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I was still very immature in my musicianship, and Cris was so much better than me. But, for some reason, and even still to this day, he can bring out things in me musically that are normally above what I can do. I realized what we had on that day because it was the first time I had ever closed my eyes when playing and just listened and tried to do what I heard as opposed to trying to play stuff I had practiced. -Kenny Liner on the birth of The Bridge |
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Besides being the foundation for what The Bridge would become musically, it also eased some of the conflicting feelings the pair had. For Liner it was a revelation about his potential as a musician. "I was still very immature in my musicianship, and Cris was so much better than me," he says. "But, for some reason, and even still to this day, he can bring out things in me musically that are normally above what I can do. I realized what we had on that day because it was the first time I had ever closed my eyes when playing and just listened and tried to do what I heard as opposed to trying to play stuff I had practiced."
 Kenny Liner - The Bridge |
Despite having played with Liner for sometime, the session helped Jacobs alleviate some of the uncertainty he felt concerning the band. "It was a pretty special day, we both definitely felt it. I remember listening back to the tape and thinking 'hmmm, we really got something here.' As I listened back to 'Pakalolo,' I was thinking how I wanted to do other things that sounded like that. That's when I finally had the vision and thought maybe we actually have something here."
Having found their musical direction, they added the bass player from Jacobs' high school band and a drummer from amongst their musical friends and played their first show in the fall of 2002 to a packed house at Palomas (a now defunct club in Baltimore). The show was packed, mostly due to the efforts of Liner, who rented out the club and sound guy for $300 and then "made it a free show and advertised the fuck out of it." The first song the band, recently christened The Bridge, ever played live together was a cover of "Dancing in the Streets," which they describe as being a "bad-ass version of the song" with Jacobs on dobro and Liner beatboxing.
While Liner poured everything he had into promoting the band, Jacobs still expressed some hesitation. "We did a couple of more shows at Palomas, and someone came up to me and was like, 'I heard about your band.' And I was like, 'I have a band?'"
Liner estimates that he went to almost every show in the Baltimore area for two years, passing out flyers and promoting the band. For those with a long enough memory they can remember Liner, with Jacobs joining him occasionally, playing impromptu acoustic sets outside gigs.
 Dave Markowitz - The Bridge |
One of those folks who remembers the two playing on the streets was another young musician who had recently begun to discover his true musical path, too. Dave Markowitz began playing guitar when he was thirteen and soon after joined a band with his friends. The band, Black Eyed Susan, is still around to this day and remains close with The Bridge, sharing the stage whenever their paths cross. Despite playing guitar with Black Eyed Susan, Markowitz had been searching for a different sound and had begun to find it playing bass. He says, "It felt more like my place musically. It was more what I was hearing and feeling."
Markowitz grew up in a neighboring town to Jacobs and Liner, and despite being a few years younger shared some of the same social circle since Markowitz's friends worked at the same health food store as Liner. He was also going to Bridge shows, and was "really, really into their music." He eventually heard through mutual friends that The Bridge was looking for a new bass player. After thinking it over, he decided to make the move and joined the band on Thanksgiving of 2004. He played his first show with the band a month later on New Year's Eve, joining them for the final song of the night, a cover of Derek and the Dominos' "Keep on Growing" that Jacobs calls pretty symbolic. Markowitz agrees, "The past two years and nine months have been great. Nothing but steady growth for the band."
As Jacobs, Liner and Markowitz developed their musical connection they also went through a Spinal Tap like procession of drummers after their original drummer decided to leave shortly before an eight week summer residency at The 8X10 (at the time called the Funk Box) in Baltimore in 2005. The band decided to use a revolving cast of drummers until they found a permanent replacement. While many good friends and musicians kept time for that summer none was able to take over on a permanent basis.
 Mike Gambone - The Bridge |
Drummer Mike Gambone, who had recently graduated from Towson University where he studied music, was busy playing in a variety of bands including a jazz group called Derivative. Gambone was vaguely aware of The Bridge and their need for a drummer. "I had heard of The Bridge from this guy in an acoustic rock group I played in who would get like one gig a month. I had seen their flyers around, but had never actually heard the band, but I knew they played a lot," says Gambone. A few months later during set break at a Derivative show, the sound guy started playing a CD of a Bridge live show that Gambone thought was "bad-ass. They were just killing it." He found out from the sound guy (who also did sound for The Bridge) that it was a show he had recorded the previous week. Gambone inquired about their drummer situation and found out they were still looking for a permanent replacement. He decided to see if he could set up an audition.
With a CD that he picked up at one of their residency shows, Gambone set about familiarizing himself with their music. "I went home and listened to the CD and listened to a bunch of live stuff," Gambone explains. "I busted my ass to get familiar with these tunes. I even wrote out charts for them. When we got together for my audition I was pretty ready for it." Gambone joined the band shortly after, and played his first show in the fall of '05 at the University of Maine, opening up his tenure with The Bridge on longtime fan-favorite "Super Funk."
Continue reading for more of The Bridge...
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