Who I IS

Tommy Foster started listening to music as a young child. To make ends meet financially for his family, he took up a job as an elevator lift operator. The hours on end of menial labor, smiling, and pressing buttons served to open his mind and allow sanitized remakes of easy listening adult contemporary hit singles to embed themselves into the very essence of his soul. He would come home every evening after his 16 hour shifts and tune into far away lands with exotic music on his AM radio. Here were the less sanitized musical works that gave him inspiration. Frank Zappa, Black Sabbath, Dr. Demento, WGN Chicago’s Animal Stories, and all sorts of other musical and comedic dimensions were delivered magically to his tender ears.

This experience in his early youth is what gives him his panache today in a variety of musical markets. By strategically deconstructing familiar pop songs and reassembling them into meaningless montages or seemingly endless medleys, he does what everyone else in this recycled cover band pop market does, but without the absolute predictability that forces the dumbing down en masse of any audience, listening or not. In addition, he maintains a continually growing list of original material that force their way out of his need to feel artistic.

Quotes from audience members:

“ Can you sing happy birthday to Amanda? She’s 21 and we would love it if you could.”

“Will you come play at my pig roast? I can’t pay you, but you can drink all the keg beer you want. We’re going to burn all of our old furniture, so if you’ve got any old couches or recliners, bring em.”

“ Remember me? You told me that you would learn Brown Eyed Girl ( or Mustang Sally or American Pie or Margaritaville or Freebird or whatever) and now I want to hear it, or I’ll never come and see you again.”