So being a crew member means you're a team player. Anthony Joseph A.J. Santella is that guy for RatDog. He hasn't missed a gig since 1996. He's filled in at various jobs onstage as the need and occasion dictated. As you sit in the audience, he's off to the left side of the stage, probably not visible, where Bobby's guitars stand racked. A.J.'s Bobby's guitar tech, but in a close, cohesive group like RatDog, he's what the situtation calls for.
A.J. grew up in New Jersey in what he thought of as a regular American family. He recalls his first musical memory as the time he broke his father's acoustic guitar over his big brother's head, and you can't much more regular than that. In his high school years the family moved to Arizona, and fairly soon thereafter he fell in with low company - a drummer.
All his new friends seemed to have an instrument of one sort or another, and so he bought a small p.a. and joined the band as vocalist. They rehearsed in a room so small - how small was it, A.J.? -It was so small I had to stand outside to sing.You also have to understand that A.J. is one of the funnier guys in RatDog -but he wasn't joking about the small part; the room really was so small that the microphone caused feedback if it was inside. They were called The Loop and played Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, and a particularly bad version of Welcome to the Jungle, he says.
He attended the local community college and knocked down a 4.0 in scuba diving. “ I decided to quit while I was ahead“ and put his energy into the band, which had added a Dead Head guitarist and some blues songs and become Gypsy Circus. Eventually we'd come 80% across the country to Phoenix, so we figured to complete the trip. Gypsy Circus moved to San Diego and settled into the club circuit. They bought a funky old school bus, kind of ahome made RV, which led to replacing the engine four different times on the side of the road. A.J. really knows something about the road.
They wound up in San Francisco and, as almost all bands must, eventually fell apart. A.J. became a carpenter in Marin County, and also spent a year as a tender on an abalone boat out of Mendocino.
And then one day in 1996 Gypsy Circus's rhythm guitarist, who'd gone to work for Mickey Hart as a sound tech, told A.J. about Bob Weir's relatively new band Ratdog, which was gigging at the Sweetwater, in Mill Valley, and needed somebody to drive the truck. There was a minor glitch/panic attack when he discovered his license had expired, but he got that fixed and hit the road. Being the kind of guy he is, in addition to driving the truck he helped, setting up drums and then keyboards. The lineup changed, both for the band and crew; A.J. stayed.
Robin became the last piece of the puzzle in the band, and what A.J. called this big dysfunctional family of mostly men had fully come together. This is our hunt. We got out every couple of months and have our say. I love the m.o. of the band. The guys are all real with each other. As a brother you can say anything to anybody. I'm a lowly roadie, but I can talk to Weir like I talk to you. There's no clear division between band and crew; we're a team, offense and defense. Bob's the captain, and he makes us want to come back and do it again.
He's watched Bone Heads get younger and younger. A lot of people have been turned on that might not have been alive for G.D. or even the beginning of the Dog, and that's a major satisfaction.
And when the band gets an off-day and the crew actually gets hotel rooms, A.J. doesn't leave his bed, right?
Uh, no, that'd be A.J. hoisting the golf bags along with Jeff Chimenti and band bus driver Donny Silva. 8 a.m. after a six hour bus ride, and they're off for 36 holes of fun and refreshment before going back to where they belong - the next show.
