Trifecta
Thursday, 12 May 2005
BenWahBob played their first Fairmount Park gig of the year. Originally known as the Budweiser “Parties at the Park” series, they added Thursdays last year and called them Michelob “Ultra Thursdays.” Free buffet, dollar bottles, and horse racing...how much more fun does one need? There was an outstanding turnout this year. Last year was a bit slow on Thursday nights, probably because people hadn’t yet caught on to it. Apparently the word is out this year, because we had around 600 people there this night. That’s about twice as many as we saw last year, but less than half what we would see on a typical Friday night. Needless to say, it’s a pretty fun gig. The event is sponsored by Anheuser-Busch, so the pay is pretty good, too.
The scheduling is a bit unusual, though. We play for an hour before the first race, and then play in between the races. The track runs ads that say, “Every 19 minutes the place goes crazy!” The scoop with us is more like, “Every 19 minutes the band stops playing!” It’s hard to get a flow going with such short sets, but everyone is having such a good time that they hardly notice. Besides, they’re there to bet on horses. We are a side attraction.
Rick, former front man for Ivory Tiger, and his lovely wife Tracy stopped by and talked for awhile, as did several other familiar faces along with many new ones. One table directly in front of the stage was occupied by a bunch of young ladies who had just graduated from nursing school, and they were really wound up. I was sorry to see them leave, as they were most of the excitement of the party. We wrapped up the night in typical BWB fashion with Black Sabbath’s War Pigs, allowing Carlos to really stretch out at the end of the night. He always wails on that solo.
I packed up my bass and small combo amp, rolled it out the door, and began my grueling 10-minute trek home. I opted for an Arcangelo Corelli string concerto CD to accompany me on my journey. I was in bed before midnight. Sweet.
Friday, 13 May 2005
Club 501 in Wood River, IL was the scene of the next act of musical mutilation. This night it was with Knucklehead. One of the problems with playing in two bands is booking conflicts. KH had this gig booked before the Fairmount gigs were confirmed for BenWahBob. Although I had told them that the premium gigs with BWB would have to take priority (I was in BWB first), I had to do this Friday night with Knucklehead because it is a PA gig. Without my PA, there’s not a gig. So, Mike Hirsch from St. Louis Music was kind enough to fill in for me with BWB for the Friday night half of that gig.
I got home from work that evening, made a quick trip to the bank, ate a quick meal, loaded the van, and arrived at the club around 19:45. Deron had called me on the way there to remind me that I was suppose to be bringing new tubes for his amp. He’s been having some trouble lately with the tone, so I dug up a set of tubes I had stashed for it when I built it. Unfortunately, it would have to wait until the next night, as I had completely forgotten about them. (Have I mentioned how much I hate Friday gigs?) Despite running a little later than I had hoped, we were set up and ready to go on time. Steve strolled in right on queue – five minutes before we started.
The place was pretty much dead most of the night. I tried not to remind myself that I had willingly traded a better paying gig playing for 1500 people, many of them beautiful women, for this. But, so it goes at this place. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes not. We had a good time entertaining ourselves, though. Towards the end of the night when things started to pick up a bit, we were fully engulfed in ourselves. One highlight for me was when our already entertaining version of Metallica’s Enter Sandman made its turn to Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch. This is usually entertaining enough on its own. For whatever reason, I decided to get a little funky at the end with some slap-and-pop bass lines. As if somehow expecting it, Deron started right in with the guitar melody from Stanley Clarke’s School Days. Amazingly, it all fit together quite well. So, off we went for a little jazz exploration. We got somewhere near the end of the bass solo when Scrappy, who doesn’t know the song at all, decided that was about enough of that and drew it to a close. We even ended the night with Fly By Night by Rush. Very cool indeed.
Saturday, 14 May 2005
I showed up early enough to re-tube Deron’s amp and still have enough time to eat before we played. I had fallen with a thud off of the Atkins wagon on Thursday night at Fairmount Park. I should have used the same reasoning this week that kept me from starting it the week before – too much temptation and opportunity to eat poorly while playing three nights in a row. I was just finishing up the tube swap and about to dive into a basket of loaded nachos, when my gorgeous girlfriend showed up in her official PJS Band Chick spaghetti top and a nice short skirt. Swwweeeeet. I still don’t know what she’s doing with me, but I’m not going to complain. She distracted me while I was trying to eat my nachos, and I barely finished before it was time to start. One problem, though...no Deron. He’s usually not late. Scrappy and I speculated that he must have been riding with Steve. Steve strolled in at 21:25, but still no Deron. This was a first.
Deron rolled in a few minutes later. I never heard an explanation, nor did I ask. He puttered around with the amp a bit to test the new tubes. The tone had improved a bit, but it still wasn’t switching channels correctly. Something was definitely amiss electronically. He managed to deal with it through the evening, though.
At some point Howard, the manager, came up and asked for some Stevie Ray Vaughn. Howard loves the blues, especially SRV, and Deron was more than happy to oblige. We had played in a blues trio many years ago in which we did a Stevie Ray Vaughn tribute set. It was always a hit. So, Deron grabbed his beer for one last swill before launching into Texas Flood. Unfortunately, his tuners caught on the edge of the pitcher sitting on his computer table and launched it onto his foot pedal below. We all stood there looking at it with a mixture of disbelief and resolute acceptance. The LED indicators blinked a couple of times and went out – not good. He tried to drain the beer out of it, but it was done for the night. Being the professional that he is, he rose above it and finished the night anyway. The channel-switching foot switch shorted out as well, so he only had one sound with which to work.
It became obvious toward the end of the last set, at least to me anyway, that we had pretty much given up on this gig. No one was there all night, Deron kept looking at the clock like he wanted to be somewhere else, Steve was only singing most of the words to the songs, Scrappy kept dropping his drumsticks, and I was just tired. We finished with a big fizzle, packed our stuff, and left. Amazingly, I had my rig, the PA, and the lights torn down, and the van was packed in less than 45 minutes after we had finished. It’s likely that the knowledge of Dawna waiting for me at my house was instrumental in motivating me. I couldn’t think of a better reason to hurry. As Scrappy and I said our parting words outside on the sidewalk, one of the bouncers walked up with the Knucklehead banner in his hands...nearly left behind again.
Next Friday night is Knucklehead at Mac & Mick’s in Granite City, IL. At least that should be a shorter blog.
BenWahBob played their first Fairmount Park gig of the year. Originally known as the Budweiser “Parties at the Park” series, they added Thursdays last year and called them Michelob “Ultra Thursdays.” Free buffet, dollar bottles, and horse racing...how much more fun does one need? There was an outstanding turnout this year. Last year was a bit slow on Thursday nights, probably because people hadn’t yet caught on to it. Apparently the word is out this year, because we had around 600 people there this night. That’s about twice as many as we saw last year, but less than half what we would see on a typical Friday night. Needless to say, it’s a pretty fun gig. The event is sponsored by Anheuser-Busch, so the pay is pretty good, too.
The scheduling is a bit unusual, though. We play for an hour before the first race, and then play in between the races. The track runs ads that say, “Every 19 minutes the place goes crazy!” The scoop with us is more like, “Every 19 minutes the band stops playing!” It’s hard to get a flow going with such short sets, but everyone is having such a good time that they hardly notice. Besides, they’re there to bet on horses. We are a side attraction.
Rick, former front man for Ivory Tiger, and his lovely wife Tracy stopped by and talked for awhile, as did several other familiar faces along with many new ones. One table directly in front of the stage was occupied by a bunch of young ladies who had just graduated from nursing school, and they were really wound up. I was sorry to see them leave, as they were most of the excitement of the party. We wrapped up the night in typical BWB fashion with Black Sabbath’s War Pigs, allowing Carlos to really stretch out at the end of the night. He always wails on that solo.
I packed up my bass and small combo amp, rolled it out the door, and began my grueling 10-minute trek home. I opted for an Arcangelo Corelli string concerto CD to accompany me on my journey. I was in bed before midnight. Sweet.
Friday, 13 May 2005
Club 501 in Wood River, IL was the scene of the next act of musical mutilation. This night it was with Knucklehead. One of the problems with playing in two bands is booking conflicts. KH had this gig booked before the Fairmount gigs were confirmed for BenWahBob. Although I had told them that the premium gigs with BWB would have to take priority (I was in BWB first), I had to do this Friday night with Knucklehead because it is a PA gig. Without my PA, there’s not a gig. So, Mike Hirsch from St. Louis Music was kind enough to fill in for me with BWB for the Friday night half of that gig.
I got home from work that evening, made a quick trip to the bank, ate a quick meal, loaded the van, and arrived at the club around 19:45. Deron had called me on the way there to remind me that I was suppose to be bringing new tubes for his amp. He’s been having some trouble lately with the tone, so I dug up a set of tubes I had stashed for it when I built it. Unfortunately, it would have to wait until the next night, as I had completely forgotten about them. (Have I mentioned how much I hate Friday gigs?) Despite running a little later than I had hoped, we were set up and ready to go on time. Steve strolled in right on queue – five minutes before we started.
The place was pretty much dead most of the night. I tried not to remind myself that I had willingly traded a better paying gig playing for 1500 people, many of them beautiful women, for this. But, so it goes at this place. Sometimes it’s good, sometimes not. We had a good time entertaining ourselves, though. Towards the end of the night when things started to pick up a bit, we were fully engulfed in ourselves. One highlight for me was when our already entertaining version of Metallica’s Enter Sandman made its turn to Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch. This is usually entertaining enough on its own. For whatever reason, I decided to get a little funky at the end with some slap-and-pop bass lines. As if somehow expecting it, Deron started right in with the guitar melody from Stanley Clarke’s School Days. Amazingly, it all fit together quite well. So, off we went for a little jazz exploration. We got somewhere near the end of the bass solo when Scrappy, who doesn’t know the song at all, decided that was about enough of that and drew it to a close. We even ended the night with Fly By Night by Rush. Very cool indeed.
Saturday, 14 May 2005
I showed up early enough to re-tube Deron’s amp and still have enough time to eat before we played. I had fallen with a thud off of the Atkins wagon on Thursday night at Fairmount Park. I should have used the same reasoning this week that kept me from starting it the week before – too much temptation and opportunity to eat poorly while playing three nights in a row. I was just finishing up the tube swap and about to dive into a basket of loaded nachos, when my gorgeous girlfriend showed up in her official PJS Band Chick spaghetti top and a nice short skirt. Swwweeeeet. I still don’t know what she’s doing with me, but I’m not going to complain. She distracted me while I was trying to eat my nachos, and I barely finished before it was time to start. One problem, though...no Deron. He’s usually not late. Scrappy and I speculated that he must have been riding with Steve. Steve strolled in at 21:25, but still no Deron. This was a first.
Deron rolled in a few minutes later. I never heard an explanation, nor did I ask. He puttered around with the amp a bit to test the new tubes. The tone had improved a bit, but it still wasn’t switching channels correctly. Something was definitely amiss electronically. He managed to deal with it through the evening, though.
At some point Howard, the manager, came up and asked for some Stevie Ray Vaughn. Howard loves the blues, especially SRV, and Deron was more than happy to oblige. We had played in a blues trio many years ago in which we did a Stevie Ray Vaughn tribute set. It was always a hit. So, Deron grabbed his beer for one last swill before launching into Texas Flood. Unfortunately, his tuners caught on the edge of the pitcher sitting on his computer table and launched it onto his foot pedal below. We all stood there looking at it with a mixture of disbelief and resolute acceptance. The LED indicators blinked a couple of times and went out – not good. He tried to drain the beer out of it, but it was done for the night. Being the professional that he is, he rose above it and finished the night anyway. The channel-switching foot switch shorted out as well, so he only had one sound with which to work.
It became obvious toward the end of the last set, at least to me anyway, that we had pretty much given up on this gig. No one was there all night, Deron kept looking at the clock like he wanted to be somewhere else, Steve was only singing most of the words to the songs, Scrappy kept dropping his drumsticks, and I was just tired. We finished with a big fizzle, packed our stuff, and left. Amazingly, I had my rig, the PA, and the lights torn down, and the van was packed in less than 45 minutes after we had finished. It’s likely that the knowledge of Dawna waiting for me at my house was instrumental in motivating me. I couldn’t think of a better reason to hurry. As Scrappy and I said our parting words outside on the sidewalk, one of the bouncers walked up with the Knucklehead banner in his hands...nearly left behind again.
Next Friday night is Knucklehead at Mac & Mick’s in Granite City, IL. At least that should be a shorter blog.
posted by Paul J. Smith | 09:29
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