 Kevin James MacDonald B - March 31, 1970 |
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Kevin's life is very simple - when he's not playing music, he's listening to it. This started when he was only five years old and, having found his parent's records, absorbed Elvis Presley, Gene Pitney, Jesus Christ Superstar and everything in between. The first record of his own was "The Monkee's Greatest Hits," received for his fifth birthday.
As he got older, he graduated to the classic rock bands (The Who, Led Zeppelin, Yes, ELP, Pink Floyd, The Cars, Dire Straits, etc) and felt as if he was "the only thirteen year old listening to The Beatles, King Crimson and Brian Eno." In the mid to late 80's, with the onslaught of hair bands and power ballads, Kevin made his most important discovery - college radio. Many bands from that "Golden Age" (The Cure, Midnight Oil, The Smith, The Chameleons, Camper Van Beehoven, The Pixies, The Church, Echo and the Bunnymen, etc) had a huge impact on Kevin, but none more than XTC and Hüsker Du, adding "…they just blew me away. Still do."
Kevin now realized that anyone "could do great things with three chords" and after receiving a keyboard in 1988, began writing his own material. Yearning to play bass, he bought his first, an Ibanez fretless, in 1990, and described its study as "learning to run before I could crawl." It wasn't until a few years later that he bought his first guitar to beef up his 4-track demos with that "Bob Mould" sound. He still needed to learn how to play it and to this day he says, "I'm still trying."
The Beatles Baby Ray |
The Pixies Midnight Oil |