Michael Wiskey has spent years crisscrossing the globe, to learn as many
styles of music as he possibly could.....and you thought he was just "from
Maine".......... ?
No suh.
From the black carib beats on the islands of St. John's, St. Croix, and
St. Thomas, to the tribal drumming in the Great White North of Calgary; from
clubs on the southern coast of Portugal to the myriad bars of Maine and
across the USA, Texas, Colorado, California, and on and on....... he's now
attempting to conquer Outerspace.
And so, who have been his influences, drumming-wise? As Carl Sagan might
have said, "Billions and billions of them, drummers scattered across the
whole universe of the musical landscape....." First to come to mind might
be Dino Danelli, of The Rascals, and Ringo Starr; but a few people in
Portland, ME, will tell you of the night he was forced to sit in the drum
chair of blues legend Sam Lay, who would't let him leave the drums alone. Sam
Lay, of Muddy Waters and the watershed first Paul Butterfield album, made him
take over his drum set, 'cause he liked his playing so much.
But perhaps THE key drum influence was G.V. Rapp of The Offbeats, who
was also a friend of John Moses, and thus began the connection to 'Space.
Michael and Vinny Dermody's "Oat Willie" crossed paths with Outerspace
frequently in the '70's - '80's........ Now you're starting to get it.
But what's to get? It's all just a bunch of notes and beats. Wiskey, the
Singing Drummer, just likes to play with friends, and that brings us, in warp
speed, to the present, and his contributions to "Rocket" . What do YOU
think? Glad he came back from Portugal and St. Thomas and Colorado and
Calgary and Dubuque and the Big Apple and Waterville and The Ted Mack Amateur
Hour????
Figure it out.