David: “How long has this band been together?”

Bill: “We regrouped in ’95, and --”

Denise: “Originally, we got together in, about 1980, we played a couple of times...and then we broke up for awhile, and Bill and Tom were (playing music) together...”

Rich: “Of course, when we broke up, It’s not that we broke up and didn’t see each other --”

Denise: “Yeah, we’ve been friends for a long time.”

David: “You broke up for, what, 12 years?”

Denise: “About 10 years --”

David: “...Most bands break up because they can’t stand each other any more. You guys broke up but remained friends. How come (you broke up)?”

Rich: “Actually, that was kind of my doing...when we first formed the band, I was playing keyboards along with Tom..and we were having a very good time playing the music, but...I had commitments that I had to take care of and the music was encroaching on them -- as evil as it sounds; so I made a decision to leave the band, and we got our friend Chris to come in in my place...”

David: “So there were two keyboards, bass/guitar switching off, and vocalists --”

Rich: “We didn’t have a drummer --”

Bill: “...We had digital drums.”

David: “...What made you get back together after ten years?”

Bill: “We got back together in ’95, which was the tenth anniversary of us breaking up...and the major reason for it was we wanted to record something, like, for posterity...”

Denise: “We had written all this music and it was (all) kind of cool, we liked it and we enjoyed doing it, and...I was always pushing (to get back together) ’cause Bill and Tom were doing their own thing, doing their own music, so they had an outlet for their creativity, but I always wanted to have a recording of some of the stuff that I did with the group, because I wasn’t at that point doing anything vocally. So I figured, ‘let me push and maybe we can get together and get things recorded, so at least I'll have some kind of a record of what we did together.’ And as we decided to do things and to pick up once more, and re-rehearse all the old songs and everything, we started to do a little bit of writing and rewriting, and re-arranging, and started to get into it again...which then became a lot of fun. We picked up Rich as a drummer -- it was (great to) ditch the drum machine, ’cause that (sound) really stunk!”

David: “And the drum machine put up a big fight and everything?”

Denise: “Oh, Yeah!”

Rich: “--Sparks flying and all!...”

David: “...Is there a distinct difference in -- I don’t know yet which (songs) are old and which ones are new -- in the songs you’ve carried for ten years and the ones you’re writing now? Is it noticeable?”

Denise: “I think there’s a difference, just because we’ve developed musically and in what we listen to...a lot of the earlier songs have a lot of...the eighties influences. We’re still very influenced by New Wave (music) and Blondie, The B-52s, stuff like that, but the songs that we’re doing now are stylistically different --”

Tom: “More organic...”

Denise: “Yes, a lot more of a mixture of styles now.”

David: “Give an example of a song.”

Denise: “Well, the old ones that definitely have 80’s influences are ‘Junk Mail’ and ‘Call You On The Phone.’ There are more than that, but ‘Junk Mail’ is definitely B-52s -influenced; ‘Call You On The Phone’ is Blondie-influenced. A newer song would be ‘Simple’ -- that’s a little more introspective, not as playful with the lyrics...it seems to me, as a songwriter, it is a little more developed.”

David: “Let’s just say a song...such as ‘Rubber Ducky,’ which obviously is not so introspective, is one you carried from the 80’s?”

Denise: “Actually no, that’s one of Bill’s little treasures that he came up with--”

Bill: “Where that came from...after The Slant broke up in ’85, I started doing some solo stuff, playing in the Village in Manhattan...I played Folk City and Speakeasy, and I started to develop more of a folky type of sound, like, more folk-rock, songs like ‘Diane’--”

David: “Was that written after you met your wife, Jennifer?”

Bill: (Laughs)“No, that was written a while before I met Jennifer--”

Denise: “Actually, we have a song, ‘Jennifer in Blue’--”

David: “--That’s for Diane!”

Denise: “--Right!!!” (Laughter and merriment all ’round)

Bill: “‘Jennifer in Blue’ isn’t on this album -- hopefully it will be on the next one -- but that (song) I wrote the day I met Jennifer.”

Tom: “She was wearing a uniform, wasn’t she?”

Bill: “No, I was wearing the uniform--”

David: “She wasn’t wearing anything?”

Denise: “He wishes!”

Bill: “Well...ah...she was wearing a lace top...she wasn’t wearing anythingblue...it was artistic license. I wrote the entire song that night in about, maybe, fifteen minutes...”

David: “Going back to the influences, everyone does point out the eighties New Wave, and you can hear it and particularly in the older songs you definitely hear the Blondies, the B-52s, the Lena Lovitch, the keyboard/synthesizer type stuff. I also hear a lot of late 60’s/early 70’s progressive/art rock, especially in the new sound of the keyboard. It hearkens back to the imagery of some of those bands...also the trading off of the harmonies...like your song ‘Outside My Dreams’ is something Jefferson Airplane could have written...do you guys have influences outside the New Wave stuff?”

Bill: “One of my heavier influences was a group called Yes--”

Tom: “Never heard of ’em.”

Bill: “--And, uh, the first time I heard them -- it was around that time that I started to take an interest in the bass guitar, and I would say that Chris Squire was a definite influence in my bass playing. I also was interested in bands like Genesis, which I thought had an interesting perspective musically...Renaissance, also--”

David: “Denise, tell us about your newest song, ‘Dark World.’ What inspired you to write it?”

Denise: “Bill had written this classical guitar piece; I had always wanted to write lyrics to it. One night -- it must have been six o’clock in the morning -- it came to me what I wanted to write about...I’ll never forget, it was pitch black in my room, and I hadto get up in the dark, fumble about for a pen...couldn’t find a piece of paper, I used the back of an old envelope, and the words all just came right out as I quickly wrote them down...as I was reading them back, I was starting to cry, ’cause it hit me--”

David: “What’s the song about?”

Denise: “It’s about...basically it’s (written) from the viewpoint of a mother who has an autistic child...who is kind of withdrawn. (Someone very close to me) had autistic tendencies...and he didn’t talk until he was about two, two-and-a-half years old...When he was a baby...he would lay in the cradle and just look straight out, and, like, you’d make faces at him and wave your hand in front of his face, and he would never see you, he wouldn’t make contact with you. And I remember (his) mother going through...her own kind of personal hell trying to make her contact with him, ’cause he just didn’t -- he was completely ‘disconnected.’ So basically that’s what this song is, the mother’s pain of trying to contact the child, and then my husband gave us the idea of putting the last verse in, which gives hope. Which, actually...there is always some kind of hope somwhere, because (this person) right now is an adult, he has a job he’s kept for years and years, he’s happy, he drives...from a point in time when (his) mother was taking him to different doctors, and some told her that he was so bad that she should put him in an institution...special schools and stuff...his mother always had faith in him. She put him in regular school, he passed all his regular classes, he got his diploma, he got his driver’s license --”

Tom: “He’s a musician. He plays beautifully!”

Denise: “He has perfect pitch, and he plays classical piano, and...even when you saw him as a baby, and he didn’t say a word,and he was just, like, looking through you...you would never know the person that he became now.”

David: “Okay ... you guys want to do the words to ‘Game Player’ and we’ll end it there?”

Bill: “Okay--”

Tom: “Try not to laugh through it--!” (All laugh)

David: “I thought it sounded really cool!”

Bill: “...Are we ready?” (All nod yes) “ONE, two, three, four, TWO, two, three, and--”
“Game-Player, Heart-Breaker...”

Denise: “Before we leave, I’d like to thank D. Klein, and over at The Spot, I’d like to thank Godfrey and Wilbert for all their help. We’ve been playing over there a lot lately, and it’s a really nice play to play, and it’s a nice place to see a show...and they’re very supportive of Long Island bands and Long Island music. Once again, we’re The Slant, and we hope you’ve enjoyed our performance for you today -- if you liked it, come see us sometime!”