Years ago when Nick was a young boy, his father would sometimes take him to his weekly jam session at his buddies house. There they would find Nick sitting behind the band with the drummer, who would give him a stick and a cowbell to bang along with. It was those early years of listening and learning the classics that fueled Nick’s desire to pick up an instrument. Naturally, the drums were his first choice.
From that point on and all throughout high school, Nick and his friends would get together and jam whenever they could. ”I remember being fourteen or so, drumming Cream songs in my buddies garage, having no clue at that point in time who Cream was. I am very thankful my friends had good tastes in music, even back then. They introduced me to a lot of what I consider my foundation today.”
Nick has often cited his founding and favorite musicians as being the blues greats; “Clapton, B.B., Stevie, Robert Johnson, etc., oh and Jonny Lang. They got me started. If it wasn’t for those guys I don’t know where I would be musically, probably left with a void in my soul, especially without Clapton.”
Having experienced the playing of parties, all night jam sessions, and short recording trials, Nick became irritated by the lack of motivation and dedication to write, practice, and record with his fellow bandmates. So it’s no surprise that in November 2003, he bought his first guitar and started teaching himself how to play. ”I just figured I can drum, so I’ll teach myself guitar too, and when I learn guitar, bass should come somewhat easily, then I can record my own songs.”
From then until now, this is where all those years of writing, recording, re-recording and perfectionism have come to meet: ”Having gone through many programs, cd’s, 8-track recorders, amps, and guitars searching for that perfect sound, I have finally collected enough equipment over the years to make things sound almost like I want them to sound. It has been extremely frustrating over the years to have recorded something that I think is musically where I want it, but to have the quality sound terrible. I am now using pro-tools 8, and have some pretty nice gear. With that said, I have somewhere near 40 songs that I could re-record, while some of them will be, some of them won’t. This is where some of them will make it and I hope you will take a listen.”
These days, Nick and his long-time friend Phil Verespy, who have been playing together for years have also found themselves in the studio. Some of their tracks can also be heard here.