Out Of Nowhere
Hepcat

"Alright, you guys," Deston said. "We really need to come up with a name for ourselves."


It had been our fourth or fifth practice at Alex's pad in Venice by then. We'd gotten a few songs down enough to want to record them. And that's what I did that night, on Alex's little tape

player. Only problem was, we didn't have a name. So we put down

all our instruments and gathered in a circle.



We had no ideas. At first, everyone started blurting out whatever name came to mind. It was comedy. People had the most ridiculous names. We figured that eventually, something good would surface. But nothing good was coming up. Instead, it became something of a joke to name ourselves, and we ended up laughing at our suggestions. Then, tired from laughter, we got frustrated and started arguing over our choices. Eventually we just sat there, looking at the patch of cigarette- and wine-stained carpet between us.



Suddenly, from out of nowhere, Alex's cat, "Hep," crossed that very same patch of carpet. In that perfect moment of silence, Alex said, "Hepcat." The name stuck immediately. Nobody argued, nobody said anything else. Everyone just repeated it to themselves. It sounded good.

But I insisted that we call ourselves "The Hepcats." So that's what I drew on the tape cover that night after practice. At the next practice, I showed it to everyone, and they liked it. Except for one thing.



"It's gonna be Hepcat," Greg said. "No 'The', no 'S'."



-- Greg Narvas, Drummer





01. Dance Wid' Me (Lee/Berry)

02. The Secret (Lee/Berry)

03. Hooligans (Heaton/Rotheray)

04. Skavez (Hillyard)

05. Miss Congeniality (Desert/Berry)

06. Clarence Thomas (Berry)

07. Prison of Love (Desert/Trujillo/Hillyard)

08. Earthquake and Fire(Lee/Desert)

09. All For You (Lee/Berry)

10. Caravan (Skaravan) (Ellington/Mills/Tizol)

11. Policewoman (Desert/Berry)

12. Same O' Same O' (Hillyard)

13. Train to Skaville (Dodd)

13.BONUS TRACKS

14. Nigel (Sofer)

15. Club Meditation (Berry)



Greg Lee #6 - lead vocals

Alex Desert #7 - lead vocals

Deston Berry - piano, vocals

Raul Talavera - alto sax

David Hillyard - tenor sax

David Fuentes - bass

Dennis Wilson -- guitar


Greg Narvas - drums, percussion



We'd started out as an experiment. Greg Lee and Alex had a vision to form a band that would play the old-time Jamaican Ska and Rocksteady that was usually only played in between sets at a typical Ska show. Yes, it was in this gap between bands that DJs would play the classic heavyweights from the old days: The Paragons, Melodians, Maytals, Skatalites, Ethiopians, to name a few. This was the ultimate dance music that Greg wanted to bring back to life.



So for our earliest days, that was our mission: to accomplish an old-time sound. And it wasn't easy. Sure, each and every one of us loved the old music, but could we play it? That was the big question and the big task for us all. To play old Ska in a new Ska world. To hit those harmonies like the Heptones. To nail the rimshots like Knibb. To boom the bass like Brevett. But the only references we had were the same reggae discs that the Djs played.



So we picked the choicest cuts, the hottest hits of yesteryear, and listened to them over and over, trying to emulate the styles that we heard. And in the meantime, we were composing our own songs drawn from other



sources of inspiration. David Hillyard brought in the Swing and Latin flavors, while Greg, Alex and Deston added that dash of soul from both American and Caribbean influences. In a way, we were doing what our Ska predecessors were doing three decades earlier.



Caravan (Skaravan): Probably the most covered Duke Ellington tune and it's done here with a Hepcat twist. Although the original song's melody conveys an image of one slowly traveling over the desert, this version is more energetic because of the ska feel. The campy jungle noises were used in the beginning of the song to set the tone and mood of exotic chaos.



Policewoman: Nobody likes to get a moving violation, especially Alex Desert. Upset over a ticket he'd received from a female police officer, he turned his frustration into creativity and wrote "Policewoman" in an hour. As Alex recalls, "I was picked up for a DUI - BUT I WAS NEVER CONVICTED!! NEVER CONVICTED!!"



Same O' Same O': A song written by maestro David Hillyard, influenced by the Illinois Jacquet records he was listening to at the time. "I was buying a lot of used Swing Lps at Rhino Records," he explains. "Plus, the swing thing was just coming together in LA in the early 90's. So I wanted to do a song in that vein. The lyrics are all about getting your balls busted by your woman. My ex-girlfriend was really good at that. I think she liked the song even though it wasn't too complimentary to her!! Yeah, it's amazing what you can get away with in a song."



Train to Skaville: The album ends with this up-tempo number. It is not to be confused with the Ethiopian's version of the same name. Originally done by The Soul Brothers, whom Alex commends - "Ya can't mess with the Soul Brothers. Dem boys is bad."



Dance Wid Me: Hepcat's anthem. Just relax and groove...grab the girl of your choice and just have a good time together. In this one, Alex, Deston, and Greg are battling over a young lady that they all fancy, telling her their intentions of courtship. As Alex recalls, "I remember trying to arrange the parts and Greg explaining that each verse was written for our distinct vocal characteristics. His (at the time)being more mellow, Deston being sweet and me being ruff/sweet." This remains one of Hepcat's most requested tunes 'til this day. Vocals by Greg Lee, music by Deston Berry.



The Secret: This was based on a rumor of an old lover of a certain Hepcat member. The rumor at the time was that this girl was gearing up to marry a man she'd just barely met. The marriage part was the secret that was never supposed to be told...but once rumors spread, they spread like wild fire, and eventually came back to the members of the band. Incidentally, the marriage at the time didn't happen-but a song about it did. Written by Deston Berry and Greg Lee.



Hooligans: "Hoolies!" was coined by the skinhead fans of Hepcat during their early years. It became an instant fan favorite ever since it was first covered live, before this recording. The song is probably one of the rawest early Wailers tunes ever recorded, and, at the time, fit Hepcat's personality perfectly.



Skavez: This remains true testament to the tremendous influence of Dave Hillyard when he joined Hepcat in 1990. Two of his main contributions to the band was his influence of integrating Latin grooves and interesting chord progressions into the band's style of Ska. It's debut at Claremont College is a classic Hepcat story. That night, Greg Lee and Alex never showed up, and we had to go on without them. Nervously, we started off with Skavez, and the crowd really dug it. But we had only one other instrumental handy. By a stroke of luck, a Fire Marshall shut the show down due to over-capacity. People were pissed, but were in happy spirits of what they'd just heard. The band survived the show and Skavez lived on.

Written by Dave Hillyard.



Miss Congeniality: About a psychotic jealous lover who kills his girlfriend when he finds out that she's cheating on him. It is revealed in the last chorus:


"Little Miss Congeniality / she lied too much so she dead and buried / No one can make a fool out of me / and live to speak about it you see!"


By far, Hepcat's most controversial song to date. Lyrics by Alex Desert, Music by Deston Berry.



Clarence Thomas: By Deston Berry, this instrumental was written during the court hearings broadcasted in the early 90's about the newly appointed Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and his charge of sexual harassment against law professor Anita Hill. The cynical "wine and dine" element to the song meant to mock this public fixation. Though Clarence was appointed, Hill did heighten sexual harassment awareness in the U.S..



Prison of Love: According to Alex, the song's lyrics were written during a long journey to get his Nissan Maxima, which had been repossessed. Apparently the vocal stylings also stem from his then obsession with The Paragons, especially with a song called "Sparkle of My Eye."


"I'm at once proud and sorry to say that the 'shoop shoo wahs' are a direct bite from those vocal geniuses," he admitted recently. Lyrics by Alex Desert, music by Lino Trujillo and Dave Hillyard.



Earthquake and Fire: One of the very first songs written by the band, this song deals with a young lover's attitude and philosophy, as reflected in the lyrics: "An angry mother and a father after me / when all I did was make her feel so happy!"


As Greg Lee so frequently announced this song at shows,"this song is about sex." The crowd's never-ending enthusiasm to sing the ending line "I'll go quietly" in unison remains to be one of Hepcat's favorite pastimes. Lyrics by Greg Lee, music by Deston Berry.



All For You: One of Hepcat's earliest Blue Beat excursions, which often accompanied Blues Busters covers we were doing at the time. This song was especially written for a friend of ours back then Ð Ted Morris Ð who wanted to express his devotion for his girl through a Hepcat tune. Lyrics by Greg Lee.



However, achieving the old traditional sound remained both a struggle and a mystery. No matter how hard we tried and how many records we listened to, we just couldn't achieve a sound we were completely happy with. Something was missing.



Then, in early '92, something happened that would change our band forever: a 10-day West Coast tour with our greatest influence, The Skatalites. It was during this encounter that we were able to witness and interact with living legends, who were responsible for the existence of Ska and Hepcat to begin with. We became their pupils, apprentices to the masters. And ultimately, we learned the many subtle but key ingredients to playing the most traditional forms of Ska and Reggae music.



This newly-found knowledge, combined with the ever-brewing creativity of our band's songwriters, created something that literally came from "Out of Nowhere." It was an excursion to the past. It was a step towards the future. But most of all, it was Hepcat.