Atlantics Paul Caruso dies, This is Unbelievable Options

[terrydactyl]

Paul drummed in Sass with the West brothers. Dana and Vernon. Very tight harmony singers from Revere. The trio was popular on the high school circuit and they were also included on the Live at the Rat record. Sass traveled to CBGB along with WA and the Boom Booms, Third Rail, DMZ, Thundertrain and most of the rest for a week of Bowery shows in the spring of 1977.

yes!
they were nice guys and a afb band - my first entry into that whole pre punk scene

i too offer my condolences to ray and boby and all that were in one of bostons best bands ever

[TYR]

From the Globe:

Paul A. Caruso Jr.; drummer balanced rock music with life
By Bryan Marquard and Steve Morse, Globe Correspondent | May 6, 2006

A year ago last night, Paul A. Caruso Jr. was on ''Late Night With Conan O'Brien," playing drums behind his friend and neighbor Joe Perry.

For many rock 'n' roll musicians who cut their teeth in the Boston club scene of the 1970s, the chance to perform with Aerosmith's lead guitarist on national television might be a suitable career finale. For Mr. Caruso, it was more of a grace note.

A gifted drummer who could play several instruments, Mr. Caruso could take the power of rock music and mold it into something prayerful and use his spiritual grounding to make his rock drumming more powerful. He was as comfortable playing in the front of a church as he was before cheering rock fans.

''He was able to balance these worlds," said Dan Burns, a longtime friend who attended Holy Family Church in Duxbury with Mr. Caruso.

''Paul was one of the very few people who was not swept up in the Aerosmith glamour, or the perceived glamour," Perry said yesterday. ''He was pretty matter of fact. He just loved to make music."

Mr. Caruso, who coproduced and played drums on ''Mercy," a Perry instrumental that was nominated for a Grammy Award, collapsed in his Kingston house Wednesday and died. He was 50. The family is awaiting results of tests to determine the cause of death.

''I'm in shock about it," said Perry, who had planned to work with Mr. Caruso in a studio on Monday. ''He was the engineer in my studio and worked with me on my whole solo record last year. I've known him for 18 years, ever since I moved to Duxbury. . . . His presence will be more than sorely missed in our neck of the woods. He was a good friend and a great musician."

Mr. Caruso grew up in East Boston and Revere, where he helped formed Sass, a power trio. In 1979 he went to meet with The Atlantics when the band was looking for a new drummer.

''He walked in, and he was very sharp," said Tom Hauck of Gloucester, who was a guitarist with the band. ''He had on a summer-weight sports jacket and sunglasses, and he looked like a million bucks. He started playing, and it was instant chemistry."

Valued for his musicianship and his ear for how a song should sound, Mr. Caruso helped shape ''Lonely Hearts," perhaps the band's best-known single.

''He had wonderful technical skill for a rock drummer," Hauck said. ''He had a light touch when he needed it, and he could play very loudly and very powerfully. He had a musicality about him that came through in his drumming. And he sang high harmonies for The Atlantics -- he had a beautiful voice."
Mr. Caruso also had a maturity that was rare in any rock music scene.

''He was a consummate diplomat," Hauck said. ''He really knew how to work with other people and make them feel at ease. He was the opposite of the quintessential rock star."

The Atlantics split up in 1983, and Mr. Caruso moved a couple of years later to Kingston, where he built Bay Farm Sound Studio as part of his house. He and his wife, Susan, had two sons and had been a couple for about 30 years, since they met at a fashion show.

''He was just very grounded here," she said. ''He loved his family and was just a great dad."

In his studio, Mr. Caruso worked with a variety of musicians, some well-known, others less so. He treated them all with respect and dignity, whether the musician was his neighbor Perry, part of the rock 'n' roll firmament, or a teenager he was encouraging to sing as part of the youth music program at St. Mary's Church in Hanover.

''He was a great perfectionist, but he would really bring the best out of everybody," Burns said. ''He had the ability to do that without being browbeating or overbearing. He would do it by encouraging. He would affirm you."

Mr. Caruso's musical association with Perry began after they became neighbors.

''One day he just went over, and they hit it off," his wife said.

The two were both adept at many instruments. When Perry released his eponymous album last year, he played all the instruments, except drums, which Mr. Caruso played.

The two also shared producing duties on the album. Among the tracks was ''Mercy," which was nominated for a Grammy as best rock instrumental performance, but did not win at the ceremony in February.

Mr. Caruso also was an engineer on two Aerosmith albums, ''Just Push Play" in 2001 and ''Honkin' on Bobo" in 2004.

''He was active in any engineering aspect in the last four to five years since we've been recording on the South Shore," Perry said.

Mr. Caruso was rare, Perry said, in that his experience bridged the time from when studios recorded on tape to the current era of digital sound and computers.

''And he was a slamming drummer," Perry said. ''He also had formal music training, which is rare in the rock 'n' roll world. He could sit down and play any kind of music, but he loved to rock."

Unlike many who long for the rock lifestyle of excess, though, Mr. Caruso was more at home at his home -- and at church.

''He had a very deep faith, which I think influenced his whole life," his wife said.

''His faith is so much a part of his life," said Burns, who lives in Duxbury. ''He had this incredible desire -- and we talked about it often -- to use his talents and gifts to feed the spiritual life."

In addition to his wife, Mr. Caruso leaves two sons, Christian and Zachary; his father, Paul Caruso Sr. of Winchester; and his mother, Claire Nye of Weymouth.

A funeral Mass will be said at 10 a.m. Tuesday at Holy Family Church in Duxbury.

[MrBoomBoom2U]

Wow!! This totally sucks! I use to work with Paul. When he open Bayfarm I did a few sessions there. I knew him from Sass, Atlantics on thru Ball & Pivot. Paul produced an album called Advanced Warning with Fred Pineau, that I played guitar on. That was when we really got to know each other. My memory of Paul during that record was of him sitting in the control booth at Downtown Recorders eating peanut butter out of the jar for lunch. He loved to eat peanut butter. I haven't spoken with him in a long time and its weird because I'm in Bobs Store and I get a call out of the blue from Dana West. I haven't seen Dana or Vernon since probably the gigs at CBGB's someone mentioned. We talked about Paul and how it would be nice to all hook up again. He was a gentle, sweetheart of a guy and a creative musicial. My sympathy to his family.

[ray fernandes]

Paul Caruso and Joe Perry at the Boneyard
[img]http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v628/rayfernandes/Untitled.jpg[img] Paul with The Atlantics 1980

This post has been edited by ray fernandes: May 6 2006, 11:43 AM

[ray fernandes]

Paul with The Atlantics 1980

[tynsle]

i have an old article that i've saved since high school, i'd like to share it. i have it saved as a picture on my computer, but you can also see it on my 'myspace' page. it's from a high school news paper called 'High School Times'
and there was a small clip of The Atlantics.

you can view it here under my pictures

http://www1.myspace.com/lasttimelaluna


(and i don't mean this to advertise my space)

[tynsle]

sorry, could have just done this

[lslapiko]

Very sad. Sorry to hear this, guys.

[Beefy Scott]

I got to know Paul a few years ago when he was helping Aerosmith design and outfit their studio in Hanover. I was working for a pro audio company that they get a lot of stuff from. I was pretty much a lacky who delivered stuff to the studio. Paul was always a really cool guy to me. He never treated me like a delivery boy. In fact, my favorite memory of Paul was him giving me a tour of Aerosmith headquarters. He showed me a bunch of cool guitars and brought me into the "Amp room". I looked around and said, "Well, that's pretty much all of them (vox, marshalls, fender, bogner, dr.z...etc.) He said, not really, there's more over here, check it out... Just a cool guy. He and Jack Douglas let me sit in the control room while they mixed a tune. Good times. I wish I knew Paul better, but what I did know, showed he was a cool guy. My heart goes out to friends and family.

[bobcolby]

My condolences to Ray, Boby and all who knew him.

[Johnny Angel]

So sad to hear this. Paul and I kept in touch a little when I first moved to California and in fact, he called me when B passed.

His cousin was bookkeeper for our family business for 20 years--small world.

[Christóbal]

Ray & Bob, I'm really sorry to hear about your loss.

Regards,

Chris

[RJC]

Wow. Though I never knew him, I'm sorry that he's no longer with us, and it's quite evident here all the lives he's touched.

RIP, Paul.

[FrankD]

Sad.

RIP

something is very wrong in the world this year.

[KaraJeanne]

Although I didn't know him personally, I can only imagine how difficult this is for all members of the Atlantics family. You are all in my thoughts and prayers as you go through this trying time. Boby, I'm sorry we didn't get to chat more last night. I'm here if you need to talk. Again, my deepest condolences to all friends, family members, and fans. On the upside, it's times like these that make us realize what a great, tight-knit, caring rock community we have here in Boston.

[Boby Bear]

Although I didn't know him personally, I can only imagine how difficult this is for all members of the Atlantics family. You are all in my thoughts and prayers as you go through this trying time. Boby, I'm sorry we didn't get to chat more last night. I'm here if you need to talk. Again, my deepest condolences to all friends, family members, and fans. On the upside, it's times like these that make us realize what a great, tight-knit, caring rock community we have here in Boston.

Thanks KJ, it's always tough when anyone from our precious scene moves on. Altho I didn't know Paul as well as many did, it has been quite the sad expeirence. The service today was deeply moving, and the church was entirely full. A real testament to the lives this man touched.

[Nixie]

When I first started this thread yesterday I had just gotten off the phone with Fred as he gave me more of the details of how Paul died.
He told me Paul was having trouble breathing and that he was rushed to the hospital.
There,they ran some tests on him and just when they were about to proceed with emergency surgery,
Paul's heart had stopped beating.All attempts to revive him had failed.
Fred also informed me that Paul's wife Susan wanted word of his passing to be gotten out to as many professional local musicians as possible because she really didn't know how to contact most of the people Paul worked with with the obvious exception of The Atlantics and Aerosmith families.
Personally, I didn't really know Paul very well and the only time really spoke to him at length was when
the idea of releasing the ANTHOLOGY came about and how we could get the master recordings of the
Big City Rock album.
During those talks I came to realize that Paul Caruso was very caring intelligent and articulate man who really
cared very much about the Atlantics legacy and how we would be remembered.
We talked about a wide range of subjects including that no matter what successes we had in our lives,
there isn't a day that goes by that we don't think of B Wilkinson and that those days in The Atlantics
were the greatest days of our lives.

And at this time while I have the opportunity to say it..
To the surviving Atlantics Boby Bear, Jeff Lock, Bobby Marron, Fred Pineau and Tom Hauck..
You are my brothers..what we shared most people could only dream of.
It was a very special time..it was our coming of age, the rite of passage in our lives.
It came along at a point in our lives when we felt for the first time in our young lives that we could
do anything and be part of something very special.

I love you

Paul Caruso and B Wilkinson may you both rest in peace.

This is just beautiful, Ray. My condolences to you and everyone who knew Paul.

[onlyone]

man... my condolences to his family and all of the atlantics family as well. very sorry to read this news.

[sagey]

sad. i saw them when i was a kid, i met them, too. they were all cool, paul was nice, they were a really good band. condolences to his friends and family.

[ray fernandes]

This is just beautiful, Ray. My condolences to you and everyone who knew Paul.

Thank you Nixie.
We must never forget to tell the people we love how we feel about them
and what they mean to us.
The one thing that has finally gotten through to me is..I'm alive, you're alive and thats the only thing
that matters.
When I think of all the time I wasted sweating the small stuff it makes me feel foolish.
Like Boby Bear, I didn't really know Paul that well but it affects the people I love that DID know him
and in turn affected me.
Before his passing I admit I thought of Paul Caruso as my successor in a hotshot band.
Well..he was much much more than that.
He will be missed

This post has been edited by ray fernandes: May 9 2006, 04:43 PM