Tiedye Keith

This is a great CD. There are moments when you feel that the band is just going to pop out of the CD and start playing in your living room. There is so much life and color in this music. It reminds me of Santana, Jerry, and Phish all rolled up and mashed together. - Arthur Kingus - CdBaby.com

Sit down and listsn to "Welcome Home" in one single session while gazing at the incredibly trippy cd art. - Funkmasta K - CdBaby.com

Fifty steps from a sleepy Burlingame sidewalk stands the welcoming front door to the home and recording studio of Keith McNamara, a.k.a. Tiedye Keith, a guitarist/vocalist hoping to bring his jam band music to the masses.


Combining his songs with the work of veteran musicians seasoned in disciplines ranging from rock, funk and soul to Latin, jazz and R&B, the 42-year-old Burlingame resident has written, performed on and produced three full-length albums that he released on his own independent record label, with three more on the shelf and two nearing completion.


“You find here in the Bay Area a melting pot in a way you don’t find in any other area of the world,” McNamara said. “We are a lot more accommodating to blending different kinds of music.”


Tiedye Keith albums feature many celebrated artists, such as vocalist Tony Lindsay of Santana, guitarist Bill Spooner of the Tubes and percussionist Pete Escovedo.


Lindsay, an 11-time Grammy winner and San Mateo resident, said singing on Tiedye Keith albums is a no-pressure experience due to McNamara’s spontaneous approach and appreciation of improvisation.


“I like doing stuff that way because with some cats, you put the microscope on things too much,” Lindsay said.


Curtis Ohlson, a bass player most famous for playing with Ray Charles, said McNamara’s style allows for creative freedom, but also inspired musicians to play a jam band style that they were not previously playing.


“What trips me out is all of a sudden he’s got everyone into the Grateful Dead vibe,” Ohlson said. “We all sound different because of Keith.”


Lindsay, who has opened for the Grateful Dead as part of Santana, said it was not until he worked with McNamara that he really appreciated what he called “hippie music.”


McNamara is proud of his working with such established musicians and loves to talk about the various players with whom he has worked.


“I know that I’m on to something if these good players love coming here and love what they’re doing and they’re behind the project,” McNamara said.


Mindful of facilitating an atmosphere of artistic freedom, McNamara made interior design choices in his home conducive to the jam-happy sensibilities of the music played there.


“The cool thing is that Keith has created a really creative atmosphere to do what we do,” said Billy Johnson, a drummer who has also played in Santana. “It’s a very colorful place and it’s totally music friendly.”


After making their way through a garden patio full of decorations and fountains, guests enter a world as colorful as McNamara’s Tiedyed socks.


“As soon as people come in the house, you can see their stress level go down,” he said.


Lava lamps and other decorative lights illuminate the living room and recording room. The bricks of the fireplace and living-room walls are painted in all different colors and designs. McNamara’s abstract acrylic paintings hang around various rooms along with other artwork.


And as his moniker suggests, he loves Tiedyed art — so much so that you can’t even use his bathroom without escaping Tiedyed patterns. Along with Tiedyed tapestries, bed sheets, pillows, a light switch cover and even conga drums, Keith’s toilet seat cover and shower curtain are Tiedyed.


McNamara said his fixation for Tiedyed art began in 1997, when he began skydiving and decided on a colorful alternative to the bland colors of skydiving jumpsuits.


He acquired most of his money by selling a food distribution business, previously owned by his father, which he worked in from age 21 to 37.


Around the same time, McNamara worked at Grateful Dead concerts overseeing attendees who needed assistance while using LSD.


McNamara estimated he has invested a quarter of a million dollars in turning parts of his home into a fully equipped recording studio.


And he hopes the Tiedye Keith project will be successful enough for to him keep making music.

- ©2007 Daily Journal - San Mateo County's homepage - smdailyjournal.com

Welcome Home

Tiedye Keith

He calls himself Tiedye Keith and there couldn’t be a more perfect moniker for this colorful artist. On his latest recording, Welcome Home (TDK Records), Tiedye Keith captures the spicy flavors of psychedelic rock, the soul of funk, the joy of jam and the heart of R&B. Imagine the fusion rock guitar power of Santana, the otherworldly spirituality of Sting and the jam-ability of the Allman Brothers – all together in a rainbow-colored package. Welcome Home opens with the freewheeling, funky, saxophone-charged “Big World,” then moves along to one of the album’s highlights – the gentler, more melodic, seemingly spiritual “Lining of Gold.” Another highlight is the Dave Matthews Band-like laden “Jack,” or “Butterfly” that emphasizes the ethereal, uplifting vocals of Regina Espinoza. Tiedye Keith, whose musical past includes work with Tune Ahead, recorded with a “who’s-who” of musicians on Welcome Home including himself on guitars and vocals, Bill Spooner on guitar (The Tubes), Myron Dove on bass (Santana), Billy Johnson on drums (Santana), Vernon Ice Black on guitar (Mariah Carey), Norbert Stachel on horns and sax (Tower of Power) and Juan Escovedo on percussion (Prince, Shelia E). Keith, the creative spring that he is, is already finished with the follow-up sister album to Welcome Home, as well as finishing three additional albums that include lead vocals from 11-time Grammy Award-winning singer Tony Lindsay on three of the tracks. As Keith himself so appropriately put it: “The story keeps deepening in romance of world class legendary talent here.”

Kristi Singer

2005-03-23

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