Kevin Gilbert

Kevin Gilbert biography
Kevin Gilbert was born in Sacramento, California on November 20, 1966. For the first 13 years, he lived a nice, comfortable life - first in California, then in New Jersey, and then back to Southern California. But then something changed. No one’s been able to figure out exactly «what» changed, but according to his brother Greg, «he ate less, slept less, read more, and composed more.» His first set of compositions that are worth mentioning were released in 1984 under the moniker NRG. Kevin was still in high school at the time. Working with Jason Hubbard, this progressive rock LP showed a full range of material, from the sarcastic «Welcome To Suburbia» to the introspection of «Staring Into Nothing.» Several albums of additional material were recorded at that time, but none have been released to date.

After realizing that progressive rock and flashy keyboard solos weren’t his thing, he spent years working at TRS Studios in Sunnyvale, California, soaking in as much as he could about the inner workings of how to make records. Through his association with TRS Records, he met Stan Cotey, Scott Smith and Chris Beveridge - and the band Giraffe was born. Originally a project between Kevin and singer/songwriter Robert Ferris, Giraffe («Gi» from GIlbert and «raf» from Robert A. Ferris.as the story goes) made its’ home at TRS and recorded 2 studio albums - «The Power Of Suggestion» in 1988 (which was self-produced) and «The View From Here» in 1989. Released as a very limited run of only 500-1000 copies each, both CD’s sold out almost immediately after they were released. They are now highly sought-after collector’s items.

After the release of «The Power Of Suggestion», Kevin entered Giraffe into the «Yamaha Soundcheck Competition» in Los Angeles - a contest designed to help unsigned bands gain visibility in the music industry. The band won first prize. The next year Giraffe flew to Tokyo to go to the contest’s finals - the Yamaha «Band Explosion» contest. The band took second prize. Although they didn’t win, the show in Tokyo was not only special in the fact that it got Giraffe to be in the spotlight but one of the judges - Patrick Leonard - took a liking to the Giraffe front man. Patrick, known for his workings with Madonna and Julian Lennon, was impressed with Giraffe and immediately wanted to work with Kevin. He agreed and disbanded Giraffe soon after the Tokyo show.

Patrick Leonard brought in Guy Pratt, Tim Pierce and Bill Bottrell and Toy Mati…Kevin Gilbert was born in Sacramento, California on November 20, 1966. For the first 13 years, he lived a nice, comfortable life - first in California, then in New Jersey, and then back to Southern California. But then something changed. No one’s been able to figure out exactly «what» changed, but according to his brother Greg, «he ate less, slept less, read more, and composed more.» His first set of compositions that are worth mentioning were released in 1984 under the moniker NRG. Kevin was still in high school at the time. Working with Jason Hubbard, this progressive rock LP showed a full range of material, from the sarcastic «Welcome To Suburbia» to the introspection of «Staring Into Nothing.» Several albums of additional material were recorded at that time, but none have been released to date.

After realizing that progressive rock and flashy keyboard solos weren’t his thing, he spent years working at TRS Studios in Sunnyvale, California, soaking in as much as he could about the inner workings of how to make records. Through his association with TRS Records, he met Stan Cotey, Scott Smith and Chris Beveridge - and the band Giraffe was born. Originally a project between Kevin and singer/songwriter Robert Ferris, Giraffe («Gi» from GIlbert and «raf» from Robert A. Ferris.as the story goes) made its’ home at TRS and recorded 2 studio albums - «The Power Of Suggestion» in 1988 (which was self-produced) and «The View From Here» in 1989. Released as a very limited run of only 500-1000 copies each, both CD’s sold out almost immediately after they were released. They are now highly sought-after collector’s items.

After the release of «The Power Of Suggestion», Kevin entered Giraffe into the «Yamaha Soundcheck Competition» in Los Angeles - a contest designed to help unsigned bands gain visibility in the music industry. The band won first prize. The next year Giraffe flew to Tokyo to go to the contest’s finals - the Yamaha «Band Explosion» contest. The band took second prize. Although they didn’t win, the show in Tokyo was not only special in the fact that it got Giraffe to be in the spotlight but one of the judges - Patrick Leonard - took a liking to the Giraffe front man. Patrick, known for his workings with Madonna and Julian Lennon, was impressed with Giraffe and immediately wanted to work with Kevin. He agreed and disbanded Giraffe soon after the Tokyo show.

Patrick Leonard brought in Guy Pratt, Tim Pierce and Bill Bottrell and Toy Matinee was born. The band spent close to 3 months together and the resulting self-titled CD Toy Matinee was a release in 1990 on Reprise Records. Sadly, this incarnation of the band was purely a studio band. When Kevin noticed that radio stations in the Los Angeles area were playing «The Ballad Of Jenny Ledge» (a true story of a former girlfriend of his leaving him for an Elvis impersonator) and «Last Plane Out» - he wanted to play live in support of this release. Unfortunately Patrick did not. So, he did what any struggling musician would do - he formed his own band! Joined by such people as Marc Bonilla and a little-known keyboardist (and then girlfriend) named Sheryl Crow, Toy Matinee toured up and down the California coast line to mixed reviews. The band was dropped by Reprise Records after the tour due to a lack of record sales.

In 1992/93, unhappy with the record business, Kevin sought refuge in hanging with friends and writing songs purely for the sake of writing them. Coined «The Tuesday Night Music Club» - this club would get together one night a week at Bill Bottrell’s studio to drink heavily, get stoned, and write tunes. This «music club» - which featured Bill, Brian MacLeod and David Baerwald amongst others - wrote over a discs’ worth of material. It was Kevin that brought Sheryl to the TNMC. According to a recent interview with Brian Macleod by Wayne Perez (Kevin’s «official» photographer), it was noted that Sheryl was signed to A&M records and her original album was turned down. So, according to the Perez interview,

«.she was down and out about all that, so Kevin wanted to cheer her up. He said «Why don’t you come to these Tuesday night jams and forget about your record and just make music with us?» So she came down and she was a total sport. Totally hanging with the lads . . . doing whatever. Somebody would have a topic «Did you see on the news today, Bush did this . . .» «Oh, let’s write a song about it.» So whatever came up.’

Making a very LONG story very short, the band recorded an album with Sheryl on vocals and Sheryl took the tapes to A&M, who released the album in 1993. Sheryl called the album «The Tuesday Night Music Club» and the rest, as they say, is history/infamy (and not meant for this bio).

The next year was a very important year for Kevin. A true fan of progressive music, Kevin had a burning desire to perform Genesis’ masterpiece «The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway» in it’s entirety. This wish was fulfilled at ProgFest 1994, where Kevin, with a reformed Giraffe (containing a then unknown Nick D’Virgilio on drums) wowed the audience with a performance worthy of Genesis themselves. This show, although never officially released, has become the stuff of legends.

At the same time that Sheryl and the TMNC were working on her debut CD, Kevin was working on his own album of tunes he’d be writing off and on for a number of years. The results manifested themselves in early 1995 with the release of Thud via PRA Records. The album took the ideas that first materialized in Toy Matinee to a different level altogether. Although darker and more introspective than Toy Matinee, anyone who heard the album loved it.

The album made a [very] small splash in a gigantic pool of releases that year and was about to fade into obscurity.until Kevin got wind of an Atlantic Records tribute album to Led Zeppelin called «Encomium.» He quickly recorded Kashmir in 36 hours and submitted it to Atlantic for inclusion on the CD. The record execs at Atlantic loved the song but they could not add him to the roster because he wasn’t a «name» artist. So, Kevin played the song live one day on «Mark & Brian» - a syndicated morning radio show, broadcasted out of Los Angeles. The song started getting airplay and was a modest hit in the Los Angeles area.

With the release of Thud, Kevin decided to fulfill a life-long dream - to record a rock opera. Working closely with Nick D’Virgilio on the project, Kevin worked like mad on this project. The concept/semi-autobiographical project is the story of one Johnny Virgil, a broken rock star that battles the demons of stardom and the music industry and comes to peace with his life at the end.

Unfortunately, this was not to be the case with Kevin. Sadly, he never got to see the results of his dream finalized. Kevin Gilbert died on May 17, 1996, of accidental asphyxiation, leaving the project unfinished. After his death, Jon Rubin and Nick D’Virgilio worked for years on the album, picking up where Kevin left off, finishing the album in late 1999. The album, entitled The Shaming Of The True, was released in 2000 by the Estate of Kevin Gilbert and through www.kevingilbert.com. It was critically acclaimed and won a Grammy nomination for its elaborate packaging (the first issue of 1400 was in a beautiful 40 page hard-bound book).

In 2002, the Estate of Kevin Gilbert released The Kaviar Recordings, featuring

Biography written by Michael Ostrich.
www.kevingilbert.com