by G. Jack Urso
EAT VINYL DEATH!
Ed Stasium,
sound engineer for Hot Hero Sandwich,
wore a button with those words during the recording sessions with the Hot Hero
Band. Somewhere between a curse and a challenge, “Eat Vinyl Death” is a battle
cry, a call to arms, and a reminder that rebellion is always at the heart of Rock
and Roll.
Nothing demonstrates
the power of Rock and Roll more than the music for Hot Hero Sandwich. Despite no recordings being released, every Hot
Hero fan will acknowledge the show’s memory was nursed along for four
decades by the remembered snippets and snatches of songs produced in the recording
studio. The music made no allowances for being a Saturday morning kid’s show. It
was straight-ahead, hard-driving, Rock and Roll. The music didn’t pander or
preach. It PUNCHED!
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For Hot Hero Sandwich, Ed Stasium was the
sound engineer in the recording studio with music director Felix Pappalardi and
The Hot Hero Band, helping to give the Hot Hero sound just the touch it needed
to sound authentic to teenagers who can spot a phony a mile away. As I’ve noted in other articles, the
soundtrack for the show has been what sustained the show’s memory decades. The
catchy melodies, hard-driving guitars, steady-thumping bass, pulse-pounding
drums, and soaring solos, were a far-cry from the corporate, tin-can, pop music
packaged for mass consumption on other TV shows. This was our music played the
way we wanted to hear it. When Casey Kasem came on during the opening credits,
it was as if it was just another break on American
Top 40.
Working on a TV
show and putting music to video was new ground for Ed at the time, but, as a
practical matter, engineering the sound for a kick-ass rock band for a TV show is,
except for certain unique tasks, is much like any other project. Whether it’s
the Ramones, the Talking Heads, or the Hot Hero Band, for an engineer, a
four-person band is a four-person band. Ed didn’t dial down his efforts just
because it was a TV show. Ed’s dial starts at 11. That’s why great artists kept
coming back to him, because Ed brought the same level of dedication to his
craft whether it was a Saturday morning TV show or a ground-breaking album by a
legendary band.
Ed Stasium’s name first popped up early on in the Hot Hero Sandwich Project in my interview with band member Robert Brissette. When Jimmy Biondolillo, the music coordinator for Hot Hero Sandwich, brought him up again, I began to wonder about Felix Pappalardi's right-hand man in the sound booth. As I have been gathering material for a profile of Felix Pappalardi for the Hot Hero Sandwich Project, I knew I had to speak to him. Fortunately, Hot Hero Band bassist Robert Brissette was still in contact with Ed and hooked me up for one of the most educational and enjoyable interviews I’ve had.
 |
| A small selection of albums Ed Stasium engineered, produced, and/or mixed. |
Get ready
audiophiles and Rock and Roll historians! First, Ed takes us on a deep dive
into the recording world in New York City in the 1970s, reviews exactly what a
sound engineer does, discusses how he got involved with Hot Hero Sandwich, provides insight into Felix Pappalardi’s role
with the show, and talks Space: 1999.
Hey, anything from
the 70s is fair game for the Hot Hero
Sandwich Project!
So, Rock and
Roll fans, point your speakers down, turn the volume up to 11, and get ready to
blast off — we’re about to visit Rock and
Roll: 1979!
____________________________________________________
Liner
Notes on Sound Engineering
 |
| Ed Stasium at work in Mediasound, NYC, 1970 (Edstasium.com). |
Ed Stasium: I did not even know an Emmy
was won by the show.
Ae13U: Oh yeah, a couple. One for Outstanding
Children's Entertainment Series and Outstanding Individual Achievement in
Children's Programming, plus nominations in several other categories [Note: Please see Hot
Hero Sandwich — A Second Serving! 1980 Daytime Emmy Awards for
more information.]
OK, to get started, Bruce and Carole Hart
made a point to hire young people, so I have to ask, how old were you during
the series production in 1979?
Ed Stasium: I guess I was 30 years
old. Yeah. I was born in September of ‘49.
Ae13U: For those of us outside the
industry, how would you define what a sound engineer does? I’m sure you could
write book.
Ed Stasium: There’s a lot involved, but
basically, when I was in an engineer position, and not producing, I would, you
know, set up the microphones and make sure that everything was recorded onto
the tape. We there was tape at one time. You have an assistant working with you
and you would have the talent of making things sound good. I suppose, making
sure it was done properly, making sure it's sounded good, that there's no
distortion. Basically plugging a mic in and getting it onto tape clean and you
sound right. From there once [you have] all the elements, you need to use multi
tracks. Back in the day, probably with the Hot
Hero stuff that was a 24-track tape machine and we would record in stages.
Some people
still think records are made with the band will just go out to a studio to
record. That doesn't happen. I mean, that that happened with the first Beatles
record and all the Sinatra stuff and Count Basie stuff and Louis Prima . . . that's
all live, right, the early Sinatra, not the later stuff, but that was all live
in the studio.
Ae13U: Old school indeed. It had its own
set of challenges.
Ed Stasium: The engineer’s job was to
make sure, especially during those days, there would be no multi-track. You
were mixing two mono or stereo, Mono in the early days. You would have an
assortment of microphones put into a desk, a mixer board, whatever you want to
call it, which would convert the microphone signal to audio, and that audio
would go on to, in the early days, a disc.
Ae13U: Right, right before tape. We’re so
used to editing audio using software, people forget we had to use a razor blade
and tape to cut and splice audio back then. When I tell my students that, they
look at me like I’m from the Stone Age.
[laughter]
Ed Stasium: Oh, man, you know cutting
tape saved my life! My engineer and I were in London coming back on that
terrible date, December 21st or 22nd, 1988.
I ended up spending a whole extra day editing songs together over the
budget and we didn't make the flight, so it saved our lives.
[Note: Stasium is referring to Pan AM Flight
103 which exploded on Dec. 21, 1988, over Lockerbie, Scotland, due to a bomb
placed by Libyan terrorists.]
Ae13U: There, but for the grace of God . .
.
Ed Stasium: So, the engineer basically
makes sure everything is set up and then you mix. Now back in the early
days with all the Sinatra stuff at Capital Records, or wherever they were doing
those recordings, he [the engineer] would actually do the mix with the
different microphones live. You have to know cues . . . sometimes the producer
would be there with you and you'd be following cues as to what instrument would
be featured for a solo, the piano, or a saxophone, or trumpet, and you place
them in the room where it would sound the best.
Ae13U: It sounds like you must have a
really strong working knowledge of how all the different brands of equipment
work.
Ed Stasium: Well, it's all the same. It
really is. You know, a preamp is a preamp. They sound differently, but they
don't operate differently. You know you have your input volume or attenuation
whatever you want to call it and get it onto the tape —nice and clean — and
then you now, especially with Hot Hero,
you know 24 track. So you do the backing track, you do the band — your drums,
the guitar, bass, and then you would overdub anything else on top of that, vocals,
percussion, keyboards, whatever you would do.
In one
particular session with Stephen Stills I remember doing . . . I think we did “Love
the One You're With” and he had played all the he played all of the instruments
on that at Mediasound . . . he did
everything on it. I don't know if he did a live vocal in the show or he did
sync.
Stephen Stills’ performance of “Love the One
Your With” on episode 4 of Hot Hero Sandwich.
Ae13U: It was all lip synced. I think you
probably could hear him singing while he was up there performing, but the mic was turned off
because they had all that neon. If the mics and instruments were plugged in, it
would create too much interference.
Ed Stasium: I don't think I ever saw
any of the shows. I was just in the studio recording this stuff and I was
probably doing other work as well at that time.
Ae13U: Stephen Stills appeared there as a favor for Felix Pappalardi, according to Mike Ratti.
Ed Stasium: Oh, OK.
Ae13U: All the guest music appearances, including Stephen Stills’, have
been uploaded to the Hot Hero Sandwich YouTube
channel.
Ed Stasium: Oh, you do? I haven't
checked that out.
Ae13U: They were recorded by the same crew
in Studio 8-H at Rockefeller Center that also filmed the musical acts on Saturday Night Live, so there’s some
great work going on there.
____________________________________________________
Hot
Hero Sandwich: 1999!
One little-known fact about the Hot Hero Sandwich Central YouTube channel is that it was built upon an older channel
dedicated to clips from Space: 1999 (which I have written about elsewhere on
Aeolus 13 Umbra in “Space: 1999 — The Complete Series Review”). In my research on Hot Hero, reading
through all the TV Guides, I discovered that one show that was often on in the
afternoons after Hot Hero, and sometimes on the same channel, was Space: 1999.
So, I removed the content and rebranded it Hot Hero Sandwich Central and most
of the subscribers stayed.
When I revealed this to Ed, he SUDDENLY ran
off camera and then returned with . . . Well, take a look below as we discuss
our mutual fandom for another 70s TV show.
____________________________________________________
ON
AIR
Ae13U: OK, before we got sidetracked on Space: 1999, we were talking about the
recording process for Hot Hero . . .
Ed Stasium: Oh yeah, well, I didn't get
to recording the band, doing the overdubs, and then you go into a mixing stage
where you would take all the elements that you've recorded onto the 24-track
tape and then you would you would mix it. You'd reduce it. You'd reduction that
into what was probably a mono mix. I don't think at that time stereo TV had
really caught on yet. So, I think that we would do a mono mix of the material
of the band . . . of the track. Maybe we’d
get a stereo mix, but I don't think so. I think it was probably all mono and we
would listen on little Auratone speakers to simulate a television speaker.
Ae13U: Those TV speakers were pretty crappy compared to what we have today.
Ed Stasium: I remember that one of the
things that the television wanted back then was to put a little more bass, a
little more bottom end, in the mix because when you would mix you'd adjust the
treble and the base in the mid-range to where it would sound good. So, we
listen on these small Auratone speakers and they always want the bass a little
bit more prominent because of the back then there were the we didn't have, you
know, [Dolby] 5.1 or any type of stereo
speakers hooked up to your TV. You just had the television speaker — a little
crappy 3-inch speaker. So, you wanted it to sound good on those suckers.
Ae13U: Jimmy Biondolillo also mentioned
that in his interview with me. Those old TV speakers were tiny. I remember it well.
Ed Stasium: I remember having a TV
monitor in the control room when we did the theme song because they had already
shot the video for the opening. I think the band either played to it or we did
to a click track, but it was the first time I ever worked with video and music
together.
Ae13U: The opening credits were actually
directed by John Nicolella, who was a director and producer for Miami Vice just a few years later. [Note: For background on the opening credits,
please read Hot
Hero Sandwich — Short Take on John Nicolella, Consultant/Location Producer]
Episode 7 opening credits.
OK, moving along, so right before Hot Hero you worked with the Ramones and
the Talking Heads and a bunch of other great bands you were involved with in Sire
Records. I'm wondering, listening to band’s music and other pieces on the show,
and maybe it's just wishful thinking on my part, but were there any kind of aural
cues, set-ups, techniques, or whatever, that you may have brought over from
your previous engineering gigs to help make the Hot Hero sound?
Ed Stasium: Good question, but in my
experience it's always make sure it's in tune. Make sure everything's in time,
make sure there are no mistakes in the performance, so you will just want to
make it as good as you possibly can. And you know, [regarding the Hot Hero Sandwich sessions] we weren't making albums
here. We are doing quick sessions, very fast sessions. Got to get it done quick.
I don't think the budget was all that much, you know, working with Felix was
great. He would guide them.
Also, I was the
engineer, right? So, I didn't do anything more special than I did, except,
listening in mono probably was the exception because I would always mix in
stereo, although in my early, earlier days I would make a mono and stereo mix,
I think probably up until around ‘78 or so. So, we would make a mono and a
stereo mix for the DJ for a single, especially. There would be a mono mix on one
side, on the other there'd be a stereo mix. On the other side, so just making
sure that it popped out of a small [TV] speaker, like I just mentioned our last
bit of the conversation.
Ae13U: Right, mono sound, and through small
speakers, still had to be taken into consideration.
 |
| The entrance to Mediasound in NYC. |
Ed Stasium: We worked in two different
studios. I remember we worked at Mediasound worked at Mediasound at Studio A,
up in the lounge as well, and we also worked in the studio called RPM. We did a
lot of work at RPM and we tracked I remember tracking the band there as well.
They had a nice Neve console as they did in Studio A and Studio B at
Mediasound. I don't know why I did get
into Mediasound because I was not a staff member. We gave RPM a lot of work
doing Hot Hero there. We did a lot of
overdubs. I think we probably did some mixing there as well because I remember
Bob Mason, the owner, he gave me a bonus check for all the time Hot Hero spent in the studio . . . It
was amazing. I was like, “What? Are you kidding me?”
[laughter]
They said you
deserve it and for bringing the work in here. I ended up doing a lot of work at
RPM over the years. Even on the second Living Colour record back in 1991, the Time’s Up, record. We did all the
overdubs we tracked in LA at A&M Studios . . . Then we went to RPM and we
did all of the overdubs and all the vocals, all the guitar overdubs, all the
overdubs, there at RPM when Bob Mason still owned the place.
 |
The Hot Hero Band in rehearsal at RPM Studio in Greenwich Village, 1979. Left to right: Richie Annunziato, Robert Brissette, and Mike Ratti (photo credit, Rich Annunziato). |
[Note: Robert Brissette discusses sessions in
RPM Studios in The Hot Hero Band — On the Flip Side with
Bassist Robert Brissette. Photos
of the band at RPM are available at Hot Hero Sandwich — On the Flip Side with
Guitarist Richie Annunizato.]
____________________________________________________
Ae13U: How did you get hired to be Felix Pappalardi’s sound engineer on the
show. Had you worked with him previously?
Ed Stasium: I had not. I had not met
Felix, but I was a big fan of Felix because he had produced he had produced Disraeli Gears by Creem, and Wheels of Fire, and I think he did some
stuff on Goodbye as well [Note: Pappalardi is listed as producer on
all those albums.] — he produced some of those tracks. But you know, Disraeli Gears was a ground breaking
record for Cream. It sounded great. It was engineered by the great Tom Dowd and
Felix had produced that, and so I knew his name and also he had been in Mountain
with Leslie West and Corky Lang, and those are really good records — and I
believe he produced those as well. You know, he and Gail wrote some of those
songs, Theme from an Imaginary Western,
which is really great stuff. So, I always, like, thrilled to be there.
Susan Planer,
the late great. Susan Planer, a great friend, tragically killed in a car
accident in in the 90s, going to a high school reunion up in upstate New York.
They slipped on some black ice and everybody survived except her. She the car
flipped or something. She broke her neck. Died instantly. Real, real tragic,
but a great friend. [Note: Susan Planer
was the influential and well-respected general manager of the legendary
Mediasound Studios in NYC.]
 |
| Susan Planer at Mediasound in an undated photo (Mediasound Studios NYC Facebook Group). |
Now, I have a
long since storied career which I won't even get into, but I ended up coming
back, I was in Canada. I was working
at the studio Warren Heights — an infamous recording studio in the Laurentian
Mountains. You know everybody rushing all their records there. I was on staff
for approximately just under a year, did some great stuff, met that a lot of
great people, hung around with the Bee Gees when they were doing the Children of the World [1976] which some
of the songs ended up on the Saturday
Night Fever soundtrack.
I came back to
New York to do an audio consultation for a telethon [with] Geraldo Rivera. The
drummer, my friend Alan Swartzberg, was a musical director and he called me up
and said “Ed, would you come down and be the audio consultation for . . . it was
called “One to One.” There was even a One to One benefit concert at Madison
Square Garden. It was to benefit . . . Geraldo was working for ABC-TV at the
time in Manhattan and he did an exposé about this place called Willowbrook — It
was a big exposé — It was a home for handicapped children. He went in there and
did the exposé, the kids were lying in bed in their feces and urine and just
horrible situation. So he started this “One to One” telethon and concerts. John
Lennon played at the concert at the Garden.
Ae13U: Right, the Willowbrook exposé. I
recall reading about that. That was groundbreaking. [Note: Rivera won a Peabody Award for the report in 1972.]
Ed Stasium: At this One to One
telethon, I think it was broadcast on WOR, but it was held at the in the ABC
studios up there on 66th, like Amsterdam, I think it was some or somewhere
around there, I ended up living on 78th between Amsterdam and Columbus in the
80s and 90s. But I think it was up there somewhere. So when I went to this
telethon, I left Canada for a few days and came down, stayed at my mom's house,
rented a car or I probably borrowed her car, I ran into an old friend, Tony
Bongiovi, who I met in 1972, and Bon Jovi and the previous manager of
Mediasound, was the manager of Mediasound, Bob Walters, building a new studio,
which was to be named Power Station. I was the first person on staff. They paid
my moving expenses. I came down.
And then for
different reasons, I left Power Station and the winter, I think it was November
of ’77, and I went independent. And because I had been doing some work at
Mediasound with Tony, Tony Bongiovi, I became friends with Susan Planer, and
Susan when I went independent, she started getting me gigs. My recollection is
that Jimmy Biondolillo, I think he asked Susan for a recommendation for an
engineer, and Susan approached me.
Ae13U: Which led your involvement on the
show. Are there are anecdotes or stories about Felix during your time with him
that may give us further insight into his dedication to the show or his craft?
Ed Stasium: He was very knowledgeable.
He's a talented musician, talented producer . . . I don't remember any
particular stories or incidents that happened. I just remember that we got on
really well and we worked really well together. We complimented each other and
you know, I would suggest something once in a while and Felix would, “Great
idea! Yeah, let’s do that.”
But he pretty
much let me do my job and he did his job and we were a team. I wish we could
have done more work, but we never did. I think I was in touch with him. I
probably still have a number of his in one of my address books.
Then he was
tragically killed by Gail [Delta Collins, Pappalardi’s wife]. She’s passed
away, not recently . . .
Ae13U: About a decade ago, I think. [Note: In 2013.]
Ed Stasium: She was kind of a trip . .
. Gail was a trip.
Ae13U: It was a complicated relationship.
In any event, this does help paint a larger picture. Did you have any further
contact with the Harts after Hot Hero
Sandwich?
Ed Stasium: As a matter of fact, she
[Carole Hart] offered me some work recording Sesame Street stuff, but I couldn't do it because I was kind of
busy doing Rock ‘n Roll at the time.
Ae13U: Well, considering some of the
legendary albums you worked on, I think we Hot
Hero fans can let that slide. Ed — I think I’ve taken enough of your time. Thank
you so much for helping us learn a bit more about Felix, the Harts, Hot Hero, sound engineering, and your
own fascinating career!
Ed Stasium: OK, Jack. Peace and love!
____________________________________________________
Concluding
Thoughts
 |
| Ed Stasium at home. Nice set-up Ed! (Edstasium.com). |
Knowing Ed Stasium’s discography, and discovering how much he engineered the soundtrack
of my life, I grew incredibly nervous about our interview; however, Ed couldn’t
have been more kind and gracious. Considering that the show was just one small
short-lived gig that probably didn’t even last six months out of a 50-plus year
career, I thought I would be lucky if Ed even remembered the series. Yet, not
only did Ed recall the show and his work on it, he gave us a bit of a tour of rock
history — history that some of which he produced himself. As a historian,
this type of primary source research is absolutely invaluable.
And, after all
this, if you still continue to doubt the life-altering power of Rock and Roll, my good friend, all I have to say is:
EAT VINYL DEATH!
And, also in the
spirit of Ed,
Peace and Love!
____________________________________________________
Tales
from the Hot Hero Sandwich Archives: Disraeli Gears
Ed Stasium’s
reference to Creem’s Disraeli Gears in his interview recalls a story how the album
played a part in Felix Pappalardi joining Hot
Hero Sandwich. A Nov.
4, 1979, Record World article
includes the following passage where Carole Hart tells the story how they came
to hire Pappalardi:
“We were breakfasting with a friend who's a
psychic just about the time we were looking for a music director and she said,
‘Carole, I see the name Felix behind your head.’ Bruce and our film editor
simultaneously said Pappalardi. We called him in Nantucket and he was working
for us the next night.”
When I saw the
reference Carole makes to “our film editor” I knew that could only possibly be
Patrick McMahon, the film editor for Hot
Hero Sandwich, later married to series writer Sherry Coben (both of whom
have previously been interviewed for Hot Hero Sandwich — A Second Serving! A Retrospective Interview).
Reaching out to
Pat for a little background, he graciously shared with me that he was indeed
the film editor friend of the Harts referred to in the article. The psychic was
a friend of his, Judy Needle from Ashville, NC, who he introduced to the Harts.
At the time, the Harts were just about to fire the music director they hired
for Hot Hero Sandwich, Gary Sherman,
who, while certainly competent and experienced, being in his late forties he
may have been a little out of touch with the late 70s teen zeitgeist. This was
noted in Hot Hero Sandwich — In Conversation with
Music Coordinator Jimmy Biondolillo, in which Jimmy discusses his interview
with the Harts and Pappalardi.
The Harts
were unfamiliar with Pappalardi's work as a producer, so McMahon lent them his copy of Disraeli Gears. Loving the album, the
Harts tracked Pappalardi down in Nantucket and a week later he was hired and at
work on the show.
McMahon,
however, never did get his album back . . . but I think he let the Harts slide.
● ● ●