MORE HISTORY

Helga Lind was John's Grandmother and his first musical influence. She recieved her music degree from the University of Washington in 1922 and went on to perform and teach. She provided live piano accompaniment to silent films in the 20's before sound "talkies" became prevalant. It was her astonishing abilities as concert pianist that inspired John as a very young boy. She frequently took him to hear concerts at the Seattle Symphony which were absolutely thrilling. She always provided him encouragement in writing classical pieces for piano & orchestra which is his first musical love.

Favorite composers of John's are Rachmaninov, Brams, Bach, Kabalefski, Motzart, Remeau to name a few, all of which he studied in earnest in his early years. The discovery of guitar at the age of eight brought formal study in addition to piano. Later, when blues and boogie-woogie were discovered, both the piano, Hammond Organ and guitar were taken to a whole new level. Artists like Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Back and the fabulous keyboards and arrangements of Emerson Lake and Palmer, along with the jazz organ works of Jimmy Smith provided a major keyboard influence. John also thrived on Europe's "progressive rock" groups who's technical musicianship, spohisticated compositions & insturmentation like Gentle Giant, Kraan and many others served to further John's creative influences. Thankfully John possessed the dexterity to perform these artist's material note for note, and by that time even more fortunate to have been in the company of drummer Todd Kasper and Bassist Keith Lowe who were equally able to perform these feats along with him while concentrating on stretching the boundries of original compositions. Movie scores by John Williams, Jerry Goldsmith, Alexander Courage, the classic B horror and sci-fi of the 1950's and many others were also huge influences at that time, and continue to be so.

GROUPS/LIVE PERFORMANCE

The first live group was born out of the basement of John WF Goode's parents in the 1970's, called MIND. The band performed beautiful covers of the Allman Brothers, Stones, Hendrix, and many more plus the above mentioned ELP, along with earlier Emerson material from "The Nice". MIND was eclectic, as it was extremely rare to hear young teenagers performing such complex pieces with complete control & ease. The group went on to become extremely popular & performed regularly at many official and non-official functions over the next few years.

Anarchy Express: with bassist Keith Low and drummer Todd Kasper making the transition with John out of the group Mind in the early 80's. As a power trio Anarchy played progressive, avant garde jazz, jazz-rock, with heavy emphasis on original music in the flavor of Hendrix, Jeff Beck & Frank Marino. as well as exploring the keyboard musings of keith Emerson like pieces. Always writing, always pushing the envelope technically & physically with original compositions, Anarchy Express morphed into a hard working road-house gigging blues & rock type group in the following years with the addition of lyricist/vocalist Tapeni Suianoa, as well as collaboration with bassist Bobby Gene Riddle that produced some outstanding originals throughout the 80's and 90's.

Cobalt Hook formed as a progressive blues band in the mid 90's, using traditional blues formats in unusual arrangments that continued John's trend for exceptional original material. Cobalt Hook was a very hard working group, with many years of four-night-a-week schedules in and out of clubs and private shows.

The Blutonix and Guitar Maniac albums showcase the many flavours and winding twists of guitar-based progressive rock and blues.

More recently, John reunites with Keith Lowe, Todd Kasper and Tapeni Suianoa to explore the Hammond based power trio with vocals.

Throughout these years hundreds of hours were spent in the studio composing and recording original material for albums and sound tracks--the more complicated, clever & ingenious the arrangements & instrumental movements, the better. As an on-staff composer at a major recording studio, too many jingles, radio ads and general video sweetening projects were scored to keep count. Most of these recordings were in the day of huge 2 inch 24 track analog tape. Sync to picture was obtained via fisk tone linked to a big tube TV monitor with time code. Delivery was achieved by mixing to stereo two-track on 1/4 inch tape. How times have changed!

Barefoot yes, on a hot day in the studio........Right: John W F Goode & Erik Walton (on sax) 1982