by Richard Cuccaro

L-R: Jeff, Kelly, Dave

In a nightclub on the upper West Side of Manhattan, the décor is entirely black. 
A singer's voice is crooning in a confessional sigh, "Look at my lips they're just 
dying to kiss you / Look at my teeth, they're just aching to bite / but as for my 
heart, it's a big empty chasm / This ain't the real thing, it's a spasm." The guitarist 
vamps a shrewd, relaxed jazz riff and the upright bass jauntily bounces along. 
The song, "Spasm" strikes a nerve.  The audience chortles and snickers after each 
stanza. It's almost call-and-response. A few minutes later we're listening to "Sex 
Without Bodies."  The narrator in the song describes watching a porn video which 
exudes, "the expression of passion amid sweat and chlorine, they were five of the 
happiest people I've ever seen."  Subsequent lines contain an oblique description of 
telephone sex that begins with, "She started to whimper, I lit up a smoke," and ends 
with the tag line, "I may never go back to the real thing again."  The audience titters.

This music is, in great part, with its sardonic, erotic humor, pop/folk/jazz meets 
Kraft-Ebbing. The author is the guitarist, Dave Cantor. The singer is Kelly Flint. 
On bass is Kelly's husband Jeff Eyrich. The trio is the core of the band calling itself 
"Dave's True Story." Blending into the vision of a twisted jungle of relationships, 
there's nostalgia as well. Dave always wears a fedora and sometimes a Hawaiian shirt.
Jeff also wears a fedora with the brim turned up and leans toward a tie and jacket. 
While I haven't seen Kelly doing a vintage dress-up in a while -- she's dressed casually 
in slacks and a pullover sweater this evening -- her singing style overcomes any suspension 
of disbelief. It's generating a noirish 40's/50's black and white B-movie aura for me. 
The ghost of Humphrey Bogart lurks in the shadows offstage. I can hear Lauren Bacall 
purring, "If you ever need me, just whistle. You know how to whistle don't you?" Kelly's 
sharply defined good looks easily connect with 
earlier film icons. There's vulnerability in her voice, but a sly, sultry delivery completes 
my cinematic regression.

On the next song, "Nature," Kelly crouches as she sings, holding an egg 
shaker, moving her arm in a metronome steadiness. The lyrics contain an ominous, 
hypnotic admonition. "I lost my nature and my loved one left me, I lost my nature and 
my loved one left me, don't lose your nature." Dave counters at the end of each stanza 
with cryptic statements such as, "I'm the real Slim Shady," in a husky, feathery tone, 
suggestive of an uncle who couldn't be trusted alone with your little sister.

Dave's Path
At this point it's hard to picture Dave Cantor as a solo act, singing his own songs. Before 
meeting Kelly, he did just that, playing at open mics in Greenwich Village. Although he 
rightfully claims to write straight-ahead jazz/pop songs without perverse humor, the perverse 
imaginings have become his trademark.  He has a keen awareness of the weirdness of the 
human condition and an ability to put that awareness into a rich, descriptive poetry. "Writing 
funny songs is easy," he told me. However, the main thrust of his craft is not what I expected. 
"Kelly and I always approached it as a mainstream project. I don't go for the joke the way 
I used to, but occasionally I have to get it out of my system," he added.
On top of this, he combines it with some very serious guitar chops. A professional touring 
and session guitarist with a much keener ear than mine, recently reacted with jaw-dropping 
admiration to Dave's playing when I shared a Dave's True Story CD.

The Search
He began his life in music studying trumpet as a grade school student on Long Island. 
When braces interfered with playing that instrument, he was transferred to French horn. 
The logic escapes him. As a junior high school student, he discovered guitar and practiced 
alone in his room for a couple of years. Venturing out to play in garage bands, he found 
that rock was not for him. 
His college years were spent experimenting with both writing and music. He attended 
SUNY College at Oneonta and set his sights on a writing career. A brief stint at Boston's 
Berklee College of Music to study composition followed. It turned out that Dave would 
have to find his way on his own.

The Writer Finds his Metier
He went through a phase where he submitted his writing for publication. After generating a 
pile of rejection slips, he turned back to music when he heard the album Nightfly by Steely Dan's 
Donald Fagen. The fire was lit again. He discovered that he could write songs that actually sounded 
like songs when he used jazz chords and framed the melody and lyrics as Tin Pan Alley heroes 
Rogers and Hart might've done. " I knew I could write a song in the 'Great American Songbook' 
style better than I could in any other style," he states.

A move to Greenwich Village in 1988 proved to be an important step in his development. Dave 
went to open mics and wrote songs that he also shared in weekly song-swap sessions run by Jack Hardy, 
the founder of The Fast Folk Musical Magazine. Periodically the magazine would publish records,
(later on, CDs) with booklets of lyrics of new works by both established and unknown singer/songwriters. 
A number of his early songs as a solo artist and with Dave's True Story are featured in the Magazine's 
catalog. One song he wrote about Suzanne Vega ("My Name is Luka"), a local hero to songwriters, 
"I wonder Who's Loving Suzanne Vega Tonight," got him noticed in the singer/songwriter community.

The Partnership
A catalyst for forming the group was meeting singer /songwriter Richard Julian, who, around 1991, 
suggested that he team up with Kelly Flint. [Richard, a singer with a four-octave range, was covered in 
Acoustic Live in January, 2000. His story can be found in our on-line archives.] After some fitful starts
and stops, the combination jelled. Around 1992, as a first gig, Dave taught Kelly about six songs and 
they played at a festival that Jack Hardy organized. They only played two songs, but Kelly was hooked.
The  duo was officially a partnership. One night, a year later, as Dave and Kelly were playing the
Postcrypt Café at Columbia University, Kelly introduced a song by saying, "This is a true story, 
it's Dave's true story." Richard, sitting in the audience, told them later, "There's the name of your band."
 In 1993, they cut their first self-named CD. They were on their way.

Kelly's Dreams
As a six-year-old Kelly Flint sat in her bedroom in Michigan City, Indiana. She'd drop the needle onto 
a record, play a line, then sing it back exactly the way she thought she heard it. Over and over. Her 
mother would poke her head in the room and say, "On to the next line!" Kelly would work her way
 through the song in that manner, however long it took. After a couple of days, her mother would 
interject with, "Time for a new song!" Kelly sang along with songs by The Beatles, Simon and 
Garfunkel, and from the cast recording of Jesus Christ Superstar among others. At the age of 13,
she discovered Joni Mitchell, which pointed her toward a contemporary folk style. She also acted
in children's theater productions and later, in high school plays.

A Dream Realized
Kelly wanted to study ballet, but parental approval was not granted. Piano lessons with classical 
pieces became a grating reminder of a dream withheld. There was another dream, however, that 
was not denied. In high school, Kelly fantasized singing one day in front of the entire student body. 
A friend who danced ballet, encouraged Kelly to audition for the Spring Festival Concert, telling her, 
"You're a great singer!" She won a slot and chose to sing "My Man" ("Oh my man, I love him so…"). 
In her performance, she began in darkness, at the unlit stage rear, and walked forward, into the light. 
As the song reached its climax, she stepped into the spotlight. For an eternity-like moment, the 
audience was quiet, and Kelly thought she had flopped. Then the students erupted in wild applause 
and gave her the long-hoped-for reward. It was an exalted moment and a revelation. Singing was 
now a focus. She began playing guitar along with records and the radio and sang in church as well. 

The Young Pro
A seminal experience grew out of her father's purchase of a restaurant when she was 14. There 
was a performance area that was situated apart from the dining room. Performers of moderate 
fame such as Steve Goodman and  Bonnie Koloc came through. Many times, they'd stay in a 
room in her family's apartment above the restaurant. She'd hear various performers singing 
in the morning and would shrewdly harmonize from around the corner. They'd hear her and, 
duly impressed, ask her to accompany them onstage. She performed in the club area for a 
while, but someone found out that she was too young legally to be working in a non-food, 
nightclub area. From then on, she still sang along during performances, but her harmonizing 
was done surreptitiously from a spot offstage.

The singing continued through a brief stay at Kalamazoo College. Shyly, she put up three small 
postcard-sized flyers to advertise her first gig at a local club, The Black Spot. More affirmation. 
Word had spread about her vocal talent and she arrived to find the place packed.

Philadelphia, then New York
She moved on to Philadelphia, studying acting for a year at Temple University. In 1981, 
word reached her that a slot in a friend's apartment was available in New York.  With youthful 
adventurous drive, she decided, "What the hell, I'll try it." She arrived with $400 and a suitcase. 
Acting auditions and waitressing jobs followed. She had studied Astrology for years and made 
a living doing astrology charts for a while. She also attended open mics and signed up to play, 
but then would back off, not answering when her name was called. Open mics can be daunting 
experiences. Faced with the talent that existed in Greenwich Village in the late 80's (John Gorka, 
Shawn Colvin, David Massengill, Lucy Kaplansky, Richard Shindell) one can only imagine the 
pressure on a newcomer. Perhaps it was her insecurity as a guitar player (I can certainly relate). 
She is quoted in an interview as saying, "I wrote songs and played guitar -- badly…'  
"I kept thinking I'd get better, but I didn't."  One night she met Richard Julian at an open mic, 
and when he asked if she was going to play, she told him about her reticence. Within two weeks, 
he had her singing back-up "for about five bands." She also attended the aforementioned weekly 
song-swap sessions run by Jack Hardy.  Kelly had three of her compositions selected at various 
times for inclusion in their catalog.

In recounting her progress as a singer, she reminisced about a favorite, now defunct venue called 
Torch. For three years, Dave's True Story had a gig playing there twice a month. People came 
to have dinner in a romantic atmosphere, and the band mostly played in the background. The clientele 
weren't obligated to applaud after each number, but did, quite often for DTS when they were 
particularly moved. "We were capturing a roomful of people who had no intention of being 
captured," Kelly told me. After one performance, a woman praised Kelly's singing, saying, 
"It skips the ears and goes straight to the heart." 

Jeff's Odyssey
Jeff Eyrich was a child of Southern California, steeped in its culture. He started surfing when 
he was six years old and surf rock coursed through his system. He begged his parents to let 
him take guitar lessons, but was forced to study piano. His mother insisted, "You'll thank me 
for this some day." The only thanks he gave was on the day he was allowed to start studying 
guitar. At around 10 years old he started taking lessons from a neighborhood hero who played 
in a surf band called "The Knights of Day." Jeff and his buddies would gather on the front lawn 
where the Knights practiced to listen and watch them practice through the front picture window. 
One day his teacher asked him if he'd like to play with them during a practice session. Jeff had 
never played with a band before. He remembers, "the power of the electric guitar" surging 
through him. That current of ecstasy propelled him toward a musician's life. "That's when 
I got hooked," he told me. His parents fixed up a music room in the attic. Jeff played guitar, 
his brother played drums and they got friends to come over and join them. Jeff played in small 
bands in high school, but he didn't get serious about music until he got to college. 

All Music All the Time
It was the tail end of the Hippie era in the late 60's - early 70's and the music just took over his life. 
At Long Beach City College, his major was Philosophy. He might as well have been majoring in 
Play Guitar in a Band Until Four in the Morning and minoring in Throw Pots in the Ceramics 
Department While Getting Stoned. School was just a joke, really, and since he was already 
supporting himself playing music, he quit school to pursue it exclusively.

Da Bluze
While he had been playing in a few bands simultaneously, his involvement with a group of blues 
fanatics playing as the Ice House Blues Band was key.  The band played back-up for a series of 
soul revues. At one of them, the bass player didn't show up and Jeff was asked to fill in. It clicked 
immediately. "I just loved it so much," he said. "It was all about the bass from then on. That's 
when I switched." The band faithfully played Chicago blues dead-on and were the primary back-up 
band at a folk blues club in Hollywood called The Ash Grove. When anyone of a certain level of 
fame came into town and needed a back-up band, they were called in to play. The artists they 
played for included Freddy King, Big Mama Thornton, Big Joe Turner, and John Lee Hooker. 
"It was a great education for me. It gave me an incredible root in the blues and R&B idiom, 
which can make you great in any kind of music," he said.

A Fortuitous Gig
Because he could read music, Jeff got work at hotel gigs. One of them was in the cocktail lounge 
at the Hyatt House on Sunset Boulevard. It was at one of those jobs in the early 1970's that 
Tim Buckley came strolling in and heard Jeff play. Fans of Tim Buckley will remember him as 
a poetic singer/songwriter with a soft, but soaring voice &endash; a fixture of the 60's folk/rock scene. 
There was, at times, a gentle, almost fragile quality to his work, with a free-form jazz-like delivery. 
He was making a comeback after a long period of inactivity. Tim asked Jeff to try out with his 
group, to see if he could fit in with the other musicians. Jeff went down the next day and was 
hired on the spot. He remembers, "It was an amazing experience. We'd play the same body of
 songs, but never the same way twice. Tim would start the songs and we would fall in, the way 
it felt right that night. That was another pivotal learning experience for me. That's where I learned 
to play flexibly, according to the emotion of the person leading the band."

Jeff spent three years with Tim. It was in 1973, that Tim, struggling to recover from a heroin 
addiction, died tragically of an overdose under mysterious circumstances. They'd just come in 
from a successful road trip, and Jeff awoke the next day to the sound of the police pounding on 
his door, trying to find out, already too late, what drugs Tim might've taken. Sadness crept into 
Jeff's voice as he emphasized, "He was very nice -- I absolutely loved playing with this guy…"
Afterward, Jeff continued on as a hired gun, doing session work. He'd often finish working on 
an album for a major artist, then accompany that artist on a tour to support the record. Bette 
Midler and Tanya Tucker were among the artists he played bass with, both in the studio and 
on the road.

The Producer
Because he'd always contribute ideas during recording sessions, he was asked to produce some 
acts that one studio producer didn't have time to work with. "Ninety-nine percent of all producers 
are or were bass players," Jeff states. He was especially adept at working with younger artists, 
at times punk and grunge bands, that older producers might've found troublesome.  He produced 
the last solo T-Bone Burnett album for Warner Brothers, which included working with slide 
guitar master Ry Cooder and the late Mick Ronson, David Bowie's guitarist. He did some 
producing for The Blasters with Dave and Phil Alvin and is still in touch with Dave. Back 
then Phil did all the singing and Jeff credits himself for encouraging Dave to sing. If Jeff's 
supportive words actually did help, we can thank him for allowing us to hear Dave's rich, 
edgy baritone. 

At this point, the sloppy, less creative nature of the punk and grunge acts' recording style 
rubbed Jeff the wrong way and he became dissatisfied with that scene. Fortuitously, he was
then approached by a French journalist who asked if Jeff would be interested in producing 
French rock bands. Jeff accepted the challenge and spent a few years traveling back and forth 
from L.A.to Paris. His work overseas got wider recognition and this led to his producing 
albums for Swedish bands as well.

An On-line Link
It was back in the United States while he was doing some studio work that his path crossed 
with Dave's True Story. An interchange in an music-oriented on-line chat room with Kelly 
Flint led to Kelly's sending the first DTS album to Jeff. He loved it. Shortly afterward, Jeff 
was asked to manage Swedish groups in the U.S. and, for this, he needed to relocate to 
New York City. When he got to New York, he and Kelly got together and eventually became 
more than friends. They moved in together and then got married, but Jeff didn't play with 
Dave's True Story for almost five years. Jeff played electric bass and Kelly and Dave were 
using upright bass players exclusively. Managing, with its need to feed the corporate sharks 
had gotten old and Jeff was ready to start playing again. Then, one New Year's Eve, they 
got a gig opening for the then fast-rising, astonishing vocalist and writer, Martin Sexton. 
Dave and Kelly were without a bass player and Jeff convinced them he'd be able to make 
his electric bass sound acoustic. The gig went very well, and Jeff decided to switch to 
upright bass to meet the artistic demands of the band. He fell in love with the upright, 
calling it "the most inspiring instrument I've ever played in my life." 

He's still taking lessons from jazz player Sean Smith. Learning this instrument that goes 
back to the Middle Ages is, he says, "a never-ending journey."
Jeff's work in production and management has been a boon to the group. These days, 
as well as playing bass, he arranges their compositions and books their gigs.

Kissing Jessica Stein
The music of Dave's True Story is featured in the 2002 film, Kissing Jessica Stein. 
"Crazy Eyes" is used during the all-important kissing scene and "Sequined Mermaid 
Dress" during a shopping spree. Although they were not included in the soundtrack album 
(corporate meddling) the film's producers talked up the group and their CDs all over the world.

One of the best ways to catch the group in their element is to see them at their 
performance series at Hojo's in Times Square. The owner is a music lover and 
the sound system is excellent. It's a "very relaxed gig" Dave says, and gives them
an opportunity to work on new material. It also encourages bantering with audence 
members. Let's all drop in to say hello.


Web site: www.davestruestory.com

Upcoming Gigs:
Mar 5      8pm Godfrey Daniels, Bethlehem, PA 
               (610)867-2390 www.godfreydaniels.org 
Mar 18    8pm  HoJo's Times Square, New York, NY
April 10  9pm Caffe Lena , Saratoga Springs, NY (518)583-0022 www.caffelena.com 
April 16   8pm Acoustic Cafe, Bridgeport, CT  $12
               (203)335-3655 www.acousticafe.com 
April 17   8pm $10 the Uptown, Kingston, NY 
               (845)339-8440