MourningStar
Maderator

About MourningStar

Biography:

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I was born in the Sonoran desert near Sentinel Peak.

I am indigenous with Mexica (maternal) and Maya (paternal) ancestry.

Music was always an integral part of my culture (parents were into mariachi and swing/big-band, my first musical loves) and go back to my earliest memories. Memory flashbacks from being 3 or 4 - my parents, who were total dancing fools, taking me along to ballroom blowouts whenever they could not get a sitter. I was usually found next to the drummer the few times I managed to move out of their sight. Another early childhood memory is the few rare visits we made to friends and relatives in Magdalena, Mexico and the always happening fiesta-concerts in the central village plaza. Man, these were some heavy-duty hard-core partying peoples. The orchestral-like mariachis and vocalists, the odor of various meats skewered and rotating over a fire pit, these sounds and smoke wafting through the night air I will never forget.

Family moved to California's San Gabriel Valley at age 10. We moved around alot the first year and lived in East L.A. (for a few weeks), then on to Bassett, El Monte, Irwindale and finally settled down in Covina. Also at this age, I got seriously into music thanks to the beautiful Velasco sisters of Tucson (rock and roll) and the Martinez family of Bassett (r&b, jazz).

I started playing drums at age 12 (thanks mainly to Ringo Starr). Shortly after was my first concert-like experience attending one of those renown dance happenings at the legendary El Monte Legion Stadium (which would soon be immortalized in song penned by a young Frank Zappa) where the headliners were Thee Midniters, a local Chicano one-hit-wonder ('Whittier Blvd') outfit with instrumentation that preceded by some years Chicago and Blood Sweat & Tears.

In the '60's formed first band at age 14 with two school friends and played neighborhood schools and church dances. I have been playing in different local bands ever since. Also played while in military at service clubs and rec centers. Music style : all eras of rock with a few r&b and soul tunes scattered thru-out. Major influences : Carmine Appice(numero uno!)/Dino Danelli - Gene Krupa/Louie Bellson/Buddy Rich - Mitch Mitchell/Ginger Baker and Ringo!

Trivia-V1.0 : Back in the 70's a bandmate worked as a guitar tech for a local company that made a guitar called Charvelle or something (maybe that was the name of the company, what did I know - I'm a drummer) asked me to design a circuit board that mounted onto one of the guitar's control knobs. It was a tiny circuit with less that a handfull of components. He provided me the schematic and told me it was a custom job for a dude I never heard of named Eddie Van Halen. Weird, as I do recall attending a massive house party in Pasadena where a band named Mammoth played. Small world!

I became 'experienced' with the release of 'Are You Experienced?' in 1967.

I saw Hendrix in concert at LA Forum1969-Newport1969Friday-Newport1969Sunday-LA Forum1970-SwingAud.1970.

My first car was a custom 1956 Chevrolet Nomad, in lowrider motif. Great for weekend cruising of Whittier Blvd and Colorado Blvd on New Year's eve. My first 'brand new' car was a 1970 Dodge Challenger R/T, no - not w/Hemi (I wish), it had the 440 Magnum w/Six-Pack. This one got me plenty of speeding & 'exhibition of speed' tickets. Got it up to 145 mph (150 max. on meter guage/don't recall the tach. read) on the I-15 leaving Las Vegas (just married) to L.A. for about one and a half minutes. This run terminated with a ticket from the CHP near Baker, CA. Other vehicles I've owned - 64 Buick Riviera, 1986 Z28, 1990 Blazer K, went thru a Harley phase in the mid-90's and currently drive a late model Silverado. I am saving my pennies for another Harley.

After high school I did 3 years-7 months in the U.S. Air Force (thanks to the winding down of the Viet Nam war and President Nixon's early-out program the remaining 5 months were 'inactive reserves'). Post-boot camp and tech. school I received an overseas assignment, so quickly married sweetheart and took new bride with me for a 2 year tour-of-duty/honeymoon in Europe. My Lady and I traveled/holidayed extensively thru-out the continent and attended a great many most awesome concerts. Upon return to USA daughter-son-daughter followed shortly after. These have provided us with 3 grandsons and 2 granddaughters.

Professional post-military/college occupational history for the following 35 years in electronics engineering with California Institute of Technology at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Pasadena), Hughes Aircraft Co./Raytheon (Space & Communications Division-El Segundo), Hewlett-Packard (Santa Rosa/Cupertino/Santa Clara) and Northrop-Grumman (San Diego). Started as design draftsman, by late 70's my tools-of-the-trade (drafting machine & table, shape templates, mechanical pens & pencils, etc.) were obsolete, transitioned to high-end workstations/computers and driving CAD-CAE software for design of printed circuits onboard planetary spacecraft (Magellan, Mars Observer & Pathfinder, Galileo, Cassini @ JPL), government earth-orbit recon satellite (@ Hughes) & military (F-22, F-35 @ N-G) avionics systems as well as scientific test & measurement equipment (@ HP).

Trivia-V1.1 :
Father's birthdate -September 18
Father military - 101st Airborne, U.S. Army WWII (an original 'Bastards of Bastogne')
Mother-In-Law passed into next world - September 18
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Location:

Lake Los Angeles, California

Interests:

Music-art-weight training-playing baseball,chess-attend Winternationals & airshows@Miramar & Edwards

Occupation:

Early retirement enables me & GrandMama to care for g-kids & travel up/down the west coast.