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Engineer, producer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Dee Long has seen a lot of musical trends pass through the history books and
marked each event with a page of his own.
His first fully realized solo album called "Outside" is a concept record for a new generation featuring a hybrid of morphed audio styles and
recording techniques plucked effortlessly from Dee's back pocket resume.
As a live performer during the burgeoning post-British Invasion era of the mid-60's in Toronto, Canada, Dee was keyboardist,
guitarist and occasional vocalist for The Sundogs, The Polychromatic Experiment, and Bloodstone -- who managed one single ("Toronto" b/w "I'm A Man") on UNI Records produced by Lords Of
London/Nucleus member Greg Fitzpatrick.
As the Beatles collapsed on the cusp of the 1970s, Dee found himself aligned with two musicians who were originally driven by the Hogtown R & B scene -
Terry Draper and John Woloschuk. But, the trio's mutual bond wasn't the roots of R & B, but their secret passion for progressive rock and straight-up commercial pop music.
In 1977 the entire world
would know this union as KLAATU. Klaatumania enveloped the mass media because one pundit described the band, erroneously, as not just the next coming of The Beatles..but the real-life reunion of the actual
Fab Four. The hype drove the band's Capitol Records debut album, 'Klaatu' (aka '3:47 EST') up the charts and landed them squarely in Billboard Magazine's Top 50. The microscope was on the trio and they
receded farther and farther into their studio bunker with producer Terry Brown (Rush, Blue Rodeo, Cutting Crew) preferring to allow the music to speak where the cult of personality could not.
Four
gold selling albums followed including their fond farewell, 'Magentalane', in 1981. For this particular album, Dee had taken over as engineer and co-producer in a new recording facility north of Toronto
called ESP Studio. But, not wanting to tour the record, Dee quit Klaatu in April 1982 and became the business partner of future Grammy Award winning producer John Jones (Duran Duran/Celine Dion) at ESP. Soon
Dee was producing, engineering, and performing on LPs by the likes of Red Rider, Zappacosta, Gary O', Rational Youth and Dalbello. It was on these albums where Dee discovered the CMI Fairlight sampler, a new
passion for writing. And his new calling card.
Fairlight programming of audio samples was cutting edge in 1984 and soon Long and Jones's services were required in England. They sold ESP Studio and set
up a digital editing suite in George Martin's illustrious Air Studios in London. It was at this facility that Dee created jingles for McDonalds, and did sampling work on projects by Mark Knopfler (Dire
Straits), Eric Clapton, The Outfield, and David Gilmour (Pink Floyd), among others. In the meantime he continued recording his own material as a means to push the boundaries of new technologies.
Fed
up with the music business, Dee moved to Vancouver in 1995 as a software programmer where he developed an animation morphing program called 'Scream'. But, renewed enthusiasm by fans of Klaatu convinced Dee
to return to the music he excelled at. First came the theme song for John Woo's short-lived TV drama "Once A Thief" and then soundtrack work for the French Sci-Fi movie 'Babel' in 1998. Following
up on the momentum, Bullseye Records of Canada decided to release his older material from the ESP/Air Studios era as a double CD attack called 'Been Here Before' with a vision to help Dee realize a
full-blown comeback record.
"Outside" is just that record. Ripe with grandiose audioscapes and his cheeky pokes at social commentary ("Chromosome Syndrome", "Mad
Magazine"), Dee presents a concept record that capitalizes on the multi-faceted experiences of a studio wizard in motion. |
