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“Cream Experience” to Play Covington’s Madison Theater May 31st

COVINGTON,KY– Kofi Baker is his father’s son, but only to a point.  The son of former Cream drummer Ginger Baker, Kofi followed his famous sire into the percussion world and took up his jazz stylings.

“My earliest, vague memory is running onto the stage at the Old Grey Whistle Test when I was six,” Kofi remenisced, in our phone conversation from his home in Southern California, where he operates his own drumming school.

“My dad’s roadie tricked me into playing.  The kit was set up – my dad was playing a show there – it was a TV show in England.  And [the roadie] said, ‘Go warm up the drums,’ so I was like ‘OK.’  And I ran out to the kit and started playing.  And everybody started pouring into the club and the film cameras started rolling, and I just remember looking up over the toms and seeing all these people watching.  I can’t remember playing, I just remember seeing all these people rushing in and running off the drums.”

Kofi has backed Steve Marriott of Humble Pie, toured with Jack Bruce and with others.  Whereas Cream and many of their late ‘60s  English peer bands took up a blues mantle, Kofi always felt more tuned into fusion and experimental rock.

“I was into Frank Zappa.  I listened to Terry Bozzio – all the drummers for Zappa.  [Miles Davis’ drummer] Tony Williams.  Those jazz fusion drummers really influenced me.  But there are so many great drummers out there.”

Growing up Ginger Baker’s son was undoubtedly challenging, and Ginger didn’t give Kofi an easy road to travel.  He made Kofi work – hard.

“The way he taught me to play drums, I definitely wouldn’t teach my students that way.”

How would Ginger Baker teach one to drum?

“With a lot of swearing,” Kofi snickered.  “Basically just shouting at me.  I had to play it right straight away or I got shouted at.  It forced me to learn really quick.”

Yes.  Difficult.

“He’s a great person.  He just shouldn’t have had kids,” Kofi explained.  “He’s a character.  It’s not that I don’t love him or anything – he’s just hard to be around.”

Despite it, or perhaps because of that environment, Kofi has managed to thrive.  And his latest project, Kofi Baker’s Cream Experience, seeks to pick up where he feels Cream left off.

“[Ginger’s] drumming was amazing.  He definitely was a pioneer of his time.  He did great stuff for the drumming world,” Kofi said.  “Unfortunately, he stopped.  That’s kind of why I’m doing it.  He stopped progressing after a certain time, and to me drumming really progressed on.  I’m honoring what my dad did, but I’m doing it completely my own way.  I don’t play songs the way my dad would play them – I play them the way I would play them.”

“I’ve been a jazz player for a long time – I’d been playing these fusion gigs and people would always find out who I am and it would be, ‘Play “Sunshine of Your Love,”’ or, ‘Play “White Room,’’’ or something like that, so we started throwing a few Cream songs in and everybody loved them.  And they were like ‘Why don’t you just do a Cream band?”  But it’s my dad’s thing and I didn’t really want to do it.  Then I went to the 2005 [Cream] reunion in Madison Square Garden and I saw the crowd and everyone really into it, and I thought, well it’s a shame not to keep it going.”

So.  Another famous musician’s kid, riding coattails?  Dusting off Daddy’s catalogue and going on the road to appease some aging Baby Boomers who, if they can’t relive 1968 with the real thing, will settle for the next best tribute band?  Not so, said Kofi.

“Cream was a jazz drummer, a jazz bass player and a blues guitar player, and they covered peoples’ tunes that they liked.  And I ended up doing the same thing, covering some Beatles’ tunes, some Hendrix, all kinds of stuff.  We’re playing tunes we like, but then stretching it out and jamming, so it’s kind of the same idea.  We’ve got originals that we’re going to start putting in over the next few months.  It’s not really a tribute, it’s a Cream experience.  We’re not dressing up like Cream and just doing Cream songs – we’re doing all kinds of tunes in the same way Cream would do it.”

He said it with conviction.  This guy wants to get out and play.

“My approach is a lot more modern, obviously.   But bringing that whole ‘60s vibe – the jamming and improv.”  He paused.  “Because music doesn’t improv anymore.  Music’s really gone stagnant.  It’s like everybody plays an arrangement and that’s it, they play it the same every night.  Cream played it differently every night.  It’s exactly the same format as jazz.  That’s what Cream was really doing.”

I’ve never thought of Cream as a jazz band before.  They were hard rock.  Thumping R&B.  They were my dad’s band – I love them, but let’s face it, their heyday came twelve years before I was a pollywog in mama’s uterus.  I have no live reference point.  How would I know what a Cream show was like?  I’ve got a copy of Disraeli Gears on vinyl; I have their greatest hits on CD.  But those are two-dimensional reproductions, akin to looking at photographs of a sculpture.  So to get the full picture, what’s the harm in going to see a life-sized, three-dimensional representation?  Maybe this is where a thirtysomething could benefit from Kofi’s combo.  Maybe I need an experience.

“Music shouldn’t be, ‘this is how you play it.’  It should be from the heart and different every night.  It should be growing,” Kofi asserted.  “And I’m hoping I can bring it back to the younger generation and show how improv music is really a great thing to do.  We get to really jam.  I think it might take a little bit of time to get people to open their minds to the whole thing again, but I think it will happen.  I don’t do it trying to please everybody.  I do it because I love doing it.”

Kofi Baker’s Cream Experience is:

Kofi Baker – Drums

Fran Banish – Guitar, Vocals

Ric Fierabracci – Bass

SHOW INFO

Madison Theater

730 Madison Ave, Covington, KY 41011

Thursday, May 31, 2012

$15 advance, $20 day of show / 7 pm door, 8 pm show

www.madisontheateronline.com