Tim Jackson

Tim Jackson was born April 29, 1949 to a family that was passionate about the arts. His mother, Polly, was an artist whose father was a successful painter and watercolorist in Boston and whose family arrived to the city in 1620 (10 years before Boston was officially founded), having arrived to the American colonies in November that year from England aboard the Mayflower.

His father, William, was a blue-collar guy from Brooklyn who worked his way up as an ad man – only to lose his job at age 50 because he didn’t have a high school diploma – and had a full-blooded Passamaquoddy Algonquin Indian grandfather from Maine. His brother Dennis owns a radio station and his brother Will, who used to write for Sweet Potato magazine in Maine, teaches English in Rhode Island prisons.

As well-known as Jackson has become for music, acting was his primary focus from his earliest childhood. His first role was as Little Black Sambo in the first grade, though he took to the stage in his own paleface, not in blackface. He performed on Merv Griffin’s quiz show Play Your Hunch when he was 10 and acting was the only thing he really wanted to do until his mid-teens.

MUSICAL BEGINNINGS, DRUM TRAINING/INFLUENCES

Jackson joined the band and orchestra in middle school simply because there was no drama department. Around the same time, his jazz-loving father gave him his first snare drum. Interestingly, 14-year-old Jackson was in the actual live audience at The Ed Sullivan Show when The Beatles debuted on February 9, 1964, which inspired him to take drumming more seriously. “I used to play on the back of a chair with thumbtacks on the soles of my sneakers in order to hear my foot,” he says. “I copied everything I heard on rock records, which was probably the drumming of Hal Blaine.”

Within a year of that seminal broadcast, he was in his high school’s top rock band, who opened twice for The Rascals. “Dino Danelli was my hero,” Jackson says of the band’s drummer. “I’d seen Joe Morello and Alan Dawson with Dave Brubeck, who lived in my hometown, and that was inspiration but I stole everything I could from Dino. Sit up straight. Be precise. Hit the cymbals from the underside and twirl my left hand where many drummers twirl with their dominant right hand.” Later, Richie Haywood of Little Feat and jazz-fusion giant Billy Cobham became inspirations. He studied jazz drums with Jim Chapin in the early ‘70s and with Alan Dawson in the late ‘70s while pounding out beats with Robin Lane & The Chartbusters.

NEW ENGLAND INSTITUTE OF ART, CURRENT ACTIVITY, FILMS

Jackson is also a member of the Boston Society of Film Critics and writes for The Arts Fuse, an online journal. He was an associate professor at the New England Institute of Art, where he was awarded the first Distinguished Faculty Award and developed and taught classes in film history, acting, directing, mass communications and art history.

Currently, he is rehearsing a one-act play, editing a book about filmmaker Wes Anderson and shooting for a museum-style installation piece of nonagenarian oral histories. Among the films he’s written and directed are the documentary When Things Go Wrong: The Robin Lane Story, Chaos and Order, Radical Jesters, American Gurner and Joan Walsh Anglund: Stories. He says he hopes to organize a poetry/video club show with Vas Deferens and The Young Rationals.

Final fun fact: Jackson’s wife is poet/mother/singer/psychotherapist Suzanne Boucher, who was in the group The Afternoon Delights, which cut one of the top-selling novelty records of all time in 1981, “General Hospi-Tale.

BANDS IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER

• The Loved Ones – 1965-1967: There were several famous concerts at Jackson’s own Staples High School. One was The Yardbirds with Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page and they used his band’s sound system. Steve Tallerico (before Tyler) & The Chain Reaction opened the show.
• Abraxas – 1968-1969: Pre-Santana group; the name comes from Herman Hesse. Jackson took one year off to study drama at Ithaca College, where he and Larry Hoppen formed this band in his sophomore year. Hoppen later became the lead singer for Orleans and sang the lead on their hit song “Still The One.”
• Benefit Street – 1969-1971: Jackson dropped out of college with a year to go to join this Rhode Island-based group. They became one of the top acts in the state, missing out on a Roulette Records contract by inches, and opened for The Chambers Brothers, B. B. King, Grand Funk and The Stooges.
• John Paul Jones – 1972-1973: a basso folk singer. They opened for a full week of Little Feat shows and for The Wailers at Paul’s Mall in Boston. There were also gigs with NRBQ at Max’s Kansas City in New York City, in Hartford with The Mahavishnu Orchestra, and with Bruce Springsteen in a high school gym in R.I.
• Blue Sky – 1973-1974: a pop band with Jeff Southworth, Jack Bone (from Martin Mull’s band) and Jeff Lorber, now a fusion jazz super star.
• The Splendiads and The Spoons – 1975-6: These bands were odd blends of ‘70s pop and comedy songs. They played at Jack’s, Brandy’s and the Oxford Alehouse a ton of  times. Fun fact: The Splendiads’ name came off a napkin dispenser in one of those many all-night after-the-gig diners.
• Tom Rush – 1976-1978: Larry Luddecke was the music director. The bass player was Leigh Foxx (Patty Smith, Blondie). ‘That was one funny band,” Jackson says. “Tom was patient.’
• The Night Visitors – 1978-1979: with the late Bard Richmond from The Road Apples and Tony Gilroy, now the writer of the Jason Bourne movies and the director of the film Michael Clayton.
• The Chartbusters – 1979- present: Jackson was recruited by Robin Lane, who had seen The Night Visitors. The group landed a contract with Warner Brothers and became the 11th band aired on MTV with their song “When Things Go Wrong” on August 1, 1981.
• The Gray Boys – Led by the late ex-Chartbuster and songwriter Asa Brebner, the band experimented with his songs, classic R&B and rockabilly.
• The Young Rationals – 1982: “A great band, perhaps too cerebral for Boston tastes,” Jackson says.
• Vas Deferens – 1982-2007: These cats were a unique art/punk/rock/blues poetry band until frontman and lyricist Nelson died from The other guys essentially became The Band That Time Forgot.
• Lavern Baker – 1990-1993: They did the a European tour, the Montreux Jazz Festival and gigs in New York and Boston until her death.
• The Band That Time Forgot – 1983- present: “I thought of the name first, then the concept: a Sha Na Na for ‘60s music,” Jackson says. “Nobody was doing this yet. I didn’t want to travel anymore, but wanted to play with my kids who were just being hatched, get back to acting, to teach and make films. I was in six bands at the same time and finishing an undergrad in English and a master’s in ed Heady times. I called all my favorite guys and we learned two songs a week for six months. I found the world’s greatest go-go dancer, We had a light show run by an old friend who had worked for Foreigner doing lasers. Within a year we had a Best of Boston Award and lines around the block. And we still sell out shows!!

NOTABLE OPENING SPOTS

• The Young Rascals – Hartford/Westport, 1966
• The Wildweeds – Bushnell Auditorium,
• Iggy & The Stooges – Providence, 1969
• The J. Geils Band
• Manfred Mann
• The Chambers Brothers
• Hall & Oates – Orpheum Theatre, Boston
• Bruce Springsteen – Rhode Island Auditorium, 1972
• The Young Bloods – Central Park, New York City
• B. King – Montreaux Jazz Festival, Switzerland
• Frankie Valli
• The Guess Who
• Edgar Winter
• Buddy Miles
• The Turtles – City Hall Plaza, Boston
• Herman’s Hermits
• NRBQ – Max’s Kansas City, New York City
• Grand Funk Railroad
• The Go-Go’s
• The Mahavishnu Orchestra – Bushnell Auditorium, Hartford
• Split Enz(tour)
• The Undertones(tour)
• The Ramones
• Irma Thomas
• Jimmy Buffet
• Peter, Paul and Mary
• Joe Jackson
• The Wailers – Paul’s Mall, Boston
• Bonnie Raitt
• The Cars – Wang Center, Boston
• The Kinks – Providence Civic Center
• Squeeze
• Leo Kottke
• The Four Seasons

NOTABLE RECORDINGS

• Robin Lane & The  Chartbusters (three albums)
• Unreleased Jonathan Edwards and Tom Rush albums
• Bill Staines
• David Mallett
• Daring and Stahl
• Young Rationals
• Live at Montreux (European release)

SOUNDTRACK CONTRIBUTIONS

• Always a Bridesmaid (documentary) (musician: drums)
• Outside Providence
• Limbo
• Lone Star
• Ed and His Dead Mother
• Return of the Secaucus Seven

(by A.J. Wachtel)