"When it comes to concept albums, this is the be all and end all to sound itself. It is a concept album based on sound itself. How much more depth is there than that? It is probably the greatest album for studying sound design driving on backroads, in a room full of lava lamps, or a low-lit experience in a warm bubble bath... seriously. The only other album that I could even compare to the deepness of 'Dawn' would be 'The Beat Goes On' LP by Vanilla Fudge... both are what I would consider landmark concepts in recording history. They are pure in expression, like a classic read. They push ideas of sound, syllables, expression, thoughts and after-thoughts for an introspective listener, beyond most, if not all others, in such time periods." - Dustin Mahrt
I signed with Mercury Records in 1969, then after moving from New York City to San Francisco, California, recorded my first Album "Dawn," released on Mercury's Limelight label that year. The name Dawn was not only a play on my first name, but was meant to represent the dawning of a new age, as I had been very influenced by the ideas about music expressed by the author Corinne Heline.
The album represents my newly realized understanding of the reality of positive and negative music, the first side of the album representing music that is positive, and the second, music that is negative. Side one opens with an improvised piece that I performed on an Oscar Schmidt 80-string guitar zither tuned to the natural pentatonic scale (C,D,E,G,A), the most harmonious of all scales. Short interludes (Why?, Where? and When?) span sections of the album. Side Two begins with a rhythmic build up that culminates in chaos, then Belief is a sound collage that incorporates duochords.
Dawn --
Recorded during the spring of 1969.
Recorded at Columbus Recorders, San Francisco, CA. George Horn, Engineer; Recorded at Pacific High Studios. Dan Healy, Engineer
Recorded and mixed at Amigo Studios, North Hollywood. Hank Cicalo, Engineer; Limelight LS-86067 (Mercury Records, Inc)
Dawn was re-released in February, 2003, on vinyl and on CD by Akarma Records, a division of Comet Records in Italy.
