Established A.D. 2000, March 19. Now in our seventh calendar year! Number 350 (Vol. 7, No. 49). This edition is for the week of December 4--10, 2006.
By Nolan B. Canova Of course I was worried about nothing and, thankfully, some pictures survive because I bought them off fans who appeared at shows with them! Note to future clubbing head-bangers: hire a photog.
I bring all this up because of a special reunion I just enjoyed with one of the singers for BLADE, Mr. Doug Deal.
Around 1984, Doug answered an ad I put out in "Rocks Off!" (one of those little tabloids you pick up as you exit a record or music store, who knows what it's called now). The phone rang and a phenomenally deep voice on the other end said he was calling about the ad. He told me his name was Doug Deal and he sang heavy metal.
"Yep, that's my dad." (Say it with a super-deep voice and a lazy N. Carolina-to-Florida drawl, like, "Yup, 'at's muh dad".) I thought that was remarkable. Arch Deal was, and still is, a legendary radio announcer, known then as the "eye in the sky" doing traffic reports. Today, he can still be heard on weekends on 970 WFLA doing the news.
My second question was something like, "what's your vocal range?" This was important because nearly all the music we played required upper-register vocals a la Rob Halford (Judas Priest) and Ronnie James Dio (Black Sabbath). His response?
"High. Love to sing high. The higher the better." ("Hahhh. Luv da sing, hahh. The hah'r the bedder.")
I was skeptical to say the least. Could this basso-profundo actually hit the high notes required?
The name we went under as a band at the time was actually SNIPER, but towards the end of my band "career", I once again re-named the band BLADE and Doug was singing with us at the Rocky Horror Picture Show (I know I have horrible audio tapes of that somewhere, maybe pictures too).
Around this time I got to meet Marty Balin of Jefferson Airplane. Marty had met and fallen in love with Doug's sister Karen when both were playing the same gig (She was with Tampa-based Mod Squad at the time). I was incredibly honored that Marty went crazy over some experimental music I'd made at the time as a lark. He offered me a touring gig as his guitarist, which I accepted. Unfortunately, a reunion with Airplane displaced the tour plans and we never went. But I digress....some other time, perhaps.
Earlier this year I carded some young guy at 7-Eleven who wanted cigarettes. The age listed said he was about 23 years old. The name on the ID: Blake Deal. I thought, "no way, what are the odds?" I asked him if he was in any way related to Doug Deal. His answer, in that familiar-sounding basso-profundo:
"Yup....'at's muh dad!"
I was giddy that history was repeating itself. One of Doug's toe-heads who slept thru our band practices in the '80s was now a grown man. I explained the situation and he enthusiastically assured me he'd contact his father about our meeting.
Arrangements were made and Doug and his fiancé Karen Benfield came to Tampa this past Thanksgiving weekend. The pictures on this page exhibit Doug's and my first encounter in about 15 years. Karen helped enormously in facilitating contact and this reunion, and I appreciate her patience.
Doug says he and Karen are planning to move back to Tampa in 2007. I jokingly said something about band practice. Doug immediately reared his shoulders back, looked me in the eye and said, "Ah'm reddy!"
Maybe....just maybe...I am, too.
All contents of Nolan's Pop Culture Review are ©2006 by Nolan B. Canova.
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