Coachmen: An Interview with Jeff Travis [Side 1]

  • [Interview Transcript from the book "Psychedelic Psounds"] THE COACHMEN: TYME WON'T CHANGEIf you were a teenager in the Omaha area in the mid 6Os, then you probably thought about forming a band, knew someone in a band, or were actually in a band. There were two bands indigenous to the Omaha-Lincoln area who stood above all others. These bands were the Rumbles and the Coachmen.The Rumbles had such great vocalists and harmony that they could not only cover a song, but imitate it as well (and sometimes even better) than the original song---whether it was by the Beatles, Beach Boys, or something more soulful.The Coachmen, however, was basically a five member group that featured a hard driving, beat-oriented sound. The Coachmen did not have the longevity or a list of recordings as extensive as the Rumbles---who are still playing ---but their memory and music are probably more definitive of that era than any other band. "Mr. Moon" was their big hit and reached #1 in Omaha, San Francisco, Minneapolis, Salem (Oregon), #4 in Des Moines, and Top 20 in Boston.To really get an idea of what it was like in those days one must remember a couple of things.First, the popular music in the mid 60s came primarily from England and featured groups like the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Animals, Kinks, Zombies, and the Yardbirds and later on by groups like Cream and the Jimi Hendrix Experience. Nebraska bands tried to emulate these groups and their music. Dozens of bands appeared almost overnight. These local bands, other than the Rumbles and the Coachmen, consisted of the Chevrons, Brakmen, Chancellors, Wonders, Great Imposters, Green Giants, Shanghais, Fortunes, Impacts, and many others.Secondly, the places to "hang out" consisted of drive-ins like Todd's (then located on 78th & Dodge next to the old drive-in theatre). And if you wanted to dance and hear music you would go to Sandy's Escape (operated by a former KOIL disc jockey) in the Benson area. Once you paid the cover charge you could hear music upstairs or downstairs. When it was crowded, as it normally was on the weekends, you might bump into some beautiful girl in a mini-skirt, or a friend, or someone who wanted to fight because that girl was his girlfriend.When it was really crowded, you knew the Coachmen were playing!The Coachmen were together beteeen May 1964 and early 1969. A total of thirteen musicians were in the band over its not quite six years of life. Seven of these are primary players who were in the band a substantial length of time. These were---in order of time within the band---Bruce Watson, Jeff Travis, Craig Perkins, Frank Elia, Rick Bell, Kelly Kotera, and Red Freeman.The following interview was conducted with Jeff Travis and Bruce Watson on 1/23/1987 and 4/6/1987.
  • AV: You were playing music before the Beatles craze hit. Was your family musically inclined, who were your musical influences, and how did you start playing music?BW: I organized my first band, the Wanderers, in 1961. The big influences on me personally were the Ventures, the Beach Boys, the Kingsmen, the Flippers, and the Eccentrics. My family is absolutely not musical.I wanted to play the drums from the time I can remember being alive and nagged my parents for about ten years before they bought me a basic Wards catalogue $150 drum set at age thirteen.JT: My mother and sister used to sit around the piano and do a lot of singing. Really nobody other than that. In my early years there was no music other than what was on the radio. Early musical influences were Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, and Jimi Hendrix. I started playing on a friend's old acoustic guitar and we just plinked around trying to play chords. That would have been around 1960. I also asked a lot of people questions about playing music.
  • AV: How did the Viscounts form in 1962?BW: I have no idea how the Viscounts formed in 1962. Rick Bell and Jeff Travis, who are first cousins, were part of the nucleus.JT: Interesting story. My cousin was living with us and we got into the guitar thing together. While we played guitars, my younger brother would set up some boxes, can lids, pencils and whatever he could find which were his set of drums. We also had a friend who like to hang around and listen to us play. Eventually, we said, "Why don't you learn to play the bass?" One thing lead to another and, after many hours of practice, we had Bob Eschelmann on bass, my cousin Rick Bell on guitar, myself on guitar, and my brother John Travis was the drummer. This group was the original Viscounts.
  • AV: What were the circumstances of meeting George "Red" Freeman and his musical contributions?BW: Red, Rick, Jeff, and Craig all knew each other and were playing together in some capacity--probably at least in part as the Viscounts--when I met them in the spring of 1964. Red was a big influence in that he was substantially older then the rest of us and was the only person among us who wrote music at that time."Mr. Moon" (and several other songs) had already been created in his own mind by that time. We played it on stage a longtime before we recorded it in 1965.JT: I don't really remember exactly how that whole thing transpired.1 guess we were playing at a VFW thing and Red had just gotten out of the service. He was hanging around while we were packing things up and said that he had played guitar. So we invited him over one night and he started plinking around with us.
  • AV: What were the circumstances of the Viscounts merging with the Chandels, how did you choose the name Coachmen, and how did this merger affect your music?BW: The merger of the Viscounts and Chandels occurred in June 1964. The Viscounts were looking for a drummer and I was looking to either find another lead guitar player for the Chandels or find another band for myself. We practiced together one night and felt that it sounded pretty good. I joined them on the condition that my good friend Jim Reinmuth, rhythm guitar of the Chandels, be put in the band as well. The Chandels broke up simultaneously as our lead guitarist, Dan Eickleberry, went into the Air Force Academy.We changed our name to the Coachmen and started playing around Lincoln with the original members of the band being myself, Red, Rick, Jim, Jeff, and Craig. Shortly thereafter, Craig moved with his parents to California but came back several months later. During that time, we utilized two bass guitarists-- one of which was Jim Shafer from the Chandels/Wanderers. After Craig came back, he was the Coachmen's only bassist until Professor Morrison's fell apart around the end of 1967.The Coachmen became six when Jeff Travis rejoined the band, at which time we moved Jim Reinmuth to electric piano. Jeff was in the picture in the beginning, dropped out for reasons I can't remember, and came back shortly after we won the KOIL Battle of the Bands in early 1965.The name Coachmen was chosen because it reflected teenage culture of the time--cars (there were lots of car clubs then) and cruising (Kings in Lincoln, Todds in Omaha).We also thought the name had a touch of British sound. We were also doing lots of Kingsmen tunes by that time, so there was a tie there. As far as the merger affecting our music-- it really didn't. We were all playing approximately the same things before we got together. However, we did have real good musical chemistry together right from the start.JT: Viscounts and Chandels were rival groups. We played a lot of swimming parties and junior high school dances. We got to be pretty good friends. There was a little changing of members in the Viscounts and some wanted changes in the Chandels. I guess those of us in control at the time decided that we'd move a few people around from both groups and form a new group. How did the Coachmen name come about? My memory doesn't serve me well. 1 think we were sitting around one night drinking a few beers, tossing names around, and finally ended up with four and five names. We threw them in a hat and out came the Coachmen. The merging of groups had a great effect on our music. We got a real good drummer out of the deal with Bruce Watson. By that time we'd also gotten an exceptional bass player in Craig Perkins. So between Bruce, Craig, Red, Rick Bell, and myself it was really the basis of the Coachmen and that was when things really started to happen for us. Just the merging of personalities and things seemed to work for us real well at the time.
  • AV: Did your musical style also change with the advent of the Beatles and the British invasion?BW: Our musical style didn't change that much with the British invasion. The biggest impact was the fact that we played it--stuff by the Beatles, Dave Clark Five, Kinks, Animals, and some other British bands. We concentrated on songs that were heavily beat driven, which was the basic element of our style.JT: Absolutely! We were doing a lot of surf music and some old rock and roll tunes such as Chuck Berry. When the Beatles hit we were playing in a little club called The 1140 Club. The Viscounts immediately donned long wigs and got ourselves sport coats and started doing Beatles tunes. I suppose we were like everybody at that time because the Beatles were such an influence that it had to affect you.
  • AV: What was the effect of winning the KOIL Battle of the Bands and who were some of the competing bands?BW: The effect of winning the KOIL Battle of the Bands was be coming well known in a short period of time throughout Omaha, western Iowa and northwest Missouri. The most significant effect to me was becoming--if anybody can be called this-- the house band at Sandy's Escape.JT: Winning the KOIL Battle of the Bands was like night and day.When you have exposure to that many people and you're getting all the publicity it had to make a difference. I think the Chancellors were right up there with us in the finals. There were so many bands and just too many years to remember all the bands.
  • AV: I saw you play at Sandy's Escape in '65 and '66. What are your recollections of Sandy's Escape with the format of two bands (one upstairs and one downstairs), the girls in miniskirts, and the occasional fights that broke out? Also what other clubs did you play?BW: Sandy's Escape, personally, is one of my very best memories of the whole thing. We played there an average of once a week, possibly more, often two or three nights in a row. The two band/two floor format worked incredibly well logistically and otherwise. It was a kind of home for us. Consequently, we got to know the regulars there--probably several hundred people--pretty well.Being in the Coachmen in 1965 and 1966 was a very exhilarating experience for an eighteen year old. It was an emotional, tense kind of high that is personified by the experience and memory of Sandy's Escape.During the three years that we played there constantly, hundreds of bands came and went. However, the true nucleus was formed by the Coachmen, Rumbles, Chevrons, Green Giants, Great Impostors, Wonders and Shanghais. All of us were Omaha based bands except the Green Giants, who lived in various little towns in Iowa and Missouri.Several other bands played a lot at Sandy's as well, but the above was the real core group. We knew the guys in these bands real well--except for the Rumbles. The Rumbles and Coachmen were the two really big name Omaha bands, which led to a kind of keeping our distance from one another. They were the best cover band I've ever heard and were outstanding vocally. I know they are still playing. I'd love to hear them.Our strong point was much different--being able to take the hard driving stuff we did and make it reach out and grab and shake you. The styles of the two bands were very different, as were the talents, which led to a lot of division among the populous in general about who was better. My own thought is that the answer to that question is neither or both.The primary teenage nightclubs we played at--other than Sandy's-- were King Arthur's (which closed in 1965 or early 1966) and The Way Out Club. There was also a place on Dodge Street that we played quite a bit for a while, though the name of it I can't remember. My recollection of the Peppermint Cave was that it was a bar in downtown Omaha. I think it's where a few of us used to jam with Buddy Miles.JT: Sandy's was the neatest thing! You just never saw anything likeit. Lots of people, great bands, good parties. Met a largegroup of nice people, some of whom even to this day I run into occasionally. There were lots of girls in mini-skirts and also occasional fights; actually, there were lots of fights! It wasn't like it had a bad reputation, but it was just that era. We played another club in Omaha called The Way Out Club which was another neat place. We played King Arthur's, private parties, the Peppermint Cave, and some local bars. Sandy's always was and always will be the highlight. It was the best, the neatest!
  • AV: What cities did you play and did you open for any nationally known bands?BW: I have no idea the number of cities we played in. My guess is approximately 200 distributed between Chicago, Denver, Northern Minnesota and Oklahoma.JT: We did the Dick Clark Caravan of Stars, playing with the Drifters, Paul Petersen, Jackie De Shannon, and all those bands from that era. We opened for Sonny and Cher, the Turtles, and the Mamas and Papas. I'm sure there are more, but again it doesn't come to mind very quickly.
  • AV: How did Scott Cameron (currently the manager for Willie Dixon) become involved with the Coachmen?BW: Scott Cameron became the manager of the Coachmen in the fall of 1965. Up to that time, I had handled all business functions for the Coachmen and was having an increasingly difficult time putting together contracts outside of a one hundred mile radius of Omaha. Scott was a very ambitious, good talker who sought us out, convinced us he could record us and get us distributed, and was willing to take over all business functions. His experience had been managing a group called the Beach-Niks from Iowa. They had been moderately successful until they disbanded following a bus accident in which their bass guitarist was killed.Scott put a lot of effort into doing his best for the Coachmen-particularly in the first year. On the negative side, we were his college education and he made some poor judgements that cost us a lot of money, some national hits (undoubtedly in the case of "Mr. Moon", probably "Tyme Won't Change" and who knows what else would have been recorded) and this ultimately led to my giving up on the band personally and the band falling apart.As the functional leader of the band, I hold myself most responsible for letting Scott take over because I could have steered us away. I regret that.JT: KOIL Battle of the Bands. Everything happened all at once. Things were moving real fast, real positive. Scotty came up to us one day and just started talking to us, about things he could do. We believed he had the capabilities of doing them so we went with Scotty. He did an awful lot for us.
  • AV: "Mr. Moon" was your first and greatest hit in 1965. It was written by Red Freeman and featured that distinctive organ which one thinks of whenever hearing a Coachmen song. How did this song evolve from composition to recording?BW: "Mr. Moon" was purely Red Freeman's creation, a song he had been kicking around since before the Coachmen formed. The organ sound was simply a matter of utilizing the instrument and following the chords. My guess is that Rick Bell created his own part on the organ and did quite a good job in doing so.JT: This song was written by Red. It was something he had been carrying with him for a while. It was our first original tune that had a beginning and an end as well as some substance to it. Even if you only hear the beginning of the song with it's distinctive bass intro, you know it's "Mr. Moon." It was just a natural. When it was time to go into the recording studio all of us decided to record "Mr. Moon."
  • AV: Were you surprised at the local success of "Mr. Moon" on MMC Records being #l and could it have been distributed better nationally by Bear Records?BW: We were surprised at the quick success of "Mr. Moon." It seemed like icing on the cake--as 1965 had been an incredibly good year to us even before it. The whole thing with Bear Records was strictly Scott Cameron's doing. It was the second serious mistake he made with us and definitely the most terminal.The first mistake was having us out on summer tour while "Mr.Moon" was hitting--playing one nighters to packed crowds of several thousand people for $200 a night with no share of the gate. He did this in the name of publicity.We could have easily gotten $2,000 or more a night, which was very big money in those days and would have made a real difference to all of us personally for obvious reasons. That kind of money would have bought quality recording time on the East or West Coast and some breathing room. Road and equipment costs for the kind of travel we did were very substantial. To Scott, everything was publicity; money was second. He always said the publicity would take care of the money. It never did.JT: We were surprised at the success of "Mr. Moon"! Again, being the first time out, Scotty had MMC Records and he was behind it 110%. Very possible, regarding the possibility of better national distribution, but it is one of those questions you don't know. If it would have hit nationally and been distributed all at once it may have done better because it tended to run its course in one city and pick up in another and kind of go like that.
  • AV: Why were there three different versions of "Mr. Moon" ranging in time from 1:22, 2:07, and 3:02?BW: There were three different time versions of "Mr. Moon" in order to satisfy every possible need in terms of radio airplay. The 1:22 version was to provide a cut that was so short that DJs could fit it in where they couldn't fit anything else. The middle length version was to conform to standard time and the longer version was to fill a larger time gap as desired by the programmer.JT: Boy, at that time we wanted airplay and we didn't care what we had to do to get it. If a DJ had a short spot before a commercial he could go the 1:22; if he needed a longer spot we recorded it so there were three different spots that could be used. It wasn't something you had to have a certain amount of time or try to program it into a certain spot. The way things worked and you needed a 1:22 song, boy, there it was. We wanted to make it as easy as possible.
  • AV: During 1966 Freeman and Bell left the group and were replaced by Frank Elia and Kelly Kotera. Why did they leave and was the transition positive?BW: Red Freeman left in 1965 after a hasty decision was made by the rest of us that Frank Elia would fit in better in terms of age and style, which he did. We treated Red poorly in the process. It was a spur of the moment thing. This was certainly not uncommon in bands in those days at that level. However, the fact that we got as big as we did and that"Mr. Moon" was a freeman tune makes the situation a little weird in hindsight. Red was a fine musician and a good guy.He really belonged as a front man and eventually became one. We saw ourselves as the epitome of a group and felt that Red was too dominate on stage.Freeman left the group in the summer of 1965 before we recorded "Mr. Moon". Rick left the group in the latter part of 1966, not long after marrying Sue Corrigan. I don't remember clearly his reasons for leaving, but he later played with the Omaha group Green Giants. My fuzzy recollection is that he just got tired of all the road work with a new wife waiting for him at home.JT: No transition is easy. We thought the transition was positive. It still wasn't a full time band. There were commitments on both sides, but some of us were pretty much foot loose and fancy free. I guess we wanted a little more musicianship and felt that with Kelly and Frank were going to get it and it did. Never any hard feelings other than the initial statement or the initial decision, but it was a positive move.
  • AV: "Linda Lou"/"I'm a King Bee" by Bear and "My Generation"/ "No Answer" by MMC were released in 1966. What success did these records have?BW: "Linda Lou" and "My Generation" each sold a few thousand copies and can in no way be considered successes. They are good testimony to the fact that Bear Records and MMC Records had no clout at all.JT: Regional, nothing in comparison to "Mr. Moon." Fun songs to play and a lot more fun to do live than "Mr. Moon" and that's probably why they were recorded. A good recording will get you gigs. "Mr. Moon" had just been played for so long that we wanted something in live situations we could really have some fun with.
  • AV: "Tyme Won't Change" was released in 1967 and managed to crack Billboard's Top 100, yet oddly enough it only reached #28 in Lincoln. How did the group feel about this song and the group's future at this juncture?BW: "Tyme Won't Change" was our next victim of the MMC record label and the inability of our management to make an equitable deal with anybody that could do us any good. The group very much liked the song and we were getting pretty disheartened with everything by this time.We should have been doing business on the national circuit by now and knew it. Instead, we were playing the same places over and over and eventually lost our capacity to draw large crowds. We continued to have the same experiences and were doing an increasing amount of longer-range travel for very little money and for the sake of the ever important publicity.By this time, the band was really clicking musically. We were extremely tight and playing a lot of interesting stuff. On a personal level, all of us were pretty discouraged about our chances of making it. The unity among ourselves was falling apart.JT: At this point we hadn't played Lincoln very much. The record "Mr. Moon" kind of took us out of Lincoln. We had moved to Omaha and I think to some extent lost some of our Lincoln following even though we were quote unquote "hometown boys."At this point we had Frank and Kelly who were pretty much Omaha town boys. The band was still positive, things were still moving, even though I think we were still living off "Mr. Moon."
  • AV: At the end of "Tyme Won't Change" a note is misplayed on the organ (similar to the error by Genesis on "The Cinema Show" from Sellin En land b the Pound). Why wasn't this corrected?BW: The bad note at the end of "Tyme Won't Change" was left in because the producers had no concept of what a record should ultimately sound like out of the studio and on the disc. The best example of this is "Tell Her No," the flip side of "Tyme Won't Change." In the recording process this tape was thrashed electronically, which put a fuzz on everything~~particularly the vocal. Scott allowed the record to be released as is. The five of us were absolutely sick about it.JT: Something new and different. Just thought, what the heck, maybe we will be a little more original. Nobody's perfect. We just talked it over and said, "Let's leave it. How big a deal can it be?"
  • AV: There is mention in Bart Becker's book on Nebraska rock, Til the Cows Come Home, about a song called "Kandy Kane" which was cut but never released. What's the story?BW: I never heard of the song "Kandy Kane."JT: We were working for Kasenetz and Katz for the White Whale label. We did a bunch of stuff for them. God only knows why it wasn t released, or whatever happened to it. It may have gotten lost along the road.
  • AV: How did the band break up and did the group ever consider going west (as Kelly Kotera did to become an engineer at the Record Plant in L.A.) to get more exposure?BW: I cannot say specifically why the band broke up as this happened approximately three months following my departure in September of 1968. Generally, it was a reflection of lack of direction, disenchantment, and burnout. The band did consider coming to the West Coast. At one point, I was the primary reason we did not go as I was a full time student. I would have lost my draft deferment immediately following dropping out of school. This period of time was the height of exporting young men to Vietnam. We also did not have the financial backing necessary to make such a relocation--no West Coast connections, record contract or other means of providing initial support.It was really a good thought but an impossibility. As individuals, Kelly Kotera and myself are the only ones who came to the West Coast, both around 1970.JT: The band just kind of faded apart. Everybody kind of got other interests. I think it was about the time I was going to get married.
  • [Interview continues at http://av.cah.utexas.edu/index.php/Vorda:Da_00135]