Bobby Rondinelli has played drums for Rainbow, Blue Oyster Cult, Black Sabbath, and many others. Now, he has joined up with up-and-coming guitarist Jamie Holka for a new instrumental record. Recently, Bobby and Jamie took some time to talk about their partnership and much more!
Please press the PLAY icon below for the MisplacedStraws Interview with Bobby Rondinelli and Jamie Holka –
On how they came together – Jamie – It was a dating site for adults.
Bobby – It was a park and ride.
I answered an ad. It said “Burly Italian looking for a guy that sounds polish”. Well, I had become friends with the old Rainbow, Deep Purple road manager, Colin Hart. was always a fan of Bobby’s and I wanted to do some recording and I researched Bobby’s more recent stuff ’cause I obviously knew his, his eighties and nineties stuff. I noticed he refined himself differently, a little more jazz in his playing. I said, “Man, I just thought we would work well together”. So, I reached out to Colin Hart to see if he could get ahold of Bobby for me. He did it, and me and Bobby started doing some long distance recording and it just went from there.
On what Bobby saw in Jamie’s playing – Well, Jamie’s definitely has his own thing. He’s kind of jazzy and rocky and a great sense of rhythm. We just hit it off. The first track he sent me, I really liked I screwed with it a little and then he liked what I did with it. And make a long story short, then he came to Long Island. We were doing it remotely. Once we got together, he asked me if I wanted to produce the record and we wrote a lot of the stuff. He would come with a riff and then I’d give him a part and then he’d come with a riff and I’d go, it was just real easy. We just hit it off immediately.
On the special guests featured on the record – We were a few songs in and we thought it might be a cool idea to do a cover song, and so I had suggested the song “Brother Louie”. Bobby said,” I can get Kenny Aaronson, the, the original bass player that played on the original recording.” I said, “Wow, that would be really, really cool”. That’s how the guest thing started. Then Bobby went into the Rolodex and just started recruiting guys, but that’s how it started.
On picking the right guest for the song – When you, when you’re working with some of the best people in the business, say you got a couple of songs with Kenny on it and a couple of songs with Danny Miranda and then Billy Sheehan, anything you give these guys or who’s the other guy that I love? Jimmy Haslip. You give these guys a song and 99% of the time they’re making it better. They’re just bringing their thing to it and, and we figured we’d spread the wealth around so it wasn’t just one guy. You make it more interesting. I don’t think there’s very many albums with Jimmy Haslip, Kenny Aaronson, and Billy Sheehan, and Danny Miranda on it. We did it because we knew they would do great, and hopefully it would get more interest for the record. “Oh, look at this, it’s got this guy, this guy, this guy and this guy”, and they all really just knocked it out of the park.
When we got ahold of Danny (Miranda), I was, we were driving to Long Island, me and Stork, the guy, the was executive producer of the album, we were driving to Long Island, and I remember we were working on the ballad that’s on the album called “Tasty Waves”. I just called Bobby on the ride and I says, “Hey, is Danny Miranda in town? You think, can we get him in the studio tomorrow?” It was kind of just something I was thinking, you know, ’cause I knew Bobby was tight with him and he was somebody we were talking about maybe getting on the record. Bob goes, “Let me give him a call”. Bobby calls back five minutes later, he goes, “Yep”. “He goes, Danny just got off the plane from doing a festival with Blue Oyster Cult in Bulgaria. He just got home.” I says, “Ah, man, too bad. He’s probably jet lagged and tired”. Bobby was like, “Nope, he’s gonna be at the studio tomorrow at two o’clock.” Danny showed up next day, two o’clock on the button, came in, had the tune charted out and fricking like Bobby said, we could have used the first take, we could have, but then Bobby says, “Nah, do it again. Do it again. Add some more stuff.” But just like talk about professional and just having it together. That’s what makes these guys, you know who they are. They’re just pros,
On Jamie’s influences – Jeff Beck was his own voice and all that. I listen to other instruments too, not just guitar players. Guitar players are their own worst enemies, I think with especially trying to record instrumental music. And that’s why having a producer, in this case, Bobby makes all the difference in the world because, you can just shoot yourself in the foot by overplaying and thinking that people wanna hear that. Influences of course. I mean, Hendrix, Jimmy Page growing up, Richie Blackmore was my hero. Of heroes as a teenager, Robin Trower, all that stuff. But then I listened to a lot of jazz players and I listened to all the instrumental records though growing up. My brother would filter me like Al DiMeola Jeff Beck, of course. There’s a Frank Zappa album that was all just guitar solos live. I got into the shredder guys as in the eighties, like a lot of us did. Of course Eddie Van Halen, but he’s another guy, man, lEddie’s Eddie, Jeff’s Jeff. I never wanted to be a note for note off the record guy. I just wanted to see if you could develop a style that was maybe my own a little bit.
On how Bobby approached the material as a producer – Well, first of all, I think there’s a freshness about Jamie’s playing that lends itself to keeping it cool and he doesn’t do any tapping or any of that shit. If he did, I would’ve smacked him in the head. Not that there’s anything wrong with it, but it’s been done. That’s not him or us. He is playing from the heart, you know, and it’s old school based in blues, in a way, Like fusion almost, and rock almost, and not really a hundred percent of anything, which I think is in our favor because it hits a lot of genres without being stale. I think we’ve got a lot of hooking material on the record. We have nice melodies and cool parts and songs. No 12-minute frigging song that sometimes you clap because it’s great and sometimes you clap because it’s fucking over, it’s over. We don’t want any of those.
On deciding to cover “Sgt. Pepper” – I had sent Bobby a video of me. I do a lot of finger style solo guitar stuff and there’s a video of me on YouTube doing “Sgt. Pepper” on an acoustic guitar, some percussion and some stuff going on. I sent it to Bobby, “Hey, I just want you to see something”. I didn’t know if Bobby knew I did this other thing or to what extent? So, I sent it to him. He goes, “Man, we should do that. We should record that, our own version.” So we did. It was the only tune on the album that it was recorded live in the studio. It was me, Bobby, and Danny Miranda, the three of us in one room. It was funny, we were thinking, “Okay, let’s leave ourselves a couple hours to record it”, and we did. After the second take, it was done. It was like, “hmm. Now what do we do?” Danny crushed it. Bobby says, “Hey, let’s do a, a little six, eight blues solo spot in there.” It just made it its own version. Something so simple like that little blues breakdown. Then it comes back to the head of the tune. Then Don Airey in there with the mini-moog, just ripping your face off. It just came off really good and easy. That was the song I remember traveling to Long Island from Buffalo in a snowstorm. I came by myself this time. I drove by myself, and I got caught in a snowstorm and my windshield wiper stopped working on the ride over. I remember thinking, “I’m gonna fucking die driving a Long Island to make this album.” But I just remembered it was during the “Sgt. Pepper” sessions that I almost died. But anyway, yeah, that’s the story of that one.
On touring plans – Well, we have a show June 6th for the release of the album in Buffalo. Then we’re gonna see what happens. I mean, it would be great if we get some opportunities, I think if the album gets some traction, then yeah, we will definitely have some opportunities to play live. We got Bobby and Kenny Aronson are gonna be the rhythm section for that show. So that’s gonna be kind of the start of it, we’ll see where that goes.
On Bobby’s upcoming plans – Well, I’m always in the studio producing or doing drum tracks. I just got back from Europe with Axel Rudi Pell like two weeks ago I was away for five weeks, and we got some more shows in September and I gotta do another album with Axel, but I’m kind of always in the studio. So, I’m keeping busy, thank God.
On Jamie’s upcoming plans – Well, I just wanna break even. I’ve only had one opportunity to really travel and that was with a band called Captain Beyond. I did that for a few years. We only did about 30 shows, but other than that, I’m just a working stiff man. I play 200 plus gigs a year, and that entails solo, duo, acoustic stuff. I got a four-piece band. I’m in a five-piece cover band. It’s just about staying employed for me. But this opportunity right here. To do essentially my music but with Bobby, the way he produced it and informed these songs. In the end I ended up saying, “Well, he’s half writer, writing credit, he’s gotta get half”, because it was my material, but it would’ve never sounded right. It would’ve never came out without him. The producing, the bringing these cats in. Just amazing. But as far as it goes for me. I mean, I’d be thrilled to take something like this on the road with these guys. That’s not even a question. The corner bar is always gonna be here for me to play to have an opportunity to do something original. That’s ultimately where it’s at for me. I think for anybody, but this is its own deal. So hopefully, hopefully people like it. That’s what we’re waiting to see.
