Half Way Home
Jennifer Barry - Vocals / Dean Zuckerman - Guitar Eddie Fagin - Bass / Kevin Costigan - Drums
Half Way Home is an L.A.-based, blues rock quartet, but that description does it no justice. More than a band, Half Way Home is a tribe, and energy center, a way of life. They don’t tour like anyone else, and, as you can hear her self titled DGC/Geffen Records debut album, they don’t make music like anyone else.
Although they look like refugees from a Santa Monica bike path, it would be foolhardy to judge Half Way Home by appearance. They play in uncompromising strip down and dirty style of funk ‘n blues. Half Way Home, produced by Jim Mitchell and Chris “Hoover” Rankin, was cut live at the record plant with a crowd of friends and fans in attendance. The band use no headphones and added few overdubs to capture their raw live sound. Says Singer Jennifer Barry, “It would be ridiculous for us to record any other way. This live stage is all we’ve known, and we feed from that give-and-take with our fans.”.
Half Way Home makes little distinction between themselves and their audience. “If you’re at the show grooving with us,” says Zuckerman, “Then you’re in the band.” While on the road during their set, the band often asked if anyone can put them up for the night. Somebody always does. There may be no stretch limos or deluxe hotel suites awaiting them, but, says Fagin, “It’s better to go to peoples homes and learn a little about their lifestyle than to sit behind the same for white hotel walls each night.” This attitude has allowed Half Way Home to establish a family of friend
Both Los Angeles natives Zuckerman and Fagan met in their teens and discovered they had similar music tastes. A lifelong music fanatic, Fagan first picked up the bass at age 14, and Zuckerman, an admirer of the Beatles and Jimi Hendrix, mastered the guitar while attending a series of boarding schools across California. The daughter of a singer/actress and a writer, Jennifer Barry grew up in the backwoods of Wilton, Connecticut where she was heavily influenced by her mother, as well as the great Billie Holiday. She moved to Los Angeles at the age of 12 where she eventually realized a singing career would be her chosen path. Also a native to Los Angeles, Costigan began drumming at the age of 12. He played with a variety of musicians throughout his teenage years. When he met Barry, Fagan and Zuckerman, Costigan says, “It all just felt right. The music just flowed from the right place. We grooved.”
In 1986 the four teenagers join together to create Half Way Home, partly in response to the musical climate of the times. Says Berry, “I don’t identify with a lot of the music from my generation. I like the blues.” Adds Zuckerman, “The basis of this band was, let’s make music you can’t find any more. There has been nothing on the radio we like in years. We wanted to create something everybody in the band could enjoy.”
Right from the start of the goal was to play music. They weren’t interested in clenching a label deal or writing hit singles. “We always just played what we felt,” says Fagen. The band likes taking chances. More than once, they drove a flatbed truck into a parking lot were major rock concert was about to begin, plugged their instruments into a generator, and performed a free set. “People who saw the flatbed shows still come up to us on the street and tell how much they enjoyed those sets. That’s what makes the effort all worthwhile. We delivered something, and it was well received,” says Costigan.
In the summer of 1992 they released an eight song self titled EP on their own homegrown label, Half Way Home Records, and distributed it themselves at concerts and through their fan network. This was accomplished while touring constantly along the western United States and putting their finishing touches on their DGC/Geffen LP. “We’re joining James Brown is the hardest working people in show business,” laughs Zuckerman.
With Half Way Home, their major label debut, the band is aware of their lives may change, but all look forward to the opportunity of making new friends across the country and across the world. “Our name says a lot about where we’ve been and where we’re going,” notes Zuckerman, “We never really want to get all the way home. Adds Barry, with a disarming smile, “We just want to make good music, open some minds and hearts, and maybe have some lunch.”
