Terry Bozzio and Pat Mastelotto have much in common. They’ve both worked with legendary rhythmic compositional masterminds’terry with Frank Zappa, and Pat with Robert Fripp in King Crimson. They both left Los Angeles after the major earthquakes of the ’80s, ending up in Austin, Texas. When they finally had a chance to get together, the obvious thing to do was – play! And play they did, creating a totally improvised acoustic percussion recording simply titled Bozzio/Mastelotto. That album led to a concert at Austin’s One World Theater on January 18, 2003. The sold-out show was filmed and recorded in surround sound for a forthcoming DVD release.

“We got together on the phone first,” Pat explains. “After gabbing for hours, we decided to drop over to each other’s home studios – our garages. There was no concept for me, just hang, listen, and play.”

Terry adds, “I really admire Pat’s work, especially with the King Crimson ‘ProjeKcts.’ We got together in my garage with a lot of our percussion instruments and started playing without any preconceived ideas. Then Pat did a lot of creative editing/assembling. And then we got together with engineer Bill Munyon and mixed, added effects, etc. The only overdub is my sick 3/4-scale violin playing on ‘Jack Benny.’ Advertisement

“The sold-out concert was incredible,” Bozzio goes on. “We brought all our acoustic instruments, and once again it was total improv. Pat did use additional electronics, and I used a looping device for ambient flute/percussion accompaniment.”

When asked how they decided who was to play which instruments, Mastelotto replies, “Whoever grabbed it first!”