For someone with so many famous heads stuck on poles outside his jungle hut, you’d expect he’d put a little more “brag” into it. But the soft-spoken Eric Drew Feldman lets his keyboard playing do the talking for him. When you’ve recorded and played live with a twisted array of musical talent that includes Captain Beefheart, the Residents, Snakefinger, Pere Ubu, the Pixies, PJ Harvey and Polyphonic Spree, you don’t have to blow any hot air into your own balloon. Speaking from his San Francisco home, Feldman touched on the high points of a marvelous career like a flat stone skipping over the surface of a mountain lake. His latest project, kNIFE & fORK’s The Higher You Get The Rarer The Vegetation, is out now via Frank Black’s The Bureau label. Feldman will be also guest editing magnetmagazine.com all week. Read our brand new Q&A with him.
Feldman: I’ve started reading a book about Nicky Hopkins. I think it is fantastic that there is a book about him. He’s played piano and organ on so many great records with a lot of aplomb. As a younger man, I often listened to his playing and began trying to emulate it, not even knowing that it was he. His piano playing on “She’s A Rainbow” and “We Love You” by the Rolling Stones is enough right there! I haven’t got into the meat of the book, though I do know that he died at age 50 of complications from Crohn’s disease. I have never really wanted to be anyone other than who I am. But I think I may enjoy a stint as Nicky Hopkins.
