MUSIC SAMPLER
© Don Deppeller

Information about Don and Mindshaft

The band was really the brainchild of both Arthur Graves (lead guitar) and myself (bassist and singer). Back in 1989, Arthur, several years younger than I, had dropped over to visit a mutual friend and I heard him play “Love Will Find A Way” (by Yes) on the guitar and I was blown away. It was the guitar sound I’d been waiting to hear. Yes, it was that striking; one wouldn’t have normally expected – and thankfully we’ve just helped break that barrier once again – another Jimi Hendrix (the comparisons irritate him, and rightfully so). I’m still in awe of his solo on Mystique, to the point I didn’t feel right singing overtop of any part of the song. I’d rate it up there with any of dozens of classic guitar-solo songs.

So, we got together and looked for a drummer we could count on to be there and with drums. It’s the ever present damnation of so many good rock n’ roll bands; the stability of drummers. While doing this we added Chris Kent, who was actually the one that came up with the name of the band, ironically after he left the nascent group in ‘94. Chris was our first rhythm guitarist and had more of a ‘punk’ style. You can still hear it in our first demo tape, “Shift”, that we finished mastering in the spring of ’96, which featured “Freak The Change Agent” and “Under the Hex”. It worked for the time and type of music we were doing. This was all around the early nineties. Then, we found a drummer by the name of Jeff Valcarcel, a Cuban-American with ADD that was a creative powerhouse in his own right. If and when the DVD ever comes out of our Kazakhstan experience, it’s his songs “Clear” and “Slow Crawl” that are some of the most striking moments in the show. We also had Heather Kyle come in to do the vocal lead on “Viva Le Druids”, with a nice harmony on the chorus.

How we got the opportunity to represent the US in Kazakhstan

It was really Jeff’s relationship with a friend and co-worker, whose father happened to be a major dealer in vehicles to the new post-Soviet republics that led to the band’s big moment representing the US in Kazakhstan on the summer solstice of 1996. This man and his partners were Iranian and had relationships with the emerging ex-Communist elite, and had formed “Amerikaz Enterprises” with the expressed purpose of fostering goodwill relationships between commercial interests and the local scene. To this end they were putting on a huge festival, to be held at the Olympic Stadium in the capital city of Kazakhstan, Almaty (or Alma-ata, the older spelling). By the time we were finishing recording “Shift”, much planning and preparation had already happened for this show we were only to become aware of a week before we were to headline it. Originally, a DC-based hip-hop/go-go band (which shall remain nameless here) of 22 musicians was scheduled to headline, but there were too many visa issues with certain band members and an arrogant, surly attitude by that group’s manager. (Dumb us; we didn’t even have a manager!) In a fit of pique the sponsors had cut all ties, and were now left with a festival they had no featured headlining artist for. Well, as it happened, Jeff’s friend convinced his father that this new band Mindshaft was worth a listen and so I received a call asking if I could bring Arthur and meet these people with a copy of “Shift”. I obliged, of course, and after playing it for the principals, they looked at each other, nodded, turned to us and asked if we could be at the embassy the next morning to get our visas. Arthur and I looked at each other and said, “Duh!” (Actually, we hesitated a moment, but only a moment….) We spent the entire next day getting visas and passports and then every night for the next week up until the dawn practicing in the “meat rocker”, our rehearsal space that was in an old abandoned supermarket’s original wood-paneled meat locker, about 10x14 (and 7’ high). You had to be either totally committed or a total masochist to endure the long night rehearsals in such claustrophobic conditions, with only a case of beer and adrenaline to sustain you. I was even fired (the second time by the same boss) 2 days before we were to leave. In the meantime, we had to film a commercial (we used a few minutes from a videotaped show we had done a few weeks prior), rehearse our new second guitarist Patrick Baillergeon (who is the only guitarist on the “Blue Dream” album), get T-shirts made, stickers, tapes and album artwork printed. (This was before CDs became so easy and inexpensive, so we only made a few hundred cassettes). Of course much of this is in the film, but it’s the contrast between the near-Beatlemania type of reception we got and the Spinal Tap quality in our ragged circumstances. Arthur got even more attention than the rest of us, as being black AND American was even more of a rarity in Almaty. Whole families would ask to have their picture taken with him; the rest of us only had screaming groupies chasing us for autographs.

With only a week of preparation behind us, we arrived in Almaty with our gear packed in 8 huge ragged cardboard boxes and were immediately taken on a whirlwind tour of the city bazaar, where we ran into Afghan war veterans from the Red Army, among many other interesting characters, not to mention orphans that laughingly dogged our steps. (Our chauffeur was a former Red Army major. He was aided in organizing our entourage by the help of Walther, an ingenious mechanic who kept our fleet of vehicles together with duct tape and nylon cord). Walther, from the former East Germany, had a couple of sound trucks that bombarded the city with constant airings of our music as well as that of the other artists that would be appearing at the festival, including a young white Russian rap superstar, “Mr. Malloy”. This was ironic, as the majority of the support acts were white Russian rappers playing “black” music (hip-hop, rap) and the one black musician from the US played rock guitar more on the order of Pink Floyd than Chuck Berry or Prince. We and Mr. Malloy appeared on a live radio interview broadcast the day of the big show, which was our second day in town, barely long enough to get over the 18-hour jet lag. Many of the listeners were probably quite puzzled, as we weren’t exactly a “famous” American rock band, but I think we handled the diplomacy pretty gracefully, considering the circumstances.

On our way into the show, we passed thousands at the gates, waiting to get in, and a few overly-excited fans started to pull Arthur out of the passenger side of the van before we even came to a stop. We were then rushed in a phalanx of soldiers down to our dressing room, and learned that there were over 700 troops stationed around the stadium to prevent any rioting, each one costing the equivalent of a month’s wages, or $50 apiece. (That, together with the exorbitant advertising for the show, put the Amerikaz concert organizers into the red for over $120,000.00 by the time all was said and done.) Once In our dressing room, attendants started bringing in dozens of roses from well-wishers and the leading newscaster of the day, the Diane Sawyer of Kazakhstan, came in to do a live interview, and we talked about what we felt was important for our listeners to know about our country, our expectations, hopes etc. I hope we did alright for the time; I don’t think I could do the same in these post-911 days.

The first thing that we noticed once we were onstage for the first set was how we were introduced; “MindhsaftRock”, all one word. After the initial cheers died away, I made a few opening remarks, which was then translated into Russian, after which a cheer would go up (I told the crowd that California girls had nothing on the girls of Almaty; this went over really well and was actually quite true in my opinion). It was quite awkward; every time I would finish a sentence I would have to wait for the unseen emcee to translate for the delayed reaction. The crowd was kept off the field, and we were stationed in the middle of the field, facing the stands (somewhat like the Beatles had at their first Shea Stadium show in 1965). The show was staged so that after one of the Russian and Kazakh acts played a set, we would play a short set of about 3 songs, then another ‘native’ band would play. Finally the headline ‘set’ came and after “Slow Crawl” and “We’re An American Band” we did “Shun” as the encore. Then, without skipping a beat, we packed up our equipment (not counting the stadium PA) and were taken straight to a nightclub, the “Manhattan”, to “sing for our supper”, which was hot dogs and french fries served at 5am right at the bar. They even brought in picnic tables with red and white gingham tablecloths and put them on the dance floor; quite the surreal scene. I was introduced to the one single girl there that night, a sultry blonde in leopard-skin evening dress, and even though we could barely speak each other’s language, a ‘good time was had by all’. Over the remaining week we were there, our respective chauffeurs would have to make arrangements for our ‘dates’ as we would be chaperoned for trips to the zoo, other nightclubs, cafes. One of our hosts, a Dutch expatriate who had been in Kazakhstan for many years, had a country house where we went for a huge banquet. For this they brought out the goldware and prepared over 20 courses. (The first being hamburgers, before they began ever-more exotic local dishes.)

The next day we went sightseeing, went on an excursion to an amusement park in the foothills of the Himalayas and ended up getting mobbed by screaming fans; we played another club, the “New Wave” lounge, which is also on the film, again with guards carrying Kalashnikovs or AK-47s. In this respect it really was almost like the Wild Wild West of the nineteenth century, or Chicago in the era of prohibition. There is an incredible architecture to the city of Almaty, which seems almost like a Paris of the Silk Route, with many bus stops that are carefully-crafted and exquisite works of art in themselves. We even went into a newly-active Orthodox church, where the priest was conducting a well-attended Mass; there’s a bit of this also in the film. Finally, it was time to go home, and we headed back to the same obscurity we had left, and it all seemed but a dream. An incredible dream.

Back in the US of A

Returning to the States with our 8 large cardboard boxes of gear and heady memories, our expectations were high but……our experience hadn’t opened any doors for us. We went back to playing the same small clubs for an increasingly splintered audience. Washington DC wasn’t exactly a hot-bed of any style of rock, unlike the harDCore scene in the early ‘80s. Then on New Year’s, a mysterious house fire in my townhouse claimed the life of my son Justin, 6 years old, and I too almost met the same fate. Would that I could have exchanged places; I awoke in the hospital in a near-constant state of pain and agony where I remained for over 6 months after nearly having my leg amputated. Without becoming bitter, I put my energies into learning to walk without a brace, getting the band back into shape, and we brought in two new singers, Sean Cope (who sings most of the songs on “Over Matter”) and Candace, who bowed out on the eve of recording “Mindshaft Over Matter”. Jeff also left the band sometime after I got out of the hospital, and we brought in Jim Bruton, who drummed on both “Over Matter” and “Turn On The Moonlight”. Unfortunately Jim was also the kind of drummer who lived the rest of his life like some other well-known drummers such as Keith Moon, and was often running either into trouble or away from commitments, such as the band. However, the chops he put in on the records were some of the finest on any rock discs. At some point, when we weren’t able to have his services behind the kit, we brought in an excellent jazz drummer, Ken, who also brought in a friend who was great on congas. This Santana-esque version of Mindshaft played an outdoor festival in northern Maryland in the summer of ’98, and somewhere there’s some footage of that show. However, Ken was restless, and soon enough the band was back to the basic power trio of Arthur on guitar, Jim back on drums, and myself on bass and vocals (Patrick had meanwhile gone off to play guitar in Jeff’s new band). This was the line-up for “Turn On The Moonlight”, which featured some of the best rockers the band ever turned out.

After once again flogging the same rock club circuit behind “….Moonlight”, Jim grew restless once again and Arthur and I then advertised for a permanent replacement, which we found in Paul Fraunfelter. After writing a new album’s worth of tracks such as “Wall of Sleep”, a newly-hypnotic and ponderous version of the early punk phase song “Dance of the Heathens”, penned with Chris Kent back in ’94, and the first version of “Into The Light”, we went into the studio to record what would become “Glimpses of Different Realities”, a play off the name of Linda Moulton-Howe’s 2-volume book. Recorded at the same studio as both “Over Matter” and “….Moonlight”, it was never officially “released”, as I wasn’t too thrilled with either the treatment of my own vocals in the studio mix or the drum tempos. It was shortly after coming out of the studio that we met another guitarist, David, who had had a run back in the ‘80s playing in a style similar to our own. David was eager to get back into the scene and practically begged to join the band, ending up luring Arthur and Paul away to play his own songs. I could see the writing on the wall, and left it to them to follow a muse of a different stripe. Meanwhile I focused on re-mixing and mastering “Into The Light” with new vocals in a new studio, laying down my own vocal track for “Loving The Human”, from “Over Matter”, and creating “CrumbleDust” with Jim Bruton, who had returned to show a whole new creative side as “Perrynoid”, a Fatboy Slim-type of musician. These 3 tracks made up the “American Rock Hymns (For Mauling Evil Mullahs)”, released at the end of 2001.

After this, Patrick and I joined up again and brought on Doug Sanford on drums, and our efforts soon resulted in the last ‘official’ Mindshaft CD, “Blue Dream” which featured a new version of “Into The Light”, “Kate”, the title track and “Every Famous Dare”, a Rob Zombie styled metal mash.

It was during the mixing of “American Rock Hymns” that I had stumbled across the original eaglesdisobey.com website and discovered the work of Dr. Dan Burisch. Over the coming year, while rehearsing what would become “Blue Dream”, even the band came to recognize the daily surveillance, as rehearsal was at our house, and the white van was usually parked outside the house with a driver always watching. Sometimes, the van followed as I drove over to the drummer’s house, or even to the grocery store. It was unnerving, and unfortunately it was hard to explain to the band exactly what was going on, because I wasn’t certain myself. It was sometime after the beginning of 2003 that we felt not only that the situation was intolerable but that staying in Washington was becoming ever more tenuous, particularly as information from ‘inside’ had led us to expect that the pole shift was imminent. Later we found that a good many others had been taken in by the same indications, including most famously the Bush administration who rushed into war with Iraq with the expectation that the shift would obviate any need for an “exit strategy”.

Today, knowing that the shift may be as long as 7 years away, it would be a miracle of the first order to get back in the studio, but more important tasks to help the public prepare lie in the immediate future. Actually it may well be that a most marvelous opportunity may be at hand for the many people who have followed the saga of Dr. Burisch on what has come to be known as the “Golden Thread” to ‘make a joyful noise unto the globe’ by having a LIVE WORLDWIDE jam via the internet. The idea is even now causing some serious thought, even as I type this in December 2005. Perhaps by the time many readers come to hear of this, we may have made it a reality. In the meantime, you can read up on the saga of Dr. Dan Burisch at www.danburisch.info to find out the rest of the story of what happened when we left Washington DC for Canada and the drama of what followed.

In the meantime, all the best to all of you, and may you find the answers your mind seeks, the joy your soul desires and the justice that truth demands. Rock On!