“DO YOU STILL DO THAT THING WITH THE F***ING KNIVES?”…

…and other questions for keyboard colossus KEITH EMERSON

Keith Emerson Band Featuring Marc Bonilla is the new reunion album of the ELP keyboardist and Los Angeles Guitar Institute Of Technology axeman, Marc Bonilla, who worked together on 1995’s Changing States. Tim Jones caught up with them in the bar of a West London hotel.

How long did the album take?

Marc Bonilla: We started writing in March 2007. We’d owned the same book of ghost stories as kids and it was in my studio, and Keith saw it and said, ‘where’d you get this book’? There was a story in it, The House Of Ocean-born Mary, and we thought we should make up a suite around that premise.

KE: I did a lot on the Korg Oasis and synthesisers, and Steve Porcaro (Toto) heard the first recordings and he said, ‘you know what people want to hear? That sound you had with ELP’. I said, ‘oh, not that old shit’. But he said, ‘no. Play the Hammond and Moog. I was reluctant at first, but Marc encouraged me. We were listening to his collection, Nine Inch Nails, The Mars Volta, and that helped, using old instruments with new production.

It’s my format of a strong 20-minute opus and then individual pieces – light, humorous or romantic. Eclectic.

Is there much still in …

by Tim Jones
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