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New Groove of the Month: Inasense
Edited by Deana and Andy
Article 1 By Lee L.
Imagine it is the winter of 1996: Looking for a place to thaw, I walk out of the frozen December night into the luxurious warmth of the Bitter End, and by pure luck, I catch an incredible unknown band--Inasense. Their sound is part Grateful Dead, part Los Lobos, part Allman Brothers, blended with mighty, mighty middle eastern/latin percussion. The music is a rolling wall of living, breathing sound, soulful and original; by the end of their first set, I realize that within a year or two, Inasense will not be playing small clubs like the Bitter End anymore. Their music will demand more space. With all the energy this band puts out, fans will be breaking down the doors and climbing the gates to see them.
Imagine it is the winter of 1999: I walk out of the cold March evening into the Wetlands, not for the warmth this time, but to hear a band I had discovered by chance three years earlier. As I look around and see Wetlands fill with a partying crowd, I think back to a cold December night three years ago and realize my prediction came true. Inasense will not be playing small clubs again. On this night, Wetlands sells-out and must turn fans away. There just isn't enough room to hold everyone. Times have changed.
Inasense may be the most powerful, unique, and original jam band in the country. Like the Dead or Phish, the stage is where they shine. Listen to Inasense and you'll hear rock, blues, country, jazz, and middle eastern rolled into one thunderous, original sound. Lead guitarist, C Lanzbom, and guitarist, lead vocalist Noah Solomon Chase, write all the songs. The thunder erupts with Gilad on percussion and Mark Ambrosino on drums. The sound is riveted together by their explosive bass player, Jay.
C Lanzbom, grew up at the Jersey Shore and besides memorizing most of the solos of Jerry Garcia, Duane Allman, and Eric Clapton, he studied with Jazz Keyboardist Lenny Popkins, a direct descendent of the great Be-Bop Keyboardist Lenny Tristano. Why would a guitar player want to study his instrument from a keyboard player? For as pure a reason as his sound is today--he wanted to absorb the essence of music, not the technique. He reasoned that feeling for music should come first and technique will surely follow. It did. Today, C is one of the most powerful, creative, and emotional players in the country.
But the birth of Inasense is as fascinating as the band's music. Back in the early 80s, when music was stagnating in the states, C felt the need to explore the world and its music, so he traveled, eventually landing in Israel where he became one of the top studio and performing musicians in the country. Because of his reputation, kids would beg him for guitar lessons, and C took on a student named Noah Chase. Having much in common--particularly a love for jam bands like the Dead--C and Noah bonded immediately. Noah eventually became C's best student, but when C discovered that Noah had an incredible voice, their fate was sealed, the seed for what would be Inasense was planted. Noah went from student to partner. Plans were made, bags were packed. C and Noah moved to New York, took some of those exotic Middle Eastern influences with them, particularly the rhythms, and applied them to rock music. They eventually met Mark, J, and Gilad and the rest is history: from a chance meeting in a foreign land to selling out the Wetlands.
Inasense blends American sounds, sounds you might hear on any corner of any city in this country. Their music melts the sharp boundaries between rock, jazz, country, and east-west, causing those boundaries to fade, and declare new life. Listen and you'll hear it, an incessant influx of musical color into a world that has tolerated its share of dullness. Under the influence of jam bands like Inasense, rock music is beginning to spread its wings again and break out of its stale cocoon. How could I know that the little band with the big sound, which I happened to stumble upon one icy winter night, would be a vital force in claiming back rock music? Times have changed.
Lee is a Chiropractor, writer, and musician who lives in San Diego.
Article 2 by AJ Abrams ( fusionaj@aol.com) What sets Inasense apart from other jam bands are their unique Middle Eastern sounds. The exotic Middle Eastern chords that come out of their classical guitars create intoxicating and infectious grooves. But the group's music crosses many additional boundaries. Inasense strives to create their own original sound by combining several different genres of music into one new, unique sound.
"New music is created when you blend stuff," Noah Chase (lead vocals, guitar) said. "We are trying to bridge gaps and accomplish diversity. Middle Eastern music hasn't been tapped into too much, We are trying to open up people's horizons. Many people wouldn't give Middle Eastern music the time of day. But it is something that people should be educated about. We are trying to bring it towards rock and both complement each other very well. They are both about rhythm and dance."
Inasense takes you on a journey from the Deep South to the Middle East. "We use a Middle Eastern groove in Allman Brothers type music. It's a unique thing we tapped into," C Lanzbom (lead guitar, vocals) said. "I grew up on these influences and and lived through them. When I lived in New Jersey I was influenced by Duane Allman and Dicky Betts. Then I moved to Israel and I took in the Middle Eastern and Greek/Spanish/European influences. Noah's parents were musicians who played bluegrass and Irish music and then he moved to Israel and learned all these Arabic tunes."
Lanzbom and Chase form the songwriting team for Inasense. Jay Weissman (bass), Mark Ambrosino (drums), and Gilad Dobrecky (percussion) round out the lineup. Lanzbom is originally from Neptune, NJ and Chase is from San Francisco. But they both moved to Israel where they met and formed the band at an American hippie commune. Lanzbom was a well-known studio musician in Israel, and when he and Chase formed the band they began jamming around local venues and the commune. When Lanzbom made the commitment to drop his session work and concentrate their own music the duo moved to New York City. "It's much harder struggling here in the States, but at least we are more true to our musical goals." Lanzbom said. The current lineup, based in New York City, has been together about 3 1/2 years and while they are a tight, professional band, Lanzbom thinks they are getting better by the day. "We're still developing and growing."
Lanzbom may think the band is still maturing, but some famous musicians have no doubt in their minds about how talented Inasense is. The band has teamed up with some fairly big names over the past few years. They have become friends with Jane's Addiction/Lollapalooza/Porno for Pyros leader Perry Farrell. Lanzbom and Farrell met through mutual friends and soon became close because both are into the spiritualism of Judaism. "We met Perry at his studio in Venice," Lanzbom said. "He invited us over and we recorded a couple of Inasense songs with him. But we also wrote one new tune together with him. He sings vocals on the track and we hope to release it on our next album. We've also jammed with him on stage in San Francisco."
San Francisco has been the site of several other superstar collaborations for Inasense. Several times Inasense has performed at the Bill Graham Menorah Day festival. At the festival, named in honor of the late rock promoter, a giant menorah is lit for the public and many Bay Area musicians perform. Inasense has jammed with Steve Kimock (Zero, KVHW) and Merl Saunders at this event. They did a version of "Fire on the Mountain" with Merl Saunders as the mammoth menorah burned brightly nearby. Back home in New York City, Spin Doctors' frontman Chris Baron has joined the band on stage at Nightengales, one of the bars where both the Spin Doctors and Blues Traveler got their start.
Due to their American/Israeli/Jewish roots, Inasense was also invited to an international cultural festival in Germany. "Both of my parents are Holocaust survivors, so I was nervous about playing there," Lanzbom said. "Going to Berlin was a heavy experience for me. I wasn't sure I would want to go where all this blood was spilled on every corner. There is a lot of fixing that still needs to take place. But that's why I had to go there. I'm about world peace. It turned out to be an incredible experience. We were received very well. I'm glad I was given the challenge to go there and perform and I would definitely go back."
Chase added: "It was an awesome show and Berlin is a great town. They have a tremendous respect for music over there and they treated us like royalty. We sat in with lots of local and international bands. There was some far out music there, including gypsy music and Romanian jazz. It felt like a little bit of fixing of sorts. It was nice to bring some positive energy there when there was so much negative energy there not so long ago."
On a lighter note, Germany is the home to several of the best audio engineering companies in the world. Neumann, Schoeps and Sennheiser are some of the prestigious names based in Germany. So, the house board mix at the festival provided an excellent recording of their show. Inasense sold cassette copies of the show to their fans at other concerts and they used one track from the show, "Listen to You" on their recent album, "The Ride."
No matter where they go, whether it's Germany, San Francisco, Colorado, or New York, Inasense has no trouble getting a club of people moving to the music. "We've been getting a reputation as a dance band," Chase said. At every show people get up and dance and it's interesting to watch. We've even had belly dancers come up on stage with us."
The website: www.inasense.com
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