On March 15th, 1992 Ben Harper and Tom Freund recorded an album entitled Pleasure And Pain (Cardas Records, 12" vinyl, limited edition of 1500 copies).


Tom Freund
Interview by Emmanuel Rivet / swer.net - 2000

"I'm living in Los Angeles now, I have been in New-York or Austin, Texas the rest of the time."

"Pleasure And Pain was an intense time. Ben and I really connected on a lot of levels. Sound and healing, tapping into the sounds around us.
We had a cool duo and band which consisted of Rosanne Lindley (David's daughter) and John McKnight who played on Ben's first record. We met in the college town of Claremont, CA. A mutual friend introduced us — Alleghaney Meadows, a ceramic artist, said we must meet eachother and play together. We had a powerful jam the first night at The Folk Music Center that Ben's grandparents owned and Ben worked selling and fixing guitars. Cool as shit store with all sorts of world instruments on the walls and 'spirits' in the air."

"Taj Mahal was playing on the (Pitzer) college campus in Claremont. The college department selected me to play for his reception after the show. So I asked Ben and our drummer friend Mark Eckhardt to join me. We played our set and then Taj Mahal came up and played with us. He grabbed my upright bass and sang while Ben and I played guitar and lap steel. The place got very hot. Ben and I were obviously "tripping out" to be playing with one of our heroes. The next day we hung out at the music store and played a little more and Taj asked Ben to play lap steel on his upcoming Hawaiin tour. The rest is history. C'est la vie."

Note 1 : "Click Yo' Heels (Pleasure And Pain) is a song I wrote that had to do with me and my gal finding a way to see eachother even if we lived far apart or we were both busy. References to les chats avec "9 lives" and of course Dorothy — from The Wizard Of Oz — finding her way back home. All the rest is good fun. Ben played a mean fuckin' slide on this song. Very careful not to crowd — we played it a lot live and for people in back of the music store."

Note 2 : "The intro and interlude from How Many Miles Must We March (Welcome To The Cruel World) is from a song of mine called Babysitter (I'll Watch Them)."

Tom Freund
Interview by Emmanuel Rivet / swer.net - 2004

swer.net : Why did you choose to study at the Claremont College (after graduating from Music & Art High School, New-York) ?
Tom Freund : To get as far from New-York and my family as I could at the time, but close to the music scene in Los Angeles.

swer.net : What was the name of the band formed by Rosanne Lindley, John McKnight, Ben Harper and yourself ?
Tom Freund : Ben and I named it Upon Time cause it said that on the back of a beer bottle that we were drinking at our favorite watering hole called the High Brow.

swer.net : What about a band called Tom and Ben's band ?
Tom Freund : Well, it was both our names but we used Upon Time when we played in Los Angeles at the Roxy and the Whiskey.

swer.net : Do you remember which songs you were playing at the time ?
Tom Freund : We did Pay The Man, Pleasure And Pain, You Should Have Come To Me and a couple of blues tunes like Dust My Broom. And I sang Angel From Montgomery and Talk To Your Daughter also Forever.

swer.net : What is the story behind your song You should Have Come To me (Pleasure And Pain) ?
Tom Freund : It was about a girl I dated in High School, an actress in American movies, and she tattled on me and her to her friend who I was really in love with.

swer.net : You opened shows for Ben on December 28 & 29, 1999 at Wheeler Opera House, Aspen, Colorado. How was it like ?
Tom Freund : Great crowd, great sound, I was hoping Ben and I would play a couple together but we did'nt. It was moving we had'nt seen eachother in a long time.

swer.net : You played at the Folk Music Center on November 11th, 2001...
Tom Freund : A lot of memories, we used to Jam there after hours 5 nights a week. Just pull a guitar off the wall, and play, writing songs and such and chasing girls, you know usual stuff.

Ben Harper and Tom Freund live
— source : www.benharper.net

• December 28/29, 1999 |  Tom Freund opened shows for Ben Harper at the Wheeler Opera House, Aspen, Colorado.

• May 15, 2005, Berkeley Community Theater, Berkeley, California | Ben made a surprise appearance at Wavy Gravy's 69th Birthday benefit for Seva and played a 30-min acoustic set. Tom Freund sat in on Pleasure and Pain on round neck acoustic guitar and sang backing vocals.

• May 22, 2005, Bridges Hall of Music, Claremont, California | BHIC played a rare acoustic set for a sold out crowd of 600 people to culminate the Claremont Folk Festival. Ben opened the show with Pleasure And Pain with help from Tom Freund on round neck acoustic guitar and backing vocals.

• June 9/10, 2005 - Temple Bar, Santa Monica, CA | Tom Freund sat in with Ben on Pleasure And Pain for two sold-out shows at L.A.'s Temple Bar.

• July/August 2005 | Tom Freund opened shows for Ben Harper (21 concerts). He sat in with Ben on Pleasure and Pain every night. He also played double bass on Beloved One a couple of times (07/30/05 - Orange Peel, Asheville, NC - 07/31/05 - House of Blues, North Myrtle Beach, SC - 08/01/05 - Tabernacle, Atlanta, GA 08/02/05 - Ryman Auditorium, Nashville, TN).
Ben sat in with Tom during his set on Copper Moon for the following shows : 07/23/05 - Kool Haus, Toronto, ON - 07/25/05 - 9:30 Club, Washington, D.C. - 07/26/05 - Avalon Ballroom, Boston, MA - 07/27/05 - Irving Plaza, New York City, NY - 07/31/05 - House of Blues, North Myrtle Beach, SC - 08/01/05 - Tabernacle, Atlanta, GA.

Copper Moon
2004 - Surf Road Records
01. Copper Moon 02. Mercury 03. Run Like That 04. C’est La Vie 05. Leavin’ Town 06. October Girl 07. Babysitter (I’ll Watch Them) 08. I Don’t Wanna Wait 09. Comfortable In Your Arms 10. Married To Laughter 11. New Moon Of The 7th Sun

Sympatico
2001 - Surf Road Records
01. Old and in the Way 02. Bombshell 03. Sympatico 04. Know What You're Thinking 05. Francie 06. Wake Up Call 07. Amiable 08. 21st of July 09. Do You Do 10. Seat on This Train.

L.A. Fundamentalist Music
2000 - Surf Road Records
01. Lady Jane (live with orchestra) - 02. Dindi MP3 - 03. Sympatico - 04. Trondheim - 05. No Turning Back.

North American Long Weekend
1998 - Red Ant
01. Digs 02. 27 03. Trondheim 04. Lady Jane 05. More Than Necessary 06. Business of Knowing 07. Holden Caulfield 08. No Turning Back 09. Great Authority 10. Synagogue 11. North American Long Weekend 12. Beautiful Sadness 13. Cry Baby Cry 14. Business of Knowing (Revisited)