Momentum, Impatience, and Poor Judgment

By the time I had spent a couple of weeks in the studio with Gene and Doc...a couple of things seemed clear. Gene was doing a very good job for me, and I was very happy with his playing and committment. But I was only luke-warm about what I was hearing from Doc. He was getting the job done, his playing was adequate, but it was unexciting, and the difference in his energy compared to Gene's and mine was becoming noticeable to me. The problem was that Gene and I weren't really close friends anymore, and I wanted him on the project...and he and Doc were close friends, and I didn't want to alienate Gene by insulting his friend. The only thing I was thinking about was getting this album done, and we were doing that. But my judgment was off, probably because of my impatience and my drug use. When I look back on it now, I think that Gene on drums and Michael, the bass player I had used on the first two sessions might have been the best combination for what I was trying to accomplish...but I completely missed that at the time. I was looking at the rhythm sections as teams, and it never dawned on me that as the manager of those teams, I could make substitutions any time I wanted to, and that Gene would probably have been OK with the change, even if Doc might not have been. I hadn't even met Doc before these sessions, and I really didn't owe him any special consideration, but I guess I felt I wanted to keep Gene happy, so it never dawned on me to ask him how he felt about the possibility of a different bass player...I think I just assumed he would be unhappy about it. I regret not having that conversation with him then, because today, I believe Gene would have been willing to do whatever the job situation called for. Once again, hindsight is alway 20/20, and although Michael was the better choice for bass, and Gene was the better choice on drums...not once, during any of the recording sessions did it ever cross my mind to try them together. The only explanation I have for that oversight is that, once again, my drug use impaired my thinking and my judgment, and although I'm grateful I actually got the chance to record a lot of Avalanche music during these sessions, I believe the album could have been considerably better with that one simple change.