Showing posts with label #DENIZ TEK. Show all posts
Showing posts with label #DENIZ TEK. Show all posts

5.17.2022

DENIZ TEK ANNOUNCES NEW ALBUM!


New Album !

When the pandemic hit, we had to cancel all touring. Sometimes a long break can be just what you need. After about a year partly spent writing, rewriting, arranging and rehearsing a new album, travel was once again possible. We were fired up and ready to go! We recorded on 8-track tape at "Ship's In" studio in Montana in August of 2021. Keith Streng (of the Fleshtones) flew in from Stockholm to play drums (Yes, drums!). Bob Brown pulled triple duty as recording engineer, producer, and bass player. Anne Tek and I played guitar on all tracks, and I sang. We sent the tapes down to Mort Bradley in Texas to mix. We are all very happy with the result and hope you will be, too.

For more info on how to hear it or get it, please visit my website: www.deniztek.com

8.01.2020

JAMES WILLIAMSON AND DENIZ TEK TO RELEASE NEW LP TWO TO ONE


Los Angeles, CA – Legendary proto-punk guitar heroes, James Williamson & Deniz Tek, have joined forces for a brand new, odds-defying studio album, Two To One, set to be released September 18 by Cleopatra Records. An inductee into the Rock N Roll Hall of Fame, Williamson was the guitarist and co-songwriter for one of the most iconic and influential albums of all-time, Iggy & The Stooges Raw Power, while Tek launched and occupied the same role for what became Australia’s ground zero for the punk movement with his band, the revered Radio Birdman. The album features 11 all-new original compositions highlighted by the first single “Stable” and the explosive lead-off track “Jet Pack Nightmare.”

Watch the video for “Stable”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OwkUzeJzpo



Williamson had this to say about the project; “It was really a lot of fun working with Deniz to make a no-frills, good old-fashioned guitar album. Took me back to Raw Power and Kill City days. Deniz comes from a very similar approach to music that I do, both of us have had many years of experience in Detroit and Ann Arbor, Michigan.”

Tek adds: “Raw Power shaped my path as a young guitar player. It was great to partner up with James to make this album. Everything fell into place beyond expectations – the songs, the band, the production, and even the timing. I am very happy with it.”

Two To One will be available on CD, digital and in your choice of red, blue, yellow or classic black vinyl!

Order the album HERE

1.06.2019

DENIZ TEK:THE MAKING OF LOST FOR WORDS

Deniz Tek (Photo: Anne Tek)

LOST FOR WORDS
Deniz Tek - guitarist, chief songwriter and founding member of legendary Australian band Radio Birdman - delivers Lost For Words, his third solo album for Career Records in five years.

Music for the imagined film. Action, Western, Surf, and Spy. Ten guitars led instrumentals with the studio band heard on his previous two albums, Detroit and Mean Old Twister.

Ric Parnell – drums (Spinal Tap, Atomic Rooster, The Deviants - many more)
Bob Brown – bass, production
Ron Sanchez - keyboards
The Fleshtones’ guitarist Keith Streng and Radio Birdman’s keyboardist Pip Hoyle joined them for the album sessions.

Produced by Bob Brown Recorded at GLEA Bozeman and Ships In Billings
Mixed by Andy "Mort" Bradley with Bob Brown and Deniz Tek at Wire Road, Houston, TX

THE MAKING OF “LOST FOR WORDS”
Deniz Tek

The best time to record is after a tour - the playing is as good as it is going to get, everything is working, and the studio is a nice change from the road.

I had toured hard with my live band in the spring of 2017 - skateboard stars Art and Steve Godoy, and guitarist Keith Streng from The Fleshtones. We played 30 concerts in 29 days across the Northeast USA and Europe. After a short rest, my wife Anne and I headed to Montana and I put the studio band together.

They were the same veteran players I had on my last two albums - Detroit and Mean Old Twister - Ric Parnell on drums, Bob Brown on bass, and Ron Sanchez on keyboards. Joining us was Keith Streng, from the touring band.

Keith, Bob and I rehearsed for a couple of days at Bob Brown’s “Ship’s In” studio in Billings, to get the guys familiar with the songs. On a sunny morning in August, we all climbed into Bob’s Volvo station wagon and headed for Bozeman - a drive west on I-90 over the mountains.

Bob Brown (photo: Anne Tek)

Ric took the bus east from his home in Missoula and met us at GLEA, the recording studio, which stands for “Gods Little Ear Acre”: the home of Ron Sanchez’ label, Career Records. We checked into an Air B&B and went over to the studio to sort out amps, get things miked up and get sounds happening. We had dinner and drinks at Ron’s and got ready to start recording early the next day.

Deniz, Keith Streng, Bob Brown (photo: Anne Tek)

Ric Parnell is the son of Jack Parnell, the legendary British jazz drummer - the only other drummer Buddy Rich is ever known to have praised, in an interview. Ric grew up in London, and played in the 70’s progressive rock band Atomic Rooster, before going on to work with many dozens of greats, including Jeff Beck, Ravi Shankar, The Deviants, Toni Basil, Bette Midler, Cher, etc ...

But Ric is best known for being in Spinal Tap, as the unfortunate drummer Mick Shrimpton who spontaneously combusted... and later as Mick’s twin, Rick.

Bob Brown played bass on my first solo tour in 1992, along with drummer Scott Asheton and Chris Masuak. I’ve been close friends with Bob and worked with him ever since.

Keith Streng (photo: Anne Tek)

Ron Sanchez, longtime friend, and label boss is the brain behind Donovan’s Brain. He engineered the sessions and played keyboards.
Keith Streng, guitarist and founding member of NYC’s Fleshtones, is a recent addition to my touring lineup.

He currently splits his time between Stockholm and NYC when he’s not on the road. He flew in for the sessions with a narrow window of time between other commitments.

The rest of us had worked long and hard rehearsing the songs, but not Ric. He doesn’t need to. It works like this. We are sitting in the studio. I say “OK, here’s how this next song goes.” I play it to him on guitar. He listens, thinks about it, and comes up with a beat.

Then we run through it a couple of times and he is ready to go. After a successful take, Ric goes outside for some “fresh air” meaning to smoke, and then in 15 minutes, we are down in the studio getting the next track together.

I played an 80’s Japanese Stratocaster, plugged directly into a Fender Blues Junior. I used no pedals or effects. We all sat in the room together and played all the songs live. One song, “It Shall Be Life”, has a fade - we even faded the song out live. “It Shall Be Life” is named after the famous line, spoken by Ten Bears at the end of the film “The Outlaw Josey Wales”.

Ric Parnell (Photo: Anne Tek)

During breaks, we loved listening to Ric’s stories. Aside from recounting his adventures with Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck and others, he enjoys talking about the making of Spinal Tap. I had always wondered how it could have been so accurate. Even though it’s meant to be a satire, the band situations depicted in the movie are astonishingly real.

I always figured that it couldn’t have been done without the actors being actual rock musicians, who had been through all of that stuff in real life. Ric says that the band improvised a lot of the script - I believe it.
All the basic tracks were recorded in two days.

Keith flew back to New York to play a gig at Yankee Stadium, and I spent an extra half day with Ric and Ron getting a few percussion parts done before Ric went home to Missoula. The following week, I recorded some guitar solos and added some acoustic and 12-string parts at Ship’s In with Bob.

One of the tunes is an instrumental version of Pip Hoyle’s song “Zeno Beach” from the 2006 Birdman album of the same name. I asked Pip to overdub keyboards on that, as well as on another tune “Vanished” which I had written for Radio Birdman, but never used. He generously recorded his parts in Sydney and sent them over.

Deniz Tek and Ron Sanchez (Photo: Anne Tek)

Erik Olson, the young genius multi-instrumentalist from Powell, Wyoming came to Ship’s In and played the fabulous sax solo on “Eddie Would Go”, a song about the fabled Hawaiian big wave surfer Eddie Aikau; and channeled Booker T. on Hammond B3 for the simple but killer groove in “Boneyard”.

Bob and I got together about six months later. I arrived in Billings in 15 below zero temperatures and blowing snow so deep that cars parked on the streets were half buried. Of course, we barbecued outside that night. We did some prep work and then went down to Houston to mix the album with Andy “Mort” Bradley.

Andy is a multiple Grammy nominee, having engineered or produced over 1000 albums in his career. He started out as a Radio Birdman roadie and sound man in 1977, and eventually became chief engineer and owner of Sugar Hill Recording Studio in Houston, where he and I worked on many albums together. (Sugar Hill is the oldest operating studio in America. Worldwide, only Abbey Road is older.)



Mort left Sugar Hill a couple of years ago and now freelances at Wire Road. That’s where we mixed Lost For Words. During the mixing sessions, an intern happened to be in the room at one point. She was probably 18 or 19 years old.

She asked, “Oh my God - is that surf music??” We confirmed that it was. These three old guys sitting around mixing a surf album, and this
kid is super enthusiastic about it. That was a good sign.

As a youngster at age 12, the first song I learned how to play on the guitar was “Walk Don’t Run”. Growing up I listened to and loved the Ventures, Ennio Morricone, The Shadows, Booker T and the MG’s and still do. I always wanted to make my own all-instrumental album. With the help of my friends, here it is. We’re all very happy with it.

I hope you are too. xDeniz

Other Deniz Tek LPs Available:

5.11.2017

JAMES WILLIAMSON AND DENIZ TEK LAUNCHED A NEW EP "ACOUSTIC K.O."

Deniz Tek (Radio Birdman) and James Williamson (Iggy & the Stooges) photo Anne Tek

FROM DENIZTEK.COM 

Fans of The Stooges and Radio Birdman are in for a real treat this spring as guitarist James Williamson and singer/guitarist Deniz Tek have teamed up for a new spin on four classic Williamson compositions from the early/mid '70s. The two proto-punk icons have unplugged their amps for drastic, yet no less gratifying reworkings of two numbers from Iggy & The Stooges’ seminal Raw Power album (“I Need Somebody” and “Penetration”) as well as two tracks from Pop & Williamson’s often-unsung masterpiece Kill City (“Night Theme” and “No Sense of Crime”). These songs were orginally composed by Pop & Williamson, with the exception of "Night Theme" which was penned by Williamson and Scott Thurston.


Rock & Roll Hall of Famer Williamson explains hooking up with Tek and working with him on this effort, “I first met Deniz in 2011 when doing the Ron Asheton Tribute show at the Michigan Theatre in Ann Arbor. Deniz had been a good friend of the Ashetons (having come from Ann Arbor like them) and had been asked to play on some of the old Stooges tunes that night.”

“Later we stayed in touch during the times I would visit Australia on tour with the Stooges, and it also turned out that he visited the Big Island of Hawaii frequently, as do my wife and I. In fact, during one of our get togethers on the Big Island Deniz mentioned that we should record some acoustic songs together. Maybe do some of my old stuff. It was later that day, hiking in a remote area, that we came across some abandoned trucks. His wife, Anne, got her camera out and said 'there’s your record cover!’”


ACOUSTIC K.O. TRACKLISTING:
I Need Somebody
Penetration
Night Theme
No Sense Of Crime

Oddly, in a parallel development, a long time fan and incredible collector of Stooges memorabilia, Hakan Beckman, had suggested to James a couple of years earlier that “Night Theme” should be orchestrated. Further, he had developed a fantasy album cover called Acoustic K.O. James loved these ideas and now, with Tek, had the vehicle to realize them.

“That’s how it all started,” Williamson admits. “However, once we began recording, the project took on a life of its own. If this was to be called Acoustic K.O. it needed to be entirely acoustic. Michael Urbano broke out his old 1920s drum kit and Gregg Foreman used my old 1930s pump organ and a piano. Guitars, of course, were acoustic, and the only exception was the bass that Bob Glaub played - an old hollow body Kay since an upright just didn’t sound right for these songs. The horn section rounded everything out.”


“For ‘Night Theme’ I enlisted the help of Mark Culbertson, musician extraordinaire who had played contra-bass for me on the albums Ready to Die and Re-Licked, to do the arrangement. He did an extraordinary job! I was able to find an incredible group of players called The Awesome Orchestra from Berkeley, CA under the direction of David Moschler to realize Mark’s arrangement and I couldn’t be happier with the results.”

“It all came together once we layed down Deniz’s vocals while in Hawaii, and with the help of Petra Haden doing some backing vocals and violin, along with Annie Hardy (Giant Drag) doing the duet with Deniz on ‘No Sense Of Crime’ we had performances to be proud of.”

Deniz Tek and James Williamson’s Acoustic K.O. EP will be available March 31st on vinyl and digital (iTunes, Amazon, etc.) formats. Read Full Article Here

10.09.2014

DENIZ TEK MEETS BLUE COUPE!


 Deniz Tek guest post:

 DENIZ TEK PLAYS GUITAR ON BLUE COUPE'S MILLIONS MILES MORE

I was playing a show with my band a couple of years ago at Bowery Electric, just a block away from the old CBGB's. Al Bouchard, BOC drummer, showed up. After the show I joined him at the bar and we had a good time catching up. (The last time I had seen him was when Radio Birdman played in NYC in 2006)


He told me he about his band, Blue Coupe, with his brother Joe and Dennis Dunaway, the original Alice Cooper bass player. BOC and Alice were two of my favorite bands. (We named our first album Radios Appear after a BOC line from the song "Dominance and Submission")



1. Prophets Dukes and Nomads 3:32
2. Hellfire Hurry 3:47
3. Hallow's Grave 3:51
4. Everybody Goes Insane 4:04
5. I'll Forever Stick Around 3:36
6. Modern Love (Stalking Time) 4:52
7. Used Car 3:56
8. Supernatural Love 4:01
9. Train of Thought 4:00
10. Ain't Dead 3:31
11. Ride With Me 3:54
12. Devil's Highway 3:51
13. More Cowbell (Gotta Fever) 2:55


Over the years I've been inspired by and covered many of their songs. I was intrigued by the idea of "Blue Coupe". I had already heard about them from pal Andy Shernoff, who had done a few shows with them up in Canada, and was writing some material for them. Al asked if I would be willing to contribute some guitar to the next album which was to be Million Miles More. I said sure thing.

 Buck Dharma and Deniz Tek 
Sydney April 2013 Photo © Anne Laurent

A couple of months later Al sent me audio files for the track, "Supernatural Love", a beautiful pop song written by Andy. It was right up my alley. I spent an afternoon in Bob Brown's studio recording guitar parts for it, sent it back, and some months later it showed up on the album. I was pleased and honored to get to play on an album with these icons of rock and roll, and to be a featured guest along with guys like Buck Dharma, Alice Cooper, and Ross the Boss.

These days, it's common to be recording not in the same room or same city, but often, not even in the same country as the other musicians. Sure is convenient, but not very good for comradeship or photo opportunities... so, unfortunately, there are no photos ! Deniz Tek


10.04.2014

RADIO BIRDMAN 2014 TOUR DATES!



Radio Birdman, one of the pioneers of the high energy rock ‘n’ roll scene in Australia, will be playing a limited number of shows this coming October and November. These shows will be a unique opportunity to catch this legendary Australian underground band whose flame has influenced a multitude of current contenders.

The line up will feature founding members Rob Younger, Deniz Tek, and Pip Hoyle, longstanding bassist Jim Dickson and returning Radio Birdman drummer Nik Rieth. Guitarist Dave Kettley of the New Christs will join on guitar.

To make things ever better the band will be reissuing their formidable back catalogue, the demand for which never ceases.


The reissue of the band’s material is initially in the form of a limited edition CD box set, out now. The box contains the three studio albums Radios Appear (Trafalgar and Sire versions) and Living Eyes, all remastered from original tapes. Each of these albums will be accompanied by a standalone bonus disc. Much of the bonus disc material is previously unreleased and will provide a treasure trove of material for diehard fans.

http://www.citadelmailorder.com/mailorder/discs/radio_birdman_the_box.jsp?source=radio_birdman_the_box_new

To cap off the box set there is a previously unreleased live concert recorded at Paddington Town Hall in 1977 just prior to the band's departure for the UK. This live recording has been mixed from master tapes that have languished forgotten for decades. The result is a totally wild and raw release that captures the band’s true primal energy. We’re sure it will prove to be the jewel in the crown for the box set.

The studio albums will also be reissued on vinyl, these being staggered over the months leading up to Christmas.

Live At Paddington Town Hall will come out on vinyl too as a double gatefold LP.

8.24.2014

RADIO BIRDMAN AUSTRALIA 2014 DATES




RADIO BIRDMAN AUSTRALIA 2014 DATES

Original members Pip Hoyle, Rob Younger, and Deniz Tek 
will assemble a new lineup for a limited run of concerts 
around Australia in November 2014.


Friday 31st October - NEWCASTLE
Saturday 1st November - SYDNEY
Sunday 2nd November - MELBOURNE
Monday 3rd November - MELBOURNE
Friday 7th November - BRISBANE
Saturday 8th November - ADELAIDE
Sunday 9th November - PERTH

5.19.2014

DENIZ TEK BUYS FRED "SONIC" SMITH'S CRESTWOOD

Deniz Tek with The Crestwood in Radio Birdman

Deniz Tek tells the history of his Epiphone Crestwood Deluxe that was once owned by Fred Smith during the MC5 days.

Deniz Tek: I was in Ann Arbor in 1973, home to visit family and friends on my first visit back after moving to Australia in '71. By then I was in a band called TV Jones, and I was always on the lookout for cool guitars. Anyway, I was at the Campus Corners store on South University, looking at the notice board. There was a handwritten ad that read something like "MC5 Epiphone Crestwood guitar" and a phone number. I knew the band had split up and was selling stuff.
 
Fred "Sonic" Smith

Being a huge fan of the MC5, and a lover of great guitars, I called the number. It was a middle man, selling the stuff. I think his name was Fred Stoll. I knew his sister in school. So I went down and bought the guitar, I wont say for how much but it was a good deal even for those days. The guitar came with a case with the MC5 stencil painted on it. I took the guitar back to Australia, and it being the finest guitar I had ever owned, I began playing it as my main axe. I've played it ever since.
 

The Epiphone Crestwood Deluxe was the top of the line solid body Epiphone back in the days when Epiphone was owned and built by Gibson. It was the Cadillac. It featured 3 mini-humbucking pickups, and a 3 position selector switch where you could get the neck pickup alone, the bridge pickup alone, or the bridge and middle pickup together. The way it was wired you couldn't get all three at once.

  photo by Kevin O'Rafferty

It had an oversized batwing headstock, bindings, Grover machine heads. The particular model that Fred had was a very rare version that had a factory-installed Bigsby tailpiece instead of the standard Epi tailpiece. This conversion left a couple of extra screwholes in front of the bridge. To cover those up, a little black plate was put on that said "Custom Made". Apparently they only made 200 of that model. Mine was made in 1966.

photo by Kevin O'Rafferty

I am pretty hard on guitars onstage. The Epiphone had the neck break off 3 times. It was never deliberate, but just from the way I play, plus the fact that the neck-body joint on those guitars is a bit flimsy ... it was that model's only design flaw. The last time it happened, in the early 90's, I left it with Dan Erlewine. He was the guitarist in the Prime Movers when Iggy was the drummer, and he was also at the same time my first guitar teacher at Herb David Guitar Studio in Ann Arbor in 1964. Dan later became a world renowned guitar luthier and repairman. He used to write the guitar repair section of Guitar Player magazine. Dan did an amazing repair job on that guitar and fixed it up so the neck joint was bulletproof. I never had a problem with it from then on.
 
Photo: Tim Bugbee

I became friends with Fred Smith a couple of years after I bought his guitar, and he would occasionally ask me to bring it along and play as a guest with Sonics Rendezvous on the song City Slang, which features a lot of guitar. Fred was always happy to see his old Crestwood.


In 1978 I was in London with Radio Birdman, and we ran into Iggy and his touring band which at that time included Fred Smith, Scott Asheton, Gary Rasmussen and Scott Thurston. Fred had some extra cash on hand, and asked me if I would consider selling the guitar back to him. By then I had played that guitar on several hundred shows and some recordings ... it felt like part of me. I wouldn't sell. He was understanding and good humored about it. We went out to dinner that night. Much later, after Fred passed away, my pal Scott Asheton told me that Patti wanted to get the guitar back as part of Fred's estate. Again, I had to respectfully decline.

I went to photograph the legendary Radio Birdman at Manning Bar last night. The band had fun on stage and the crowd loved it. The show was awesome.
Here is a photo of half of Deniz Tek and his beloved Epiphone Crestwood Deluxe as they get ready to launch.
Photo Emmy Etié Photography

When I was touring with DKT-MC5 in 2004, I played that guitar. It was a great, great honor to fill in with them. Of course, no one can ever fill Fred Smith's shoes, or play like him. I asked Wayne what he wanted me to do, exactly. He said "I'm hiring you to play your ass off". I said: "I can do that"! Wayne remembered Fred's guitar well. He said that around the time I bought it, they also tried to sell his world famous American flag Stratocaster. And he told me that no one bought it! Unsold, it went into storage. He went on to say that he never found out what happened to it after that.


The guitar has become iconic over the years. People associate it with me, with Radio Birdman, and with the MC5. In Australia, Epiphone guitars became sought after. Players wanted that sound, and that look! By 2006, the last time I toured with it, it was so beat-up and had lost so much paint that it began to have some tone problems when the bare wood would get soaked. I had it dried out and clear coated, and decided to allow it to retire gracefully. Deniz Tek

★Deniz Tek, from Ann Arbor, Michigan, is a guitarist, singer and songwriter currently based in Sydney, Australia. His career in music, grounded in late-60's Detroit, extends through several decades and across continents. He is best known as a founding member of the influential Australian independent rock band Radio Birdman.

In 2007, Deniz was inducted into the Australian Music Hall of Fame, and in 2012 was voted number 7 in the top 100 Australian guitarists of all time.★

5.08.2014

DENIZ TEK AND THE BAD MEN



Wed. MAY 28- American Bar & Grill - Lancaster, PA

Thurs. May 29- Bowery Electric, NYC with STEVE WYNN & the MIRACLE 3, The Nuclears and John Cooper Clark.

Fri. MAY 30- Brighton Bar, Long Branch, NJ - with the Easy Outs.

EUROPE TOUR JUNE 2014

DENIZ TEK AND THE BAD MEN ( Art & Steve GODOY ) 
US/EUROPE TOUR  - MAY/JUNE 2014

28/05 LANCASTER, PA - USA - American Bar & Grill
29/05 NYC - USA - Bowery Electric (w/STEVE WYNN & The Miracle 3)
30/05 LONG BRANCH, NJ - USA - Brighton Bar
03/06 OSLO, NORWAY - Kulturhuset 
04/06 MOSS, NORWAY - Tivolikjeller 
05/06 STOCKHOLM, SWEDEN - Lilla Hotellbaren
06/06 HALDEN, NORWAY - Feelgood
07/06 GOTEBORG, SWEDEN - Henriksberg
08/06 MALMO, SWEDEN - Folk & Rock
09/06 HAMBURG, GERMANY - Hafenklang 
10/06 BERLIN, GERMANY - White Trash 
11/06 TBA
12/06 NANCY, FRANCE - Royal Royal Pub
13/06 PARIS, FRANCE - La Mecanique Ondulatoire 
14/06 KORTRIJK, BELGIUM - The Pit's 
15/06 HONFLEUR, FRANCE - La Batolune 
16/06 ROUEN, FRANCE - Le 3 Piece Muzic Club 
17/06 KOLN, GERMANY - Sonic Ballroom
18/06 BAYREUTH, GERMANY - Schokofabrik
19/06 GENEVE, SWITZERLAND - La Graviere - Les Acacias
20/06 STUTTGART GERMANY - Goldmark's 
21/06 ARCO (TN), ITALY - Festa della Musica
22/06 ZURICH, SWITZERLAND - Wirtschaft Zum Transit 
23/06 VOGOGNA (VB), ITALYLa Loggia del Leopardo
24/06 BRESCIA, ITALY - Lio Bar 
25/06 SAVIGNANO SUL RUBICONE (FC), ITALY - Sidro
26/06 LA SPEZIA, ITALY - Boss 
27/06 ANCONA, ITALY - Fun House 
28/06 BUCINE, ITALY - Spectre Club
29/06 BARZANÒ (LC), ITALY - Fin Qui Tutto Bene Festival
30/06 TBA, ITALY
01/07 ZANÈ (VI), ITALY - Cascina Irma

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