 Hello and welcome to the drum history podcast. I'm your host Bart van der Zee and today I'm joined by Mr Mario Decutis who is the president of alternate mode Inc. Mario welcome to the podcast. Thanks for inviting me here Yes, it's an honor. We've been talking for a while and we have some mutual friends and you're someone who comes very highly recommended as a Really just a veteran of the industry who's done quite a bit which I'm excited to hear about Really when I think of you I think of the the cat percussion and the mallet cat and just the the incredible Innovation that you've you've created with that but on top of that you've also I've been a percussionist with Radio City Music Hall for a long time up until a couple years ago since I believe 1979 is that right? till yeah till 2020 till 2020 which a lot of things stopped in 2020 We know so alright Mario, so This is an interesting one because you've got so much cool stuff that you've done I'd like to just hear about your background. So why don't we jump in with? really the the beginning of your drumming and Journey and then we'll get into the business and and all the percussion stuff and and all that so so tell us about you okay, I Was started off as a drummer, but wanted to be a Vi player and I guess when I went to college I went to Bronx community and then Queens College Got a part of partial scholarship at NYU and I started studying with Dave Friedman I Discovered in college that my thing was an orchestral percussion. I wanted to Play jazz or play More mallets. It was more fun playing shows percussion than playing a triangle in an orchestra. This wasn't my thing so I went to college studying jazz and I started playing in some funk bands and my fingers used to bleed Because everything was rocking away and my vibraphone just so I had this incredible desire to get involved in electronics There was an article in modern drummer in the mid 80s early 80s About a guy in long metal where I live now Bill Katowski that was Making or about to make a mallet instrument So I immediately called them up and I drove up there And he showed me this gigantic thing that was millions of wires on it and It had some I believe additive synthesis kind of thing with simple oscillators But the DX7 had just come out and that just like rocked my world It rocked the whole music world. It was first time we were hearing FM synthesis beautiful sounds so I was Influential and telling Bill to abandon this thing and to make a MIDI controller Because Yamaha had you know, it's so far ahead in the sound department with that FM synthesis stuff. So he did and We became friends and I was taking control voltage in college So I was learning music. I was learning the Buchler system the morgue system, you know So I was having music concrete. I was having fun and all those things actually taking master courses while I was still in my bachelor's So Bill and I became really good friends and It wasn't too long when he decided to go into business that I became his partner. So we were partners from 85 up until 95 when Kat went out of business and In 96 I took it over Um, but one of the interesting things that happened 86 87 I was playing on this thing called the World Yard It was a little dinner both that went around Manhattan and they had the earliest mallet Instrument and I drove the kid the saxophone player home and he said to me I feel sorry for you man Why do you feel sorry for me your instrument sucks? That's not nice What does it suck? All the notes are the same length. You don't you can't bend notes You can't add vibrato. You don't have control of how you can give staccato. I brought and I said, oh my god It was like he changed my life that guy from then on it was about building a vocabulary in the instrument and It's been the thing that has been driving me since that day Luckily the thing about bill bill was an engineer not an end not a musician So I would just fill up his mind Constantly, this is how we should do this if we haven't do that and I would get like a chip the next day Try this out. Try this out Consider myself the luckiest guy in the world to be able to dream of features and can have it given it to you so I was in love with Those early cat days. Hmm. That's unbelievable. I mean, it's but you clearly have a brain for this kind of thing like for for a like I guess it'd be electrical engineering. I mean, what was your degree in in school? Was it something was it this type of stuff? No, I was a music major. Okay, no Concepts thought imagine and no idea that I was gonna get involved in any of this I just basically fell in love with with Getting involved with bill having an instrument fondly that that I could you know, they play to be heard and then what when I Started thinking about how can we make it more expressive? How what are the things that how can we? How is emotion described when you play when you think about it? Well, it's because you bend the note a little bit You add a little vibrato you add a little filter for all these little things can be quantified So it's been all that and the the jam cat the thing the hand drum that I created Had the most expressive stuff ever But it was beyond what a hand drummer was we can really warm a lot of compositional tool Sure, but but for me it was the ultimate expression and it was the first product Hardware product that didn't come from the cat days. It came from some of the cat engineers But my concept which was from learning from bill when you work with an engineer for 10 years You get very skillful in being able to communicate to engineers and that's what yeah, I know the gift that bill gave me Yeah, I mean, it's a different language. I mean it is a 100% different world, but it sounds like he I mean, it's it's interesting to me that he's not amused bill wasn't a musician but he still saw the Opportunity to create I mean really to create the vibes that were Electronic with his first design instead of the midi so that would be all everything in one The brain was inside of it. It had built-in sounds, right? That was his first But then you said no midi's the way to go. We got to control the things well He worked with he worked with star instruments back then way back. Do you remember star instruments? I've heard of it and I didn't an e-drum episode and that that is coming back the name Yeah, there's a little drum, but it had a step sequencer in there. It was kind of like an analog digital hybrid I mean that was bill and then he left and he started working for Hasbro Hasbro was gonna be making Milton Bradley was gonna be making some kind of a Digital xalaphone sure they had banded the idea and Bill said you know what I really want to do this And they got permission to take the project and he left them and created the cat got it Now when did you guys like go to market? When did you besides you just playing it? But what was the like, you know creating the business actually making this thing a Boxed-up ready to sell product well interesting thing happened at Radio City. There was a strike the orchestra had a strike is again in the late 80s or something and The orchestra got arrested in front of Radio City in our tuxedos, you know, it was just like this publicity stunt It meant nothing. We got it was just a stunt But when I was sitting there in the in my tux handcuffed to the violin player who was then 75 and I'm 28 You know like what am I doing? So I really got mad at music and I said I'm ready to do something else, you know I just had this urge that and when I started working with Bill I soon this so we decided that oh, let me start selling to you. I'll sell in my basement I know the guys at mayonnaise and we did that kind of thing and slowly but surely I got hooked into the selling thing hmm and I Started reading all these books on how to sell and books on you know, how do you create a rep for us? And so I became the sales force for Cat ink Sure back in those late 80s up until 90s 596. Hmm. Yeah, I mean you're you have that like Well, first off, you're knowledgeable But you have that from talking you on the phone for a while But I feel like everyone who comes in contact with you kind of becomes your friend like You're very personable where I could see that very much being like You would be a good salesman for it plus it sounds like you had the best of all the worlds where it's you know The instrument you're playing at Radio City Music Hall, which cannot be I mean, that's big one of the biggest You know shows in the world. That's kind of the top of the top. So clearly you're an incredible performer But yeah, I can totally see you being a great salesman for this, you know, I love the product. It was became Sonominous and when when cat went out of business in 95 I can tell you why that happened But when that happened, I couldn't stop. No, this is my instrument so I picked it up with a totally different mindset that I Didn't care about rep stores distributors anymore. I just wanted to keep it small so I could get back into playing more So at the time it was like you're doing what you're gonna sell direct the stores will never talk to you again The internet was just starting but the internet saved me and I was able to sell direct for You know 20 years got it And there's just only when more competition came in that I needed to get big brother involved sure You know back in the days in the 80s. It was really interesting time There was so many small American innovative companies doing incredible things up and it was exciting time Because you could a small company could survive selling that way. But what happened was the Walmart Mentality came in and all of a sudden Containers of coming in from China. So you needed mass Marketing and because there was mass marketing that had to sell to the masses So the quality of the product started going down Because every decision was based on when you save 25 cents by doing this I'm gonna get a thousand of those and we don't care about the features Because we wanted to make it work for everybody. It was the absolute opposite of what I wanted I wanted to make the best instrument. I never even thought or cared about what it caused I just wanted to make it and then to make it the best that I could so I could enjoy the most and Hopefully there'd be enough people to allow me to continue my game of hiring engineers to let me have fun in my basement Yeah, and let them do the you know the the actual building and putting together of the circuits and all that stuff You're the the creative guy and just to kind of clear it all up a little bit So so cat can you just give us a very simple like the timeline of things and we'll jump back and kind of go more through the history But how did that all go just so people kind of know the like then what the names of where we were at basically So it started as cat as katowski engineering. Okay, that was his first mallet instrument totally analog when he started to when I When bill was convinced that going to a controller was the way to go And we started working together and he hired people to put up thing the cat became the name Got it and we became cat ink. I think in 85 could have been 86 but I think we were officially cat ink in 85 and our big instruments then we did the mallet cat we did the The ditty which is the trigger the MIDI interface. We did the drum cat And then the trap cat and the trap cat is what killed the company Really? Yeah, what happened was? We started to say well, we need to get to a new level here. We need to make a turnkey so we Got together with the folks at Kurzweil Kurzweil with the Waltham not far from here Where's the the whole engineering team and we went to them say we want a synth a Sampler synth inside this instrument and Their director was all for it and we were gonna put stuff in that was like came out 20 years later but so with that in mind cat got large amounts of Loans Because the trap cat was gonna sell we were gonna be rich with this thing with the sound built in the best sounding engine 24 pads FSR Well in the middle of the project so we got the loan so all the loans are spent and the when you get alone in the bank You are certain. There are certain covenants that you have to adhere to so The engineer at Kurzweil decides to leave So when he left it put Kurzweil in this horrible place and they had to abandon our project So now we have an instrument that doesn't have sounds in it then The company that builds the sensors Didn't support the tails properly as it comes out of the track aboard and they started to snap and We didn't know until after we had hundreds out in the field to the field So they were coming back. So the product coming back going down stores all anointed us No sounds built in Unable to get the turns and the banks are seeing that they're coming back. They turned in their loan So ten years of work This disappeared in 60 days. Jeez It's a lesson for young entrepreneurs Entrepreneurs don't be so anxious to get that loan because if anything turns hairy you are fried Wow. Yeah, so they had their whole life there house everything in jeopardy At the same time I couldn't live without it My wife was a successful Realtor she was a manager in the second largest real estate say thing in Long Island. I Commenced her to leave her job to move up here and a few months later. We were out of business. Oh boy, so I Had to pick it up Yeah, but the goal was that it'd be here for a few years, you know that bill would help the bill help you with the transmit You know, he got himself another job right away and but No one wanted this to die Yeah, so the I found myself. All right after a year's time I started the emu folks Contacted me. Yep, and they helped me get back into production So they also helped me get it into stores They would get a trap cat in the store, but not sell them stands for the trap cat and The whole court it would go by and guitar center or somebody would say this thing isn't selling and I'd call up in you and say Where are the stands? Don't tell us how to sell So a year after a year and a half of that I Got everything back So emu was no longer the distributor and now it's by myself. That's what I said I'm done with stores. I'm done with reps. I'm done with everybody. Let's keep it small Let's really become small so I can enjoy my life and still keep the thing going Yeah, and that's what I've been doing. So in 90s 1996 my wife and I started Alternate mode smart. Yeah, and we and like I said, we managed to keep it going until The market changed and the suddenly realized I needed help Yeah, and then you connected with how Leonard correct who is who is Licensing the cat brand because that is a fan. I mean, it's famous. I mean your your innovative technology has really It's known and I'm not I feel very, you know, again, I've said it before but in that world with you know orchestral percussion and vibes and things like that that is outside of my world But even I know about the mallet cat. I mean it seems like an industry standard. Do you have a lot of competition? I mean, I don't know much about this world at all. Well, there was almost none at all and then there was a guy in the UK Jollison Different instrument completely And we both coexisted easily. We were both expensive making them and small You know, you know in our little factories but then Pearl came out with a mallet station and They did the thing that I talked about with, you know, the Walmart mentality They got a thousand of the may they got a made overseas and they brought the thing in and selling it cheaper than I could get the Metal for you. I mean, it was like one of those kinds of things So it was an existential threat So I used that as an opportunity to go to how let it it said They will bring the marketing To show the world that there's a mallet electronic mallet and something out there. Yeah, and we can piggyback because my instrument's better The good news is that they didn't do it, right? You know, yeah, sure, they if they hadn't done it, right, I wouldn't be here Yeah, at least in business. Yeah, but no the positive outlook you're having on it Which I think is smart is sometimes competition. I mean It's not it's a pretty niche market and for someone like like a big brand like Pearl to bring The attention to it and then people are maybe Searching it online and then they realize there is your brand. That is a good way to look at it where Yeah, then people maybe find you when I first came out sale stop. Whoa Where's the floor and then it just Right back where it was. Hmm interesting. Yeah, it's just a different a different headspace Yeah, and I got aggressive too. I have to admit I made videos showing What mine could do which I knew theirs couldn't so I am for the emphasize that kind of thing at the same time I the whole why it's exciting with the how lender thing is the appeal to make the next generation If I pull this thing off this next generation It's going to be it's going to revolutionized electronic percussion. Really like right now you are working right now We are working on it. Cool. I was working on it Independent of how led it up until the COVID and I could no longer for the engineers. I was with I Was hardware and software engineer with making a whole new stuff This technology has changed so much that you can get Thousands of levels of dynamics and you're playing it can tell you where you struck it on the bar Um, another for two of this thing that happened was I met a guy in Austria with a company called V sound V3 sound and We're working together on sound libraries So now I have a killer a killer vibraphone mallet orchestral percussion library killer hand drum library with the world percussion of latin percussion Asian percussion It's just like that and now we're working on a drum a drum thing as well Interesting and there's still controllers where where historically you would always have to have like a Outboard, you know a MIDI like a brain like a box that has all the sounds in it still I guess now people would probably hook it up to their computer. Well, that's the I say that's always been our Problem is that you have to give people to connect things. No, I want to make a turnkey box Yeah, you turn the thing on there's the sounds listen to it but it's gonna have a connection a USB connection to software because I'm I I've been working on a whole new set of Sequencing software All the see, you know, either if you look at a program these amazing programs like, you know digital performer able to live You know, they're wonderful super powerful to finish your thing but the Looper program has always been limited. You got these floor loopers that So I created this or I'm working on this thing called a catalyst That allows you to on the fly without touching your computer You can create loops of different lengths put them together. You can transpose them You can quantize them in subtle ways. You have a metronome. That's a rhythmic generator So that it improvises with you like little AI stuff going on to practice and I think that's The future especially when you combine it with a company like how Linda that has Publications. Yes. Yeah, so I'm hoping that the next generation will be so simple You'd be like a Casio keyboard, you know, Casio can sound pretty good their keyboards are pretty high-end now You know, but people don't consider that because it's so simple to use That's the way to get into every school in the country by making it simple to use I mean for most people as you're saying That's the barrier is like, well, wait, it would almost be like a kid would buy it by mistake Thinking it had things in it. Let's say a keyboard That's like an elisis midi keyboard and then they return it because there's no sounds in there Yeah, which you wouldn't blame someone for that, but it's like Having things built in is nice. There's just two almost levels There's a level of something that comes loaded with things and then there's the more professional one where You got to do the work to put a man where a pro would want his own sounds or her own sounds, you know You know, the younger people that could call themselves producers, you know that mentality They're into the technology. Yes, you know, they want the looping They want the the slicing and the rexing and they want all that but drummers By and large don't want that. You know, yes, some of them they'll go they'll buy a computer. They'll get you know Addictive drums or or tune tracks or sure, you know, great libraries But most drummers are very hesitant to take that on the field to take that on the gig They want it just turn the thing on and play it already. So I think that's where I want to go Yeah, from now on at radio city. We're using Four or five mallocats and drumcats and jam cats I mean this whole thing using five computers, you know backups on top of that. It's insane That's awesome. Well, how does a purist vibe purist, you know, per like orchestral purist How do they look at that again? I'm not in that world when when someone comes into radio city and sees all the electronics Which I think it's 2022. It's awesome. It gives you more options to put all these things in there How was it received from the you know, you know, the the purists out there? Well, it's interesting the young players that are coming in auditioning Julliard grads mad school grads, you know, all great players 90% of them have no prior experience with electronics So they'll do their auditions on acoustic timpani and on a member or something and then they come in and they're surrounded with this So there is a disconnect and I think there's the reason why there's a disconnect is because it's not properly taught in schools yet So in order for this to be successful really It the manufacturer needs to start looking as their primary one of the primary goals is to educate the educators Because and if we can with this new stuff and especially with this software where you can Teach people how to improvise in New new in different ways if you can create a syllabus that way and present it to some Young percussion instructors or jazz instructors now every year that school will start pumping out a new generation of drummers and percussionists that see that It's a valid art form. Sure. One of the bad things about electronics, especially drums Because of this mentality that they have to sell to the masses You make a three hundred dollar kid a five hundred dollar kid a seven. It's great, but it's shite It's you it's not musical enough to say this is my instrument They'll practice in the basement. They'll do it, you know in the dorm But how many times do you go to a concert and you see it just an electronic drum? It's pejorative in nature on a mallet instrument on this thing to me It's better than acoustic vibraphone because I can bend notes I can I can add vibrato I can control the gate in ways that you can't do with just a piece of wood or a vibraphone So for me if I had to be stuck in one room for the rest of my life with a vibraphone or a mallet cat There's no no question. Hmm, you know with this percussion library that we put Originally for the jam cat if I put on every octave of this mallet cat akunga a bongo a tumba a Quinto and you start playing you suddenly realize that you have four octaves of sounds and By starting to learn patterns You can create a groove of a whole section that you can't do one any other controller other than a keyboard Mm-hmm. Sure. So it's I'm learning now. It's like I'm learning how to play I've never dealt with I'm gonna play this combination of a you know of a dune back with a shaker or there's a shaker and I'm learning Whoa, you can create the imagination that The shaker was continuing or the triangle is can you know the or the bongos because what the way you you know do that? That boom, you know, it's gonna be there. So you can yeah, yeah And yeah, so I'm hoping in the next few months. I'm gonna be pumping out tons and tons of videos of Showing all these new sounds that I'm just learning how to play right now Well, I mean that raises the question too of you've been doing this a long time Like there might be other people who are in your generation who are Maybe like a little bit hesitant to try and get into all this electronic stuff even younger people. I mean Like you said you were coming up in music school and you just kind of got into this and you've relied on you know Electrical engineers and people like this But what would you say is maybe advice of people? Let's say people over the age of like 50 who who have no real background in messing with you know, MIDI and Controlling sounds and either in the percussion world or in the drum world or whatever But what what is some tips you would give for like, you know, how to shake that kind of fear of oh, I don't know I'm not good with computers. I'm not good with electronics Any advice? Yes. I mean, that's the goal of the next generation You don't need a computer. You don't need to know the language of MIDI If you see a little button that says vibraphone you click it Yeah, and they want marimba you click it it becomes that and and then I think what happens is You find your own voice and then you The instrument teaches you in a way if you allow yourself to space to Let it tell you where you're at and what you are and you stick with that Then you have now you're communicating with your instrument and you've found your voice Sometimes you think you want to be this but it's telling you you're this if you stay there and let it It's kind of like it's almost alive in a way It's your mind, but so I find that it's giving me a voice. Sure. It's and when I'm saying oh, I wish it could do this Hey, Chuck, can you put this in there? I got to find a way of doing that. Hey guys, I'm excited to announce I just became a partner with Drumeo and I can now offer a free 30-day trial of Drumeo to my listeners and viewers And I think you guys are gonna really like it find the link in my description for a free 30-day trial of Drumeo It sounds like too like you can like you're saying like like there's like, yeah You can it's pretty simplified or and it will be more simplified But it seems like you could do the bass level and make it sound great But then you could kind of dip your toe in a little more like you can kind of create It's sort of like a blueprint where you know people can do whatever they want with it If they want to get more into sounds and tweaking things and using computers. It's a very powerful tool It's my hope that how let it that we'll start finding ways to incorporate it with education so that When people want to get beyond just the preset the little preset of the sound same boy, you know That sound just lasts a little bit too long. I want it to be shorter That they can find a way of getting into the gate time of the note changing it, you know, those kinds of things So in my mind everything is drag and drop Sure, and I want to eliminate as much of the MIDI words as possible So if you see a picture of a deegan vibraphone and you drop it on the thing It sucked up those samples it put the right octave in a white place You know all that that I do but if someone wants to change it I'm going to give them the tool to go into the computer Interface see the on the screen change and then change that themselves. Yeah, there's something about MIDI that I mean I've had a hand I've had a fair amount of experience with MIDI with like, you know working in Pro Tools and the MIDI stuff there and You know like creating kind of background music for like videos or something pretty basic stuff But it's almost like it can be as crazy and involved as you want it to be like you can go nuts And you can program things to do anything you want with it like it's it's basically endless But it's it it's daunting at first all me not your not your instruments But just MIDI in general is sort of a There's a lot to it. It's a language. Yeah, it's a language and another thing that I noticed that Fear you said, you know all the people Learning to manipulate loops in real time Threatens drummers it doesn't have to For example, if you have a little file that there's this to do that But chap the doom tata check attack attack that the doom popper you suddenly realized I am just Playing this and I'm getting that that I could do that could do pop and then you can start building stuff and Become the creative process becomes the exact way when you're playing this Yeah, you don't have to always spend your whole life sitting down playing bass playing hi No, you can have a hi-hat just giving you that beat and you can so to me Exploring blues not in the producer way Well, it is turn on the thing and they think they got a groove Interacting with that groove in a way that you become part of that groove It's an exciting new thing and again. I'm learning because I came from the old school, you know, 70s 80s I was playing a orchestral You know Tiffany's I'll phone bells all that stuff. Yeah, I haven't touched that in those instruments in years though Do you have fun hopping? I was gonna say do you have fun hopping on real acoustic instruments or I mean you're like This is your business. This is your baby But like is it fun for you to hop on those every once in a while and kind of you know Go back to the the the olden days of instruments. I sold them all No, I don't miss them. I have to be honest. All right. Yeah, well, you're of course This is this is your world, but I mean, I'm sure some people you got it. You got always remember I'm sure you've felt that throughout your career of it's it's I feel like electronic drums and percussion I keep saying drums just because of the show in my background But electronic instruments and acoustic instruments are always sort of like it's it's one or the other It's rarely both together in general. What's your thoughts on on on those two different worlds coming together? I think that the real hybrid has not happened yet That it's been attempted several times by different companies in different ways, but it's not here yet Including us Although we're working on something. Well, you know, we had we were I was in a project with the Aquarian drums with mini tronics the company Frank even top was the Inventor of the facade and we got together created mini tronics and we went to Aquarian To put sensors inside the head. Have you ever seen that? I don't think I've seen that it's a head an acoustic head and Sandwich between inside that head is a layer of conductive ink ink that respond and then there's dielectric dots that separate a circuit and what happens is Juice is flowing through that thing and when you put your finger on it it creates resistance So by measuring resistance, you can determine how hard you hit or where you hit And you can do Hold and don't not and sustain Wow, you can't do that with piezo technology so FSR is a Interesting Tool to get expression now so we made these heads that have zones inside them What's cool about that is that you could be playing on the head you hearing the sound You will not get that electronic sound until you actually strike that black ink So you could have multiple so it's the first time that you have a triggering technology that doesn't interact There's no false triggering of any kind. Yeah So in our first attempt when you were working Well, I should go back a little bit. You said from cat. I was there was an adventure with KMC and KMC was going to use the cat name and they started we started working together We're talking about the future of making new stuff and then KMC sold it to Fender and Fender had all the stuff for a while and then Fender Sold it to DW. So my life just keeps on different hats, you know Same story different person. I mean, this is it's relevant right now, you know, and then after a while I think DW had too much stuff from KMC. They were selling the percussion and and the Gibraltar so They sold It to the the transfer the license the cat license that I had given KMC Fender DW over to how Leonard so that's just a little progression of things. Okay. Yeah, so then my hope was to make this hybrid drum set with aquarium Called them in heads and on heads and then alternate mode called them hybrid heads hybrid pads same product with this marketing differently But the same problem arose We had to rely on plugging into a rolling module or Yamaha module release module So we weren't ready yet. We didn't have all the tools in place to make it a turnkey Concept that is the key to success today. Yeah, especially because young people have Attention problems Gradification man, it has to really you know You can't expect someone to want to dig in and learn the technology unless I've already in love with the thing they're playing Yeah, so I have to create the love first So I'm hoping the next generation will have this kind of technology not another mesh head So that what I like imagine a drum where as you play from center to edge Just like an acoustic drum you're hearing the harmonic cycle change So imagine if a recording was able to capture all that so you start to get All of a sudden that drum won't it be very blurred Between what is acoustic and what is electronic right now? Yeah I mean because you've seen the whole progression from I mean going back to 79 through now I mean you've seen Everything basically covered in that in that world. I know it goes back a little further with even more Simmons I mean they would have made a high-end expensive FSR, you know, yeah, yeah, but you hear about how how kind of unpleasant those those early E-drums were to play on people's wrists and hands because it was like hitting just a pad But it was a progression you had to learn. Yeah when our hands hurt. Oh shoot. We got to do something about Yeah, exactly. Um, I want to talk a little more about Radio City Music Hall. I mean that is just such a cool gig that has to be It's like like I said, it's hallowed ground You now continue now you said you you you're not performing there, but you were still doing the programming correct for the yes all of the electronic Percussion stuff there. What is that entail? All what is that process of programming everything like I had to make sure that in the Theater it sounded better than the acoustic, you know, one of the problems in Radio City unlike Going to a concert hall the orchestra is on a Band car a literal car that's on wheels that goes up and down up floors It goes down into a subbasement when they need to push us in this concrete enclosure While they move all of it is a mutsunary So the volume was a nightmare to work when you were playing timpani or Piati when you're surrounded by a concrete So they needed to make changes for the volume. So they the drums Bass keyboard and percussion when electronic for the idea of mitigating sound. So that was the reason why and They didn't know that I was doing this. I never let them know all these years. So from 79 to the to the I don't know to the 2000 something or they didn't know and I got a call from someone saying hey, they're gonna put a mallet cat in Radio City They didn't know you were making the mallet cat. No, and you're playing there. I didn't want them to know I was I was enjoying my acoustic world stress free this play and go home So when I heard that they were gonna do that that's when they went to management I said dude, no, you're hiring me if you're gonna do like cuz and that's what happened So I got the best sounds that one can find on a computer To make sure that when you play timpani it sounded like timpani in the old it sounds Better than acoustic because like I said with all this moving. There's all these mic issues. He was a nightmare When my partner and I when I was playing acoustic tempani We would sit up in the in the mezzanine and we get discouraged because you couldn't hear what we were playing They you know when ourselves were playing we were listening sure I said When I listened to the With the electronics, I could hear when the player let go with the the dampened pedal I was able to hear the vibraphone sustain That's how good they got the electronics to to go through the you know million watt system whenever they have there so In that case the electronics were better than the acoustic because of those constraints Yeah, I mean electronics stuff things are set to cut more there The volumes are are kind of things are figured out a little bit more so I can totally see that and I was it was interesting I did an episode a while back with Warren odes on who plays on Broadway a lot and and Hearing about how much stuff is hidden in different rooms in the acoustics and it's moved around It's like yeah, that is a bit of a nightmare with microphones and electronics would just take care of that problem, right? Exactly, I mean I remember one of the shows that he was course letter something else playing This out of the bells are here and the guy's head is right here playing trumpet Yeah, at Radio City the French horns were here right in front of me and their bell would come at me And I mean it was horrifying to have those sounds smashing all day long. I mean not my hearing is shot Yeah So I loved having the ability to put a cat headphone on those big You know those headphones are like Muffs you guys are in pretty tight quarters. I mean, it's just it's obviously it's it's pretty pretty wild now It's so interesting that you were the performer, but then you're also the business owner Were you a little bit? Was it a little a little nerve-wracking to have your company your baby up on a huge Radius, right? Yeah, you know the saying you know you as good as your last performance Well after a while the conductors if something happened to the equipment It was the same as if I play bad And I felt in jeopardy whenever some kind of crap happened And in Radio City because of this going back and forth They have to unplug the The the plug and then go on battery power So they were these little spikes that a laptop would freeze Or the mallocat would freeze because we are we're running around and our shoes get static And you touch the metal and stuff like that always happen So I created this really complex redundancy system that if that went down you can play here If that went down you can play here if the computers went down step in the foot widths The next computer running can at the same time would take over Can't trust the mixes let's have two mixes if the mixer went down just that kind of the thing man Geez you you clearly and like I said before your brain has to work in a certain kind of way with The flow and I heard someone say you know my old boss at a recording studio would say you know When you're doing a lot of crazy routing with audio processing, whatever it is midi anything You know, it's like a flow of water and you kind of turn it this way and it goes this way and it goes this way and Which yeah, it's all simple and easy when you say it like that But when you're in the actual the literally the pit Doing it and programming it. It's not quite so easy. I mean it can get very confusing very fast I mean that's uh About as big of a venue as you can can get where the high stakes So what I'm demanding now from media city that if I'm not there That I need to have a training session with the percussionist that you're hiring Not the programming, but if this stops playing Is the midi cable connected? Let's start with the list midi cable. Yeah both the computer, you know those kinds of things Uh, and the problem is when notes are going by and you're not playing them You kind of panic And you have to go through some panics in your life to say no no no Stop just take it easy Work what what is that working? But that's not working. Oh, it must be this cable or That kind of thing or someone kick the adapter on the floor Yeah, I mean things have to go wrong At one point for I mean I have many examples in in the audio engineering world where something's gone wrong Even before I start these interviews I have always learned it's the simplest things of check how much hard drive space you have because I've done voiceover sessions historically where you know, again, I'm the engineer Oh, I just started a session and there was uh 150 megabytes of space on a hard drive which has eaten up like that There's simple little things you need to look for which you don't know unless you've been burnt. Yeah Um, you mentioned Brian lince when Brian left emu he went with muse receptor And like, you know, you know, I'm friends with Brian. So before I know it knew it Before the computers I had A half dozen muse receptors at radio city You know, they work great. You turn them on. Everything's fine. The problem with muse receptors was it was before they was ssd drives So it would take minutes for it to load up especially because we had to load the whole show and the concept that I created at radio city is rather than Keep on loading and sounds and worrying about things to go along with that load the whole damn show and And just access the sounds by calling up a different midi channel So it's all there. Let's to go wrong. You know, I had a situation once where the show was in pre pre starts It's gonna start any second the show starts with me doing an eight bar bongo solo on the drum cat And the electricity was So all the machines went down down and now they're starting to come back up And they called the show they didn't listen to me And the pit's coming up and I'm staring at the screen. I'm watching the little thing and like You know, I have a tambourine in my hand and I gotta play the solo I want a tambourine, you know Things like that when they happen, I mean, okay, so that's what the purest Percussionists who love their acoustic instruments, they're saying now and I gotta you know, I'm doing the devil's advocate thing They're going well, you don't get that problem with Uh, you know natural acoustic instruments, which oh sure you do you put your whole sort of bass drum Sure, there you go snare jump cracks. There's something always that goes wrong I think electronic stuff it is the way of the future, but I mean it has been it's not I mean it's 2022 It's not like I'm like, you know People I have to convince people that computers and the internet are good But we all know this but there's still I mean to this day anything you use. I mean it's I feel like it's you have to have the redundancy. We rely so much on Power, I mean really you to plug it in and batteries, but they're getting better now I mean way better, you know the technology has to change like, you know, we do but um Redundancy is key if I have an important show I have an extra malachite on my trunk or an extra computer Always it's like bringing an extra snare to a gig, you know what? I mean, it's just a different different kind of thing. Obviously you own the company so you can have that It's it's easier for you to bring bring stuff like that but now um So people listening might be kind of in this in the world of playing vibes and in Percussive more percussion stuff as opposed to just drum set players Do you do like do you have like, you know artists on your roster and endorsements? Or how does how does that work with people who might want to be, you know work with Mario in the cad days, we were that was a you know, we were Playing with the big boys. So we had the Vinnie Caliura in Dennis Chambers And you know, we had big people but when I took back over in in 97 or something when it went on my own It was just basically you want it you call me you have it It was yeah, it was a different kind of vibe now It's changing with how landed. Hey, we need young people How many times people want to see this gray hair guy playing on a mallet instrument? So if anyone's listening who uh Matt the but oh matt the baisy the the baisy baisy california young Player from uh, berkeley lives in california. He is a Fantastic modern electronic player cool. He's he's the i can think the best that i know Uh, so i need we need young players anyone who's really into wants to call me please because we're looking to make uh young people To attract more young people Yeah, i i just did the week before an episode about dixon drums and it's very much where There's certain brands where you kind of like, uh, there's opportunity and and like you're saying you Nowadays you need the young generation younger generation. I mean it could even be older people but you just need the The faces on youtube and instagram and facebook using it because that's how we all Find out about things is is the the brand recognition of some monster percussionist playing You know a mallet cat or anything that you've created. That's how you get Get to the younger generation and we need that to keep it all going We need to keep music playing That produces today Don't want to use musical terms don't want to use musical things They are produces not players and A lot of people are attracted to that because it's so easy to grab a baseline and drop it on the timeline and great And who listen to my composition? We have to get players to keep on playing. There's nothing like To have a relationship with an instrument and to play with someone and have that interaction with two players How can you you know garage band for me growing up was in the garage playing with other players and Uh, I think that's what's lost today. Yeah, I have found it I've been in situations in the studio as an engineer where it would be limiting Where I would be around singers and more people who have like theory backgrounds than me where I've never wanted to know theory more and and just I don't know more It wouldn't even be percussion. It would be just general music piano knowledge Then when you're sitting in a room with people who are really going back and forth with terms And you're just like and I'm sitting there. I mean, I were all drummers and percussionists So I you know, I love everyone who's a drummer and percussionist, but I'm like Man, I wish I could hang more with these I don't know being able to call out the note that they're singing wrong or something like that. I feel like Sounds cheesy, but knowledge is power. You know, it's truly It helps you stand out and I hope that that is the case for a long time where it's not just drag and drop Like you said it is But I I have hope for the future. I see a lot of people on social media Who are very great players who are truly knowledgeable. There's a lot of great people out there and I think there's there's a lot of hope Not to be an iconic list. I think that the way they're teaching music in schools are just wrong four years of species counterpoint and I mean Graduating as a performing percussionist and don't know what a MIDI cable is I mean, there's some real problems. I think in the school system because all it does is just Continue the thing that you're going to be one in a thousand to get an orchestral gig Or you're going to end up teaching this in perpetuating the same thing I think to be relevant today If I had a kid that wanted to go to berkeley was going to cost me a quarter of a million dollars to get his degree It would try to be for practical musical applications And that means so that you when you go into a studio, you you understand what's going on with the board when you're playing electronic You can play the electronic instrument Yeah It doesn't have to be your number one thing if you're marimbas, you're marimbas, you know, uh, I don't really like What I'm always have to do is hey, let me hear your vibe sound. I can't tell you how many basic shows and nam show Let me hear the vibe sound, you know okay, but This is so much more than a vibe sound. Hey, well, let me show you what it's like to play flute on this or or hey I'm gonna play guitar You don't sound like a guitar player if you play a little guitar voicings guitar players play opens Open so you gotta learn so each instrument becomes like a teacher when you hear yourself back and say hey, that didn't sound like a flute Oh my sustain pedal was down and I bled it a whole bunch of notes You don't do that on that kind of thing that there isn't a formal that I know of Training on how to be musical on different sounds other than so this is the kind of thing I was longing to see in schools and then there'll be life in performance I think young people would be excited To use what they're learning in their daily applications Sure Yeah, it sounds like best of both worlds where a man take that if you're in at berkeley or wherever Any of the great music schools? It's like once you get back to your dorm or your apartment or your house mess around with computers and make it your own And uh, that's how you stand out. You know what? I mean, I mean it makes some some crazy sounds and just have fun with it But so as we wrap up mario, when can people expect this kind of you know New stuff you're talking about the next iteration of what you're working on and and on that note Where can they find out about it? alternate mode.com join our newsletter and we send out new letters on a regular basis On how let it side cat percussion dot com How let it brings in lots of kits uh that have the cat name on it and there'll be new ones coming out probably Definitely the nam show That which I believe is april right now I'm hoping in the next month or two. I'll have an upgrade for the matter cat gd s One of the reasons why we have such a good following is that people buy an instrument to keep on using it for 20 years There's not many Companies that make an electronic instrument that stays that way for 30 years. I mean, yeah, it's essentially the same instrument That's why it's time for a new one because the electronics are getting harder and harder to find components and Technology has changed. So I'm really ready for that. Um, I hope to be releasing tons of new stuff on on the facebook alternate mode facebook stuff So, uh, the goal is what I'm which I'm hoping that people enjoy is that When I start playing I'm going to play the kunga part the bongo part the shaker part the bass part the guitar part The vibe part or the steel drum part and then they say wow, this is a whole different way of playing and practicing Because the first time you play Uh, uh on a company part and you listen to yourself back you go. Oh man, I'm so busy. This is crazy I would hate a guy who played like that You don't know that until you listen to yourself playing back and say my god I must have hurt people the way I played that it's that kind of thing So I'm learning now how to be a composer in my little practice sessions And I say this is really valuable. I wish I had that in school A little program to listen to yourself compose parts. Yeah So that's exciting for me. It's a growth thing for me. I'm nowhere near saying to this I'm learning But it's uh, I don't mind sharing my learning and you know in public to see Yeah, how it how it grows totally it holds you kind of responsible and that's a great way to look at it You usually don't listen back to yourself and go. I should have played more notes But um, that's cool. Everything will be in the description all of the alternate mode links and mallet cat and drum cat all that stuff the howl entered links I'll share and mario's facebook and all that stuff And then mario's going to be kind enough to hang out and record a patreon bonus episode where we are going to talk about his 1979 audition for radio city music hall, which I think will be an interesting story And I'm excited to hear about it. So if you guys want to hear that, um, you can go to patreon.com slash drum history podcast Or go to my website drumhistorypodcast.com There's a little button to click and you can check out that and like 65 or 70 other bonus episodes So there's lots of cool stuff there. Um And I want to thank you. It's very nice. Very kind of you to think of writing me Thank you very much. Well, the the the first big thank you Beyond you goes to our mutual friend barry james who has been going through some health issues But barry's been he's been talking to me about getting you on the show for I want to say Maybe three years now plus uh, and it you know, we we we finally made it happen But we I really hope barry is you know pulling through and and doing well and I'm sure he's listening right now So, you know, we love barry and I hope he feels better. Love you barry. Yep. Awesome Cool. Well mario, thank you for being here. Thank you so much