Among Josephmooon’s earliest supporters is Koh MrSaxman, a celebrated Thai music master whose melodic saxophone compositions and improvisations surf atop the waves of multiple genres from pop to jazz to chill electronic beats. Based in Bangkok and known for collaborations around the world, Koh MrSaxman visited Hua HIn last weekend to perform at the HOP Music and Art Festival.
It was great to catch up with him. I gave him a Josephmooon face mask and a copy of our new CD, So Far So Good.
We first met a few years ago when I interviewed Koh MrSaxman on the local radio station, Surf 102.5, during the Hua Hin Jazz Fest. We bonded immediately over a pure love of music. We just sensed it in each other, “brothers from different mothers,” and while our native tongues may be different, our adopted musical vocabularies are all we really need to communicate.
Then as we started to get more serious about recording, Koh was very generous to book Josephmooon on a small stage at the Hua Hin Jazz Fest in December 2020. The band assembled for this occasion (Chicago pal Terry Fox on bass, lead guitarist Khun Ar, who plays on So Far So Good‘s “Captolea,” and drummer Khun Ae, with whom I played in the Beatles cover band, Magical Mystery) rehearsed eight songs, but only had enough time to play five.
Check out this very raw recording on my Soundcloud.
The only other live Josephmooon performance was a solo gig I wrangled at the Ssshhh Bar in Hua Hin, way before lockdown closed all the bars and music establishments. That evening, I performed the first 10 songs we’d completed on electric guitar with a drum machine. And while I’d painstakingly rehearsed dialing in an appropriate drum beat and guitar effect for each song, the overall result was underwhelming. The audience was forgiving, however, making a painful “debut” a bit less so. Grateful anyway, for the opportunity to “road test” the songs in front of an audience, which invariably gives them a little more dimension and context that can be taken into a recording session.
It will be fun to play these songs live on stage with a band one day. I hope it happens. There likely will be some Chicago and Austin gigs scheduled in Spring 2022, as I am planning a two-month trip back to the good ol’, but whether these turn out to be solo acoustic performances or full band presentations remains to be seen.
Auditioning now for Josephmooon – what’s your instrument?
