Gene Butler Band: Bio

GENE BUTLER

Singer/Songwriter Gene Butler was born, and partially raised, in the small, but, musical city of Macon, Georgia – birthplace to Otis Redding, the Allman Brothers, Little Richard and the best damn peaches in the entire South.  The third of seven children, Butler’s love for music began from the first moment her heard his mother sing.  Life was tough, times were lean, but, when his mother sang, especially during the hardest of times, it meant that no matter what little amount of food was in the fridge, or how many bill collectors came knocking on the door, things were going to turn out just fine. 

            “As long as momma was singing I knew I was somewhere in a safe world.  Those rare times when she didn’t have any room inside her for a song were the times I’d be on the lookout for the Big Bad Wolf around every corner.”

Butler’s first paid gig was as a member of Macon’s YMCA Boy’s Choir.  He was eight years old and the dollar he got for each performance went directly to the box office of the Rialto Theater, where every Saturday they showed a double-feature preceded by a full hour’s worth of the latest cartoons.  In those days a dollar would buy you a ticket to the movies along with a bag of popcorn, a coke and a box of your favorite candy.  Try putting a dollar into your gas tank today and driving around the block.

“I was a movie going freak.  Couldn’t get enough of the big screen.  I was in my own world when the lights went down.  Just me and Steve McQueen or Elizabeth Taylor.  Even today I still go see nearly every movie that comes out.  That’s one of the advantages of being mostly unemployed.  Set my butt down in a movie theater in the afternoon, turn down the lights and everything else just melts into a beautiful two hours of pure fantasy.”

At the age of ten, Butler wrote his first song ‘Momma, Wish I’d Listen To You’.  It was a collaboration between Butler and his schoolmate, Larry McCoy.  They had been picked up at midnight by the local police for walking the streets and violating the "Under-Age" ten o’clock curfew law.  After spending a few hours in jail, they met the next morning in the schoolyard and cranked out the words to their outlaw story.  The song is on the first Gene Butler Band CD ‘Concrete Country’.  It’s sung acapella, as it was in it’s original format.

“My life of crime basically ended that night in the Macon jail.  I learned that being surrounded by iron bars and seedy looking characters with hard eyes staring at you wasn’t exactly the kind of living I had in mine.  I remember wondering if Elvis Presley ever spent the night in jail.  Yep, that was just about enough of the desperado life for me.”   

In the Sixties, Butler and his immediate family moved to Seattle, Washington.  It was there he picked up his first guitar, a Tennessean Gretsch, and began to write and play in full fever.  When he turned sixteen he and two of his brothers, Corneilus and Mikie, formed a band called the Mudville Flats.  Corneilus on saxophone, Mikie on drums and Butler on guitar. 

            “I couldn’t play worth a damn.  Anything that had more than three chords in it I’d be in more danger than a turkey at Thanksgiving.  But, Corny could play his horn a bit and was a master showman.  Mikie was a natural on drums.  We played wherever and whenever anyone would let us.  Eventually we gathered somewhat of a following and did okay.  Looking back on it I’d have to say we had more guts than musical ability, but playing with my brothers was a part of my life I’ll cherish forever.  And I still have that Tennessean Gretsch.  I’ve also mastered a couple of more chords since then.”

At the age of eighteen, Butler sold his first song.  A country ballad titled "What Month of the Year".  It was bought and recorded by a semi-famous Seattle group "The Jerry Rowan Trio".  To Butler’s horror, they somehow managed to turn a three-quarter time country tune into a full fledged bosa-nova. 

 “I wasn’t paid any money for the tune.  Instead, the Mudville Flats were given some free studio time.  It was the first time we’d ever recorded in an honest-to-God real studio and needless to say we thought we were in the big time.  However, we were recorded live and I hadn’t yet learned that a studio mic picks up every little sound you make.  So, when I was singing I’d let out a huge breath in between every verse.  Since we got only one shot at each song we recorded, that breathing stayed on all the tracks.  If you ever heard a possum under the house giving birth to eight new possums you’d have some idea of what it sounded like.”

When Butler turned twenty, he headed for the great state of California and Hollywood.  At the time he was one part of the singing duo ‘Gene & Gina’.  Gina was a legit opera trained singer and had a singing range of three full octaves while Butler still proudly retained his singing range of one-half octave.  With Butler playing guitar and both he and Gina harmonizing, the pair met with some very quick success.  Playing lots of clubs and other music venues they were signed to a seven year contract by a large management firm to record and perform.  It seemed they were on their way to the Hollywood Illusion of fame and fortune.  The Illusion came to a screeching halt when the founder/owner of the large management firm died in a plane crash.  The management firm was dissolved, all contracts were void and the Illusion put on hold.  Gina went back to Washington, got happily married to a piano player, had some nice looking babies and she and her husband still perform on the weekends in some of the better lounges in Seattle.  Butler remained in Hollywood with his songs, guitar and half octave.

      “Gina had a beautiful voice.  She was about five foot two inches tall and as round as a basketball, but, she could sing like an angel.  I had a voice that sounded like a bull frog with a broken ass.  But, in some mysterious way the two us blended together in a very unique manner.  It was kinda like the rough soil of the earth dancing with a beautiful white cloud.  Gina was only seventeen when we make the trip to California, so her father, a wonderful Greek gentleman who owned an International House of Pancakes, drove us the entire distance down from Seattle to Hollywood.  He stayed long enough to set Gina up in a one bedroom apartment in Studio City, complete with swimming pool and I found a room the size of a closet in a nearby house that rented for ten dollars a week.  For some reason they had painted the walls of the room red with black trim.  It was a great place to sit and contemplate various means of suicide.  When Gina’s father left to go back to Seattle, he left Gina his car and took the Greyhound Bus home.  This was an act of kindness on the part of a good father that I will never forget.  Of course as soon as he left I was over at Gina’s almost every day, lounging by the pool, eating Cheetos and writing new songs.  This was the first pool that I could sit at all day and not be chased away by the owner or management. We had a good go at it, and near success, Gina and me and she’ll always maintain a warm spot in my heart.”

This Bio of Gene Butler will continue when Gene Butler again sits down at his computer and drifts back to the beginnings.       

Brantley Kearns - fiddle

Brantley was born and raised in North Carolina. He began playing violin at the age of four and continued to trained as a classical violinist through grammar school, high school and up until his first two years of college. By the age of ten Brantley was also starting to play traditional fiddle tunes of the Southeast – learning "first hand" from veteran fiddle players at local square dances and gatherings where his father was a frequent caller and promoter.
After a year at the University of North Carolina Brantley traveled west where he attended Merritt College and the University of San Francisco. It was in the Bay Area that he eagerly became a part of the bluegrass music scene in the 1970's. Brantley moved to Los Angeles in 1973 and was there just a few months when a call came from the David Bromberg to come out to New York and join his band. Brantley worked with Bromberg until 1976 and then returned to Los Angeles.
Brantley worked with numerous country bands during the heyday of the "Urban Cowboy" period in the late 70's and early 80's. It was during the time that he toured with Bobbie Gentry and Tin Star.
In 1984 I began working with Dwight Yoakum, playing on his albums and touring with him for the next four years.
I have recorded and toured with Heather Myles, Rick Shea, Billy Joe Shaver, Dave Alvin and now…the Gene Butler Band.

Billy DaMota - Guitar

Billy DaMota was born and raised in San Francisco. He was nine years old, and on his way to grade school when it happened. Standing at the schoolbus stop, on a typical foggy San Francisco morning, he listened to his transistor radio as a new song blasted out over the airwaves, on KYA Radio AM 1260. It was September 16th, 1963 when “She Loves You” by the Beatles shook him all the way down to his lunch box. On September 17, he made his mother promise to buy him a guitar...and she did. Billy instantly became an “artist”. He formed his first band shortly thereafter and called it the “Imitations”. There wasn’t a Ventures, Chuck Berry, Beachboys or Beatles song that Billy couldn’t play.

San Francisco was the place to play Rock and Roll and the 60’s was the time. So play Billy did, writing songs and performing in a number of original bands that rocked the Bay Area. And just when success seemed to be around the proverbial corner, the ‘70s came...and with the ‘70s came disco. And with disco came all the disappointment and disillusionment that Billy could handle. Uninspired and unfulfilled playing in cover bands and interpreting such ‘70s icons like K.C. and The Sunshine Band and Wild Cherry, Billy ultimately made the decision to stop performing.

For Billy, the 1970s were a “wasteland of bad relationships, dead-end retail jobs and disco. I almost lost my art”, he says.

The ‘80s brought Billy to Los Angeles, where he found himself with a brand new career in the film business, working in casting on major studio films such as Predator and The Three Amigos. Billy went on to cast the feature films Colors, Miracle Mile, and Steven Seagal's first film, Above the Law. He also cast and co-produced the award-winning Reflections in the Dark, starring Mimi Rogers and Billy Zane and even wrote a screenplay with the late Dr. Timothy Leary!

The ‘90s marked Billy’s return to music, through songwriting, performing and recording. He played guitar and co-wrote tunes on the first CD for his group, "The Big Way", and released the CD on his own independent label, Cattivo Records. He has recorded with Hellecaster Will Ray, ex-Mike Bloomfield sideman, Gashouse Dave Shorey, and composes soundtracks for film and theatre. His song, “Comes On Too Strong” is featured in the film Changing Habits.

Billy lives in Glendale, California with his seven evil cats.

Jesse T - Drums

For over 12 years Jesse has been dividing her time between music and acting. Originally from San Francisco, she finds inspiration in a wide variety of musical styles and brings a fresh approach and subtly to her art. Jesse is currently the drummer for The Gene Butler Band in Los Angeles and is happy to be playing with a great group of musicians who make it fun to play American Roots Music. She has also performed locally with Gilli Moon, Kelly’s Lot, Sean Wiggins, Henry Inglesias, and Amy Kuney. From country-western at L.A.’s Cowboy Palace, to alternative rock at The Gig, Jesse draws inspiration from jazz, world music and funk. Her other Los Angeles venues include Universal Studios, Pershing Square, Highland Grounds and the Conga Room. On a hiatus from the city in the U.S. Virgin Islands, Jesse had the opportunity to play with John McDowell (Rusted Root) and Jai Utal. She has a Bachelor of Arts in Theater Arts from Sonoma State University. Check out her website (www.hjt3.com) for her acting resume and other photos.

MATTHEW MCFADDEN - Bass

Born in New York, raised in New Jersey, Florida and Massachusetts, Matt moved to L.A. and quickly became involved in the SoCal music scene. Over a three decade career, Matt has played innumerable performances in so many bands and in so many styles that he’s “lost track”! Whether it be Rock, Blues, R&B, Jazz, Latin or Country Matt has played them all. An early career leaning towards Jazz led to him playing and/or recording with Guitarist Dave Becker and L.A Fusion mainstay The Fents before spreading out into more diverse roles as a sideman with Singers and Songwriters such as Shelly O’Neill, the 11-piece Latin/Jazz/Funk band Iguana, and with the Blues-Rock “house” band Cheap Suit at The Mint.
His 16-year association with Gene Butler however is his main focus now. “I’ve found that I like to play any style of music, as long as it’s ‘authentic’”, says Matt, “and you’re not gonna find anything more ‘authentic’ than Gene! It also helps to play with good players, whom you like, and I’m lucky to be able to enjoy all those ingredients playing with Gene and this band.”