Jan. 27, 1973: Changing times for Bob Bakert
We first encountered Bob Bakert as half of the highly promising folk duo Gold back in January 1971. Two years later, things have changed.
Jan. 27, 1973
A Man and His Guitar –
Bob Bakert’s Music
Keeps ‘em Dancing
“THERE’S DOC D’AMATO,” Bob Bakert says matter-of-factly, spying the manager
of the folk duo Gold, the group he quit a little over a year ago, as he wheels
the big red Cadillac into the parking lot of a Snyder discotheque.
It’s breakfast time for Bob. Hungry after two hours of
practicing guitar, he orders a club sandwich and a draft beer.
As the waitress leaves, Doc joins us, his bubbling
cordiality jolting Bob as if someone woke him up too early.
“Say,” Doc goes, “you got an open night? I was talking to
this club owner and he wants to have you.”
* * *
“IF HE WANTED
me,” Bob replies, “he could’ve called me. He knows how to get ahold of me.”
Doc, undaunted, starts talking about Gold and his dealings
with record companies and producers that are looking at them these days.
“We got a contract from Jerry Ragovoy to produce them,” Doc
relates. “He’s a great producer, got his own studio. Then we went over the
contract and saw that he wanted 50 percent of the publishing. We didn’t want to
give up that much, so we’re looking for another producer.”
Gold – Bobby Frauenheim and Dave Nehrboss – is hanging out
in
“Yeah, I’ve met Albert Grossman,” Doc continues. “He’s into
being the King of Woodstock. After five minutes, I figured he wasn’t what we
wanted.”
Gold, Doc adds, isn’t making much money these days from
club dates. There aren’t that many. Nothing like what Bob’s got. Bob’s working
six, seven nights a week.
The talk with Doc leaves Bob restless. “Doc’s OK,” Bob says
as we drive past his parents’
* * *
BOB MEANDERS
toward the airport to get a closer look at the vertical take-off plane he
spotted, then doubles back to his brother Howard’s farm at the end of a dirt
road not far from the Moog Synthesizer plant in Williamsville.
It’s a country preserve in the middle of suburbia.
Pheasants flock around a pond. Howard, burly and bearded, mounts one of the
dozen or so horses he owns or boards and rides smartly about in front of the
barn.
His other brother, Michael, owns a clothing store where Bob
gets all his dressy stage clothes. And there’s a utilitarian side to his
classiness, like with the Cadillac.
“I’ve always had small cars before,” he says as he wheels
toward his garage apartment near downtown Williamsville, “but this time I had
to have something that could carry all my equipment.
“I looked at a station wagon a year newer than this, cost
the same amount of money, and it was a piece of junk. So this is really pretty
practical.”
The sign on the apartment door tells you to take off your
shoes. Barefoot inside, the only thing that distracts you from the good taste
of the new furniture is the big four-track tape recorder against one wall.
* * *
BOB THREADS
a tape through it. “I wrote this song to be a commercial tune and it came out
too schleppy,” he says. “It’s kind of affected by my girlfriend being away in
The chorus has what people in the business call “the
commercial hook” – “Susan, don’t make me be lonely; Susan, don’t make me sad …”
“Wanna hear a tape of Gold?” Bob asks. Soon the room is
full of those big
“You notice how it all starts to sound the same after a
while?” Bob says. “We never worked too much on arrangements. I might write a
song in the morning and we’d be doing it that night and just leave it that way.
“Gold needed a couple things, I thought. I wanted to pick
up a bass and a drummer, really get some bottom in the group. I didn’t think
we’d get any farther without that.
“As far as breaking up, I guess I had an ego thing going
then. It was my fault. It got to where David and I were competing and I was
saying the group was David, that we wouldn’t be anything without his voice.
* * *
“I WANTED to
play a little more electronically, be a little more diverse. I wanted more
rhythm and David was really into folk. After I quit, I wanted to get back in,
but they decided to not let me.
“Solo’s been good to me. I picked up a Univox sideman for
rhythm. I talked with a lotta drummers and they agree that a guitarist and a
drummer don’t sound as good. A drummer will overpower you, but I can turn that
rhythm instrument very low. I couldn’t afford to have someone else playing with
me, either.
“Lately I’ve been offered a couple big jobs, road jobs.
Sonny Turner of the Platters wanted me to join his band, but I’d earn less
money than I’m earning now.
“I’ve been practicing a lot. I practice all day. I play like
breathing. I’ve had younger guitar players come over, like the guys from
Together, and I’ve shown them some things. Got them into up-and-down picking. I
got that from John McLaughlin and Larry Coryell.
“Future-wise, I’d like to develop this nightclub thing to
earn a living, then get into recording, do bass, drums, guitar on that
four-track recorder. What I need now is more money to buy a mixer and some
better microphones.
“I’ll have to turn my head around to get into this writing thing. But I’m only 22, I’ve got a long time. I’ll make it. Maybe not next year or the year after or maybe 10 years, but eventually. I just work too hard at it not to. I really do.”
The box/sidebar:
Changed His Style
When Bob Bakert quit the folk group Gold in October 1971,
his first inclination was to continue in folk music.
“I hung around the Limelight a lot,” he says. “It was just
about the only musical outlet I had.”
* * *
HIS EVOLUTION
to one-man commercial-type tunes took about six months. What started it was an
engagement at the Pillow Talk on
“The Pillow Talk wasn’t much of a change at all, really,”
Bob recalls. “I had all folk tunes, not much that was commercial. I played
every song I knew. The only difference was I had a suit on.
“Then I started learning material I had to learn. Dance
material. Creedence. ‘
“The other thing I realized is I’d have to get a beat. At
the Pillow Talk, I actually got them dancing without that electronic sideman
and that’s really a feat.”
Dick Scarfia from Ruby Red’s saw him at the Pillow Talk and
Bob’s been playing at the two Ruby Red’s on
* * *
A PEEK INTO
the one at Transit Lanes north of Eastern Hills Mall shows that Bob really
packs a dance floor now.
His voice is strong and clear, colored with a touch of
echo, and he does a nice job on John Denver’s “Rocky Mountain High.” He doesn’t
get much of a chance for fancy guitar work, however. Most of it has to be
heavily rhythmic. Weeknights, when the audience is older, he mellows his sound.
“It seems when I sit down to write a song,” he says, “I get
back into my acoustic folk non-commercial thing.
“The other night I played a set of originals at Ruby Red’s
because I had a request for them, but I can’t do that all the time. You have to
be like Gold and have an audience for it.”
* * * * *
FOOTNOTE: Bob moved to
Meanwhile, he kept up on guitar, but played out only
occasionally. Then he returned to acoustic music in 2009, began going to open
mics and writing songs again. He is a co-founder of the
He also books concerts and festivals in the
But those aren’t his only interests these days. He is
editor of a magazine, Jazz Guitar Today, and is a member of the board of
directors for the Velvet Note in the
Comments
Post a Comment