Jeff Reitz - Orchid

When and where were you born? Are you originally from Edgerton, WI? What was growing up like for you?

I was born in 1955 in Edgerton, Wisconsin. It’s a small town in south central Wisconsin about 30 minutes south of Madison. The population from roughly 1900 until 1970 was around 4,000 people. One of the main industries for decades was growing tobacco for cigar wrappings. I worked in the tobacco fields for several years while in junior high school.

When did you first begin to fall in love with music and what was it that initially fascinated you? Tell me about growing up with your younger brother Thomas.

Both of my parents were musicians. My mother played piano and saxophone. My Dad played trumpet in swing bands in high school and college, and later learned piano, saxophone and other instruments in college with a minor in music. He subsequently taught music and band in several high schools in Wisconsin. Later in the early 1960s he formed his own Dixieland band, the Tobacco City Seven. So music was always a part of my life. I have fond memories of my brothers and I listening to 45 rpm records on rainy days – all styles from Buddy Holly to Perry Como to Hank Williams. And game nights on Saturdays we always listened to swing or Dixieland jazz. We had for our own enjoyment a family polka band with everyone playing an instrument. Before going to kindergarten my parents enrolled me into “musical kindergarten” taught by one of the older ladies in town for several local children. We enjoyed singing, but also learning rudiments of the piano and reading music. I started playing an acoustic guitar in third grade and learned the usual stuff from books. But in my spare time it was songs by the Rolling Stones, Cream and others. I also started playing saxophone in 5th grade. Eventually my youngest brother, Tom, got a “toy” drum set for Christmas one year.

I kinda took to it and demolished it in the process, but apparently showed some talent doing so. My Dad’s buddy, Red – a jazz drummer – came to the house to listen to me playing on the toy set and affirmed I could handle the real thing. So we got my silver sparkle Ludwig set, similar to what Ian Paice of Deep Purple was playing. I also added an Epiphone electric guitar to my collection around this time. My brother, Tom, was a natural musician, like the rest of the family. He also played saxophone and guitar. He is 7 years younger than me. One of my fun memories is when I was in college and he had to DJ a sock hop while he was in junior high. I told him he could definitely play the usual stuff, Bay City Rollers, etc., that he and his classmates got into, but if he really wanted to get the party started he should put on Kiss from the Alive album. Which he apparently did when it appeared that nobody was dancing. He told me he put on Kiss, everyone jumped on the dance floor, and the chaperones immediately confronted him about what he was playing. When he explained that the event was a “dance” and now everyone was dancing, they relented and the rest of the night was a success.

What would you and your friends do for fun in those early days? Did you go to many local shows/concerts in your area? What was the music scene in your community like back in those days? Were there any groups you saw that made a huge impact on you and if so, who were they?

I always remember the great bands that performed for the 4th of July celebration in town every year. Later, weekends while I was in junior high and high school were usually spent at the youth center or a gymnasium for live shows by local and regional bands. My favorite Edgerton band was Stoned Henge, which did covers and originals. Some of the band members are no longer with us, but last year one of the surviving members put together some CDs of all of their original songs and made them available to anyone who wanted. So that music brought back lots of memories. Hearing great local bands also reinforced a desire to perform in a band myself. My parents had a pool table so I’d often have friends over to play pool in the evenings. We’d talk about music and listen to some AM stations from Little Rock, Arkansas, and Nashville, that were playing R&B and other cool music we didn’t often hear on the Top 40 WLS out of Chicago. Around that time we also started listen to WIBA FM out of Madison, which exposed us to more rock artists we’d never heard of like Johnny Winter and JoJo Gunne. We did go to lots of shows by national acts starting my sophomore year in high school. I have vivid memories of shows by Rare Earth and Five Man Electrical Band in Chicago; and Wishbone Ash, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, and many others in Madison.

Jeff Reitz.

Did you participate in any groups prior to Orchid? Tell me about how the band came together. How did you initially meet your bandmates? Where would you guys practice/rehearse and what was the overall chemistry like when you guys first started jamming together? When and where did the band play their very first live performance and what was that experience like for you?

My buddy, Pepper, and #2 brother, Mark, put together a song for the high school talent show with me on drums, Pepper on guitar and Mark on piano. Kind of a medley of songs including In-a-gadda-da vida by Iron Butterfly, and yes it featured the drum solo. That was very well received and reinforced my love for the drums. Shortly thereafter, I hooked up through a music store in the larger city of Janesville with three guys – Rick, Scott and Rick - who had a band but needed a drummer. We became Greenfield, a 4 piece roots rock type band: America, Neil Young, James Gang, etc. The band added a second guitar player, Randy, and eventually a second singer, female. Around that time the band started morphing into more of a wedding band. Male singer, Rick, left the band and I became a bit disillusioned with the music we were now playing. Orkid, some guys from Edgerton, were already starting to play out around this time. But their drummer was unreliable due to a variety of reasons. So Al, Randy and Dale asked me to join as their drummer. I did and we developed quite a following in southern Wisconsin and northern Illinois doing hard rock covers by bands such as Uriah Heep, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Jethro Tull, etc. Our 2nd guitarist, Dale, also played organ for the songs that needed it. We changed the name to Orchid. We played bars and clubs on weekends, but also did lots of shows in high schools and junior highs in the greater area.

Orchid.

What was the band’s process and approach to writing as well as recording its music? How did the deal with American come about? Can you tell me about writing as well as recording the tunes “Go Big Red/Act Naturally”? When and where did recording begin in ‘73? What was the first order of business once the record came out? What eventually happened to the group after ‘73?

We had a couple original songs that we performed. SOS Boogie was written by our bass player, Al. I wrote Go Big Red with some assistance on lyrics from my younger brother, Tom. Essentially the basic structure of the song was brought to the band. We would all then kick things around and typically would make some modifications to the song until we were all satisfied with the final product. We recorded Go Big Red b/w Act Naturally at American Records studios in Sauk City, Wisconsin, which is just north of Madison. My Dad had previously recorded his Dixieland band there, and so knew the people and could fill us in on the process. We recorded the two tracks as an ensemble recording but each instrument had its own track. There were very minimal overdubs as I recall. We then got the song mixed and there you have it. I believe the process took somewhere between 3 and 5 hours. Once the record was released we definitely played it at all of our subsequent gigs. We also were able to obtain placement on most of the jukeboxes in south central Wisconsin. I guess we got good plays or that wouldn’t have lasted very long. I also have one of our live shows recorded, although the quality is not the best. All 4 of us were seniors in high school and graduated in 1974. I left town for college. Al kept playing in a couple other bands. Randy may have also but I’m not sure. Al passed away about 6 years ago but I’m still in touch periodically with the other guys. Did you continue to record and write music after Orchid? What have you been up to in recent years? Is there anything else you would like to further share with the readers? I did not do too much musically after 1974 until my brother, Tom, asked me to join a pick-up band as the bass player for an event in 1985 in Milwaukee.

Orchid.

He was in “hair metal” band, Angel White, at the time which was one of the more popular rock bands in the Milwaukee area. His drummer, Greg, from Angel White joined Tom and I, and another friend of Tom’s, Ox, was our lead singer, although all 4 of us sang. We were called the Fabulous Remakes. I have two of our shows recorded. We were strictly a cover band. Later I joined Tom and Greg in Delusions of Grandeur, along with a second guitarist or keyboards player, for several years. Tom and I also had a side project from D.O.G. called Merge Left, which did cover songs of classic rock songs in ska or punk style. When D.O.G. disbanded, Tom formed Pink Houses in the early 2000s as a John Mellencamp Tribute band. I did sound for the band shortly after it formed for several years, then later joined as the sax/miscellaneous percussion/backup vocals guy, retiring from Pink Houses in about 2013. Pink Houses still continues as a regional “show” band for all sorts of events and festivals. I also formed Delta Ratz as a 5 piece creative blues band in 2008, with Tom as one of our guitarists. I played bass guitar in this band, as well as shared lead vocals. The band morphed into a classic rock power trio by 2014 and continued in this genre until our last gig on New Years Eve, 2018/2019. We did 3 or 4 of my original songs in Delta Ratz, including Dirty Work that had a reference to the tobacco fields I worked in as a kid. I’m presently in on the ground floor of a new tribute band called ClaptoNation, which should have our website, etc., up sometime this fall with gigs to follow presumably in early 2023.

Dakota Brown