Musical History of Steve Couch

BOOMERANG 1990 - 1993
After SoundWorks broke up I began working on originals and playing around town with different bands, jamming, just sort of drifting. I had a party one afternoon at my house on the lake in Davie. Jim Token brought over a few musicians I had not met before. Bill Robinson, Jim Ingalls, Father Time, Blood. Eddie was at the party and we just sort of jammed on different songs and had some fun. Later that year, I had moved to Miami Beach and was spending a lot of time on the water, with my family, doing a lot of boating.
Jim Token called one day and said he was playing with some guys he wanted me to meet and try and get involved with.. I went and heard them and although Jim T. played as crazy as ever, and the band sounded good, I did think their guitar player, Blood, communicated the type of style and discipline I was accustomed to. I had remembered him from the jam we had and although he played a lot of riffs, I could not really see myself playing with him. I thought Bill and Jim had a lot to offer, but considering Jim Ingalls basically played rhythm guitar and sang, just as I did, I thought it would be rather redundant to have two players at that position.
One Friday, I went over to a local bar close to my house to see my old friend from Blue Mist, Leo, play in a band. While I was there I spoke to the owner about playing there and he said yes. So I had a gig, without a band. I called Jim Token and he said he would ask Bill and Jim if they were interested in playing. Even though we never really had any formal rehearsal, we played the gig, It was fairly loose, but had its moments. We called ourselves DéjàVu , because we needed a name for that gig. It was a lot of fun and got my interest in performing back in my head. A couple of weeks later, Jim Token and I were out on the town, and we found this little bar in South Miami called the Bird Bar. After talking to the owner, we had landed another gig. We went back in there with the same group of guys. We played for a few weeks and things began to tighten up, but I could not get use to Blood's playing style. We knew we had to replace our guitar player.

For a brief period we tried out Harvey Carvin. Although Harvey brought a few interesting tunes to the group, he did not really mix in with the group. I was working at Miami heart Institute at the time and I had a co-worker whose boyfriend played lead. She said he was looking for a band and said she would see if he was interested. We did not expect much the night John Vossen came to practice. But we quickly learned why they called him "Johnny V Johnny V had a smooth–fast approach to his guitar playing. Little bit of Eddie Van Halen and Stevie Ray Vaughn rolled into one. The guys immediately knew we had found the guitar we were looking for. John's precise guitar style and his dedicated team work attitude made a great addition to the group. We also knew we needed another name. After the usual night where everyone throws out every name they ever knew, we decided on my old bands name, "BOOMERANG." We began rehearsing at Bill and Jim’s north Miami Studio and eventually made a Demo CD. We used that CD to begin landing us gigs. We also began dedicating one rehearsal night per week to vocals only. This approach allowed Bill, Jim and I to really perfect out 3-part harmonic style. We were then able to learn a some tunes that emphasized vocal harmonies. As the band began to play a few gigs it wasn’t long before Jim Token’s substance abuse began to affect the band. We actually played a gig one time where we owed the club owner money because he drank up the profits. Kind of reminded us of the "blues bros." Anyway, the effect of alcohol and drug abuse took it toll on Jim and we had to make a replacement at drummer. Bill and Jim had played with a drummer in an earlier band, Steve Katz- alias- “Father Time.” Father Time had gigged with us one weekend when Jim Token was out of town so, we all knew he was a capable player. Since he already knew the majority of the material it was an easy decision to bring him in. It wasn't long before the groups sound tightens up around Steve's solid drumming.

After a gig one night, My brother Mike , liked what he heard and offered to get back involved with the band and became our manager. Mike was always good at band management, and it wasn't long before we were gigging nearly every weekend. During the year 1992, He kept us playing so much we had to add band income to our income taxes. We played over 90 dates that year. We also had some of our biggest gigs, Friday Live on Miami beach, Bayside Amphitheatre in downtown Miami, FL, large corporate parties. We became regulars at the many different clubs at Bayside as well as Center Stage.
We even had an old friend of mine , Jack McCurdy , start doing sound for us. The band was playing strong and we developed a small following around town.
We started having internal issues for one reason or the other. We had a band meeting one night that turned disastrous, which I think was the beginning of the end for the group. A little while after that I saw my old friend Eddie and we decided to setup a jam at Father Time's house. We invited John because we needed a guitar player. the jam was a lot of fun, unfortunately , Bill came over and interpreted it as us wanting to form another band. The group disbanded!
Eddie, John, Father Time and I began working on originals. A few weeks later, my brother had one more gig lined up for us. Not wanting to cancel, Eddie, John, Father Time and I played the gig. We had a lot of fun. Right after that gig, we got a call from the City of Miami Beach to perform at another Friday Night Live event. We had really enjoyed that event and did not want to cancel. So we called Bill to see if we wanted to play keys. Bill came over and we practiced a few weeks and went and did the event. That was the last "Boomerang" performance.