It's a rainy, chilly December night, and San Francisco's historic Fillmore auditorium is packed to the chandeliers. The headliner is Tower of Power, making one of its annual return visits to the place where its funky odyssey began more than three decades ago. Throngs of hardcore fans have jammed themselves in — standing in this seatless facility — to absorb every last note from the ten-piece soul-music institution. The electricity in the air builds quickly through a sizzling set from the opening act, Berkeley's own Sy Klopps Blues Band. During intermission, the crowd inches closer to the stage in anticipation. The buzz suddenly explodes into a deafening roar the moment members of TOP file onstage to take their places and blast in unison the punchy, syncopated opening bars of “Soul with a Capital S” from their 1993 album, T.O.P.
For the next 90 minutes, the audience is completely mesmerized: they bounce and sway to the grooves, sing the lyrics, and study the band's tightly choreographed pure energy. TOP's set offers a rich mix of established hits such as “Can't You See,” “Diggin' on James Brown,” and new material from the band's forthcoming album (Oakland Zone, due for release in late summer 2002). The excitement in the room never relents.
One thing is certain: Tower of Power delivers the goods onstage. The band inspires its fans with burning live shows that feature dazzling musical pyrotechnics. It is a genuinely passionate and well-disciplined outfit whose consistent focus, precision, and intensity set a prime example for any performing musician.
Musically, Tower of Power is a notoriously tight ensemble with impeccably high standards. Musicians have long revered the band's individual members for their instrumental expertise. The horn section is widely acclaimed in the music industry and is in constant demand with numerous recording artists. Tower of Power alumni include Richard Elliott, Brandon Fields, Saturday Night Live musical director Lenny Pickett, and Santana's Chester Thompson.
The band's music has stood the test of time, continuing to resonate with legions of musicians and loyal fans worldwide. This fact is evidenced by the rigorous touring schedule TOP follows year after year. Fans just can't get enough of their music.
Perhaps most importantly, Tower of Power maintains its successful career on its own terms, never bowing to passing trends or popular opinion. Through good times and bad — and through dozens of personnel changes over the years — TOP has never wavered from its original style nor changed its approach to writing and performing.
Formed in 1968 in Oakland, California, by saxophonists Emilio Castillo and Stephen “Doc” Kupka and bassist Francis “Rocco” Prestia, Tower of Power's crackling Oakland sound struck gold in the San Francisco Bay Area psychedelic rock revolution, which was led by the Grateful Dead, Jefferson Airplane, and others. TOP followed in the footsteps of James Brown, Sly and the Family Stone, Otis Redding, and Howard Tate and found its audience.
“At the time we started out, there was a San Francisco sound with all that flower power, and we were definitely not that,” says Kupka. “We came from soul bands, and there were lots of them in the East Bay. We have a sound based on the classic soul sounds of the '60s, and then we kind of took that and made it our own sound.”
Tower of Power was able to cultivate its supertight arrangements thanks to a music scene that offered plentiful opportunities to gig at that time, a world that no longer exists. “We had a rehearsal hall in Berkeley and a steady gig on Monday and Tuesday nights,” says bandleader Castillo. “For a long time, we had weekend after-hours gigs. We would go play the Fillmore or somewhere else in the Bay Area, and at one o'clock in the morning we'd tear everything down, then head to Albany or Fremont and play from two to six in the morning. So yeah, we did a lot of gigs, and that helped establish the pattern of constantly polishing the diamond.”
The band's 1970 debut album, East Bay Grease, didn't make the splash that they'd hoped for. “It didn't really get in the record stores across the nation,” says Castillo. “We toured with Santana and Creedence Clearwater Revival, and then we did the Bump City record. We had kind of a legal battle with [rock impresario and original manager] Bill Graham for almost two years, between those two records. So our popularity was skyrocketing in the Bay Area, and word was getting out in the nation, but there was no record out. When the Bump City record [finally] came out, it took off. We had the single ‘You're Still a Young Man,’ and from then on we were a nationwide act.”
In the mid-1970s, TOP built its national reputation by unleashing landmark funk and R&B albums such as Tower of Power, Back to Oakland, and Urban Renewal on the Warner Brothers label. These albums spawned hits that still receive radio airplay today, including “So Very Hard to Go” and the powerhouse funk anthem “What Is Hip?” the steady, propulsive 16th-note groove of which lit a fire under countless bassists and drummers.
Tower of Power's fortunes waned considerably in the late '70s and early '80s, partially due to a poor relationship with its new label, Columbia. Band members relocated from the Bay Area to Los Angeles. The band was without a record deal in the mid — '80s, but the TOP horns gained mainstream attention while touring with Huey Lewis and the News and making regular TV appearances with Paul Shaffer's band on NBC's Late Night with David Letterman. Castillo landed a record deal with Epic in 1990. The 1991 album Monster on a Leash paved the way for a strong rebound the '90s, when TOP released four more albums and gained new career momentum.
Today TOP features a stellar lineup. Joining Castillo, Kupka, and Prestia are trumpet players Adolfo Acosta and Mike Bogart, lead vocalist Larry Braggs, keyboardist Roger Smith, saxophonist Tom Politzer (who recently replaced Norbert Stachel), guitarist Jeff Tamelier, and drummer David Garibaldi.
So what is hip about Tower of Power? I spoke with Castillo, Garibaldi, Kupka, and Tamelier backstage before gigs at the Fillmore and at the Paramount Theater in Oakland, California.
Tower of Power is a study in longevity. How does the band stay so energized about its music after more than 30 years?
Castillo: It's easy to keep it fresh for us because we love what we do. We love the music. We've never made music to fit the radio or to fit what people think it should be. We make music to please ourselves and it pleases us a lot. We're out there playing our hearts out. If we get the right feedback from the crowd, it makes the whole thing happen. It has a lot to do with the audience — the whole energy thing — because Tower of Power is an energy band. It's not only the energy from the stage, it's the energy that we get back from the audience.
Garibaldi: I always liked the old-school approach of being in a band and building something together. I love the concept of our band. [There aren't] many other bands like it around right now. It's still a lot of fun. When I was a kid, I wanted to play the drums and travel the world. I'm just thankful I get to live my dream. There's this dynamic in the band that we are constantly changing things, mixing and matching everything. There are certain [songs] that we do pretty regularly, just because they're fun to play, they're ours, people like them, and you get to show off what you do, which is fun. There's a certain reward in having a band that's well rehearsed. It's the sense that when we go out to play, we're going to kick some ass. That's how we do it. It's like when we were 25 years old.
Kupka: I think it's the music and the choice of personnel. Even in the bad times, we never broke up — we were able to keep it together.
Tamelier: We don't get caught in the barriers that music has now. It's like the tortoise and the hare — Tower of Power's a funky tortoise, still going. The music has staying power. It's got a very original flavor to it. We stay true to what we do, and I think everybody still digs it.
Castillo: We have great fans. We've got the diehards. People talk about Deadheads, but I'll tell you something, man: they don't compare with Tower of Power [fans]. Our fans travel all over the world to see us. They stay in touch with each other via the Internet and other means, and we're just totally blessed on that level. Pretty much every night that we play, there's a whole group of staunch Tower of Power fans giving back to us the energy that we need to make it an electric show.
What is it about your music that makes it so special?
Castillo: We're not like the average five-piece rock 'n' roll band. For that matter, we're not even an average funk band. We have a unique concept of rhythm and rhythm-section parts, and the way we approach our horn section — it's completely different than what most bands do. I won't say it's something that we just came up with and it was really ingenious. It comes from inside of us. It's a total heart thing; it's not a brain thing. It's what we do by nature. No matter what we did, we always sounded like Tower of Power, because we can't help ourselves.
Kupka: The sound of the band, to my mind, is the way Rocco and David Garibaldi play together. As players, they're both on the same wavelength and it's magical. Both of them play on top of the beat.
Garibaldi: Rocco is the heart and soul of the band. It's been like that since I [first] heard him when he was 18 or 19 years old. He made the music feel a certain way. It certainly gave us a lot of options, rhythmically. It was like raw energy at that time — 1970. I wanted to play better, so I started studying, and that changed the way that I approached the music and made everything a lot more sophisticated. It took off a lot of the rough edges.
The band has experienced many personnel changes over the years, and yet it has always maintained its identity.
Castillo: Just getting into Tower of Power looks good on anyone's résumé, so a lot of players are attracted to the band. Generally, they feel the concept. They're pretty much tuned in already or they don't make the cut. They learn the finer points of how we approach music.
You've always defined this band as its leader and founder.
Castillo: I'm the leader of the band, but make no mistake: it's a band. I'm a big believer in bands. Everybody makes the same amount of money, everybody has to do the same thing. We're all required to be a legal partner and have an equal vote. You'd be a fool not to take advantage of all the talent at your disposal in this band, so I always try to listen. But it's true, someone has to make a final decision, and that's me.
What qualities do you look for in a member of Tower of Power?
Castillo: I like great players, obviously. A lot of great players don't fit into Tower of Power, and those are people who are not team players. I felt that when I hired people who had principles, they lasted longer and the group was more harmonious. The stage — that's just one hour a day. But it's the other 23 that really count. I want all these guys to stay in the band. I do. I have had a lot of personnel changes and turnover, but not because I like to change people all the time. Some people move on, but I hire people to keep them, not to do a two-year run. [Laughs.]
What approach do you take when creating your setlists?
Castillo: It depends on the gig. Usually, we play for 90 minutes. We always do a few ass-kickers, and then we slow it down and do a great ballad. Then we'll do a few other ass-kickers, then we'll kind of bring it down a little bit. Then we'll hit you at the end so that when we leave, you're wanting more. We might not do “So Very Hard to Go” every night, although it was one of our biggest hits. Sometimes a fan will ask for a tune — I don't bow to that very often, but sometimes I do. It's like, “If somebody really wants to hear ‘This Time It's Real’ tonight, guys, then we're going to do it.”
Garibaldi: We have a setlist of maybe 25 songs. We have lots of source material, music from all eras of the band. We're learning new material to get it going. That's what we used to do: when we were going to record, we'd learn the material and put it in the shows right away so that it would evolve. By the time we were ready to record it, we were happy with it. That's why those recordings sounded the way they did, because we played [new songs] for six months, or whatever, and then recorded them.
It seems that a lot of bands do the opposite: they record their new songs first and then take them out on the road.
Garibaldi: Well, our big thing is our live shows. We're busy playing all the time, so recordings are just part of what we do. We like the process of building material, playing it, recording it, then playing it. If it's good, it stays in the rotation of songs that we play.
Castillo: We have some tunes that are potential tunes for [our new] record, so we try to work them up because they evolve in the live performance. All this cool stuff happens that doesn't happen if you don't go through that process. We're not able to do all of the tunes that way, but we do as many as we can. Sometimes it's good for them not to evolve. There are certain tunes that you can overthink.
How often do you rehearse?
Kupka: These days, just to rehearse, we have to fly everyone to the same city, put them up, give them per diems — I mean, it costs thousands. We do that when we're getting ready for a CD or before a major tour when we haven't played for a few months.
Tamelier: We don't all live in the same town, but we'll make time to get together [for] a week or two weeks out of the year to learn a new show. For example, right now we're doing a new record and we wrote probably 30 tunes for it. Dave and Rocco put their slant on [the tunes], like they did in the old days.
How does the band as a whole approach its songwriting?
Castillo: Everybody's going to put in their two cents' worth. We're not the kind of band that comes in and just whips off a tune in five minutes. We overthink everything, and a lot of times I have to tell them, “You know what? We went past it, guys. Let's just start all over again.” We like different parts; we like everything to work like a little machine. It's just the way we approach music, and sometimes it can be too much; we've got to put ourselves in check and say, “It's too mechanical now. Let's just go for the feel.” A lot of times, that's where Rocco comes in because he totally plays from his heart. I can be right in the middle there and say, “Yeah, I want this clever stuff in here, but I want it to feel comfortable.” It's a process.
Kupka: It's a lot of give and take, even more so than it used to be. Greg Adams was our arranger for years and years. Now it's a little more democratic, and the rhythm section has always been that way. We have a real solid horn section these days.
Garibaldi: [We] play to the strengths of the people in the band. People always bring up the era when we had Chester Thompson and Lenny Pickett because it's a great era of the band, but that doesn't exist anymore. We have a great band right now. We play well together. It's a different type of band than it was at that time. The cool thing about Emilio's approach is that he lets the players express themselves. He's not looking over your shoulder. He lets you do your thing, and if what you do doesn't work for the band, eventually that's going to come out. People get the freedom to be what they are. It's a collective. People bring in their ideas and we start working on them. It's like a lab where you bring stuff in and see if it fits with what's going on. Maybe if it doesn't work in this song, it can work somewhere else. In the early days, we used to do a record every year. Now it's a little bit more spread out, so if there's a period of time when we're not working on new material, we're just working out there doing a million gigs.
Is it difficult to spend so much time on the road?
Castillo: I'm always getting the question, “How do you keep your family?” But the truth of the matter is that we do 120 dates a year. You figure there's 30 days off somewhere out in the world where you're traveling or you're just off. That's 150 days. That leaves 215 days a year that I'm home 24 hours a day. You think about the guy that's an accountant, a programmer, or whatever — he's working maybe six days a week, sometimes 9 to 12 hours a day, and his commute, and then he has his one or two days off for the weekend. I have 215 days with my wife and kids, so it's a great gig. I enjoy seeing the world. A lot of times I can take my wife and kids with me.
Tower of Power has seen and endured a lot of changes in the music business since 1968. It's a very different world now.
Castillo: Rock 'n' roll is big business now, man. Kids know about the business now. When I started, there was no business. You just played music. It was the coolest thing in the world. It was that simple. You did it because it felt good. Now, people have other agendas. They can't help it. They're a product of their environment with the media, with the industry as big as it is, and with as much publicity about it as there is — they don't know any better. But I have to say, you see a lot of these garage-type bands that are making it big now, and you can tell that they're from the old school. It's just like when we get together and we're thrashing in the garage, and we have a thing going on, and it's cool. People are still attracted to the band thing.
