Jimmy Foot's first solo album

       After the RHYTH-O-MATICS last show in 1988,  SUSIE and I produced an album for a Humboldt county reggae band ROD DEAL & THE I-DEALS. TERRY BECKER engineered the album, recorded in Studio "D" at HYDE STREET STUDIOS. This is the same room that was formerly WALLY HEIDER's STUDIO "D". SUSIE FOOT was managing the studio complex at the time, so did not have the time to engineer but worked as my co-producer and she found Terry. 

       TERRY BECKER went on to engineer my Rhythm Addict album with 17 of my songs, and also co-produced by Susie. These were put together on most likely the longest cd ever made; 83 minutes!

       Basic tracks were recorded at HYDE STREET STUDIO's STUDIO "D", with ROBIN SYLVESTER on bass and JIMMY SAGE on drums,  and myself on guitar. I was lucky enough to be joined by a number of Bay Area heavyweights; veteran blues harpist CHARLIE MUSSELWHITE, The Diva herself LINDA IMPERIAL, DAVID FREIBERG from Starship and Quicksilver Messenger Service, GEORGE T. GREGORY from The James Cotton Band, keyboardist and 2nd engineer TOM DOTY, JONI HAASTRUP from Mono Mono and Ginger Baker's Air Force, RUDY ORTIZ from The Rhyth-O-Matics, and singers SUSAN SHY and MICHAEL WARD.

     I named the album Rhythm Addict for a few reasons; That was the name I had originally come up with for The Rhyth-O-Matics before it was altered in committee, three of the songs were from what would have been The Rhyth-O-Matics' next album (Unite, Seize The Time, Afroskalypso), and at the time I was a monster rhythm guitar player and playing gigs with 2 African bands; HEDZOLEH SOUNDZ and JONI HAASTRUP, and the guitar style on this album is very rhythmic and rhythm is addictive.    

  Originally, I was not going to be the singer on Rhythm Addict. There was a singer named Bob (I'll leave out his last name) who was really good, and had "the right" voice that I wanted. He was a former drug addict, and had been clean for a number of years. After we had laid down a number of  the tracks, I found out that he had relapsed under the pressure and would not be available. Terry talked me into singing most of the songs myself. The instrumental tracks on this album are really great, and I am very happy with my production and my guitar work, but because many of the tracks that Bob was supposed to sing were in the wrong key for me, I'm a little disappointed with most of my vocals. I have all of the Rhythm Addict mixes saved sans vocal. I'd love to have a good singer come in and re-sing some of the songs someday. I consider the album a good record of my songwriting and arranging and it was great doing a second album with Terry. TOM FLYE also did some engineering on the 3 ROM tracks. TOM DOTY was an amazing second engineer as well as great keyboard player.

I also want to note the contributions from my old Magic Mind bandmate RICK MILLER playing a funk line on "Wonder What You're Doin' Tonight". I had originally written the music with Rick's lyrics, but replaced them as they were about him and his ex and a little bitter. I also wrote a new set of lyrics to one of Rick's songs, "Is There Nothin'" as I was invested in the arrangement, but wanted a softer tone for the album. "Seize The Time" was originally written and sung by RUDY ORTIZ, and I altered some of the lyrics for my version.

       In 1991, cds were a new platform. There were no CD-Rs and no short runs. Minimum order was 1,000, there were some huge mistakes in the artwork our artist had sent them (French misspelled, spine text upside down compared to everything else on the market), the album was 81 minutes long and cd limit was 74 minutes at the time.