Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project

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Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project News #4

Happy New Year to all friends and supporters of the Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project!! Much aloha and thanks to all of you - whether it was a cash donation or merely words of encouragement - any way we truly appreciate every bit of support we get from our friends and community. It's your enthusiasm that drives our project forward. Mahalo to all of you.

This has been an interesting stretch of time for the CCRR Project. Our original core band is still rockin' with the same personnel. (They now call themselves Cellar Door.) The guys get better all the time, particularly since a couple of them have started studying music at Hilo High with Wendell Ing. Ironically, the better they get, the more self conscious they are about their faults. This is pretty classic stuff and no real surprise to anyone who has played in a band. But it does make managing them that much more difficult. Right now all they want to do is woodshed and all Caki and I can do is wait for them to be ready to gig again.

Sadly, our girl group, The Flaming Tampons Of Death, broke up. (And BEFORE we got them to do a T-shirt!) The drummer moved to Alaska and so far we haven't found a replacement for her. Kaikea Blakemore, the singer/guitarist for the girls' band is an extremely talented young rock n roller. Caki is trying to help her get an internship with a New York based magazine this summer. To earn money for that trip, we've been helping Kaikea sell various duct tape items that she designs and produces. She can do custom designs of wallets, guitar straps and handbags and the stuff is really cool, durable, waterproof and very reasonably priced. If you are interested, please contact us for details.

Most of our focus this fall went into our second Teen Dance - the Almost Christmas Teen Dance which we held on December 3 at the Cooper Center. In addition to the handful of kids that we work with regularly, we also try to do projects that benefit as many area kids as possible. There really isn't much for them to do in our little community. But with lots of help and timely donations we were able to show 43 kids a great time. Here is an excerpt from the article Caki contributed to our Volcano Newsletter about it:

"The Almost Christmas dance was attended by 43 Volcano area 7-10 graders Friday, Dec. 3rd at the Cooper Center. DJ "JE" turned the room into a mean teen dance machine after chaperones Darren Campbell and Keoni Kramer melted the ice with some very funny dancing...

"Quite a few touching Christmas cards were made for Margie Perez'son Tyler, who is stationed in Iraq. His company has some other Hawaiian members. We collected some candy from attendees and are sending the soldiers a big Aloha package that we hope will arrive in time for Christmas. One of our favorite cards shows a snowman, and says "United we stand, separated we melt." Robert & I feel that no matter what your views are on this war, we must all have compassion for the people who have been called to fight it...

"It truly does 'take a village.' Everywhere Robert & I go people thank us for the teen dances we have organized. But the truth of the matter is, we couldn't possibly see them through without A LOT of help from an enormous group of people."

Of course Caki's absolutely right. To accomplish anything we have to lean on so many people for help. More often than not people volunteer time, money, goods without question. This is probably the most gratifying aspect of what we do - to see our friends and neighbors' generosity over and over again. WE are truly blessed to live in such a cool community and to have such great friends. We wish all of you a very Happy New Year!!

Aloha Rob and Caki Kennedy

for more details about CCRR Project
to Jam With RobK
and for a good time in general.
Big Changes coming in 2005
Stay Tuned

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Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project News #3 3/04

Because of hard drive troubles, it's been awhile since I've had a chance to write to many of you. Worse still, I lost my email address book so I lost a number of addresses completely. For that reason, I ask those of you that DO receive this message to forward it to our friends that might be interested.

There have been a number of interesting developments since I last did a newsletter. First of all, Project Plague became professionals, doing their first paying, public performance in Hilo back in December. They did two sets, before and after a showing of the movie SLC Punk. The first set was AWESOME. The Plague tore it up in front of a small but very enthusiastic crowd. It's hard to say exactly what undermined the second set - it could have been how dismal the movie was or perhaps that the guys put all their most difficult songs in the second set - whatever the reason, the guys didn't play very well. Ignoring the fact that they made two bucks each, the band dissolved into a classic set of interband fireworks. The drummer quit - temporarily - and then one of the guitar players got the boot. Shortly after, one of the other guitar players - and the lead vocalist - moved. Fortunately the core threesome that has hung in there from the beginning of the project continue to develop their hard metal/punk sound. They are now calling themselves Lethal Dreams. You can check out their new website:

http://www.lethaldreams.malnourishedism.com

All along the size of our group has expanded and contracted. Various kids hang out and jam, some more seriously than others. I can usually tell if they're truly interested if they are willing to participate in the yardwork we do. So far we've earned over $800 - using the money to pay for the repairs of donated equipment, buying sticks, strings, cords, and covering general operating expenses. The group has decided to pool their labor and save up enough money so Kai Fernandez, the band's drummer, can get a drumset of his own. We got a great price from our supporters at Hilo's Music Exchange for a Yamaha five-piece drumset and the group has earned almost half the money Kai needs. A few more weekends of yardwork and Kai will be in business. Meanwhile, my old Workdog pal, Scott Jarvis, donated the cymbals, throne and cymbal stands that Kai will need to flesh out his stock kit. Big thank yous to Scott.

In the beginning of February, I got an interesting new challenge when Matthew Bowers joined our project. Matt is nine and not particularly interested in punk rock. He got an electric guitar for Christmas and wanted to learn how to play Skynard and BTO. He's a very serious kid even if his ambitions are kind of funny. Matt's needs are different from the other kids I've been working with. Fortunately, the Cooper Center is large enough that I could find him some semi-quiet space. I've hooked Matt up with Adrian Hinden - a local musician here in Volcano - who is teaching him guitar basics every Thursday in the Coopeer Center kitchen.

Perhaps the most exciting new development in the project is that a couple girls from Volcano have approached me about starting a girl's rock band. Fortunately, there is some free time at the Cooper Center on Wednesday afternoons, and even more fortunately my charming, talented spouse, Caki, is available to help that day. So - as of last week - the CCRR Project has expanded to three days a week and we are now forming our second band. The girls will do yardwork with us and Caki is exploring other fund raising ideas.

Now more than ever - because our group is growing - we can REALLY use any musical equipment that you can spare. We have recieved several guitars, a few amps, various efx boxes and miscellaneous drum equipment so far. We are using everything we have gotten. We are able to offer our donors a tax deduction on their gifts because we operate as part of the Cooper Center, a nonprofit organization with a 501C3 designation. We need ANYTHING that can be used to make music. Please contact me if you care to make a donation.

My new record, The End Of The Earth, is now scheduled for release in July /August on Orange Recordings. You can keep up with all the latest Orange and RobK news at: http://www.orangerecordings.com/robk.html

Thanks to everyone for their interest and enthusiasm. Stay healthy and stay in touch.
Aloha
RobK

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Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project News #2 11/03

Aloha Friends A lot to be thankful for this month. First of all Project Plague News: We got our new drums courtesy of the Volcano Rotary. Almost instantly the band shifted to a higher gear. The guys were totally ready for their first public gig - opening for national blues sensation Jimmy Thackery! It was a benefit for the charter school that half the guys go to. Plague played after the Lava Lizards and before Jimmy. They had a lot of the crowd dancing and going wild. A fine showcase! Then our local community group, Volcano Community Assoc., voted to match the funds that the guys have earned doing yardwork. We cleaned out the VCA budget for youth projects ($500). What a cool community we live in that they've stepped forward with drums and this great monetary support. The five hundred is being used to repair two amps that have been donated to us and to buy a new guitar amp. All the amps will be the property of the Cooper Center. (It's their 501C3 that I opperate under to make the donations tax deductable.) That means that our community center has its own smoking rock n roll rig that will be there for the next crew that comes along after Project Plague have moved on to bigger things. Speaking of bigger things, we've got our sights set on playing some of the hard core gigs that have been popping up around our island. We've been checking out the competition on Friday night band trips and we can see that Plague is pretty close. We did an impromptu gig on the side of the highway on Hugs Not Drugs day about a week ago and got a great response from the community. Right now, the guys need originals bad and have worked up one good one so far. Recent cool donations from our supporters include a BSR bass, a smoking little guitar and a little key board. Super thanx to Jimmy F and Mal! In other news, it looks like I have made a deal with Orange Recordings to release my own record that I've been working on since we split NYC in 98. It's called The End Of The Earth and there's a lot of you fine people representin'! Check it out!

It's worth getting on the Orange mailing list, Ron always has something of interest going on. So that's whassup this time around. I hope all of you are healthy and having fun! Alohadios
RobK

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Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project News #1

The Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project began January 2003 when 5 teenage kids from Volcano, HI asked RobK to help them start a band. Besides the inconsequential fact that none of the kids had any musical experience whatsoever; there were some REAL obstacles - the two most obvious being no equipment and no place to practice.

Having no equipment was not intimidating to RobK who had spent a good portion of his career with little more than a bass guitar to his name. He was able to borrow a couple amps, collect some drywall buckets for percussion, and within weeks the band was ready to begin rehearsals.

Rob contacted Betsey Mitchell, who administrated the Cooper Center, and she was happy to make the facility - and it's PA - available to a group of local kids. Betsey suggested that Rob "formalize" the group by joining the Cooper Center Council as a member. By joining the Cooper Council - a nonprofit organization - Rob was able to offer tax deductions for donated equipment. He sent emails to all his contacts in the music business soliciting donations. Meanwhile the first group of guys started practicing at the Cooper Center twice a week.

To pay for postage and repairs to the donated equipment, Rob organized the kids into a yardwork crew. They have earned over $800 working weekends chopping weeds, cutting and hauling wood, mowing grass, weedwacking, etc.

Before long, donations started arriving. So far the Project has received several amps, 4 guitars, a dozen cymbals, numerous effects boxes, a mini keyboard, stereo system and more. Through these generous gifts and using their general resourcefullness, the band was in fairly good shape for equipment within months. But our lack of a drum kit was a continuing problem.

To the rescue came the Volcano Rotary and the Hilo Music Exchange. Rotarian Les Hershorn and Collier Thayer of Hilo's premier music store proposed a matching fund donation. Thanks to the Rotary, the Cooper Center became the owner of a brand new Acclaim drum set. The Rotary also offered the band their first public performance - opening for national blues sensation Jimmy Thackery at a benefit for the school that most of the guys attended. The gig was a great success. The Band - Project Plague - did a hot 4 song set that blew more than a few minds.

That same month, September 2003, the Volcano Community Association voted to award the band $500 from it's youth projects budget. This money was used to repair two donated amps and to buy a new guitar amp. While this equipment now makes it possible to run one band effectively, it does not solve the Project's equipment needs. The Cooper Center's aging PA will require attention soon. More to the point, more kids have been showing up and there is a distinct possibility of one or two more bands forming.

Rob publishes a newsletter from time to time to keep people abreast of the latest Cooper Center Rock n Roll Project News. To be added to the mailing list contact RobK.

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