in a workshop format, but the classes are small. We use a recording studio format where I’ll set up material with Jorma and we’ll play that material, then I’ll drop myself out so the students will get a chance to play the material as a bass player with a guitar player that’s actually playing off the bass. Workshops are usually over a four-day weekend and that gives me a chance to hone in on each student and figure out what needs strengthening in his or her particular playing. I use the material more to find the examples of their technique and how to apply it because they’re all going to go off and be in other bands and I want to encourage them to write their own material. I try to teach them to get better tone through fingering and fret placement and work with the concepts of the notes and the structure of the song. So I work with theory too.

What is Break Down Way all about?
Break Down Way is an interactive Web site that Jorma and I both recorded on and set up lessons on that allows students in their own way, on their own time to interact with the material, get explanations on the material, you know, start and stop it and focus in and get a better understanding. It’s just another way to understand the same thing.

I know that you have your hand in equipment design, how did that all come about?
Well, I’ve dabbled in design ever since my father Bill Casady and I built my first heath kit amplifier back in 1958, an 8-watt amp for my first guitar. I followed my dad’s philosophy, “if you don’t like something, fix it and make it right.”  I have worked with Epiphone to produce my ‘Jack Casady’ signature bass, a double cut-away hollow body bass. But lately I’ve been working with Aguila Amplification and we put out a twin 8/5 combination speaker cabinet that I use with acoustic Hot Tuna and for recording sessions and it just gets a really sweet, wonderful sound.

There is so much music out there, what are you listening to these days?
Lately I’ve been listening to a lot of European stuff, a lot of mixture of culture music, where the textures of jazz are mixed with say, Middle Eastern and African rhythmic feels. It’s fascinating to me to see how all the younger players put that together without it being so strict within each culture.

How do you feel about the advent of so much new music and recording technology?
When I was in my early teens my father belonged to the American Jazz Society. He was an audiophile and collected records, so I listened to a lot of music of the ’20s and ’30s. I really developed an appreciation for recorded music of other eras. I found it mysterious to listen to these records and think about the time and place it was recorded, say New Orleans or NYC in the ’20s and ’30 — a pretty wild time with a lot going on, then that was similar to the ’60s. I think at different periods of time you have a creative surge forward and then it sort of backs off for a while, kind of like waves in the ocean. I was spending my free time going down to the Library of Congress listening to music from around the world, nowadays everybody can do this over the internet and the selection is so vast and varied that a young musician has the chance to hear so much more variety than they ever could before. The young people today have all these tools before them, but at the end of the day it’s all a matter of how you use them and where it leads you and what you do with it. So for those that are curious and want to enrich their lives with art from around the world, this new technology makes it possible.

Has recording technology produced a bit of over-saturation?
There are a gazillion people playing now. When we first started recording that was the only way to hear yourself back, they had equipment in the studios, you didn’t have your own equipment in those days. Now everybody has their own studio in their iPhone! (Laughs). I’m not kidding. I downloaded a four track studio right on my phone that I was messin’ with in Italy last week! But, that has nothing to do with talent. As always, even though many more people are playing you are still amazed at the few that take it somewhere that just moves you inside.

Do you have any advice for aspiring musicians?
The technology and the information highway (laughs) can be a huge time waster, instead of listening to other people and dreaming about what you want to do, at the end of the day a musician needs to knuckle down, get disciplined and learn their craft. A good musician has to practice, find good teachers and study. If they want to get into the higher levels of their craft they need to do the work, just like always.

Hot Tuna will play at 8 p.m., on Aug. 29 at Revolution Live, 200 W. Broward Blvd, Fort Lauderdale. Tickets are $22. Call 954-727-0950 or visit jointherevolution.net.

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