Assignment Earth

Some months before my first son was born I did what I guess could be called a fan film project, which is further detailed here…. http://supervisor194.com/. We put it on the internet.

And as happens when you put things on the internet you reach people, and sometimes you come in contact with them.

One of those people I came in contact with because of the project was a guy named Nick Walusko.

He got what we were doing. He picked up on the ’60’s vibe we intentionally were going for; both sonically, visually and sensibility wise.

It was about a show that never got made (was a pilot at least) but would have been at the tail end of the ’60’s, and very much a product of it’s time.  The only riff on secret agent spies through out the ’60’s that hadn’t been done – James Bond from outerspace.

Nick made astute comments about mics we used, what we tried to do in our mix of it, the aesthetic we were going for. We spoke a same language about this and a lot of things.

It got to the point where we were corresponding almost on a daily basis.  And my back and forths with Nick became a ritual I dubbed “Mornings with Nicky”.

As I said, my first child had been born so there were extra morning responsibilities but before I knew it I found I had built in an extra 30 minutes or so by getting up earlier to conduct morning correspondence with my new friend.   I’d wake up to answer questions he’d written late the night before – – usually time stamped 1 or 2 in the morning.   So the new things I was reading and commented on were while he was in bed.  It was this cycle we went through for almost a year. And he very often left me a little gift in the form of an MP3 or picture.  Cool little finds that only I would dig.  The in studio raw takes of the British studio musicians recording the UFO TV show  theme; listening to the banter between between this British production of director, guys in the booth and the musicians was like a Christmas present to me.  Kind of stuff I could sit and listen to for hours.   What a treat.  And Nick had a treasure trove of stuff in his files like this. He intuitively knew what to send me.  It was all great!

UFO title session

 

Lead tape audio of the engineer counting off the musicians performing the jam session from the Star Trek episode “The Way To Eden”.

At one of the many shows he invited me to when The Beach Boys were in my area he actually came out and played this as his introduction music and came out on stage and gave not only the Vulcan salute, but the symbol of “ONE” from this episode just for me!  I mean, who else in the crowd knew what that was about?  Now, that’s a mench, eh?

In his collection Nicky had the most inconsequential things, except to me, like the theme from Dusty’s Tree House.  A kind of poor man’s Mr. Rogers/Captain Kangaroo that I watched because I loved the theme song.

Dusty’s Treehouse

“Fantastic Voyage” – Filmation

Opening credits of Filmation cartoon, “Journey to the Center of the Earth”, with the absurdly long Ted Knight narration.  But that’s part of what made it fun!

These were GOLD to me!  And it was little things like this that buoyed me through the hard teaching day and week.

We found we both a had a love for singer/songwriters and hearing them do versions of their songs in their own voice. We both agreed that the worse the voice of the songwriter, the more endearing. Because of course, not everyone who writes songs necessarily has the best singing voice.   But the earnestness of hearing the composer made it almost more special.  Nicky concurred and had many examples like this in his collection.

Someday Man – Paul Williams

Morning I’ll Be Moving On – Paul Williams

He told me he worked in “the business” and had some audio and video recording experience. It was about 3 or 4 months into “Mornings with Nicky” before I even learned that, “Oh yeah, I play guitar for Brian Wilson”.  I said, “like,… the Beach Boys Brian Wilson?”  He said, “yeah”, offhandedly as if it were,… just a thing.

Around the time I met and was corresponding on line with Nicky, my mother had moved to the area to be near us after my children were born.  She was starting a new life for herself and began taking on many new responsibilities in a church she’d joined.  Among these responsibilities was helping to organize a beach themed Vacation Bible School-“Surfing with the Scriptures”.

My mother so wanted to serve her church, plant her roots someplace new,  show her worth in a new town; a new situation,…..and show off her children.  She volunteered me to do beach music for the end of the week concert. Problem was I didn’t have any tunes like that to do, had never really done that type of thing…Oh —and I didn’t have a band!  My youngest child had just been born – just two weeks old.  I was busy.

It didn’t matter what I said to my mother.  She wanted to deliver for her church and kept reminding me,  “Family does for family”, she said.  I agreed, but told her it was not realistic to ask me to do something that I didn’t do. I told her this was not an old Andy Hardy movie where Mickey Rooney rallies Judy Garland and the other kids to erect a barn and put on a world class, Hollywood style show.   Again, she wouldn’t hear of it and told me she’d already told everyone at the church we were performing.

So,….I called some friends of mine I’d gone to college with, guys I’d mostly played in band with. Most of these people had grown up in my kitchen and sat at our table being fed by her. In a way it was an easy favor to ask.  They all agreed to help out.  We put together some numbers, we played, —  it was “too loud!”.  My mother never asked me to so something like that again.

How ironic that I actually knew a guy who not only played with Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys, but played all that kind of music, from Dick Dale, the Ventures to the Dell Tones.  I of course, didn’t even entertain the idea of asking him, but you know what?     If he could’ve, I think he would have done it.   Wouldn’t that have been something?

We later laughed about it.  He commended us for tackling such material on the fly.

Sir Surfalot

He would send me un-released, unfinished mixes of things he was working on.

Isle of Canopic

Mu-Empire

We were becoming friends and we’d not yet met in person.  We shared all sorts of things.   I told him about my wife, my kids, my work, my dreams.  He listened.  He was supportive.  He encouraged me to get on with dreams I had.

He told me of things in his life.

Of his wife, Susan.

Once when he was out at a restaurant with Susan they heard Jack Sheldon, of “School House Rock” fame, sitting in with the house band.

Jack was the voice you heard on all those fun Saturday morning School House Rock cartoons, but he was also a good jazz trumpeter too. Nick caught him sitting in with the house band at Colombo’s Italian Steak House.  He sent a video from his phone of Jack playing a few bars on a little blues shuffle in F one night.  I transcribed it out and still use those licks to this day.

(As I was working on this blog entry I learned that Jack died on 27 December 2019, age 88.  RIP Jack.)

Here’s the video Nick took. Dec. 2010 (click on the red link)

Jack Sheldon

 

 

 

 

 

 

We talked about our childhoods.

 

He shared things like encounters with famous props and celebrities from shows we both grew up watching.

 

 

 

 

 

I couldn’t compete with a man who had lunch with Paul McCartney, or a dinner with Micky Dolenz in which they, “talked non-stop quantum physics for about an hour”, or in general, was buddies with Billy Mumy.  But I offered a few of my own.

 

He spoke often about his close friend and partner in the music biz, Darian Sahanaja.   They had started a group called “The Wondermints” which was already very popular when Brian Wilson got wind of them and asked them to be his backing band.

It was also obvious that he loved and admired Brian.  He spoke many times of Brian and he considered it an honor to work with and look out for him.

Yes, I had a friend in Nicky.  He and his wife even sent us Christmas cards.

In 2012 when La La Land records released the re-mastered soundtrack of all the music from the original Star Trek show (a highly coveted bit of music for me) Nick showed up at the release event in LA and got me a copy  He even stood in line and got it signed by original series composer, Gerald Fried.  I paid him back but the time involved…..  I mean, again….what a friend we have in Nicky.

Gerrald Fried 12:3:12

Nick sent some video of Gerald Fried (again, click on the red link) playing

his compositions at the event. Dude is 90 something and

still going strong.

Nick invited me to several shows when they were in my area but I remember the last one most.

And it is with that I’ll tell you a story that I think encapsulates Nick Walusko to me.
We’d been speaking back and forth for about 7 or 8 years when I casually mentioned to a teacher friend of mine about my acquaintance with Nick Walusko.  My friend was floored – – “You know Nick Walusko….’Mr. Wonderful’ of the Wondermints? He was very aware of the Wondermints and was more starstruck that I knew Nick than anything to do with the Beach Boys.   I said, “yeah, I’ve had him to the house before a show once.  Picked him up at the arena, brought him over to the house – introduced my brother to him, hung out for an afternoon, drove him back.  I know him!  Next time he’s in town I’ll see if I can get you a ticket?”  My friend was jacked…and I made a mental note of it for the next time around.

I was good to my word, and so was Nick.

The band came back to Texas, just like the Monkees said , we’re maybe coming to your town. I called my friend, Nick arranged to have a ticket at will call in his name, back stage pass, meet and greet – – the whole thing!  WIN WIN all around.

However, Will Call got my friend’s name wrong on the envelope and when we went up to pick up our tickets the lady said there was no such name for my friend.  We learned later, after the fact, that the name we were stating was one letter off from what they had on their envelope.  One vowel different from what she was seeing. Rules being rules and lack of common sense and human decency being absent from most of the mechanisms of the working and legal world, the lady behind the counter would not help us or budge.  She knew it was the ticket – – I could see it in her eyes.  But like Alex Trebek or Pat Sajak being a stickler for the exact phrase or spelling, she would not give us the tickets.
Nick called me to see if we got the tickets.  I told him there was a problem. Without a thought he came up front, made his way in to the ticket office, actually reached in the drawer and got us our seats.  Yes, they had an “E” instead of an “O” but it was basically the name of my friend.
Think about that!  How any people, about to perform a show, would leave the routine and preparatory habits all performers have; the comfort of being in that protective shell backstage, to come out and do that for someone?  Nick straightened out the mix-up.  Made sure we were ok.  Even walked with us to our seats.  Then went back stage just minutes before the show.  Now, that’s a dude!  That’s a pro. That’s compassion.  That’s humanity.

That’s a legacy.

 

 

I woke up and checked my twitter one morning in early August.   My summer was over – – those teacher breaks aren’t as long as they used to be, and certainly not as long as people think they are these days.  It was my third day back at work and the shock of being back still hadn’t subsided.  I woke those three days in to another shock as I read in my Twitter feed – – news of Nick’s passing.  I couldn’t believe it.   I thought, “What?!  I know this guy!  I know Nick!”   There wasn’t much more information than the tweet I found and I went to school that day numb and bewildered.

As I went through the next few weeks I realized we really had shared a lot about ourselves over the years.   I had saved all the e-mail exchanges we had.  It was in an envelope called the “Nicky Walusko Files”.  I told myself then I was going to put up something about Nick.   My blog had become kind of an “in memoriam” listing of people, places and things from childhood; the passing of heroes from my childhood.   But this one was different.  This guy was really a contemporary,…a friend.

A few days after I heard of his death I was looking through old text messages.  Still couldn’t believe he was gone.  For what reason I’m not sure, I called his line and left a message.  It was through that call that I eventually got in touch with his widow, Susan.  I looked down and saw a call coming in from him one day.  We had what was a cathartic and enjoyable conversation. I told her of my friendship with Nicky.  I also told her something that had been brewing in my mind after his passing, that “If a legacy is the lives you’ve touched and the friends you’ve made, then Nick really did leave a legacy”.

I was honored to find out they used that quote of mine in a slideshow presentation at his memorial service.

He was a good friend with many similar, weird interests.  Now that the holidays are here I finally have time to put this down.  I hope people come across this blog.  I hope people remember Mr. Wonderful.

He left a legacy.

 

Ballad of Cowboyardee