Who?
Founded in 1968 in Cleveland, Ohio, the confusingly-named The Same As Last Week became a hugely popular band in Northeast Ohio and the Midwest. They entertained devoted followers at frat parties, college dances, crowded local bars, a summer lake resort, and even a 400-seat lounge at a bowling alley in Calumet City, IL. With their diverse musical backgrounds, two superb lead singers, and uncommon instrumentation, they added unique flavors to an eclectic repertoire of rock and soul hits of the day, oldies, and future classics.
On the album “Live In Cleveland 1969 (2023 Mix)” are:
Eric Blecher, bass guitar
Jeff Bloom*, guitar & backup vocals
Les Bloom*, alto sax & flute
John Bogo, drums
Lee Branst, lead vocals
Dave Featheringham, lead vocals
Bill Jaros, organ & piano
Mike Kaplan, vibraphone
*not related at all (we hope)
Additional band members (not on the album):
** Mike Bevis, organ [through February 1969]
*** Neil Hecht, drums [from October 1969 on]
The band picked the best popular songs for dancing, from a variety of genres, played them well, and worked every weekend for two years (like thousands of other bands in the '60s did throughout the world) – way before disco and auto-tuning.
The 1969 Recording
Following a Midwest summer tour in 1969, the band's first gig back in Cleveland was at an outdoor fraternity party. Someone brought along a stereo ¼” reel-to-reel tape recorder. The inputs to the two tracks were not ideal. One track came out of the PA system; the other track was from a microphone suspended over the instruments. During the gig, the tape even ran out a couple times, but a few sets were captured. The tape was then forgotten.
The band dis-banded
After several of the band members graduated from Case Western Reserve in June 1970, the band sadly broke up.
Members moved on to further musical ventures, advanced degrees, or the military. They ultimately enjoyed long careers in engineering, business, finance, education, home building, or medicine.
So, you might well wonder how the band released an album 54 years later? The answer to that starts here.
lost tape found
A copy of the lost tape, forgotten for almost 40 years, was discovered by Les in 2008 and he digitized it.
But not until 2011, when Les had a personal website, was he able to share those tracks on the Internet. While the tracks were fine to share with friends and family, the audio quality wasn't great. The sound was muddy, unbalanced, and contained lots of background noise.
meanwhile…
The members of the band, now spread around the US and UK, remained friends, and, starting around 2011, reconnected virtually a few times via email, recalling many happy and strange memories from our brief but intensely emotional time together as a band.
At the start of the pandemic in 2020, now in our 70s, there was more incentive and time to get in touch more regularly – initially by emails or online chats, and then via video reunions. This allowed the band members to see and hear each other for the first time in many, many years – noticing more gray hairs (or little hair at all) and a few extra pounds here and there. But still friends and communicating more.
RESURRECTION AFTER 54 YEARS
Fast forward to July 2023.
For several years, Jeff, in his business, had been working with Oleg “Yorshoff” Yershov, a highly skilled, Ukrainian audio engineer now in his mid-30s. But in 2023, in the midst of the war in Ukraine, Oleg was sent a few of the band’s original tracks.
When he listened to them, he heard great spirit, energy, and musical quality. Wanting to help the band share these and also give himself a distraction from the war, he challenged himself to bring the tracks into the 21st century as a widely available digital album.
Using his exceptional audio engineering skills, artificial intelligence, and the latest technology magic, he devoted over 200 hours to resurrecting the half-century old recordings and made the band’s music come alive again.
So, 54 years after our band played this set at a party, we are proud to present to you a new album based on our original crude recording, in which the tracks now sound almost like they were made in a professional studio.
The technical prowess demonstrated by Oleg in putting this immense project together has been extraordinary.
Most importantly, we are very grateful to Oleg that, out of the horrors of a brutal, ongoing war, not only has a beautiful collaboration arisen, but we are able to share with you a unique and wonderful period of live music, from a typical ‘60s band.
Fun fact: As a side note, the audio in “Live in Cleveland 1969 (2023 Mix)” is older than the Beatles' recent AI-based single, “Then and Now”, and our album was released a week before (without any re-recording)!
