GUITARIST MARK DOYLE LOOKS TO SET A MOOD WITH HIS NEW DISC

By Mark Bialczak, Staff writer

Joe Whiting has known Mark Doyle practically forever. Their musical careers have crossed and uncrossed so many times in the last 32 years that some Central New York music fans have a hard time mentioning one of their names without thinking of the other.

Since Whiting, the singer from Skaneateles, and Doyle, the guitar player from Auburn, met in 1967, their efforts have produced such notable bands as Free Will (a name that the RCA Records folks made them change to Jukin' Bone), The Doyle-Whiting Band and Backbone Slip.

Lately, however, Doyle and Whiting have been involved with their own new discs. Earlier this year, Whiting released his third solo disc, "Strong Love, " without input from Doyle. And Doyle just put out his first solo disc, "Guitar Noir, " without asking Whiting for any help with the music.

Whiting picked up "Guitar Noir" and was very curious. "My first listening was when I opened up the CD case, " Whiting says. He put the disc on. Surprise set in. "I think it's quite different, " Whiting says. "It's not what I expected. I expected what a lot of people expected. It was going to be a rock album. Once I got past that, I really enjoyed it. "The first time I listened to it, and I told Mark this, "I just didn't get it, "' Whiting says. "Once I realized it was a jazz guitar album, it kind of unlocked itself for me."

Doyle says he doesn't consider the disc to be jazz guitar, though. "I tell people I'm not a jazz guitarist. I'm a jazz pianist, " he says. "I'm self-taught on guitar. It's emotional. Piano, I have theory. That's intellectual."

Doyle made the just-released disc his way, showcasing several of the pieces of talent that make him a very interesting musical puzzle. He arranged the music for the instrumental work. He set the mood with his heady, atmospheric guitar work. He produced the entire project, too.

"I think it's just, you know, light years beyond what's come out of this town, " says Ron DeRollo, the Syracuse blues guitarist and owner of Lakewood Studios in Jamesville, where Doyle recorded and DeRollo mixed parts of the disc. "I hope it's not over everybody's head, " DeRollo says. "It's an incredible project."

With the added talents of Syracuse side men Jimmy Johns on drums, Darryl Pugh on bass and Phil Broikos on drum loops, just to mention a few, "Guitar Noir" is out to set moods, much like soundtrack music does for TV and film viewers.

In fact, if "Guitar Noir" captures the attention of Hollywood or New York agents who happen to be seeking arrangers and composers for soundtrack work, that would make Doyle happy, too.

His career list has included, at one time or another and sometimes all at once, rock guitarist (which took him on the road with Meat Loaf, among others), jazz pianist (with his own trio), string arranger (for Boston standout producer Maurice Starr and his project, New Kids on the Block), songwriter (with Meat Loaf on "Razor's Edge" from the disc "Midnight at the Lost and Found" and record producer (for a list of Central New York musicians that range from the late, great blues band Kingsnakes to contemporary pop singer Kim Fetters).

What's one more responsibility? Make that one more opportunity, the way Doyle looks at it.

The genesis of "Guitar Noir" began six years ago in the Boston area, where Doyle lived from 1988 to 1994. Doyle began thinking about why he was so much a fan of blues-rock guitarist Jeff Beck's albums "Cause We Ended as Lovers" and "Blow by Blow." "I had really been working on this ever since I lived in Cambridge, " Doyle says during a recent conversation from his home in Eastwood, where he lives with his wife, Liz Lanza Doyle - when he's not at the apartment he splits in New York City with another musician. "I wanted an album that started where that mood ended."

Doyle went to the Cambridge, Mass., recording studio of longtime friend and colleague Richard Mendelson and recorded a handful of tracks, mostly the disc's ballads. Mendelson appreciated Doyle's work in the studio. A former Syracusan, Mendelson had played drums to Doyle's guitar in the Central New York outfit Big Bucks Band in the 1970s. In Boston, they worked together under Starr - Mendelson mostly as a recording engineer and Doyle as a string arranger. Those tapes stayed in the can for awhile because Doyle moved back to Syracuse in 1993, after he returned to play a reunion show with Whiting with the long-defunct Free Will at the first Syracuse Area Music Awards. But Mendelson - and those tapes - came back into Doyle's vision when a New York City manager told him that if he wanted to remain contemporary enough to produce work by young artists for young fans, he must somehow incorporate programmed music loops into his repertoire. "One manager said, if you're going to be producing 20-year-olds, you've got to be talking in a framework of hip-hop, more cutting-edge, " Doyle says. Doyle couldn't see bringing loops into the music of any of the Central New York discs he was working on.

"You know what, Syracuse is a real singer-songwriter town, " he says. "There's not a lot to let me do that and still be true to the song." Doyle decided to work on the experiment himself. He pulled out the Cambridge tapes, then got in touch with Mendelson - who just so happened to be the overseer of a library of popular tape loops. Mendelson gave Doyle some loops he had used for a disc called "Freaky, Jazzy, Funky." New arrangements and compositions joined the ballads from Boston.

Doyle sent an early demo tape of the collection to Matt McCaffery, who writes for The Tip Sheet in New York City. McCaffery wrote that the music "can only be called guitar noir." More inspiration. "I wrote the song ("Guitar Noir') in a half-hour, " Doyle says. Doyle put the disc together himself, meshing his instrumental, arranging, engineering and production talents.

Fetters, who had Doyle work as producer for her debut disc, 1998's "In My Wildest Dreams, " says "Guitar Noir" sounds like a logical extension of Doyle's accomplishments. "It's great, " Fetters says. "He has his own style." Fetters isn't worried that the music is too sublime for Central New York tastes. "I think that there are definitely a lot of Mark Doyle fans in this area, the Syracuse and Auburn area, " she says. "And I think people in Hollywood need to hear it."

Central New York fans can hear Doyle's lone live performance of the music from "Guitar Noir" at two shows on Nov. 27 at Happy Endings Cake and Coffeehouse in Syracuse. Doyle will lead a band that includes Jimmy Johns on drums, Andy Rudy on keyboards, and, he hopes, Mike Cortese on percussion and Phil Broikos on theremin.

Songs "Perry Mason Theme, " "Invitation" and "Wild Is the Wind" may sound old and new at the same time.

Doyle says he'll spend some time pushing "Guitar Noir, " by computer from Syracuse and in person from New York City, contacting agents and hopefully lining up gigs to arrange more guitar noirlike compositions.

Sometime, though, he'll likely move on to another recording project. His friends have some suggestions.
"I hope he makes a rock'n' roll record, like the Rolling Stones, " says DeRollo.
"I think he should make a jazz piano trio record, " says Whiting.
"I'd love to see him produce a major pop album for a great artist, " says Mendelson. "It would be interesting to see what he could do with somebody like Sting or Paul McCartney."

The details
What: Mark Doyle's "Guitar Noir" in concert.
When: Saturday, Nov. 27. Two shows, at 7:30 p.m. and 10 p.m.
Where: Happy Endings Cake and Coffeehouse, 317 S. Clinton St., Syracuse.
Tickets: $7, available at the club.
To hear "Guitar Noir" on NewsLine: Call 472-2111. Once connected, punch in 8864. The tune is the "Perry Mason Theme."