Russ with Dave Jazzin' up the beach
by craig eddy
Russ Haines is almost entirely a local boy. Growing up attending Menlo-Atherton High, He got to play at the North Sea and Montreux Jazz Festivals, literally bumping into Miles Davis at a musicians’ bar and being complimented by this weird vocalist nobody had heard of named Bobby McFerrin. He interned at The Music Annex Recording Studios when Windham Hill started, and got to work with some awesome musicians including Michael Hedges. Russ worked on a few gold albums for Los Huracanes Del Norte and Los Tigres, important Norteno bands. He got into mastering audio and editing video and created audio tracks for international ad campaigns for Coca Cola and Renault. He won an award (and a really expensive pair of headphones that his dog immediately ate) from Neumann/Sennheiser for his fairly offensive arrangement of Jingle Bells.
By the time he bought a house in La Honda twenty years ago, Russ was a member of the first band to be live on the internet, Severe Tire Damage. His band mates were coworker computer researchers from Apple, Digital Equipment Corporation, and Xerox. They got a lot of international press including New York Times, PBS, and Smithsonian Magazine.
His local music history includes playing Jazz, Rock, and Punk guitar at the local venues. Russ also plays drums, bass, and keyboards. Lately his passion is playing Jazz with locals Bundy Browne, and Dave Schorr.
Russ tells me there is no down side musically when the power goes out in La Honda, as it has always traditionally been the time when local musicians walk around with a six pack and instrument in hand listening for the nearest live music. That is how he met the Wings, Larry W, Banjomatic (Derrick) and others. Hopefully Russ will make an appearance at Jamfest this year!